Speaker 1: Today's biggest news from The Australian. I'm Kristin Amyot with
Speaker 1: the Front's afternoon headlines. A bombshell revelation in a baffling case.
Speaker 1: South Australian police say they've identified a suspect in the
Speaker 1: disappearance of four year old Gus Lamont from his family's
Speaker 1: rural property in September.
Speaker 2: We have a suspect who we believe is known to Gus.
Speaker 2: I can't give you any more information about the suspect,
Speaker 2: or where the suspect is and why that person is
Speaker 2: a suspect. I do want to stress, however, that Guss's
Speaker 2: parents are not suspects in his disappearance.
Speaker 1: Guss's grandparents, Shannon Murray and Josie Murray, have each separately
Speaker 1: hired lawyers, but jointly released a statement saying they were
Speaker 1: absolutely devastated by the police announcement. The pair said they
Speaker 1: want nothing more than to find Gus and reunite him
Speaker 1: with his mum and dad. No charges have been laid,
Speaker 1: Detective Superintendent Darren Fielki said on Thursday. They've been forthcoming
Speaker 1: with information throughout the investigation.
Speaker 2: So from the time that Gus went missing, the family
Speaker 2: members have been cooperating with police and providing information that
Speaker 2: has assisted with establishing the movements of Gus around the
Speaker 2: time that he went missing. A detailed review of all
Speaker 2: that information has been conducted by Task Force Horizon members.
Speaker 2: As a result of that, we've identified a number of
Speaker 2: inconsistencies and discrepancies with that information as it relates to
Speaker 2: timelines and the versions of events provided to us by
Speaker 2: the family members.
Speaker 1: Fielke said the suspect stopped cooperating with the investigation following
Speaker 1: an operation at Oak Park Station in mid January where
Speaker 1: police sees a vehicle, a motorcycle, and electronic devices.
Speaker 2: As a result of these inconsistencies and investigations into them,
Speaker 2: a person who resides at Oak Park Station has withdrawn
Speaker 2: their support for the police and is no longer cooperating
Speaker 2: with us.
Speaker 1: Said on Thursday, the incident was being treated as a
Speaker 1: major crime and confirmed police believe Gus is deceased. They
Speaker 1: say they've ruled out the possibility Gus was abducted by
Speaker 1: a stranger or that he simply wandered off.
Speaker 2: The ground searches and the aerial searches have failed to
Speaker 2: locate Gus or any items belonging to Gus. At this time,
Speaker 2: despite all of the combined search efforts, we have found
Speaker 2: no evidence, physical or otherwise to suggest that Gus has
Speaker 2: merely wandered off from the Oak Park homestead.
Speaker 1: The detective superintendent said. The police investigation is ongoing.
Speaker 2: What I can say, however, is that we'll can if
Speaker 2: he knew, to thoroughly and meticulously investigate the disappearance of
Speaker 2: Gus until we get an outcome. We are all focused
Speaker 2: and determined to locate Gus and return him to his parents.
Speaker 2: Nothing is off the table as we work towards that outcome.
Speaker 1: Reserve Bank Governor Michelle Bullock confirmed the government's big spending
Speaker 1: agenda fueled inflation. It comes after the RBA raised interest
Speaker 1: rates for the first time in two years due to
Speaker 1: persistent inflation, and is at odds with a claim by
Speaker 1: Treasurer Jim Chalmers that government spending wasn't a factor in
Speaker 1: that decision.
Speaker 3: Government spending is part of total spending and total aggregate
Speaker 3: demand in the economy, so it, along with private spending,
Speaker 3: contributes to aggregate demand. And so to the extent that
Speaker 3: aggregate demand is above our group supply, which we think
Speaker 3: it is, that's contributing to inflationary pressures, and that's why
Speaker 3: we've decided to raise interest rates just a bit.
Speaker 1: Anti Israel author and activists Runder Abdelfhatar will appear at
Speaker 1: the Newcastle Writers Festival in March, just three months after
Speaker 1: her ousting from the Adelaide Writers Week caused the event
Speaker 1: to collapse. Almost two hundred authors boycotted the long running
Speaker 1: Adelaide Festival after learning Abdelfhatar had been disinvited in the
Speaker 1: wake of the Bondai Beach terror attack. She'll appear in
Speaker 1: Newcastle on a panel moderated by Josh Bornstein, the employment
Speaker 1: lawyer who successfully represented presenter Antoinette Latouffe in her unfair
Speaker 1: dismissal case against the ABC in twenty twenty five. Letouf
Speaker 1: will appear separately at the Newcastle Festival. New South Wales
Speaker 1: Arts Minister John Graham said on Thursday, while hate speech
Speaker 1: won't be accepted at the Newcastle event, he doesn't believe
Speaker 1: in canceling artists from cultural events. Check out those stories
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