THE NEWS WRAP: Doubts raised over Asian Century white paper

Business leaders have raised doubts about the Federal Government’s ability to carry out the proposals outlined in its newly released Asian Century white paper.

The paper, which provides a blueprint of a national strategy for the Asian Century, has attracted some scepticism from Australia’s peak business body, the Business Council of Australia.

“’The challenge with such a long-term vision will be implementing detailed policies which are consistent with that vision over a sustained period of time,” BCA chief Jennifer Westacott says.

“What is needed is bipartisanship on the broad direction.”

Australia unprepared for climate change challenges

Australia is far from ready to face the challenges climate change will bring, a new report says.

The Climate Institute will today release a report that finds government and business have much to do to protect Australia’s infrastructure from the damage wreaked by natural disasters.

The report – titled Coming ready or not: Can Australia’s infrastructure handle climate change? – says the electricity, financial services and insurers, and road and rail sectors are underprepared.

UBS looks to cut 10,000 jobs

Investment bank UBS could cut as many as 10,000 jobs from its global operations amid declines in global takeover activity and poor equity market turnover.

Chief executive Sergio Ermotti is overhauling the bank as regulators pressure UBS and Credit Suisse Group AG to boost capital and scale back trading and investment banking operations.

UBS has been struggling to boost profitability as client activity and trading remain sluggish.

Overnight  

The Australian dollar is more than half a US cent higher on US growth data and commentary from the euro zone.

At 7am, the Australian dollar was trading at US103.64 cents, up from US103.12 cents on Friday.