Australia politics live: renewables and batteries soar but ‘critical’ moment coming; WiseTech staff face AI redundancy

Professionals Australia, the union representing workers at software company WiseTech has told Guardian Australia around 190 staff on the company’s product development and customer service teams have been notified their roles could go as part of 2,000 cut due to advancements in artificial intelligence.

Guardian Australia reported last week that staff were told that they would be informed this week after nearly three months of waiting since the initial announcement.

Guardian Australia understands emails were sent out to affected employees and those who will remain with the company informing them either way, but were recalled and resent an hour later.

Professionals Australia said this was to allow those staff who may be cut to provide their personal email details prior to being cut off from WiseTech systems.

There will be a two-week consultation with WiseTech for those affected, with employees being invited to a meeting to discuss the changes. WiseTech has not yet outlined if it plans to offer more than the required redundancy.

A spokesperson for WiseTech said no final decisions had been made yet:

No final decisions will be made about any individual roles until the relevant requirements for each local jurisdiction have been met.

double quotation markWe recognise that a process of this scale, nature and complexity creates uncertainty for our people. We’ve taken a careful, deliberate approach to ensure our decisions are well informed and made with full regard to our business and our people.

Australia has become a top-three global player in batteries, and renewable energy met nearly half of the nation’s power in 2025, but the Clean Energy Council has warned that progress could stall as investment in new wind and solar plummeted.

The industry’s annual snapshot found renewable energy supplied 43% of Australia’s power throughout 2025, up from 39% in 2024. The year ended on a high, with clean energy generating more than 50% of power in the national grid in the final quarter.

Australia ranked third in the world for utility-scale batteries, behind only China and the United States – with 2GW of large-scale battery capacity connected to the grid, up 233% on the previous year.

Yet despite these achievements, CEC chief executive Jackie Trad said the energy transition was approaching a “critical juncture”.

double quotation markThe next five years matter most. Our sector’s highest priority in 2026 must be to remove the barriers slowing investment in new large-scale wind and solar projects that will ultimately replace unreliable coal generators that threaten the security of our energy system.