Tag Archives: oceania

Recall for popular baby toy over choking hazard

A potential choking hazard has triggered the recall of a baby toy sold at Target stores.

The Early Learning Centre (ELC) Little Senses Lights & Sounds Shape Sorter toy was the subject of a recall by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

Aimed a children aged from six to 36 months of age, it is sold online or in-store at Target.

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An urgent recall has been issued for a popular baby toy sold at Target.

The toy has a defect that may result in part of the toy, a red sorting cube with a clear top, breaking, the ACCC said.

The ball could present as a choking hazard for young children with the risk of severe injury or death.

The consumer watchdog urged customers to immediately remove and dispose of the red cube from the toy.

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Shoppers who have bought the product from Target should contact the company to request a replacement cube, which will be free of charge.

Orders for the replacement cube should be emailed to Target.

Sydney resident's novel solution to charge electric car

A Sydney resident has come up with a novel way to charge their electric car without a garage.

Photos show the electric car parked on a street in Manly with a lengthy extension cord snaking from the house onto the road before the electric car charger is plugged into a power bank beneath the boot of the vehicle.

The person has even added a cable cover on the footpath to protect the loose power cord.

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Electic car charging set up Manly, Sydney.Electic car charging set up Manly, Sydney.

Another video shows the extension cord wrapped around the fence when it's not in use.

Mark told Ben Fordham on 2GB the innovative charging set-up is simply a hazard.

"It's going to be a trip hazard as well as an electrical hazard to any hazard," he said.

"If someone trips over, do they sue the homeowner?

"Because their home and contents insurance probably has public liability cover but the insurance companies will say it's outside your house so we're not covering and the local council will say it's not our problem.

"It's going to be a lawyer's picnic."

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Electic car charging set up Manly, Sydney.https://omny.fm/shows/ben-fordham-full-show/bizarre-electric-car-charging-set-up-in-sydney-str/embed?style=cover

He also questioned what happens to the exposed power bank that can be seen on the ground when it rains.

The charging set up has sparked questions about how people without garages will charge electric cars, which more Aussies are being urged to invest in.

Mark said even though some councils are considering running the charging cables down power poles it's going to look like "spaghetti junction".

"It's going to be like the old poles 30 years ago when Optus were running pay TV cables all over the streets and people were up in arms about that. It looks terrible," he said.

Trapped teen cut out of mangled car in Sydney

Police are investigating whether speed was the cause of a crash that left five teenagers injured in Sydney's south west.

At about 6am, emergency services were called to Stoney Creek Road, Beverly Hills, after a Honda Accord had crashed into a pole.

Two passengers, both 16-year-old girls, were treated at the scene and taken to St George Hospital in stable conditions.

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Five teenagers injured in crash at Beverly Hills, Sydney's south west.

Another two passengers, a 15-year-old boy and a 16-year-old boy, were taken to Liverpool Hospital in stable conditions.

The 18-year-old man driving the car suffered minor injuries. He was taken to hospital for mandatory testing.

Fire and Rescue revealed that they had to use hydraulic tools to cut free one of the teens, who was trapped in the back seat.

Assistant Commissioner Brett McFadden said police are investigating whether speed was the cause of the crash.

McFadden added officers are investigating the status of the 18-year-old's licence.

"Early indications are the status is ambiguous at the moment," he said.

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Five teenagers injured after crashing in Beverly Hills in Sydney's south-west.

Locals were woken by the huge sound of the crash, some even felt the house shake.

"Dust came from the ceiling," one said.

"I heard a loud bang about 6am this morning, it woke me up, I had a peak out the window and saw the crash," another said.

"It was really confronting, not a good thing to see."

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Five teenagers injured after crashing in Beverly Hills in Sydney's south-west.

It comes just a week after the fatal crash near Wollongong where five teenagers were killed.

"We have a direct correlation with what happened just days ago at Buxton. We are most fortunate we didn't lose another five lives," McFadden said.

An investigation into the circumstances of the crash is underway.

RBA considers smaller rate hike as house prices tipped to fall

Australia's next interest rate hike could be halved from the usual trend of 50 basis points as property prices dip by at least 10 per cent, the governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia has hinted at in a recent speech.

Addressing a parliamentary standing committee on economics, Governor Philip Lowe said that while further hikes to the cash rate are "required", it will be necessary to slow the speed and size of those hikes.

He said while the RBA was not on a "pre-set path", it was committed to doing whatever was necessary to bring Australia's inflation rate back down to between two and three per cent.

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"I know that higher interest rates are unwelcome for many people, especially those who have borrowed large sums over recent times," Lowe told the committee. 

"Higher interest rates are putting pressure on households, just at the time that higher petrol prices and grocery bills are squeezing budgets. So it is a difficult and a concerning time for some people. 

"The alternative, though, of allowing higher inflation to become entrenched would be even more difficult and it would damage our economic prospects."

Australia's current inflation rate is 6.1 per cent, and the current cash rate target is 2.35 per cent, having been lifted by five consecutive hikes since May.

All bar one of those hikes was by 50 basis points – or 0.5 per cent. Only the first hike in May was 25 basis points.

"At some point, we will obviously not be increasing rates by 50 basis points at each meeting, and we're getting closer to that point," Lowe said.

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During questions Lowe said he anticipates Australia's red-hot property market to retreat by as much as 10 per cent as higher interest rates and inflation clamp down on the public's willingness to commit to large mortgages.

"House prices went up 25 per cent over the past two years. A very, very big increase," he said.

"It's not a forecast, but it would not surprise me if prices came down by a cumulative 10 per cent. 

"And even if they did, that is still up 15 per cent over three years."

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Lowe and the entirety of the RBA have been frequently criticised in recent months as leading house buyers into a false sense of security that interest rates would not rise until 2024.

He told the committee that he never made that promise – and any statement on the movement of the cash rate target was wholly dependent on the latest economic data.

"I am frequently reminded that many people interpreted our previous communication as a promise, or a commitment, that interest rates wouldn't rise until 2024," he said. 

"This was despite our statements on interest rates always being conditional on the state of the economy. This conditionality often got lost in the messaging. 

"We are currently working through the implications of this for our future approach to forward guidance and communication more generally."

Mass grave found near former Russian controlled city

Ukrainian authorities found a mass burial site near a recaptured northeastern city previously occupied by Russian forces, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.

"A mass grave of people was found in Izium in the Kharkiv region. The necessary procedures have already begun there. More information – clear, verifiable information – should be available tomorrow," Zelenskyy said on Thursday in his nightly televised address.

Associated Press journalists saw the site in a forest outside Izium on Thursday. Amid the trees were hundreds of graves with simple wooden crosses, most of them marked only with numbers. A larger grave bore a marker saying it contained the bodies of 17 Ukrainian soldiers.

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Ukrainian investigators were already at work examining the site with metal detectors for any hidden explosives.

Oleg Kotenko, an official with the Ukrainian ministry tasked with reintegrating occupied territories, said videos that Russian soldiers posted on social media indicated there were likely more than 17 bodies in the mass grave.

"We haven't counted them yet, but I think there are more than 25 or even 30," he said.

Izium resident Sergei Gorodko said that among the hundreds buried in individual graves were dozens of adults and children killed in a Russian airstrike on an apartment building. He said he pulled some of them out of the rubble "with my own hands."

In his address to the nation, Zelenskyy invoked the names of other Ukrainian cities where authorities said retreating Russian troops left behind mass civilian graves and evidence of possible war crimes.

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"Bucha, Mariupol, now, unfortunately, Izium. … Russia leaves death everywhere. And it must be held accountable for it. The world must bring Russia to real responsibility for this war," he said.

Sergei Bolvinov, a senior investigator for Ukrainian police in the eastern Kharkiv region, told British TV broadcaster Sky News that a pit contained more than 440 bodies was discovered near Izium after Kyiv's forces swept in.

He described the grave as "one of the largest burial sites in any one liberated city."

"We know that some (of the people buried in the pit) were shot, some died from artillery fire, from so called mine-explosion traumas.

"Some died from airstrikes. Also, we have information that a lot of bodies have not been identified yet" Bolvinov said.

Ukraine's deputy interior minister, Yevhen Enin, said Thursday night that other evidence found after Kyiv's sweeping advance into the Kharkiv region included multiple "torture chambers" where both Ukrainian citizens and foreigners were detained "in completely inhuman conditions."

"We have already come across the exhumation of individual bodies, not only with traces of a violent death, but also of torture – cut off ears, etc. This is just the beginning," Enin said in an interview with Ukraine's Radio NV.

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