ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: I'm here for the opening of the Griffith Regional Sports Centre and I'm joined by the mayor Doug Curran, the local member, Helen Dalton and Wes Fang representing the New South Wales Government from the New South Wales Legislative Council. This is a fantastic facility and congratulations to all of the local community who have campaigned and funded this over 20 years. This is a project that was first envisaged way back in 2002. And what it shows is that if a local community has vision, if it puts in the effort, and it has good leadership from volunteers and community activists, then you can achieve a world class facility like we have here, with basketball, netball, athletics, hockey, a range of sports across the board, as well as a 50 metre Olympic swimming pool. In 2032, in 10 years' time, Brisbane will be hosting the Olympics. And that is an opportunity for the young sporting stars of today who have that ambition to represent Australia in their own country's Olympics in 10 years' time. I hope many of them come from regional Australia. This region itself has produced champions, including the great Evonne Goolagong Cawley, who of course won Grand Slam titles at Wimbledon, at the French Open, as well as the Australian Open. And this is a great tribute. I pay tribute to all the volunteers in the local community here who've produced this amazing facility that the locals are all celebrating today, with a ‘come and try’ day here. I had a go, with mixed results, it must be said, at basketball and netball. But I did score my first netball point ever this morning, so it's been a great day. Congratulations to all involved.
JOURNALIST: A group of women and children is expected to arrive back from Syria to Australia. Can you confirm if they've arrived and what processes they'll go through before they return to their families?
PRIME MINISTER: Well it's important that we follow national security advice and I'm doing that. National security advice is that it's not appropriate to be discussing those details. What I will say is that Australia will make sure of two things. One, that the Australian Government will always work to ensure that people are kept safe here in Australia, that is our priority. And secondly, that we'll follow the national security advice and we will undertake every action as a result of not just accepting that advice, but implementing that advice.
JOURNALIST: (Inaudible)
PRIME MINISTER: As I said yesterday at a similar press conference, the national security advice is that at this point in time it's not appropriate to comment on the details. There will be of course a statement at the appropriate time. But we're acting on that national security advice. And our first and only priority is to keep Australians safe.
JOURNALIST: A question regarding the tragic death of Cassius Turvey. Does that highlight the lack of safety for Aboriginal people?
PRIME MINISTER: Well this is a human tragedy. And our hearts go out to Cassius' family and his friends. This is a tragic circumstance and all Australians will be feeling for Cassius' family and his friends at this time. The appropriate investigations will occur. But this is something that shouldn't occur, ever. It certainly shouldn't have occurred in Australia in 2022.
JOURNALIST: (Inaudible)
PRIME MINISTER: Well we're working through the Murray-Darling Basin Plan as was agreed by all states and territories some years ago. We need to make sure that it's worked through and it's worked through cooperatively and I'm certain that we'll be able to do that.
JOURNALIST: We're in Griffith where flooding is currently being experienced, there's flooding across the state, particularly in this area. Will you consider extending your buyback scheme to other affected communities?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, this was an approach from the New South Wales Government, from Dominic Perrottet to us. And we sat down and worked through cooperatively with the New South Wales Government, the Northern Rivers scheme that is a direct result of the extraordinary impact of not just one flooding event but multiple flooding events, including the quite catastrophic events that we saw in February earlier this year. The Lismore community has been devastated. The New South Wales Government and the Australian Government have come up with an $800 million plan that includes buybacks, as well as money to lift homes in areas where that could make a difference, as well as money for refurbishing to protect against flooding events. We'll continue to work cooperatively with the New South Wales Government. These are issues that are above politics. I have visited the flood prone areas in Forbes and Parkes with Premier Perrottet, I visited regional Victoria with Premier Andrews and I have visited Tasmania as well and we've worked with Premier Rockliff. Australia is seeing more frequent and more extreme weather events. There is a direct result, not of every individual event, but overall changing weather patterns are no doubt what we are seeing with climate change. What the scientists told us would happen is happening. And that's why I'm very pleased that our Powering Australia plan to deal with climate change has been endorsed by the Business Council of Australia, by the Australian Industry Group, by the National Farmers’ Federation, by the Australian Council of Trade Unions. We need to act in the long term to deal with this. But we also need to deal with immediate issues. And that's what we've done, in partnership with the New South Wales Government, with the announcement that Premier Perrottet and I made yesterday.
JOURNALIST: Any possibility of that buyback scheme being extended (inaudible)?
PRIME MINISTER: This was a very specific scheme put forward by the New South Wales Government working with local government and it was a very positive announcement yesterday. We'll continue to work with state and territory governments on these issues. Thank you.