We have been lied to for decades about the creation of Israel. It was born in sin, and it continues to live in sin, writes Jonathan Cook.
COMMENTARY:By Jonathan Cook
The headline above, about yet another Israeli operation to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians in the tiny, besieged and utterly destroyed enclave of Gaza, was published in yesterday’s Middle East Eye.
When I began studying Israeli history more than a quarter of a century ago, people claiming to be experts proffered plenty of excuses to explain why Israelis should not be held responsible for the 1948 ethnic cleansing of some 750,000 Palestinians from their homes — what Palestinians call their Nakba, or Catastrophe.
1. I was told most Israelis were not involved and knew nothing of the war crimes carried out against the Palestinians during Israel’s establishment.
2. I was told that those Israelis who did take part in war crimes, like Operation Broom to expel Palestinians from their homeland, did so only because they were traumatised by their experiences in Europe. In the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust, these Israelis assumed that, were the Jewish people to survive, they had no alternative but to drive out the Palestinians en masse.
3. From others, I was told that no ethnic cleansing had taken place. The Palestinians had simply fled at the first sign of conflict because they had no real historical attachment to the land.
4. Or I was told that the Palestinians’ displacement was an unfortunate consequence of a violent war in which Israeli leaders had the best interests of Palestinians at heart. The Palestinians hadn’t left because of Israeli violence but because they has been ordered to do so by Arab leaders in the region. In fact, the story went, Israel had pleaded with many of the 750,000 refugees to come home afterwards, but those same Arab leaders stubbornly blocked their return.
Every one of these claims was nonsense, directly contradicted by all the documentary evidence.
That should be even clearer today, as Israel continues the ethnic cleansing and slaughter of the Palestinian people more than 75 years on.
1. Every Israeli knows exactly what is going on in Gaza – after all, their children-soldiers keep posting videos online showing the latest crimes they have committed, from blowing up mosques and hospitals to shooting randomly into homes. Polls show all but a small minority of Israelis approve of the savagery that has killed many tens of thousands of Palestinians, including children. A third of them think Israel needs to go further in its barbarity.Today, Israeli TV shows host debates about how much pain soldiers should be allowed to inflict by raping their Palestinian captives. Don’t believe me? Watch this from Israel’s Channel 12:
🔴SHOCKING🔴
Israel is quite possibly the only nation in the world where it is permissable and commonplace to go on TV and openly declare that the RAPING of prisoners should be a LEGITIMATE and OFFICIAL POLICY of the state and must be widely implemented. pic.twitter.com/1PyRXk8fxU
2. If the existential fears of Israelis and Jews still require the murder, rape and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians three-quarters of a century on from the Holocaust, then we need to treat that trauma as the problem – and refuse to indulge it any longer.
3. The people of Gaza are fleeing their homes — or at least the small number who still have homes not bombed to ruins — not because they lack an attachment to Palestine. They are fleeing from one part of the cage Israel has created for them to another part of it for one reason alone: because all of them — men, women and children — are terrified of being slaughtered by an Israeli military, at best, indifferent to their suffering and their fate.
The official death toll in Gaza is a lie. The casualty numbers are far, far higher.
4. No serious case can be made today that Israel is carrying out any of its crimes in Gaza — from bombing civilians to starving them — with regret, or that its leaders seek the best for the Palestinian population. Israel is on trial for genocide at the world’s highest court precisely because the judges there suspect it has the very worst intentions possible towards the Palestinian people.
We have been lied to for decades about the creation of Israel. It was always a settler colonial project.
And like other settler colonial projects — from the US and Australia to South Africa and Algeria — it always viewed the native people as inferior, as non-human, as animals, and was bent on their elimination.
What is so obviously true today was true then too, at Israel’s birth. Israel was born in sin, and it continues to live in sin.
We in the West abetted its crimes in 1948, and we’re still abetting them today. Nothing has changed, except the excuses no longer work.
Jonathan Cook is a writer, journalist and self-appointed media critic and author of many books about Palestine. Winner of the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. Republished from the author’s blog with permission.
In 1874, a surgeon in South Australia telegraphed wound care instructions for a patient 2,000 kilometres away. A few years later, in 1879, a letter in The Lancet medical journal suggested physicians use the telephone to cut down on unnecessary patient visits.
As the telephone and telegraph spread, the idea of telemedicine – literally “healing at a distance” – inspired science fiction writers to conjure up new ways of treating patients across great distances.
Real-world technology has developed in tandem with scifi speculation ever since. Today, certain kinds of telemedicine have become commonplace, while other futuristic tools are in the offing.
The radio doctor and the teledactyl
In his 1909 short story The Machine Stops, English novelist E.M. Forster described a telemedicine apparatus that, when telegraphed, descends from the ceiling to care for patients in the comfort of their home. His story is also the earliest description of instant messaging and a kind of internet – both important for real-life telemedicine.
In 1924, Radio News magazine printed a cover story showing the future “Radio Doctor”. The cover depicts a physician examining a patient through a screen. Although the magazine story itself was a bizarre fiction that had little to do with a radio doctor, the imagery is evocative.
In a 1925 cover story for Science and Invention, US writer Hugo Gernsback describes a device called “The Teledactyl” (from tele, meaning far, and dactyl, meaning finger). The device uses radio transmitters and television screens to allow a doctor to interact with a patient. The added twist – the physician touches the patient using a remotely controlled mechanical hand set up in the patient’s home.
Gernsback was a futurist and pioneer in radio and electrical engineering. Nicknamed the “Father of Science Fiction”, Gernsback used fictional stories to educate readers on science and technology, and often included extensive scientific details in his writings. He helped establish science fiction as a literary genre, and the annual Hugo Awards are named after him.
From seafarers to spacefarers
The radio was important for early telemedicine. In the 1920s, physicians across the globe started using the radio to evaluate, diagnose, treat, and provide medical advice for sick or wounded seafarers and passengers. The radio is still used to provide medical consultation to ships at sea.
In 1955, Gernsback returned to the idea of distance medicine with “The Teledoctor”. This imaginary device uses the telephone and a closed-circuit television with mechanical arms controlled by the physician to provide remote patient care. Gernsback said the doctor of the future “will be able to do almost anything through teledoctoring that he can do in person”.
In 1959, psychiatrists in Nebraska started using two-way closed-circuit televisions to conduct psychiatric consultations between two locations. This is considered one of the first examples of modern-day telemedicine. Early telemedicine networks were expensive to develop and maintain, which limited broader use.
In the 1960s, NASA began efforts to integrate telemedicine into every human spaceflight program. By 1971, a telemedicine system was ready for trial on Earth – in the Space Technology Applied to Rural Papago Advanced Healthcare (STARPAHC) program. Using a two-way television and radio connection and remote telemetry, the program connected Tohono Oʼodham people (then known as Papago) with nurses and physicians hundreds of miles away.
The internet and a pandemic
It wasn’t until 1970 that the word telemedicine was officially coined by US doctor Thomas Bird. Bird and his colleagues set up an audiovisual circuit between the Massachusetts General Hospital and Logan Airport to provide medical consultations to airport employees.
From the 1970s onward, telemedicine started gaining more traction. The internet, officially born in 1983, brought new ways to connect patients and physicians.
Satellites could connect physicians and patients across greater distances without the need for two-way closed-circuit televisions. The cost to develop and maintain a telemedicine network decreased in the 1980s, opening the door to wider adoption.
In his 1999 science fiction novel Starfish, Canadian writer Peter Watts describes a device called the “Medical Mantis”. This device allows a physician to remotely examine and perform procedures on patients deep beneath the ocean’s surface. In the early 2000s, NASA’s Extreme Environment Mission Operations started testing teleoperated surgical robots in undersea environments.
The evolution of telemedicine has kept pace with advances in information and communication technology. Yet, throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, telemedicine remained little used.
It took the global COVID pandemic to make telemedicine an integral part of modern healthcare. Most of this is consultations via video call – not so far away from what Gernsback envisioned a century, though so far without the robotic hands.
What’s next? One likely factor pushing real-world telemedicine to match the dreams of science fiction will be developments in human spaceflight.
As humans progress in space exploration, the future of telemedicine may look more like science fiction. Earth-based monitoring of astronauts’ health will require technological breakthroughs to keep pace with them as they travel deeper into space.
Debbie Passey 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tenaw Tiruye, Postdoctoral Researcher, Cancer Epidemiology and Population Health, University of South Australia
Every year more than 24,000 Australian men are diagnosed with prostate cancer, making it the most frequently diagnosed cancer among Australian men.
Despite high survival rates – around 96% of men diagnosed with prostate cancer will survive for at least five years – prostate cancer can significantly affect mens’ mental wellbeing. This can apply through all stages of the illness, including diagnosis, treatment and follow up.
Rates of anxiety, depression and suicide are higher among men with prostate cancer than in the general population.
In our recent study, we wanted to understand the scale and timing of mental health issues among men with prostate cancer. Our findings suggest we need to offer them more support, sooner.
What we found
We looked at 13,693 men diagnosed with prostate cancer in South Australia between 2012 and 2020. We analysed prostate cancer registry data alongside data from the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and the Medicare Benefits Schedule.
Using this data, we tracked medication prescriptions (such as antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications) and mental health service use (such as GP mental health visits and psychiatrist visits) five years before and five years after prostate cancer diagnosis.
We found the proportion of men using antidepressants or anti-anxiety medications rose from 34.5% five years before a diagnosis to 40.3% five years afterwards. Some 10.2% used mental health services five years before, compared with 12.1% five years afterwards. GP mental health visits were most common, rising from 7.8% to 10.6%.
The most significant increase in the use of medicines and health services for mental illness occurred around the time of prostate cancer diagnosis. Some 15% of men started on antidepressants or anti-anxiety medications at the time of their diagnosis, while 6.4% sought help from mental health services for the first time.
Notably, the true impact of a prostate cancer diagnosis on men’s mental health is likely to be underestimated in our study. We only looked at mental health services subsidised by Medicare, but some men may access mental health services privately or through community services. And of course, some men with mental health issues may not seek help at all.
Men may be less likely to seek help
Our research suggests there’s a tendency for men to take medication rather than get help from mental health services. This may reflect a preference for medication, but could also be due to limited availability of services, or stigma around getting help.
Research shows many cancer patients are reluctant to seek help for mental health concerns.
Evidence on general help-seeking behaviours suggests men may be even less likely to seek support than women. Whether it’s the stigma surrounding mental health, or a fear about being seen as weak, only one-quarter of men say they would seek help from a mental health professional if they were experiencing personal or emotional problems.
More than 24,000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer in Australia each year. Halfpoint/Shutterstock
Early intervention is key
Given the trends in medication and mental health service use we observed in our study, men appear to be most vulnerable to psychological issues around the time of their prostate cancer diagnosis. This vulnerability might stem from the stress of being diagnosed with cancer, treatment decisions, and concerns about the future.
As such, there would be value in incorporating mental health screening into routine prostate cancer diagnosis processes. Early identification of mental health issues is important to pave the way for timely interventions and support, which can significantly improve mental wellbeing.
Rather than waiting for men to proactively seek out mental health supports after they’ve been diagnosed with prostate cancer, we should be offering those identified by such screening support at diagnosis and throughout treatment.
What do we need to do?
Psychological issues are one of the most frequently reported unmet needs among men with prostate cancer.
Improving access to mental health care may include increasing the annual sessions of Medicare-subsidised mental health services and offering more access to GP mental health plans for men with prostate cancer.
It would also be worthwhile to expand telehealth services. These provide an important option where costs or distance may make access to mental health services difficult for some prostate cancer patients.
Finally, we must normalise mental health discussions to ensure men with prostate cancer have every opportunity to voice their struggles and get the support they need.
This is particularly important given the wide-ranging effects of mental health problems on a person’s quality of life, health outcomes, and the overall burden on the health system.
The study discussed in this article was funded by the Movember Foundation.
Kerri Beckmann receives funding from Cancer Council SA’s Beat Cancer Project.
The deep complexities of climate change raise a myriad of challenges for humanity – not least of which is how best to respond. Should we throw ourselves into slashing carbon emissions and stabilising Earth’s climate as soon as possible? Or accept our fate and go into survival mode?
A recently published book tackles this question. In Living Hot: Surviving and Thriving on a Heating Planet, public ethicist Clive Hamilton and energy expert George Wilkenfeld urge Australia to get serious about climate adaptation.
Many of the pair’s arguments make perfect sense. The path to decarbonisation is challenging, and progress has been far too slow. And of course, the world has already heated far too much and more damage is already locked in – so adapting is vital.
However, I disagree with the central thesis of the book: that humanity cannot adapt adequately to climate change if we keep trying so hard to reduce emissions. This is not an either-or proposition: we must do both.
Not a zero-sum game
Climate mitigation refers to efforts to reduce the amount of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Adaptation involves adjusting our lives to cope with life on a hotter planet – such as higher seas and more extreme weather.
Much of Living Hot is devoted to outlining the barriers and limits to Australia’s mitigation task.
However, I find other parts of the book problematic.
Hamilton and Wilkenfeld argue that hopes of returning to a safe climate are “wishful thinking”. They say Australia has been too slow on climate action and has wasted its chance of becoming a renewable energy superpower and attempts to “electrify everything” – replacing our coal- and gas-powered economy with renewable energy, and electric vehicles and appliances – will likely fail.
Overall, the pair believe while Australia should still strive to meet its international obligations to reduce emissions, our primary focus should now be on planning to live on an overheated planet. Or in their words: “our only choice now is to focus on adaptation”.
I have several issues with this argument. First, it’s broadly accepted in the academic literature that reducing emissions is vital if adaptation is to be successful. As the old adage goes, prevention is better than cure.
Second, Hamilton and Wilkenfeld devote a large portion of the book to outlining the problems with mitigation, but apply a far less critical lens to the many barriers and limits to adaptation.
Transforming society to adapt to climate change will be no easy task. The book does note some complexities involved in, say, retrofitting homes to make them more resilient to disasters, or relocating flood-prone communities. It touches on the futility of building river levees and seawalls, and the general challenges of building community consensus for change.
But to me, this part of the analysis feels underdone. Exactly how will we get Australians on board with adaptation actions such as pre-emptively relocating entire regions, when we have barely embraced far easier changes, such as eating less meat?
Hamilton and Wilkenfeld argue the challenges inherent in mitigation – such as cost and political resistance, or our slowness to act – are essentially now insurmountable. Yet this same logic is not applied to the adaptation discussion.
All this leaves me wondering why Hamilton and Wilkenfeld didn’t argue for a two-pronged approach: full-throttle emissions reduction coupled with transformative adaptation.
Hamilton himself has done much in the past to raise public awareness of the need to heed the science and cut emissions. By approaching mitigation and adaptation hand-in-hand, we could harness community concern about climate change to kickstart and bolster adaptation actions.
Australians are increasingly climate-literate. It seems far-fetched to imagine people would accept the argument that mitigation has essentially failed and we must now accept catastrophic heating.
Despondency is not ‘natural’
At the end of Living Hot, Hamilton and Wilkenfeld discuss the “personal oddesey” of researching and writing the book. They write:
Making ourselves peer into the abyss of an Australian society struggling to cope with an unending series of extreme events meant reconfiguring our picture of what the future will be like.
Yet I disagree when Hamilton and Wilkenfeld write it is “natural to be despondent when thinking about climate change”.
Yes, feeling disillusioned about climate crisis is common, and valid. So too is feeling overwhelmed, cynical, horrified, depressed, confused, isolated or angry.
But as my research has shown, feelings of climate distress are not “natural”. They arise from emotional violence inflicted on us by political systems that know a public that feels disillusioned, overwhelmed and burnt-out is less likely to fight the expansion of fossil-fuelled capitalism.
Others do not have this luxury. Those on the frontlines of the climate crisis – young people, Pacific Islanders, disaster survivors, First Nations peoples, and others vulnerable to climate change – cannot give up. Many already live with the catastrophic impacts of global warming, or will still be alive when the worst effects are felt. They do not call for us to lower our mitigation ambitions. They keep fighting.
As part of a recent collaborative research project, I spoke to wildlife carers about their efforts to care for animals during the Black Summer bushfires. These people went to extreme lengths – compromising their finances, physical and mental health – to save or care for as many animals as they could.
Of course, the number of animals they were able to save pales in comparison to three billion displaced or incinerated. Still, these people didn’t quit.
It’s in these acts of perseverance, in the face of seemingly insurmountable challenges, where we can truly find hope.
Blanche Verlie received funding from the Australian Commonwealth Government via a Bushfire Recovery Grant from the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources under grant number GA223763 for the wildlife carer research discussed in this article. Blanche is on the Board of Directors of Climate for Change.
Japan’s population crisis isn’t letting up, despite ongoing efforts by its government to boost fertility rates. According to data released in June, birth rates fell for the eighth consecutive year in 2023, reaching a record low.
The data came shortly after a report by the Population Strategy Council warning that 744 of the nation’s 1,729 municipalities were at risk of disappearing by 2050.
The figures – startling as they are – are perhaps unsurprising considering Japan’s fertility rate has been on a decades-long downturn. But what does this feel like for the people who live there?
My research on the remote Gotō Islands of Western Japan, known for the 2018 UNESCO World Heritage sites of the Hidden Christians, provides a window into life in a quickly depopulating place.
A traumatic history
On the island of Hisaka, my interviewees explained how a population of around 4,500 in the 1950s has rapidly fallen to fewer than 250 people today. Arriving here is like travelling to a deep past with no cinemas, no fast food restaurants and few transport alternatives apart from boats.
Although they are naturally beautiful and verdant, the Gotō Islands are also marred by the symptoms of depopulation, from abandoned houses to cars and even vending machines.
The return to nature is evident: no people means the roads and houses are overgrown by forests. In some places without human life, wild deer, cattle and boar cause damage to the environment.
A broken, unmaintained vending machine. Gwyn McClelland
Depopulation is not a new problem on the Gotō Islands, which are remembered as the arrival place of Japanese Christians fleeing religious persecution since the late 1700s.
These Hidden Christians originally arrived on the invitation of the local Daimyo, or Lord, to farm the land and make it productive.
In 2018, four locations on the religiously diverse Gotō Islands were named as UNESCO World Heritage sites. These stunning landscapes are now known for their Catholic churches, alongside a traumatic history.
Exploring the Gotō
I have travelled to the Gotō Islands multiple times since 2022. I spoke with the people of the islands – and in particular to the descendants of the famed minority, the Hidden Christians.
Five of the interviews I conducted in this project are now online in both the original Japanese and with English transcripts.
Naru Island Junior High School Principal Miyamoto Kin’ichirō (born 1972) explained to me that when he went to school on the neighbouring island, Hisaka, there were just under 1,000 residents and 43 students at the school.
Today, there are more residents on Naru Island – just under 4,000 – but only 19 students at the school where he works. Kin’ichirō used the Japanese phrase “tonde mo nai” to express his concerns about the future:
In 50 years from now, it will be a situation ‘beyond help’ […] when there are basically no children on the island, and it is only the elderly.
Some islands of the Gotō archipelago are already abandoned.
One afternoon, my interviewee Kuzushima Yoshinobu (born 1956) took me on his boat to see the tiny island of Kazura-shima, which his community left wholesale almost 50 years ago.
He showed me the location of the removed church and a fig tree he had climbed as a child, now surrounded by the remains of the community’s village.
The Hidden Christians, which included Kuzushima’s ancestors, came from the mainland to the Gotō after 1797 in response to a call to repopulate and cultivate the islands’ neglected areas.
While the remote island inlets were inhospitable, they were the perfect place for peasants to hide outlawed Christian religious practices under the umbrella of apparent Shintoism and Buddhism.
The places that were the most difficult for the Hidden Christians to settle at were among the first to become uninhabited in the 20th century.
Akōgi Hidden Christian Museum on Naru Island, Gotō Islands. Gwyn McClelland
When I asked Hidden Christian descendant Urakami Sachiko (born 1943) about her hopes for the islands, she said:
at this point, I feel like there is no hope. I think that this island [Naru Island] will probably become uninhabited in some decades.
She playfully continued:
the young people who are from this place, I really want them to try a bit harder.
In what is called U-taan (U-turn) in Japanese, Sachiko and others like her returned to the islands later in life after living on the mainland.
One tourist guide and atheist, Iriguchi Hitoshi, showed me maps on which he had scrawled many historical migrations so he could explain the history to tourists.
But he said he was most worried about the most recent migration away from the islands, warning that young people with Hidden Christian and Catholic heritage would lose their faith as they moved to the mainlands.
“Faith’s base-camp is disappearing,” he said.
A history of helping
Not all of the islands have suffered population decline in the same way. Since the pandemic, a number of young and middle-aged people have come from Osaka and Tokyo to live and work remotely on the Gotō.
In 2024, the city of Fukue rejoiced that its number of residents had actually increased. I met some of the young people who brought their families here, found jobs and were welcomed by the locals.
I noted how the people living in these remote places helped each other out and shared resources.
Two of my interviewees and descendants of the Hidden Christians, Miyamoto Fujie and Jitsuo, took me along as they bought vegetables on a neighbouring island and sold them to the villagers of Hisaka Island (where there was no longer a shop) for 100 yen a bag (about A$1).
In fact, while some aspects of the Hidden Christian history include extreme persecution and prejudice, the historical cooperation between Buddhist, Shinto and Hidden Christian communities on the Gotō is one positive aspect of this story.
As explained by Sakatani Nobuko, a Buddhist guide (and collaborator on my project) on Hisaka Island:
because there is that history of helping each other as well as the difficult, the history is very rich.
The Gotō islands are beautiful and verdant, with many abandoned dwellings now overgrown with forest. Gwyn McClelland
Gwyn McClelland was a fellow of the Japan Foundation, and the National Library of Australia (NLA) in researching the Hidden Christian World Heritage Goto Islands. The Yanai Initiative (UCLA) and Waseda University supported the Japan Past and Present Digital Humanities Project, and the University of New England (UNE), Anaiwan Country, Armidale also supported this research.
The government’s recently announced plans to “transform maths education” have set off a heated debate over how the subject is taught in classrooms.
Primary and intermediate schools will now have a new maths curriculum starting in 2025 – a year earlier than initially planned – based on “structured maths”.
From what Education Minister Erica Stanford and her ministerial advisory group have said, it’s likely structured maths will include teachers directly explaining maths to children before they practise it, children repeating maths techniques until they have mastered them, and more rote memorisation of basic facts like times tables.
During last year’s election, National campaigned on a policy to “teach the basics brilliantly”. Students are now required to have one hour of maths per day in Years 1-8 and twice-yearly standardised maths tests in Years 3-8 from 2025.
But the government’s latest announcement has a new tone of urgency – which raises some questions.
Misleading numbers
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon called recent Year 8 maths results “appalling” and a “total system failure”. Stanford told media “those statistics tell us there’s no time”.
The government justified the changes using a study that found just 22% of Year 8 students, and just 12% of Māori students, were at the expected curriculum benchmark for mathematics. Taken out of context, these figures clearly paint a grim picture.
But in reality, they show a change in curriculum and a new benchmarking process introduced by the previous government in 2023, rather than a change in achievement.
As explained by Charles Darr, one of the lead researchers involved in the study quoted by the government:
We’ve been tracking student achievement in mathematics at Year 8 for more than ten years, and in that time, there has been no evidence for improvement or decline. We do have a new draft curriculum, however, and the provisional benchmarking exercise we carried out indicates it requires a higher level of proficiency than the 2007 curriculum.
The Aotearoa Educator’s Collective has called the government out on this misleading use of statistics.
The problem with rushing change
Primary maths education has been neglected for decades and does need support. But the government appears to be manufacturing a crisis to justify rushing the changes.
The structured maths curriculum and teaching resources are still being developed and time is running out.
Having these resources in teachers’ hands in time for 2025 will mean important processes, including consultation, quality control of resources and teacher professional learning, will be very rushed – if they happen at all.
This pace is concerning. Teachers are already under pressure to implement other mandatory changes in assessment and literacy.
Educators need resources directly connected to the curriculum and relevant to the children in Aotearoa New Zealand. Rushing the process means neither of these are likely to be the case.
Stanford is in commercially sensitive negotiations with existing providers to create these resources, yet these providers will also be operating on a rushed time frame.
They may not be able to provide something that is deeply connected to the curriculum, perhaps instead reframing existing material that is only superficially related.
Another option the minister might consider is to import overseas resources. This approach is also problematic. Resources made outside Aotearoa New Zealand do not reflect the diversity of our classrooms. For mathematics to be relevant for all children, resources should be locally focused.
Lack of research for new curriculum
At a surface level, the proposed new maths teaching methods have appeal. But research supporting this change is limited and underdeveloped. Even the ministerial advisory group concedes the research base for structured maths is “not as clear cut as the research for literacy”.
According to a report from the advisory group, “applying general principles from cognitive psychology to mathematics suggests that these (structured maths) practices will improve teaching”. But general principles suggesting an approach might work do not justify a rushed system overhaul.
Of course cognitive psychology, which includes topics like repetition and memory, is relevant to maths learning. However, cognitive theories of learning are only one part of the complex activity of classroom teaching.
Time to slow down
The limited evidence for structured maths stands in stark contrast to the broad base of research showing how to engage children in cognitively rich, creative and culturally-relevant maths.
While the government’s crisis narrative is unhelpful, there is a need and a political mandate for more support in maths education.
But what the country requires is a slow and considered response that is likely to work for the children and teachers it serves.
Rushing through a model with a weak evidence base only adds to teachers’ workloads, without guaranteeing to deliver the “brilliance” teachers and parents have been promised.
David Pomeroy receives funding from the Teaching and Learning Research Initiative (TLRI).
Lisa Darragh receives funding from Royal Society Te Apārangi Marsden Fast Start Grant
ABC chair Kim Williams has attracted considerable attention with his criticism of the broadcaster’s online news choices. Williams has taken issue with what he sees as the ABC prioritising lifestyle stories over hard news.
In the process, he has raised an important issue of principle.
Is it right for the chair to insert himself into editorial decision-making, even at the level of broad direction, as here?
Generally speaking, the answer would be no.
To see why, it is necessary only to look back to the chaotic period in 2018 when a former chair, Justin Milne, inserted himself into editorial decision-making because of concerns that the reporting of some ABC journalists was upsetting the government and thereby imperilling the ABC’s funding.
That debacle ended with the resignation not just of Milne but of the then managing director, Michelle Guthrie, leaving a sudden vacuum of leadership and a nervous newsroom.
It is therefore risky for Williams to take a step down this path.
However, the weakness of ABC news leadership requires that something be done.
This weakness has a moral as well as a professional-practice dimension.
A risky path to follow. Video: ABC News
The moral dimension is demonstrated by the treatment of high-profile staff such as Stan Grant and Laura Tingle, and of less well-known but still valued journalists such as ABC Radio Victoria’s Nicole Chvastek, and Sydney radio’s Antoinette Lattouf. All of these journalists, in various ways, have fallen victim to the ABC’s propensity to buckle under external pressure.
The professional-practice dimension is demonstrated not just by the online performance criticised by Williams but by the prioritising of police-rounds stories over far bigger issues on the evening television bulletin, and by occasional spectacular failures such as the attempt to link the late NSW Premier Neville Wran with Sydney’s Luna Park ghost train fire.
The standing of the ABC’s best journalism — programmes such as Four Corners and Radio National’s Background Briefing — is undermined by these systemic failures.
However, indicating his preference for hard news over lifestyle stories will get Williams only so far. It lies within his power and that of the board to do what ought to have been done long ago if the ABC is serious about strengthening its news service: separate the roles of managing director and editor-in-chief.
Having them in the one person creates an inherent conflict that has nothing to do with the integrity of the individual occupying the position, but everything to do with the core responsibilities of the two jobs.
The managing director, as a board member, is responsible for the overall fortunes of the ABC. This includes its financial fortunes and its relationship with its most important stakeholder, the federal government.
An editor-in-chief’s first responsibility is not to these considerations at all, but to the public interest. That requires above all the creation of a safe space in which ABC journalists can do good journalism without looking over their shoulders to see if they are going to be the next target of an attack from a politician (Chvastek), a lobby group (Antoinette Lattouf), or News Corporation (Grant and Tingle).
The Stan Grant controversy. Video: The Guardian
It also requires the imposition of rigorous editing processes to see that stories are properly verified, accurate and fair, regardless of the standing or wilfulness of the staff involved, and that the stories deal with issues of substance.
And in the case of Lattouf, the focus shifts to the public interest in the impact on money and morale of the prolonged legal proceedings over her sacking.
She was removed from a temporary role on ABC Sydney radio for posting on Instagram a report by Human Rights Watch, in which it was alleged that Israel was using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza.
The ABC argued unsuccessfully in the Fair Work Commission that she had not been sacked. Subsequently Lattouf made an offer to settle for $85,000 in damages and her old role back. However, the ABC has not accepted this and instead is now involved in a further legal dispute, this time in the Federal Court, over whether due process was followed in sacking her.
Fair Work Commission finds Antoinette Lattouf was sacked by ABC. Video: ABC News
This is causing consternation in Canberra, where the Senate standing committee on environment and communications has asked the ABC how much this action is costing.
The ABC has supplied the committee with the amount but it has not been made public.
It is a textbook case of how a strong editor-in-chief who was not the managing director would act in this situation. A reporter would be assigned to find out the amount, since it is clearly a matter of public interest, and a well-connected press gallery journalist would get it without too much trouble.
ABC management would then be asked to comment, and a story containing the amount and any ABC comment would be broadcast on the ABC.
A managing director has a conflicting responsibility: to do all he or she can to protect the corporate interests of the ABC, so the amount remains secret.
Meanwhile, the ABC gives rival news organisations the chance to scoop the ABC on its own story, leaving its news service looking even weaker.
The Albanese government might be likened to the harried house-husband struggling with untidy rooms, dog hairs on the carpet, and piles of clothes in or waiting for the washing machine.
All this, with a property inspection looming that threatens a forced move into less salubrious accommodation.
With less than a year to go until the latest date for an election, the government is looking overwhelmed by its list of “still to do” and “issues outstanding” items. Starting things is always easier than completing them. Obstacles and distractions turn up.
Early in the term, the Senate was more compliant. Now, with the Greens as well as the Coalition muscling up for the election, and the crossbench more diverse after defections (including Fatima Payman from Labor), negotiations on bills have become more complicated.
Deals must soon be clinched on some major items if the government is to avoid them becoming “fails” on the report card.
Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, Bill Shorten, has legislation to reform the scheme due to be debated in the Senate when parliament resumes on Monday after the winter recess.
With the government committed to significantly reducing the growth in the cost of the NDIS, the “Getting the NDIS Back on Track” bill is designed to create the “scaffolding” for a batch of changes to bring the scheme back to its more limited original intent.
Shorten has been negotiating with the Liberals, who have put forward amendments, and pressing the states, which have cavilled at having to take a bigger role in providing services. Shorten’s aim is for the bill to be passed in the sitting fortnight.
On another front, Special Minister of State Don Farrell has had to further delay introducing legislation for his proposed reforms of election spending and donations. That’s been put off a month, until September. There is no deal so far with the opposition or crossbench: the government is hoping the Liberals might eventually play ball.
Negotiations aiming for a bipartisan agreement to put aged care funding on a more sustainable basis (involving extra government money and additional consumer imposts) have dragged on endlessly, with legislation yet to be introduced.
More immediately, the battle with the nefarious CFMEU has become predictably difficult. The Fair Work Commission’s general manager, who is the regulator, has applied to the federal court to install an administrator in the union’s construction division. New Workplace Relations Minister Murray Watt has reiterated he’ll introduce legislation next week unless the union consents to the administrator.
One of Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ key reforms is to restructure the Reserve Bank, establishing two separate boards (one an expert in monetary policy, the other for administration) instead of the present single board. The legislation hasn’t been introduced yet because Chalmers – who wants changes to the bank to be bipartisan – hasn’t been able to reach an agreement with the Liberals.
Sprucing the government’s house also involves decluttering. At the weekend Anthony Albanese tossed out the earlier plan for a Makaratta Commission to deal with truth-telling and treaty.
Post referendum, Albanese is taking his Indigenous policy in a fresh direction, emphasising economic empowerment rather than the remaining parts of the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Predictably, this has left some in the Indigenous constituency further disillusioned and others downright angry. Things weren’t helped by the PM seeking to leave the impression the government had never supported a commission, although money remains in the budget for one.
Months ago, at risk of another rebuff from the High Court, the government tried to rush through legislation to make it a crime for non-citizens to refuse to co-operate in their deportation (for example, by declining to provide documents).
Labor expected the opposition to wave the bill through. Instead it was sent to a Senate inquiry. Meanwhile the government won the relevant court case, reducing the need for the draconian measures in the legislation. Now this bill is in limbo.
Then there’s the religious discrimination legislation, which was an election promise. This bill has been drafted and shown to the opposition but not publicly released. Albanese has said he won’t go ahead with it unless there is bipartisan agreement – which there is not.
Assuming Albanese pronounces the bill dead, the declared intention is to go ahead with separate legislation against hate speech.
As the government struggles with a legislative agenda facing blocks and other delays, the economic backdrop gyrates.
An August interest rate hike was avoided with better-than-feared inflation figures, but the relief has been dampened by a public row breaking out this week between the Reserve Bank and the government over the role of its spending in contributing to, or reducing, inflation.
The bank is tut-tutting about government spending (state as well as federal) and pointing out that the anti-inflation effect of the budget energy price relief will be only temporary. It also believes the economy is “running a bit hot”. Chalmers is pushing back on its various contentions.
Under the revised arrangements for the Reserve Bank that Chalmers has been able to put in place, which includes a regular Governor’s press conference, we are hearing a lot more from the Reserve Bank, a complication, at best, for the treasurer.
This week the government unveiled another dollop of spending – a 15% increase in wages for child care workers, costing $3.56 billion.
This was provided for in the May budget but not announced. The timing is politically neat: 10% pre-election and 5% post-election.
So is the timing of the condition the government has imposed on the childcare providers – not to increase fees by more than 4.4% for one year, until after the election.
Some observers have noted that Chalmers, hyperactive and ambitious, has been more subdued since the budget. If the government falls into minority at the election, it would be defying history if some tensions between the prime minister and treasurer did not emerge in the second term.
Labor colleagues privately have become more critical of Albanese as the election draws nearer. They’re worried about the polls, surprised Peter Dutton is cutting through to the extent he is, and concerned Albanese, while talking a lot, is not more effectively reaching an electorate that is worried about the present and pessimistic about the future.
Given that Albanese in the 2022 election, when he was kicking with the wind in the final quarter (to use his terminology), did not seem a great campaigner, his colleagues will want him to sharpen his messaging for what will be a tougher fight next time.
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.
Olympian Tom Daley is the most decorated diver in Britain’s history. He is also an avid knitter. At the Paris 2024 Olympics Daley added a fifth medal to his collection – and caught the world’s attention knitting a bright blue “Paris 24” jumper while travelling to the games and in the stands.
At the Tokyo Olympics, where Daley was first spotted knitting, he explained its positive impact on his mental health.
It just turned into my mindfulness, my meditation, my calm and my way to escape the stresses of everyday life and, in particular, going to an Olympics.
The mental health benefits of knitting are well established. So why is someone famous like Daley knitting in public still so surprising?
But the history of yarn crafts and gender is more tangled. In Europe in the middle ages, knitting guilds were exclusive and reserved for men. They were part of a respected Europe-wide trade addressing a demand for knitted products that could not be satisfied by domestic workers alone.
The industrial revolution made the production of clothed goods cheaper and faster than hand-knitting. Knitting and other needle crafts became a leisure activity for women, done in the private sphere of the home.
World Wars I and II turned the spotlight back on knitting as a “patriotic duty”, but it was still largely taken up by women.
During COVID lockdowns, knitting saw another resurgence. But knitting still most often makes headlines when men – especially famous men like Daley or actor Ryan Gosling – do it.
Men who knit are often seen as subverting the stereotype it’s an activity for older women.
Knitting the stress away
Knitting can produce a sense of pride and accomplishment. But for an elite sportsperson like Daley – whose accomplishments already include four gold medals and one silver – its benefits lie elsewhere.
Olympics-level sport relies on perfect scores and world records. When it comes to knitting, many of the mental health benefits are associated with the process, rather than the end result.
Daley says knitting is the “one thing” that allows him to switch off completely, describing it as “my therapy”.
The Olympian says he could
knit for hours on end, honestly. There’s something that’s so satisfying to me about just having that rhythm and that little “click-clack” of the knitting needles. There is not a day that goes by where I don’t knit.
Knitting can create a “flow” state through rhythmic, repetitive movements of the yarn and needle. Flow offers us a balance between challenge, accessibility and a sense of control.
It’s been shown to have benefits relieving stress in high-pressure jobs beyond elite sport. Among surgeons, knitting has been found to improve wellbeing as well as manual dexterity, crucial to their role.
For other health professionals – including oncology nurses and mental health workers – knitting has helped to reduce “compassion fatigue” and burnout. Participants described the soothing noise of their knitting needles. They developed and strengthened team bonds through collective knitting practices.
A Swiss psychiatrist says for those with trauma, knitting yarn can be like “knitting the two halves” of the brain “back together”.
Another study showed knitting in primary school may boost children’s executive function. That includes the ability to pay attention, remember relevant details and block out distractions.
As a regular creative practice, it has also been used in the treatment of grief, depression and subduing intrusive thoughts, as well countering chronic pain and cognitive decline.
Knitting is a community
The evidence for the benefits of knitting is often based on self-reporting. These studies tend to produce consistent results and involve large population samples.
This may point to another benefit of knitting: its social aspect.
Knitting and other yarn crafts can be done alone, and usually require simple materials. But they also provide a chance to socialise by bringing people together around a common interest, which can help reduce loneliness.
The free needle craft database and social network Ravelry contains more than one million patterns, contributed by users. “Yarn bombing” projects aim to engage the community and beautify public places by covering objects such as benches and stop signs with wool.
The interest in Daley’s knitting online videos have formed a community of their own.
In them he shows the process of making the jumper, not just the finished product. That includes where he “went wrong” and had to unwind his work.
His pride in the finished product – a little bit wonky, but “made with love” – can be a refreshing antidote to the flawless achievements often on display at the Olympics.
Gabrielle Weidemann receives funding from the Australian Research Council and from the Department of Defence. None of this funding is associated with the mental health effects of knitting.
Michelle O’Shea 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Buchanan, Professor, Discipline of Business Information Systems, University of Sydney Business School, University of Sydney
From December the typical early childhood educator and carer will get a pay rise of at least $103 per week. By the following December, it will be more, taking the total to an extra $155 per week.
And there will be more after that.
The two pay rises, totalling 15%, announced by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Thursday will be completely funded by the government. It’s part of a deal in which the childcare centres that actually employ the workers agree to increase their fees by no more than 4.4% over the next year.
The initiative, years in the making, is a down payment on a bigger increase expected when the Fair Work Commission completes its review of the wages of workers in childcare and some other caring professions by mid-2025.
An earlier decision about aged care workers awarded increases up to 28.5%.
Albanese’s move is good social and educational policy, and even better politics.
A (partial) remedy for gender pay inequity
Employees in the early childhood education and care sector are among the lowest-paid of all professions. Their median weekly earnings are less than two-thirds of median adult earnings. The starting salary for adults is about $24 per hour.
Attracting and retaining workers in the sector has been a chronic problem.
Australia’s childcare industry has one of the largest unfilled vacancy ratios of any occupation. In the Sydney region, childcare is the top occupation where vacancies outstrip applications. Early childhood teaching is the fourth-highest.
The government’s decision to increase wages early, without waiting for an order from the Fair Work Commission, is very welcome.
Until the current Fair Work hearing, child carers and childhood educators themselves had to prosecute costly and complex cases using laws that were poorly designed to deal with gender-based undervaluation of care work.
The Fair Work Commission’s new approach derives from the Albanese government’s 2022 reform of the Fair Work Act that directed it to
promote job security and gender equality.
In late 2023 the commission received a report on the effect of gender-based occupational segregation. In early 2024 it decided to grant pay increases of between 15% and 28.5% for aged care workers. Its decision was based on a finding that their work had been historically undervalued because of assumptions based on gender.
At this year’s annual wage review, the commission announced it would undertake the same exercise for childhood educators and carers and a number of other caring professions. The results will be incorporated in next year’s review.
The United Workers Union has been asking for a 25% increase. One of the big employers, the Australian Securities Exchange-listed G8, called on the government to fund a 15% hourly wage increase for specialist educators and a 10% increase for all early childhood educators.
These developments represent a significant shift in wages policy and relative pay, one likely to more properly value care work and get unfilled vacancies filled.
Good education policy
Demand for early childhood education and care is high and rising.
Between 2014-15 and 2022-23 the proportion of children aged five years and under getting subsidised places rose from 40.8% to 49.9%.
In terms of developing future citizens, this is a great achievement. But it is less so in terms of fees. Most of the growth was in private centres, which are mostly run for profit.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission found last year that early childhood education and care was less affordable in Australia than in most other developed countries.
Average daily fees at centre-based day care climbed 20% between September 2018 and July 2023. Out-of-pocket expenses increased by 7%.
The fees paid by families are a significant burden on them. Industrial relations expert Rae Cooper says they form part of the architecture of discrimination that limits women’s ability to work.
The deal accompanying Albanese’s pay rise for workers doesn’t impose a cap on fees, but it does require providers to not increase their fees by more than 4.4% over the next 12 months.
Whether this is the beginning of tighter quality and cost controls in ways seen as essential in a recent Productivity Commission report remains to be seen.
Good inflation policy
The measures will cost $3.6 billion over four years.
Whereas some argue that extra government spending necessarily increases inflation, this extra spending will restrain fee increases at the same time as it boosts wages for a sizeable number of traditionally underpaid workers.
Merely accepting a Fair Work Commission decision on work value without providing funding for it and without obtaining guarantees on fees would have added to the inflation experienced by parents much more.
Good politics, for now
Deep problems remain with Australia’s system of early education and care.
The basic architecture of the system, set up in the Hawke-Keating era, uses public money to fund a market of providers in which for-profits form the majority.
But this package of initiatives is an important step towards fixing things.
Families with young children face huge pressures from rising rents and interest rates. Insulating them from fee increases, at least for the next 12 months, is smart politics. It’s a down payment on work to come.
John Buchanan has received funding from State and Federal Governments, unions, NGOs and employers for applied research undertaken over the last 35 years.
His most recent applied research projects have been undertaken for IFM (Industry Funds Management), the NSW Teachers Federation, the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association and the Queensland Nurses and Midwives Union as well as icare NSW, custodian of the NSW Workers Compensation Insurance service.
He is a member of the National Tertiary Education Union and was on the bargaining team that settled the latest enterprise agreement for the University of Sydney.
Frances Flanagan is a member of the National Tertiary Education Union.
France is “checking” whether a high-level mission to New Caledonia will be possible prior to or after the Pacific Islands Forum Leaders’ Summit in Tonga at the end of the month.
Forum leaders have written to French President Emmanuel Macron requesting to send a Forum Ministerial Committee to Nouméa to gather information from all sides involved in the ongoing crisis.
The French Ambassador to the Pacific, Véronique Roger-Lacan, will be in Suva on Friday for the Forum Foreign Ministers Meeting to “continue the dialogue . . . and explain the facts”.
She told RNZ Pacific that sending a mission to New Caledonia was a request and it was up to the PIF to decide if “anything is realistic”.
“Paris is checking whether it can be before the summit or after. We still need information,” she said.
Asked if France was open to the idea of such a visit by Pacific leaders, Roger-Lacan said: “Paris is always open for dialogue.”
On Monday, the incoming PIF chair and Tonga’s Prime Minister, Hu’akavameiliku Siaosi Sovaleni, confirmed he was still waiting to “receive any notification from Paris”.
“It’s very important for the Pacific Islands Forum to visit New Caledonia before the leaders meeting,” he said.
But Roger-Lacan said it is up to Paris to decide.
“New Caledonia is French territory and it is the State which decides on who enters the French territory and when and how.”
French President Emmanuel Macron . . . security forces are still working on removing roadblocks, mainly in the capital Nouméa and its outskirts. Image: Pool/Ludovic Marin/AFP/RNZ Pacific
It has been almost three months now since violent unrest broke out in Nouméa after an amendment to the French constitution that would voter eligibility in New Caledonia’s local elections, which the pro-independence groups said would marginalise the indigenous Kanaks.
French security forces are still working on removing roadblocks, mainly in the capital Nouméa and its outskirts.
The death toll stands at 10 — eight civilians and two gendarmes. Senior pro-independence leaders who were charged for instigating the civil unrest are in jail in mainland France awaiting trial.
It is estimated over 800 buildings and businesses have been looted and burnt down by rioters.
‘Hear all the points of view’ But Roger-Lacan dismissed such claims, saying those who were leaving were “mostly expatriates” and that “migration is a basis of humanity”.
“There are lots of industries that have closed because of the burning and of the riots, and maybe those people are not sure that anything will reopen.
“When there is a place which is not worth investing anymore people change places. It’s normal life.”
She slammed the Pacific media for “not being very balanced” with their reports on the New Caledonia situation.
“Apparently, there have been people in the Pacific briefed by one side, not by all the sides, and they have to hear all the points of view.”
Saint-Louis still not under control She said security was now “almost back”.
“There is one last pocket of of instability, which is the Saint-Louis community and there are 16,000 New Caledonian people who still cannot move freely within that area because there is so many unrest.
“But otherwise, security has been brought back,” she added.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
In his landmark ruling against Google earlier this week, United States district judge Amit Mehta said the tech giant has built “the industry’s highest quality search engine”.
Judge Mehta made clear this was partly because Google had an illegal monopoly over the market. Nonetheless, Google was keen to promote the praise it received for its flagship product. Its president of global affairs, Kent Walker, said:
This decision recognizes that Google offers the best search engine, but concludes that we shouldn’t be allowed to make it easily available.
But is the Google search engine as good as the company (and Judge Mehta) says it is? And by what metric do we measure whether Google has the “best” search engine in the world?
To answer these thorny questions, it’s important to think about the broader context of the internet – and, in particular, the powerful place of advertising.
Search engines are an expensive business
On September 4 1998, computer scientists Larry Page and Sergey Brin launched Google. In the 26 years since, the company has radically transformed our ability to find information.
People expect the search engine to rapidly deliver accurate answers to every one of those queries. To fulfil this expectation, Google must keep the index up to date by regularly scanning and re-scanning the internet.
This huge task requires thousands of staff – and is therefore very expensive.
One edge Google has over its competitors when it comes to delivering relevant results is its large customer base. They can tune their algorithms based on customer clicks to be more accurate and cover a broader range of queries.
A good way to measure the quality of Google’s search engine is by tracking the presence of advertisements to see how much they affect peoples’ ability to find the information they are looking for.
Advertising has long been a key part of Google.
The company doesn’t appear to keep copies of its search result pages. However with some sleuthing, examples of how ads in search have changed over the years can be found on the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine. The picture that emerges indicates the line between high-quality search results and sponsored content is increasingly blurred.
The first page captured in the year 2000 shows only two adverts at the very top of the page. These are clearly identified by different coloured boxes and the prominently displayed message “sponsored link”.
Screen capture from 2000 of Google search results for the query ‘hotel’. Supplied
The next example, taken from 2013, shows many more ads. But they are clearly labelled in a coloured box and in a separate column on the right.
Screen capture from 2013 of Google search results for the query ‘hotel’. Supplied
In 2016, the column has disappeared and the ads at the top lose their distinctiveness from Google’s main result list, for which Google receives no money.
Screen capture from 2016 of Google search results for the query ‘hotel’. Supplied
Finally, the capture of the Google result today shows sponsored links occupying much screen space before the main results can be seen at the bottom of the page.
Screen capture from 2024 of Google search results for the query ‘hotel’. Supplied
There are other problems impacting the quality of Google’s search engine – as well as its competitors’. In a study published earlier this year, German researchers found that spam and other low quality content is very prevalent among the top results for product review searches on Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo.
They concluded:
We find that search engines do intervene and
that ranking updates, especially from Google, have a temporary positive effect,
though search engines seem to lose the cat-and-mouse game that is [search engine optimisation] spam.
So, what’s the fix?
The impact of forcing Google to give up some of its market share might increase competition, which could push Google to improve the experience search engine users have by reducing the volume and display of advertising.
However, reducing the search engine’s customer base too much might impact on the search engine’s ability to deliver high quality results, because the number of customer clicks that help tune the search engine algorithm would drop.
Apart from breaking up a monopoly, are there other ways to improve search quality?
The most promising approach at the moment is to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) behind the scenes.
A recent leak of how the Google algorithm works found that a generative AI system was being used to judge the quality of web pages.
Microsoft has also applied an “AI model to our core Bing search ranking engine, which led to the largest jump in relevance in two decades.”
Hopefully this works. Because with multiple disruptions from the courts and AI innovations including Chatbots, the sedate changes in the quality of search results are about to accelerate.
Mark Sanderson received funding from Microsoft Research in 2018.
For decades, Australia’s largest independent oil and gas company, Woodside, has eyed off a prize: the largest known unconventional gas fields in the nation.
But there’s a problem. The enormous Brecknock, Calliance and Torosa gas fields are hundreds of kilometres off the coast of Western Australia – buried underneath pristine coral reefs. To access it, the company would have to drill more than 50 wells around the Scott Reef system and pipe the gas 900 km along the ocean floor to a processing plant.
Now Woodside has an even larger problem. The state’s Environmental Protection Authority is signalling it will reject this A$30 billion project, known as Browse, which is part of Woodside’s much larger Burrup Hub project.
It would be unusual to see the state authority reject a project of this size – they’re more commonly approved with conditions. But the authority is clearly concerned about the potential damage the giant gas project could do. The project has been mired in controversy, attracting 800 public appeals and more than 400,000 signatures on a petition against it. Conservationists are elated at news of the rejection.
Has this project by Australia’s homegrown answer to Big Oil been shut down? Not quite. The authority has only made a preliminary decision. Woodside has vowed to keep pushing for a green light – and it has the support of federal Resources Minister, Madeleine King.
But because these reefs are on an important migration route for endangered pygmy blue whales, federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek may have to weigh in.
What happens next will tell us a great deal about who holds sway within the Albanese government.
How big is this project?
If approved, the Browse project would feed gas into Woodside’s proposed Burrup Hub, the company’s gas megaproject which would become one of the largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) processing hubs in Australia. Conservationists have described Burrup as a “climate bomb”, which would produce twice the emissions of any other fossil fuel project seeking approval.
The Browse gas has high levels of carbon dioxide (12% CO₂), and gas extraction commonly leads to escaped methane, a particularly potent greenhouse gas. Last year, Shell left the joint venture citing concerns about profitability and carbon.
Under Woodside’s proposal, gas would be extracted and stored on two floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) vessels. This photo shows a drilling platform and a FPSO vessel. m.afiqsyahmi/Shutterstock
But greenhouse gas emissions aren’t usually covered under an environmental authority’s remit. The Western Australian authority reportedly rejected the Browse project on conservation grounds. A freedom of information request by the Nine newspapers produced a letter the authority sent in February to Woodside, indicating the project was “unacceptable” due to the likely impacts on Scott Reef.
The concerns are well-founded. The project would threaten the habitat or migratory routes of endangered species such as pygmy blue whales, manta rays, whale sharks and nesting green turtles. Gas flaring would disorient migratory birds and young turtle hatchlings.
Noise pollution from drilling, piling and other infrastructure would cause stress and impact habitat. Chemical pollutants including drilling fluid and treated sewage would be released into the water.
High speed transfer boats could threaten whale migration paths. Then there’s the chance of an oil blowout. If this happened, it would be devastating for marine life.
There’s a chance gas extraction could cause Sandy Islet, the only part of Scott Reef above the high tide mark, to be submerged, risking the destruction of a popular nesting habitat for green turtles.
In the public interest?
Woodside argues exploiting these enormous gas fields is necessary to avoid a forecast gas shortage in WA – and to firm up energy security in Asia.
But the state doesn’t have a gas shortage. Even if it did, WA has a domestic reservation policy requiring LNG producers to reserve 15% for the domestic market. Given a recent WA parliamentary inquiry found major gas companies are only reserving 8% of the state’s gas at present, it would be far simpler to enforce the current reservation policy rather than crack open new gas under a coral reef.
What’s coming next?
A final decision by the state Environmental Protection Authority is yet to be handed down. But even if the decision is a clear no, it’s hard to see the company giving up.
In that case, Plibersek would likely have to weigh in. She is tasked with making determinations of national environmental significance under Australia’s main environment laws.
These laws don’t account for damage done by emissions, meaning Plibersek could not reject Woodside’s proposal on climate grounds. But the act does cover protection of endangered species, migratory species and the marine environment.
The endangered pygmy blue whale is found in Western Australian waters –including Scott Reef. Under Australia’s environment laws, endangered means the species has had a severe drop in population and has fallen by at least 50% over ten years or three generations.
Plibersek could stop the Browse project due to its impact on the pygmy blue whale, as this species has an existing species recovery plan.
When a recovery plan is in place, our laws state the federal minister cannot approve a project inconsistent with or in contravention of the plan. But the whale’s recovery plan expires next year.
Gas – or nature?
When the Albanese government came to power, it promised stronger action on climate and a reversal of the worsening decline of the natural world.
But what happens when the government’s priorities conflict? This year, King launched the government’s future gas strategy, which envisages a role for fossil gas out to 2050.
For so long when a fossil fuel company has applied to open new gas fields or coal mines in Australia the answer has been yes. A decision by WA’s environmental authority has challenged that. But it’s not a hard no.
If Browse gets federal approval, it will be a very clear sign of the government’s priorities.
Samantha Hepburn 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.
Taylor Swift’s Eras’ Tour concerts in Vienna, scheduled for August 8–10, have been cancelled due to a foiled terrorist plot. The events were expected to draw around 65,000 attendees each night.
Two suspects have been arrested. The main suspect is a 19-year-old Austrian citizen who is believed to have pledged allegiance to Islamic State last month. Authorities found chemical substances in his possession and noted that he had been radicalised online. The other suspect was arrested in Vienna.
Concerts have always been prime targets for terrorists seeking to inflict maximum harm. This was tragically underscored by the attack on Crocus City Hall in Moscow in March. Four terrorists associated with IS carried out a coordinated attack involving mass shootings, slashing, and incendiary devices, resulting in 145 deaths and more than 551 injuries.
Concerts as terror targets
From 1996 to 2020, at least 33 cases of attempted or executed terror attacks targeting concerts have been recorded globally. These attacks have claimed an estimated 263 lives.
In nearly 70% of these cases, bombings and explosions were the primary method of attack, while firearms were used in almost 24% of the cases. The use of relatively primitive explosive devices, such as hand grenades, was reported in at least eight cases.
The most fatal terrorist attacks on concert venues in history include:
November 13 2015, Paris: the Bataclan theatre attack by the Islamic State of Iraq resulted in 90 deaths. This incident was part of a coordinated series of attacks across Paris, which left 130 people dead in total.
October 1 2017, Las Vegas: an alleged anti-government extremist opened fire on attendees of the Route 91 Harvest music festival from a hotel room, killing 58 people and injuring more than 850. This remains the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
May 22 2017, Manchester: a suicide bomber affiliated with IS detonated an explosive device at the end of an Ariana Grande concert, killing 22 people and injuring more than 500.
Given this history, it’s not surprising Austrian authorities decided to cancel the concerts.
Avoiding tragic deja vu
The demographic targeted in the alleged terror plot in Vienna is reminiscent of the 2017 Manchester Arena attack.
The typical profile of Ariana Grande concertgoers, especially during the “Dangerous Woman Tour” when the Manchester attack occurred, included a large proportion of young fans, many of whom were teenagers or even younger children. The audience was mostly female and often included families, with parents accompanying their children.
Among the 22 people killed in Manchester, the youngest victim was an 8-year-old girl. Several other children and teenagers lost their lives. An attack at a Taylor Swift concert could have inflicted similar damage and resulted in a comparable tragedy.
One of the victims of the Manchester Arena attack was 29-year-old Martyn Hett. Martyn’s mother became a prominent advocate for counterterrorism measures in the aftermath of the attack. Her efforts and campaigning resulted in the development of “Martyn’s Law” in the UK. This law aims to improve security at public venues by mandating better preparedness and response strategies to prevent similar terror attacks.
One of the likely indicators used by ASIO to assess the threat level is the global security atmosphere, including existing and potential threats identified in other parts of the world. The interconnected nature of global terrorism means threats abroad can have implications for our national security.
This is further highlighted by the recent foiled terror plots ahead of the Paris Olympics, which were largely motivated by ideological extremism and encouraged by global terrorist networks. In the months leading up to the games, French authorities reportedly thwarted at least two terror plots aimed at the Games.
In late April, a 16-year-old was arrested after announcing plans to carry out a suicide bombing. More recently, an 18-year-old was detained for allegedly plotting an attack at a soccer stadium in Saint-Etienne, inspired by Islamist ideologies.
ASIO Chief Mike Burgess has emphasised more young Australians are being radicalised through the internet, which he describes as a “the world’s most potent incubator of extremism”. He’s highlighted that the online ecosystem has facilitated the spread of extremist ideologies, conspiracies, and misinformation, making young people particularly vulnerable to radicalisation.
This trend has been exacerbated by global events and conflicts, which have intensified grievances and fuelled extremist views. Burgess has noted that there has been a resurgence in minors embracing violent extremism, with recent cases involving individuals as young as 14. The above examples are case in point.
What does this mean for Australians? First, it reaffirms that our intelligence agencies are ahead of these trends, closely monitoring what’s happening here and around the world. This is cause for reassurance.
It also alerts us that the elevated terror threat level is for a reason, and the call for heightened vigilance is justified. It shows Australia’s commitment to a proactive approach in safety and security, staying ahead of potential risks before they materialise and taking mitigating measures.
It’s important to remember that countering terrorism is a shared responsibility between the government, the private sector and the community. While the current terror threat level is no cause for anxiety or suspicion of one another or any communities, it is crucial to remember that community-level vigilance remains a powerful tool in the fight against terrorism.
Milad Haghani receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
If you’re a parent, you’ll be well-acquainted with one of the more hotly debated parenting topics: screen time and kids.
On the one hand, screen time helps kids learn, develop creativity and supports social interaction and connection.
But too much screen time can negatively impact your child – not just their development but their physical health, too.
So how exactly does screen time impact your child’s physical health? And how can you help them develop a positive relationship with screens?
How much screen time is OK?
The Australian guidelines for screen time are part of its 24-hour movement guidelines. These prescribe the amount of time we should spend each day on physical activity, sleep and screen time to maintain physical and mental health and wellbeing.
The screen time guidelines, which are based on seated activity, recommend:
no screen time for children under two
no more than one hour of screen time for children aged two to five
no more than two hours of recreational screen time outside of school work from the age of five to 17.
But just17% to 23% of Australian pre-schoolers and 15% of 5 to 12-year-olds meet these recommendations.
How screen time affects kids’ diets and health
Children with higher screen time are more likely to engage in mindless eating and overeating. When they’re distracted by screens, kids can miss important signals from their brains letting them know they’re full.
The lesser-known way too much screen time affects a child’s diet is by impacting their sleep. For children and adolescents, adequate sleep is:
11 to 14 hours, including naps, for toddlers
10 to 13 hours, including naps, for three-to five-year-olds
nine to 11 hours for kids aged five to 13
eight to ten hours for teenagers.
Research shows a child’s ability to get adequate sleep is impacted by screen time. A review of 67 studies of school-aged children and adolescents found screen time was associated with shorter and later sleep in 90% of the studies reviewed.
We need adequate sleep to regulate two essential hormones – ghrelin and leptin – that manage our hunger and appetite. Getting less than our recommended sleep disrupts our appetite hormones, resulting in an increased desire to eat.
It also leads to increased impulsive behaviour linked to food choices, which often results in us reaching for foods high in sugar, fats and salt for immediate gratification. So if your child is not getting the sleep they need, there’s a good chance they’ll be using their pester power to satisfy their craving for sugary, fatty and salty foods the next day.
Children may crave more junk foods if they’re not getting enough sleep. Petr Bonek/Shutterstock
Finally, more time indoors looking at screens can mean less time being physically active. Australia’s guidelines recommend children do at least 60 minutes each day of physical activity that makes the heart beat faster (or at least one hour of “energetic play” for pre-schoolers). The 60 minutes doesn’t have to be all in one go – it can be made up of several shorter sessions through the day.
What can parents do?
Fortunately, there are some practical steps you can take to ensure your child has a healthy relationship with screens and ensure they’re getting enough sleep and physical activity.
1. Establish screen time rules
Consider guidelines for your child’s age and cover expectations for where, when and how screens are used. Young kids playing an educational game on a tablet in the family room might be OK, while watching YouTube in the bedroom might not.
Make mealtimes and the bedroom at bedtime screen-free zones. Involve your children, particularly teenagers, in the process to ensure everyone follows the rules.
2. Spend time outdoors
Try establishing regular time in your family’s schedule for physical activity outdoors, whether a daily visit to the park or sports on the weekend. Making sure your child gets enough physical activity daily also supports their sleep and overall health.
Like rule-setting, involving your child in the activity choice will make them more willing to participate.
3. Be a role model
Kids closely observe and mimic their parents, so the best way to ensure your child has healthy screen time habits is to adopt them yourself. Apply rules to your own screen use at home, including being mindful of being distracted by never-ending notifications.
4. Make your child’s bedroom a sleep sanctuary
Ensuring your child’s bedroom is quiet, comfortable and dark enough is essential for a good night’s sleep. This includes being at a comfortable temperature (18°C to 22°C). Store toys and screens in other rooms so your child associates their bedroom with sleep time, not playtime.
Dr Nick Fuller works for the University of Sydney and RPA Hospital and has received external funding for projects relating to the treatment of overweight and obesity. He is the author and founder of the Interval Weight Loss program, and the author of Healthy Parents, Healthy Kids.
A classic image of the Olympics and Paralympics is an athlete at the end of a race struggling for breath, their heart obviously racing.
But at the other end of the scale are athletes such as archers and shooters, who need to slow their heart rates down as much as possible.
Athletes in speed and endurance events regularly push their heart rate to the maximum. But these athletes usually have low heart rates at rest.
What causes our heart rates and respiratory (breathing) rates to change so much, and is this healthy?
When heart rates and respiratory rates rise
If you are still and calm as you read this, your heart is probably beating 60–100 times per minute and you are likely breathing 12–20 times per minute.
During physical activity when muscles are contracting, the muscles need more oxygen to provide them with energy to work.
To deliver this extra oxygen (carried in our blood), our heart pumps blood faster. In other words, our heart rate increases.
We also breathe faster to get more oxygen into our lungs to be delivered to the exercising muscles.
Your resting heart rate can tell you plenty about your health and fitness.
How fast can our heart rate get during exercise?
Aerobic means “with oxygen”. In aerobic exercise (“cardio”) you use large muscles repetitively and rhythmically. For example, walking, running, cycling, swimming and rowing.
Muscles that are contracting during aerobic exercise use a lot of energy and need ten times more oxygen than at rest.
High intensity aerobic events that involve large muscles or the entire body cause the highest heart rates.
An estimate of maximum heart rate (beats per minute) is 220 minus your age. This equates to 195 beats per minute for a 25-year-old – close to the average age of the Australian Olympic team of 26.5 years.
Athletes competing in Olympic events of endurance or speed will reach their maximum heart rate.
You can usually only maintain maximum heart rate for a few minutes. But in a 2000-metre rowing race, the rowers maintain intense effort at close to maximum heart rate for 6–8 minutes.
This is one of the toughest events for the heart. It’s no wonder rowers often collapse in the boat as they cross the finish line.
Highly trained endurance athletes can have a maximum heart rate higher than expected for their age. Eliud Kipchoge from Kenya is considered the greatest marathon runner of all time. During his world record run in the 2022 Berlin marathon, he ran with a heart rate of around 180 beats per minute for almost the entire race.
How does breathing change with exercise?
Our breathing changes with exercise to increase oxygen uptake from the air.
At low-to-moderate intensity exercise, you start to take deeper breaths. This brings in more air and oxygen with each breath. However, there is a limit to how much the chest can expand.
With higher intensity exercise, respiratory rate increases to increase oxygen intake.
Elite athletes can breathe more than 50 times per minute. This is driven by our diaphragm, the most important muscle of breathing.
Regular moderate-to-vigorous intensity aerobic exercise makes the heart stronger and more efficient. A stronger heart pumps more blood per beat, which means it doesn’t need to beat as often.
Exercise also increases vagus nerve activity to the heart and slows down the heart’s pacemaker cells. These both reduce heart rate.
A large review found endurance training and yoga were the best exercises to reduce resting heart rate. But training needs to be maintained to keep resting heart rate low.
When elite athletes reduced their training volume by half during COVID lockdown, their resting heart rate increased.
So it is healthy to do activities that increase your heart rate in the short-term, whether as an Olympian or Paralympian competing, or a fan with your heart racing watching a gold medal event.
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.
Australia needs to provide permanent supportive housing for many reasons. The most compelling reason is simple: it permanently ends homelessness for our most marginalised citizens.
Permanent supportive housing combines affordable housing with health and social services for people for whom mainstream systems do not work. It’s an evidence-informed approach that ends homelessness for people who are so excluded from opportunities and mainstream institutions that basic principles of citizenship barely exist for them. They are people whose deprivation, especially through generations, not only makes them sick, but also results in premature deaths.
We saw short-lived COVID policy successes in housing the homeless. But we are now seeing an increase in homelessness. It’s a societal failure that causes great harm to people in our cities, suburbs and even towns.
The evidence shows that permanent supportive housing, by ending chronic homelessness and rough sleeping, enables people to improve their health and wellbeing. They can be safe and regain control over their lives.
Supportive housing also produces cost offsets for the state. This is because it reduces costs for the criminal justice and crisis health systems. The security and affordability that permanent supportive housing provides mean people spend less time in ambulances, emergency departments, courts and prisons.
For instance, there was a study of Brisbane Common Ground permanent supportive housing, using robust government-linked data. It showed an overall net saving of $13,100 per tenant in the first year of being housed compared to a year sleeping rough.
Why do people become homeless?
Another way to frame the argument for investing in permanent supportive housing is to be clear that homelessness is a mark of policy failure.
People are homeless not because the country lacks the wealth to do better, nor because we don’t know how to end it. We also need to move beyond the unfortunate and enduring myth that people choose to be homeless.
We now know homelessness is the result of how we choose to organise society. This includes the choices we make about housing affordability, the extent, resourcing and accessibility of public health and human services, and the quality of connections between housing and the services and resources people need to live meaningful lives.
How can this model be delivered?
There are multiple approaches to permanent supportive housing. It can:
be social housing or private housing with a subsidy
be standalone housing or multiple apartments in one building
provide support services onsite at the housing or through an outreach model
target single people or families
work for First Nations people, non-Indigenous people and culturally and linguistically diverse populations.
housing is affordable, with rent capped at 30% of income
housing is permanent, not crisis or transitional accommodation
people are tenants with a lease, not program clients
social and health services are integrated into the model
tenants have the same rights and responsibilities as any citizen in terms of using, or refusing to use, social and health services
using these services or doing anything other than complying with tenancy law is not a condition of being housed
the housing providers and service providers are separate organisations to ensure the person collecting rent is not the person providing support.
New plan offers a chance to change
The Australian government is developing a National Housing and Homelessness Plan. It’s an ideal opportunity to commit to a permanent supportive housing system.
The evidence for the effectiveness of permanent supportive housing is as clear as the evidence that our current approaches do not work. We urgently need to do things differently. Permanent supportive housing is a significant part of what this difference could be.
For permanent supportive housing to greatly reduce homelessness, Australia needs to invest at scale. We need to move beyond one-off programs and successful pilot projects that have helped families who are homeless and at risk of domestic violence and abuse.
We know what works. We are just not great at using this knowledge to change how we deliver housing and support.
Permanent supportive housing must be part of a broader strategy to increase the supply of social and affordable housing.
The United States offers some ideas to consider. The Corporation for Supportive Housing has helped to develop more than 385,000 permanent supportive housing units. These have been delivered using tax credits, innovative finance models and government subsidies.
With the right mix of Commonwealth and state investment and policies, both Australian community housing providers and not-for-profit social services could help deliver permanent supportive housing on a large scale.
The key elements and benefits of supportive housing explained.
It’s a matter of choice
Government intervention is critical. For a start, governments will own, fund or subsidise the housing. Governments will also have to fund the supporting social and health services.
Ultimately, Australia will only choose to end homelessness when there is the social and political will to do this. And that depends on making the case for how permanent supportive housing fundamentally enables people to live well and society to work well. This includes advocating for and supporting this approach in our neighbourhoods.
The stark inequities and human suffering created by homelessness are a threat to social cohesion and connection to the state as citizens. Permanent supportive housing will enable us to stop wasting taxpayer money on responding to the consequences of homelessness. It can help build a more unifying vision of society that actually delivers on the ethos of a fair go.
Cameron Parsell receives funding from The Australian Research Council (Life Course Centre of Excellence and Industry Fellowship), Micah Projects, The St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland, Lord Mayor’s Charitable Foundation (Melbourne), and The Queensland Mental Health Commission.
Karyn Walsh AM is CEO of Micah Projects and provided comment and advice on this article
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elizabeth Sinclair, Senior Research Fellow, School of Biological Sciences and Oceans Institute, The University of Western Australia
Community glass artwork by Shark Bay Arts Council members of restored seagrass meadow on display at the Wirriya Jalyanu (seagrass) Festival.Elizabeth Sinclair/UWA
Please be advised that the following article contains images of an Indigenous person who has died, which are used with family permission.
Our journey began in 2018 at Bush Heritage Australia’s Hamelin Station, a relaxed setting on Malgana Country for knowledge sharing and storytelling. An inspirational weekend under the stars sowed the seeds for a partnership to heal Country. Our focus was on restoring seagrass, which grows in extensive meadows in shallow waters.
In 2010-11, an extreme marine heatwave had hit the Western Australian coastline. The seagrass (wirriya jalyanu) was badly damaged. This affected the health of culturally significant species such as dugongs (Dugong dugon, wuthuga) and green turtles (Chelonia mydas, buyungurra), which feed on the seagrass.
On that weekend in 2018, we (university researchers and Traditional Owners) learned we had a common goal: to look after Sea Country. Ecosystem restoration and biodiversity conservation are Western “science speak” and are part of a global solution to manage the impacts of climate change. These concepts are also at the core of Indigenous culture and lore.
Our co-designed project won funding to employ Malgana land and sea rangers in Gathaagudu/Shark Bay, a UNESCO World Heritage area. The project was a partnership between the newly founded Malgana Aboriginal Corporation and University of Western Australia researchers. The aim was to develop and test ways to restore seagrass meadows, drawing on both Western science and Indigenous knowledge.
Malgana land and sea rangers at Hamelin Station, Gathaagudu/Shark Bay, Western Australia. Elizabeth Sinclair, UWA, CC BY
‘Being on Country is medicine for us’
Our partnership recognised that Indigenous Peoples have deep ecological knowledge of Country. Malgana people shared their valuable insights on Sea Country.
Storytelling or songlines demonstrate a long oral history and connection of Malgana people to their Country. The stories are consistent with Western science-based knowledge from diverse fields such as ecology, geology, hydrology and molecular biology.
The partnership enabled trainee Indigenous rangers to return to Country. At the same time, they were able to gain industry qualifications through TAFE.
Knowledge-sharing workshops on Country helped Malgana rangers connect or reconnect with Country. The workshops covered cultural protocols, Traditional ecological knowledge, Malgana language, seagrass growth, flowering and seeding ecology.
Participants in the project meet on Country. Patricia Oakley, Malgana Elder
We also undertook research to understand relatedness, or genetics, of two large seagrasses, wire weed (Amphibolis antarctica) and ribbon weed (Posidonia australis), across Gathaagudu. DNA testing has shown an ancient ribbon weed clone is the world’s largest plant, spanning at least 180 kilometres. Our genetic study of wire weed is not yet published.
We developed restoration methods for both species. Our approaches took into account their different reproductive traits and genetic information.
Our restoration methods included planting cuttings or runners, sowing seeds and modifying the environment by providing hessian substrate for seedlings to attach.
Malgana ranger Nicholas Pedrocchi (deceased, published with the family’s permission) and UWA researcher John Statton lower a seagrass snagger, a sand-filled hessian sock, into the water. Elizabeth Sinclair, UWA, CC BY
A Wirriya Jalyanu Festival marked the end of our project funding. Its theme was Art Meets Science. The festival shared knowledge of Sea Country through a mix of science, culture, language and artistic activities for all ages.
Sharing this knowledge with the wider community improved their understanding of this World Heritage area. We came away with a deeper understanding of their love and shared responsibility for its care.
‘If we look after country, then Country will look after you’
Partnerships that share Western and Traditional knowledge can restore seagrass meadows. The methods need to be scaled up to heal Sea Country, given the scale of loss caused by a single extreme climate event.
Local Indigenous ranger programs have environmental, cultural, social and economic benefits. Healing Country helps heal the intergenerational trauma of Indigenous Peoples through connecting or reconnecting to Country.
A next step is to empower the Malgana rangers and local Indigenous-led businesses to support and monitor large-scale ecosystem restoration and its impacts on biodiversity.
Continuous funding for these ranger programs is desperately needed to provide job security. Broadening partnerships with local rangers and communities allows for year-round observation and action On Country.
Since Europeans colonised Australia, Indigenous Peoples have been disrespected, which has contributed to enormous damage to our unique wildlife and ecosystems. The dynamic nature of these problems means we need diverse knowledge inputs. Partnering with local Traditional Custodians for two-way learning is a respectful way forward.
Western science and Traditional ecological knowledge together lead to a better understanding of Country. Applying these combined knowledges can increase biodiversity and help meet ambitious global solutions to climate change, such as the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030.
Elizabeth Sinclair receives funding from the Australian Research Council. This project was supported with funding from the Australian government under the National Environmental Science Program (NESP) Marine Biodiversity Hub and Marine and Coastal Hub.
Gary Kendrick receives funding from the Australian Research Council. This project was funded through the Australian government’s National Environmental Science Program.
Martin Breed receives funding from the Australian Research Council, National Environmental Science Program (NESP) Resilient Landscapes Hub, Cooperative Research Centre for Transformations in Mining Economies (CRC TiME), Australian Academy of Science, and the New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment.
Patricia Oakley is a descendant of the Malgana saltwater people from Gathaagudu (Shark Bay) and member of the Malgana Aboriginal Corporation (MAC) and MAC Elders Advisory Council, a senior ranger and a director on the MAC and Department of Biodiversity Conservation and Attractions Joint Management Body.
Sean McNeair works for Tidal Moon Pty Ltd and is a major shareholder since his resignation from Yamatji Marlpa Aboriginal Corporation (YMAC) as the MAC ranger co-ordinator (2018 to 2020). He is also affiliated with the Australian Marine Park Advisory Committee as a voluntary member and is a current official member of the Malgana Aboriginal Corporation (MAC) since native title determination in late 2018.
Children all over Australia have been watching the Olympics. At school and at home they have seen athletes win medals, waving flags and doing victory dances. For many this will be the first time they remember seeing the games.
For some kids, this may be the start of a dream to become an Olympian and even win a gold medal.
As a parent, how do you help your child approach their new-found enthusiasm?
Sport is not just about winning
The medals, finals and Olympic celebrations are very exciting. When children watch the Olympics, they see athletes as rock stars. But there is more to sport.
If you are watching the Olympic coverage or other sport, try to point out moments where athletes achieve a personal best or where they have come back from injury or are simply happy to compete.
Also look out for moments of sportsmanship, where athletes embrace at the end of a race (like we see in the athletics) or cheer each other on (like we saw in the gymnastics).
This highlights how sport can be about overcoming adversity, doing your best and caring about other competitors, rather than simply dominating the field.
Also keep medals in perspective.
Winning an Olympic medal is also not an easy or straightforward achievement. In the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, 10,500 athletes competed for 329 gold medals spread through 32 sports. Even when you become an Olympian, you only have about a 3% of chance of winning gold.
You don’t have to get serious early on
It is often assumed the earlier an athlete begins a sport, the better. US gold medallist Simone Biles was six when she began gymnastics. World record-breaking pole vaulter Mondo Duplantis was three when he first tried the sport.
But this is not the case for everyone. A 2023 study that looked 2,838 athletes from 44 Olympic sports showed world-class athletes started with their current sport at the average age of 10.6 and decided to focus on this sport at an average age of 15.6 years.
In fact it may be better if you don’t
A 2015 study cautioned against children specialising in one sport too early. It said beginning a sporting career younger than 11 increases the chances of injury, reduces motor skill development and discourages children from participating in games and competitions for fun.
A 2023 meta-analysis (which reviewed all available evidence at the time) of 13,392 athletes from a wide range of Olympic sports, showed less than 1% of junior champions between the ages of 11 to 13 years become elite athletes. In fact, it is less likely for these young champions to become elite athletes than someone who never practised the same sport until the age of 15.
Use the opportunity
Research shows we are more likely to exercise as adults if we had positive experiences with sport as a child.
So if your child is excited about the Olympics, one way to think about it is “this is a great opportunity to set them up for healthy behaviours throughout their lives”.
Consider trialling a new sport through a club open day. Or if you already do a sport, ask the coach which skills from other sports might be beneficial. There are lots of common (or transferable) skills across sports. For example, a 2005 study showed expert athletes from field hockey, netball and basketball all have the common ability to recognise patterns. When children are young it is important to try lots of things, to develop skills and see what you enjoy.
For parents, the key message is to keep sport enjoyable and positive for your child.
A 2016 study based on fathers of children who played soccer developed three ways parents could support their children in healthy ways. This involves:
empathetic communication: parents listening to children without judgement, accepting their struggles and offering unconditional support
a positive approach: this means cheering without advising (leave the advice to their coaches), being positive regardless of the results and praising smaller accomplishments not just the big wins (“that was a great kick!”)
reasonable expectations: don’t have false or exaggerated expectations about results, and do not ask kids to be something they are not. Remember, they are just kids.
Alberto Filgueiras 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.
We’ve just seen how quickly market turbulence can spread across the world of finance.
At the start of the week, fears of a US recession and a Japanese interest rate hike sent shockwaves across equity markets, currency markets (also known as forex markets) and bond markets.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average – an index that tracks a range of US shares – fell by more than 1,000 points.
Japan’s stock market suffered its worst fall in 37 years.
But amid all the chaos, some of the largest losses accrued to one of the most volatile of markets – cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin fell by 15% in just 24 hours, and Ethereum by 22%.
Many global markets – including crypto – have now rebounded somewhat since the crash. Whether we’re out of the woods yet remains unclear.
But why is it that seemingly unrelated assets, such as stocks and crypto, seem to crash at the same time? And what does it mean for attempts to diversify risk?
Much of the dip we saw in US markets at the start of the week was driven by two things: a weaker-than-expected US job market, and missed earnings forecasts for a few large US tech stocks.
These factors led US investors to reassess their projections of future cash flows and triggered a selloff in equity markets, especially tech and AI-related sectors.
Globally, we also saw an unexpected interest rate hike by the Bank of Japan against the backdrop of a looming expected rate cut in the United States.
This made what’s called the “carry trade” – borrowing in Japanese yen (the low interest rate currency) and lending in US dollars (or other higher-interest-rate currencies) – far less profitable, prompting hedge fund investors to unwind their positions.
In crypto markets, investors are used to sharp price fluctuations. Crypto volatility is typically an order of magnitude greater than that of traditional asset classes like stocks. But the single day drop in Bitcoin’s price was large, even by crypto standards.
Why do prices move together?
US tech sector investors are in a seemingly different corner of the financial world from the hedge funds engaging in the Japanese yen carry trade. And crypto investors sometimes seem like they are in a different investment universe altogether.
But in financial markets, the “butterfly effect” – the idea that seemingly small events can have big consequences – is the rule, rather than the exception.
One reason is that large investors who lose money in one market often need cash quickly, which they get by selling in other markets.
Getting a ‘margin call’ means a trader must quickly come up with cash to cover a loss. DC Studio/Shutterstock
For example, traders might get “margin calls” on their positions. In simple terms, this means they are forced to come up with cash to cover a losing “bet” on which way a stock price will move.
They may have to sell other assets in their portfolio to raise funds quickly. When multiple other assets get sold at the same time, prices go down in tandem.
But you have to move serious amounts of money to have this effect on the global stage. So who are these market players large enough to make asset classes move together?
In current markets, they tend to be multi-strategy hedge funds, large institutional investors that take huge positions across different types of assets.
In the past, especially during the global financial crisis, this group has also included large investment banks.
Increasingly connected markets
Financial markets now are more interconnected than ever before, meaning market crashes can happen faster and affect a wider range of assets.
Amid contagion-prone traditional assets, Bitcoin once seemed to offer something different – true diversification.
In the past, we have seen periods of relatively low correlations between movements in the price of Bitcoin and shares.
But this correlation can vary wildly and has often been positive.
Recent research has found that investors’ risk appetite, as well as interest rates and the idiosyncratic demand for crypto are three key factors driving crypto prices.
This could help explain why Bitcoin and Ethereum crashed when investors’ risk appetite dropped amid fears of a US recession.
And the risk appetite factor may be becoming more pronounced, with Bitcoin more plugged into the traditional financial system after the launch of multiple Bitcoin “exchange-traded funds” (ETFs).
As more and more institutional investors come to hold Bitcoin through instruments like ETFs, we could see crypto and other assets “co-move” – move together – more.
It may be getting harder to diversify
A key principle of responsible investment strategy is diversification – in a nutshell, making sure you don’t put all your eggs in one investment basket.
Investing in assets that co-move less with the rest of the market can help lower the overall riskiness of a portfolio.
Crypto assets used to be considered such an asset. Monday’s crypto crash – which coincided with the bloodbath in global share markets – signals we may need to reassess that idea.
Marta Khomyn 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gordon Peake, Adjunct lecturer, School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Johns Hopkins University
There is so much money sloshing around these days in Bougainville, an autonomous region of Papua New Guinea, the stores are running short of goods and some locals are partying until dawn.
The region’s economy is buoyant thanks in part to good fortune – record high prices for cocoa – and a largely unknown Australian and New Zealand aid success story.
Nearly a decade ago, the two governments helped Bougainville’s cocoa farmers rehabilitate their plantations, some of which had gone to seed since the region was embroiled in a civil war in the 1990s.
The aim of the initiative, called the Commodity Support Facility, was to plant quality seeds, improve the financial literacy of farming collectives and help farmers get their product to market.
More than 20 million kina (A$8 million, NZ$8.7 million) was spent to help more than 2,500 smallholder farmers. And this year, these farmers are reaping the rewards. Weather-related diseases caused the West African cocoa crop to collapse, quintupling world prices and precipitating Bougainville’s unexpected economic boom.
Success for farmers
Bougainville’s cocoa story is more than 100 years old. The Germans planted cocoa trees during their 30-year colonial rule, and today, the industry is the lifeblood of the archipelago.
The most recent chapter began in 2016 when the Commodity Support Facility was launched. Officially, it was a partnership between the governments of Australia, New Zealand, PNG and Bougainville, though Australia contributed a large portion of the funding.
It was hardly a propitious time to launch such an endeavour like this, as world cocoa prices were falling rapidly. Like elsewhere in PNG, the cocoa industry in Bougainville had been laid low by a pestilent worm called the cocoa borer, which had wrought devastation on production.
Australia also supported a complementary project managed by the nonprofit organisation CARE that included a focus on supporting women in cocoa production. The program organised an annual chocolate festival that helped put Bougainville’s products back on the map and recently funded a new laboratory to test the quality of cocoa beans.
Bougainvillian youth taking a break on truck during work at cocoa nursery. Adam Constanza/Shutterstock
And nearly a decade after seedlings resistant to the borer were distributed to farmers, the rewards are being reaped. According to initial findings from a survey by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, 87% of grantees have benefited from increased income. Cocoa output has also improved, with more beans being grown and produced through the new trees.
This, combined with the price boom, has left Bougainville’s cocoa farmers flush. It has the potential to be a real boon in this hardscrabble island chain still bearing the scars of a violent conflict from 1988–98, which had been sparked in part by opposition to mining development.
Today, tensions remain between Bougainville and the PNG government over a 2019 independence referendum that showed residents overwhelmingly supported secession. Talks on progressing the results of the referendum are proceeding at a languid pace.
Why this program matters
Given how hard it is to deliver aid effectively in Papua New Guinea, as well as the geopolitical imperatives around aid these days, you would think more people outside of Bougainville would know about the project’s success.
It’s true there are chirpy stories posted about the Bougainville cocoa initiative on the Australian High Commission’s social media channels. But given so much government aid content feels boosterish, it is hard to distinguish a genuine, silver-plated aid success story when it comes around.
The question now is how Bougainville can double down on its success. If the late night din in the regional capital of Buka is anything to go by, at least some the newfound wealth is being spent on consumption.
But one day cocoa prices will fall again. As a result, the long-lasting benefits of the cocoa boom will only materialise if the windfalls are saved and reinvested. There is little in the public domain about how many farmers are actually doing this.
It’s also a challenge for Bougainville’s autonomous government, which has struggled to generate revenue, aside from the indirect rise in GST revenue from increased spending. Additional money is coming into the coffers through an adjusted cocoa export levy, but we couldn’t ascertain how much. Our inquiries to the Bougainville government went unanswered.
Whatever the amount, the increased money coming to the government must be invested productively in things like education and health.
Lessons for Canberra and Wellington
There is also a lesson here for officials in Canberra and Wellington. Development is often acknowledged as a long-term endeavour, yet the attention span of the aid world is stubbornly short.
The cocoa project in Bougainville is – to its credit – still running, combining the existing grants to farmers with a new focus on building buyer confidence.
Reports on the project, as with all development projects, however, are rarely publicly released. This is a shame because there is much that could be learned:
how, for example, has the project managed to succeed when many similar projects have failed?
how is the current revenue from cocoa exports being spent? Countries are notoriously bad at managing windfall gains, so what is Bougainville’s government doing with its cut?
and how are relations between the region’s independence-focused politicians and PNG’s independence-averse government being affected?
Long after the fanfare of the project launch, sweet success has materialised, seemingly out of the blue, in Bougainville. If it is to bring real long-term gains, though, people need to be paying attention.
Gordon Peake was in Bougainville from 2016-20 as a contractor working on the Bougainville Partnership, with a focus on supporting implementation of the autonomy arrangements of the Bougainville peace agreement. The Bougainville Partnership also implemented the Commodity Support Facility, but Peake did not work on this project himself.
Terence Wood 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.
Most of the world has signed up to commitments to reduce emissions under the Paris Agreement. It aims to hold the increase in the global average temperature to “well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C.
Australia’s commitments are net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and a reduction to 43% below 2005 levels by 2030.
Progress on meeting the commitments is reviewed every five years. The next review is due next year, along with upgraded commitments.
Those who are having difficulty meeting their commitments are likely to claim that their economic cost is too big. This claim is hard to verify, in part because those economic costs depend on what other countries are doing.
Every nation’s commitment, modelled
In an effort to try to get a handle on which countries will do well out of the commitments all countries have made and which will do badly in purely economic terms (regardless of the benefits from limiting climate change) I have modelled the 2030 promises using a variant of the global trade model GTAP.
The model includes most forms of emissions and, when commitments are input, determines the cheapest way for each region to hit its target.
The biggest commitments compared to business as usual have been made by Japan, the United States, the European Union and Australia.
The model has Russia and all but the largest economies in Asia and the Pacific (i.e. not China, India and Japan) actually increasing their emissions as industrial activity relocates to them from other regions that are trying harder to reduce emissions.
India does well, the Middle East does badly
In terms of the impacts on gross national income, two regions actually benefit from the commitments of all nations – India and the rest of Asia and the Pacific. Both regions have weak emissions reduction targets and import energy.
The model predicts lower oil and gas prices as a result of reduced demand from the regions with ambitious emissions targets. This will allow energy importers without ambitious targets to benefit.
The Middle East does badly. It is heavily reliant on fossil fuel exports and has slightly more stringent emissions reduction targets than India and the rest of Asia and the Pacific.
That makes the Middle East the worst-affected region. Its per capita income is modelled to grow by only 1.5% per year on average if all countries hit their 2030 targets compared to at least 2.1% every year without global climate action.
Russia is less reliant on fossil fuel exports than some Middle Eastern countries, which is one of the reasons the impacts on Russia’s income are not as severe.
The other is that Russia’s emissions reduction commitments are weak. Russian fossil fuels that aren’t exported as a result of efforts to reduce emissions elsewhere get used in Russia.
Impact on Australia modest, given emissions per capita
If Australia made no effort to reduce its emissions, Australians’ real income is estimated to grow by at least 1% every year to 2030. With the 2030 commitment, that annual increase becomes 0.9%, which is modestly less.
The modelling suggests Australia could be doing more. Of the regions modelled, Australia is set to have the highest emissions per capita until 2028 when it is overtaken only by Russia.
Many of the nations that will see their incomes rise as a result of others’ emissions reduction efforts have lower per capita incomes than Australia’s.
It will be hard to pressure them to reduce their emissions while Australia’s emissions per capita are high.
Sam Marginson is a member of the Australian Greens.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marnie Lloydd, Senior Lecturer in Law and Co-Director New Zealand Centre for Public Law, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
Getty Images
The laws of war might seem of limited relevance in relatively peaceful New Zealand. But our soldiers participate in coalitions fighting wars abroad, and the often flagrant violation of humanitarian law in ongoing conflicts reminds us not to be complacent.
Essentially, international humanitarian law, also known also as the law of armed conflict, places important restraints on how wars may be fought. The new report maps New Zealand’s existing obligations and how they are part of domestic law and policy.
In doing so, New Zealand joins other countries that have published such voluntary reports promptly. Australia will also publish its first national report this year. And while states accused of violating international humanitarian law might not follow suit, the broader aim is to keep the issue alive and ultimately strengthen compliance by all countries.
Respecting international law
Unlike more recent humanitarian treaties, such as those banning landmines or cluster munitions, the Geneva Conventions do not require annual meetings of countries, or require signatories to submit regular reports.
This has made compliance a challenge. And attempts since 2011 to gain global political support for some form of regular, voluntary, formal framework have so far faltered.
A 2019 resolution at the four-yearly International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement instead encouraged a less politically sensitive alternative: countries would review their own implementation and share best practices through a voluntary national report.
How countries implement international humanitarian law – by training their military on the rules, for example, or enacting domestic war crimes legislation – is central to respecting that law. The New Zealand government and local Red Cross pledged to work on this before the next Red Cross conference in late 2024.
The resulting report first sets out how New Zealand has signed up to nearly all the key international treaties and made them part of its own laws. It also explains who is responsible for implementing and enforcing those laws, and how the rules of armed combat are taught.
This includes various government departments (Defence Force, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Crown Law). Non-governmental institutions (Red Cross, education providers) are also involved, for example, by holding events for students and the public to discuss war, peace and humanitarian values.
Finally, the report summarises New Zealand’s commitment to specific protections under international law for prisoners of war, women and girls, cultural property and the environment, as well as to rules prohibiting or restricting the use of munitions such as chemical weapons.
Ukraine, 2024: The Red Cross and Red Crescent were instrumental in pushing for national voluntary reports. Getty Images
What NZ can do next
New Zealand has a solid record in ratifying the relevant international humanitarian law treaties and implementing them at home.
The Operation Burnham Inquiry into alleged violations by NZSAS troops in Afghanistan, and the laws and policies adopted as recommended by that inquiry, are examples of good practice for other countries to follow – and of the possible challenges in doing so.
This is not to say New Zealand has nothing more to do. These national reports also serve to identify gaps in implementation and suggest areas for future efforts.
Precisely because of New Zealand’s commitment to international humanitarian law, the report should now be used as a tool to further strengthen those efforts. This needs to involve the whole government, not be confined to the military and foreign affairs, and involve Māori and civil society.
Lastly, New Zealand must continue to demand respect for these laws by other countries. That includes speaking out about the worst offenders, based on a coherent and consistent foreign policy, and supporting Pacific states with their own implementation.
Given the death and devastation caused by today’s ongoing wars, this report offers everyone a simple way to engage and reflect on these vital issues of human dignity in peace and conflict.
Marnie Lloydd is a member of New Zealand’s International Humanitarian Law Committee and has worked previously with the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. She provided advice on earlier drafts of New Zealand’s Report on the Domestic Implementation of International Humanitarian Law.
NASA/International Space Station Archaeological Project, CC BY
New results from the first archaeological fieldwork conducted in space show the International Space Station is a rich cultural landscape where crew create their own “gravity” to replace Earth’s, and adapt module spaces to suit their needs.
Archaeology is usually thought of as the study of the distant past, but it’s ideally suited for revealing how people adapt to long-duration spaceflight.
In the SQuARE experiment described in our new paper in PLOS ONE, we re-imagined a standard archaeological method for use in space, and got astronauts to carry it out for us.
Archaeology … in … spaaaaace!
The International Space Station is the first permanent human settlement in space. Close to 280 people have visited it in the past 23 years.
We’ve also studied the simple technologies, such as Velcro and resealable plastic bags, which astronauts use to recreate the Earthly effect of gravity in the microgravity environment – to keep things where you left them, so they don’t float away.
Most recently, we collected data about how crew used objects inside the space station by adapting one of the most traditional archaeological techniques, the “shovel test pit”.
On Earth, after an archaeological site has been identified, a grid of one-metre squares is laid out, and some of these are excavated as “test pits”. These samples give a sense of the site as a whole.
In January 2022, we asked the space station crew to lay out five roughly square sample areas. We chose the square locations to encompass zones of work, science, exercise and leisure. The crew also selected a sixth area based on their own idea of what might be interesting to observe. Our study was sponsored by the International Space Station National Laboratory.
Then, for 60 days, the crew photographed each square every day to document the objects within its boundaries. Everything in space culture has an acronym, so we called this activity the Sampling Quadrangle Assemblages Research Experiment, or SQuARE.
The resulting photos show the richness of the space station’s cultural landscape, while also revealing how far life in space is from images of sci-fi imagination.
The space station is cluttered and chaotic, cramped and dirty. There are no boundaries between where the crew works and where they rest. There is little to no privacy. There isn’t even a shower.
What we saw in the squares
Now we can present results from the analysis of the first two squares. One was located in the US Node 2 module, where there are four crew berths, and connections to the European and Japanese labs. Visiting spacecraft often dock here. Our target was a wall where the Maintenance Work Area, or MWA, is located. There’s a blue metal panel with 40 velcro squares on it, and a table below for fixing equipment or doing experiments.
NASA intended the area to be used for maintenance. However, we saw hardly any evidence of maintenance there, and only a handful of science activities. In fact, for 50 of the 60 days covered by our survey, the square was only used for storing items, which may not even have been used there.
The amount of velcro here made it a perfect location for ad hoc storage. Close to half of all items recorded (44%) were related to holding other items in place.
The other square we’ve completed was in the US Node 3 module, where there are exercise machines and the toilet. It’s also a passageway to the crew’s favourite part of the space station, the seven-sided cupola window, and to storage modules.
This wall had no designated function, so it was used for eclectic purposes, such as storing a laptop, an antibacterial experiment and resealable bags. And for 52 days during SQuARE, it was also the location where one crew member kept their toiletry kit.
It makes a kind of sense to put one’s toiletries near the toilet and the exercise machines that each astronaut uses for hours every day. But this is a highly public space, where others are constantly passing by. The placement of the toiletry kit shows how inadequate the facilities are for hygiene and privacy.
What does this mean?
Our analysis of Squares 03 and 05 helped us understand how restraints such as velcro create a sort of transient gravity.
Restraints used to hold an object form a patch of active gravity, while those not in use represent potential gravity. The artefact analysis shows us how much potential gravity is available at each location.
The main focus of the space station is scientific work. To make this happen, astronauts have to deploy large numbers of objects. Square 03 shows how they turned a surface intended for maintenance into a halfway house for various items on their journeys around the station.
Our data suggests that designers of future space stations, such as the commercial ones currently planned for low Earth orbit, or the Gateway station being built for lunar orbit, might need to make storage a higher priority.
Square 05 shows how a public wall space was claimed for personal storage by an unknown crew member. We already know there is less-than-ideal provision for privacy, but the persistence of the toiletry bag at this location shows how crew adapt spaces to make up for this.
What makes our conclusions significant is that they are evidence-based. The analysis of the first two squares suggests the data from all six will offer further insights into humanity’s longest surviving space habitat.
Current plans are to bring the space station down from orbit in 2031, so this experiment may be the only chance we have to gather archaeological data.
The authors gratefully acknowledge the work of our collaborators Shawn Graham, Chantal Brousseau, and Salma Abdullah.
The SQuARE experiment was sponsored by the ISS National Laboratory and funded by Chapman University. Axiom Space was the Implementation Partner.
Alice Gorman has previously received funding from the Australian Research Council.
New Zealand and the United States are the only high-income countries to allow unrestricted direct-to-consumer advertising of branded medicines, including the name of the drug and the condition for which it is prescribed.
Our recent analysis explores why most other countries outlaw this controversial practice. We review evidence that direct advertising can lead to overdiagnosis and unnecessary treatments, causing potential harm and higher health costs.
Direct advertising of prescription medicines, primarily through television and print media, developed in the US and New Zealand during the 1990s in the absence of any new legislation or a specific ban.
After three decades, New Zealand’s legislative vacuum changed last year when the previous government formalised the legality of direct ads in the new Therapeutic Products Bill. The move surprised many, given the Labour Party’s historical opposition to the practice.
The bill became law in July 2023. But one of the current coalition government’s campaign pledges was to scrap it, based in part on concerns about regulation of natural and other low-risk health products.
The government appears committed to repealing the law. As yet, though, there is no indication of what regulatory framework would take its place. And it is unclear whether Minister of Health Shane Reti will renew his efforts while in opposition to ban the practice.
Why drug companies like direct advertising
Many medicines for common health conditions are available in supermarkets or at pharmacies to buy over-the-counter. They generally treat milder conditions, and safe use is relatively straightforward.
Other medicines are designated prescription only because their use carries a significant risk of harm, especially if used inappropriately. It is why direct advertising of prescription medicines typically exhorts consumers to “ask your doctor if it is right for you”.
Direct advertising is effective in promoting the prescription of branded and usually expensive medicines. It represents a key marketing strategy of the pharmaceutical industry, particularly in the US where billions are spent annually on such advertising.
Because of its effectiveness, companies have lobbied to extend direct-to-consumer advertising to other countries, including the European Union. Thus far, health authorities have successfully resisted because of concerns about the associated public health risks and increased health spending.
The exception is Canada, which introduced partial direct advertising in 2001 in response to industry pressure. This allowed companies to run “reminder ads” that name the drug but not the condition for which it is used.
Direct advertising can lead patients to seek prescriptions of unnecessary medicines. Getty Images
Although most studies of direct advertising focus on high-income countries, there is evidence the practice also occurs in low- and middle-income countries, even when technically illegal.
A notable example was documented in Sri Lanka in 2000, where a drug company persuaded the national medical association to co-sponsor anti-obesity advertisements in newspapers. It then encouraged those responding to the ads to ask their doctors about the company’s prescription-only weight-loss drug.
In Turkey, widespread advertising of a prescription-only smoking-cessation drug prompted suspension of the drug’s license. Turkish doctors also called attention to the higher risks of harm related to low education levels, and the poor enforcement of prescription-only status of drugs in Turkey and other developing countries.
Other countries resist direct advertising
The nearly universal prohibition of direct advertising is regarded as a health protection measure, especially for newly marketed drugs.
In a study of 109 new drugs approved in the US, fewer than 500 patients had been treated in most pre-market clinical trials – too few to discover infrequent but significant adverse effects.
More generally, drug-related harms are a common but preventable cause of emergency department visits and hospitalisations. This underpins the rationale to treat prescription medicines differently, including how they are advertised.
The global withdrawal of the arthritis drug Vioxx (rofecoxib), one of the most heavily advertised medicines during its five years on the market, heightened these safety concerns. Vioxx raised the risk of heart attacks, but the manufacturer continued to promote the drug to the public in the US and New Zealand long after internal company documents indicated an increased risk of death.
A ban would help optimise healthcare
Direct advertising affects the doctor-patient relationship. It leads patients to seek medicines which they cannot obtain unless their doctor agrees to issue a prescription. Impacts include the time taken to discuss the target condition, which may or may not warrant medical intervention, and the advertised remedy, which may or may not reflect best practice.
Strong evidence now shows direct advertising can lead to unnecessary, inappropriate and sometimes harmful prescribing. The practice may also encourage patients to self-diagnose or misinterpret their symptoms, contributing to unnecessary diagnostic testing and treatment.
Although direct advertising may prompt patients to visit doctors with previously unreported symptoms and to discuss therapeutic options, doctors generally regard the practice as an unwelcome distraction from clinical work.
But the commercial success of direct advertising has seen vigorous industry efforts to defend, develop and extend the practice. The pending repeal of New Zealand’s Therapeutic Products Act presents a timely opportunity to address the legality of direct advertising of prescription medicines.
It remains to be seen whether the government will be persuaded by the available evidence that banning direct advertising would help contain health spending, and to promote population health by reducing over-diagnosis, unnecessary treatments and the harm they can cause.
David Menkes is reimbursed for his work as a member of the Mental Health Advisory Committee for PHARMAC.
Barbara Mintzes has acted as a paid expert witness for Health Canada in a legal case involving marketing of an unapproved drug product.
Joel Lexchin has received payments from a legal firm for work on the role of promotion in generating prescriptions. He is a member of the Board of Canadian Doctors for Medicare.
Social media have only made body image issues worse for young people, leading them to compare themselves with others and strive for often unattainable – and unhealthy – beauty standards.
TikTok, which allows people to create and consume short videos, has amassed more than 1 billion users. Harmful content, including videos that glamorise disordered eating and extremely thin bodies, circulate readily on the platform.
Given most TikTok users are young, we wanted to explore how such content affects young women’s body image. Our new study found watching just eight minutes of TikTok content focused on dieting, weight loss and exercise had an immediate negative effect on body image satisfaction.
We recruited 273 female-identifying TikTok users aged 18 to 28 and randomly allocated them into two groups. People with a past or current eating disorder diagnosis were excluded from the study.
Participants in the experimental group were shown a 7–8 minute compilation of “pro-anorexia” and “fitspiration” content taken directly from TikTok. These video clips featured young women restricting their food intake and giving workout advice and dieting tips, such as describing their juice cleanses for weight loss.
Participants in the control group watched a 7–8 minute compilation of TikTok videos featuring “neutral” content such as videos of nature, cooking and animals.
Using a series of questionnaires, we measured levels of body image satisfaction and attitudes towards beauty standards before and after participants watched the TikTok content.
Both groups reported a decrease in body image satisfaction from before to after watching the videos. But those exposed to pro-anorexia content had the greatest decrease in body image satisfaction. They also experienced an increase in internalisation of beauty standards.
Internalisation occurs when someone accepts and identifies with external beauty standards. Exposure to harmful social media content doesn’t always result in harm – it’s when this content is internalised that body image is likely to suffer.
Before the video experiment, we asked participants some general questions about their TikTok use. We also measured preoccupation with “healthy” eating and symptoms of disordered eating.
We found participants who used TikTok for more than two hours a day reported more disordered eating behaviours than less frequent users. However, this difference was not statistically significant. This means the difference between groups did not meet the threshold required for us to conclude it was unlikely to be due to chance.
On a scale used to rate eating disorder symptoms, participants who reported high (2–3 hours a day) and extreme (more than 3 hours a day) rates of TikTok use averaged scores just below the cut-off for clinically significant eating disorder symptoms. This suggests more than two hours a day of exposure to TikTok content may be linked to disordered eating, but further research is needed to explore this.
We measured participants’ attitudes before and after watching pro-anorexia or neutral content. Paul Hanaoka/Unsplash
Harmful content is widespread
The content we showed participants in the experimental group is widely circulated on TikTok, not just within “pro-ana” communities. “Clean” eating, detoxing and limited-ingredient diet trends are the wolf in lamb’s clothing of disordered eating, allowing diet culture to be rebranded as “wellness” and “self-care”. This content, alongside fitspiration, often rewards and gamifies excessive exercise and disordered eating.
Social media wellness influencers play an important role in normalising disordered eating and fitspiration content. But hashtags like #GymTok and #FoodTok allow any TikTok user to create and consume content around theirs and others’ daily eating routines, weight-loss transformations and workout routines.
What’s more, everyday users can circulate dangerous diet-related videos without the backlash a celebrity or well-known influencer might receive for sharing socially irresponsible content.
Our study only looked at short-term consequences of exposure to this sort of content on TikTok. Longitudinal research is needed to see if the negative effects we observed endure over time.
It remains difficult to censor
TikTok users have limited control over the content they’re exposed to. Because they spend much of their time on a personalised “For You” page formulated by an algorithm, a user doesn’t need to search for or follow disordered eating content to be exposed to it.
In our study, 64% of participants reported seeing disordered eating content on their For You page. Examples could include videos portraying binge eating, laxative use or excessive exercise.
Paradoxically, searching for body positivity content may make users vulnerable to seeing disordered eating content.
The most important thing TikTok users can do is to be aware that following or searching for any kind of content related to food, body or exercise may lead to inadvertent exposure to distorted body ideals. Limiting time on TikTok will limit exposure, but our findings show even less than ten minutes can have a negative effect.
Ultimately, online safety for young people depends on appropriate social media regulation. Without this, upskilling young women on how to avoid harm on social media is a bit like giving them an inflatable life jacket, then leaving them to swim indefinitely against a rip.
The TikTok reels in this article are included only to illustrate the type of content examined in this study and accessible to TikTok users. If you need support, consider contacting the Butterfly Foundation Helpline (1800 33 4673) or chat with them online. For emergency crisis support, call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
Madison Blackburn co-authored the research this article is based on.
Rachel Hogg 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.
If you consider yourself a climate science supporter, you probably wouldn’t think simple exposure to a sceptic’s claim could shift your views.
Our new research has produced worrying findings. Climate misinformation may be more effective than we’d like to think because of a phenomenon called the illusory truth effect In short, we are more likely to believe a lie if we encounter it repeatedly. Worse, the effect works immediately – a lie seems to be more true even after just one repetition.
As our social media feeds fill up with AI-driven bots, sheer repetition of lies may erode the most essential resource for action on climate change – public support. Traditional media has a different problem – in their commitment to presenting both sides, journalists often platform climate sceptics whose untrue claims add to the repetition of misinformation.
There’s no easy answer. But one thing that does work is to come back to the scientific consensus that our activities are the major cause of global warming – and to the overwhelming public support worldwide for stronger action on climate change.
We’ve long known about the illusory truth effect, where sheer repetition makes information sound more true, regardless of whether it’s true or false. The reason this works on us is familiarity – when information becomes familiar, we mentally ascribe a level of truth to it.
But does this repetition still shift perceptions of truth when we hold seemingly strong existing beliefs?
To find out, we ran experiments where a total of 172 people who were overwhelmingly endorsers of climate science viewed claims aligned with solid climate science, climate sceptic claims, and weather-related claims. Participants saw some claims just once, while others were repeated.
What we found was that it took just a single repetition to make the claims seem more true. This happened for all types of claims, including climate science and sceptic claims.
What’s more, this happened even to those people who regarded themselves as endorsing the scientific consensus on human-caused climate change and who are highly concerned about climate change. The effect held even when these participants later identified the claim was aligned with climate scepticism.
Spreaders of misinformation can game traditional media
In recent years, many researchers have explored this effect in different areas of knowledge. This evidence base points towards an important finding: low quality or malicious information can be laundered through repetition and made to seem true and trustworthy.
This poses an interesting challenge to the way the traditional media has long operated. Many journalists pride themselves on their adherence to fair, balanced reporting. The reason for this lies in history – when the mass media first emerged as a major force in the 19th century, highly partisan or sensational “yellow” journalism was common. Balanced journalism emerged as a counter to this, promising to platform several sides of a debate.
But balance can be easily gamed. Giving equal exposure to opposing voices can lead people to think there is less of an expert consensus.
How can we we defend ourselves?
What our research suggests is comments, articles, and posts of climate misinformation may have a corrosive nature – the more we’re exposed to them, the more likely we will come to accept them.
You might think intelligence and careful thinking can have a protective effect. But the broader body of research on illusory truth has found being smarter or more rational is no protection against repetition.
What can we do to protect ourselves?
Repeated misinformation can corrode public support for climate action. Shutterstock
Researchers have found one reliable solution – come back to the scientific consensus. For decades, scientists have researched the question of whether our activities are the main cause of rising global temperatures. Many different lines of evidence from rates of ice melt to sea temperatures to satellite measurements have now answered this conclusively. The scientific consensus is now 99.9% certain, a figure which has only grown over time. Drawing on this consensus may work to protect us from accepting sceptic arguments by reminding us of the very large areas of agreement.
There’s a systemic problem here. Never before in history have we been able to access so much information. But our information environments are not benign. Actors with an agenda are at work in many areas of public life, trying to shape what we do or do not do. We need to learn more about how we can battle the power of lies on repeat.
Eryn Newman receives funding from the Australian Research Council and The Australian National University.
Kate Reynolds receives funding from the ARC, ANU & ACT Government
Mary Jiang and Norbert Schwarz 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.
The Great Barrier Reef is vast and spectacular. But repeated mass coral bleachings, driven by high ocean temperatures, are threatening the survival of coral colonies which are the backbone of the reef.
Our study, published today in Nature, provides a new long-term picture of the ocean surface temperatures driving coral bleaching. It shows recent sea surface heat is unprecedented compared to the past 400 years. It also confirms humans are to blame.
The results are sobering confirmation that global warming – caused by human activities – will continue to damage the Great Barrier Reef.
All hope is not lost. But we must face a confronting truth: if humanity does not divert from its current course, our generation will likely witness the demise of one of Earth’s great natural wonders.
One-of-a-kind ecosystem
The Great Barrier Reef is the most extensive coral reef system on Earth. It is home to a phenomenal array of biodiversity, including more than 400 types of coral, 1,500 species of fish and 4,000 types of molluscs, as well as endangered turtles and dugongs.
However, mass coral bleaching over the past three decades has had serious impacts on the reef. Bleaching occurs when corals become so heat-stressed they eject the tiny organisms living inside their tissues. These organisms give coral some of its colour and help power its metabolism.
In mild bleaching events, corals can recover. But in the most recent events, many corals died.
The Great Barrier Reef has suffered five mass bleaching events in the past nine summers. Is this an anomaly, or within the natural variability the reef has experienced in previous centuries? Our research set out to answer this question.
Mass coral bleaching in recent decades has devastated the reef. UQ
A 400-year-old story
Coral itself can tell us what happened in the past.
As corals grow, the chemistry of their skeleton reflects the ocean conditions at the time – including its temperature. In particular, large boulder-shaped corals, known as Porites, can live for centuries and are excellent recorders of the past.
Our study sought to understand how surface temperatures in the Coral Sea, which includes the reef, have varied over the past four centuries. We focused on the January–March period – the warmest three months on the reef.
First, we collated a network of high-quality, continuous coral records from the region. These records were analysed by coral climate scientists and consist of thousands of measurements of Porites corals from across the Western tropical Pacific.
Drilling a coral skeleton core in the Coral Sea. Source: Tom DeCarlo.
From these records, we could reconstruct average surface temperatures for the Coral Sea from the year 1618 to 1995, and calibrate this to modern temperature records from 1900 to 2024. The overall result was alarming.
From 1960 to 2024, we observed annual average summer warming of 0.12°C per decade.
And average sea surface temperatures in 2016, 2017, 2020, 2022 and 2024 were five of the six warmest the region has experienced in four centuries.
Humans are undoubtedly to blame
The next step was to examine the extent to which increased temperatures in the Coral Sea can be attributed to human influence.
To do this, we used published computer model simulations of the Earth’s climate – both with and without human influence, including greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels.
So what did we find? Without human influence, Coral Sea surface temperatures during January–March remain relatively constant since 1900. Add in the human impacts, and the region warms steadily in the early 1900s, then rapidly after the 1960s.
In short: without human-caused global warming, the very high sea temperatures of recent years would be virtually impossible, based on our analysis using the world’s top climate models.
There is worse news. Recent climate projections put us on a path to intensified warming, even when accounting for international commitments to reduce emissions. This places the reef at risk of coral bleaching on a near-annual basis.
Back-to-back bleaching is likely to be catastrophic for the Great Barrier Reef, because it thwarts the chances of corals recovering between bleaching events.
Even if global warming is kept under the Paris Agreement goal of 1.5°C above pre-industrial temperatures, 70% to 90% of corals across the world could be lost.
We must stay focused
The Australian government has a crucial role to play in managing threats to the Great Barrier Reef. The devastation is in their backyard, on their watch.
But what’s happening on the Great Barrier Reef should also be an international wake-up call. The fourth global mass coral bleaching event occurred this year; the Great Barrier Reef is not the only one at risk.
Every fraction of a degree of warming we avoid gives more hope for coral reefs. That’s why the world must stay focused on ambitious action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Emissions reduction targets must be met, at the very least. The solutions are available and our leaders must implement them.
Our research equips society with the scientific evidence for what’s at stake if we don’t act.
The future of one of Earth’s most remarkable ecosystems depends on all of us.
Ben Henley receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Helen McGregor receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg 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.
Most of the world has signed up to commitments to reduce emissions under the Paris Agreement. It aims to hold the increase in the global average temperature to “well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C.
Australia’s commitments are net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and a reduction to 43% below 2005 levels by 2030.
Progress on meeting the commitments is reviewed every five years. The next review is due next year, along with upgraded commitments.
Those who are having difficulty meeting their commitments are likely to claim that their economic cost is too big. This claim is hard to verify, in part because those economic costs depend on what other countries are doing.
Every nation’s commitment, modelled
In an effort to try to get a handle on which countries will do well out of the commitments all countries have made and which will do badly in purely economic terms (regardless of the benefits from limiting climate change) I have modelled the 2030 promises using a variant of the global trade model GTAP.
The model includes most forms of emissions and, when commitments are input, determines the cheapest way for each region to hit its target.
The biggest commitments compared to business as usual have been made by Japan, the United States, the European Union and Australia.
The model has Russia and all but the largest economies in Asia and the Pacific (i.e. not China, India and Japan) actually increasing their emissions as industrial activity relocates to them from other regions that are trying harder to reduce emissions.
India does well, the Middle East does badly
In terms of the impacts on gross national income, two regions actually benefit from the commitments of all nations – India and the rest of Asia and the Pacific. Both regions have weak emissions reduction targets and import energy.
The model predicts lower oil and gas prices as a result of reduced demand from the regions with ambitious emissions targets. This will allow energy importers without ambitious targets to benefit.
The Middle East does badly. It is heavily reliant on fossil fuel exports and has slightly more stringent emissions reduction targets than India and the rest of Asia and the Pacific.
That makes the Middle East the worst-affected region. Its per capita income is modelled to grow by only 1.5% per year on average if all countries hit their 2030 targets compared to at least 2.1% every year without global climate action.
Russia is less reliant on fossil fuel exports than some Middle Eastern countries, which is one of the reasons the impacts on Russia’s income are not as severe.
The other is that Russia’s emissions reduction commitments are weak. Russian fossil fuels that aren’t exported as a result of efforts to reduce emissions elsewhere get used in Russia.
Impact on Australia modest, given emissions per capita
If Australia made no effort to reduce its emissions, Australians’ real income is estimated to grow by at least 1% every year to 2030. With the 2030 commitment, that annual increase becomes 0.9%, which is modestly less.
The modelling suggests Australia could be doing more. Of the regions modelled, Australia is set to have the highest emissions per capita until 2028 when it is overtaken only by Russia.
Many of the nations that will see their incomes rise as a result of others’ emissions reduction efforts have lower per capita incomes than Australia’s.
It will be hard to pressure them to reduce their emissions while Australia’s emissions per capita are high.
Sam Marginson is a member of the Australian Greens.
In the past decade, Australia’s animation industry has matured well beyond its domestic context – to the point of competing on a global scale.
StudioCanal Australia’s latest release, 200% Wolf, is perhaps the perfect example of this. The film picks up where its predecessor, 100% Wolf (2020), left off – continuing the journey of poodle protagonist Freddy Lupin (voiced by Ilai Swindells).
While 200% Wolf inherits some of the narrative issues present in the original film, its overall higher level of production is a welcome improvement. It reminds us Australia really does have the ability to lead the world in animation.
Production at the highest level
The film excels in its use of animation techniques to convey emotion – with strong shot composition and scenes that are smooth, dynamic and well choreographed. The use of bold colours and lively backgrounds also creates a world that will draw young viewers in.
Animation production is a collaborative and difficult process, with many factors influencing the overall style and thematic focus of the final product. But when it’s done right, it has the unique ability to transport us into a different world.
Director Alex Stadermann and art director Shane Devries have curated a visual feast for young eyes with 200% Wolf. With complex action sequences, whizz-bang special effects and a beautiful sense of colour and light, the story features almost every good animation trick in the book.
The character animation, creature design and physical performance is also exceptional and outperforms 100% Wolf. The film’s illustrated title and credit sequence alone tastefully pay reverence to the artistry and people power required to make such a film.
In the age of AI, 200% Wolf is also the first animated film I’ve seen that explicitly states in its credits “this was made by real people”, while thanking the audience for supporting Australian industry and artists.
Considerations for co-viewing
Co-viewing is essentially when parents and their children consume media together.
Co-viewing is an important factor when creating animation for children. Adult viewers should be able to guide children’s interpretations of the content – reinforcing the positive messages while helping them find meaning in the story. At the same time, adults should also be able to enjoy and resonate with the story themselves.
The humour in 200% Wolf falls short. It often feels forced and caters strictly to a very young audience, with heavy use of slapstick and “potty” jests. The deeper emotional moments also come across bluntly, lacking the level of subtlety adult viewers desire.
So while the film is visually stunning – and imbued with a unique sense of identity – it doesn’t break out of the “children’s” category enough to be considered quality co-viewing.
A lacking storyline
Anthropomorphised animals have long been used to captivate young minds. They are also a great vessel through which to explore cognitive and emotional development within characters.
Animated dogs in particular became well established in the 20th century, during a period Animation Academy Professor Paul Wells describes as the “Disney-fication” of animation.
From comedic sidekicks such as Scooby-Doo to heroic protagonists like Bolt, animated dogs are embedded in the children’s content landscape.
In 2020, the film 100% Wolf – based on Jayne Lyon’s much-loved book – cut through the national and international market at a time when there was a global content drought due to the pandemic. Unfortunately, the film itself was riddled with overused tropes, and its formulaic narrative struggled to be compelling.
In the sequel, Freddy embarks on a new adventure to save his pack and prove his true nature once again. And while there is a deepening of the story and lore – especially with the introduction of the baby moon spirit MooPoo (Elizabeth Nabben) – the story once again ends up feeling slightly bland and generic.
The twists and turns promise to set up a narrative with humour and heart, but they often miss the mark.
The film’s erratic pacing means some scenes drag while others rush through crucial developments – failing to pique the audience’s interest. Nor does the audience get a chance to properly understand the characters’ motivations.
Freddy’s quest also feels repetitive of the first film; themes of identity and self-acceptance are rehashed without any new depth or insight.
Breaking barriers for animation
Historically, it has been incredibly difficult to raise capital for feature films in Australia. Animated films come with yet another layer of complexity, given the unique attention to detail they require.
Beyond having to navigate complex internal collaborations, animation creators and studios must also meet specific criteria and production demands set by external entities such as Screen Australia, the government’s key funding body for Australian productions.
With the many hurdles Australian animators have to jump, 200% Wolf is a nice reminder that world-class animation is indeed possible here.
Ari Chand 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.
On August 3, last Saturday, prisoner rights institutions and Palestinians all around the world were standing in solidarity with Gaza and Palestininian prisoners. This day is dedicated to highlighting Israeli crimes and violations of Palestinian prisoners’ rights and the continuing genocide in Gaza.
The machinery of brutality that punishes and tortures in secrecy in Israeli prisons must be brought to light.
Since October 7, Palestinian detainees have faced horrific crimes.
Shortly after Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant announced that Israel was cutting off food, water, electricity and fuel to Gaza, effectively announcing the start of the genocide, Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir launched his own war against Palestinian political prisoners and detainees held in Israeli jails and camps, by declaring a policy of “overcrowding”.
Since then, the Israeli army and security services have launched mass arrest campaigns, which have swelled the number of Palestinian citizens from the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem to 9800.
At least 335 women and 680 children have been arrested. More than 3400 have been put under administrative detention — that is, they are held indefinitely without charge. Among them, there are 22 women and 40 children.
There has never been such a high number of administrative detainees since 1967.
Gaza arrests number unknown Israel has also arrested an unknown number of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, possibly exceeding thousands, according to our humble estimates. They are held under the 2002 “Incarceration of Unlawful Combatants Law”, which allows the Israeli army to detain people without issuing a detention order.
Israeli prisons cut food rations for Palestinians to the point of starvation since 7 Oct.
Testimonies of freed prisoners reveal that Israeli authorities rapidly converted more than a dozen prison facilities into a network of torture camps for Palestinian detainees. >> pic.twitter.com/BzciJGfzGY
Under Ben-Gvir’s orders, the already grave conditions in Israeli prisons have been made even worse. The prison authorities sharply reduced food rations and water, closing down the small shops where Palestinian detainees could purchase food and other necessities.
The cover of “Welcome to Hell”, the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem’s report on systemic violations against Palestinian prisoners. Image: APR screenshot
They also cut off water and power and even reduced the time allocated to using the restrooms. Prisoners are also prohibited from showering, which has resulted in the spread of diseases, especially skin-related ones like scabies.
There have been reports of Palestinian prisoners being deprived of medical care.
The systematic malnutrition and dehydration Palestinian prisoners are facing has taken a toll. The few that are released leave detention centres in horrific physical condition.
Even the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that such weaponisation of food is “unacceptable”.
The use of torture, including rape and beatings, has become widespread. There have been shocking reports about prison guards urinating on detainees, torturing them with electric shock and using dogs to sexually assault them.
Human shield detainees There have been even testimonies of Israeli forces using detainees as human shields during combat in Gaza.
The systemic use of torture and other ill-treatment has predictably gone as far as extrajudicial killings.
According to a recent report by Hebrew daily Haaretz, 48 Palestinians have died in detention centres. Among them is Thaer Abu Asab, who was brutally beaten by Israeli prison guards in Ketziot Prison, and died of his injuries at the age of 38.
According to Haaretz, 36 Gaza detainees have also died in the Sde Teiman camp. Testimonies from Israeli medical staff working at the detention centre have revealed horrific conditions for Palestinians held there.
Detainees are reportedly often operated on without anaesthesia and some have had to have their limbs amputated because they were shackled even when sleeping or receiving treatment.
Palestinians who have been released have said what they were subject to was more horrific than what they had heard took place at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo detention centres, where American forces tortured and forcibly disappeared Arabs and other Muslim men.
They have also testified that some detainees were killed through torture and severe beatings. One prisoner from Bethlehem, Moazaz Obaiat, who was released in July, has alleged that Ben-Gvir personally took part in torturing him.
Denied lawyer, family visits Israeli authorities have denied prisoners visits by lawyers, family, and even medics, including the International Committee of the Red Cross. They have carried out acts of collective punishment, destroying the homes of their families, arresting their relatives and holding them hostage, and illegally transferring some to secret detention camps and military bases without disclosing their fate, which constitutes the crime of enforced disappearance.
Despite condemnations from various human rights orgaisations, Ben-Gvir and the rest of the Israeli governing coalition have doubled down on these policies. “[Prisoners] should be killed with a shot to the head and the bill to execute Palestinian prisoners must be passed in the third reading in the Knesset […]
“Until then, we will give them minimal food to survive. I don’t care,” Ben-Gvir said on July 1.
Electric shocks, rape, and torture to death.. Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons face serious violations, with some families receiving news of their deaths weeks later.
Euro-Med Monitor regularly documents dozens of testimonies from released Palestinian detainees and… pic.twitter.com/o04T1JS9bG
By using mass detention, Israel, the occupying power, has systematically destroyed Palestinian social, economic and psychological fabric since 1967. Over one million Palestinians have been arrested since then, thousands have been held hostage for extended periods under administrative detention and 255 detainees have died in Israeli prisons.
Israeli crimes against the Palestinians did not begin in October 2023, but are a continuation of a systematic process of ethnic cleansing, forced displacement and apartheid that began even before 1948.
But Israel’s colonial regime overlooks the Palestinian people’s resilience. Inspired by the experiences of the free nations of Ireland, South Africa and Vietnam, we draw strength from our determination to achieve our right to self-determination, freedom and independence.
This is why on this day, August 3, we urged the world to collectively protest against Israeli occupation crimes and racist laws and we call on governments to uphold their legal duties to prevent such crimes from happening.
Political prisoners solidarity We also called on unions, universities, parliaments and political parties to effectively participate in large-scale events, demonstrations and digital campaigns in solidarity with Palestinian political prisoners.
The international community should hold the occupying power to account by imposing a complete arms embargo on it, applying economic sanctions, and suspending its UN membership.
They should also nullify bilateral agreements, and halt Israel’s participation in international forums and events until it abides by international law and human rights. The international community must compel Israel to protect civilians according to its obligations as an occupying power.
Israel must also reveal the identities and conditions of people it has forcibly disappeared. We demand an end to arbitrary and administrative detention policies. The bodies of those who have died inside and outside prisons must also be released, and all prisoners must receive legal protection.
Israel, the occupying power, is under the obligation to allow special rapporteurs, United Nations experts, and the International Criminal Court prosecutor to visit Palestine, inspect prisons and deliver justice for the victims, including material and moral compensation.
Israel must not be allowed to get away with these horrific crimes.
Qadura Faresis head of the Commission of Detainees Affairs in Palestine. Republished from Al Jazeera.
The Albanese government will fund a 15% pay increase for early childhood educators – tying it to centres agreeing to not increase their fees by more than 4.4% over the next year.
The pay rise will be phased in over two years, with a 10% increase from December and a further 5% from December 2025.
A typical worker paid at the award rate would receive $103 a week increasing to at least $155 a week from December 2025.
The cost of the move is $3.6 billion.
The May budget provided for funding higher childcare wages, although the government gave no details at the time.
The Productivity Commission, in an interim report into early childhood education and care, pointed to better wages and conditions as a key way to address workforce shortages in the sector. The government has the commission’s final report but has not yet released it.
The government said in a statement that it was providing the interim retention payment for two years “while the Fair Work Commission finalises its gender undervaluation priority awards review and as the government charts a path towards a universal childcare system”.
The Fair Work Commission began proceedings to investigate the historic undervaluation of early childhood education and care work, disability home care work, and other social and community services workers shortly after delivering its national wage case decision in the middle of the year.
At the time is said the review would not begin with a “blank slate” but would build on the reasoning used in earlier decisions about aged-care workers and teachers.
The aged care decision, delivered early this year, awarded increases of up to 28.5%.
The government said the interim childcare pay rise would be tied to a commitment from childcare centres to limit fee increases.
“We want to make sure workers can be fairly paid without the costs being passed on to families.”
Since Labor came to power the childcare workforce has grown by more than 30,000 but more people were needed. “This commitment will help retain our existing early childhood educators, who are predominately women, and attract new employees.”
Anthony Albanese said the government’s cheaper childcare policy had “already delivered increased subsidies to over a million families. This will provide even more cost of living relief.”
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said: “We’re improving access to affordable early childhood education and care, boosting productivity and workplace participation, and helping Australians work more when they want to”.
Education minister Jason Clare said the “child care debate is over. It’s not babysitting. It’s early education and it’s critical to preparing children for school.”
Minister for Early Childhood Education Anne Aly said: “This is a wonderful outcome for a highly feminised workforce that has for far too long been neglected and taken for granted”.
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.
By Maxim Bock, Queensland University of Technology
Fiji journalist Felix Chaudhary recalls how the harassment began: “Initially, I was verbally warned to stop.”
“And not only warned but threatened as well. I think I was a bit ‘gung-ho’ at the time and I kind of took it lightly until the day I was taken to a particular site and beaten up.
“I was told that my mother would identify me at a mortuary. That’s when I knew that this was now serious, and that I couldn’t be so blasé and think that I’m immune.”
Pressing risks of Chaudhary’s early career Felix Chaudhary, now director of news, current affairs and sports at Fiji TV, and former deputy chief-of-staff at The Fiji Times, was detained and threatened several times during the period of government led by former Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama from 2007 to 2022.
Commodore Bainimarama, as he was known at the time, executed his military coup in December 2006 against Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase and President Josefa IIoilo.
Although some media outlets were perceived as openly supporting the government then, not all relinquished their impartiality, Chaudhary explains.
“Some media organisations decided to follow suit. The one that I worked for, The Fiji Times, committed to remaining an objective and ethical media organisation.
“Everyone who worked there knew that at some point they would face challenges.”
Military impact on sugar industry During the early days of the coup, Chaudhary was based in Viti Levu’s Western Division in the city of Lautoka, reporting about the impact of the military takeover of the sugar cane industry. It was there that he experienced some of his most severe harassment.
“It was just unfortunate that during the takeover, I was one of the first to face the challenges, simply because I was writing stories about how the sugar cane industry was being affected,” he says.
“I was reporting about how the military takeover was affecting the livelihoods of the people who depend on this industry. There are a lot of people who depend on sugar cane farming, and not necessarily just the farmers.
“I was writing from their perspective.”
A lot of countries, including Australia, in an effort to avoid appearing sympathetic to a government ruling through military dictatorship, turned their backs on Fiji, Chaudhary explains.
“These countries took a stand, and we respect them for that,” he says.
“However, a lot of aid that used to come in started to slow down, and assistance to the sugar industry, from the European Union, didn’t come through.
“The industry was struggling. But the Fijian government tried to maintain that everything was fine as they were in control.
‘Just not sustainable’ “It was just not sustainable. They didn’t have the resources to do it, and people were feeling the impact. This was around 2009. The military had been in power since 2006.”
Chaudhary chose to focus his writing on the difficulties faced by the locals: a view that was in direct contention with the military’s agenda.
He experienced a series of threats, including assurances of death if he continued to report on the takeover. His first encounter with the military saw him seized, driven to an unknown location, and physically assaulted.
Chaudhary soon realised this was not an isolated case and the threats on his life were far from empty.
“Other people, in addition to journalists, were taken into custody for many reasons. Some ended up dead after being beaten up. That’s when I knew that could happen to me,” he says.
“I figured I’d just continue to try and be as safe as possible.”
Chaudhary was later again abducted, threatened, and locked in a cell. No reason was given, no charges were laid, and he was repeatedly told that he might never leave.
Aware of military tactics Having served in the Fiji military in 1987–1988, Chaudhary was aware of common military tactics, and knew what these personnel were capable of. Former army colleagues had also tried to warn him of the danger he was in.
“When I was taken in by the military, I was visited by two of my former colleagues. They told me if I didn’t stop, something was going to happen,” he says.
“That set the tone. It reminded me that I needed to be more careful.”
On another occasion, military personnel entered The Fiji Times offices and proceeded to forcefully arrest both Chaudhary, and his wife, the newspaper’s current chief-of-staff, Margaret Wise.
“The military entered the newsroom while we were both at work, demanded our phones and attacked [Margaret] physically. I came to her defence, and I was also attacked. These threats were not only to me, but to her as well.”
Chaudhary admires Margaret Wise’s incredible tenacity.
“She’s a very strong woman. Any other person might have wanted to run away from it all, but we both knew we had a responsibility to be the voice for those that didn’t have one,” he says.
Dictatorships have a ‘limited lifespan’ “She also knew that governments come and go, and that dictatorships only have a limited lifespan. On the other hand, media organisations have been here for decades, in our case, a century and a half. We knew we had to get through it.”
The pair supported each other and decided to restrict their social life in an effort to protect not only themselves, but their families as well.
Looking back, Chaudhary acknowledges the danger of that period, and questions whether he would have done the same thing again, if presented with a similar situation.
“I think I might have changed the way that I did things if I had thought about the livelihoods of the people working for The Fiji Times,” he says.
“I didn’t think about that at the time. Some people might say that was a bit reckless, and maybe it was.
“I kept thinking about my family, but then you have to think about the other families as well. Sometimes you have to make a stand for what is right, no matter what the consequences are.
“People think that’s bravery. It’s not really. It’s just doing what is right, and I’m glad I’m here today.
“I have a lot of respect for other people who went through what I went through and are still alive to tell the tale.”
Chaudhary maintains that anyone in a similar situation would do the same.
“What I do know is everybody, regardless of who they are, has the wanting to do what is right. And I think if presented with this sort of situation, people would take a stand,” he says.
Fiji TV dealing with harassment Although journalists continue to experience incidents of harassment, the form of harassment has changed, with women often receiving the worst of it, Chaudhary explains.
“Harassment now is different. Back then, they had a licence to harass you, and your policies meant nothing, because they had the backing of the military,” he says.
“Nowadays, harassment is different in the sense that there is a lot of male leaders who feel like they have the right to speak to females however they want.”
Chaudhary, through his position at Fiji TV, has used his past experiences to shape the way he deals with cases of harassment, and especially when his female journalists are targeted.
“For us at Fiji TV, it’s about empowering the female journalists to be able to face these situations in a diplomatic way. They don’t take things personally, even if the attack is verbal and personal,” he says.
“Our journalists have to understand that these individuals are acting this way because the questions being asked are difficult ones.
“I’ve tried to make changes in the way they ask their questions. They are told not to lead with the difficult questions. You ask the more positive questions and set them in a good mood, and then move to the more difficult questions.
“The way you frame the questions has a lot to do with it as well.
“When the females ask, especially these sources get personal, they use gender as a way to not answer the question and just deflect it. So, now we have to be a bit more creative in how we ask.”
Things are improving Nevertheless, Chaudhary maintains that things are improving, citing the professionalism of his female journalists.
“We are able to break a lot of stories, and it’s the female journalists doing it,” he says.
“They are facing this new era with this new government with the hope that things are more open and transparent.
The 2022 Fiji research report ‘Prevalence and Impact of Sexual Harassment on Female Journalists’. Image: Screenshot APR
“I’m really blessed to have four women who are very strong. They understand the need to be diplomatic, but they also understand the need to get answers to the questions that need to be asked.
“They are kind of on their own, with a little bit of guidance from me. We worked out how to handle harassment, and how to get the answers. They have kind of done it on their own.”
While asking the tough questions may be a daunting exercise, it is imperative if Fiji is to avoid making the same mistakes, Chaudhary explains.
“I think for me now, it’s just about sharing what happened in the past, and getting them to understand that if we don’t ask the right questions now, we could have a situation similar to that of the last 16 years.
“This could happen if we don’t hold the current government to account, and don’t ask the hard questions now.”
Fiji’s proposal to end sexual harassment A 2022 research report, ‘Prevalence and Impact of Sexual Harassment on Female Journalists’, revealed that more than 80 per cent of Fijian female journalists have experienced physical, verbal and online sexual harassment during the course of their work.
The report by The University of the South Pacific’s Journalism Programme and Fiji Women’s Rights Movement also proposes numerous solutions that prioritise the safety and wellbeing of female journalists.
Acknowledging the report’s good intentions, Chaudhary argues that it hasn’t created any substantial change due to long-standing Fijian culture and social norms.
“The report was, for many people, an eye opener. For me, it wasn’t,” he says.
“Unfortunately, I work alongside some people who hold the view that because they have been in the industry for some time, they can speak to females however they want.
“There wasn’t necessarily any physical harassment, but in Fiji, we have a lot of spoken sexual innuendo.
“We have a relationship among Fijians and the indigenous community where if I’m from a certain village, or part of the country and you are from another, we are allowed to engage in colourful conversation.
“It’s part of the tradition and culture. It’s just unfortunate that that culture and tradition has also found its way into workplaces, and the media industry. So that was often the excuse given in the newsroom.
Excuse that was used “Many say, ‘I didn’t mean that. I said it because she’s from this village, and I’m from there, so I’m allowed to.’ The intent may have been deeper than that, but that was the excuse that was used,” he says.
Chaudhary believes that the report should have sparked palpable policy change in newsrooms.
“It should have translated into engagement with different heads of newsrooms to develop policies or regulations within the organisation, aimed at addressing those issues specifically. This would ensure that young women do not enter a workplace where that culture exists.
“So, we have a report, which is great, but it didn’t turn into anything tangible that would benefit organisations.
“This should have been taken on board by government and by the different organisations to develop those policies and systems in order to change the culture because the culture still exists,” he says.
Maxim Bockis a student journalist from the Queensland University of Technology who travelled to Fiji with the support of the Australian Government’s New Colombo Plan Mobility Programme. Published in partnership with QUT.
The Chamorros are the indigenous people of the Mariana Islands — politically divided between Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands in Micronesia.
Today, Chamorro culture continues to be preserved through the sharing of language and teaching via The Guam Museum.
But the battle to be heard and have a voice as a US territory remains an ongoing struggle.
Chamorro cultural historian and museum curator Dr Michael Bevacqua says Chamorro people in Guam have a complex relationship with the US — they consider themselves as Pacific islanders, who also happen to be American citizens.
Bevacqua says after liberation in July 1944, there was a strong desire and pressure among Chamorros to “Americanise”.
Chamorros stopped speaking their language to their children, as a result. They were also pressured to move to the US mainland so the US military could build their bases and thousands of families were displaced.
“There was this feeling that being Chamorro wasn’t worth anything. Give it up. Be American instead,” he says.
‘Fundamental moment’ For the Chamorros, he explains, attending the Festival of Pacific Arts in the 1970s and 1980s was a “very fundamental moment”.
It allowed them to see how other islanders were dealing with and navigating modernity, he adds.
“Chamorros saw that other islanders were proud to be Islanders. They weren’t trying to pretend they weren’t Islanders,” Dr Bevacqua said.
“They were navigating the 20th century in a completely different way. Other islanders were picking and choosing more, they were they were not completely trying to replace, they were not throwing everything away, they trying to adapt and blend.”
Being part of the largest gathering of indigenous people, is what is believed to have led to several different cultural practitioners, many of whom are cultural masters in the Chamorros community today, to try to investigate how their people expressed themselves through traditional forms.
“And this helped lead to the Chamorro renaissance, which manifested in terms of Chamorros starting to carve jewellery again, tried to speak their language again, it led to movements for indigenous rights again.
“A lot of it was tied to just recognise seeing other Pacific Islanders and realising that they’re proud to be who they are. We don’t have to trade in our indigenous identity for a colonial identity.
“We can enjoy the comforts of American life and be Chamorro. Let’s celebrate who we are.”
Festival of Pacific Arts and Culture 2016 . . . Chamorro “celebrating who they are”. Image: FestPac 2016 Documentary Photographers/Manny Crisostomo
Inafa’ maolek Guam’s population is estimated to be under 170,000, and just over 32 percent of those are Chamorro.
Dr Bevaqua says respect and reciprocity are key values for the Chamorro people.
If someone helps a Chamorro person, then they need to make sure that they reciprocate, he adds.
“And these are relationships which sometimes extend back generations, that families help each other, going back to before World War II, and you always have to keep up with them.
“In the past, sometimes people would write them down in little books and nowadays, people keep them in their notes app on their phones.”
But he says the most important value for Chamorros now is the concept of inafa’ maolek.
Inafa’ maolek describes the Chamorru concept of restoring harmony or order and translated literally is “to make” (inafa’) “good” (maolek).
Relationship with community “This is sort of this larger interdependence and inafa’ maolek the most fundamental principle of Chamorru life. It could extend between sort of people, but it can also extend as well to your relationship with nature, [and] your relationship to your larger community.”
Guam coastline . . . “Chamorro people are always held back because as a territory, Guam does not have an international voice”. Image: Michael Hemmingsen-Guam 2/RNZ
He says the idea is that everyone is connected to each other and must find a way to work together, and to take care of each other.
He believes the Chamorro people are always held back because as a territory, Guam does not have an international voice.
“The United States speaks for you; you can yell, shout, and scream. But as a as a territory, you’re not supposed,to you’re not supposed to count, you’re not supposed to matter.”
He adds: “That’s why for me decolonisation is essential, because if you have particular needs, if you are an island in the western Pacific, and there are challenges that you face, that somebody in West Virginia, Ohio, Utah, Arizona and California may not care about it in the same way, and may be caught up in all different types of politics.
“You have to have the ability to do something about the challenges that are affecting you. How do you do that if 350 million people, 10,000 miles (16,000 km) away have your voice and most of them don’t even know that they hold your voice. It sucks.”
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
A growing number of complaints against older doctors has prompted the Medical Board of Australia to announce today that it’s reviewing how doctors aged 70 or older are regulated. Two new options are on the table.
The first would require doctors over 70 to undergo a detailed health assessment to determine their current and future “fitness to practise” in their particular area of medicine.
The second would require only general health checks for doctors over 70.
A third option acknowledges existing rules requiring doctors to maintain their health and competence. As part of their professional code of conduct, doctors must seek independent medical and psychological care to prevent harming themselves and their patients. So, this third option would maintain the status quo.
Haven’t we moved on from set retirement ages?
It might be surprising that stricter oversight of older doctors’ performance is proposed now. Critics of mandatory retirement ages in other fields – for judges, for instance – have long questioned whether these rules are “still valid in a modern society”.
However, unlike judges, doctors are already required to renew their registration annually to practise. This allows the Medical Board of Australia not only to access sound data about the prevalence and activity of older practitioners, but to assess their eligibility regularly and to conduct performance assessments if and when they are needed.
What has prompted these proposals?
This latest proposal identifies several emerging concerns about older doctors. These are grounded in external research about the effect of age on doctors’ competence as well as the regulator’s internal data showing surges of complaints about older doctors in recent years.
Studies of medical competence in ageing doctors show variable results. However, the Medical Board of Australia’s consultation document emphasises studies of neurocognitive loss. It explains how physical and cognitive impairment can lead to poor record-keeping, improper prescribing, as well as disruptive behaviour.
The other issue is the number of patient complaints against older doctors. These “notifications” have surged in recent years, as have the number of disciplinary actions against older doctors.
In 2022–2023, the Medical Board of Australia took disciplinary action against older doctors about 1.7 times more often than for doctors under 70.
In 2023, notifications against doctors over 70 were 81% higher than for the under 70s. In that year, patients sent 485 notifications to the Medical Board of Australia about older doctors – up from 189 in 2015.
While older doctors make up only about 5.3% of the doctor workforce in Australia (less than 1% over 80), this only makes the high numbers of complaints more starkly disproportionate.
It’s for these reasons that the Medical Board of Australia has determined it should take further regulatory action to safeguard the health of patients.
So what distinguishes the two new proposed options?
The “fitness to practise” assessment option would entail a rigorous assessment of doctors over 70 based on their specialisation. It would be required every three years after the age of 70 and every year after 80.
Surgeons, for example, would be assessed by an independent occupational physician for dexterity, sight and the ability to give clinical instructions.
Importantly, the results of these assessments would usually be confidential between the assessor and the doctor. Only doctors who were found to pose a substantial risk to the public, which was not being managed, would be obliged to report their health condition to the Medical Board of Australia.
The second option would be a more general health check not linked to the doctor’s specific role. It would occur at the same intervals as the “fitness to practise” assessment. However, its purpose would be merely to promote good health-care decision-making among health practitioners. There would be no general obligation on a doctor to report the results to the Medical Board of Australia.
In practice, both of these proposals appear to allow doctors to manage their own general health confidentially.
Older surgeons could be independently assessed for dexterity, sight and the ability to give clinical instructions. worradirek/Shutterstock
The law tends to prioritise patient safety
All state versions of the legal regime regulating doctors, known as the National Accreditation and Registration Scheme, include a “paramountcy” provision. That provision basically says patient safety is paramount and trumps all other considerations.
As with legal regimes regulating childcare, health practitioner regulation prioritises the health and safety of the person receiving the care over the rights of the licensed professional.
Complicating this further, is the fact that a longstanding principle of health practitioner regulation has been that doctors should not be “punished” for errors in practice.
All of this means that reforms of this nature can be difficult to introduce and that the balance between patient safety and professional entitlements must be handled with care.
Could these proposals amount to age discrimination?
It is premature to analyse the legal implications of these proposals. So it’s difficult to say how these proposals interact with Commonwealth age- and other anti-discrimination laws.
For instance, one complication is that the federal age discrimination statute includes an exemption to allow “qualifying bodies” such as the Medical Board of Australia to discriminate against older professionals who are “unable to carry out the inherent requirements of the profession, trade or occupation because of his or her age”.
When changes are proposed to health practitioner regulation, there is typically much media attention followed by a consultation and behind-the-scenes negotiation process. This issue is no different.
How will doctors respond to the proposed changes? It’s too soon to say. If the proposals are implemented, it’s possible some older doctors might retire rather than undergo these mandatory health assessments. Some may argue that encouraging more older doctors to retire is precisely the point of these proposals. However, others have suggested this would only exacerbate shortages in the health-care workforce.
The proposals are open for public comment until October 4.
In 2018, Christopher Rudge was commissioned to write an independent report on health practitioner regulation by the Medical Council of NSW.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s address to the weekend Garma festival had a different tone from last year’s, when the Voice referendum was approaching. The Prime Minister is resetting policy, moving the focus to the economic empowerment of Indigenous communities as a path to reducing Indigenous disadvantage and “closing the gap”. Indigenous outcomes continue to go backwards for some key closing-the-gap targets.
Albanese said the government would work closely with the Coalition of Peaks, a grouping of more than 80 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community-controlled organisations.
Pat Turner is lead convener of the Coalition of Peaks and CEO of the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation (NACCHO), and she joined the podcast.
On government-subsidised projects, Turner is frustrated companies and investors have been slow to involve local Aboriginal communities.
This has been raised in the group that is responsible for renewables, and they say, oh no, it’s far too expensive to do this in Aboriginal communities. So they need to get out and talk to the Aboriginal leaders on the ground who know what their community’s needs are, and they need to map it so they can’t just be using the excuse of costs alone as an issue that’s preventing them from engaging directly with the landholders.
They just look at the costs and, you know, shake their heads. But I think they’ve got to do better modelling with the land councils.
On increasing Aboriginal employment, Turner says
We’ve been working with the Treasury as the Coalition of Peaks now since the [2022] jobs summit. And the Coalition of Peaks’ priority is to ensure that we get real jobs at the local level. And then we have the issue in relation to the leveraging of […] our land assets for all future development opportunities. So there is a good opportunity there, but it must involve the statutory landholders directly.
On reducing incarceration rates, she highlights bail laws,
All jurisdictions should be reviewing their bail laws.
You’ve got to have an address for people to be bailed to. And so there’s got to be some form of accommodation whereby people can give an address to be bailed to. This is how everything’s interrelated and I say that you can’t do economic policy on its own. That means that state governments should be investing more money into housing and different types of accommodation that are required for different, situations.
On the Voice’s defeat and the future of Aboriginal leadership, Turner says the loss was “a massive hit to morale across Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australia”.
But I have to say that it hasn’t deterred the Coalition of Peaks from pursuing full implementation of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap.
While we all need new generations to come forward, they have to do it by listening to the elders and being guided by them.
Asked to name any leaders of the future she points to Rachel Perkins, one of those prominent in the Voice campaign.
Could she work with Jacinta Price if there were a Coaliton government?
We work with anyone who’s in government. As we’ve already demonstrated. It was Scott Morrison who gave birth to the National Agreement when he was the head of COAG, right back in 2018 and they gave the go-ahead in Adelaide.
So the Coalition is very invested in the National Agreement on Closing the Gap. And I expect that support to continue.
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.
When the Australian public voted last year on whether to change the Constitution to establish an Indigenous Voice to parliament, it came after months of intense and sometimes bitter campaigning by both the “yes” and “no” camps.
Polling conducted 12 months before the referendum showed majority public support for the proposed constitutional change. But ultimately the polls flipped and 60.06% of Australians voted “no”.
Why? Factors included a lack of bipartisan support, a growing distrust in government, confusion about the proposal’s details and enduring racism in Australian society.
However, my research, published in the journal Media International Australia, highlights how misinformation and conspiratorial narratives on social media platforms – in particular, X (formerly known as Twitter) – also played a key role.
The findings paint a striking picture. There is a new type of political messaging strategy in town – and it needs urgent attention.
A bird’s-eye view of campaign messaging
I collected 224,996 original posts on X (excluding reposts) containing search terms relevant to the referendum (for example, “Voice to Parliament” or #voicereferendum). The data collection spanned all of 2023 up to the referendum date on October 14. It included more than 40,000 unique user accounts.
First, I categorised posts based on the presence of partisan hashtags. This enabled the identification of the top 20 keywords associated with each campaign.
The results provide an aerial view of each campaign’s messaging strategy. They also reveal that keywords associated with the “no” campaign dominated on the platform.
Keywords from the “yes” campaign included, for example, “constitutional recognition”, “inclusive”, “closing the gap” and “historic moment”.
Keywords from the no campaign included, for example, “division”, “expensive”, “bureaucratic”, “Marxist”, “globalist” and “Trojan”.
I found the “no” campaign keywords occurred more than four times as often in the dataset as the “yes” campaign’s, with the “not enough details” and “voice of division” narratives most prevalent of all.
The “yes” campaign only had two of the top ten keywords in campaign messaging on the platform.
How did the ‘no’ campaign manage attention on X?
I categorised each post in the dataset according to its dominant theme or topic. The top ten most prevalent topics covered the majority of the dataset (64.1% of all posts).
Next, I examined which of the top ten topics gained most attention on X – and which X users were the most influential.
Across the board, the posts that received the most engagement (that is, the number of replies and reposts with an attached original message) were from politicians, news media and opinion leaders – not bots, and not trolls.
In line with the keyword analysis, the “no” campaign messaging dominated the topics of discussion, but not because everyone agreed with it.
Several of the topics featured core “yes” campaign messaging, emphasising First Nations representation and equality, opportunities to make a difference and historical facts.
But most of the discussion from “yes” campaigners was drawing attention to and critiquing the “no” campaign’s core messaging around fear, distrust and division.
Rather than blatant falsehoods or full-blown conspiracy theories, the most widely discussed posts from “no” campaigners were characterised by rumours, unverified information and conspiratorial assertions.
Prominent “no” campaigners portrayed the Voice as divisive, implying or arguing it would lead to drastic social changes such as apartheid. It was positioned as part of an alleged secret agenda to consolidate elite privilege and erode Australian democracy through risky constitutional changes.
Such claims are indisputably conspiratorial because they assert that powerful actors are hiding malevolent agendas, and because they lack credible and verified empirical evidence.
These claims were supported by collaborative work by No campaigners to find what they believed to be evidence.
This type of “just asking questions” and “do your own research” approach stood in contrast to the journalistic fact-checking and traditional expertise predominantly drawn on by the “yes” campaign.
Yet, my study’s results show that the more the “yes” campaign tried to counter misrepresentations and confusion around the Voice proposal, the more they fuelled it.
A post-truth referendum
What Australia witnessed in October 2023 was a thoroughly post-truth referendum.
To be clear: it was not a referendum that lacked truth, but one in which traditional political messaging simply didn’t cut it in a fast, free-flowing and predominantly online media environment.
The “no” campaign’s messaging strategy was all about constructing a “truth market” in the public sphere. In other words, they created an environment where multiple – often conflicting – versions of the truth competed for dominance and where emotional resonance received more attention than reasoned debate.
We can’t really call it “disinformation” because most of it didn’t involve outright falsehoods.
Instead, a near-constant supply of contrived media events and rumour bombs attracted 24/7 news attention and fostered participatory discussions on platforms such as X from actors across the partisan divide. Examples of rumours spread during the campaign included the Indigenous Voice to parliament would divide Australia and was a land grab for globalist elites.
In trying to counter the “no” campaign’s messaging on X, many “yes” campaigners entered into a “defensive battle”. This drowned out their core message. It also amplified the fear and division narratives of the “no” campaign.
Targeted messaging designed to exploit social media and elicit reliable outrage from different segments of the population is not new. It has a name: propaganda.
Propaganda is not a bad word, despite the reputation it has developed since the second world war. It is simply a more accurate and principled way to understand what happened during the Voice referendum debate, and for political campaigning more generally.
What is new, however, is the current information environment: the speed of digital networks and the collaborative and social dimensions of how people engage with information.
Properly diagnosing the problem is the first step to remedying it.
Timothy Graham receives funding from the Australian Research Council (ARC) for his Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DE220101435), ‘Combatting Coordinated Inauthentic Behaviour on Social Media’. He also receives ARC funding for the Discovery Project, ‘Understanding and combatting “Dark Political Communication”.’ (2024 – 2027).
A former teacher and football coach who a majority of Americans had never heard of before is now running for vice president of the United States alongside Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
While the two names at the top of the Democratic and Republican tickets – Harris and Donald Trump – will largely define the next three months in the US presidential race, both campaigns will still focus considerable attention on defining Tim Walz, Harris’ largely unknown running mate.
So, who is Walz? And what will his addition to the Democratic ticket mean for Harris and the Democrats’ chances of winning the election?
Teaching in rural public schools
Walz undeniably has strong roots in rural and working-class America, despite being a member of a Democratic Party that has become increasingly urban and highly educated in recent years.
Born in a small Nebraska town to a school teacher father and a school administrator mother, Walz enrolled in the National Guard at 17. He later graduated from a small public university with a degree in social science education.
Walz met his wife, Gwen, while teaching in rural Nebraska. She soon persuaded him to move to her home state of Minnesota, where they got jobs teaching at the same school.
One particular incident then spurred Walz’s decision to embark on a career in politics. In 2004, he took a group of students to a rally for then-presidential candidate George W. Bush. They were initially denied entry because one of the students had a campaign sticker for Bush’s rival, John Kerry.
Walz was reportedly irate – and signed up to volunteer for Kerry’s campaign the next day. He then ran for Congress himself in a rural southern Minnesota district bordering Iowa, which he won in 2006.
As a former command sergeant major, he was the highest-ranking enlisted military member in the history of Congress. And as a representative, he become known as a workhorse, eventually leading the Veterans Affairs Committee.
After winning six terms in a row in a once reliably Republican district, Walz ran for and won the Minnesota governorship in 2018. He was re-elected in 2022.
Walz’s political positions
In his first congressional campaign, Walz presented himself as a moderate Democrat, touting endorsements from the National Rifle Association.
As a veteran and one of very few Democrats to represent a mostly rural district, Walz bucked the party line on some issues, including opposing a decrease in military spending. A key reason was his concern about China.
Walz taught English for a year in China and spent his honeymoon there. He and his wife even started a company leading student tours of China.
Given this history, Walz has a deep familiarity with the country. When he got to Congress, he joined the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, a legislative group monitoring human rights and the rule of law in the country. He co-sponsored a number of resolutions condemning China’s human rights abuses and poor environmental standards.
Walz has also championed democracy activists in Hong Kong and regularly meets with exiled Tibetan leaders, including the Dalai Lama.
He and his wife were even married on June 4 1994 – the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijing in 1989 – because, his wife said, he “wanted to have a date he’d always remember”.
Walz’s time as governor of Minnesota – a state that is more Democratic-leaning than neighbouring Wisconsin or Michigan – has undoubtedly seen him turn more progressive.
Aided by the fact Democrats hold a small majority in the Minnesota legislature, Walz’s tenure has led to a number of progressive legislative wins, including:
From teaching on a Native American reservation to a school in China not long after the Tiananmen Square massacre, Walz’s life story has had many diverse turns. So much so, his staffers once called him Forrest Gump, after the Tom Hanks character with a colourful life.
Both the Harris and Trump campaigns are now angling to define his latest chapter.
The Harris campaign is hoping Walz’s straight-talking, Midwestern dad persona, combined with his background as a National Guardsman familiar with everything from turkey hunting to repairing pickup trucks, will make him relatable to a wide swathe of voters in middle America. He’s a conventional politician.
This is particularly important given his running mate, Harris, is anything but conventional – if she wins in November, she would be the first Black woman and South Asian president in US history. She’s also from California – a state that hasn’t produced a president since Ronald Reagan in the 1980s.
The campaign will also seek to juxtapose Walz’s perceived normalcy against the Trump-Vance ticket, which it is depicting as “weird”.
Walz first used this word to describe the Republican ticket, and it instantly went viral. He’s since become referred to as a “cool dad” online and has become the source of a stream of memes in recent days.
For the Trump campaign, they are hoping to define Walz by his more progressive tenure as Minnesota governor, ultimately alienating more moderate voters.
In the hours after Walz was announced as Harris’ running mate, Republicans began highlighting the unrest in Minnesota that followed the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in 2020 and criticising Walz for being too slow to call in the National Guard to quell the violence.
While Walz would ultimately call in a sizeable number of National Guardsmen, the Republicans have nonetheless zeroed in on this attack line – even highlighting how Harris sought to raise funds for protesters who had been arrested in Minnesota.
Crime is a challenging issue for Democrats. When pollsters asked Americans last year which political party does better on crime, Democrats trailed Republicans by ten percentage points.
Where to from here?
Ultimately, Harris made clear what she views as Walz’s addition to the Democratic ticket, highlighting his background as a school teacher and National Guardsman. She also told him on Tuesday, “you understand our country”.
Over the next few months, we’ll see how accurate that statement is – if Walz’s understanding of the country actually helps Harris to win the race in November.
Jared Mondschein 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.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachael Jefferson, Lecturer in Human Movement Studies (Health and PE) and Creative Arts, Charles Sturt University
The Paris Olympics has proudly proclaimed to be the first games in 128 years to offer gender equality.
This has been achieved by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) providing an equal number of quota places for female and male athletes, while also increasing the number of women in coaching, broadcasting and sport governance roles.
However, gender equality in sport is not just about the numbers – it involves dismantling systemic patriarchy piece by piece.
The Paris games will feature the highest proportion of women in the history of the Olympics.
Female athlete participation
The ratio of female-to-male athlete parity is significant in the Paris Olympics, given women were banned from the first games in 1896 and only permitted to compete in small numbers in “female-appropriate” events four years later.
There was a steady increase in female participation as the games became more popular through the 20th century. However, it was not until 1979 that the right of women to participate in sport was formally included in the first international convention (United Nations) on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.
It took another 33 years for women to be allowed to compete in all events on the Olympic program in 2012.
Despite this progress, women’s Olympic events have often been sidelined by the media, enabling male athletes to enjoy greater publicity (and associated sponsorship) than their female counterparts.
Combat and strength sports are now based on weight categories, permitting the women’s and men’s events to alternate instead of having men’s events available in the popular evening slot.
The women’s marathon – only introduced to the Olympics in 1984 – will also conclude the athletics program instead of the men’s for the first time.
Media representation
Amplifying women’s voices and stories from the games has been a key objective for the Paris Olympics.
The IOC has been instrumental in this endeavour via its 2024 Portrayal Guidelines: gender-equal, fair and inclusive representation in sport.
These guidelines have led to a large increase in the number of female staff in broadcast roles and production teams in Paris.
And female-targeted training camps in 2023 provided by the Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) have been a timely institutional transformation.
Improved media representation of female athletes is also a priority, focusing on how they are visually captured and presented in all forms of media and communication.
This helps to reframe persistent patriarchal narratives about how sportswomen must maintain their femininity to be worthy recipients of the male gaze.
Regrettably, this is still a work in progress for some commentators such as Bob Bollard, whose recent sexist “makeup” remark went viral when he was reporting on the gold medal win for the Australian women’s 4x100m freestyle relay team.
After the Bollard incident, Yiannis Exarchos, the OBS chief, swiftly reminded mostly male camera operators to refrain from any sexist filming of female athletes. He said the problem was mainly down to “unconscious bias”, with camera operators and TV editors tending to show more close-up shots of women than men.
Leadership and infrastructure
Female under-representation in the IOC is well documented.
The Paris games are a springboard for much needed systemic change in the minutiae of Olympic policies and practices.
Female athletes are no longer victims of vast patriarchal conspiracies to lock them out of this male-dominated arena. They’ve gained ground and are kicking sexism to the touchline with relish.
We all need to welcome in this new era.
Rachael Jefferson 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.
Across the world’s oceans, our knowledge of the seafloor is very limited. Mapping and studying deep, remote offshore areas is difficult, expensive and time-consuming. So much of the ocean has not yet been explored.
But what if marine mammals could help? In our new research, my colleagues and I attached underwater cameras and trackers to eight Australian sea lions (Neophoca cinerea) from two colonies in South Australia. The sea lions explored unmapped areas of the ocean, found new reefs, and revealed amazing diverse habitats on the seafloor.
This turned out to be a very effective way to map large areas. That’s because we could use the information to predict habitats in areas the sea lions didn’t visit. These predictive computer models could also be used to assess how the various habitats might correspond to different environmental conditions.
Improving our understanding of how seafloor habitats function, and how human activity may change them, will be crucial if we are to protect these vital ecosystems in the future.
Sea lion swimming through invertebrate reef, sponge garden, macroalgae reef, bare sand, and invertebrate boulder habitats. Video: Angelakis et al. 2024.
Using sea lions as data collectors
We attached cameras and trackers to eight adult female sea lions – four from Olive Island on the western Eyre Peninsula and four from Seal Bay on Kangaroo Island – between December 2022 and August 2023.
Female Australian sea lions from Olive Island and Seal Bay colonies were equipped with small light-weight cameras. Roger Kirkwood
Small, lightweight cameras and satellite-linked GPS loggers were glued to small pieces of neoprene (wetsuit material), which were then glued to the fur of the sea lions.
The equipment weighed less than 1% of the sea lions’ body weight and didn’t stick out very far, so as to minimise drag and allow unrestricted movement.
In each case the equipment was removed after one trip to sea (about 2–6 days), when the animal returned to land to nurse her pup. The data was then collected and downloaded.
Building predictive computer models from the data required several steps.
First, we analysed the video (89 hours in total). We used a computer program, with which we categorised the different seafloor habitats the sea lions visited.
We then time-matched these videos to movement data from our trackers. This ensured we mapped the habitats to the right locations.
Next, we combined this habitat data with environmental data such as nutrient concentrations, sea surface temperatures and seafloor depths. This allowed us to characterise the different habitats the sea lions visited. We could then use this information to predict habitats in areas the sea lions didn’t visit while they were out at sea.
Altogether we mapped habitat across more than 5,000 square kilometres of the seafloor, which until now has never been explored.
What we discovered
Our study shows Australian sea lions use a variety of habitats on the seafloor. These include lush kelp (macroalgae) reefs and meadows, vast bare sand plains, dense sponge gardens and diverse invertebrate reef habitats.
Using machine-learning (a form of artificial intelligence), our models predict these diverse habitats cover large areas of the continental shelf across southern Australia. This machine-learning approach produced really accurate models.
Our models suggest nutrient supply, sea surface temperature and depth are particularly crucial to the distribution and structure of seafloor habitats.
Why our research matters
Through this research we have been able to efficiently map seabed habitats across large, previously unexplored areas of the ocean. This has given us crucial insight into how different conditions may drive the location and structure of seabed habitats.
Using sea lions to map the seafloor has considerable advantages. Sea lions can cover large areas in short time frames, and can access habitats we can’t. This research can also be conducted from land, with fewer people, at relatively low cost compared with traditional vessel surveys.
Furthermore, Australian sea lions are endangered. Their populations across South and Western Australia have declined by more than 60% over the past 40 years.
Our study helped identify habitats and areas of importance to sea lions. This information will be crucial for conserving and managing their populations into the future. Habitats and areas that are valuable to Australian sea lions may also be important to other key marine species as well.
Sea lion cameras also offer a unique way to understand the importance of different marine environments from the perspective of a predator. Traditionally, the quality and importance of different marine environments has been evaluated from an anthropocentric (human-based) perspective.
So this study highlights an important progression in marine science. Using video from a predator like the Australian sea lion is another way we can assess the importance of different marine environments. In future, this approach will help improve our understanding of the world’s oceans and the species that use them.
Australian sea lions spend several days searching for food at sea before returning to rest on land. Nathan Angelakis
Nathan Angelakis is a PhD candidate at the University of Adelaide and the South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) – Aquatic Sciences. This project was supported with funding from the Australian government’s National Environmental Science Program, Marine and Coastal Hub, and The Ecological Society of Australia under the Holsworth Wildlife Research Endowment.
