Australian news and politics recap: May 22, 2025

Health Minister Mark Butler says Australia’s Medicare Urgent Care Clinics have marked a new 1.5 million-visit milestone.

The clinics are bulk-billed medical centres established to provide free, walk-in care for urgent but non-life-threatening conditions to ease pressure on hospital emergency departments.

Speaking at Adelaide’s Western Medicare Urgent Care Clinic on Thursday, Mr Butler said an interim report of the evaluation of the clinics had found that nearly half of all attending patients would have gone to a hospital ED if they weren’t available.

“In two short years, Medicare Urgent Care Clinics have become a vital part of Australia’s health system and clocked up 1.5 million free visits. By July next year, another 50 Urgent Care Clinics will open,” he said.

Ms McBain says climate change is having a big impact on natural disasters amid the NSW floods.

Speaking in the National Situation Room, Ms McBain said Australia was seeing more “devastating events”, “more frequently”.

“I don’t think that there is a question out there that climate change is having a significant impact on weather events right across the world. In Australia, here, we’re not immune to that,” she said.

“We’re seeing more devastating events like this happen more frequently. We came to Government in 2022 saying that we have to work more on disaster mitigation and resilience, which is why we put in place… the Disaster Ready Fund.”

Minister for Emergency Management Kristy McBain says the Federal Government has enacted the Disaster Recovery Allowance in response to the deadly NSW floods.

It comes after Commonwealth disaster recovery payments had been made available for 16 local government areas so far.

“Today I’ve enacted the Disaster Recovery Allowance to look initially at four Local Government Areas, Kempsey, Port Macquarie, Dungog and the Mid Coast Council area,” she said.

“That is to assist people who have been impacted with up to 13 weeks’ allowance in lieu of them being able to undertake their usual course of employment.”

Speaking with media in the Canberra-based National Situation Room, Minister McBain was asked how long the Commonwealth disaster recovery payments would be available for, saying: “We are working on that”.

Former Queensland Premier Anna Bligh, who led Queensland through the devastating 2011 floods, has told victims to seek support from their banks.

Speaking as the boss of the Australian Banking Association, Ms Bligh said: “I urge anyone who is facing financial stress as a result of this extreme weather event to reach out to their bank and discuss support options.”

“This doesn’t have to be today, it could be in the next few weeks or months as recovery efforts get underway.”

Minister for Emergency Management Kristy McBain has said a Prime Minister visit to the flood zones on NSW’s Mid North Coast is unlikely until the emergency response eases.

Speaking on breakfast TV on Thursday, Ms McBain said while the Federal Government had begun to roll out disaster recovery payments, they didn’t want to take resources away from the response.

“We don’t want to take any unnecessary resources away from local communities,” she said.

“But we are engaging directly with New South Wales. Both the Prime Minister and I spoke last night, and we’ve been speaking with our New South Wales counterparts.

“At the moment, in this response phase, we want to make sure that all of the resources are looking at where they need to, and that is directly at community. So, there’s no visit plan today.”

Anthony Albanese had said while leaving the National Press Club on Wednesday he was having “a couple days off” after returning from his first international trip.

“I’m going to have a couple of days off now and then… and then I’ll see you next week,” he told reporters as he exited the venue, where Labor’s campaign architect Paul Erickson had delivered the address.

Ironically, Mr Erickson had commended the PM’s hands-on response to the ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred at the start of the election, describing it as a key factor that helped shape the public’s perception of Mr Albanese as a decisive and responsive leader.

It’s been revealed NSW State Emergency Service personnel were in contact with a 63-year-old man before he died inside a home at Moto, north of Taree, on Wednesday afternoon.

SES Commissioner Michael Wassing told a press conference on Thursday: “I can’t go into the exact details. But SES had been in contact with that male and police obviously had turned up as soon as his body was discovered.”

He added, “I can’t pre-empt all these things but I understand that there may have been existing medical conditions.”

Commissioner Wassing said a coronial investigation will determine whether floodwaters played a role in the man’s death.

Minister for Emergency Management Kristy McBain is expected to speak later this morning in the National Situation Room about the ongoing flood risk on NSW’s Mid North Coast.

The floods have turned deadly with the body of a man found in Taree on Thursday morning.

Ms McBain told breakfast TV that Taree was “copping it the worst” with more rain on the way.

“Taree is obviously the area that’s copping at the worst at the moment, and we don’t want to see those record flood levels being broken, but unfortunately, that’s what we’re seeing,” she said.

“We need to make sure our communities are heeding those emergency service warnings from local radio and from family and friends, and make sure that we are evacuating as soon as possible.”

Ms McBain said while the flood response was mostly in the hands of the NSW authorities, Commonwealth disaster recovery payments had been made available for 16 local government areas so far and Australian Defence Force members would be deployed for search and rescue. It will include night time capability if required.

New South Wales Premier Chris Minns told a press conference on Thursday there were 140 active flood warnings for the area roughly 50,000 people lived in and at least 9500 properties deemed in the “direct vicinity” of the flood waters.

Nationals MP Michelle Landry says the party is holding firm on its nuclear push and called for Australia to lift its longstanding ban on nuclear power to seriously consider it as an energy security solution.

The party has continued to back the nuclear policy that the Coalition campaigned on in the 2025 election, despite speculation that it may have turned voters away.

It was one of four policies the Nationals had urged new Liberal leader Sussan Ley to etch into a renewed Coalition agreement.

However, Ms Ley had refused to make preliminary assurances before a full review of the election loss and of all policies was conducted.

Speaking on ABC breakfast radio on Thursday, Ms Landry suggested a different approach to nuclear power, which included private sector backing and bipartisan support, should be considered for Australia’s long term energy plan.

“We think it’s the way for the future. I think that it’s something that we need to put a lot of work into.

“If we could get private enterprise on board. People are definitely interested in it. (Nationals Leader) David (Littleproud) has said about getting the private enterprise involved with it.

“What we would like to see is lifting the moratorium on nuclear, so that we can look at how we can move forward with it.

“But you know.. on both sides, the Opposition and Government have to agree on this.”

Ms Landry said she didn’t think Coalition had sold the policy well at the election and couldn’t counter Labor’s scare campaign which claimed building the seven earmarked rectors would cost taxpayers $600 billion.

“We just didn’t sell it properly. Then we had the major scare campaigns from the unions and Labor (which) doubled the price of what it was going to cost,” she said.

“The figure that was thrown around was $600 billion. I think we’ve worked out that it’d be around the $300 billion mark.”

The NSW Police Acting Commissioner Deputy Commissioner Peter Thurtell has revealed that three people are missing in floodwater on the Mid North Coast.

“Sadly, as the Premier has already indicated, one life has already been confirmed lost, and we have reports of three other people missing,” he said.

“I know the message has already gone out, and the Premier and the Commissioner of the SES have just mentioned it, really, the danger of driving or walking through floodwaters cannot be understated, and people need to avoid doing that.”

The NSW Premier has continued to give an update about the devastating floods on the Mid North Coast.

“Both the rivers around Taree and Kempsey are stable, or slightly receding. However, there is more rainfall in the mountains and we can’t guarantee that it will not peak again,” Mr Minns said.

“Although, the ManningRiver has peaked at an unprecedentedlevel not seen since the 1920s. Emergency services have deployed 2,500 emergency workers, including 2,200 SES volunteers andprofessionals.

“There are 500 appliances, including trucks and boats, and 10 helicopters that are on site. It’s one of the largest deployments for a storm cell that we’ve seen in New South Wales.

“There is 140 flood warnings, 50,000 people are in the range where they have been asked to prepare to evacuate and could be isolated. And there’s been 9,500 properties in the direct vicinity. So, we’re far from out of the woods here.

“And the grim reality is that we’re getting more and more used to this because there’s more and more of these natural disasters.”