Australia news live: Marles says Labor ‘utterly committed’ to Brereton response but can’t say when work will be completed

Follow today’s news liveLabor announces $50bn boost to defence spending as it flags non-citizens may serve in ADFGet our morning and afternoon news emails, free app or daily news podcastUnemployment ‘might take up a little bit’ when new numbers released later this weekQ: Given the economic conditions we’re seeing, what should households with mortgages expect?[Inflation] won’t necessarily continue to come off in a perfectly straight line, but [it] is a fraction of what it was a couple of years ago when we came to office. That’s a good thing.So we’ve got a whole bunch of things going for us in Australia, but enough to concern us as well about the global conditions about the way that people are still under considerable cost of living pressure.The way that I would describe it to your listeners is we’ve got inflation lingering in parts of the world, we’ve got growth slowing in China and elsewhere, we’ve got tensions rising in the Middle East and the war in Europe. We’ve got supply chains which are straining and we’ve got a global economy which is fragmenting and transforming and so all of these factors are really important to us as we finalise the government’s third budget.These are going to be these global conditions are going to be a really big influence on our budget, so the trip to DC which will be a pretty quick and make the most of it but it’s a good opportunity to take the temperature of the global economy. Continue reading...