Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Good morning, I'm Alice Dempster. And I'm Larissa Huntington. It's Friday the 24th of April. In your Squiz today, shoring up our fuel supply, pushback on the government's NDIS overhaul, valet James Valentine and commemorating Anzac Day. This is your Squiz today. Larissa, we're still waiting on whether peace talks get back on track in the Middle East.
And with a long weekend coming up for Aussies in New South Wales, ACT and Western Australia, there's been a tension again on our petrol prices. The federal government's spoken out about its plans to shore up our fuel supply.
And the latest on that is that after a meeting of National Cabinet yesterday, PM Anthony Albanese has confirmed that we're going to stay on level two of our fuel security plan. But he also flagged that the government's working on contingencies. He said that's because the longer that the war goes on, the more significant the implications for Australia will be. There is some good news though.
If you drive, you might have noticed that petrol prices have dropped a little bit. The NRMA says that the wholesale price for diesel has fallen by a dollar per litre and unleaded by 70 cents over the past couple of weeks. And they're now flowing through to prices at the Bowser. And on top of that, our national petrol reserves have risen from 36 days to 46 days since the start of the war.
So we've got an extra 10 days in the coffers there. So all that considered, Albanese said that a move to level three isn't on the cards right now.
But if you're wondering if or when that might change, he says that we'll know four to six weeks ahead of any big drop in our supply. And what we do know is that we're now buying more from the US and further afield. Places like Argentina and Algeria are in the mix. And we are also exporting lots of gas. But Albanese's ruled out raising taxes on our big gas companies.
Yeah, there'd been calls to tax them more in recent weeks, but he said that they already pay around $22 billion a year, and they rely pretty heavily on investors from North America and Japan. And some say that a tax hike would spook those investors, and the PM seems to agree with that. He says that without those investor dollars, it'd be much harder for our gas to be extracted in the first place.
So while gas company taxes aren't looking likely, new reports say that the government has been scoping around for other ways to make our supply resilient. And they've been sounding out energy companies earlier this month about developing a third oil refinery in Australia.
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Chapter 2: What measures is the government taking to secure our fuel supply?
Mark Butler's been in the spotlight this week. As Andrew and I have spoken about, our Federal Health Minister unveiled some huge changes to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, or the NDIS, on Wednesday, and he's coming under fire from the Greens and some disability advocates for the proposals.
because his plan, if it passes in Parliament, would radically cut funding for the NDIS, with hundreds of thousands of people impacted. And of particular concern to participants and carers are cuts to social and community activities, which help to get disabled people out and about.
And some squizzers wrote to us about this yesterday to explain that things like cooking classes might actually mean going with a carer to learn how to make toast without burning themselves. And they say it's really important for their independence and their self-esteem. But Butler says that the government's making these hard calls to ensure the scheme's longevity.
He did, however, acknowledge that some people were uneasy about the changes.
People with Disability Australia's acting CEO Megan Spindler-Smith says that's because many participants were caught off guard by the scale of the changes that were announced. She said people are very anxious, especially those that could be part of the group cut from the scheme. In response, Butler says changes will be finalised with the disability community. A message now from NIB Insurance.
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If you've caught any news headlines over the past day, you'll know that the long-time ABC radio presenter and musician James Valentine has died. His family shared that news yesterday morning.
He was 64 years old and he died by voluntary assisted dying. And if you're a listener of ABC Sydney's 702 or Valentine's National Afternoon Show, you'll also know that he was being treated for cancer over the past two years and that he called time on his 25-year radio career just a couple of months ago in February. He had a lot of fans, me included.
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