Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Moulds, Senior Lecturer of Law, University of South Australia

The federal government has just released a major report about anti-discrimination laws and religious schools in Australia.

It was done by the Australian Law Reform Commission, which finished its work late last year.

It has been keenly anticipated by the LGBTQ+ community who want to ensure students cannot be expelled from religious schools, and to ensure LGBTQ+ teachers do not lose their jobs.

Some religious schools have also been campaigning to maintain their right to hire staff who share their religious beliefs.

Why do we have this report?

This work forms part of a broader, highly contentious debate about religious discrimination and expression in Australia. This has been going since marriage equality laws were passed in 2017.

The Australian Law Reform Commission’s job is to provide the federal attorney-general with advice about how to bring the law into line with current social conditions and community needs. It is made up of independent legal experts.

The commission first started looking into the rights of religious schools in 2019 at the behest of the Morrison government.

But its focus changed in 2022, when the Albanese government asked it to look at what changes were needed to better protect students and staff from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, relationship status or pregnancy.

This debate has been complicated by a mix of relevant state and territory laws and the lack of a special law protecting against discrimination on religious grounds at the federal level.

What does the report say?

The report notes many religious schools in Australia already have inclusive enrolment and employment policies and do not want to discriminate against students or teachers on any grounds. The commission also highlights the importance of religious faith in the Australian community and says families should be able to continue to choose schools for their children that align with their values and beliefs.

But the commission also notes the laws need changing to make sure religious schools are not given a blanket exemption from the rules designed to protect people against sex discrimination. It follows a raft of other inquiries documenting accounts of students being expelled from faith-based schools “because they were transgender” or teachers being fired because of their sexual orientation.

The commission found when students or staff are subject to discrimination on the basis of these attributes, it can

result in tangible harm (such as loss of employment, and economic or social disadvantage) as well as intangible harm (such as undermining a person’s sense of self‑worth, equality, belonging, inclusion, and respect).

Read more:
Why are religious discrimination laws back in the news? And where did they come from in the first place?

What does it recommend?

For these reasons, the commission recommends amending laws so religious schools are subject to the same rules as all other education service providers (including public schools).

This means religious schools can’t deny enrolment to trans students, and can’t expel a kid for having gay parents. It also wants laws clarified so religious schools can’t fire or refuse to hire teachers on the basis of their sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status or pregnancy.

However, at the same time, the commission recommends religious schools should still be able to “build a community of faith”, for example by giving preference when hiring to teachers who share the school’s religion, provided they don’t breach other workplace laws.

What does this mean for students, teachers and schools?

If the recommendations become law, not much would change for most schools. For schools in some places, such as Victoria, this change would simply align state and federal laws.

Religious schools will still be able to maintain their religious character by selecting staff who share their faith. And while the recommended changes would remove religious schools’ ability to discriminate directly on certain grounds, such as when hiring staff, a “reasonableness test” would still apply to working out whether other directions or conditions relating to employment are unlawful.

For example, this means a school principal could still ask a teacher to comply with a specific requirement, such as a dress code, if it is reasonable in the circumstances.

This means if the recommendations do become law, religious school administrators would need to check their employment and enrolment policies to review any conditions on staff recruitment (including interns and volunteers. They would also need to check any rules or policies relating to students that could result in a disadvantage for people on the basis of their sexual orientation, orientation, gender identity, relationship status or pregnancy.

What happens now?

Although the Australian Law Reform Commission is made of up some of the sharpest legal minds in Australia, it cannot change the law itself. Only federal parliament can do that by passing legislation to implement its recommendations.

At the moment this does not look likely. Earlier this week, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said any changes would need bipartisan support before he takes them to parliament.

Coalition members did not make supportive noises. On Tuesday, Shadow Attorney-General Michaelia Cash asked: “how will religious schools be able to maintain their values?”

This suggests the debate around religious discrimination and schools in Australia will continue.

Read more:
Future of Anthony Albanese’s religious discrimination legislation is in Peter Dutton’s hands

Sarah Moulds has previously received research funding from the Law Foundation of South Australia and the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust. She is the volunteer Director of the Rights Resource Network SA and a member of the Australian Discrimination Law Experts Group.

– ref. A major report recommends more protections for LGBTQ+ students and teachers in religious schools. But this needs parliament’s support to become law – https://theconversation.com/a-major-report-recommends-more-protections-for-lgbtq-students-and-teachers-in-religious-schools-but-this-needs-parliaments-support-to-become-law-226309

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milovan Savic, Research Fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society, Swinburne University of Technology

Our digital world is bigger and more connected than ever. Social media isn’t just a daily habit – with more than 5 billion users globally, it’s woven into the very fabric of our existence.

These platforms offer entertainment, connection, information and support, but they’re also battlegrounds for misinformation and online harassment.

Platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok vie for our attention, each boasting user counts in the billions. But what do these numbers actually tell us, and should we care?

What is an active user or a unique user?

Behind the impressive statistics lies a complex reality. While global social media usership has hit the 5 billion mark, representing about 62% of the world’s population, these figures mask the intricacies of online participation.

In Australia, the average person juggles nearly seven social media accounts across multiple platforms. This challenges the assumption that user counts equate to unique individuals.

It is also important to differentiate between accounts and active users. Not all accounts represent actual engagement in the platform’s community.

An “active user” is typically someone who has logged into a platform within a specific timeframe, such as the past month, indicating engagement with the platform’s content and features. They’re measured with analytics tools provided by the platform itself, or with third-party software.

The tools track the number of unique users – that is, individual accounts – who have interacted with or been exposed to specific content, whether a post, story or advertising campaign.

Social media companies use these metrics to showcase the potential reach of their platform to marketers. It’s key to their business model, as advertising revenue is typically their main source of income.

However, the reliability of these statistics is debatable. Factors such as bot accounts, inactive accounts and duplicates can inflate numbers, offering a distorted view of a platform’s user base.

Moreover, the criteria for an “active user” vary across platforms. This makes it difficult to make comparisons between user bases and to truly understand online audiences.

User count isn’t always relevance

TikTok boasts a staggering 1.5 billion users globally. This doesn’t even include users on its Chinese counterpart, Douyin. It is also often at the centre of controversies and geopolitical tensions.

For example, TikTok has repeatedly faced threats of bans in significant markets such as the United States, raising questions about future access. But with such a vast user base, TikTok’s impact on culture and trends – particularly among young people – is clear and far-reaching.

Read more:
If TikTok is banned in the US or Australia, how might the company – or China – respond?

However, the true impact of platforms is further muddied by algorithms – the complex formulas that dictate the content we see and engage with. Designed to keep us scrolling and interacting, they significantly shape our online experiences.

They also complicate how “active” a user might appear. Someone could seem more engaged simply because the algorithm promotes content they interact with more often.

So, while a high active-user count might indicate a platform’s popularity and reach, it doesn’t fully capture its influence or social relevance. True engagement goes beyond numbers, delving into the depth of user interaction, the quality of the content, and the cultural impact these platforms wield.

Different strokes for different ages

When we look at the users’ demographics, we see distinct preferences across age groups.

Among the younger crowd, specifically Gen Z, TikTok vastly outpaces Instagram with one in four users under the age of 20.

Meanwhile, Snapchat and Instagram are the preferred platforms for people aged 18–29.

Facebook, with its massive user base of more than 3 billion and a median user age of 32, is the platform of choice for millennials, Gen X and boomers.

Read more:
‘OK Boomer’: how a TikTok meme traces the rise of Gen Z political consciousness

People in their 30s and older tend to use LinkedIn and X (formerly Twitter) more than platforms like Snapchat.

But all these social media platforms tend to vary in their primary focus, from news and professional connections (like LinkedIn) to predominantly serving entertainment (like TikTok).

This means demographic trends also reveal how each platform impacts users differently, catering to varied content preferences – whether it’s for entertainment, staying updated on news and events, or connecting with friends and family.

User count isn’t what matters

For content creators and news media, delving into user statistics is crucial if they want to reach their target audiences.

However, despite headlines often focusing on vast user numbers, do these figures actually matter to the everyday social media user? Research I’ve done with colleagues suggests they don’t.

For individuals navigating these digital spaces, it’s not about which platform boasts the highest user count and is therefore deemed “important”.

Instead, the focus is on maintaining connections within their social circles. This preference is rooted in cultural practices, meaning it aligns with the habits, preferences and values of their own community or cultural group.

In other words, people are drawn to social media platforms that are popular or widely accepted among their family, friends, social allies and broader cultural community. This suggests the essence of social media lies in the quality of interactions rather than the platform’s global standing.

Whether for staying informed, being entertained, or nurturing relationships, people gravitate to spaces where their community or “tribe” gathers.

Read more:
It’s hard to imagine better social media alternatives, but Scuttlebutt shows change is possible

Milovan Savic receives funding from Australian Research Council

– ref. Social media apps have billions of ‘active users’. But what does that really mean? – https://theconversation.com/social-media-apps-have-billions-of-active-users-but-what-does-that-really-mean-226021

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Liam Grealy, Senior Research Fellow, Menzies School of Health Research

At the remote Indigenous community of Binjari, south of Katherine in the Northern Territory last week, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced a landmark A$4 billion investment in remote housing across the Territory.

He said the ten-year commitment by the Commonwealth and Territory governments would deliver up to an extra 270 houses per year, a total of 2,700.

At the press conference, Albanese was told $4 billion for 2,700 houses worked out at about $1.5 million each. He was asked whether each house could possibly cost that much to build.

While it is reasonable to examine the cost of construction, the inference that remote housing is unreasonably expensive is misleading.

Significant, but less than what’s needed

The $4 billion will deliver much more housing than is currently available, albeit not as much as is needed.

It is not as much as is needed because the prime minister says it will halve overcrowding in remote Indigenous communities.

The 2021 Census found the proportion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the Northern Territory living in overcrowded dwellings was 43%, and Territory government data shows more than 52% of the remote community housing was overcrowded in 2022.

Halving these figures would still leave a significant proportion of the Territory’s remote Indigenous population living in overcrowded housing.

$4 billion won’t mean $1.5 million per house

It is true the houses will be expensive to build. Albanese points out that some houses will be in extremely isolated locations and each will have three bedrooms on average. As the ten-year program progresses, labour and materials costs will increase significantly. But the cost won’t average $1.5 million each.

That’s because a fair chunk of the $4 billion will be spent on things other than building houses for remote community residents.

In the most recent (five-year) national agreement, $200 million of the $1.1 billion was allocated to build employee accommodation, for teachers, clinicians, and other workers.

As populations grow, and before building starts, leases need to be secured and land serviced with water, electricity, sewerage, and sometimes roads.

Houses need maintenance

The previous agreement allocated $200 million to repairs and maintenance. But this wasn’t enough to maintain houses at a reasonable standard.

An evaluation found the average spend per remote house was about $6,000 per year. That amount fell far short of the $10,000 per house spent by South Australia in the Aṉangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands over the border.

The $4 billion also promises to do something else, in addition to building houses and properly maintaining them.

It promises to create local employment and support Aboriginal businesses, as part of the government’s Remote Jobs and Economic Development Program.

This will be an investment in people, with the potential to build sustainable Aboriginal community-controlled organisations in remote contexts.

What will matter will be the detail

Perhaps the most promising things about the new Commonwealth-Territory agreement are its ten-year length and context.

The last time a ten-year agreement was drawn up in the mid-2000s, the so-called Northern Territory Intervention was underway, dismantling community control over housing.

The Indigenous-run Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission had been abolished, a for-profit consultancy’s report had seriously criticised Indigenous-run Indigenous housing organisations, and the Coalition’s Indigenous affairs minister had described Aboriginal homelands as “cultural museums”.

This agreement promises to rebuild rather than demolish Aboriginal control of remote Aboriginal housing. It is an opportunity to significantly reform the sector to increase self-determination. Key to this transition will be the form taken by the partnership agreement still being drawn up.

It will include the Australian and Territory governments, the peak body for Aboriginal housing in the Territory, and four Aboriginal land councils.

Read more:
High Court, then what? NT remote housing reforms need to put Indigenous residents front and centre

Of chief importance will be ensuring remote houses are built to the latest energy efficiency standards. A properly-funded preventive and cyclical maintenance program will also be especially important.

There is a lot to clarify, but the ten-year agreement provides the foundation for a pipeline of works, the employment of local staff and the development of local skills, including through apprenticeships. It is a historic opportunity to get remote Indigenous housing right.

Liam Grealy receives funding from Aboriginal Housing NT for the project ‘Investigating Options to Establish Aboriginal Controlled Governance for the Remote Housing System in the Northern Territory’. He receives funding from the NT Government for the ‘Homelands Housing and Infrastructure Program Monitoring and Evaluation Project’.

– ref. Building remote Indigenous homes well is hard, but they won’t cost $1.5 million each – https://theconversation.com/building-remote-indigenous-homes-well-is-hard-but-they-wont-cost-1-5-million-each-225651

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bruce Baer Arnold, Associate Professor, School of Law, University of Canberra

The alleged data breach involving Catherine, Princess of Wales tells us something about health privacy. If hospital staff can apparently access a future queen’s medical records without authorisation, it can happen to you.

Indeed it may have already happened to you, given many breaches of health data go under the radar.

Here’s why breaches of health data keep on happening.

Read more:
Yes, Kate Middleton’s photo was doctored. But so are a lot of images we see today

What did we learn this week?

Details of the alleged data breaches, by up to three staff at The London Clinic, emerged in the UK media this week. These breaches are alleged to have occurred after the princess had abdominal surgery at the private hospital earlier this year.

The UK Information Commissioner’s Office is investigating. Its report should provide some clarity about what medical data was improperly accessed, in what form and by whom. But it is unlikely to identify whether this data was given to a third party, such as a media organisation.

Read more:
After the Medicare breach, we should be cautious about moving our health records online

Health data isn’t always as secure as we’d hope

Medical records are inherently sensitive, providing insights about individuals and often about biological relatives.

In an ideal world, only the “right people” would have access to these records. These are people who “need to know” that information and are aware of the responsibility of accessing it.

Best practice digital health systems typically try to restrict overall access to databases through hack-resistant firewalls. They also try to limit access to specific types of data through grades of access.

This means a hospital accountant, nurse or cleaner does not get to see everything. Such systems also incorporate blocks or alarms where there is potential abuse, such as unauthorised copying.

But in practice each health records ecosystem – in GP and specialist suites, pathology labs, research labs, hospitals – is less robust, often with fewer safeguards and weaker supervision.

Read more:
Vaccination status – when your medical information is private and when it’s not

This has happened before

Large health-care providers and insurers, including major hospitals or chains of hospitals, have a worrying history of digital breaches.

Those breaches include hackers accessing the records of millions of people. The Medibank data breach involved more than ten million people. The Anthem data breach in the United States involved more than 78 million people.

Hospitals and clinics have also had breaches specific to a particular individual. Many of those breaches involved unauthorised sighting (and often copying) of hardcopy or digital files, for example by nurses, clinicians and administrative staff.

For instance, this has happened to public figures such as singer Britney Spears, actor George Clooney and former United Kingdom prime minister Gordon Brown.

Indeed, the Princess of Wales has had her medical privacy breached before, in 2012, while in hospital pregnant with her first child. This was no high-tech hacking of health data.

Hoax callers from an Australian radio station tricked hospital staff into divulging details over the phone of the then Duchess of Cambridge’s health care.

Read more:
Did 2Day FM break the law? And does it matter?

Tip of the iceberg

Some unauthorised access to medical information goes undetected or is indeed undetectable unless there is an employment dispute or media involvement. Some is identified by colleagues.

Records about your health might have been improperly sighted by someone in the health system. But you are rarely in a position to evaluate the data management of a clinic, hospital, health department or pathology lab.

So we have to trust people do the right thing.

Read more:
What is HIPAA? 5 questions answered about the medical privacy law that protects Trump’s test results and yours

How could we improve things?

Health professions have long emphasised the need to protect these records. For instance, medical ethics bodies condemn medical students who share intimate or otherwise inappropriate images of patients.

Different countries have various approaches to protecting who has access to medical records and under what circumstances.

In Australia, for instance, we have a mix of complex and inconsistent laws that vary across jurisdictions, some covering privacy in general, others specific to health data. There isn’t one comprehensive law and set of standards vigorously administered by one well-resourced watchdog.

In Australia, it’s mandatory to report data breaches, including breaches of health data. This reporting system is currently being updated. But this won’t necessarily prevent data breaches.

Read more:
Government’s privacy review has some strong recommendations – now we really need action

Instead, we need to incentivise Australian organisations to improve how they handle sensitive health data.

The best policy nudges involve increasing penalties for breaches. This is so organisations act as responsible custodians rather than negligent owners of health data.

We also need to step-up enforcement of data breaches and make it easier for victims to sue for breaches of privacy – princesses and tradies alike.

Read more:
Where’s Kate? Speculation about the ‘missing’ princess is proof the Palace’s media playbook needs a re-write

Dr Arnold spent several years as the Australian representative on OECD Health Informatics working parties. He is a former director of the Australian Privacy Foundation

– ref. Attempts to access Kate Middleton’s medical records are no surprise. Such breaches are all too common – https://theconversation.com/attempts-to-access-kate-middletons-medical-records-are-no-surprise-such-breaches-are-all-too-common-226303

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Tesch, Visiting Fellow at the ANU Centre for European Studies, Australian National University

It is no surprise the second anniversary of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine generated so much commentary. What is surprising, though, is that Kremlin propaganda remains so prevalent in what purports to be analysis.

This week, the ABC was forced to defend a documentary it aired on the conflict, which quoted Russian soldiers justifying the country’s invasion. Ukraine’s ambassador to Australia said it repeated “blatant lies” coming from the Kremlin.

But this is not the only example. Among the other Russian assertions frequently repeated by commentators are that the West is at fault for the war and the root cause lies in “NATO expansion”. Proponents of this line recycle the tired narrative that the West does not understand Russia’s world view and has failed to accommodate its “legitimate security interests”.

Another persistent line is that the West’s failure to understand Russia’s thinking is to blame for the tensions that have marked relations between the two sides for the past 20 years.

On the contrary, Putin has been clear he is intent on recovering Russia’s “historic lands” in his war with Ukraine, in the process wantonly breaching security guarantees Moscow had given Kyiv twice in the 1990s.

There is no misunderstanding Putin’s threat-infused nostalgia for “the legacy of the Yalta and Potsdam conferences” of 1945, either. This was when the US, UK and Soviet Union carved up the territories of the vanquished following the second world war and demarcated their respective spheres of influence, denying tens of millions of people any say in their own future.

Accusing the West of sowing democracy on Russia’s doorstep today ignores the reality that, freed from 50 years of Moscow’s repressive domination, the countries of eastern Europe unequivocally saw their future security and prosperity as part of the European Union and NATO.

Read more:
Putin is on a personal mission to rewrite Cold War history, making the risks in Ukraine far graver

While they have been understandably silent on the matter since February 2022, some of Russia’s leading foreign and defence policy thinkers – none of them Kremlin opponents – previously dismissed the idea that “NATO expansion” represented a threat to Russian security.

Defence analyst Alexander Khramchikhin argued in the authoritative Military Industrial Courier in October 2021 that claims NATO was preparing to attack Russia were “shameful”. If NATO was preparing for war with Russia, he added, it was doing so defensively.

Similarly, Andrei Kortunov, formerly the influential head of the Russian International Affairs Council, argued on the now-shuttered Carnegie Moscow office website in January 2021,

former Soviet republics have been desperately storming the gates of the Euro-Atlantic security structures, and the West, fully aware that accepting these new member states would weaken NATO, not strengthen it, had to respond to this pressure.

Putin’s own policies have also substantially worsened Russia’s strategic circumstances, not least by driving Finland and Sweden to pursue NATO membership. Moreover, NATO’s recent policies (including generally declining military expenditure from 1990–2014) in no way pointed to hostile intent towards Russia.

Putin’s war aims were not limited

In a similar vein, some believe Putin’s aims in Ukraine are limited to securing disarmament and neutrality, as well as a special status for Crimea and the eastern region of Donbas. Advocates of this line implicitly condone Putin’s use of military force to unilaterally recast post-second world war borders.

It is clear serious planning and intelligence failures misled Putin and his narrow cohort of advisers into thinking Ukraine would fold in days. A history autodidact, Putin presumably had no interest in occupying western Ukraine, knowing this traditionally had been Catholic Polish and Lithuanian territory and never part of the Orthodox Slavic lands of Great Russia.

We can reasonably surmise Putin’s goal was the swift capture of Kyiv, the political or physical elimination of President Volodymyr Zelensky, and the occupation of Ukraine east of the Dnipro River (and potentially the Black Sea coastline, including Odesa, founded by Putin’s heroine, Catherine the Great).

Thus, Putin would replicate the “gathering of the lands” of one of his distant predecessors, Tsar Ivan III, and consign what was left of western Ukraine to the eternal financial responsibility of Europe.

The revised map of Ukraine that former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev introduced on state television earlier this month makes clear this intent.

Confident assertions, whether by the Kremlin or outside analysts, that Russia’s economy has withstood Western sanctions are also premature.

Sanctions work over the long term, and Russia’s much-touted growth rates mainly reflect its increased investment in the military and defence sectors. Credible commentators believe Russia’s economy shows clear signs of overheating. Only time will tell.

What is true, though, is some countries are conniving with Russia to exploit loopholes and circumvent sanctions. Furthermore, many analysts are silent on the fact that Russia – a permanent member of the UN Security Council – is flouting the very sanctions it helped impose on North Korea by sourcing weapons and military material from Pyongyang.

Aiding Ukraine is not a distraction

Another myth being propagated in the West is the contention that aiding Ukraine diminishes US capacity to deter China in the Indo-Pacific.

It is not a zero-sum game. It is hard to see how unsettling allies and partners by dumping democracies – including one fighting for the very principles upon which the US was founded – would be a deterrent to China.

Read more:
Ukraine war: what China gains from acting as peacemaker

Neither Russia nor China has allies as we understand the term. Both see alliances as directed against someone or something, rather than being mutually reinforcing arrangements underpinned by common beliefs and values.

Both Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping seek to undermine confidence in US leadership and commitment through falsehoods and propaganda. We must be vigilant and forthrightly contest these efforts, regardless of the competing demands on governments and the distractions of our often fractious democracies.

Peter Tesch was Australian ambassador to the Russian Federation from 2016 to 2019.

– ref. No, the West is not to blame for Russia’s war in Ukraine. Why this myth – and others – are so difficult to dispel – https://theconversation.com/no-the-west-is-not-to-blame-for-russias-war-in-ukraine-why-this-myth-and-others-are-so-difficult-to-dispel-226306

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Catharine Lumby, Professor of Media, Department of Media, University of Sydney

Gender, class, race, culture and religion are all categories used to exclude people in ways that privileged people will never experience. This exclusion can be as blatant as a gang of masked people performing the Nazi salute, or as subtle as an upper-middle-class golf club quietly binning membership applications from Jews or Muslims.

The question of how we redress these exclusions is once again in the news because of a legal case taken up against Hobart’s contemporary art gallery, MONA. The anti-discrimination case has been launched on the basis that it contains a women-only Ladies Lounge art installation created by Kirsha Kaechle, an artist who is also married to the museum’s founder, David Walsh.

Jason Lau brought the complaint because he had been denied access to the space, which features works by Pablo Picasso and Sidney Nolan, on account of his gender. Kaechle said she is “delighted” the anti-discrimination complaint has ended up in Tasmania’s Civil and Administrative Tribunal.

“The men are experiencing Ladies Lounge, their experience of rejection is the artwork,” she said.

“OK, they experience the artwork differently than women, but men are certainly experiencing the artwork as it’s intended.”

Whatever decision the tribunal hands down, these recent events remind us that women still struggle to claim a small slice of the pie men have claimed for centuries.

A history of keeping women out

As a kid in primary school, growing up in Newcastle – a working-class beachside town – I was occasionally asked by my Nanna to head down to the local pub in my PJs and give my Granddad a nudge to come home for dinner.

Until 1965, women were excluded from public bars. A few bars would let them drink in the “ladies lounge”, which would confine them to a small area and often charge them more for drinks than men.

Even so, working-class women had little time to lounge. Most worked menial jobs while also doing all the domestic labour.

Because I was a kid, I was warmly received at the Bennett Hotel and would sit up at the bar with a raspberry lemonade. The men – most of whom had knocked off at 4pm from working on the docks or at BHP – were seriously drunk by 6pm.

Today, there are still prestigious clubs across Australia that exclude women, the Melbourne Club being a notorious example. Even if they don’t explicitly ban women from being members, they are male-dominated by their very nature. Membership relies on being “the right sort of chap”: someone who went to the right school and university and rose up the ranks.

Men have controlled parliaments, the corporate sector and now claim dominion over big tech. It’s no skin off their collective noses if women have a room to gather and drink tea or a glass of wine.

Read more:
The AI industry is on the verge of becoming another boys’ club. We’re all going to lose out if it does

Why women’s spaces matter in art

There’s a good reason women might want to hang out in a space where they feel comfortable. At the sharp end, there are women who are survivors of sexual assault and domestic violence. On average one woman is killed every nine days by an intimate partner.

Beyond that, the Ladies Lounge is an apt subversion of a throughline that has dominated the art world for centures: art is made for the male gaze. Even though art galleries are public spaces, they have been overwhelmingly stocked with work by male artists, many of whom have built careers painting female nudes designed for the male gaze.

Art historian Kenneth Clarke (1903-83) described a female nude this way:

By art, Boucher has allowed us to enjoy her with as little shame as she is enjoying herself.

Really, Kenneth?

In 1989, American activist art group Guerrilla Girls found fewer than 5% of the artists in the modern art section of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art were women, yet 85% of the nudes were of women. By 2012, these numbers had barely shifted: fewer than 4% of the artists were women, while 76% of the nudes were of women.

Women walk through the world with an enormous cultural weight simply because they are women. The sexy young woman. The maternal saintly body. The invisible older woman. This is why women’s spaces matter, and why women should be able to choose whether, when and how they can be seen.

One of my favourite Australian contemporary artists is Julie Rrap who, with extraordinary talent and wit, uses her body to make art that returns the male gaze. Since the 1980s, she has been producing photographs, videos and sculptures that play with the female form in a way that subverts the tradition of the classical nude in Western art.

Rrap’s work is a classic example of a woman artist reclaiming space in a traditional male setting: the art museum.

Ways to go

My last word goes to Emma Jones, a young woman who is completing her honours thesis at Sydney University on these very questions. Asked whether women’s spaces were still relevant, she said:

The world is still dominated by men trying to speak on behalf of women. Social media has given a powerful platform to a fresh wave of men attempting to ‘educate’ other men about what women ‘really’ want. The need for women to meaningfully connect with other women, feel heard and develop their voice is just as relevant today as it’s always been.

I’m with you on that, babe. When you become the leader of a women-dominated federal government, I look forward to seeing you support a bill to set up a men’s space in Parliament House. I’ll be catching up with you in the members’ bar.

Read more:
Why weren’t there any great women artists? In gratitude to Linda Nochlin

Catharine Lumby does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Women have been excluded from men’s spaces for centuries. And that’s why the MONA Ladies Lounge matters – https://theconversation.com/women-have-been-excluded-from-mens-spaces-for-centuries-and-thats-why-the-mona-ladies-lounge-matters-226308

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Leonie Lockstone-Binney, Professor, Griffith University

When Queensland premier Steven Miles announced Brisbane’s Lang Park (sponsored name Suncorp Stadium) as the venue for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, he hoped, no doubt, it might finally lay to rest speculation about all the proposed Olympic venues and especially the Brisbane Cricket Ground (Gabba) rebuild.

But what does this mean more generally for the Games’ budget and for the legacy it will leave for Brisbane and south-east Queensland?

Read more:
How can you tell if hosting the Olympics or Commonwealth games offers value for money? Here are our expert tips

The Olympics’ ‘new norm’

The Olympic Games are famous for cost blowouts – every Olympics host since 1960 has spent significantly more than initial estimates, with an average spend of about 2.5 times the original budget.

These budget blowouts, and the cost of bidding simply to host the Games, have led to widespread criticism of the mega event.

In response to pressure to become more sustainable, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) introduced a series of reforms called the “new norm”. The IOC’s new norm was designed to reduce the costs of staging the Games by reducing the amount of new infrastructure required and encouraging the use of temporary and reusable venues.

These “new norm” principles are what made the Brisbane bid a more affordable and realistic proposal.

Since securing the Games in July 2021, there has been increasing public debate about whether the state government is keeping to these principles and can deliver a sustainable, legacy-driven event on budget.

Queensland’s stadium sagas

Brisbane’s IOC Future Host Commission Questionnaire Response, in effect the bid document, projected costs of A$4-5 billion, plus an additional $7.1 billion spend on infrastructure. This included using a refurbished Gabba as the main Olympic venue.

However, the former Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk very quickly introduced a controversial plan to knock down and rebuild the Gabba from scratch.

Following strong criticism, Miles in December 2023 moved to commission an independent Sport Venue Review led by former Brisbane lord mayor Graham Quirk.

The report was released on March 18, and although the Queensland government accepted 27 of the 30 recommendations, one of its most significant was rejected. Controversially and seemingly in contradiction to the “new norm” principles, the review recommended building an entirely new stadium on a greenfield site at Victoria Park.

It also recommended the demolition of the Gabba once the new stadium was complete.

Miles was quick to rule out that recommendation, revealing he had been working for some weeks on an alternative proposal, instead announcing Suncorp Stadium would be the main stadium hosting the Games’ opening and closing ceremonies.

In another snub for the Quirk Review, it was also announced the Queensland Sport and Athletics Centre (QSAC) would be upgraded and serve as the venue for the athletics despite the review finding such as upgrade would not offer legacy benefits.

The choice of Suncorp Stadium appears to be a win for the “new norm”, as it saves around $3.4 billion that was earmarked for the Gabba rebuild, while using an existing venue that will remain as a legacy asset.

Revamping QSAC is also broadly in keeping with new norm principles if it provides a substantially upgraded asset for the community post-Games.

However, using Suncorp is not cost-neutral, with Miles suggesting that if upgrades cost upwards of $1 billion, this would be shared “roughly half-half” between Suncorp and the Gabba.

QSAC will also require a significant makeover to bring it up to standard and the venue is currently poorly served by public transport, and likely requiring further investment to enhance noted accessibility issues.

Additionally, costs will remain associated with the upkeep of the Gabba, described by the Quirk review as an “end-of-life” venue.

The Gabba is currently in desperate need of a refurbishment as it is not compliant with modern building codes, particularly in terms of accessibility for people with disabilities. The Queensland government has promised a “modest” refurbishment in consultation with stakeholders (AFL and Cricket Australia) in the range of $500 million.

The longer-term question still to be addressed is whether the redevelopment of these venues will provide Queensland with world class facilities that provide optimal long-term benefits for the community?

Read more:
In a year of sporting mega-events, the Brisbane Olympics can learn a lot from the ones that fail their host cities

Lessons and next steps

What lessons can we draw from this recent experience?

Planning and development of major sporting events is always intensely political.

While it is crucial to avoid majorly expensive venues that will be rarely used after the Games, the IOC’s new norm should not necessarily mean entirely new venues are out of scope for host cities.

New venues may well align with new norm principles if they strongly support the long-term development plans of the host city and provide lasting community use after the Games have come and gone.

In the case of Brisbane 2032, getting the independent coordination authority set up is an urgent priority to provide a solid governance model for planning, design and construction of the proposed venues.

After something of a false start, we can ill afford further delays.

Leonie Lockstone-Binney receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the International Olympic Committee.

Judith Mair receives funding from the International Olympic Committee

Kirsten Holmes receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the International Olympic Committee.

Paul Burton is a member of the Planning Institute of Australia and the Urban Development Institute of Australia. He receives funding from the City of Gold Coast and participated in the closing ceremony of the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games.

– ref. Recovering after a false start? What’s the state of play for Brisbane’s 2032 Olympic and Paralympic planning? – https://theconversation.com/recovering-after-a-false-start-whats-the-state-of-play-for-brisbanes-2032-olympic-and-paralympic-planning-226121

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Graeme Coulson, Honorary Principal Fellow, School of BioSciences, The University of Melbourne

There’s almost no warning. A dark shape appears on the side of the road, then you feel a jolt as something goes under the car. Or worse, the shape rears up, hits the front of your vehicle, then slams into the windscreen. You have just experienced a wildlife-vehicle collision.

This gruesome scene plays out every night across Australia.
When these collisions happen, many animals become instant roadkill. An estimated 10 million native mammals, reptiles, birds and other species are killed each year.

Others are injured and die away from the road. Some survive with terrible injuries and have to be euthanised. The lucky ones might be rescued by groups such as Wildlife Rescue, Wildlife Victoria and WIRES.

Wildlife-vehicle collisions also increase the risk to whole populations of some threatened species, such as Lumholtz’s tree-kangaroo on the Atherton Tablelands in Queensland.

People are affected, too. Human deaths and injuries from these collisions are rising, with motorcyclists at greatest risk. Vehicle repairs are inconvenient and costly. Added to this is the distress for people when dealing with a dead or dying animal on the roadside.

How can we reduce the wildlife toll on our roads? Many measures have been tried and proven largely ineffective. However, other evidence-based approaches can help avoid collisions.

Read more:
2 biggest threats to wombats revealed in new data gathered by citizen scientists

Evidence for what works is limited

Many communities are worried about the growing impacts of wildlife-vehicle collisions and are desperate for solutions. Recent reports from Europe and North America review the many methods to reduce such collisions.

Do these findings apply to Australia’s unique fauna? Unfortunately, we don’t have a detailed analysis of options for our wildlife, but here’s what we know now.

Well-designed fences keep wildlife off our highways but also fragment the landscape. Happily, animals will use crossing structures – overpasses and underpasses – to get to food and mates on the other side of the road. Fences and crossings do work, but are regarded as too costly over Australia’s vast road network.

As for standard wildlife warning signs, drivers ignore most of them after a while, making them ineffective. Signs with graphic images and variable messages get more attention, but we need road trials to assess their effect on drivers and collision rates.

Read more:
Good news: highway underpasses for wildlife actually work

Whistling in the dark

Some drivers install cheap, wind-driven, high-pitched wildlife whistles on their vehicles. Tests in the United States 20 years ago found humans and deer could not hear any whistling sound above the road noise of the test vehicle. Yet these devices are still sold in Australia as kangaroo deterrents.

The Shu-Roo, an Australian invention, is an active wildlife whistle. It is fitted to the bumper bar, producing a high-pitched electronic sound, which is claimed to scare wildlife away from the road. Sadly, our tests show the Shu-Roo signal can’t be heard above road noise 50 metres away and has no effect on captive kangaroo behaviour.

We also recruited fleets of trucks, buses, vans, utes and cars to field test the Shu-Roo. Nearly 100 vehicles covered more than 4 million kilometres across Australia over 15,500 days. The drivers reported just over one wildlife-vehicle collision per 100,000km travelled, but there was no difference in the rate for vehicles fitted with a Shu-Roo versus those without one.

The virtual fence is the latest attempt to reduce wildlife-vehicle collisions. It uses a line of posts spaced along the roadside, each with a unit producing loud sounds and flashing lights aimed away from the road. Vehicle headlights activate the units, which are claimed to alert animals and reduce the risk of collision.

Early results from Tasmania were encouraging. A 50% drop in possum and wallaby deaths was reported, but this trial had many design flaws. Recent trials in Tasmania, New South Wales and Queensland show no effect of virtual fencing on collisions with possums, wallabies or wombats.

Our concern is that this system is being rolled out in many parts of Australia. It gives the impression of action to reduce collisions with wildlife, but without an evidence base, solid study design or adequate monitoring.

Read more:
Roadkill: we can predict where animals cross roads – and use it to prevent collisions

A very messy problem

The problem has many dimensions. We need to consider all of them to achieve safe travel for people and animals on our roads.

At a landscape level, collision hotspots occur where wildlife frequently cross roads, which can help us predict the collision risk for species such as koalas. But the risk differs between species. For example, on Phillip Island most wallaby collisions happen on rural roads, while most involving possums and birds are in urban streets.

Traffic volume and speed are key factors for many species, including kangaroos.

Driver training and experience are also important. In the Royal National Park in New South Wales, half the drivers surveyed had struck animals, including wallabies and deer. Yet most still weren’t keen to slow down or avoid driving at dawn and dusk.

Read more:
10 million animals are hit on our roads each year. Here’s how you can help them (and steer clear of them) these holidays

Road design has a major influence on wildlife-vehicle collions too, but the planning process too often neglects wildlife studies.

Smarter cars are being developed. One day these will use AI to spot animal hazards, apply automatic emergency braking and alert other drivers of real-time risk.

To explore potential technological solutions, Transport for NSW is running a symposium at the University of Technology Sydney on May 21. The symposium will cover wildlife ecology and the evidence base for options to reduce wildlife-vehicle collisions in Australia.

If you see an injured animal on the road, call Wildlife Rescue Australia on 1300 596 457. for specific state and territory numbers, go to the RSPCA injured wildlife site.

Graeme Coulson currently receives funding from Nakatomi, Parks Victoria, Phillip Island Nature Parks and ACT Environment, Planning and Sustainable Development Directorate.

Helena Bender received past funding from the following organisations to undertake PhD research that is drawn up and reported in this work: Holsworth Wildlife Fund, The Royal Automative Club of Victoria, New South Wales Road Traffic Authority, National Roads and Motorists’ Association Limited, Transport South Australia, The University of Melbourne (Department of Zoology and the Faculty of Science). She has received funding more recently from Nakatomi.

– ref. 10 million animals die on our roads each year. Here’s what works (and what doesn’t) to cut the toll – https://theconversation.com/10-million-animals-die-on-our-roads-each-year-heres-what-works-and-what-doesnt-to-cut-the-toll-222367

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Baker, Associate Professor, Communication Studies, Auckland University of Technology

The imminent demise of TVNZ’s Sunday program demonstrates the TV current affairs genre in New Zealand is on its last legs. The death knell was sounded back in 2015 when TV3 axed its nightly Campbell Live program, but this latest cut appears to spell the end.

Coupled with the earlier announcement that Warner Bros. Discovery will be shutting down its Newshub operation in June, the end of Sunday also represents a turning point for New Zealand’s broadcast media.

While it could be argued Sunday has not been as hard-hitting as past TV current affairs programs, these terminal signs still matter. All up, the proposals mean 20 hours of news and current affairs television per week will go from local screens.

In particular, long-form television current affairs has been a vital part of the overall broadcast news menu. It has allowed deeper analysis of events and issues, and often made news in the process. Its disappearance is a watershed moment in New Zealand media.

The birth of TV current affairs

The origins of long-form TV current affairs can be traced to Britain in 1953, when the BBC launched Panorama. Within a few years, the show was tackling the 1956 Suez crisis, setting the tone for stories of national and international importance.

Interviews would take time, and context was given in complex stories. It was all part of the BBC’s public service broadcasting remit, set out in its charter, to “inform, educate and entertain”.

Read more:
With the end of Newshub, the slippery slope just got steeper for NZ journalism and democracy

Panorama was joined by other programs – notably ITV’s World in Action and Channel 4’s Dispatches – which established the form and function of TV current affairs.

Such programs helped audiences understand current events, and often held politicians and the powerful to account. To take just one example, World In Action’s investigations in the 1980s helped expose what happened to the so-called Birmingham Six, one of the UK’s worst miscarriages of justice.

60 years of investigations

TV current affairs arrived in New Zealand with Compass in 1963, not long after the still-running Four Corners debuted on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1961. Compass was followed by Gallery in 1968.

This was the beginning of rigorous political interviews. These programs provided the opportunity for New Zealand stories to be told and seen from a New Zealand perspective.

By the 1970s, the local TV current affairs roster was well established, often dealing with controversial issues such as police brutality, industrial disputes and antiwar protests. The roster was later fleshed out with shows such as Foreign Correspondent and Eyewitness.

Read more:
Funding public interest journalism requires creative solutions. A tax rebate for news media could work

From the late 1980s, however, New Zealand broadcasting was progressively deregulated and commercialised. TVNZ became a “state-owned enterprise”, directed to run like a business and turn a profit. Ultimately, a program’s success relied not only ratings, but also on whether it earned more than it cost to make.

The commercial era saw the rise of a new kind of personality-driven TV current affairs: the nightly Holmes show and the weekly 60 Minutes and 20/20 (local versions of international franchises).

Critics viewed the trend towards softer and often tabloid material as representing a wholesale loss in quality. But quality long-form current affairs still survived in the form of Frontline and its successor, Assignment.

That era lasted into the early 2000s. Sunday picked up the long-form mantle in 2002, replacing the local version of 60 Minutes.

New model needed

As broadcasting grew more commercial, research has shown coverage of more serious subjects declined. At the same time, “infotainment”, human interest, celebrity and entertainment news increased.

But free-to-air broadcasting has been operating under economic constraint for decades now. With its advertising model broken by the digital economy, and viewers migrating to streaming services, expensive long-form current affairs formats have been harder to justify financially.

Public funding for current affairs, mostly via NZ On Air, has supported Māori and Pacific-focused programs The Hui (TV3) and Tagata Pasifika (TVNZ), as well as weekend interview show Q+A (TVNZ).

Read more:
First Newshub, now TVNZ: the news funding model is broken – but this would fix it

The Hui, in particular, has investigated important issues such as abuse in state care. But with its fortunes tied to Newshub’s, the show’s future is also uncertain.

While the economics of TV current affairs are changing rapidly, the kinds of issues needing coverage are more urgent than ever – climate change and the impact of artificial intelligence, to name just two.

According to TVNZ, closing Sunday is still only a proposal. If there is any room for negotiation, then, the broadcaster should seriously consider any viable alternative.

One option might be to retain a core team of investigative journalists and to develop a new model to deliver their stories, perhaps online and through the TVNZ+ digital platform. Because to lose what remains of TV current affairs will be a serious loss to journalism and to New Zealand.

Sarah Baker does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The demise of TVNZ’s Sunday spells the end of long-form current affairs – just when we need it most – https://theconversation.com/the-demise-of-tvnzs-sunday-spells-the-end-of-long-form-current-affairs-just-when-we-need-it-most-225461

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julaine Allan, Associate Professor, Mental Health and Addiction, Rural Health Research Institute, Charles Sturt University

X owner Elon Musk recently described using small amounts of ketamine “once every other week” to manage the “chemical tides” that cause his depression. He says it’s helpful to get out of a “negative frame of mind”.

This has caused a range of reactions in the media, including on X (formerly Twitter), from strong support for Musk’s choice of treatment, to allegations he has a drug problem.

But what exactly is ketamine? And what is its role in the treatment of depression?

It was first used as an anaesthetic

Ketamine is a dissociative anaesthetic used in surgery and to relieve pain.

At certain doses, people are awake but are disconnected from their bodies. This makes it useful for paramedics, for example, who can continue to talk to injured patients while the drug blocks pain but without affecting the person’s breathing or blood flow.

Ketamine is also used to sedate animals in veterinary practice.

Ketamine is a mixture of two molecules, usually referred to a S-Ketamine and R-Ketamine.

S-Ketamine, or esketamine, is stronger than R-Ketamine and was approved in 2019 in the United States under the drug name Spravato for serious and long-term depression that has not responded to at least two other types of treatments.

Read more:
FDA approves promising new drug, called esketamine, for treatment-resistant depression

Ketamine is thought to change chemicals in the brain that affect mood.
While the exact way ketamine works on the brain is not known, scientists think it changes the amount of the neurotransmitter glutamate and therefore changes symptoms of depression.

How was it developed?

Ketamine was first synthesised by chemists at the Parke Davis pharmaceutical company in Michigan in the United States as an anaesthetic. It was tested on a group of prisoners at Jackson Prison in Michigan in 1964 and found to be fast acting with few side effects.

The US Food and Drug Administration approved ketamine as a general anaesthetic in 1970. It is now on the World Health Organization’s core list of essential medicines for health systems worldwide as an anaesthetic drug.

In 1994, following patient reports of improved depression symptoms after surgery where ketamine was used as the anaesthetic, researchers began studying the effects of low doses of ketamine on depression.

The first clinical trial results were published in 2000. In the trial, seven people were given either intravenous ketamine or a salt solution over two days. Like the earlier case studies, ketamine was found to reduce symptoms of depression quickly, often within hours and the effects lasted up to seven days.

Over the past 20 years, researchers have studied the effects of ketamine on treatment resistant depression, bipolar disorder, post-traumatic sress disorder obsessive-compulsive disorder, eating disorders and for reducing substance use, with generally positive results.

One study in a community clinic providing ketamine intravenous therapy for depression and anxiety found the majority of patients reported improved depression symptoms eight weeks after starting regular treatment.

Read more:
Ketamine injections for depression? A new study shows promise, but it’s one of many options

While this might sound like a lot of research, it’s not. A recent review of ketamine research conducted in the past 30 years found only 22 ketamine studies involving a total of 2,336 patients worldwide. In comparison, in 2021 alone, there were 1,489 studies being conducted on cancer drugs.

Is ketamine prescribed in Australia?

Even though the research results on ketamine’s effectiveness are encouraging, scientists still don’t really know how it works. That’s why it’s not readily available from GPs in Australia as a standard depression treatment. Instead, ketamine is mostly used in specialised clinics and research centres.

However, the clinical use of ketamine is increasing. Spravato nasal spray was approved by the Australian Therapuetic Goods Administration (TGA) in 2021. It must be administered under the direct supervision of a health-care professional, usually a psychiatrist.

Spravato dosage and frequency varies for each person. People usually start with three to six doses over several weeks to see how it works, moving to fortnightly treatment as a maintenance dose. The nasal spray costs between A$600 and $900 per dose, which will significantly limit many people’s access to the drug.

Ketamine can be prescribed “off-label” by GPs in Australia who can prescribe schedule 8 drugs. This means it is up to the GP to assess the person and their medication needs. But experts in the drug recommend caution because of the lack of research into negative side-effects and longer-term effects.

What about its illicit use?

Concern about use and misuse of ketamine is heightened by highly publicised deaths connected to the drug.

Ketamine has been used as a recreational drug since the 1970s. People report it makes them feel euphoric, trance-like, floating and dreamy. However, the amounts used recreationally are typically higher than those used to treat depression.

Information about deaths due to ketamine is limited. Those that are reported are due to accidents or ketamine combined with other drugs. No deaths have been reported in treatment settings.

Reducing stigma

Depression is the third leading cause of disability worldwide and effective treatments are needed.

Seeking medical advice about treatment for depression is wiser than taking Musk’s advice on which drugs to use.

However, Musk’s public discussion of his mental health challenges and experiences of treatment has the potential to reduce stigma around depression and help-seeking for mental health conditions.

Read more:
Ketamine can rapidly reduce symptoms of PTSD and depression, new study finds

Julaine Allan receives funding from the Australian Government to conduct research on mental health and substance use interventions, treatments and outcomes.

– ref. Elon Musk says ketamine can get you out of a ‘negative frame of mind’. What does the research say? – https://theconversation.com/elon-musk-says-ketamine-can-get-you-out-of-a-negative-frame-of-mind-what-does-the-research-say-226223

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Hortle, Research Fellow, Tasmanian Policy Exchange, University of Tasmania

The billboards are fading in the harsh sun. Antony Green is doing his vocal warm-up exercises. The 2024 Tasmanian election campaign is almost done and it’s now over to the voters.

The five-week campaign has been largely uninspiring but not without notable moments, from wildcard independents to promises of the world’s largest chocolate fountain.

So what’s the state of play going into election day? Which announcements have cut through, and what’s been lost in the flood of promises? And of course, what might we prefer to forget?

Read more:
Dire polls for Labor in Tasmania and Queensland with elections upcoming

The key players

Tasmania has five electorates: Bass, Braddon, Clark, Franklin, and Lyons. Each of these will elect seven members to the lower house for the first time since 1998, when each electorate was reduced to five seats.

Jeremy Rockliff is leader of the Liberal Party (there’s no Coalition down south), and has been premier since April 2022.

He’s had a rough ride. There have been several cabinet reshuffles, and he’s been forced to govern in minority since May 2023, when two of his MPs quit the party to sit on the crossbench. He called the election in a bid to re-establish his parliamentary majority.

In the opposite camp, Rebecca White is leader of the Labor Party, and will be hoping to avoid her third straight electoral defeat. Like Rockliff, the past few years haven’t been smooth sailing for White and Labor.

She resigned as party leader after the 2021 election defeat and was replaced by David O’Byrne. However, O’Byrne was forced to quit three weeks later following a sexual harassment claim, and White was re-elected as leader. She and Labor have struggled to cut through during the election campaign.

Rosalie Woodruff is the leader of the Greens, which have long been the third party in Tasmania. Woodruff took over from Cassy O’Connor in July 2023, but is something of an unknown quantity, with a lower public profile than previous Greens leaders.

Here’s where things get interesting. This election will see the highest number of independents (29) contesting a Tasmanian election for decades.

While there are too many to list them all, ones to keep an eye on include:

• John Tucker and Lara Alexander (the Liberal MPs who quit in 2023)

• David O’Byrne (former Labor leader)

• Kristie Johnson (a sitting independent MP)

• Sue Hickey (former Hobart Lord Mayor, former Liberal then independent MP).

Finally, there’s the Jacqui Lambie Network (JLN), which is running candidates in all seats except Clark. The JLN made the controversial decision not to release any policies, instead pitching themselves as a group of down-to-earth people that wants to “keep the bastards honest”.

Read more:
Tasmania is going to an early election. Will the country’s last Liberal state be no more?

Which issues have dominated the campaign?

Polling during the campaign showed the top concerns for most Tasmanian voters were health care and cost of living. Labor and Liberal both put forward several measures aimed at these areas, among others.

Millions of dollars have been promised with the enthusiasm of a discount carpet warehouse closing-down sale – but this hasn’t necessarily helped win votes. In fact, this sort of policy bonanza can confuse and overwhelm voters.

In an ideal world, we would each decide our vote by comparing each candidate or party’s full set of policies, and figuring out which one best matches our own values. But who has time for that?

In reality, people typically vote based on a combination of other things, including specific, controversial issues, eye-catching headlines, and candidates’ personalities. This is how democracies tend to work all over the world.

So what were the things that might have shifted votes during this campaign?

The long-running divide in Tasmanian society between environmental conservation and economic development remains, meaning voters may decide whom to side with depending on each party’s stance on salmon farming or the proposed new AFL stadium, for example.

Some influential issues are hyper-local, such as a long-closed community pool.

There have been a few “headline grabbers” during the campaign, designed to stick in the minds of undecided voters. The best example of this is the Liberals’ promise to build the world’s largest chocolate fountain if elected. Labor’s refrain “Tasmanian prices for Tasmanian power” is also in the mix.

The final thing that may sway voters is what Dennis Denuto would call “the vibe” around candidates.

Rockliff has benefited from the perception that he’s a “nice guy” in tough circumstances, while White has struggled to separate her brand from the O’Byrne controversy and earlier Labor factional fighting.

The Greens have been doorknocking hard, particularly in the state’s northwest. That personal contact may help them get a new candidate across the line.

The JLN has leaned heavily on their namesake’s forceful “battler” personality. Each independent has tried to build their own brand, typically by focusing on a specific issue or spruiking their ability to stand up to the major parties. It’s tricky to tell how successful these efforts have been – the proof will be in the votes.

The lowlights

There have been a few lowlights during the campaign. First prize goes to the fake JLN site set up by the Liberal Party. This particular piece of skulduggery is not against electoral law, but it’s certainly against the spirit of democracy. It might not have the desired effect: this type of negative campaigning can turn voters away from the offending party.

Another disappointing aspect of the campaign was Rockliff and White repeatedly ruling out offering ministries or policy concessions to independents, the JLN, or the Greens in exchange for their support. This is due to the perceived failure of previous power-sharing deals in Tasmania.

Read more:
The Jacqui Lambie Network is the latest victim of ‘cybersquatting’. It’s the tip of the iceberg of negative political ads online

Rockliff even proposed that MPs who quit their party should be booted out of parliament and replaced with a candidate from the same party – a stunt that ignores that our political system is based on candidates being elected to represent a constituency, not a party.

Rockliff and White may come to regret their strident rhetoric when the votes are counted. It looks very unlikely either party will win the 16 seats needed to form a majority government.

Robert Hortle does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. From power prices to chocolate fountains, the Tasmanian election campaign has been a promise avalanche – https://theconversation.com/from-power-prices-to-chocolate-fountains-the-tasmanian-election-campaign-has-been-a-promise-avalanche-225783

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chloe Lucas, Lecturer and Research Fellow, School of Geography, Planning, and Spatial Sciences. Coordinator, Education for Sustainability Tasmania, University of Tasmania

Every day, more children discover they are living in a climate crisis. This makes many children feel sad, anxious, angry, powerless, confused and frightened about what the future holds.

The climate change burden facing young people is inherently unfair. But they have the potential to be the most powerful generation when it comes to creating change.

Research and public debate so far has largely failed to engage with the voices and opinions of children – instead, focusing on the views of adults.
Our research set out to change this.

We asked 1,500 children to tell us what they wanted to know about climate change. The results show climate action, rather than the scientific cause of the problem, is their greatest concern. It suggests climate change education in schools must become more holistic and empowering, and children should be given more opportunities to shape the future they will inherit.

Questions of ‘remarkable depth’

In Australia, research shows 43% of children aged 10 to 14 are worried about the future impact of climate change, and one in four believe the world will end before they grow up.

Children are often seen as passive, marginal actors in the climate crisis. Evidence of an intergenerational divide is also emerging. Young people report feeling unheard and betrayed by older generations when it comes to climate change.

Our study examined 464 questions about climate change submitted to the Curious Climate Schools program in Tasmania in 2021 and 2022. The questions were asked by primary and high school students aged 7 to 18.

The children’s questions reveal a remarkable depth of consideration about climate change.

Read more:
How well does the new Australian Curriculum prepare young people for climate change?

Kids are thinking globally

The impacts of climate change were discussed in 38% of questions. About 10% of questions asked about impacts on places, such as:

With the rate of climate change, what will the Earth be like when I’m an adult?

What does the melting of glaciers in Antarctica mean for Tassie (Tasmania) and our climate?

These questions demonstrate children’s understanding of the global scale of the climate crisis and their concern about places close to home.

How climate change will affect humans accounted for 12% of questions. Impacts on animals and biodiversity were the subject of 9% of questions. Examples include:

Will climate change make us live elsewhere, eg underwater or in space?

What species may become extinct due to climate change, which species could adapt to changing conditions and have we already seen this begin to happen?

Approximately 7% of questions asked about ice melting and/or sea-level rise, while 3% asked about extreme weather or disasters.

‘What can we do?’

Action on climate change was the most frequent theme, discussed in 40% of questions. Some questions involved the kinds of action needed and others focused on the challenges in taking action. They include:

How would you make rapid climate improvements without sacrificing industry and finance?

Around 16% of questions asked about, or implied, who was responsible for climate action. Governments and politicians were the largest group singled out. Other questions asked about the responsibilities of schools, communities, states, countries and individuals. Examples include:

What can I do as a 12-year-old to help the planet, and why will these actions help us?

If the world knows about climate change, why has not much happened?

Some 20% of questions suggested action by specific sectors of the economy. This included stopping using fossil fuels and moving to renewable energy or nuclear power. Some suggested action related to food, agriculture or fisheries.

Existential worries

In 27% of questions, students raised existential concerns about climate change. This reveals the urgency and frustration many children feel.

The largest group of these questions (15%) asked for predictions of future events. Some 5% of questions implied the planet, or humanity, was doomed. They included:

Will all the reefs die?

How long before climate change will destroy the Earth?

How long will we be able to survive on our planet if we do nothing to try to slow down/reverse climate change?

Why is Earth getting hot?

Scientific questions about climate change made up 25% of the total. The largest group related to the causes and physical processes, such as:

What causes the Earth to get hotter due to climate change?

Would our world be the same now if the Industrial Revolution hadn’t happened?

How do they know the climate and percentage of gases, such as methane, in the 1800s?

What all this means

Our analysis indicates children are very concerned about how climate change affects the things and places they care about. Children also want to know how to contribute to solutions – either through their own actions or influencing adults, industries and governments. Children asked fewer questions about the scientific evidence for climate change.

So what are the implications of this?

Research shows that where climate change is taught in schools, it is primarily represented as a scientific and environmental issue, without focus on the social and political causes and challenges.

While children need information about the science of global warming, our research suggests this is not enough. Climate change should be integrated into all subjects in the curriculum, from social studies to maths to food.

Teachers should also be trained to understand climate challenges themselves, and to identify and support students suffering from climate distress.

And children must be given opportunities to get involved in shaping the future. Governments and industry should commit to listening to children’s concerns about climate change, and acting on them.

Read more:
‘I tend to be very gentle’: how teachers are navigating climate change in the classroom

Chloe Lucas received funding from the Centre for Marine Socioecology, the University of Tasmania, and the Tasmanian Climate Change Office for the research and engagement reported in this article, as part of the Curious Climate Schools program. She is also funded by the Australian Research Council. Chloe is a member of the Centre for Marine Socioecology, the Institute of Australian Geographers and the International Environmental Communication Association, and is a member of the Editorial Board of Australian Geographer.

Charlotte Earl-Jones received funding from the Centre for Marine Socioecology, the University of Tasmania, and the Tasmanian Climate Change Office for the research and engagement reported in this article, as part of the Curious Climate Schools program. She is also funded by Westpac Scholars Trust and the Australian Commonwealth Government Research Training Program. She is a member of the Institute of Australian Geographers.

Gabi Mocatta received funding from the Centre for Marine Socioecology, the University of Tasmania and the Tasmanian Climate Change Office (now re-named Renewables, Climate and Future Industries Tasmania) for the research and engagement reported here. She is also President of the Board of the International Environmental Communication Association.

Gretta Pecl receives funding from the Australian Research Council, Department of Agriculture Water and the Environment, Department of Primary Industries NSW, Department of Premier and Cabinet (Tasmania), the Fisheries Research & Development Corporation, and has received travel funding support from the Australian government for participation in the IPCC process.

Kim Beasy received funding from the Centre for Marine Socioecology, the University of Tasmania, and the Tasmanian Climate Change Office for the research and engagement reported in this article, as part of the Curious Climate School program. She is a member of the Centre of Marine Socioecology and the Australian Association of Environmental Education.

Rachel Kelly receives funding from the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation, and the Centre for Marine Socioecology at the University of Tasmania.

– ref. ‘How long before climate change will destroy the Earth?’: research reveals what Australian kids want to know about our warming world – https://theconversation.com/how-long-before-climate-change-will-destroy-the-earth-research-reveals-what-australian-kids-want-to-know-about-our-warming-world-226122

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Wardlaw, Research Associate, University of Tasmania

Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests are globally significant. They accumulate carbon faster than any other natural forest ecosystem in the world.

But climate change is making it harder for these forests to remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it in wood. During heatwaves, they stop removing carbon altogether and release it instead.

What will happen as heatwaves occur more frequently? Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests will become carbon sources more and more of the time. As temperatures continue to rise, the forests will reach a “tipping point”. When this happens the forests will no longer be able to store carbon and mass tree deaths will occur.

My new report released today makes recommendations about preparing for this. There are serious implications for greenhouse gas emissions, conservation and wood production. We cannot ignore the risks of a warming climate. There is a lot we can do now to prepare and make future forests more resilient.

Read more:
In heatwave conditions, Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests no longer absorb carbon

Forests of immense value

The Tasmania Wilderness World Heritage Area is ranked number one of all UNESCO sites globally for taking carbon out of the atmosphere and storing it. That’s because western Tasmania’s high rainfall and cool temperatures are ideal for forest growth.

These tall eucalypt forests contribute greatly to Tasmania’s claim to net-zero emissions in its greenhouse gas accounts.

The forests have produced most of the high-quality sawlogs supplying Tasmania’s sawmilling industry for more than a century.

They also provide unique and long-lasting habitat for wildlife. Large logs support diverse communities of insects and fungi.

The forest supports unique tourism experiences and an emerging opportunity for “big tree tourism”.

Tall eucalypt forests are dominated by one or two or three species of Eucalyptus:

• E. obliqua (messmate or stringy bark)
• E. regnans (swamp gum or mountain ash)
• E. delegatensis (alpine ash or gum-top stringybark).

Preparing for tipping points

As temperatures continue to rise, many ecosystems are predicted to reach a tipping point. This is the point at which the ecosystem can no longer function and is eventually replaced by a different ecosystem.

Many plant-based ecosystems, mostly in the tropics, are expected to reach a tipping point within three decades. Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests may be among them because they share similarities with tropical rainforest.

World Heritage values would be jeopardised, huge amounts of stored carbon would be released, and biodiversity dependent on the tall trees would be threatened. So there is an urgent need to begin preparing now for a future tipping point in these forests.

The main ambition of the measures outlined in my report released today is to restore forested areas after the original forest is lost – or damaged irreversibly. The new forests would be grown from the same species of eucalypts but the seed sown would regenerate forests better suited to the new climate than the original forest.

To achieve this ambition, we need to decide what features of tall eucalypt forests we want to retain in future forests. Capacity for rapid growth after disturbance would be high on the list of those features.

We also need to know what features need to change to make the forests better suited to a new climate. Increasing the optimum temperature for carbon uptake is the top priority.

Producing climate-ready seed for sowing

In new research, soon to be published, I reviewed several studies that compared the features of Tasmanian tall eucalypt forests with other forests on the Australian mainland.

I wanted to understand why Tasmania’s forests were so sensitive to heatwaves and what, if anything, could be done to lessen their impact. I found the poor response to heatwaves had more to do with the local conditions than anything else. The forests are accustomed to high rainfall and a narrow temperature range.

Could we speed up natural selection to help Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests adapt to a new, warmer climate?

Previous research has shown forests can be managed to speed up natural selection and produce seed better suited to new climates. But this is only feasible in forests managed for wood production.

We need to find out whether natural selection can increase the optimum temperature for carbon uptake by the forest, and if so, by how much.

We need to ensure the right policy settings are in place. A policy to end logging of native forests, for example, would rule out speeding up natural selection.

And we need to think and plan what to do if tall eucalypt forests in reserves are lost or irreparably damaged. Should we try to restore new generations of tall eucalypt forests, and if so, how?

Finally, community support is required. People need to understand what we are trying to achieve. They can also bring new ideas about how to make tall eucalypt forests more resilient.

Timely, accurate, trusted, and accessible information will be crucial. Ongoing monitoring of the tall eucalypt forest in the upper reaches of Tasmania’s Huon Valley can provide much of this information.

Future forests

Clearly, humanity must cut greenhouse gas emissions and limit global warming. But some climate impacts are now unavoidable and we need to be prepared.

As heatwaves intensify, Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests will reach a tipping point. Trees will die. The forest we know today will be lost forever.

But if we are prepared, we can ensure another forest takes its place. With our help, future generations of tall eucalypt forests can still exist – forests better suited to Tasmania’s new climate.

Read more:
Hard to kill: here’s why eucalypts are survival experts

I receive funding from the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network.

– ref. Tasmania’s tall eucalypt forests will be wiped out by heatwaves unless we step in to help them – https://theconversation.com/tasmanias-tall-eucalypt-forests-will-be-wiped-out-by-heatwaves-unless-we-step-in-to-help-them-224335

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Bunce, Honarary Professor in Environmental Genomics, University of Otago

New Zealand’s rivers are not in a good shape. The Ministry for the Environment’s latest freshwater report shows an estimated 45% of total river length is no longer suitable for swimming and 48% is partially inaccessible to endangered migratory fish.

The science is clear. Inputs of nitrogen and phosphorous, coupled with invasive species, stress some rivers to the point where they can’t sustain healthy ecosystems. The state of rivers and groundwater also impacts on the quality of drinking water.

The government’s intention to replace the national policy statement on freshwater management brings the topic of freshwater quality back into the national spotlight.

But irrespective of political debates, given the perilous state of New Zealand’s freshwater, effective monitoring based on sound evidence is needed in order to weigh trade-offs and understand if we are managing rivers sustainably.

This is where environmental DNA (eDNA) comes in.

Aotearoa New Zealand will always need multiple methods to monitor the thousands of rivers and streams across the country, but we hope our new eDNA method will help by making freshwater monitoring faster, cheaper, more comprehensive and better suited to countrywide surveys.

Read more:
It sounds like science fiction. But we can now sample water to find the DNA of every species living there

Rivers are full of life

The life found in New Zealand’s rivers is a vital component of their health. Microbial diversity is continually degrading and recycling nutrients that sustain new life and maintain river health.

Whether fish, frog or falcon, all organisms shed bits of genetic material into the environment. These DNA “breadcrumbs” provide vital clues about what is living in the area. We can test all these DNA signals without actually ever seeing an animal.

The same ultra-sensitive technology is already being used to detect COVID in wastewater by tracking SARS-CoV-2 variants and concentrations of the virus.

Until eDNA was developed, the primary method we had to monitor river health involved catching (often killing) and sorting thousands of invertebrates or electric fishing. Such methods are time consuming, costly, require specialist expertise and typically need five-year windows to detect a change in river health.

The game changer with eDNA is its ability to detect many species at once, employing an easy-to-use (filtration) sampling method. This opens up a raft of possible applications.

The Department of Conservation is using eDNA to detect new populations of endangered galaxid fish and the Ministry for Primary Industries is using it to track the spread of the freshwater golden clam that invaded the Waikato river.

But there is much more to eDNA than detecting a favourite (or least favourite) animal. The real shift is the ability to read eDNA barcodes across the “tree of life”.

‘Seeing’ entire ecosystems

Rather than focusing on just a few select indicator species, eDNA helps us to consider the ecosystem more holistically, such as the example below from the Waikato River, from a single litre of filtered water.

In a partnership between the eDNA company Wilderlab, the Department of Conservation, the Ministry for the Environment and regional councils, we harnessed this holistic ecosystem data to develop a new index to measure river health called the Taxon-Independent Community Index, or TICI.

Using regularly monitored river sites across Aotearoa New Zealand, we focused on 3,000 eDNA barcodes from bacteria, fungi, plants and animals that are indicators of river nutrification.

The TICI index is a score from 60 to 140, based on which of the 3,000 barcode signatures are present. Some barcodes push the dial in a positive direction, others nudge it negative.

Raw DNA data can be complex. The TICI index distils the genetic code into a metric that people can more easily engage with. From zero river samples profiled using eDNA in 2019, we now have more than 50,000 eDNA records, including 16,000 TICI scores. Collectively, this has generated one of the most powerful global eDNA datasets, and opens a number of new applications.

Teichelmann Creek in the predator-free Perth Valley (in South Westland) currently tops the leader board with a TICI score of 135.03 (pristine). At the other end of the table, Papanui Stream in the Hawke’s Bay generated a TICI of 68.05 (very poor).

Where to next for eDNA?

We envisage that eDNA-based indicators, like the TICI index, will provide a practical way for people to track health in their local rivers.

Communities are already engaging with this tool through the Wai Tuwhera o te Taiao programme. Farmers are getting on board and eDNA techniques feature in the futures thinking of central government.

Read more:
Consumers want NZ farmers to comply with regulations — better monitoring and transparency would help to build trust

In a 2019 report on New Zealand’s environmental reporting system, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment identified deficiencies and fragmentation in New Zealand’s environmental data gathering and reporting, including for freshwater. We argue that eDNA gets us a step closer to fixing some of these issues.

Using the eDNA toolkit it is within our technical (and budgetary) reach for regular monitor of all rivers in Aotearoa to help prioritise where, when and how much management (or restoration) is needed.

And there is more to come on the eDNA monitoring front, including methods of sampling eDNA from the air, household taps, shipping containers and around aquaculture facilities.

Michael Bunce has received funding from Australia & New Zealand on the use of eDNA technologies, including to work with community groups as part of the Wai Tuwhera o Te Taiao programme at the Environmental Protection Authority. He is currently Chief Science advisor at the Department of Conservation.

Simon Jarman currently works with eDNA Frontiers and Wilderlab, companies which offer fee-for-service eDNA services.

– ref. We need faster, better ways to monitor NZ’s declining river health – using environmental DNA can help – https://theconversation.com/we-need-faster-better-ways-to-monitor-nzs-declining-river-health-using-environmental-dna-can-help-225564

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yuan-Sen Ting, Associate Professor, Astrophysics, Australian National University

How stable are planetary systems? Will Earth and its seven siblings always continue in their steady celestial paths, or might we one day be randomly ejected from our cosmic home?

Physicists understand the rules that govern the orbits of two celestial bodies, but as soon as a third is added (let alone a fourth, fifth, or hundredth) the dynamics become far more complex. Unpredictable instabilities arise, in which an object may be randomly ejected into space or fall into its host star.

The so-called “three-body problem” has troubled scientists for centuries (and more recently forms the premise of a bestselling series of science fiction novels and a new Netflix adaptation). One obstacle to understanding it has been that we know relatively little about how common it is for such catastrophic instabilities to arise.

In a new study published in Nature, we and our colleagues have shed some light on this question. In a survey of nearby stars, we found as many as one in dozen pairs of stars may have devoured a planet, likely because the planet developed a “wobble” in its orbit and fell into the star.

Studying twins

Our study found at least 8% of pairs of stars in our sample show chemical anomalies indicating one star had engulfed planetary material that once orbited it.

To detect this subtle signal, we had to rule out other possible explanations for these chemical patterns. So we focused on “twin stars”, known to have been born at the same time from the same mix of materials.

This approach can eliminate confounding factors, in the same way that studies of twins are sometimes used in sociological or medical research.

The result comes from a survey of twin stars named C3PO which one of the authors (Ting) initiated in the US, and Liu and others later joined.

Our team collected an exquisite sample of spectroscopic data from 91 pairs of twin stars – many times larger than similar studies conducted in the past.

We found that some stars differed from their twins, showing a distinct chemical pattern with higher amounts of certain elements like iron, nickel and titanium compared to others such as carbon and oxygen. These differences indicate strong evidence that the star has ingested a planet.

Instabilities may be unexpectedly common

If a host star engulfs one or more members of a planetary system, it suggests some instability in the dynamics of the system must have occurred.

Simulations suggest such instability may be common in the early life of a planetary system – the first 100 million years or so. However, any traces of planets engulfed during this early period would be undetectable in the stars we observed which are billions of years old.

Read more:
New evidence for an unexpected player in Earth’s multimillion-year climate cycles: the planet Mars

This suggests the chemical anomalies we saw were caused by more recent instabilities, causing the stars to consume some planets or planetary material.

This revelation is not entirely unexpected. Theorists who study planetary dynamics, including our co-author Bertram Bitsch, have noted that many planetary systems are known to be unstable, especially among systems with a kind of planet called a “super-Earth” – somewhat larger planets than Earth but far smaller than giants like Jupiter.

Systems including a super-Earth planet may be particularly unstable. The gravitational tug-of-war between the host star and its massive planets might generate instability.

A delicate balance

Our study encourages us to reconsider our place in the universe. While we take stability for granted in our Solar System, this may not be normal throughout the cosmos.

Our study does not suggest we are likely to see such instabilities in our own Solar System. Even with our new results, however, it is important to recognise that planet engulfment and instability still occur only in a minority of cases.

We hope our study will inspire more people to study planetary systems and their relationship with their host stars. Our understanding of the dynamics of multiple-body systems is still very much incomplete.

As we continue to explore the mysteries of the cosmos, studies like this remind us of the delicate balance that allows life to thrive on Earth and the potential fragility of our cosmic home.

Read more:
The Three-Body Problem: Liu Cixin’s extraterrestrial novel is a heady blend of politics, ethics, physics and Chinese history

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Planet cannibalism is common, says cosmic ‘twin study’ – https://theconversation.com/planet-cannibalism-is-common-says-cosmic-twin-study-225990

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kimberley Baxter, Research Fellow, Centre for Childhood Nutrition Research, Queensland University of Technology

Feeding babies and toddlers can be challenging at the best of times. But when families can’t afford enough food, let alone the recommended range of different coloured vegetables, or iron-rich meats, it’s tougher still.

In our recently published research, parents told us how much effort they put in to feeding children when there is little money.

They also told us how the ever-present juggle of budgets and the realities of family life strained relationships and increased their mental load.

Read more:
‘I’m scared we won’t have money for food’: how children cope with food insecurity in Australia

Living in poverty

In the cost of living crisis, one in six Australian children live in poverty. More families than ever are seeking help from food banks.

So we asked parents what it was like to feed young children when money was tight. We interviewed 29 Australian parents with at least one child between six months and three years old. Most had an income around or below the poverty line.

The average age of parents was 32 years, including 28 mothers and one father. This is what they told us.

Read more:
‘Successful failures’ – the problem with food banks

Family tensions rise

Families’ financial position was precarious, with little buffer to cope with more financial strain. One parent told us:

We’re still on the one income […] We try and get a lot of free vegetables from the food banks and whatnot. We’ve borrowed money in the past, but the main thing we do is make sure [our child’s] food is fine.

This uncertainty about money flowed into relationship tension, and stress about food waste and the food bill. Another parent, who said they had lost weight due to not eating proper meals, told us:

Things have been tense, and [my partner’s] pretty upset about outgoing money for [food …].

There was also strain when young children created a mess with food or threw it on the floor:

But then my partner’s like ‘why are you buying that bunch of bananas? Most of it’s, like, in his hair.’ As trivial as it might sound to some households, [it] caused a lot of stress in ours.

Read more:
How many Australians are going hungry? We don’t know for sure, and that’s a big part of the problem

Making trade-offs and sacrifices

Parents described feeding the family as a difficult balance. They put the needs of children and partners first. They often hid their sacrifices from their partners. One parent told us:

My partner doesn’t miss out anywhere near as much as what I do. He doesn’t know that either. […] But there is many, many, many days where I will go without a meal.

Read more:
Are home-brand foods healthy? If you read the label, you may be pleasantly surprised

The unseen mental load

Not having enough money increased the load caused by the thinking, planning and emotional strain of getting enough food to feed everyone. One participant said:

It’s always there in the back of my mind […], what would I do if I really didn’t have anything left to feed all of us.

Read more:
We asked same-gender couples how they share the ‘mental load’ at home. The results might surprise you

Resilience and creativity

Parents described multiple strategies to make the most of the food they had.

We will now go to the fruit and vegetable shop that’s quite far away from our house because it’s cheaper to buy it in bulk [… We] pre-plan, absolutely, and meal plan.

Despite hardships, parents adapted to challenges by being creative with food and cooking. One parent said:

In the last food parcel I got there was this big bag of polenta, […] you don’t want to be wasteful […]. I’ll look at […] simple recipes that have that ingredient […] and go from there.

Parents valued mealtimes as family time, to connect and share. Parents tried to make the most of their situation and remember that when it comes to meals, “basic doesn’t mean bad”.

Read more:
Are we overthinking family meals? 5 realistic tips to ease the pressure

What does this mean for supporting families?

Health professionals working with parents need to know many struggle to feed their family. It’s not just a matter of budgeting or cooking; parents already do that. The high mental load parents experience needs to be recognised. Programs and support should be accessible, brief and realistic.

Common advice, such as offering food many times and providing variety to children, may need to be adapted. Variety could be sourced from foods on special, and food waste reduced by offering small amounts of new foods at first.

We also need to ensure the food offered in childcare centres is adequate and healthy. Providing good-quality school meals would relieve the pressure on parents to supply a healthy lunchbox, or give money for the canteen. This would give all Australian children the chance to enjoy a variety of nutritious foods, regardless of their situation at home.

We would like to thank the families who so generously shared their time and stories with us. We also acknowledge our research team: Smita Nambiar-Mann, Robyn Penny and Danielle Gallegos.

Kimberley Baxter receives funding from a grant from the Children’s Hospital Foundation (Reference number WCCNR03). She is a
member of Dietitians Australia.

Rebecca Byrne receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Australian Research Council and the Children’s Hospital Foundation.

– ref. Feeding young kids on a budget? Parents say the mental load is crushing – https://theconversation.com/feeding-young-kids-on-a-budget-parents-say-the-mental-load-is-crushing-225350

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Leonora Risse, Associate Professor in Economics, University of Canberra

The Australian government wants to make sure its contracts – worth almost A$75 billion annually – don’t just deliver taxpayers value for money, but also promote gender equity.

Under proposed procurement policy changes announced earlier this month, large companies that wish to bid for government contracts will first have to meet some gender equality conditions.

How exactly will these measures work across Australia’s huge private sector, and what kind of an impact could they have?

Not a new idea

Federal tender processes – the way we try to award government contracts to the best possible providers – currently follow a set of Commonwealth procurement rules.

They must provide value for money, encourage competition and ensure that public funds are used in an “efficient, effective, economical and ethical” way.

Using tenders as a lever to achieve gender equality isn’t a new idea. It’s been recommended around the world, including by the OECD, the Asian Development Bank, and the World Bank Group.

The idea is for the government to use its “purchasing power” to incentivise – and in effect pressure – companies to take bolder steps toward achieving gender equality.

It’s a way to make sure the government’s direct efforts to promote gender equality aren’t being contradicted or undone elsewhere in the ways taxpayers’ money gets spent.

Existing requirements for Australian companies

In Australia, companies with at least 100 staff are already required to report to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) on six gender equality indicators. These indicators cover:

• workforce composition
• board composition
• the gender pay gap
• the availability of flexible working arrangements
• employee consultation processes
• policies on sexual harassment.

Bidding for some government contracts also requires companies to prove their compliance with the WGEA’s reporting processes. This involves downloading a certificate from the agency’s website.

Under the proposed changes, large companies with more than 500 employees will have to go beyond just reporting their numbers. If they want to remain in the running for government contracts, they will need to set and achieve measurable targets for their organisation across at least three indicators.

As Senator Katy Gallagher, the minister for finance, women and public service, explained while announcing the measures:

We in the government believe that shining a light on what’s actually happening in workplaces will put pressure on employers to rethink how they hire, promote and remunerate their staff.

Concerns about implementation

There are concerns around the practicality, market effects and reach of such a large-scale procurement policy. But there’s reason for us to be optimistic that Australia’s proposed design goes some way to mitigate these concerns.

1. Companies might not know how to conduct this analysis

Some might say there’s a risk these new requirements will be overly burdensome for companies not already conducting this kind of analysis. Such companies may lack the resources and technical knowledge to undertake extra steps.

It’s a fair concern. OECD research shows that a lack of clarity around “what to do” is the main challenge with gender equality procurement practices globally.

But a key strength of Australia’s proposal is that it leverages existing data collection processes that companies have already invested in, not adding burdensome extra demands.

There’s evidence for the effectiveness of this approach at a state level. In a 2022 pilot, the Western Australian government introduced a new requirement that bidders for its contracts prove their compliance with WGEA’s existing reporting procedures. An evaluation of the program found the new criteria made a big difference in sharpening businesses’ awareness and understanding of gender equality.

To further mitigate this risk, the Australian government can invest in providing informational guidance to businesses on what will be required of them. Victoria’s Commission for Gender Equality in the Public Sector has already done this for state government tenders.

2. Less competition for tenders?

If an extra layer of requirements squeezes out potential contenders in the business community, there’s a risk it could lessen competition for government contracts.

Economists have good reason to worry that weaker competition could push up the price of the products and services on offer, a loss for taxpayer value.

But Victoria’s social procurement framework helps us navigate this concern, prompting us to consider the ways “value for money” can mean more than just getting the cheapest price.

A broader definition of “value” would include progress toward social goals that provide significant benefit to the community – such as women’s equality.

Gender equity practices themselves are an often overlooked source of extra value, through the broader ideas, innovation and skill sets that diversity brings. These measures mean that a new pool of businesses can join the competitive mix.

3. Limited reach

For companies that don’t have to vie for government contracts, there’s a good chance these new measures won’t carry much weight. However, the government has other ways to put pressure on them.

Already, the WGEA has the power to publicly “name and shame” companies that don’t comply with legal requirements to submit their gender equality data.

Following the public spotlighting of companies with the biggest gender pay gaps, the “non-compliance” list calls out companies that aren’t even submitting their data at all.

Read more:
QANTAS pays women 37% less, Telstra and BHP 20%. Fifty years after equal pay laws, we still have a long way to go

There are some widely known names on the latest list: General Motors, Manly Warringah Sea Eagles Club, Sofitel Sydney Wentworth, and several Melbourne-based McDonald’s stores.

It’s unclear just how much being named on this list – or being deemed ineligible for government contracts – matters to these companies, or to their customers and clients.

It’s these companies – slipping through the cracks and outside of the scope of government contracts – that we will still need to focus on.

Procurement is just one lever in a multi-pronged strategy to achieve gender equality. Evaluations suggest some procurement strategies are unlikely to boost women’s bidding success unless the other deeper barriers that limit women’s involvement are also broken down. However, Australia’s existing investment in data collection means they could still be a powerful tool.

Leonora Risse has undertaken research for WGEA and made a submission to the review of the Workplace Gender Equality Act. She serves as an Expert Panel Member on gender pay equity for the Fair Work Commission. She receives research funding from the Trawalla Foundation and the Women’s Leadership Institute Australia. She is a member of the Economic Society of Australia and the Women in Economics Network.

– ref. Companies vying for government contracts could soon have to meet gender targets. Will we finally see real progress? – https://theconversation.com/companies-vying-for-government-contracts-could-soon-have-to-meet-gender-targets-will-we-finally-see-real-progress-226018

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By William Peterson, Adjunct Associate Professor, Auckland University of Technology

Between COVID, increasing production and transport costs, and changing audience tastes, the country’s largest arts festivals have had to rebadge themselves.

Festivals in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Perth have all undergone major cultural shifts – generally away from internationalism. The new kid on the block, Hobart’s Dark Mofo, offered a brew of Tasmanian winter funkiness. This vision was transferred to Melbourne’s Rising Festival in the wake of lockdowns.

This leaves the Adelaide Festival, founded in 1960, as the venerable grandparent of the region’s art festivals. Against the odds, the Adelaide Festival continues to offer a carefully curated program of international work, placing it in active conversation with domestically produced work.

From 2017-2023, festival co-directors Neil Armfield and Rachel Healy delivered a solid program that balanced high-culture spectacle with local work. Their curatorial choices required mutual approval, extensive travel to international festivals, and healthy doses of fortitude.

This year’s was the first full program curated by experienced international festival director Ruth Mackenzie, who has worked extensively in the UK and Europe. Under her watch, the festival placed high-quality Indigenous Australian work front and centre, while also showcasing superb offerings from the nation’s smaller companies.

On the international front, it brought big-ticket extravaganzas alongside outstanding theatre and dance groups from outside the mainstream.

I saw all the shows in this year’s theatre, music theatre, dance, dance theatre and opera categories. The music and visual arts program, as well as the events of Writer’s Week and WomAdelaide, were too much to take in simultaneously.

Indigenous Australia front and centre

When it comes to programming Indigenous work in the festival, pulling existing work off-the-shelf isn’t possible. And if it were, it wouldn’t be respectful or desirable.

Indigenous artists must be in positions of cultural and artistic leadership. Perhaps the greatest challenge is identifying and obtaining the financial resources from local and national funding bodies to support these artists.

Such work requires tact, solid community contacts and a deep knowledge of how funding and local systems work. Mackenzie, with the help of chief executive Kath M. Mainland and a capable festival staff, appears to have mastered these challenges.

This year’s festival featured outstanding works by Indigenous artists both local and national. For me, the standout was Baleen Moondjan, Stephen Page’s first commissioned work since leaving the helm of the Bangarra Dance Theatre.

Staged on a sandy ridge amid a row of whale bones extending to the water’s edge at Glenelg (Pathawilyangga) Beach, the work dramatised the transfer of faith, spirit and knowledge across the generations.

Masterfully blending music, dance, movement, song and text, it featured powerful performances from Elaine Crombie as Moondjan elder Gindara, and Zipporah Corser-Anu as her granddaughter.

Guuranda, written and directed by Jacob Boehme, was another breakthrough work of local Indigenous storytelling. Like Baleen Moondjan, it was commissioned by the festival and supported by donors to the Adelaide Festival First Nations Commissioning Program.

The creative team drew from consultations with four elders from Narungga Country, traditional owners of the Yorke Peninsula region. Their personal stories were connected to creation stories linked to physical features of the land.

These ancient, living stories were beautifully evoked through dance and song. Lyrics in Narungga, written by Jacob Boehme and Sonya Rankine, were powerfully delivered by Rankine, Warren Milera and the Narungga Family Choir.

Another standout was the Australian Dance Theatre’s production of Marrow, choreographed by Daniel Riley.

The starting point for this work, Riley noted in post-show remarks, was the heartbreak that followed the failure of the Indigenous Voice referendum in October.

This work evoked that disappointment viscerally. Dancers moved with difficulty, against obstacles, then walked backwards toward the audience. Later they were tossed about, as if responding to external blows.

The work’s trajectory suggested it is the power of the land itself that provides the strength to continue the fight.

A celebration of indie creators

Australian work has long had a strong presence in the festival. But this year’s programming brought festival audiences into unaccustomed spaces to experience work by some of the nation’s most consistently interesting non-mainstream companies.

No longer was the best work of our independent companies relegated almost exclusively to the nation’s two large Fringe festivals (Adelaide and Melbourne). Mackenzie had the curatorial confidence to program their work alongside audacious, high-brow, big-ticket extravaganzas from some of the world’s most famed directors and choreographers.

Among the local standouts was Private View by Adelaide’s Restless Dance Theatre. Their honest, gentle and confronting exploration of the ups and downs of love drew from the experiences and imaginations of the company’s troupe of dancers living with and without disabilities.

The work broke down barriers between audience and onlooker, able and disabled. It ended with many of us on our feet, dancing in a sea of confetti, joyous.

Another supremely memorable show from the independent sector was Grand Theft Theatre by Pony Cam, led by David Williams. With equal amounts of humour, charm and earnestness, highly skilled actor-dancers reminded us not just why we go to the theatre, but of how this experience can change lives.

It was a pleasure to also see work from VITALStatistix, a company that has been making high-quality, socially engaged work in Port Adelaide since 1984. The company’s I Hide in Bathrooms was staged in their home in the historic Waterside Worker’s Hall.

Writer/performer Astrid Pill offered a quirky, serious and moving take on life, partnership and death. We were left with an obvious but often overlooked truth: “We will all be left, and we will all leave.”

International fare

Mackenzie brought in work by four of the established superstars of the international festival circuit: directors Barry Kosky, Robert Lepage and Thomas Ostermeier, and choreographer Akram Khan.

She also programmed a deeply satisfying selection of carefully crafted, timely works by smaller companies, mostly based in Europe.

Among the outstanding works in this category were Qui a tué mon père (Who Killed my Father) and Antigone in the Amazon.

In the former, acclaimed German director Ostermeier teamed up with Édouard Louis in a theatrical adaptation of Louis’ novel. The writer himself narrated and enacted the story of his troubled relationship with his father, and of growing up gay in a conservative, working-class town a world away from Paris, condemned to “poverty, homophobia and conformity”. The work suggests the ultimate killers of his father were a long line of national leaders from Jacques Chirac to Emmanuel Macron.

For me, however, the most emotionally taxing but rewarding work of this year’s festival was Antigone in the Amazon. It’s a collaboration between the Belgium company NTGent and the Amazonian activist group Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST).

Brilliantly directed by Milo Rau, the work offers complex, multi-layered insights into the ongoing battle between Indigenous peoples in the Amazonian rainforest and those profiting from the land through deforestation and habitat destruction. The dramatic recreation of a well-known massacre of 17 civilians in the state of Pará on April 17 1996 was masterfully paired with Sophocles’ ancient Greek tragedy, Antigone.

Live action was cleverly linked to videos shot in remote locations in the Amazon. In turn, the onstage actors appeared in sequences shot on location with actors associated with the MST.

The result was an uncanny and powerful doubling. Drawing from Sophocles’ play, the work concludes with the tragic observation that “the killers and the killed” are “all one family”.

The festival’s three big-ticket items were clear crowd-pleasers.

Berlin-based Australian Barry Kosky offered up a dark, brilliant staging of Bertolt Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera. Actors moved up, down and across a massive black constructivist set, playing a game of cat and mouse that ends with the capture of arch-villain Macheath.

All are equally complicit in creating misery in this Weimar-era German classic, in which Kurt Weil’s lilting tunes contrast with Brecht’s hard-hitting lyrics to create that sense of estrangement Brecht is famous for.

Canadian director Robert Lepage’s The Nightingale and Other Fables came in two parts: a prelude of Russian folk tales, ingeniously presented with human bodies creating shadows, and a wildly extravagant staging of Igor Stravinsky’s short opera, The Nightingale.

Based on a Chinese classic tale, it tells the story of a nightingale (sung by soprano Yuliia Zasimova) who enchants the emperor and ultimately returns every night to sing to him.

Lepage’s staging relied on the charming and enchanting tradition of Vietnamese water puppetry. While puppets were manipulated from a pool of waist-deep water in the orchestra pit area, the stage of the Festival Theatre was filled to capacity with members of the State Opera of South Australia Chorus and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.

It was a thrilling production with inventive and ingenious puppets of all sizes, even if excessive in its visual splendour at times.

Choreographer Akram Khan’s work famously builds on the vocabulary of the traditional South Asian dance, Kathak, as a basis for his company’s unique style of contemporary dance. His work Jungle Book reimagined is far from the Disney version.

In this darkly dystopian world, climate change has brought devastation to the planet. Humans are useful only for what they can teach the remaining animals.

Though I found the use of text intrusive and confusing at times, the dance work involved all the extraordinary precision, speed, athleticism and full use of the body associated with Khan’s choreographic practice.

An old vision realised

The depth, breadth, range, grit and good-heartedness of this year’s festival made me reflect on one of the most infamous of international festival fails: the dismissal of artistic director Peter Sellars in November 2001, months prior to the opening of the 2002 Adelaide Festival.

Sellars, who met great success as a theatre and opera director in Europe and his native US, had a compelling vision for an Adelaide Festival. He wanted one that was international, yet intensely local, and which featured new Indigenous Australian work.

Unfortunately, for a range of reasons – not least of which was a lack of understanding of how things work in Australia – Sellars was sent packing.

Some 22 years later, we have a festival that in many respects realises Sellars’ three-pronged vision. It’s made possible because Ruth MacKenzie and her team did their homework, and did it well.

Read more:
The magic tricks and the deep souls of theatre, dance and music at the 2024 Perth Festival

William Peterson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Adelaide Festival 2024: a moving marriage of local and international works – with Indigenous voices front and centre – https://theconversation.com/adelaide-festival-2024-a-moving-marriage-of-local-and-international-works-with-indigenous-voices-front-and-centre-226004

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephanie Perkiss, Associate professor in accounting, University of Wollongong

Australians enjoy chocolate, consuming on average the equivalent of 32 kilograms a year, but there is growing interest in its origins and how it’s made.

They want to know their product is sustainably made by companies that only deal with ingredient suppliers who engage in fair labour practices and safeguard against deforestation and other environmentally damaging processes.

But according to the 5th Edition of the Chocolate Scorecard, produced by Be Slavery Free, two Australian universities and several sustainability interest groups, some retailers are lagging when it comes to stocking sustainable products.

The scorecard is released at Easter, the busiest time of the year for the sweet treat. Sales in this period account for 75% of chocolate sold annually in Australia, with the average consumer spending $62 on Easter chocolates.

The scorecard ranks the policies and practices of chocolate traders, manufacturers, brands and retailers, assessing 63 companies on six criteria. These are traceability and transparency, living income, child and forced labor, climate change and deforestation, agroforestry and agrochemical use.

Next year’s report card will also include a rating based on gender equality which is being added as a seventh criteria.

Read more:
The real cost of your chocolate habit: new research reveals the bittersweet truth of cocoa farming in Africa’s forests

It assesses companies deemed industry leaders in sustainable policies and practices and awards them a green rating (or “egg”), while yellow and orange ratings are given to companies considered to be “progressing” and “needing improvement”. Red is given to those “trailing in policy and practice” and grey indicates a lack of transparency.

This year, the German brand, Ritter Sport, available in some large Australian supermarkets, was given a Good Egg Award in the medium and large company category for its progress and to show bigger companies can do much better.

Dutch brand, Tony’s Chocolonely, was given a special achievement award in the same category for consistently rating green. New Zealand manufacturer Whittaker’s was a highly rated yellow.

Mars Wrigley (maker of Mars bars, Snickers, Milky Way and Twix) rated strongly among the world giants of chocolate, followed by Nestle (Kit Kat, Smarties), Hershey’s (Kisses, chocolate syrup) and Ferrero (Nutella, Kinder, Ferrero Rocher), all of which received yellow awards.

Lindt and Mondelēz, whose portfolio includes Cadbury, Toblerone and Green & Black’s, received orange, indicating the need for improvement.

Globally, no retailers were rated green. Of the stores operating in Australia, Aldi (run by Aldi Sud), received yellow while Woolworths (including Big W) scored a disappointing orange. This was followed by red recipients Coles, David Jones and Kmart.

Chocolate is a growing business

Global revenue from chocolate is expected to reach US$254 billion in 2024. Around US$3.5 billion is generated in Australia and this is expected to grow by nearly 8% over the next few years.

According to the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, a business is responsible for any and all adverse human rights impacts either through their or their suppliers’ activities. Responsibility should not be shifted to another level in the supply chain.

Research on retail stores reveals confectionery is often an impulse purchase. Stores stock sweet products at payment areas, setting a high profit margin. These products can financially make or break a retailer.

So when a retailer sells chocolate, they have a responsibility to address human rights and environmental issues.

Some retailers are falling behind in sustainable sourcing

Unlike other regions, all Australian retailers took part in this year’s chocolate scorecard. These companies were early adopters in responding to human rights and environmental issues through certifications such as Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance.

But most retailers have poor data on their supply chains. While they develop a code of practice for their manufacturers and suppliers for the chocolate to be certified, it’s up to suppliers to adopt. This cascading model can lead to all responsibility resting with the farmer.

US retailers are the largest in the world and have the resources to lead the way. However, all US retailers received “grey” ratings in this year’s scorecard for not responding. This list includes three of the largest outlets in the US by revenue, Walmart, Costco, and Kroger.

One likely reason the US chocolate industry is lagging is because it has not passed regulations to curb deforestation. The European Union has passed the EU Deforestation Regulation, to ensure commodities such as cocoa, sold in the EU, are not sourced from deforested areas. The UK Environment Act 2021 calls for similar due diligence on critical forest-risk commodities. The US has proposed the Forest Act, but has not passed it.

Making responsible decisions

Retailers need to be aware that consumers are increasingly seeking ethically produced and sustainable products, including chocolate.

Read more:
Cocoa beans are in short supply: what this means for farmers, businesses and chocolate lovers

Ethically-produced cocoa must become a core element of their corporate responsibility and business strategy. Retailers can make improvements by working with their suppliers and manufacturers to trace their cocoa supply chains to ensure they are untainted by human rights and environmental abuse.

Consumers can use the 5th Edition Chocolate Scorecard to inform their sustainable purchasing decisions about the brands they buy and the retailers they buy from.

John Dumay is affiliated with the Macquarie Business School Modern Slavery Think Tank and is a member of the Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery (HTMS) Research Network, run by the Australian Institute of Criminology.

Cristiana Bernardi and Stephanie Perkiss do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Each Easter we spend about $62 a head on chocolates, but the cost of buying unsustainable products can be far greater – https://theconversation.com/each-easter-we-spend-about-62-a-head-on-chocolates-but-the-cost-of-buying-unsustainable-products-can-be-far-greater-225784

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

The United States House of Representatives has passed a bill to force TikTok’s owner, ByteDance, to either sell TikTok to a non-Chinese company or face a ban in the US.

While the measure won’t come into effect until the American Senate agrees, it has re-engaged a debate over TikTok’s risk to national security, as well as its impact on young people and the implications for free speech if there was a ban.

The Albanese government has flagged it won’t blindly follow the US action but instead will rely on advice from its security agencies.

The government, however, earlier banned TikTok from official devices.

Read more:
If TikTok is banned in the US or Australia, how might the company – or China – respond?

Lesley Seebeck, former CEO of the Cyber Institute, Australian National University, and former chief investment and advisory officer at the Digital Transformation Agency, joins us to discuss the concerns about TikTok.

On the security implications, Seebeck offers some advice

I think, certainly, banning on the official devices is worthwhile. I’d also strongly recommend that any journalists or anyone that may feel that they’re of interest to the Chinese state also think twice about having TikTok on their phones.

While the American bill offers TikTok an out if it is sold to a non-Chinese company, Seebeck says that is unlikely to happen,

The problem is that China has made it clear that it will not sell it […] which tells you a lot about the fact that China sees this as a strategic asset […] This is very sensitive technology that would be handed over.

On why there’s so much concern around China owning TikTok,

If you looked at China 20 years ago, we would be much more comfortable because it was not the place it is now becoming – more and more authoritarian and assertive under XI Jinping. Things like the national security laws are deeply concerning – the one that’s just passed in Hong Kong – [they] give us a sense of what could be exerted extraterritoriality.

Seebeck highlights why TikTok’s data collection differs from that of other platforms like Facebook.

People often say, well, TikTok’s collecting data, but so does Facebook and all the rest. But it’s a different way of doing things, because what drives TikTok is the algorithm and that real time responsiveness, which makes it so attractive.

What TikTok does, it’s a constant refresh of data to drive that algorithm. So every time you click on a video […] or you might be following an influencer, and they change, it’s this constant interaction. So the data they’re collecting allows a lot more granularity and a lot more sense about what you might do.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Politics with Michelle Grattan: Cyber expert Lesley Seebeck on TikTok’s future in Australia – https://theconversation.com/politics-with-michelle-grattan-cyber-expert-lesley-seebeck-on-tiktoks-future-in-australia-226222

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Muhammad Rizwan Azhar, Lecturer, Edith Cowan University

The main cost of an electric vehicle (EV) is its battery. The high cost of energy-dense batteries has meant EVs have long been more expensive than their fossil fuel equivalents.

But this could change faster than we thought. The world’s largest maker of batteries for electric cars, China’s CATL, claims it will slash the cost of its batteries by up to 50% this year, as a price war kicks off with the second largest maker in China, BYD subsidiary FinDreams.

What’s behind this? After the electric vehicle industry experienced a huge surge in 2022, it has hit headwinds. It ramped up faster than demand, triggering efforts to cut costs.

But the promised price cuts are also a sign of progress. Researchers have made great strides in finding new battery chemistries. CATL and BYD now make EV batteries without any cobalt, an expensive, scarce metal linked to child labor and dangerous mining practices in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Economies of scale and new supplies of lithium make it possible to sell batteries more cheaply. And the world’s largest carmaker, Toyota, is pinning its hopes on solid-state batteries in the hope these energy-dense, all but fireproof batteries will make possible EVs with a range of more than 1,200km per charge .

How are battery makers cutting costs?

The largest market for electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles is China. But demand for EVs here has eased off, dropping from a 96% surge in demand in 2022 to a 36% rise in 2023.

As a result, battery giant CATL has seen its profits fall for the first time in almost two years.

One of the best ways to create more demand is to make your products cheaper. That’s what’s behind the cost-cutting promises from CATL and BYD.

You might wonder how that’s possible. One of the key challenges in shifting to battery-electric cars is where to get the raw materials. The electric future rests on viable supply chains for critical minerals such as lithium, nickel, copper, cobalt and rare earth elements.

Until recently, the main EV battery chemistry has been built on four of these, lithium, nickel, manganese and cobalt. These are also known as NMC batteries.

If you can avoid or minimise the use of expensive or controversial minerals, you can cut costs. That’s why Chinese companies such as CATL have all but monopolised the market on another chemistry, lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries. These batteries are cheaper, as they have no cobalt. They have other benefits too: a longer usable life and less risk of fire than traditional lithium battery chemistries. The downside is they have lower capacity and voltage.

The recent price cuts come from a deliberate decision to use abundant earth materials such as iron and phosphorus wherever possible.

What about lithium? Prices of lithium carbonate, the salt form of the ultra light silvery-white metal, shot up sixfold between 2020 and 2022 in China before falling last year.

Despite this, battery prices have kept falling – just not by as much as they otherwise would have.

The world’s huge demand for lithium has led to strong growth in supply, as miners scramble to find new sources. CATL, for instance, is spending A$2.1 billion on lithium extraction plants in Bolivia.

Growth in lithium supply is projected to outpace demand by 34% both this year and next, which should help stabilise battery prices.

Battery options are multiplying

China’s battery makers have cornered the market in lithium iron phosphate batteries. But they aren’t the only game in town.

Tesla electric cars have long been powered by batteries from Japan’s Panasonic and South Korea LG. These batteries are built on the older but well established NMC and lithium nickel cobalt aluminate oxide (NCA) chemistries. Even so, the American carmaker is now using CATL’s LFP batteries in its more affordable cars.

The world’s largest carmaker, Toyota, has long been sceptical of lithium-ion batteries and has focused on hybrid and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles instead.

But this is changing. Toyota is now focused heavily on making solid-state batteries a reality. These do away with liquid electrolytes to transport electricity in favour of a solid battery. In September last year, the company announced a breakthrough which it claims will enable faster recharging times and a range of 1,200km before recharge. If these claims are true, these batteries would effectively double the range of today’s topline EVs.

Read more:
Petrol, pricing and parking: why so many outer suburban residents are opting for EVs

In response, China’s battery manufacturers and government are working to catch up with Toyota on solid-state batteries.

Which battery chemistry will win out? It’s too early to say for electric vehicles. But as the green transition continues, it’s likely we’ll need not just one but many options.

After all, the energy needs of a prime mover truck will be different to city runabout EVs. And as electric aircraft go from dream to reality, these will need different batteries again. To get battery-electric aircraft off the ground, you need batteries with a huge power density.

The good news? These are engineering challenges which can be overcome. Just last year, CATL announced a pioneering “condensed matter” battery for electric aircraft, with up to three times the energy density of an average electric car battery.

All the while, researchers are pushing the envelope even further. A good electric car might have a battery with an energy density of 150–250 watt-hours per kilogram. But the record in the lab is now over 700 watt-hours/kg.

This is to say nothing of the research going into still other battery chemistries, from sodium-ion to iron-air to liquid metal batteries.

We are, in short, still at the beginning of the battery revolution.

Read more:
How sodium-ion batteries could make electric cars cheaper

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A battery price war is kicking off that could soon make electric cars cheaper. Here’s how – https://theconversation.com/a-battery-price-war-is-kicking-off-that-could-soon-make-electric-cars-cheaper-heres-how-225165

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marten Risius, Senior Lecturer in Business Information Systems, The University of Queensland

Australia’s eSafety commissioner has sent legal notices to Google, Meta, Telegram, WhatsApp, Reddit and X (formerly Twitter) asking them to show what they’re doing to protect Australians from online extremism. The six companies have 49 days to respond.

The notice comes at a time when governments are increasingly cracking down on major tech companies to address online harms like child sexual abuse material or bullying.

Combating online extremism presents unique challenges different from other content moderation problems. Regulators wanting to establish effective and meaningful change must take into account what research has shown us about extremism and terrorism.

Extremists are everywhere

Online extremism and terrorism have been pressing concerns for some time. A stand-out example was the 2019 Christchurch terrorist attack on two mosques in Aotearoa New Zealand, which was live streamed on Facebook. It led to the “Christchurch Call” to action, aimed at countering extremism through collaborations between countries and tech companies.

But despite such efforts, extremists still use online platforms for networking and coordination, recruitment and radicalisation, knowledge transfer, financing and mobilisation to action.

In fact, extremists use the same online infrastructure as everyday users: marketplaces, dating platforms, gaming sites, music streaming sites and social networks. Therefore, all regulation to counter extremism needs to consider the rights of regular users, as well.

Read more:
Christchurch attacks 5 years on: terrorist’s online history gives clues to preventing future atrocities

The rise of ‘swarmcasting’

Tech companies have responded with initiatives like the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism. It shares information on terrorist online content among its members (such as Facebook, Microsoft, YouTube, X and others) so they can take it down on their platforms. These approaches aim to automatically identify and remove terrorist or extremist content.

However, a moderation policy focused on individual pieces of content on individual platforms fails to capture much of what’s out there.

Terrorist groups commonly use a “swarmcasting” multiplatform approach, leveraging 700 platforms or more to distribute their content.

Swarmcasting involves using “beacons” on major platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Telegram to direct people to locations with terrorist material. This beacon can be a hyperlink to a blog post on a website like WordPress or Tumblr that then contains further links to the content, perhaps hosted on Google Drive, JustPaste.It, BitChute and other places where users can download it.

So, while extremist content may be flagged and removed from social media, it remains accessible online thanks to swarmcasting.

Putting up filters isn’t enough

The process of identifying and removing extremist content is far from simple. For example, at a recent US Supreme Court hearing over internet regulations, a lawyer argued platforms could moderate terrorist content by simply removing anything that mentioned “al Qaeda”.

However, internationally recognised terrorist organisations, their members and supporters do not solely distribute policy-violating extremist content. Some may be discussing non-terrorist activities, such as those who engage in humanitarian efforts.

Other times their content is borderline (awful but lawful), such as misogynistic dog whistles, or even “hidden” in a different format, such as memes.

Accordingly, platforms can’t always cite policy violations and are compelled to use other methods to counter such content. They report using various content moderation techniques such as redirecting users, pre-bunking misinformation, promoting counterspeech and offering warnings, or implementing shadow bans. Despite these efforts, online extremism continues to persist.

Read more:
Disinformation threatens global elections – here’s how to fight back

What is extremism, anyway?

All these problems are further compounded by the fact we lack a commonly accepted definition for terrorism or extremism. All definitions currently in place are contentious.

Academics attempt to seek clarity by using relativistic definitions, such as

extremism itself is context-dependent in the sense that it is an inherently relative term that describes a deviation from something that is (more) ‘ordinary’, ‘mainstream’ or ‘normal’.

However, what is something we can accept as a universal normal? Democracy is not the global norm, nor are equal rights. Not even our understanding of central tenets of human rights is globally established.

What should regulators do, then?

As the eSafety commissioner attempts to shed light on how major platforms counter terrorism, we offer several recommendations for the commissioner to consider.

1. Extremists rely on more than just the major platforms to disseminate information. This highlights the importance of expanding the current inquiries beyond just the major tech players.

2. Regulators need to consider the differences between platforms that resist compliance, those that comply halfheartedly, and those that struggle to comply, such as small content storage providers. Each type of platform requires different regulatory approaches or assistance.

3. Future regulations should encourage platforms to transparently collaborate with academia. The global research community is well positioned to address these challenges, such as by developing actionable definitions of extremism and novel countermeasures.

Marten Risius is the recipient of an Australian Research Council Australian Discovery Early Career Award funded by the Australian Government. Marten Risius has received project funding from the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT).

Stan Karanasios has received funding from Emergency Management Victoria, Asia-Pacific Telecommunity, and the International Telecommunications Union. Stan is a Distinguished Member of the Association for Information Systems.

– ref. Terrorist content lurks all over the internet – regulating only 6 major platforms won’t be nearly enough – https://theconversation.com/terrorist-content-lurks-all-over-the-internet-regulating-only-6-major-platforms-wont-be-nearly-enough-226219

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anne Twomey, Professor emerita, University of Sydney

The government will be on tenterhooks again next month when the High Court of Australia hears another case that could lead to the release of a further cohort of people currently in immigration detention.

Given the ongoing political fallout of the previous controversial High Court case, the outcome of this one will be closely watched.

So why is this new case so significant, and how does it differ from the last one?

Read more:
What is the government’s preventative detention bill? Here’s how the laws will work and what they mean for Australia’s detention system

What is the case about?

The case is called ASF17 v Commonwealth. It concerns an Iranian citizen who has been held in immigration detention for ten years. He failed in his application for a protection visa and is therefore subject to an obligation that he be deported as soon as reasonably practicable.

However, he has hindered his deportation (or “frustrated” it, in legal terms) by refusing to meet with Iranian officials to secure the travel documents needed for his return to Iran.

He says he has good reason not to want to be returned to Iran because he is bisexual, has converted to Christianity, is Kurdish and has opposed the mistreatment of women by the Iranian government.

He says he fears for his life if he is removed to Iran, but he is prepared to cooperate in his removal to any country other than Iran.

The Commonwealth has accepted there is no prospect of his removal to any country other than Iran. It has also accepted that he cannot be removed to Iran without his cooperation, as Iran does not accept involuntary removals.

So does this mean he’ll be released in accordance with the High Court’s previous NZYQ case?

How is this different from the previous case?

You might remember the NZYQ case from late last year. In it, the court found a stateless Rohingya refugee, who couldn’t secure a visa because of previous criminal convictions, couldn’t be held in indefinite detention. This was because there was “no real prospect of his removal from Australia becoming practicable in the reasonably foreseeable future”.

The decision overturned a 2004 precedent and triggered the release of at least 149 other detainees in similar situations.

The Commonwealth has argued ASF17’s case falls into a different category, because whether there is a practical prospect of removal must be assessed on the basis that the detainee is cooperating.

When the case was first heard in the Federal Court, the Commonwealth argued that when assessing whether there is a practical prospect of deporting a detainee, delays caused by the detainee not cooperating shouldn’t be taken into account. This is regardless of whatever may be the reasons for his or her non-cooperation.

Justice Colvin, in the Federal Court, accepted the Commonwealth’s argument. He pointed out that the reasons for refusal to cooperate, including fear of persecution on return to Iran, were matters separately dealt with during his application for a protection visa.

Once the detainee had reached the end of his appeals on this point, he was being held solely for the purpose of removal from Australia, so the reasons for his concerns could not be revisited.

Justice Colvin concluded that the assessment of whether there was a real prospect of his removal becoming practicable in the reasonably foreseeable future then had to be made on the basis of the detainee’s cooperation in taking relevant steps towards deportation. This was the case even if the detainee refused to act.

Read more:
New laws to deal with immigration detainees were rushed, leading to legal risks

The appeal to the High Court

ASF17 then appealed to the Full Federal Court, and the Commonwealth government successfully sought the removal of this case directly into the High Court. This is because the lower courts have not been acting consistently on this point.

For example, in AZC20 v Secretary, Department of Home Affairs (No 2), an Iranian detainee who had never been convicted of a crime and had been held in detention for ten years was ordered to be released, despite the fact he was refusing to cooperate with his removal to Iran (although he was prepared to cooperate with his removal to any other country). The Commonwealth therefore wants the High Court to resolve the uncertainty and give a clear decision.

Previously, in its NZYQ judgment, the High Court distinguished that case from cases in which the detainee seeks to frustrate attempts to deport them.

This justifies the Commonwealth’s approach of treating detainees who have frustrated their deportation as being in a different category. It still, however, leaves it open to the High Court to decide whether they should be released or remain in detention.

In the past, the High Court has not been sympathetic to those who have sought to thwart their deportation by telling falsehoods about their identity, noting that the courts are disinclined to allow a party to take advantage of his or her own wrongful conduct.

But whether honest non-cooperation, as opposed to falsehoods, would be treated the same way remains to be seen.

How many detainees will be affected?

The decision in this case is likely to affect a wider cohort of people in immigration detention who cannot be deported because they have refused to cooperate. Some countries, such as Iran, do not accept the involuntary return of their citizens, which means detainees can prevent their deportation to these countries by refusing to cooperate.

According to The Guardian, a leaked government document estimated that about 170 people currently in detention could be affected, although the minister has refused to discuss numbers or the details of the case while it is before the courts.

Read more:
High Court reasons on immigration ruling pave way for further legislation

If the High Court were to decide that a person could prevent their deportation by refusing to cooperate and could use this to cause their release into the community, it would give detainees a great incentive to refuse cooperation in deportation matters.

The Commonwealth has strong arguments on its side, but as always it is a matter for the High Court ultimately to decide.

Anne Twomey has received grants from the ARC and occasionally does consultancy work for governments, Parliaments and inter-governmental bodies. She is also a consultant with Gilbert + Tobin Lawyers, which does pro bono work for refugee claimants.

– ref. The government is fighting a new High Court case on immigration detainees. What’s it about and what’s at stake? – https://theconversation.com/the-government-is-fighting-a-new-high-court-case-on-immigration-detainees-whats-it-about-and-whats-at-stake-226120

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Foreign Minister Penny Wong delivered a forthright message to her Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, at the Australia-China Foreign and Strategic Dialogue in Canberra on Wednesday.

“I told the foreign minister Australians were shocked at the sentence imposed on Dr Yang Hengjun,” she said at a news conference following their meeting. “And I made it clear to him the Australian government will continue to advocate on Dr Yang’s behalf.”

Yang, an Australian citizen, was given a death penalty sentence on espionage charges earlier this year, although it is set to be commuted after two years of good behaviour.

The media did not hear Wang’s version of the conversation because the Chinese foreign minister had previously indicated he would not front the news conference. Normally with senior visiting figures, there is a joint press conference after the talks.

Unusually, given Wang’s absence, media arrangements were the same as if he had been there. Australian and Chinese journalists were allocated three questions a side. Wang did not hold a separate news conference.

Read more:
Does Yang Hengjun have any legal hopes left after receiving a suspended death sentence in China?

The visit of Wang, who met Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Wednesday afternoon, comes as Australia is hoping for an early end to the remaining trade sanctions China imposed when it put the former Coalition government in the freezer.

China’s final decision on lifting its tariffs on wine is due by March 31. In an interim determination last week, the Chinese said the tariffs were no longer necessary.

Australia is still waiting for progress on the restrictions on lobsters and some beef abattoirs.

Meanwhile, Australia has suspended anti-dumping tariffs against Chinese wind towers, an action the Chinese saw as a good gesture.

Wong in the meeting welcomed the progress on removing trade impediments and “reiterated our desire for the removal of remaining impediments on beef and lobster.” The two foreign ministers also discussed the volatility of the nickel market.

“I made the point that predictability in business and trade is in all our economic interests,” Wong said.

Wong did not shy away from a range of sensitive subjects, raising Australian concerns about human rights in Tibet and Hong Kong and expressing “our serious concern about unsafe conduct at sea, our desire for peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and in our region”.

Wong said the dialogue enabled the two countries to manage their differences.

“It doesn’t eliminate them, but this government in the interests of Australia will always seek to manage those differences wisely.

“As I said at the outset of my meeting, China will always be China, Australia will always be Australia.”

On Thursday, Wang will meet former Prime Minister Paul Keating, who has previously been critical of Wong and the Albanese government regarding the threat China poses and the government’s support for AUKUS. Ahead of this meeting, Keating said in a written statement earlier this week: “I have supported Foreign Minister Penny Wong in her attempts to lower the loud hailer and ‘stabilise’ relations with China”.

Wong said her meeting with Wang was the latest in the process of achieving a “stable relationship” between the two countries.

The foreign and strategic dialogue only recommenced under the Labor government, after the hiatus in the bilateral relationship in the latter days of the Coalition government.

Wong said arrangements were “on track” for a visit later this year by Chinese Premier Li Qiang.

Responding to a question, Wong also pushed back against former US President Donald Trump’s attack on Australia’s ambassador to the United States, Kevin Rudd.

Trump lashed out at Rudd – who some years ago was highly critical of Trump – in an interview with right-wing political figure and broadcaster Nigel Farage.

Farage told Trump that Rudd had said horrible things about him.

Trump replied: “I heard he was a little bit nasty. I hear he’s not the brightest bulb. But I don’t know much about him. But if, if he’s at all hostile, he will not be there long.”

Asked if Rudd would be kept in Washington if Trump became president again, Wong said: “The answer is yes”.

She said Rudd was a “very effective ambassador […] doing an excellent job advancing Australia’s interests in the United States”.

“Even Mr Dutton has expressed confidence in Mr Rudd,” she said. Rudd would be able to work closely with whoever won the presidential election, she added.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi declines to front media after talks with Penny Wong – https://theconversation.com/chinese-foreign-minister-wang-yi-declines-to-front-media-after-talks-with-penny-wong-226221

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Beck, Professor of Constitutional Law, Monash University

On March 21, the federal government will release the Australian Law Reform Commission’s report on ensuring religious schools cannot discriminate against LGBTQIA+ students and staff.

But the political debate is already well under way – and has been going on since 2017. So how did we get here?

The current debate started with marriage equality

When same-sex marriage was legalised in late 2017 following a successful postal survey on the issue, conservative religious groups were promised a “religious freedom” review as a consolation prize.

That review, led by former Liberal minister Philip Ruddock, found Australia does not have a religious freedom problem. However, it did recommend new legislative protections against religious discrimination. In response, in December 2018, the Morrison government promised a Religious Discrimination Act.

What the Morrison government ended up proposing – in multiple versions over several years – was laws that would both prohibit discrimination against people on the basis of religion (which was not particularly controversial) and allow discrimination against LGBTQIA+ people and others by taking away existing anti-discrimination protections (which was very controversial). These draft laws never passed.

Before the 2022 federal election, Labor leader Anthony Albanese promised to change federal law to ban discrimination against LGTBQIA+ students and staff by religious schools, and to protect people against discrimination on the basis of their religious beliefs or lack of religious beliefs.

Read more:
Future of Anthony Albanese’s religious discrimination legislation is in Peter Dutton’s hands

There are actually two distinct issues at play

The debate we’ve been having over the past few years is actually a debate about two issues.

The first issue is about religious discrimination. This means ensuring people are not discriminated against on the basis of their religious beliefs, or lack of religious beliefs.

All states and territories (other than New South Wales and South Australia) already have laws banning this kind of religious discrimination. But there is no federal law banning religious discrimination – apart from a constitutional provision banning religious discrimination in federal government jobs.

It’s standard practice for there to be complementary federal and state anti-discrimination laws on the same topic. For example, if a person is discriminated against on the basis of their race, that person can choose to take action under either federal or state law.

One proposal is for there to be a federal Religious Discrimination Act.

The second issue is religious exemptions, which involves allowing discrimination on the basis of sexuality, gender identity, marital status and so on where the discrimination has a religious motivation. For example, the Sex Discrimination Act currently prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, sexuality, gender identity and marital status, but also includes an exemption that allows religious schools to discriminate against students and teachers.

So, if a non-religious private school expels a student for being gay that would contravene the Sex Discrimination Act. But if a religious school did the same thing for religious reasons, that would not contravene the Sex Discrimination Act.

Some states and territories already ban religious schools from discriminating against students and teachers for these kinds of reasons. So if a religious school in Victoria expels a student for being gay, that would not breach federal law as it stands but it would breach Victorian law. The practical result is that the school can’t expel the student for being gay.

A second proposal is to modify the religious exemptions in the Sex Discrimination Act.

Read more:
Why Australia does not need a Religious Discrimination Act

The Morrison government’s first draft of the legislation

The Morrison government held a consultation during 2019 on a first draft of its promised legislation. This draft legislation included standard anti-discrimination provisions to prohibit discrimination against people on the basis of their religious beliefs or lack of religious beliefs. It also included highly controversial additional provisions.

The controversial provisions included:

• a provision about “statements of belief” – motivated by the Israel Folau controversy – which would have overridden all other federal and state anti-discrimination laws to allow derogatory statements to be made by doctors, schools and employers against women, people with disabilities and LGTBQIA+ people.

• a provision allowing healthcare practitioners to refuse to provide care to people, such as allowing a pharmacist to refuse to fill prescriptions for a divorced woman or a nurse to refuse to dress a gay man’s wound.

In effect, these provisions would have created a “sword” allowing harm to be inflicted on people by taking away existing anti-discrimination protections. Anti-discrimination laws are meant to be a “shield” protecting people from harm. This is why the issue has been so controversial.

The Morrison government’s second draft

The controversy over the first draft led to consultations in 2020 on a second draft.

The second draft was very similar to the first. It too included the override provisions on “statements of belief” and refusal to provide health care.

However, it reduced the number of healthcare professions entitled to refuse to treat patients. It also included some additional measures about:

• allowing religious hospitals to “preference” people of the same religion as the body in hiring decisions. For example, a Catholic hospital could give priority to Catholics in hiring new staff

• allowing religious camps and conference centres to take faith into account when hiring out their campsites.

The bill fails

The Morrison government introduced legislation based on the second draft into parliament in 2021.

During debate, several Liberal backbenchers crossed the floor to vote in favour of amendments the government did not want. One of those amendments – to remove the ability of religious schools to discriminate against LGBTQIA+ students – succeeded, with five Liberal MPs crossing the floor.

The amended bill passed the House of Representatives with the support of both major parties. However, it did not come to a final vote in the Senate because people on all sides of the debate were unhappy with the bill and it was causing internal tensions in the Liberal Party. The bill lapsed.

So why is it back in the news?

After the Labor Party won the 2022 federal election, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus asked the Australian Law Reform Commission to advise on what amendments to federal law would be necessary to deliver the Labor Party’s election promise. Labor’s promised legislation would:

• ensure religious schools cannot discriminate against LGBTQIA+ students or staff under federal law.

• ensure religious schools can give preference to people of the same faith as the school when hiring staff under federal law.

• ensure the legislation will be drafted in a manner that does not remove existing legal protections against other forms of discrimination.

The commission delivered its report to the attorney-general in December 2023.

In anticipation of the report being released on March 21, senior politicians on both sides of politics, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, have already started the politicking. The debate may not be over yet.

Luke Beck is board member of the Rationalist Society of Australia Inc and a member of Australia Labor Party. The views in this article are his own.

– ref. Why are religious discrimination laws back in the news? And where did they come from in the first place? – https://theconversation.com/why-are-religious-discrimination-laws-back-in-the-news-and-where-did-they-come-from-in-the-first-place-226220

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marina Yue Zhang, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney

TikTok’s owner is once again navigating troubled waters in the United States, where the US House of Representatives has issued an ultimatum: divest or face shutdown within six months.

In Australia, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and Senator James Paterson, the shadow home affairs spokesperson, want Canberra to follow suit.

TikTok, owned by the Beijing-based tech giant ByteDance, has been here before. It fought off a similar order by the Trump administration banning the video-creating and sharing app in the United States several years ago.

In a bid to mollify US security concerns about user data potentially being handed over to the Chinese Communist Party, TikTok pledged to migrate American user data to US-based Oracle Cloud. However, TikTok has reportedly struggled to live up to this promise.

Read more:
Attempts to ban TikTok reveal the hypocrisy of politicians already struggling to relate to voters

TikTok’s growing resistance to US pressures

The platform’s survival in Western markets depends on its ability to navigate these geopolitical complexities. This situation will test TikTok’s adaptability and strategic approach, as well as the power of its user base.

In the past four years, TikTok has seen tremendous growth in both its user base and advertising revenue, though this has started to slow somewhat in the US. Last year, ByteDance was valued at US$220 billion (A$337 billion), which was down from US$500 billion (A$766 billion) in 2021, but still ranked as the world’s most valuable non-public startup.

This valuation not only highlights its worldwide appeal, but also uniquely equips it to deal with US regulatory hurdles.

Indeed, TikTok’s response to the latest attempted US ban has demonstrated the power of its resistance. On March 7, the platform engaged its users directly with a pop-up message urging them to contact Congress to complain. In doing so, it shifted the narrative from a direct confrontation between itself and Washington to a broader conflict between the US government and American citizens over freedom of expression.

The bill that would force ByteDance to sell the app or face a nationwide ban must still pass the Senate, so public pressure may come to bear. President Joe Biden has said he would sign the bill if it’s passed.

Although the bill has widespread support on both sides of the political spectrum, senators from both parties will need to consider the potential backlash from young people in a pivotal election year. Already, former President Donald Trump – the Republican nominee in the 2024 presidential contest – has backflipped on a potential TikTok ban, which underscores ByteDance’s growing political leverage.

Should the bill become law, civil liberty groups could also challenge it in US Federal Court as an infringement on TikTok users’ First Amendment rights to free speech. Some groups are already mobilising for action.

Federal judges have struck down attempted bans in the US in the past, but on different grounds. (One of these cases was brought by TikTok users, but was reportedly orchestrated by TikTok and its Chinese parent company.)

A new challenge on free speech grounds, which have yet to be tested in court, could lead to an eventual appeal to the US Supreme Court.

Other ways China could retaliate

Although US national security officials were briefing US senators on the risks posed by TikTok this week, this isn’t the sole reason the social media app has run into problems in Washington.

TikTok has also been targeted because of the burgeoning tech rivalry between the US and China, where many fear the spectre of a far-reaching tech decoupling between the countries or even an outright tech cold war.

Read more:
A TikTok ban isn’t a data security solution. It will be difficult to enforce – and could end up hurting users

Facing potential pressure to sell at a reduced value, ByteDance might decide to exit the US market altogether, considering the challenges faced by other Chinese tech companies in Western countries, like Huawei.

Such a decision could prompt retaliatory trade restrictions or other actions by the Chinese government due to nationalistic pressures. This could boost ByteDance’s stature in China – similar to what happened to Huawei after it was banned in the US.

China already blocks many US media outlets, social media platforms and other websites, such as Facebook, Twitter and Google. But it could retaliate with sanctions, as it has in the past against US data firms, officials and researchers (with limited impact).

The Chinese government has also said any sale of TikTok would have to comply with its law on tech exports, which requires licenses for the export of certain technologies. It’s not entirely clear how the law would apply to TikTok, but some experts believe it could encompass the algorithm that powers the app. This means, theoretically, China could prevent ByteDance from selling this technology to a foreign company.

TikTok’s predicament in the US also could set a precedent for other Chinese tech companies, like the e-commerce platforms Temu and Shein. Both companies are also under increasing congressional scrutiny, which likely makes them apprehensive about potential mandates for divestment or other regulatory hurdles they could face in the future.

Could Australia be next?

In Australia, TikTok is already banned on government-issued devices. Now, there is renewed momentum for a nationwide ban as well.

As a close ally of the US and a major trading partner of China, Australia is in a particularly vulnerable position. It could be forced to choose between a US strategy of decoupling its tech industry from China’s, or prioritising its improving relationship with Beijing.

As the debate in the US drags on, the point of difference between the two major parties in Australia will likely become more defined. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said his government has no plans – at this stage – to follow the US lead on a TikTok ban, but this could change as the next federal election gets closer.

Politicians on both sides will need to take into account the impact of a potential ban among TikTok supporters, as well as the Chinese-Australian community. Many Chinese-Australians would see a ban as yet another slap in the face to their country of origin and further evidence of anti-China foreign policy.

Wanning Sun receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Marina Yue Zhang does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. If TikTok is banned in the US or Australia, how might the company – or China – respond? – https://theconversation.com/if-tiktok-is-banned-in-the-us-or-australia-how-might-the-company-or-china-respond-225889

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma McNicol, Research Fellow at Monash Sustainable Development Institute, Monash University

50 years ago, there wasn’t a single women’s shelter in Australia.

Then feminists squatted two terraces in Sydney, opening “Elsie”, Australia’s first domestic and family violence refuge.

Commissioned by Elsie co-founder Anne Summers, I’ve recorded oral histories with the women who built and sustained Australia’s refuge movement.

Australia’s refuge movement is a story of courageous grassroots feminist activism.

Read more:
The Whitlam government gave us no-fault divorce, women’s refuges and childcare. Australia needs another feminist revolution

Choose to act

In the 1970s in Australia, there was nowhere for women experiencing male violence at home to go.

One night almost exactly 50 years ago, around 40 women’s liberation activists changed that, claiming squatters’ rights over two derelict Glebe terraces. They broke a window, changed the locks and turned on the gas and water, opening “Elsie”, Australia’s first women’s refuge.

As Elsie worker Ludo McFerran explained, Elsie’s mission was a “space for women, run by women”, which the residents would control. Elsie did not offer “charity”, the founders aimed at “change”, and therefore refuges would one day become obsolete.

Cooma, Kamilaroi woman Mary Ronyane, who today manages Wilcannia Safe House, proposed that Elsie was created because, when together women draw from their strength, they can “make a choice”. They chose to act.

McFerran described the refuge work as “highly vulnerable”. At the beginning, the work was entirely voluntary, and refuge work never proved a lucrative career.

The activists sacrificed all their time, energy, health and often their safety. In the “wild west”, as McFerran described it, perpetrators would “regularly turn up, threaten to burn the house down and kill everyone inside.”

There was no legal protection for residents or workers, so when perpetrators failed to return children after visits, workers would “go and try find them” and where possible “grab the kids back and make a run for it.”

Desperately trying to cover the operating costs, some of the workers started dealing marijuana to pay for necessities. Sydney’s artists and intellectuals started seeking out “Elsie Pot”.

With an intention to secure funding, the activists started encouraging various government ministers to come and see the conditions Elsie’s residents were enduring. Founder Christina Gibbeson told me how she kidnapped Doug Everingham, the minister for health at the time. She forced her way into a car carrying Everingham and instructed his driver to take them to Elsie. She mused:

“I would’ve gone to jail for it today, I suppose.”

Ceding power and privilege

Australia’s early refuges operated collectively. Everyone was obliged to scrub bathrooms and care for resident children. Decisions took time and often went to a vote. Former resident and worker, Bundjalung woman Christine Robinson, believes “at Elsie, we all had a say and a voice.”

The founders recognised residents’ insights and skills that came with their life experience. In 1980, six years after Marrickville refuge opened, the refuge’s residents informed staff that it was time for them to leave and let them take the reins, and they did.

The activists wanted liberation for all women, not just those who looked like them. Women’s Halfway House worker Di Otto noted that they viewed the refuge “as a site in which they could make contact with women outside of [their] circles […] and work towards a collective and inclusive liberation.”

Vivien Johnson shared:

[…] [us] middle class white women were consistently confronted by our class prejudices [and] with the racism we held towards the women with whom we claimed to be equal with.

Christine Robinson believes Australia’s refuge movement “valued diversity.”
She explained that Elsie’s staff all learned how to sit with, and learn from, fellow feminists calling out their racism.

Robinson explained at Elsie, she and fellow Aboriginal leaders had a platform to culturally educate their non-First Nations colleagues, whom she described as a “captive audience”, “trying” to get it right.

Space for activism

Elsie’s founders sought to cultivate an environment in which residents could build confidence and reclaim control over their lives. In 1975, Bobbie Townsend, a working-class woman, arrived at Elsie with two children.

Townsend believes the late night discussions at Elsie’s dinner table “saved her”, and shared:

[…] for 26 years nobody had asked me what I thought about anything […] The first time someone asked me in a collective meeting what I thought, I didn’t know what to say […] Elsie was about taking control.

Robinson, like Townsend, also a resident turned staff member, reflected that “Elsie gave women power to make decisions for themselves.”

Today, there is nothing quite like Elsie

The founders all described an atmosphere of hope. Under Whitlam, things were possible.

McFerran explained that today, tendering practices have forced out community-run refuges. Run by Christian, centralised institutions, few refuges observe the grassroots collectivist principles that animated the movement’s early years.

While Elsie still opens its doors to victim-survivors today, it is run by St Vincent de Paul.

Emma McNicol does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Squatting, kidnapping and collaboration: Australia’s first women’s shelters were acts of radical grassroots feminism – https://theconversation.com/squatting-kidnapping-and-collaboration-australias-first-womens-shelters-were-acts-of-radical-grassroots-feminism-225895

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Janice Lord, Associate Professor in Botany, University of Otago

Chillier mornings and higher heating bills aren’t the only signs of the changing seasons. Common insects, too, are having to adapt. One day we see them in our gardens and parks, the next they appear to have disappeared.

But most are still here – they’re just harder to find.

Overwintering is an adaptation that many plants, insects and other invertebrates undergo in temperate climates. It’s how they survive cold times of the year when food sources are scarce.

It’s similar to the way some mammals, such as bears, hibernate. But while hibernation involves an extended and deep dormancy akin to sleep, overwintering organisms are still active, just to a lesser extent.

Some alpine insects, such as wētapunga, can even tolerate being frozen solid for days at a time, slowing down their metabolism until conditions become favourable again.

The stay-at-home monarch

New Zealand’s monarch butterflies demonstrate how insects can adapt to new environments. In North America, they disappear for the northern winter, migrating up to 5,000 kilometres from around the Great Lakes to the central Mexican volcanic mountains.

They arrive in huge swarms, with population estimates one year of around 380 million butterflies, clustering together to conserve energy.

Read more:
Insects and spiders make up more than half NZ’s animal biodiversity – time to celebrate these spineless creatures

In New Zealand, however, the monarch has adapted to island life and does not migrate. We know this because, for 15 years, the Moths and Butterflies of NZ Trust tagged monarch butterflies in autumn and winter to track where they were overwintering.

The data collected showed no pattern of migration or any common destination. Most recovered tags were still within the general area in which the butterflies were released.

New Zealand monarchs do show some similar behaviours to their North American counterparts, though. You might be fortunate to see a tree with a swarm of monarchs, usually on the tree’s northern side.

The butterflies stay active during winter, as temperatures allow. On a sunny day you will see them flying around, looking for nectar from flowers to top up their energy.

Leave the leaf litter

Overwintering in large numbers, however, is not typical of the way most insects survive the winter. Aotearoa’s native bees are active only in the summer, when females forage to collect a nutritious “pollen ball” to sustain their dozen or so offspring underground during development.

Bee larvae will remain underground during winter, long after their parents have perished. They will emerge the following summer as the new generation of adults, never having met their caregivers.

While flowers rich in nectar and pollen are crucial for insects to forage when they emerge from overwintering, dead and decaying plant matter is the lifeblood of the invertebrate world during autumn and winter.

Read more:
NZ votes the red admiral butterfly ‘bug of the year’ – how to make your garden its home

Leaf litter provides cover and nutrition for millions of insects and other microorganisms that cycle nutrients and soil, pollinate ecosystems and sustain larger organisms such as birds and fish.

You can help butterflies and other invertebrates survive winter by raking dead leaves onto the garden, rather than into the rubbish, and leaving seed heads on plants. Not only will this give these amazing ecosystem engineers somewhere to shelter, it will also help them return precious nutrients to the soil.

Plants such as Leucanthemum and Alyssum, which produce nectar-filled flowers in autumn and winter, can provide a top-up feed for butterflies and other pollinators during warm spells.

Native winter-flowering whauwhau, or five-finger (Pseudopanax arboreus), provides vital overwintering energy for insects. And kotukutuku (Fuchsia excorticata), though mainly bird-pollinated, is also popular with bees.

Flight of the bumble bee

Not all insects overwinter. Colony and social insects such as bumble bees and honey bees follow characteristic phenological cycles, intricately and inseparably linked to floral blooming seasons.

Bumble bee queens initiate a colony underground and begin to produce workers that typically live for an average of 28 days.

As the colony deteriorates with age at the end of summer, the queen will shift from producing sterile workers to producing reproductive individuals. These male drones and female gynes will leave the nest to mate, while workers consume the remaining resources.

Read more:
Why do bees have queens? 2 biologists explain this insect’s social structure – and why some bees don’t have a queen at all

Around March and April you may see many dead bumble bees on the ground. This isn’t necessarily cause for alarm – they have simply worked hard pollinating and have reached their natural life expectancy.

Meanwhile, newly mated queen bumble bees will now seek out new spots in which to begin colonies, such as vacant rodent and rabbit burrows. The queens benefit from the retained heat provided by undisturbed leaf litter, which also protects them from predators.

Eventually, our overwintering insects will emerge, often coinciding with the start of flowering and pollen production. But a changing climate can disrupt key plant-animal interactions such as pollination. In the meantime, they will appreciate all the help we can give them as temperatures drop and the cycle of life turns again.

The authors gratefully acknowledge the help of the Moths and Butterflies of New Zealand Trust in the preparation of this article.

Janice Lord has received funding for invertebrate-related research from the Miss E.L. Hellaby Indigenous Grasslands Research Trust, Royal Society of New Zealand, Department of Conservation, and University of Otago. She is a member of the Entomological Society of New Zealand and an honorary associate of Plant and Food Research Ltd.

Connal McLean is a member of The Entomological Society of New Zealand and The Moths and Butterflies of New Zealand Trust.

– ref. NZ’s summer insects are packing up for autumn – here’s how our gardens can help them through the cold months – https://theconversation.com/nzs-summer-insects-are-packing-up-for-autumn-heres-how-our-gardens-can-help-them-through-the-cold-months-226206

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cherine Fahd, Associate Professor Visual Communication, University of Technology Sydney

Science-fiction film as a genre allows us to encounter hypothetical worlds in which to understand our own.

These films often present utopian and dystopian worlds, exploring themes of nationalism and heroism. They often include a strong, white, male lead who heroically rescues the poor and the good from the stranglehold of authoritarianism. Therefore, historically, science fiction has had mass appeal for political zealots from the far left to the alt-right.

In Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two (2024), however, science fiction becomes a genre to subvert colonial and patriarchal narratives of the white, masculine saviour.

Read more:
Bagpipes in space: how Hans Zimmer created the dramatic sound world of the new Dune film

What is a ‘white saviour’?

Elements of a white saviour narrative are pervasive in Villeneuve’s first Dune film (2021), which hints at – but doesn’t commit to – subverting this narrative. But before we get into the details, it helps to understand what the “white saviour complex” is.

This is, to put it simply, the idea that a white person or people are needed to help or “save” people of colour from their circumstances.

White saviourism, also called the white “messiah complex”, is born of a legacy of colonialism, and often performed in a paternalistic or self-serving way. For decades, we’ve seen this narrative play out in science-fiction films, from the Star Wars franchise to Avatar (2009).

The setup

Signs of white saviourism in the first Dune film are recognisable in the male protagonist, Paul Atreides, played by Timothée Chalamet. Paul is destined for messianic status in both films, which have so far stayed close to the plot line of Frank Herbert’s book series of the same name.

However, Chalamet’s casting as a white saviour is complicated by his physicality. In both demeanour and appearance, Paul Atreides contradicts the traditional masculinity of science-fiction heroes, with his fine features, elfin stature and mummy’s boy status.

The first film follows the House of Atreides as it travels to the distant planet, Arrakas, to take charge of the scarce and precious spice production which their future wealth, power and survival depend on.

The Indigenous inhabitants of Arrakas, the Fremen, are portrayed as being deeply connected to the desert environment.

They find innovative ways to survive in the extreme weather conditions, yet are considered savage by the aristocratic characters in the film. They’re even referred to as “rats” by the film’s villainous, luminously white, oil-bathing leader, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen.

This reflects a common criticism of the white saviour complex: it perpetuates stereotypes about the Indigenous people being “helped”, while ignoring their strengths and agency.

Dune as a colonial critique

It’s tempting to consider Dune’s narrative, settings and costume design as an appropriation of Islamic and Arab culture. For example, there are scenes where the Fremen are dressed in Bedouin clothing, worshipping behind an Islamic architectural screen in ways that are reminiscent of Muslim prayers at a mosque.

The cinematography and light also appear to refer to 19th-century paintings by Jean-Léon Gérôme, much of which are of Islamic subjects. Such appropriations aren’t unique to Dune; the landscape of Arrakas itself is reminiscent of Tatooine, the desert planet where much of the action takes place in the original Star Wars trilogy.

While the intention may be to create otherworldly settings, the portrayal of a desert land often relies on stereotypical tropes of “exoticness” associated with the Middle East, as well as the use of Arabic-sounding names for characters and locations.

Nonetheless, there is a surprising critique of colonialist fantasy in Dune: Part Two, which primarily takes place through changes between the script and the book. These changes enable us to see the white saviour from the perspective of Chani (played by Zendaya), Paul’s Fremen love interest.

In the book, Chani is a supporting character who is merely there to encourage and promote Paul’s ascendancy. She is also a white person who is bound to Paul through having his children. In the film, Chani’s character has been adapted to provide a critical counterpoint.

This reveals Villeneuve’s directorial intention in reframing the book to account for the postcolonial and feminist perspectives of the 21st century. In many ways, Dune: Part Two can be read through the post-colonial perspective of late Palestinian-American writer Edward Said.

In his 1978 book Orientalism, a founding text of post-colonialism, Said argued against the West’s distorted image of the East or the Orient as exotic, backward, uncivilised and sometimes dangerous.

He expressed that Western scholars, artists and politicians use Orientalism as a pervasive framework to depict the East as the “Other”. This reinforces a binary opposition between the West as rational, developed and superior and the East as irrational, undeveloped and inferior.

While we see this play out in both Dune films’ visual tropes, a more nuanced message is delivered through the character of Chani.

Paul through Chani’s eyes

Chani is a woman of colour who is sceptical of Paul’s mother’s intentions for him as leader. She also refuses to believe in the prophecy of a saviour, as is held by some Fremen.

Ultimately, the film’s postcolonial and feminist leanings are made explicit in the final scenes. Through careful cinematography and editing, the audience is encouraged to see, from Chani’s perspective, the ways in which Paul is being manipulated.

When Paul avenges the death of his father and takes control of the empire, promising to marry the empress – despite having declared his enduring love for Chani – we encounter this betrayal from Chani’s standpoint.

The scenes tend to switch back to her disappointment as the witness. As viewers, we are not encouraged to celebrate Paul’s rise to messiah. Rather, we mourn the loss of his moral conscience with Chani. And this point is affirmed when we see Chani surfing the worm alone in the final scenes.

As a woman of colour who is both independent, powerful and resistant to the white saviour narrative, Chani activates the idea of looking at cinema from a non-white vantage point. She leads us to be critical of both colonial and patriarchal narratives.

Where will this lead? We will have to find out in the next film.

Read more:
Diplomacy and resistance: how Dune shows us the power of language – including sign language

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Is Dune an example of a white saviour narrative – or a critique of it? – https://theconversation.com/is-dune-an-example-of-a-white-saviour-narrative-or-a-critique-of-it-225656

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacinta L. Johnson, Senior Lecturer in Pharmacy Practice, University of South Australia

Urinary tract infections can be a minor medical annoyance or lead to a hospital stay – especially for older people.

If you think you might have a urinary tract infection (UTI) you need prompt advice and often antibiotics. But it can be difficult to get an appointment with your doctor at short notice, especially in rural areas.

Now trained pharmacists in most Australian states are able to review your symptoms and supply antibiotics if appropriate.

But there are still times when you should see a doctor.

What is a UTI? And when is it serious?

The urinary tract consists of the kidneys, ureters, and bladder and urethra. It’s the body system responsible for producing, storing and removing urine from the body.

When bacteria invade the urinary system – mostly from the bowel or the skin – they can multiply and cause infection.

Roughly half of all women and one in 20 men will have a UTI at least once in their lifetime. The risk increases with age. One in ten postmenopausal women report having a UTI in the last year.

Typical signs of infection include a painful or burning sensation when urinating, feeling like you need to urinate urgently and often and cloudy or foul-smelling urine. In more severe cases symptoms can include fever, lethargy and pain in the lower back.

In older adults, UTIs can cause confusion, agitation and falls.

For some people, UTIs can have serious complications, such as kidney damage, kidney failure or infection in the blood (sepsis), particularly if treatment is delayed.

Read more:
Why do I keep getting urinary tract infections? And why are chronic UTIs so hard to treat?

A common reason for hospital admission

UTIs are the second most common cause of preventable hospital visits in Australia. Across the country they are reported to result in 100,000 emergency department visits and 75,000 hospital stays each year.

The rate of hospitalisation for UTIs for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is around double the rate for other Australians. People aged over 65 years are five times more likely to be hospitalised with a UTI than younger Australians.

A quicker option

The newly rolled out pharmacist consultations do not replace the option of visiting your GP. But they do provide an additional choice.

In Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia the legislation has been changed to allow pharmacists to supply antibiotics to treat women (or people with female anatomy) aged 18 to 65 years with uncomplicated UTIs.

In New South Wales, the ACT, Victoria and Tasmania trials allowing pharmacists to treat UTIs in the same patient group are underway or have been announced.

This approach to provide accessible and timely treatment options for UTIs through pharmacies aligns with that in New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Canada.

Read more:
Cranberry juice can prevent recurrent UTIs, but only for some people

Not for everyone

State guidelines direct pharmacists to only provide antibiotics to women (or people with female anatomy) aged 18 to 65 years with uncomplicated UTIs. If the pharmacist finds warning signs for a serious infection, or a complicated UTI, you will be referred for further consultation with a doctor.

Under this program, UTIs that occur in people who have an anatomically male urinary tract, are under 18 years or over 65, or are pregnant would be considered to have complicated UTIs, and such patients would be referred to their doctor.

Some other situations where UTIs are considered complicated and should be assessed by a doctor include when they occur in people with kidney disease, urinary catheters, a condition that weakens the immune system (such as diabetes, cancer or HIV) or reoccurring symptoms.

To supply antibiotics for UTI treatment pharmacists are required to undertake additional training. Pharmacists can only prescribe antibiotics according to an agreed evidence-based treatment guideline, such as South Australia’s.

Pharmacists will assess if you are eligible for the pharmacy UTI service and ask specific questions to check your symptoms match those of an uncomplicated UTI or for warning signs you need to see a doctor. If treatment is appropriate, they will ask questions about your medical and medication history to determine which type of antibiotic is most suitable for you.

Pharmacists will not test urine for bacteria, as Australian guidelines state antibiotic treatment can be started for women with uncomplicated UTIs straight away. If your symptoms or history suggest urine testing might be required the pharmacist will refer you to a doctor.

You can get a record of the consultation that you can share with your doctor. The requirements for documentation differ in different states but pharmacists can upload information to My Health Record (if you haven’t opted out and are happy for them to do so).

This new service is not without controversy. GPs have expressed concerns about misdiagnosis and antimicrobial resistance where the bacteria could evolve and become much harder to treat. Detailed procedures have been developed for pharmacists to minimise these risks.

Read more:
Do you really need antibiotics? Curbing our use helps fight drug-resistant bacteria

What else can you do?

While taking antibiotics to treat a UTI you should also drink lots of water and ensure you empty your bladder completely every time you go to the toilet.

Pain relievers can help ease discomfort from a UTI. But it’s important to speak with your pharmacist or doctor to find the best pain management option for you.

Jacinta L. Johnson is employed as the Senior Pharmacist for Research within SA Pharmacy and is a Board Director for the Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia. In the last five years, she has received research funding or consultancy funds (for development and delivery of educational materials) from SA Health, the Medical Research Future Fund, the Hospital Research Foundation – Parkinson’s, the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia, the Pharmacy Guild of Australia, the Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia, the Australian College of Pharmacy, Mundipharma Pty Ltd, Aspen Pharmacare Australia Pty Ltd, Reckitt Benckiser (Australia) Pty Ltd and Viatris Pty Ltd. Jacinta has not received funding from any organisation related to pharmacist consultations for provision of antibiotics for urinary tract infections.

Wern Chern Chai does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Now you can get UTI antibiotics from pharmacies without prescription. Here’s what to know – https://theconversation.com/now-you-can-get-uti-antibiotics-from-pharmacies-without-prescription-heres-what-to-know-224962

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Scanlan, Lecturer, Edith Cowan University

Last Sunday, Liverpool faced Manchester United in the quarter finals of the FA Cup – and in the final minute of extra time, with the score tied at three-all, Liverpool had the crucial opportunity of a corner kick. A goal would surely mean victory, but losing possession could be risky.

What was Liverpool to do? Attack or play it safe? And if they were to attack, how best to do it? What kind of delivery, and where should players be waiting to attack the ball?

Set-piece decisions like this are vital not only in football but in many other competitive sports, and traditionally they are made by coaches on the basis of long experience and analysis. However, Liverpool has recently been looking to an unexpected source for advice: researchers at the Google-owned UK-based artificial intelligence (AI) lab DeepMind.

In a paper published today in Nature Communications, DeepMind researchers describe an AI system for football tactics called TacticAI, which can assist in developing successful corner kick routines. The paper says experts at Liverpool favoured TacticAI’s advice over existing tactics in 90% of cases.

What TacticAI can do

At a corner kick, play stops and each team has the chance to organise its players on the field before the attacking team kicks the ball back into play – usually with a specific prearranged plan in mind that will (hopefully) let them score a goal. Advice on these prearranged plans or routines is what TacticAI sets out to offer.

The package has three components: one that predicts which player is most likely to receive the ball in a given scenario, another that predicts whether a shot on goal will be taken, and a third that recommends how to adjust the position of players to increase or decrease the chances of a shot on goal.

Trained on a dataset of 7,176 corner kicks from Premier League matches, TacticAI used a technique called “geometric deep learning” to identify key strategic patterns.

The researchers say this approach could be applied not only to football, but to any sport in which a stoppage in the game allows teams to deliberately manoeuvre players into place unopposed, and plan the next sequence of play. In football, it could also be expanded in future to incorporate throw-in routines as well as other set pieces such as attacking free kicks.

Vast amounts of data

AI in football is not new. Even in amateur and semi-professional football, AI-powered auto-tracking camera systems are becoming commonplace, for example. At the last men’s and women’s World Cups in 2022 and 2023, AI in conjunction with advanced ball-tracking technology produced semi-automated offside decisions with an unprecedented level of accuracy.

Read more:
Games by numbers: machine learning is changing sport

Professional football clubs have analytical departments using AI at every level of the game, predominantly in the areas of scouting, recruitment and athlete monitoring. Other research has also tried to predict players’ shots on goal, or guess from a video what off-screen players are doing.

Bringing AI into tactical decisions promises to offer coaches a more objective and analytical approach to the game. Algorithms can process vast amounts of data, identifying patterns that may not be apparent to the naked eye, giving teams valuable insights into their own performance as well as that of their opponents.

A useful tool

AI may be a useful tool, but it cannot make decisions about match play alone. An algorithm might suggest the optimal positional setup for an in-swinging corner or how best to exploit the opposition’s defensive tactics.

What AI cannot do is make decisions on the fly – like deciding whether to take a corner quickly to exploit an opponent’s lapse in concentration.

There’s also something to be said for allowing players creative licence in some situations. Once teams are using AI to suggest the optimal corner strategy, opponents will doubtless counter with their own AI-prompted defensive setup.

So while the tech behind TacticAI is very interesting, it remains to be seen whether it can evolve to be useful in open play. Could AI get to the stage where it can recognise the best tactical player substitution in a given situation?

DeepMind researchers have advanced decision-making like this in their sights for future research, but will it ever reach a point where coaches would trust it?

My sense from discussions with people in the industry is many believe AI should only be used as an input to decision-making, and not be allowed to make decisions itself. There is no substitute for the experience and instinct of the best coaches, the intangible ability to feel what the game needs, to make a change in formation, to play someone out of position.

Smart tactics – but what about strategy?

Coming back to that crucial Liverpool corner in last Sunday’s FA Cup quarter final: we don’t know whether Liverpool’s manager Jürgen Klopp considered AI advice, but the decision was made to play an attacking corner kick, presumably in the hope of scoring a last-minute winner.

The out-swinging delivery into the box may well have been the tactic with the highest probability of scoring a goal – but things rapidly went wrong. Manchester United gained possession of the ball, moved it down the pitch on the counterattack and slotted home the winning goal, sending Liverpool out of the tournament at the last moment.

So while AI might suggest the optimal delivery and setup for a set piece, a coach might decide the wiser move is to play safe and avoid the risk of a counterattack. If TacticAI continues its career progression as a coaching assistant, it will no doubt learn that keeping the ball in the corner and playing for penalties may sometimes be the better option.

Mark Scanlan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Can AI improve football teams’ success from corner kicks? Liverpool and others are betting it can – https://theconversation.com/can-ai-improve-football-teams-success-from-corner-kicks-liverpool-and-others-are-betting-it-can-225894

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Flood, Professor of Sociology, Queensland University of Technology

Four in five young men and two in three young women have been exposed to pornography by the time they turn 20, according to the first nationally representative survey on this issue in Australia.

Boys and young men are exposed earlier to pornography than girls and young women, and far more likely to be frequent users.

Among young people who had seen pornography, the average age of first exposure was 13.2 years for males and 14.1 years for females.

Exposure to pornography is likely to shape children’s and young people’s developing sexual and relationship attitudes and behaviours, with potentially significant health consequences.

We summarise the findings here, drawing on the survey among 1,985 young people aged 15-20 conducted by leading violence prevention organisation Our Watch, as well as Maree Crabbe’s interviews with young Australians.

Read more:
Pornography has deeply troubling effects on young people, but there are ways we can minimise the harm

Exposure is common

Most young people aged 15-20 have seen pornography, whether intentionally or accidentally. Over four-fifths (86%) of young men, and over two-thirds (69%) of young women, have encountered pornography.

While the average age of first exposure to pornography among those who have seen it is 13 for boys and 14 for girls, some children’s first exposure is considerably earlier. As Lizzie commented,

I was maybe 8 or 9 years old when I first saw porn. I had an older brother and I think one day he left a porn site open, and it just sparked my curiosity after that.

Young people see pornography two to three years before their first sexual experience with a partner. As Nathan commented,

there was a group of boys who would spend the entire time at the back of the classroom just having fun, laughing and watching pornography together. And this was well and truly before any of us were sexually active.

Read more:
Help, I’ve just discovered my teen has watched porn! What should I do?

Deliberate and accidental exposure

First exposure is about equally likely to be deliberate or accidental. Among young people who had seen pornography, 50.1% of young men and 40.3% of young women reported deliberately seeking pornography the first time they viewed it, while 46.2% of young men and 55.7% of young women reported that their first exposure was unintentional.

Among the children and young people who had deliberately sought out pornography the first time they saw it, the most common motivation was curiosity. Other motivations included looking for sexual stimulation, because friends were watching it, and wanting to learn more about sex.

For young people whose first exposure was unintentional, most had accidentally encountered pornography via an internet pop-up or web search. Other common means included being shown by someone else and coming across it on social media.

Emma’s story is typical:

I accidentally clicked on just one of the many pop-ups that are around and it took me to a porn site.

As Mohammad explained:

Even when you’re not looking for it you find it on the internet.

Young men are frequent users

There is a strong gender contrast in the frequency of pornography use among young people. Many young men are frequent users, with over half (54.4%) using pornography at least weekly and one in six (16%) doing so daily. On the other hand, only about one in seven young women (14.3%) use pornography weekly and only one in 70 (1.4%) do so daily.

Pornography use is both widespread and normalised among young men, as Crabbe’s interviews corroborate. “It was just assumed that boys our age were watching it,” reports Tash. “Every guy I know uses it, girls not so much”, said Hannah.

One-fifth of young people have not seen pornography, including one-tenth (10.5%) of young men and over one-quarter (28.7%) of young women. Compared to boys and young men, girls and young women are less interested in and more critical of pornography.

Lack of interest was the most common reason for not having seen pornography, reported by 59% of men and 87% of women. Other common reasons included concerns that it is disgusting or gross (20% men, 40% women) and that they would not like its depictions of relationships (10% men, 39% women).

Why does it matter if young people are exposed to porn?

Other studies document that pornography shapes young people’s sexual understandings, expectations, and experiences, just as it shapes these among adults.

Pornography consumption is associated with a range of harms, including risky sexual behaviours such as choking, more sexually objectifying and gender-stereotypical views of women, rape myth acceptance, sexual coercion and aggression, and sexual and dating violence victimisation.

Read more:
Hold pornography to account – not education programs – for children’s harmful sexual behaviour

Lessening the harms

Four strategies are necessary to mitigate the potential harms of pornography exposure.

First, children and young people across Australia should have access to respectful relationships education and comprehensive sexuality education in schools. This should provide alternative and age-appropriate content on sexuality, including critical content on pornography.

Second, parents should be equipped with the tools to talk to their children about pornography, helping them to avoid or reject content that is sexist or celebrates violence that can be found in much pornography.

Third, we need social marketing and communication campaigns intended to undermine the influence of sexist and harmful content in pornography, and instead foster more gender-equitable and inclusive social norms.

Fourth, the federal government should support regulatory strategies to reduce minors’ exposure to pornography, such as age verification for adult websites, labelling and warning systems, mandated filtering by internet service providers with options for adult opt-in, and other measures.

Maree Crabbe has worked as a consultant on this issue and has developed a range of resources including school curricula, professional learning, two documentary films, and the “It’s Time We Talked” website.

Kelsey Adams and Michael Flood do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. By the time they are 20, more than four in five men and two in three women have been exposed to pornography: new research – https://theconversation.com/by-the-time-they-are-20-more-than-four-in-five-men-and-two-in-three-women-have-been-exposed-to-pornography-new-research-225573