Australia news LIVE: China tests nuclear-capable missile; Australia signs $1b defence pact; PM in Solomon Islands

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What’s making headlines

By Angus Dalton

Hello and welcome to our national news live coverage for Tuesday, July 7. Here’s what’s making headlines today.

Geopolitics: The launch of a nuclear-capable long-range missile from a Chinese submarine in the South Pacific with just hours of notice has angered Australia and New Zealand, who labelled the test destabilising and concerning. It came just hours after Australia and Fiji struck a new defence alliance.

Pacific deal: Australia and Fiji’s new $1 billion defence alliance could be expanded to other nations in a major victory for the Albanese government as it seeks to limit China’s influence in Pacific security affairs.

Housing: Decades of property prices rising far faster than incomes has left young people facing a bleak future and a fall in living standards, the head of the Productivity Commission has warned.

Bird flu: Free-range poultry farmers may need to keep their birds indoors due to the risk of the deadly H5N1 bird flu, as another seabird became Australia’s seventh case of the highly transmissible virus.

World Cup: Donald Trump admitted to calling FIFA president Gianni Infantino to ask for a review of a US player’s red card.