Australia’s net overseas migration intake would be cut to roughly one-third of its current level under a Coalition plan announced as the party loses support to anti-immigration group One Nation.

Opposition immigration spokesman Angus Taylor said on Tuesday that, if elected at the next election, the Coalition would reduce annual net overseas migration from almost 300,000 people to about 100,000 in its first year in office.

The intake would then rise to 160,000 people a year after four years—well below Labor’s target of 225,000, but above One Nation’s proposed limit of 130,000.

The Coalition would also halve the annual refugee intake, reducing it from 20,000 people to 10,000.

“What we are proposing today is the biggest cut to immigration in the history of this country,” Taylor said.

“That is what is necessary right now given the failures of the Labor government.”

The proposal comes as Pauline Hanson’s One Nation gains ground in the polls, eroding the Coalition’s traditional voter base and pushing migration to the centre of the political debate.

Several elements of the Coalition’s plan mirror One Nation policies, including a requirement for prospective migrants to leave Australia and submit new visa applications from offshore.

The measures are designed to curb so-called “visa hopping” by stopping migrants whose visas have expired from applying for another visa in Australia and lodging appeals to remain in the country.

That change would effectively eliminate most bridging visas.

“We will regain control of our borders, we will regain control of immigration in this country, and we will ensure that immigration policy is in the interests of our great country and no one else,” Taylor told reporters in Sydney.

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According to Coalition estimates based on undisclosed figures prepared with assistance from the Parliamentary Budget Office, the policy would reduce the number of temporary visa holders—excluding New Zealanders—by about 650,000 over four years and add roughly $260 million to the federal budget.

Taylor said lower migration would benefit the economy by focusing the program on skills Australia needs and increasing the proportion of skilled workers entering the country.

However, the Coalition will not release formal costings until closer to the 2028 election, when the government has provided updated forecasts for net overseas migration.

Temporary graduate visas would be scrapped, while student visa numbers would fall from 528,800 in 2025/26 to 456,200 in 2031/32.

The humanitarian intake would also be reduced to 10,000 places a year, with onshore applicants given a maximum of 30 days to submit an application.

Working holiday-maker visas, which farmers and regional communities rely on heavily, would be reduced by 23,700 by 2031/32. Fees would also increase for visa holders heading to non-regional areas.

But the Coalition will introduce an extra 15,000 skilled visas for major projects and a new agriculture visa from 2030.

Family reunion visas will be unchanged.

The Coalition will also draw up a list of safe nations to limit the number of vexatious protection visa claims.

Senator Hanson said the coalition was planning to build more homes than bring in more people to compete for them.

‘The coalition has turned up late to the grand final after both teams have headed back to the change rooms, waving a photocopy of One Nation’s immigration policy,’ she said.

‘Who trusts the major parties that created this mess to fix it anyway?’

President Donald Trump has approved a firing-squad execution for Nidal Hasan, the former Army major convicted of killing 13 people and injuring more than 30 others during the 2009 Fort Hood shooting.

Hasan, who later embraced jihadist views, said he carried out the attack because he opposed being deployed to Afghanistan and wanted to shield Islamic and Taliban figures from American forces.

He was found guilty and sentenced to death in connection with the massacre.

Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, said Monday that Hasan would become only the second person since 2010 to be executed by firing squad.

“Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has recommended — and President Donald J. Trump has approved — death by U.S. Army firing squad for convicted terrorist Nidal Malik Hasan, the jihadist who opened fire on unarmed American soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009,” Parnell wrote on social media.

Parnell said Hasan killed 13 people and wounded 32 others while shouting “Allahu Akbar” during the assault.

“The Secretary of the Army will set the time and place of the execution. Judgement day for Hasan has finally come,” he added.

Hegseth shared the announcement on X, adding a brief response: “Justice.”

The Daily Mail has contacted the White House for comment.

Hasan entered a medical readiness building at Fort Hood in November 2009 armed with two handguns and several magazines of ammunition.

He reportedly shouted “Allahu Akbar,” meaning “God is great” in Arabic, before opening fire on soldiers waiting for medical examinations and vaccinations.

The rampage became the deadliest attack ever recorded at a domestic U.S. military installation.

Hasan was shot during the exchange of gunfire and left paralyzed from the waist down. He received a death sentence in 2013.

At trial, Hasan told jurors that he had “switched sides” in what he described as America’s war against Islam.

He acknowledged launching the attack, saying he wanted to prevent U.S. troops from being sent overseas to kill fellow Muslims.

Prosecutors also argued that Hasan was attempting to avoid an upcoming deployment to Afghanistan.

The Department of Defense classified the Fort Hood shooting as an act of workplace violence rather than terrorism.

Hasan is one of four inmates on death row in the US Army’s justice system. 

Since 1608, at least 144 civilian prisoners have been executed by shooting in America, nearly all in Utah. 

Only four have occurred since 1977, when the use of capital punishment resumed after a ten-year pause. 

The first of those, Gary Gilmore, caused a media sensation in part because he waived his appeals and volunteered to be executed. 

When asked for his last words, Gilmore replied, ‘Let’s do it.’

In March of last year, Brad Sigmon, a South Carolina man who killed his ex-girlfriend’s parents with a baseball bat was executed by firing squad.

The Justice Department announced earlier this year it would adopt firing squads as a permitted method of execution as the Trump administration moves to ramp up and expedite capital punishment cases.

The Justice Department is also reauthorizing the use of single-drug lethal injections with pentobarbital that were used to carry out 13 executions during the first Trump administration – more than under any president in modern history. 

The Biden administration had removed pentobarbital from the federal protocol over concerns about the potential for unnecessary pain and suffering.

The moves were announced as part of a broader push to step up federal executions after a moratorium under the Biden administration. 

Only three defendants remain on federal death row after Democratic President Joe Biden converted 37 of their sentences to life in prison, though the Trump administration has so far authorized seeking death sentences against 44 defendants.

‘The prior administration failed in its duty to protect the American people by refusing to pursue and carry out the ultimate punishment against the most dangerous criminals, including terrorists, child murderers, and cop killers,’ Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement. 

‘Under President Trump´s leadership, the Department of Justice is once again enforcing the law and standing with victims.’

The federal government has not previously included firing squad as a method of execution in its protocols, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

 Five states currently allow executions by firing squad: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah.

The pentobarbital protocol was adopted by Bill Barr, attorney general during Trump´s first term, to replace a three-drug mix used in the 2000s, the last time federal executions were carried out before Trump’s first term in office.

Attorney General Merrick Garland in the final days of the Biden administration withdrew the pentobarbital lethal injection policy after a government review of scientific and medical research found there remains ‘significant uncertainty’ about whether its use causes unnecessary pain and suffering.’

In 2020, under Barr’s leadership, the Justice Department published a rule in the Federal Register to allow the federal government to conduct executions by lethal injection or use ‘any other manner prescribed by the law of the state in which the sentence was imposed.’

A number of states allow other methods of execution, including electrocution, inhaling nitrogen gas or death by firing squad.

Australia’s oldest living person has marked his 113th birthday alongside the only man in the world older than him, with the pair sharing birthday wishes despite being thousands of kilometres apart.

Ken Weeks, who lives in Grafton, northern New South Wales, reached the remarkable age on October 5 — the same day João Marinho Neto of Maranguape, Ceará, Brazil, celebrated turning 114.

The two men not only have the same birthday but are recognised as the world’s two oldest living men. They are separated by roughly 14,000 kilometres.

Mr Weeks, a resident of Whiddon aged care in Grafton, was delighted to receive a birthday message from Mr Neto. He responded with a video of his own, thanking the Brazilian centenarian and wishing him a happy birthday.

“Ken’s 113th birthday is an extraordinary milestone,” Whiddon chief executive Chris Mamarelis said.

“But for us, it was never about the number. It’s about Ken and the life he has lived to get here.

“Today, he connects with the only man on earth older than him. Two men, born a year and 14,000 kilometres apart, exchanging messages on the one day that belongs to both of them. That is not something we can plan for. It is a privilege to witness.

“I don’t believe we will ever see this again. The world’s two oldest men — one turning 113 and the other 114 on the same day — wishing each other a happy birthday from opposite sides of the world.

“That is not rare. That is special, and it may be the only time it ever happens.”

Mr Weeks has lived at the aged-care home since 2018, moving there shortly before his 105th birthday. Until then, he had lived independently for decades and was still walking into town to shop when he was 100.

He has spent more than a century in the Northern Rivers region of north-eastern New South Wales. The eldest of five children, he grew up on a farm beside the river at Swan Creek.

During World War II, Mr Weeks was unable to enlist in the Royal Australian Air Force. Instead, he contributed to the war effort by helping build airfields.

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A lifelong builder and tinkerer, he worked in construction and repairs before operating several small businesses, including a service station, milk bar and repair shop.

Mr Weeks married Jean McPhee in 1941, and they had two sons, Ian and Noel. Their marriage lasted 45 years, until Jean died in 1986.

His son Ian said his father had followed a straightforward lifestyle, without many of the modern health habits often linked to exceptional longevity.

“He lived a plain, simple life; no drinking, no smoking, though he ate white bread,” he said.

‘He wasn’t into today’s health stuff, not very much sweet stuff, but it was all plain simple food.’

While Mr Weeks remains physically fit and relatively agile, his age has impacted his voice.

‘He has trouble talking [and] he doesn’t speak very well,’ Ian said.

His granddaughter Eunice described him as a ‘gentle’ and ‘kind’ man.

‘Grandpa’s resilience, determination, and independence combined with his faith in God have given him a remarkable and long life,’ she said.

‘And while he is remarkable, I also love that he has lived a simple ordinary life of industrious hard work.

‘To me he is a typical Aussie battler, that just happens to be my grandad.’

LongeviQuest, a global longevity research organisation, recognises Mr Neto as the world’s oldest living man and Mr Weeks as the second-oldest living man.