Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ruth Wallace, Director, Northern Institute, Charles Darwin University

The federal and Northern Territory governments have just made a “historic” funding announcement of about A$1 billion for schools in the territory.

This includes an extra $737.7 million from the federal government and an extra $350 million from the NT government between 2025 and 2029. This would make the NT only the third Australian jurisdiction (after the ACT and Western Australia) to have “fully funded” public schools.

This means they would get 100% of the “Schooling Resource Standard” which was set up through the so-called Gonski reforms more than a decade ago. This determines how much funding schools get based on student needs.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare described the announcement as a “historic day for public education in the Northern Territory”.

What is the funding for? What do NT schools and students need?

Read more:
As more money is flagged for WA schools, what does ‘fully funded’ really mean?

What is the funding for?

Governments say the funding will provide more resources to improve education outcomes in the NT. Funding will go to the most disadvantaged schools first. It also comes on top of $40.4 million dedicated specifically to Central Australian schools in last year’s federal budget.

We already know NT schools need extra support.

Late last month, the NT government released a review of secondary education in the territory, produced with Deloitte Access Economics in partnership with Charles Darwin University.

It found the territory’s education system had higher needs for specialised support for students and teachers than the rest of Australia.

These include high proportions of cultural and linguistic diversity. The territory has the highest proportion of students identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander in Australia (39%). There are than 100 Aboriginal and about 87 other languages spoken in the region.

The population is also extremely geographically dispersed with at least 66% in remote or very remote communities.

There are also high levels of socioeconomic and educational disadvantage. For example, a 2022 report for the territory’s education department noted average household income in very remote areas of the NT was approximately 45% lower than the rest of Australia.

On top of this, there are significant teacher shortages.

The importance of student attendance

Funding is going to need to be flexible so schools can implement programs that meet their local needs.

This includes addressing student attendance at school, which remains a significant issue in the NT. In 2022, the overall attendance rate was 73% for public schools and 48% for very remote public schools. This rate refers to the proportion of time students attend school, compared to the time they are expected to attend.

The current NT government student engagement strategy found we need to address attendance through local programs, developed at the school level with support from education department teams. Ruth was the Chair of the Expert Reference Panel for this project.

The strategy was developed through extensive consultation with Indigenous communities and recognises students’ educational outcomes depends on four key areas:

1. partnership between families and schools

2. having educators with the skills to engage students

3. meaningful learning experiences

4. supporting students’ wellbeing, inclusion and diversity.

Read more:
Universities Accord: there’s a push to increase Indigenous students and voices in higher education. But we need more detail and funding

But we need more certainty

It is important to point out governments have so far only signed a “statement of intent”. This means there is no formal commitment yet to this funding.

And we don’t have any certainty beyond 2029.

The statement of intent is part of ongoing negotiations this year for a new National School Reform Agreement. This agreement will outline new policies for education reform from 2025. As part of this, all states and territories are making bilateral arrangements with the federal government over funding for their school systems.

We also need to acknowledge decades of educational underfunding cannot be reversed in four years. The funding levels required to improve targets around key elements such as early literacy skills, school attendance, NAPLAN results and Year 12 attainment need to be assessed (and potentially changed) through to and beyond 2029.

How do we make sure funding works?

The $1 billion flagged by governments will be fundamental to improving educational outcomes in the territory. Current funding arrangements are likely to continue cycles of disadvantage.

But ultimately, investment in NT students is more than just funding. It is about recognising and catering to the complex and unique nature of the educational environment, with culturally relevant teachers and high quality resources. This also needs to include culturally relevant assessment and reporting about student progress.

This – combined with funding certainty – would signal there is a long-term and genuine commitment to future of the NT and our children.

Read more:
What is the National School Reform Agreement and what does it have to do with school funding?

Through Charles Darwin University, Ruth Wallace works with the Northern Territory government and the federal government on a project basis. Ruth was a chief investigator in the NT Secondary Review and chair of the Expert Advisory Panel of the Effective Engagement Review both of which are mentioned in this article. The work is independent of NT government influence.

Through Charles Darwin University, Tracy Woodroffe works with the Northern Territory government and the federal government on a project basis. The work is independent of government influence.

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

– ref. There’s an extra $1 billion on the table for NT schools. This could change lives if spent well – https://theconversation.com/theres-an-extra-1-billion-on-the-table-for-nt-schools-this-could-change-lives-if-spent-well-225678

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Louise Grimmer, Senior Lecturer in Retail Marketing, University of Tasmania

Think of some of the world’s biggest brands: Nike, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, Apple. With what do you associate them? Are they positive associations? Now consider, do you trust them?

Brand trust is a measure of how customers feel about a brand in terms of how well the brand delivers on its promises. Trust is an important measure for any organisation, large or small.

Whether or not customers trust a brand can be the difference between choosing that brand’s products or services over another.

In Australia, Woolworths held the title of our most trusted brand for three and a half years. But recent cost-of-living pressures have put supermarkets in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons.

Roy Morgan Research’s most recent trust rankings show Woolworths has slipped to number two, handing its crown to hardware behemoth Bunnings.

Read more:
Brad Banducci checks out from Woolworths, signalling a business out-of-touch with its customers

It’s clear that trust is fragile and can be quickly squandered when brands lose touch with those they serve.

So what makes us trust a brand in the first place? And why do we trust some more than others?

What makes us trust a brand?

According to customer experience management firm Qualtrics, brand trust is

the confidence that customers have in a brand’s ability to deliver on what it promises. As a brand consistently meets the expectations it has set in the minds of customers, trust in that brand grows.

There are many ways to go about measuring brand trust. A typical first step is to ask lots of people what they think, collating their general opinions on product quality and the brand’s customer service experience.

This can be strengthened with more quantifiable elements, including:

• online ratings and reviews
• social media “sentiment” (positive, negative or neutral)
• corporate social responsibility activities
• philanthropic efforts
• customer data security and privacy.

Some surveys go even deeper, asking respondents to consider a brand’s vision and mission, its approaches to sustainability and worker standards, and how honest its advertising appears.

Is this a real and useful metric?

The qualitative methodology used by Roy Morgan to determine what Australian consumers think about 1,000 brands has been administered over two decades, so the data can be reliably compared across time.

On measures of both trust and distrust, it asks respondents which brands they trust and why. This approach is useful because it tells us which elements factor into brand trust judgements.

Customer responses about the survey’s most recent winner, Bunnings, show that customer service, product range, value-for-money pricing and generous returns policies are the key drivers of strong trust in its brand.

Here are some examples:

Great customer service. Love their welcoming staff. Whether it’s nuts and bolts or a new toilet seat, they have it all, value for money.

Great products and price and have a no quibble refund policy.

Great stock range, help is there if you need it and it is my go-to for my gardening and tool needs. Really convenient trading hours, and their return policy is good.

In addition to trust, there are three other metrics commonly used to assess brand performance:

• brand equity – the commercial or social value of consumer perceptions of a brand

• brand loyalty – consumer willingness to consistently choose one brand over others regardless of price or competitor’s efforts

• brand affinity – the emotional connection and common values between a brand and its customers.

However, trust is becoming a disproportionately important metric as consumers demand that companies provide increased transparency and exhibit greater care for their customers, not just their shareholders.

Why do Australians trust retailers so much?

Of Australia’s top ten most trusted brands, seven are retailers – Bunnings, Woolworths, Aldi, Coles, Kmart, Myer and Big W.

This stands in contrast with the United States, where the most trusted brands are predominantly from the healthcare sector.

So why do retail brands dominate our trust rankings?

They certainly aren’t small local businesses. Our retail sector is highly concentrated, dominated by a few giant retail brands.

We have only two major department stores (David Jones and Myer), three major discount department stores (Big W, Target and Kmart) and a supermarket “duopoly” (Coles and Woolworths).

It’s most likely then that these brands have been enjoying leftover goodwill from the pandemic.

As Australia closed down to tackle COVID-19, the retail sector, and in particular the grocery sector, was credited with enabling customers to safely access food and household goods.

Compared with many other countries, we did not see a predominance of empty shelves across Australia. Retailers in this country stepped up – implementing or improving their online shopping capabilities and ensuring physical stores followed health guidelines and protocols.

Now, with the pandemic behind us and in an environment of high inflation, the big two supermarkets face growing distrust and a public inquiry.

Lessons from the losers

After two high profile disasters, Optus finds itself the most distrusted brand in Australia.

Its companions in the “most distrusted” group include social media brands Meta (Facebook), TikTok and X.

Qantas, Medibank Private, Newscorp, Nestle and Amazon also made the top 10.

The main reason consumers distrust brands is for a perceived failure to live up to their promises and responsibilities.

For example, worker conditions at multinational firm Amazon are seen by some consumers as a reflection of questionable business practices.

Other brands may have earned a reputation for failing to deliver the basics, like when chronic flight delays and cancellations plagued many Qantas customers.

Read more:
The Optus outage shows us the perils of having vital networks in private hands

Lessons from the winners

On the flip side, consumers have rewarded budget-friendly retailers with increased trust in the most recent rankings.

Aldi, Kmart and Bunnings have improved their standing as trusted brands, no doubt in part because they have helped many Australian consumers deal with tight household budgets.

As discretionary consumer spending continues to tighten, we may see a more permanent consumer shopping shift towards value for money brands and discounters.

Trust is a fragile thing to maintain once earned. As we move through 2024, Australian companies must pay close attention to their most important asset – strong relationships with those they serve.

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

– ref. Bunnings has toppled Woolworths as Australia’s most “trusted” brand – what makes us trust a brand in the first place? – https://theconversation.com/bunnings-has-toppled-woolworths-as-australias-most-trusted-brand-what-makes-us-trust-a-brand-in-the-first-place-225578

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne

The Tasmanian state election is on March 23. A uComms poll for The Australia Institute, conducted March 4–5 from a sample of 1,174, gave the Liberals 37.1% of the vote, Labor 23.0%, the Greens 13.7%, the Jacqui Lambie Network 8.5%, independents 12.8% and others 5.0%.

The Liberals have governed since winning the 2014 election. If this poll’s Labor vote of 23% is accurate, that would be a dreadful result for Labor ten years after losing power.

By 46–36, respondents thought Tasmania was headed in the wrong, rather than right, direction. A breakdown by voting intentions shows large majorities of all non-Liberal voters thought Tasmania was headed in the wrong direction.

Tasmania uses the proportional Hare Clark system, with five electorates each returning seven members for a total of 35 lower house seats, up from 25 total seats at previous elections. A quota for election is one-eighth of the vote, or 12.5%.

Analyst Kevin Bonham said the Liberals would be expected to win 14 of the 35 seats if this poll is accurate, Labor ten, the Greens four, the JLN 2–3 and independents 4–5. The Liberals would be well short of the 18 needed for a majority, but much better placed to form government than Labor.

Bonham said that during the 2021 Tasmanian election campaign, uComms released a poll that greatly understated the Liberals. They have changed their methods since to include SMS as well as voice robopolling. They were accurate at the federal Dunkley byelection. Other recent Tasmanian polls also have the Liberals best placed to form a minority government.

Queensland Newspoll: 54–46 to LNP

The Queensland state election will be held in October. A Newspoll, conducted March 7–13 from a sample of 1,037, gave the Liberal National Party a 54–46 lead over Labor, representing a seven-point swing to the LNP since the October 2020 election. Primary votes were 42% LNP, 30% Labor, 13% Greens, 8% One Nation and 7% for all Others.

Labor Premier Steven Miles had a 49% dissatisfied, 38% satisfied rating (net -11), while LNP leader David Crisafulli was at net +14. Crisafulli led Miles as better premier by 43–37. Just 26% thought Labor deserved to be re-elected, while 58% thought it was time to give someone else a go. This is the first Queensland Newspoll since before the 2020 election.

After Miles replaced Annastacia Palaszczuk as Labor leader and premier in December, there were two relatively good uComms polls for Labor, with the one in mid-February having a 50–50 tie. But this poll is a reversion to bad polling for a government headed for defeat in October.

Labor has governed in Queensland since 2015, and it was easily the worst state for Labor at the 2022 federal election, so a defeat for Labor is the expected outcome.

On Saturday, there will be Queensland state byelections in Labor-held Inala and Ipswich West, and Queensland local government elections, including for the high-profile Brisbane City Council. Labor won Inala by 78.2–21.8 and Ipswich West by 64.3–35.7 against the LNP in 2020.

The Poll Bludger reported Friday that a DemosAU poll of the Brisbane City Council, conducted March 8–14 from a sample of 1,034, had the incumbent LNP Brisbane mayor leading Labor by 58–42, and the LNP also likely to retain their majority on the council.

Federal Freshwater poll steady at 51–49 to Labor

A national Freshwater poll for The Australian Financial Review, conducted March 8–10 from a sample of 1,051, gave Labor a 51–49 lead, unchanged since the February Freshwater poll. Primary votes were 39% Coalition (up one), 31% Labor (steady), 14% Greens (steady) and 16% for all Others (down one).

Albanese’s net approval was steady at -7, with 45% unfavourable and 37% favourable. Dutton’s net approval fell four points to -13. Albanese’s lead as preferred PM increased to 47–38 from 42–38 in February.

The Coalition’s lead over Labor on best to manage cost of living dropped to three points from six points in February, but they still led Labor by ten points on managing the economy. Cost of living was rated an important issue by 72%, up three since February, with housing second on 42%.

Essential poll: Labor regains slight lead

A national Essential poll, conducted March 6–10 from a sample of 1,126, gave Labor a 48–47 lead including undecided, a reversal of a 48–47 lead for the Coalition last fortnight. Primary votes were 35% Coalition (steady), 32% Labor (up two), 11% Greens (down two), 8% One Nation (up one), 2% UAP (steady), 8% for all Others (steady) and 5% undecided (up one).

Respondents were told that Australia spends $55.6 billion on defence, making it the fourth highest expense in the budget. On this spending, 51% thought it about the right amount, 29% too much and 20% not enough.

On Israel’s military action in Gaza, 37% thought Israel should permanently withdraw from Gaza, 20% agree to a temporary ceasefire and 18% thought Israel was justified in continuing its actions.

On Australia’s relationship with China, 67% thought it a complex relationship to be managed, 20% that China is a threat to be confronted and 13% that China is a positive opportunity to be realised. There was no change in these responses since March 2023.

On Australia’s role in global affairs, 38% thought we should be an independent middle power with influence in the Asia-Pacific region, 20% primarily an ally of the United States and 25% said we should do our best not to engage in world affairs.

Morgan poll and Cook byelection

A national Morgan poll, conducted March 4–10 from a sample of 1,714, gave Labor a 51.5–48.5 lead, a two-point gain for the Coalition since the previous week. Primary votes were 38% Coalition (up 1.5), 32% Labor (down two), 13% Greens (down 0.5), 4% One Nation (up 0.5), 9% independents (up 0.5) and 4% others (steady).

The byelection in former Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison’s seat of Cook will be held on April 13. At the 2022 election, Morrison defeated Labor by a 62.4–37.6 margin. Candidate nominations close next Thursday, with Labor not expected to contest.

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

– ref. Dire polls for Labor in Tasmania and Queensland with elections upcoming – https://theconversation.com/dire-polls-for-labor-in-tasmania-and-queensland-with-elections-upcoming-225455

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Taylor Brydges, Research Principal, University of Technology Sydney

Since the 1990s, fast fashion has enabled everyday people to buy the latest catwalk trends. But the sheer volume of garments being whipped up, sold and soon discarded is contributing to a global sustainability crisis.

Now, just when the fashion industry should be waking up and breaking free of this vicious cycle, it’s heading in the opposite direction. We’re on a downward spiral, from fast fashion to ultra-fast fashion. The amount of natural resources consumed and waste produced is snowballing.

Ultra-fast fashion is marked by even faster production cycles, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it trends, and poor labour practices. Brands like Shein, Boohoo and Cider are liberated from the concept of seasonal collections. Instead they are producing garments at breakneck speeds and self-generating microtrends such as balletcore, Barbiecore and even mermaidcore. At the same time there is limited transparency or accountability around clothing supply chains.

The overproduction and consumption of clothing cannot be allowed to continue. Without change, the industry will account for 26% of the world’s carbon budget for limiting global warming to 2°C by 2050. The fashion industry must take responsibility for its actions. Policymakers also have an important role to play in enabling the necessary shift towards a more responsible and circular fashion economy. And let’s not forget the power of consumers.

Read more:
To make our wardrobes sustainable, we must cut how many new clothes we buy by 75%

Cheap clothing at what cost?

It was once thought the pandemic would trigger a transition to a more sustainable fashion industry. Unfortunately in reality the industry is getting worse, not better.

Most ultra-fast fashion brands emerged in the late 2010s following the most well known, Shein, founded in 2008. These online, direct-to-consumer brands exploded in popularity during lockdowns, with Shein holding the title of the world’s most popular brand in 2020.

Established brands such as Gap introduce 12,000 new items a year and H&M 25,000. But Shein leaves them in the dust, listing 1.3 million items in the same amount of time. How is this even possible?

The ultra-fast fashion model thrives on data and addictive social media marketing to create insatiable consumer demand.

But Shein’s incredibly low prices (its website has thousands of items under A$5) come at a human cost. The company’s own 2021 Sustainability and Social Impact Report (later removed from the site) found only 2% of its factories and warehouses met its own worker safety standards, with the rest requiring corrective action.

The brand has also forgone in-house designers. Instead it works with independent suppliers who can design and manufacture a garment in two weeks.

The result is an incredibly profitable business model. Shein filed for an initial public offering (IPO) last year to value the brand at US$136 billion, up from US$2.5 billion in 2018.

Shifting from fast to ultra-fast fashion has serious environmental and social consequences. This includes even more exploitative labour practices. Shein garment workers reportedly work 75-hour weeks and warehouses operate 24/7.

Ignoring this shift isn’t just a fashion faux pas. Doing so jeopardises national efforts for a more sustainable fashion industry.

Read more:
Fast Fashion: Why garment workers’ lives are still in danger 10 years after Rana Plaza — Podcast

A seamless transition to sustainability

The Australian Fashion Council is leading a national product stewardship scheme called Seamless that promises to transform the fashion industry by 2030.

The idea is to bring fashion into the circular economy. Ultimately that means zero waste, but in the meantime raw materials would be kept in the supply chain for as long as possible by designing out and minimising waste.

Members will contribute a four-cent levy for every clothing item they produce or import.

These funds go into clothing collection, research, recycling projects and education campaigns.

BIG W, David Jones, Lorna Jane, Rip Curl, R.M. Williams, THE ICONIC, Sussan Group and Cotton On are Seamless Foundation Members. Each has contributed A$100,000 to the development of the scheme.

As one of the world’s first industry-led collective product stewardship initiatives for clothing textiles, Seamless presents a unique opportunity to drive change towards a more sustainable and circular fashion industry.

But there is a risk ultra-fast fashion brands may act as freeriders in Seamless, benefiting from the investment and initiatives without making meaningful contributions. Shein and others will continue putting more and more product on the market, which will need to be dealt with at the end of its short life. But if they fail to commit to the scheme, they won’t be the ones paying for that.

The government-funded consortium must also recognise ultra-fast fashion in tackling the industry’s environmental and social sustainability challenges. At the moment they’re only talking about fast fashion and ignoring the rise of ultra-fast fashion. Their global scan, for example, includes a discussion of fast fashion and no mention of ultra-fast fashion.

This also points to a lack of data more broadly in the industry but in the case of Seamless, it could have a big impact if this growing market segment is ignored.

Shein and Temu are estimated to earn a combined $2 billion in sales in 2024, with customers from all walks of life.

Read more:
Fast fashion’s waste problem could be solved by recycled textiles but brands need to help boost production

The critical crackdown

Some brands are actively engaged and working towards a more sustainable future. But others such as Temu are learning from Shein and looking to emulate their business model.

The transition to a more sustainable and responsible fashion industry requires a greater understanding of ultra-fast fashion, urgent systemic changes and collective efforts.

The Institute for Sustainable Futures, where I work, is a founding member of an international academic research network aimed at tackling the complexities of ultra-fast fashion. That includes how ultra-fast fashion is affecting the livelihoods of garment workers, how it’s fuelling textile waste and underscoring the industry’s struggle to embrace circular economy principles. We’re also investigating how to reshape consumer behaviour, away from social media-fuelled hauls towards more sustainable consumption particularly among Gen-Z consumers.

Last month, Federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek announced a potential intervention, perhaps by introducing minimum environmental standards or a clothing levy by July.

The clock is ticking. It is time to lay the foundation for a more sustainable and just fashion industry. Australia has a rich fashion history and is home to many leading local brands – many of whom have gone global. These brands show us what is possible when good design, sustainability and innovation drive an industry.

Ultimately, our collective choices wield immense power. By understanding the consequences of our fashion habits and advocating for change, we can all be catalysts for a more sustainable and just fashion industry.

Taylor Brydges is an Advisor to the Product Stewardship Centre of Excellence, which has provided mentorship to Seamless.

– ref. Ultra-fast fashion is a disturbing trend undermining efforts to make the whole industry more sustainable – https://theconversation.com/ultra-fast-fashion-is-a-disturbing-trend-undermining-efforts-to-make-the-whole-industry-more-sustainable-224253

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Huw Griffiths, Associate Professor of English Literature, University of Sydney

Walking through Chippendale on my way to Sydney’s Belvoir Street Theatre, where this production of Holding the Man is playing, I pass by the York Theatre. This was the theatre where, in 1985, Timothy Conigrave, author of the original memoir upon which the play is based, was rehearsing a touring show of Neil Simon’s Brighton Beach Memoirs. He had to excuse himself from one rehearsal for an appointment where he learned his HIV-positive diagnosis.

Then, walking up the hill to Surry Hills, I get to the Belvoir Street Theatre itself. Five years after that initial diagnosis, Conigrave’s play, Thieving Boy, was getting its first rehearsed reading at the Belvoir. He wasn’t able to attend because he’d been kept in hospital with Pneumocystis pneumonia, PCP, an AIDS-defining illness.

To watch this revival of Tommy Murphy’s beautifully crafted adaptation of Conigrave’s memoir at the Belvoir is to inhabit spaces that are filled with the book’s memories.

One of the things that memoir can do is to hold a space open for memories to live on in the world, personal memories that would otherwise be lost. Conigrave’s 1995 book, Holding the Man, is a rare gift, perfectly capturing what it was like to grow up gay in the decades just before the arrival of HIV.

Read more:
Holding the Man, and bringing HIV/AIDS in Australia to a mainstream audience

Noticing the small things

At the book’s heart is a joyous love story between Tim and his high school sweetheart, John Caleo. There is, of course, the overarching trajectory of John’s death and the impact of HIV on their friends and families. But the book works its remarkable magic on a reader by disarming you with the tiny details of somebody’s life.

It is the small things that are often the most affecting in Conigrave’s writing: what people were wearing, what they were listening to, how they looked in certain turns of the light, the awkwardness and fun of sex, what made them smile or laugh.

Eamon Flack’s production captures well – and with a lovely, light touch – this sense of fleeting memories that are, nevertheless, still available to us. Tom Conroy is superb in the central role. He takes us from nine-year-old Tim to grieving lover with all of the empathy and playfulness that the part requires. Neither Conigrave’s book nor Murphy’s script shy away from Tim’s flaws; he is, at times, petulant and selfish, but always charming, recognisable and human.

Conroy is joined by a wonderful cast: Danny Ball as John, his lover, but also an ensemble of four performers (Russell Dykstra, Rebecca Massey, Guy Simon and Shannen Alyce Quan) who cycle through all the other people in Tim’s life. They are all great, but special mentions for Massey who wears more wigs than Cher and revels in every part. Guy Simon’s two appearances as a schoolfriend’s mum are also an absolute joy.

The wit, charm and love of the opening act (schoolboy crushes, dancing, music and a lot of laughter) are balanced well with the pathos of the second half (the endurance of love, loss and tears, but also more laughter). Flack’s direction knits together the constant shifts in focus – an essential part of memoir and of memory plays – with an ease that only seems effortless; this is a compelling and skilful use of stage and script.

Read more:
Class, queerness and illness in the ‘post-crisis’ era: rewriting the narrative of HIV

A timely reminder

This is also a production that knows it is addressing an audience in 2024, not in 1995, when Conigrave’s book was first published, nor in 2006 when Murphy’s adaptation was first staged. We’ve lived through a lot since, not only the bruising marriage equality vote in Australia, but also a global sense that the lives of queer people might be newly under threat.

The lives and loves of gay men, our friends and families, are unavoidably threaded through (pulled apart and drawn together) by what happened in the 1980s and 1990s. This production is an important and timely reminder of what was lost, what was gained, and of the precious memories that we need to keep alive.

On the day of the opening night, the NSW parliament was hearing the first reading of a bill that would outlaw gay conversion practices, the victims of which testify to its corrosive and violent impact on their lives.

Here’s hoping the ban on such practices is one more step in restoring joy to the lives of queer kids in our city and state.

Holding the Man is at Belvoir, Sydney, until April 14.

Read more:
‘Treatments’ as torture: gay conversion therapy’s deep roots in Australia

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

– ref. Love, loss and tears – but also laughter: Belvoir’s compelling and skilful staging of Holding the Man – https://theconversation.com/love-loss-and-tears-but-also-laughter-belvoirs-compelling-and-skilful-staging-of-holding-the-man-223005

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cherine Fahd, Associate Professor Visual Communication, University of Technology Sydney

No photos of the war. No photos of its victims. No mention of the hundreds of photographers who have died taking them. We are a group of activists and artists who believe the future will be shaped by those who can see it. We stand together against the forces that refuse to let us. The future is being shaped by art festivals that choose what we see. Hiding behind the pretty face of diversity, while refusing to see the genocide.

This arresting public statement accompanies a series of large-scale street posters called no-photo2024. The anonymous artists and activists behind no-photo2024 are highlighting the exclusion of Palestinian photographers from the PHOTO 2024 festival, now showing in Melbourne.

The no-photo2024 posters are strategically placed near PHOTO 2024 venues. Their aim is to highlight the contradiction of excluding the atrocities captured by Palestinian photographers in Gaza.

Read more:
Australian media’s Instagram posts on Gaza war have an anti-Palestine bias. That has real-world consequences

PHOTO 2024

Although the organisation behind PHOTO 2024, Photo Australia, calls itself “apolitical”, the festival has built its reputation by promoting and commissioning politically charged works by First Nations, African, Middle Eastern and LGBTQI+ photographers. Big names from previous festivals include Hoda Afshar, Christian Thompson, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Hayley Millar Baker, Broomberg and Chanarin, Mohamed Bourouissa and Aziz Hazara.

The festival commissions new work for outdoor projects and through an open call process invites submissions from artists and photographers worldwide. Applications are assessed by an international jury of leading photography and visual art curators. The festival also stages public programs and incorporates satellite events and exhibitions in collaboration with cultural, education, industry and regional partners.

The festival is well known for setting themes that promote photography’s role in challenging power. PHOTO 2021 explored the theme of “the truth” at the height of Donald Trump’s presidency, attracting projects focused on the reliability of photography in social media, fake news and AI. The program that year boasted supporting “First Nations truth-telling” and “the experience of whistleblowers who have spoken out for those whose voices were never meant to be heard”.

This year, the festival continues to promote socio-political issues with the theme “the future is shaped by those who can see it”. Events include an ideas summit exploring photography as activism, among other timely discussions. The hero image by Morroccan-Belgian photographer Mous Lamrabat presents two African models adorned in fashionable garments which read “stop terrorising our world”.

But there are no photographs from Palestinian photographers.

The Conversation approached PHOTO 2024 for comment. They said:

Over 150 artists are exhibiting at PHOTO 2024 International Festival of Photography, selected in response to a curatorial theme set in 2022. PHOTO Australia did not exclude any artists due to race, religion, nationality, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or any other personal characteristics. PHOTO Australia stands by its values to create an inclusive platform that doesn’t discriminate, censor nor diminish the plethora of expressions artists bring to the world. Artists exhibited by PHOTO Australia were invited directly, or applied to our open call in February 2023 and were selected in consultation with local and international curators.

The majority of the program is presented by 40 cultural institutions and independent galleries who curated their own exhibitions in response to the theme, and selected artists according to their own curatorial policies.

The contract of photography

The no-photo2024 posters present a black square or rectangle symbolising a redacted photograph. Adjacent descriptive text reveals the hidden narrative of the censored image. Every poster is printed with a caption attributing the text description and the redacted image to a Palestinian photographer.

The juxtaposition of the redacted image and the textual description not only commemorates the efforts of Palestinian photographers but also prompts a broader reflection on the societal and ethical implications of selectively withholding images of atrocity from the public eye.

The posters expertly draw on the influential work of Israeli writer Ariella Azoulay and the outspoken Jewish-American theorist Judith Butler.

Azoulay’s The Civil Contract of Photography (2008) explores photography’s political and ethical conditions, proposing it as a social practice linked to citizenship, human rights and sovereignty – not just an art form.

She introduces the idea of a “civil contract” where photography acts as an agreement of mutuality and responsibility between the photographer, subject and the viewer.

Azoulay suggests photography can build solidarity. She argues photographs are a form of testimony, bearing witness to injustices and human rights violations. Significantly, she uses Palestine as a critical example of how photography can document the realities of occupation, conflict and resistance.

Azoulay challenges the age-old idea that photographs are simply past moments. She instead views them as active engagements that invite ethical and political participation. In no-photo2024 we have a precise example of putting Azoulay’s theory into practice.

The posters also draw on Judith Butler’s Precarious Life (2004) and Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? (2009).

Butler asserts the media’s portrayal of individuals through photography, crafts a narrative that privileges some lives over others. They argue the media dictates who we mourn and who we overlook.

This disparity results from deliberate choices in how images are framed based on politics and race. Hence, they write, our connection (or indifference) to the suffering of others through images is often manipulated, leading to “desensitisation” to the plight of those deemed “other” or less human, an argument first formulated in Susan Sontag’s equally influential Regarding the Pain of Others (2003).

Butler dissects how the media’s selective framing of the “other” (Palestinians, in the case of no-photo2024) not only obscures the true impact of violence and war but actively shapes our perception of who deserves to be mourned. Butler views photography’s dual role in perpetuating indifference and promoting a radical shift in our ethical orientation toward action.

Our shared, precarious world

no-photo2024 is a powerful call to action. It prompts collective reflection on how images hold the potential to bear witness to atrocities, mobilise public opinion, and contribute to the struggle for human rights and social justice.

One poster reads, “Rubble. Rubble hand. Rubble sleeve. Blooded finger. A fresh tea bag crushed between the rubble. Metal. Rubble. The shadow of a body”. The Instagram post documenting the paired poster states it is “installed near a commercial art gallery that demands silence on Palestine from its artists, fearing a loss of support from their patrons.”

In this post-photographic AI-driven age, no-photo2024 promotes a much needed conversation about the ethical responsibilities of creating, curating and consuming photographs. It challenges the photographic community to move beyond aesthetic appreciation and engage with images as participants in a shared, precarious world.

Read more:
Australian writers festivals are engulfed in controversy over the war in Gaza. How can they uphold their duty to public debate?

Cherine Fahd is co-chair of Powerhouse Photography.

– ref. Guerrilla festival no-photo2024 is highlighting the unseen work of Palestinian photographers in Gaza – https://theconversation.com/guerrilla-festival-no-photo2024-is-highlighting-the-unseen-work-of-palestinian-photographers-in-gaza-225182

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacinta L. Johnson, Senior Lecturer in Pharmacy Practice, University of South Australia

Hair loss (also known as alopecia) often affects the scalp but can occur anywhere on the body. It’s very common and usually nothing to worry about; about half of Australian men show signs of visible baldness at age 50 and over a quarter of Australian women report hair thinning by the same age. It’s often genetic.

But if you’ve noticed hair loss and are worried by it, see a GP or dermatologist for a diagnosis before trying any treatments. Products claiming to reverse hair loss are everywhere, but few have been scientifically tested for how well they work.

One group of products that have actually been scientifically tested, however, are known as topical minoxidil products. These include products such as Regaine®.

So, do they work? Here’s what the research evidence says, what you can realistically expect and what you need to know if you’re considering this treatment.

Read more:
The art of balding: a brief history of hairless men

What is minoxidil – and does it work?

Topical minoxidil usually comes as a kind of foam or serum you apply to your scalp.

It’s been approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration, Australia’s regulatory authority for therapeutic goods, for the treatment of hereditary hair loss in males and females. Minoxidil is also available in tablet form, but this isn’t currently approved for hair loss (more on that later).

So, is topical minoxidil effective? In short – yes, but the results vary widely from person to person, and it needs to be used consistently over several months to see results.

Scientists don’t know exactly how minoxidil works. It may affect the different phases of the hair life cycle, thereby encouraging growth. It also opens up blood vessels near hair follicles.

This increases blood flow, which in turn delivers more oxygen and nutrients to the hair.

While minoxidil is unlikely to restore a full head of thick, lush, hair, it can slow down hair loss and can stimulate regrowth.

It is the over-the-counter option with the most evidence. Two strengths are available: 5% and 2%.

An analysis of randomised controlled trials found minoxidil applied to the scalp twice a day increased the number of hairs per square centimetre by eight to 15 hairs, with the higher strength treatment having a slightly greater effect.

Can I use it for non-genetic balding?

There are many causes of hair loss. The main cause in both males and females is a hereditary condition called androgenic alopecia.

Although topical minoxidil is only approved for use in Australia for androgenic alopecia, there is some evidence it can also help in other conditions that cause hair loss.

For example, it may hasten hair regrowth in patients who have lost hair due to chemotherapy.

Unfortunately, minoxidil is not effective when the hair follicle is gone, like after a burn injury.

Although small studies have found promising results using minoxidil to promote hair growth on the face (for beard or eyebrow enhancement), topical minoxidil products are not currently approved for this use. More research is required.

What else do I need to know?

Minoxidil won’t work well for everyone. Early in treatment you might notice a temporary increase in hair shedding, as it alters the hair cycle to make way for new growth. Minoxidil needs to be trialled for three to six months to determine if it’s effective.

And as it doesn’t cure hair loss, you must continue to use it each day to maintain the effect. If you stop, you will start losing the new hair growth within three to four months.

Minoxidil products may not be suitable for everyone. If you have any medical conditions or take any medications, you should speak with your doctor or pharmacist before using minoxidil products.

It has not been tested for safety in people under 18, over 65, or those who are pregnant.

You can read the consumer medicines information sheet for more information about using over-the-counter minoxidil products.

Many people do not like to use minoxidil solution or foams long-term because they need to be applied everyday day, which can be inconvenient. Or they may notice side effects, such as scalp irritation and changes to hair texture.

Some people tolerate the foam products better than the solution, as the solution contains more of a compound called propylene glycol (which can irritate the skin).

What about the oral tablet form of minoxidil?

Minoxidil is also available on prescription as an oral tablet. While traditionally used for high blood pressure, it has also been used as a treatment for hair loss.

In 2020, a systematic review identified 17 studies involving 634 patients using oral minoxidil for various hair loss conditions.

The authors found oral minoxidil was effective and generally well tolerated in healthy people who were having trouble using the topical products.

The review noted oral minoxidil may increase hair growth over the whole body and may cause heart-related side effects in some patients. More research is required.

In Australia, oral minoxidil is available under the trade name Loniten®. However, it is currently only approved for use in high blood pressure.

When people seek a prescription treatment for a non-approved purpose, this is called “off-label” prescribing. Off-label prescribing of oral minoxidil, potentially for use in alopecia, may have contributed to shortages of Loniten® tablets in recent years. This can reduce availability of this medicine for people who need it for high blood pressure.

Read more:
Big hair? Bald? How much difference your hair really makes to keep you cool or warm

Jacinta Johnson is Senior Pharmacist for Research within SA Pharmacy and Board Director for the Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia. In the last five years, she has received research funding or consultancy funds (for development and delivery of educational materials) from SA Health, the Medical Research Future Fund, the Hospital Research Foundation – Parkinson’s, the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia, the Pharmacy Guild of Australia, the Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia, Mundipharma Pty Ltd, Aspen Pharmacare Australia Pty Ltd, Viatris Pty Ltd. and Reckitt Benckiser (Australia) Pty Ltd. No funding has been received relating to minoxidil.

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

– ref. What is minoxidil, the anti-balding hair growth treatment? Here’s what the science says – https://theconversation.com/what-is-minoxidil-the-anti-balding-hair-growth-treatment-heres-what-the-science-says-223736

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alessandra Sutti, Associate Professor, Institute for Frontier Materials, Deakin University

Orbiting 400 kilometres above Earth’s surface, the astronauts on the International Space Station live a pretty normal social life, if not for one thing: they happily wear their unwashed clothes for days and weeks at a time. They can’t do their laundry just yet because water is scarce up there.

But down here on Earth, washing clothes is a large part of our lives. It’s estimated that a volume of water equivalent to 21,000 Olympic swimming pools is used every day for domestic laundry worldwide.

Fibres from our clothes make their way into the environment via the air (during use or in the dryer), water (washing) and soil (lint rubbish in landfill). Most of this fibre loss is invisible – we often only notice our favourite clothing is “disappearing” when it’s too late.

How can you ensure your favourite outfit will outlast your wish to wear it? Simple question, complex answer.

Washing machines are not gentle

When you clean the filters in your washing machine and dryer, how often do you stop to think that the lint you’re holding was, in fact, your clothes?

Laundering is harsh on our clothes, and research confirms this. Several factors play a role: the type of washing machine, the washing cycle, detergents, temperature, time, and the type of fabric and yarn construction.

There are two types of domestic washing machines: top-loader and front-loader. Mechanical agitation (the way the machine moves the clothes around) is one of the things that helps ease dirt off the fabric.

Top-loaders have a vertical, bucket-like basket with a paddle, which sloshes clothes around in a large volume of water. Front-loaders have a horizontal bucket which rotates, exposing the clothes to a smaller volume of water – it takes advantage of gravity, not paddles.

Top-loading machines tend to be more aggressive towards fabrics than front-loaders due to the different mechanical action and larger volumes of water.

Washing machine panels also present many choices. Shorter, low-temperature programs are usually sufficient for everyday stains. Choose longer or high-temperature programs only for clothing you have concerns about (healthcare uniforms, washable nappies, etc.).

Generally, washing machine programs are carefully selected combinations of water volume, agitation intensity and temperature recommended by the manufacturer. They take into consideration the type of fabric and its level of cleanliness.

Select the wrong program and you can say goodbye to your favourite top. For example, high temperatures or harsh agitation may cause some fibres to weaken and break, causing holes in the garment.

Some fabrics lose fibres more easily than others

At a microscopic level, the fabric in our clothes is made of yarns – individual fibres twisted together. The nature and length of the fibres, the way they are twisted and the way the yarns form the fabric can determine how many fibres will be lost during a wash.

In general, if you want to lose fewer fibres, you should wash less frequently, but some fabrics are affected more than others.

Open fabric structures (knits) with loose yarns can lose more fibres than tighter ones. Some sports clothing, like running shirts, are made of continuous filament yarn. These fibres are less likely to come loose in the wash.

Cotton fibres are only a few centimetres long. Twisted tightly together into a yarn, they can still escape.

Wool fibres are also short, but have an additional feature: scales, which make wool clothes much more delicate. Wool fibres can come loose like cotton ones, but also tangle with each other during the wash due to their scales. This last aspect is what causes wool garments to shrink when exposed to heat and agitation.

Read more:
Laundry is a top source of microplastic pollution – here’s how to clean your clothes more sustainably

Go easy on the chemicals

The type of detergent and other products you use also makes a difference.

Detergents contain a soap component, enzymes to make stains easier to remove at low temperature, and fragrances. Some contain harsher compounds, such as bleaching or whitening agents.

Modern detergents are very effective at removing stains such as food, and you don’t need to use much.

An incorrect choice of wash cycles, laundry detergent and bleaching additives could cause disaster. Certain products, like bleach, can damage some fibres like wool and silk.

Meanwhile, research on fabric softeners and other treatments continues – there’s no one-size-fits-all answer about their potential impact on our clothes.

Just skip laundry day

So, how to ensure your clothes last longer? The main tip is to wash them less often.

When it’s time for a wash, carefully read and follow the care labels. In the future, our washing machines will recognise fabrics and select the wash cycle. For now, that’s our responsibility.

Read more:
How to make your clothes last longer – it’s good for your bank account and the environment too

And the next time you throw your shirt into the dirty laundry basket, stop. Think of the astronauts orbiting above Earth and ask yourself: if they can go without clean laundry for a few days, maybe I can too? (Although we don’t recommend just burning your dirty undies, either.)

Alessandra Sutti has received research funding from the Australian Research Council, the Marine Bioproducts Cooperative Research Centre, the Innovative Manufacturing Cooperative Research Centre and by companies participating in associated projects such as the ARC Research Hub for Functional and Sustainable Fibres and the ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre for Green Chemistry, as well as from industry partners associated with these grants, such as HeiQ Pty Ltd, Xefco Pty Ltd, C. Sea Solutions Pty Ltd (trading as ULUU) and Simba Global Pty/Ltd. Alessandra is a paid member of the HeiQ Innovation Advisory Board, is a member of the American Chemical Society and serves as a volunteer member on Standards Australia ME-009 Committee (Microplastics). She collaborates closely with The GLOBE Program (through GLOBE Italy), The University of California Berkeley and San Francisco State University, co-developing microplastics monitoring protocols and is involved in environmental education programmes.

Amol Patil is engaged at the ARC Research Hub for Functional and Sustainable Fibres, a collaboration between Deakin University, the Australian Research Council and industry partners such as Simba Global Pty Ltd, Xefco Pty Ltd, HeiQ Pty Ltd, and Sea Solutions P/L (trading as ULUU). He is also working on a joint project sponsored by HeiQ-Marine bioproducts (MBCRC).

Maryam Naebe is the recipient of Discover Natural Fibre Initiative Innovation Award. She has received funding through competitive grants and industry projects including Australian Research Council ARC Research Hub, ARC Discovery Project, Australian Wool Innovation, Cotton Research and Development Corporation, Cotton Incorporated (USA), Ford Motor Company (USA).

– ref. What washing machine settings can I use to make my clothes last longer? – https://theconversation.com/what-washing-machine-settings-can-i-use-to-make-my-clothes-last-longer-224064

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hassan Vally, Associate Professor, Epidemiology, Deakin University

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) can have a considerable impact on the day-to-day functioning and overall wellbeing of people affected. It causes a variety of symptoms including difficulty focusing, impulsivity and hyperactivity.

For many, a diagnosis of ADHD, whether in childhood or adulthood, is life changing. It means finally having an explanation for these challenges, and opens up the opportunity for treatment, including medication.

Although ADHD medications can cause side effects, they generally improve symptoms for people with the disorder, and thereby can significantly boost quality of life.

Now a new study has found being treated for ADHD with medication reduces the risk of early death for people with the disorder. But what can we make of these findings?

A large study from Sweden

The study, published this week in JAMA (the prestigious journal of the American Medical Association), was a large cohort study of 148,578 people diagnosed with ADHD in Sweden. It included both adults and children.

In a cohort study, a group of people who share a common characteristic (in this case a diagnosis of ADHD) are followed over time to see how many develop a particular health outcome of interest (in this case the outcome was death).

For this study the researchers calculated the mortality rate over a two-year follow up period for those whose ADHD was treated with medication (a group of around 84,000 people) alongside those whose ADHD was not treated with medication (around 64,000 people). The team then determined if there were any differences between the two groups.

Read more:
ADHD medications have doubled in the last decade – but other treatments can help too

What did the results show?

The study found people who were diagnosed and treated for ADHD had a 19% reduced risk of death from any cause over the two years they were tracked, compared with those who were diagnosed but not treated.

In understanding this result, it’s important – and interesting – to look at the causes of death. The authors separately analysed deaths due to natural causes (physical medical conditions) and deaths due to unnatural causes (for example, unintentional injuries, suicide, or accidental poisonings).

The key result is that while no significant difference was seen between the two groups when examining natural causes of death, the authors found a significant difference for deaths due to unnatural causes.

So what’s going on?

Previous studies have suggested ADHD is associated with an increased risk of premature death from unnatural causes, such as injury and poisoning.

On a related note, earlier studies have also suggested taking ADHD medicines may reduce premature deaths. So while this is not the first study to suggest this association, the authors note previous studies addressing this link have generated mixed results and have had significant limitations.

Read more:
How do stimulants actually work to reduce ADHD symptoms?

In this new study, the authors suggest the reduction in deaths from unnatural causes could be because taking medication alleviates some of the ADHD symptoms responsible for poor outcomes – for example, improving impulse control and decision-making. They note this could reduce fatal accidents.

The authors cite a number of studies that support this hypothesis, including research showing ADHD medications may prevent the onset of mood, anxiety and substance use disorders, and lower the risk of accidents and criminality. All this could reasonably be expected to lower the rate of unnatural deaths.

Strengths and limitations

Scandinavian countries have well-maintained national registries that collect information on various aspects of citizens’ lives, including their health. This allows researchers to conduct excellent population-based studies.

Along with its robust study design and high-quality data, another strength of this study is its size. The large number of participants – almost 150,000 – gives us confidence the findings were not due to chance.

The fact this study examined both children and adults is another strength. Previous research relating to ADHD has often focused primarily on children.

Read more:
How hormones and the menstrual cycle can affect women with ADHD: 5 common questions

One of the important limitations of this study acknowledged by the authors is that it was observational. Observational studies are where the researchers observe and analyse naturally occurring phenomena without intervening in the lives of the study participants (unlike randomised controlled trials).

The limitation in all observational research is the issue of confounding. This means we cannot be completely sure the differences between the two groups observed were not either partially or entirely due to some other factor apart from taking medication.

Specifically, it’s possible lifestyle factors or other ADHD treatments such as psychological counselling or social support may have influenced the mortality rates in the groups studied.

Another possible limitation is the relatively short follow-up period. What the results would show if participants were followed up for longer is an interesting question, and could be addressed in future research.

What are the implications?

Despite some limitations, this study adds to the evidence that diagnosis and treatment for ADHD can make a profound difference to people’s lives. As well as alleviating symptoms of the disorder, this study supports the idea ADHD medication reduces the risk of premature death.

Ultimately, this highlights the importance of diagnosing ADHD early so the appropriate treatment can be given. It also contributes to the body of evidence indicating the need to improve access to mental health care and support more broadly.

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

– ref. Could ADHD drugs reduce the risk of early death? Unpacking the findings from a new Swedish study – https://theconversation.com/could-adhd-drugs-reduce-the-risk-of-early-death-unpacking-the-findings-from-a-new-swedish-study-225680

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Menkes, Associate Professor in Psychological Medicine, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

Pharmaceutical industry payments to doctors are common, often substantial and can affect clinical decision making.

Seven years after the industry trade association Medicines New Zealand first mooted a disclosure system, pharmaceutical companies operating in New Zealand recently revealed their financial relationships with individual doctors for the first time.

This included disclosure of payments for speaking engagements, consultancies, advisory board memberships, travel costs, attendance at conferences and other sponsored events.

In the absence of relevant legislation, this is a welcome, albeit incomplete, development. It includes only members of Medicines New Zealand, representing less than half the pharmaceutical companies operating in the country. Some member companies did not participate and several payment types (hospitality, conference sponsorship and research funding) were omitted.

Our new research analyses international evidence and concludes that such payments should be subject to mandatory, comprehensive and accessible disclosure.

Why drug company payments are a problem

Accumulating evidence shows pharmaceutical company payments to doctors influence prescribing and other aspects of healthcare, including research and teaching. The deadly opioid epidemic in the US, for example, has been linked to excessive prescribing resulting from industry promotion.

It may sound like a good thing to have medical experts advising industry about the optimal use of medicines. But receiving payments for such advice has been associated with impressive increases in prescribing of the sponsor’s product(s).

Beyond stimulating the prescription of particular drugs, such payments have been associated with the distortion of clinical guidelines by influential doctors. This affects medical practice and can result in overdiagnosis, overtreatment and treatment-related harm.

Since pharmaceutical promotion typically focuses on newer, branded medications, an increase in prescriptions is also linked with rising health costs.

Read more:
Influential doctors aren’t disclosing their drug company ties

Attempts at regulation

Because of the above concerns, coupled with health professionals’ tendency to favour transparency in principle, disclosure of payments now occurs in most high-income countries.

However, reporting standards for industry payments vary widely, as we discovered when surveying the international evidence.

Court cases in the US have led to billion-dollar fines for illegal pharmaceutical marketing by various companies. The resulting US Sunshine Act 2010 is the most comprehensive legislative requirement to date for reporting payments to health professionals.

Some European countries and South Korea also legislate disclosure requirements. By contrast, other European countries as well as the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Japan rely on industry to do this.

Accessibility is an important aspect of disclosure. Currently in New Zealand, a patient would need to search company reports separately to discover how much funding their doctor may have received from pharmaceutical firms marketing medicines they are prescribed.

By contrast, the database mandated by the US Sunshine Act includes all companies and details on whether payments to individual doctors are related to one or more of their products.

Apart from providing patients with easily accessible information about payments received by their doctor, this resource has enabled researchers to document the extensive connections between doctors’ payments and prescribing.

Our analysis indicates that industrial gift giving to doctors is also prominent in low and middle-income countries. Provision of drug samples and support to attend educational events are comparable to the Global North, but typically without disclosure requirements.

Studies in Global South countries suggest doctors receive a broader range of gifts not typically seen in wealthier countries. This can include cash, office supplies, cars, personal travel, domestic cattle, and sexual “favours”.

Arguments in favour of the status quo

Some pundits have vigorously defended the benefits of doctors interacting with industry. Others have highlighted the administrative burden and uncertain efficacy of enforcing disclosure requirements.

Retaining industry funding for medical education, especially in the Global South, is seen by some as a priority because of resource limitations. But this rationale needs to be balanced against the typical industry focus on a limited range of topics, the inability of many doctors to perceive bias in industry-funded education, and the potential harm from shifting scarce resources to expensive branded products.

Read more:
Canadians need to know how much money Big Pharma gives health-care providers, but this information is far too difficult to find

As with other payment reporting schemes led by industry, New Zealand’s system falls short of international best practice, both in terms of completeness and ease of access. Worse, it is less comprehensive than many other schemes, with member companies choosing whether to report and recipient doctors able to opt out of disclosure.

Given its relatively late appearance internationally, we had hoped that Medicines New Zealand would implement a disclosure regime reflecting international best practice. Instead, it has chosen a system which is both limited and cumbersome to use, from the standpoint of both patients and researchers.

Next steps

Implementing best practice is a substantial challenge, considering different political systems and anticipated pushback from industry and others who benefit from weak or absent disclosure policies. But strong evidence that industry payments play a key role in unethical pharmaceutical marketing provides additional impetus for tightening disclosure requirements.

One might expect that transparent reporting of industry payments would discourage doctors from accepting such largesse. This appears not to have happened in the US. Even with its system of mandatory and comprehensive reporting, the volume and impact of payments persist, possibly because most doctors don’t recognise they’ve been influenced.

This suggests transparency requirements may be necessary but not sufficient to address undue industry influence on medical practice.

On a positive note, restricting exposure to pharmaceutical marketing during medical training, coupled with good role modelling by senior doctors, offers a promising means to prioritise evidence-based patient care over company profits.

David Menkes is a paid member of the Mental Health Advisory Committee for PHARMAC.

– ref. NZ’s new disclosure scheme for pharma payments to doctors falls short of best practice – https://theconversation.com/nzs-new-disclosure-scheme-for-pharma-payments-to-doctors-falls-short-of-best-practice-225457

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katherine Moseby, Associate Professor, UNSW Sydney

Australia is home to more than 350 species of native mammals, 87% of which are found nowhere else on Earth. But with 39 of these species already extinct and a further 110 listed as threatened, there’s every chance many will vanish before you even knew they existed. So here’s one we think you simply must know (and save), before it’s too late.

The charismatic kowari is a small carnivorous marsupial. It was once common inland but is now found only in the remote deserts of southwest Queensland and northeastern South Australia, in less than 20% of its former range.

This pint-sized predator fits in the palm of your hand. Its bright eyes, bushy tail and big personality make it the perfect poster child for the Australian outback. But with just 1,200 kowari left in the wild, the federal government upgraded its conservation status in November from vulnerable to endangered.

Reversing the decline of the kowari is within our grasp. But we need public support and political will to achieve this. It requires limiting grazing of cattle and sheep, while keeping feral cat numbers under control.

Read more:
Threatened species recover in fenced safe havens. But their safety is only temporary

Meet the kowari

The kowari (Dasyuroides byrnei) is a skilled hunter that stalks mice, tarantulas, moths, scorpions and even birds. Alert and efficient, they attack their prey voraciously.

Formerly known as the brushy-tailed marsupial rat, or Byrne’s crest-tailed marsupial rat, the kowari is more closely related to Tasmanian Devil and quolls.

The Wangkangurru Yarluyandi People use the name kowari, while the Dieri and Ngameni peoples use the similar-sounding name kariri.

Kowaris live in stony deserts. They mainly inhabit remote treeless “gibber” plains. These areas of flat, interlocking red pebbles form vast pavements that could be mistaken for the surface of Mars.

In the outback, where temperatures can exceed 50°C, kowaris beat the heat by sheltering in burrows dug into sand mounds. At night they emerge to race across the plains, their head and distinctive brushy tail held high, pausing regularly to scan for predators and prey.

During chilly winter days, kowaris slow their metabolism to conserve energy. They go into a state of torpor, which is a daily version of hibernation.

Read more:
Torpor: a neat survival trick once thought rare in Australian animals is actually widespread

At the two main South Australian sites, the number of animals captured in trapping surveys declined by 85% between 2000 and 2015. At this rate, the species could disappear from the area within two decades.

The entire population is estimated to number as few as 1,200 individuals scattered over just 350 square kilometres. That’s a combined area of less than 20km x 20km.

Based on this evidence, the conservation status of kowaris was upgraded from vulnerable to endangered in November last year.

Shrinking populations in the stony desert

Kowaris have been declining for a while but are suddenly on the fast track to extinction. How can that be, when they live in one of the most vast and remote parts of Australia?

Threats include land degradation from pastoralism, and predation from introduced feral cats and foxes.

But it’s complicated. Threats can combine, having a synergistic effect (greater than the sum of their parts). And then there are climate influences.

Heavy rain in the desert triggers a cascade of events that culminates in an explosion of feral cat numbers.

When conditions dry out again, the cats switch to eating larger or more difficult prey such as bilbies and kowaris, often causing local extinctions. In southwest Queensland, feral cats most likely wiped out one population of kowaris and decimated another.

Huge efforts to control cat plagues have saved the kowari and bilby populations in Astrebla Downs National Park from local extinction so far, but other areas have succumbed.

In SA, all the remaining kowari populations are on pastoral stations used for grazing cattle.

Cattle can trample kowari burrows. They can also compact the sand mounds, making it difficult for kowaris to build burrows in the first place. And they eat the plants on the mounds, reducing the availability of both food and shelter. This makes kowaris easy prey.

Over the past few decades, pastoralism has intensified. Nearly half of Australia (44%) is covered in pastoral leases where many threatened species occur.

Domestic stock usually graze close to watering points such as bores and troughs. More and more watering points are being established, to make more of the pastoral lease accessible to stock. So the area protected from grazing is shrinking as cattle encroach further into kowari territory.

How can we save the kowari?

We have the knowledge and tools required to save this species from extinction. We just need decisive leadership and sufficient funding to put these plans into action.

State governments should provide more resources for desert parks so rangers can monitor feral cat numbers and respond rapidly to plagues. We can make use of new technology such as remote camera traps checked via satellite. These measures would also protect the last remaining stronghold of the bilby in Queensland, another nationally threatened mammal.

The pastoral industry and governments must work together to review watering-point placement and reduce grazing pressure in known kowari habitat.

By closing some pastoral watering points and ensuring a portion of each lease (possibly 20%) is away from waters, we can reduce the harm of stock and provide refuges for threatened species. Pastoral companies could show leadership and implement these actions themselves rather than waiting for governments to act.

In the meantime, reintroductions into safe havens is one stopgap measure helping to prevent imminent kowari extinction. In 2022, 12 kowaris were successfully reintroduced to the 123 square km fenced Arid Recovery Reserve in northern SA. The population has expanded since release. Removing cats, foxes and domestic stock from the reserve has given kowaris a chance to reclaim a small portion of their former range.

But safe havens are small and we need to act on a larger scale. If we don’t, the kowari may become yet another Australian species lost before you’ve even seen it.

Thanks to Genevieve Hayes, former ecologist at Arid Recovery, for coordinating the reintroduction of the kowari at Arid Recovery and commenting on the draft of this article.

Read more:
So you want to cat-proof a bettong: how living with predators could help native species survive

Katherine Moseby is co-founder and chief scientist at Arid Recovery. She receives contract work from Arid Recovery to assist with conservation and restoration works.

Katherine Tuft is Chief Executive at Arid Recovery which has received grant funding from the federal government and other sources to support research and conservation for the kowari.

– ref. Meet the kowari: a pint-sized predator on the fast track to extinction – https://theconversation.com/meet-the-kowari-a-pint-sized-predator-on-the-fast-track-to-extinction-219598

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Giselle Natassia Woodley, Researcher and Phd Candidate, Edith Cowan University

Sexting involves taking self-made naked or partially naked sexual photos, videos or explicit texts and sending them online or via a mobile phone. They are more commonly referred to as “nudes” or “dick pics” by young people.

A 2021 survey of almost 7,000 Australian teenagers (aged 14 to 18) found sexting was “ordinary practice” for young people. Of those surveyed, 86% reported they had received sexts and 70% said they had sent them.

Our new research explores Australian teens’ experiences with sexting and sext education. We conducted 49 interviews with 30 young Australians (aged 11 to 17), with 19 repeat interviews a year later.

Our findings show how current messages to simply avoid sexting do not work for young people. While the risks should be acknowledged, education should also include how to be respectful and safe with sexting.

What are the laws around sexting?

In most states and territories in Australia, it is legal to have sex when you are 16, but you need to be 18 to sext.

This is because the creation of sexual images of people who are minors is seen as creating child sexual exploitation materials. This is illegal under Commonwealth laws.

This makes sexting between young people under 18, consenting or otherwise, both legally and ethically complex.

States have diverse practices regarding underage sexting (and police and prosecutors have some discretion). But if you are in possession of a naked image of someone under 18 or send a naked image of someone under 18, you are breaking the law. It is even illegal to own a naked photo of yourself under 18, even if that image is never sent to anyone.

Researchers have argued this legal approach to sexting can end up punishing those it is supposed to protect. It also adds to the shaming and fear around sexting for young people.

Our research

Most young people in our study had their first experience of sexting between ten and 13-years-old. In many cases, this was before their first kiss.

But young people in our study said education about sexting in school tends to be based around risks, often in response to a particular incident and is mostly ignored by students. As Max* (12), told us, “it was just basically saying […] ‘don’t send them’”. Lauren (14) said:

They more veer on the safety side of things […] why nudes are bad […].

She argued this didn’t work.

They [teens] know the warnings, but it just sort of goes in one ear and out the other. I don’t think kids listen to that.

Rightly or wrongly, teens in our study also saw relationships as a safe space for sexting. As Warren (17) noted:

If I was in a relationship, it’s a bit different ‘cause I trust them, they trust me.

This “don’t do it” messaging is akin to abstinence-only sex education, which is widely acknowledged to be ineffective and fails to protect young people from pregnancy and STIs. In contrast, comprehensive sexuality education has been proven to delay first sexual experiences and increase contraceptive use. This shows offering young people access to important sexual information can protect them.

Read more:
‘We haven’t been taught about sex’: teens talk about how to fix school sex education

Young people want to be ‘be prepared’

Teens in our study acknowledged sexting had a “dark side”.

For many, their first sext was an unsolicited image known as “cyberflashing”. Many knew of peers who had their own images leaked by other students without their consent, even though none said this had happened to them. This sharing and leaking of private images has previously been known as “revenge porn” and forms part of an array of behaviours known as Technology-Facilitated Sexual Violence, which is illegal.

Teens wished they had been taught about sexting before encountering it so they could “be prepared”. Secondary school students said sexting education should begin in upper primary school with age-appropriate discussions continuing into high school, where, as Tiffany (15) told us, sexting “happens regularly, daily”.

Lauren said education around how to be respectful and consider issues like consent in online safety was also important:

I think it would be really useful, some people just don’t know, if you send something to someone that it’s obviously ‘private’ […] you just want to share it with that one person.

The UK is changing its approach

Pretending sexting won’t or shouldn’t happen because it is illegal is like pretending no one under 16 has sex, no young teenagers drink alcohol and no one takes illicit drugs. We don’t pretend these behaviours don’t exist: we educate for harm minimisation around them.

Recent guidance to schools in the United Kingdom around sexting reduces the emphasis on legal issues, while attempting to minimise shaming of young people who sext. This approach emphasises young people’s rights and responsibilities to make informed choices over their own bodies and sexual selves.

Indeed, online sex is sex, forming part of a repertoire of sexual behaviours. Offering non-judgmental information acknowledges sexuality as a legitimate part of human development.

Read more:
20% of young people who forwarded nudes say they had permission – but only 8% gave it. Why the gap?

What can parents and teachers do?

Parents and teachers can offer balanced information that identifies potential dangers but also acknowledges the reality of young people’s behaviours.

Instead of “don’t do it”, teens may be more receptive to discussions about consent and mutual respect for one another’s bodies as they would (and should) in real life.

If things do “go wrong” there are several services available.

The eSafety Commission acknowledges it is important young people know they can always say no to a request to send nudes, and to avoid sharing intimate images and videos without consent . This is both breach of trust and against the law. It also has advice for when nudes have been shared, if someone is trying to blackmail you over a naked image (“sextortion”) and provides a way to report image-based sexual abuse.

You can also make a report to the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation and US-based site Take It Down

The federal government’s parenting website, the Raising Children Network also offers balanced step-by-step guides if your child is asked to send a nude, receives one or has one shared without their consent.

Above all, maintaining an open dialogue and a shame-free stance will allow young people to feel safe to discuss anything with the adults in their lives. It also helps if teens know parents will help in a crisis, rather than punish them.

*Names have been changed.

This paper is an outcome of the Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project Adolescents’ perceptions
of harm from accessing online sexual content (DP 190102435). As such, funding was received from the Australian Research Council.

Giselle is also part of a not-for-profit Relationships and Sexuality education advocacy group, Bloom-Ed, whose views are not expressed here.

Lelia Green receives funding from the Australian Research Council (ARC). She is a Co-Chief Investigator on the Discovery Project ‘Adolescents’ perceptions of harm from accessing online sexual content’ (DP 190102435). As such, funding was received from the Australian Research Council (2019-2023). It should be noted that teen sexting culture was not the focus of this grant, but was raised by teens when they were asked about online sexual content. Lelia also acknowledges significant in-kind support from the School of Arts and Humanities at Edith Cowan University. All views expressed are her own.

– ref. We teach school kids about safe sex. We need to teach safe sexting too – https://theconversation.com/we-teach-school-kids-about-safe-sex-we-need-to-teach-safe-sexting-too-224748

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Thomas Jeffries, Senior Lecturer in Microbiology, Western Sydney University

The mention of ancient Egypt usually conjures images of colossal pyramids and precious, golden tombs.

But as with most civilisations, the invisible world of infectious disease underpinned life and death along the Nile. In fact, fear of disease was so pervasive it influenced social and religious customs. It even featured in the statues, monuments and graves of the Kingdom of the Pharaohs.

By studying ancient specimens and artefacts, scientists are uncovering how disease rocked this ancient culture.

Tutankhamun’s malaria, and other examples

The most direct evidence of epidemics in ancient Egypt comes from skeletal and DNA evidence obtained from the mummies themselves.

For instance, DNA recovered from the mummy of the boy pharaoh Tutankhamun (1332–1323 BC) led to the discovery he suffered from malaria, along with several other New Kingdom mummies (circa 1800 BC).

In other examples:

• skeletal and DNA evidence found in the city of Abydos suggests one in four people may have had tuberculosis
• the mummy of Ramesses V (circa 1149–1145 BC) has scars indicating smallpox
• the wives of Mentuhotep II (circa 2000 BC) were buried hastily in a “mass grave”, suggesting a pandemic had occurred
• and the mummies of two pharaohs, Siptah (1197–1191 BC) and Khnum-Nekht (circa 1800 BC), were found with the deformed equinus foot which is characteristic of the viral disease polio.

Signs of a disease-ravaged people

Amenhotep III was the ninth pharaoh of the 18th dynasty, and ruled from about 1388–1351 BC.

There are several reasons experts think his reign was marked by a devastating disease outbreak. For instance, two separate carvings from this time depict a priest and a royal couple with the polio dropped-foot.

Statues of the lion-headed goddess of disease and health, Sekhmet, also increased significantly, suggesting a reliance on divine protection.

Another sign of a potential major disease outbreak comes in the form of what may be an early case of quarantine, wherein Amenhotep III moved his palace to the more isolated site of Malqata. This is further supported by the burning of a workers’ cemetery near Thebes.

Grave goods also became less extravagant and tombs less complex during this period, which suggests more burials were needed in a shorter time frame. These burials can’t be explained by war since this was an unusually peaceful period.

Did disease trigger early monotheism?

Amenohotep’s son – “the heretic King” Akhenaten (who was also Tutankhamun’s father) – abandoned the old gods of Egypt. In one of the earliest cases of monotheism, Akhenaten made worship of the Sun the official state religion.

Some researchers think Akhenaten’s dramatic loss of faith may have been due to the devastating disease he witnessed during his childhood and into his reign, with several of his children and wives having died from disease. But we’ve yet to find clear evidence for the role of disease in shaping his theology.

There’s also no direct DNA evidence of an outbreak under his father, Amenhotep III. There are only descriptions of one in letters Amenhotep III and Akhenaten exchanged with the Babylonians.

To confirm an outbreak under Amenhotep III, we’d need to first recover pathogen DNA in human remains from this time, has been found in other Egyptian burial sites and for other pandemics.

Also, while many ancient epidemics are referred to as “plagues”, we can’t confirm whether any outbreaks in ancient Egypt were indeed caused by Yersinia pestis, the bacteria responsible for bubonic plague pandemics such as the Black Death in Europe (1347-1351).

That said, researchers have confirmed the Nile rat, which was widespread during the time of the Pharaohs, would have been able to carry the Yersinia infection.

How were outbreaks managed?

Much like modern pandemics, factors such as population growth, sanitation, population density and mobilisation for war would have influenced the spread of disease in ancient Egypt.

In the case of war, it’s thought the Hittite army was weakened by disease spread when it was famously defeated by Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses the Great in the battle of Kadesh (1274 BC).

In some ways, Egyptian medicine was advanced for its time. While these outbreaks occurred long before the development of antibiotics or vaccines, there is some evidence of public health measures such as the burning of towns and quarantining people. This suggests a basic understanding of how disease spreads.

Diseases caused by microorganisms would have been viewed as supernatural, or as a corruption of the air. This is similar to other explanations held in different parts of the world, before germ theory was popularised in the 19th century.

New world, old problems

Many of the most widespread diseases that afflicted the ancient world are still with us.

Along with Tutankhamun, it’s thought up to 70% of the Egyptian population was infected with malaria caused by the Plasmodium falciparum parasite – spread by swarms of mosquitoes occupying the stagnant pools of the Nile delta.

Today, malaria affects about 250 million people, mostly in developing nations. Tuberculosis kills more than a million people each year. And smallpox and polio have only recently been eradicated or controlled through vaccination programs.

More work is yet to be done to detect individual pathogens in Egyptian mummies. This knowledge could shed light on how, throughout history, people much like us have grappled with these unseen organisms.

Read more:
Did everyone in Bridgerton have syphilis? Just how sexy would it really have been in Regency era London?

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

– ref. From malaria, to smallpox, to polio – here’s how we know life in ancient Egypt was ravaged by disease – https://theconversation.com/from-malaria-to-smallpox-to-polio-heres-how-we-know-life-in-ancient-egypt-was-ravaged-by-disease-223970

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Louise Crabtree-Hayes, Professorial Research Fellow, Institute for Culture and Society, Western Sydney University

This article is part of The Conversation’s series examining the housing crisis. Read the other articles in the series here.

At a time when everything from abolishing negative gearing to capping rents are being suggested as ways to reduce Australia’s housing crisis, little attention has been given to housing co-operatives.

A housing co-op consists of a group of people who share in the management and running of their accommodation. Applicants are have to meet certain criteria, including means testing. Once accepted, they are expected to contribute according to their capacity and ability.

While only a small provider of accommodation in Australia (0.03% of all homes compared to Sweden’s 22%), new research reveals how developing the sector could relieve some of the pressure.

Working with community housing providers and co-operatives across four states and surveying about 300 co-op residents, our research is the first analysis of the operation and impact of Australia’s affordable rental housing co-operatives.

What we found can inform housing policy and choices.

How membership differs to renting or owning

Like all co-ops, housing co-operatives are defined by a “one member, one vote” principle. This means, as both tenants and members, residents have a say in how the organisation runs and how homes are maintained.

This is fundamentally different to renting and owning, providing residents with stability and a greater say in their housing.

Tenant-members can make improvements, decide on policy and make the sorts of connections to their home and community usually thought to only be available to homeowners. As one research participant said:

Even though we don’t own the space, there’s a real sense of belonging to the site, to the property.

In Australia, 184 co-operatives provide 3,732 homes. Another 25 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander co-operatives provide 1,287 homes as their sole purpose or within broader community service delivery.

Although only a small housing contributor in Australia, these nearly 5,000 co-operative homes are a solid base from which the sector can grow.

The cost and management of co-ops

To assess the value of housing co-operatives, we looked at sector costs, tenant-members’ inputs and outcomes.

We found the sector’s costs were similar to those of other types of community housing and that greater tenant-member involvement in managing the co-op lowers overall costs.

Read more:
Huge housing costs make us slaves to our jobs and unsustainable growth. But there’s another way

Further, tenant-members’ participation in their co-op also develops their skills, leading to other education and employment opportunities.

Tenant-members expressed high levels of satisfaction with their living arrangements, a strong sense of home, solid social bonds, and an improved sense of health and wellbeing. These positives were shared with their children.

Importantly, our study found participants had a strong sense of agency and voice, which is often missing in other housing tenures, especially renting.

We also found the more a tenant-member enjoys getting involved in anything from planning a garden to doing building maintenance, the more they will do for the co-op. This cycle is self-reinforcing.

The value of these effects can be extraordinary, with respondents referring to living and participating in their co-operative as “life-changing”.

Co-operatives clearly provide stable long-term housing, as most survey respondents have lived in their co-operative and/or the co-operative sector for over ten years (46% and 55% respectively) and most (74%) want to live in their co-operative for the rest of their lives.

What helps housing co-operatives succeed?

We found three main contributors to co-op success:

1. the more a tenant-member participates in running their co-operative, the more they benefit. However, participation needs to be equitable, allowing tenant-members’ contributions to vary throughout their lives and for different tenant-members to participate differently

2. the more tenant-members learn about their roles and responsibilities, the better the co-op functions and the greater the benefits

3. there is no one right way to be a co-operative. There is value in co-ops being diverse, reflecting diverse tenant-members, locations and incomes.

Co-operatives can help people settle down, grow as individuals, build careers, keep their kids in the same school and contribute to their neighbourhoods.

Read more:
Want to cut your new home costs by 10% or more? That’s what building groups can do

They are an example of how Australia’s housing system could provide more affordable, stable and dignified housing choices. A research participant expressed this best:

I had to move so many times as a single mother, every time knowing I’d have to urgently find new, safe, continuous housing for three people and pay for every aspect of the move, bond and rent. The pressure, the fear, was insane.

Living here my kids grew up – the neighbours are great, the public transport is there and it’s been a pretty safe and friendly community. Lifelong friendship and family bonds continue. I love gardening here and can stay active as I age […] I love my neighbours. I’m home.

Lessons for housing policy

While Australia has both ownership and rental co-operatives, most Australian co-operatives are affordable rentals, comprising very low-moderate income households as part of the community housing sector.

Our earlier report showed in other countries, housing co-operatives form a large share of mainstream housing supply. For example, in Norway housing co-operatives comprise 15% of all homes.

Our new findings suggest Australia’s housing policies can support the growth of housing co-operatives for renters and owners, so more people can enjoy the benefits of affordable, stable homes.

Read more:
The private sector housing experiment has failed: Ottawa must now step up on social housing

Louise Crabtree-Hayes receives funding from the Australian Research Council with contributions from community housing providers in the co-operative sector.

– ref. ‘I’m home’: how co-operative housing could take pressure off Australia’s housing crisis – https://theconversation.com/im-home-how-co-operative-housing-could-take-pressure-off-australias-housing-crisis-225561

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

If history had taken a different turn, Australia might now not be debating nuclear power but have had it up and running for decades.

John Gorton, who was prime minister from 1968 to 1971, was a true believer in nuclear. His biographer Ian Hancock wrote that Gorton “visualised the generation of cheap electricity, and fuel for transport of all kinds”.

Gorton declared in his policy speech for the 1969 election:

We shall, during the next parliament, take Australia into the atomic age by beginning the construction of an atomic plant at Jervis Bay [on the NSW south coast], to generate electricity. We believe that Australia will make increasing use of atomic power in the years ahead and that the time for this nation to enter the atomic age has now arrived.

Plans were well underway when in 1971 Gorton lost the prime ministership to Billy McMahon, a critic of the Jervis Bay project, which was put into limbo. Treasury did an evaluation that – you’ve guessed it – slammed the cost; a journalist at the time described it as “a most devastating critique”. The way was opened for coal, which was much more economically viable for Australia’s power generation. The Jervis Bay project was dead.

Peter Dutton is a very different brand of Liberal from the freewheeling, often undisciplined Gorton, but he has become as convinced as his predecessor about the nuclear path. And, just as in Gorton’s time, the critics cite cost. Only now the cost issue is about renewables versus nuclear.

Dutton, under pressure to release policy, says the opposition will put out its nuclear energy blueprint before the budget.

It seems an odd choice as the year’s first big policy hit – nuclear power isn’t dominating kitchen table discussions around the country. Leaving that aside, the release will be a major test for Dutton, in handling both the economics and the politics of the ensuing debate.

He starts with most energy experts ranged against him. He’s obviously not himself an expert, so being convincing when he has to get into the fine detail won’t be easy. Public attitudes towards nuclear may have softened, but if he flounders in defending the economic case, he’ll have lost the argument even before the politics kick in.

Read more:
Dutton wants a ‘mature debate’ about nuclear power. By the time we’ve had one, new plants will be too late to replace coal

One aspect of the evolution of the opposition’s nuclear policy that raises an eyebrow is how it has so quickly transitioned from concentrating on small modular reactors – which spokesman Ted O’Brien spruiked enthusiastically but most experts dismissed as impractical – to being centred on conventional reactors. It might have been a sensible move, but it makes you wonder whether the policy crafters were on top of the complexities to start with.

The political battle over nuclear will be on several fronts: the overall scare campaign, the regional reaction, and attitudes in the cities.

The opposition hopes its plan to place the reactors (about half a dozen) on or near the sites of coal-fired power stations as they phase out will limit the effectiveness of Labor’s scare assault. It will then become a matter of persuading the affected local communities, and Dutton has flagged incentives.

More generally, the opposition aims to persuade regional voters that nuclear is better than having their areas covered with power lines and wind farms that many find ugly and intrusive. This would probably resonate in many areas, provided Dutton could allay other doubts with these voters, such as about cost.

The cities will be another matter. In teal and similar seats, a strong commitment to renewables is likely to make voters unsympathetic to the nuclear case. The opposition may not have great hopes of winning back the teal electorates, but it will be aware of the risk of losing more seats to teal candidates and so it has to be careful.

In outer suburbia, Dutton’s target territory, the danger for him is that voters see nuclear power as a side issue. Yes, they will hear his claim it would mean lower power prices but, even if they buy that very contested argument, they’ll know that would be far into the future.

Hard-pressed families are interested in the here and now. And that goes to a broader problem for Dutton’s nuclear campaign. It could lead up a dry gully, a debate that consumes time and effort better spent on more central cost-of-living and other issues.

Dutton says the opposition won’t be a small target at the election. Even if that’s sound thinking, he needs to have reasonable confidence that “big target” policies will carry a more than fifty-fifty chance of paying significant dividends. He doesn’t have much political capital to spend. The likely dividend from the nuclear policy could easily be a net negative.

Dutton might be a nuclear believer but his stand also has to be understood in a Coalition context. His most important priority since the election has been keeping unity in the opposition’s ranks. He has managed this but it is always potentially precarious.

The Nationals have been bugbears for Liberal leaders on energy policy. Currently the party is divided between those who support the 2050 net zero emissions target (including leader David Littleproud) and the radical outliers who’d like to ditch the commitment to the target, which the party only signed up to under duress in the runup to the last election. The radicals would also like to ditch Littleproud if they got a chance; there are conflicting assessments about how stable his leadership is.

For multiple and obvious reasons, Dutton can’t afford to see the Nationals fragment over the 2050 target, or have his conservative Liberals arc up about it. The nuclear policy is the glue keeping various bits of the Coalition stuck to the target. Dutton argues the opposition believes in renewables but they won’t alone get Australia to the target. “Labor sees nuclear power as a competitor to renewables,” he said this week. “We see nuclear power as a companion to renewables.” It’s an energy policy that gives something to various otherwise irreconcilable groups within the Coalition.

The nuclear pitch will come under scrutiny when in May the CSIRO releases its GenCost report, titled Annual insights into the cost of future electricity generation in Australia. The result of its examination of nuclear could be a serious blow for Dutton. If so, seen in historical terms, that would be a win for McMahon economics over Gortonian aspiration.

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

– ref. Grattan on Friday: Like Peter Dutton, John Gorton once had a nuclear plan. It didn’t end well – https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-like-peter-dutton-john-gorton-once-had-a-nuclear-plan-it-didnt-end-well-225794

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Doug Drury, Professor/Head of Aviation, CQUniversity Australia

The American aerospace giant Boeing has been synonymous with safe air travel for decades. Since the 1990s, Boeing and its European competitor Airbus have dominated the market for large passenger jets.

But this year, Boeing has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. In January, an emergency door plug blew off a Boeing 737 MAX in mid flight, triggering an investigation from United States federal regulators.

More recently, we have seen a Boeing plane lose a tyre while taking off, another flight turned back as the plane was leaking fluid, an apparent engine fire, a landing gear collapse, a stuck rudder pedal, and a plane “dropping” in flight and injuring dozens of passengers. A Boeing engineer who had raised concerns regarding quality control during the manufacturing process on the company’s 787 and 737 MAX planes also died earlier this week, apparently of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

As members of the travelling public, should we be concerned? Well, yes and no.

Read more:
Boeing door plug blowout highlights a possible crisis of competence − an aircraft safety expert explains

Many problems, but not all can be blamed on Boeing

The recent parade of events has certainly been dramatic – but not all of them can be blamed on Boeing. Five incidents occurred on aircraft owned and operated by United Airlines and were related to factors outside the manufacturer’s control, like maintenance issues, potential foreign object debris, and possible human error.

A United Airlines 777 flying from San Francisco to Japan lost a tyre on takeoff, a maintenance issue not related to Boeing. The aircraft landed safely in Los Angeles.

A United Airlines flight from Sydney to Los Angeles had to return to Sydney due to a “maintenance issue” after a fluid was seen leaking from the aircraft on departure.

A United Airlines 737-900 flying from Texas to Florida ended up with some plastic bubble wrap in the engine, causing a suspected compressor stall. This is a disruption of air flow to an operating engine, making it “backfire” and emit flames.

A United Airlines 737 Max flying from Tennessee to Texas suffered a gear collapse after a normal landing. The pilot continued to the end of the runway before exiting onto a taxiway – possibly at too high a speed – and the aircraft ended up in the grass and the left main landing gear collapsed.

The fifth event occurred on a United Airlines 737-8 flight from the Bahamas to New Jersey. The pilots reported that the rudder pedals, which control the left and right movement of the aircraft in flight, were stuck in the neutral position during landing.

Manufacturing quality concerns

The exit door plug failure in January occurred on an Alaska Airlines flight. US regulators are currently investigating Boeing’s manufacturing quality assurance as a result.

The door plug was installed by a Boeing subcontractor called Spirit AeroSystem. The door plug bolts were not properly secured and the plug door fell off in flight. The same aircraft had a series of pressurisation alarms on two previous flights, and was scheduled for a maintenance inspection at the completion of the flight.

Spirit got its start after Boeing shut down its own manufacturing operations in Kansas and Oklahoma, and Boeing is now in the process of buying the company to improve quality oversight. Spirit currently works with Airbus, as well, though that may change.

Read more:
Why did Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 have a sealed-off emergency exit in the first place? The answer comes down to money

What changed at Boeing

Critics say the culture at Boeing has changed since Airbus became a major competitor in the early 2000s. The company has been accused of shifting its focus to profit at the expense of quality engineering.

Former staff have raised concerns over tight production schedules, which increased the pressure on employees to finish the aircraft. This caused many engineers to question the process, and the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to fine Boeing for lapses in quality oversight after tools and debris were found on aircraft being inspected.

Several employees have testified before US Congress on the production issues regarding quality control. Based on the congressional findings, the FAA began to inspect Boeing’s processes more closely.

Several Boeing employees noted there was a high staff turnover rate during the COVID pandemic. This is not unique to Boeing, as all manufacturing processes and airline maintenance facilities around the globe were also hit with high turnover.

As a result, there is an acute shortage of qualified maintenance engineers, as well as pilots. These shortages have created several issues with the airline industry successfully returning to the pre-pandemic levels of 2019. Airlines and maintenance training centres around the globe are working hard to train replacements, but this takes time as one cannot become a qualified engineer or airline pilot overnight.

So, is it still safe to fly on Boeing planes? Yes it is. Despite dramatic incidents in the news and social media posts poking fun at the company, air travel is still extremely safe, and that includes Boeing.

We can expect these issues with Boeing planes now will be corrected. The financial impact has been significant – so even a profit-driven company will demand change.

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

– ref. Should you be concerned about flying on Boeing planes? – https://theconversation.com/should-you-be-concerned-about-flying-on-boeing-planes-225675

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Hughes, Lecturer, Research School of Management, Australian National University

Firebrand senator Jacqui Lambie is furious. Amid the Tasmanian election campaign (in which she’s running candidates), her party, the Jacqui Lambie Network, has fallen victim to one of the many pitfalls in the world of online political advertising.

Her party’s website is lambienetwork.com.au. You might understand her anger, then, after finding out the Tasmanian Liberal party created a website to campaign against her, called lambienetwork.com. It’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it difference.

This is a textbook example of what’s known as cybersquatting. It’s when internet domain names that are similar to existing trademarked material or the names of people or organisations are bought up by competitors to use against the original. In fact, the major parties have purchased a heap of domain names.

As political parties desperately battle for voters’ attention in a world full of distractions and dwindling trust in government, cybersquatting is one of many online tools in the toolkit. But the toolkit is full of blunt instruments that may only be effective on a minority of people. The true damage is being done to the majority, who have less and less faith in politics and its institutions.

Read more:
All governments are guilty of running political ads on the public purse. Here’s how to stop it

A crowded, manufactured landscape

In commercial marketing, there’s a focus on long-term brand building. In political marketing, there’s just one goal: winning.

With such high pressure, and little time to hit objectives, parties and candidates use highly emotive messaging and narratives to drive rapid attention and engagement, and hopefully convince people to vote for them.

With markets splintered into ever-smaller segments, based at times on very specific needs, social media has helped move voters quickly and developed narratives around leaders’ personal brands.

Instagram was used successfully by former prime minister Scott Morrison with his Scomosas and attempt at Bunnings DIY.

His successor, Anthony Albanese, has replicated that strategy, letting us get a glimpse of who he really is, even having a Twitter/X account for his dog Toto. This is aimed at developing resonance and building up likeability for his brand.

Of course, as any royal watcher or user of social media can tell you, curated images are exactly that: manufactured, for us. So we are trusting this method less and less. This will only get worse the longer voters are exposed to it.

Stories such as that in the 2022 federal election of Labor-aligned groups considering paying influencers to post friendly content, doesn’t help either.

As a result, when we see content posted by an influencer, we’re now more likely to be sceptical. Do they really like this product, or are they just being paid to say they do?

‘Angertainment’ is highly effective

So it’s back to square one. Enter negativity, or “angertainment”.

Reality shows are full of it. One example is the villain edit, where certain contestants are framed to be the antagonist for the sake of drama. There’s also the cued music to make us feel this is the “season-defining moment”.

They do this for the same reasons politicians have done it for decades. It works. It gets our attention. We get engaged. We change our vote. Ratings of these shows don’t lie.

In the past, this was called “wedge politics”, as it wedged one group of voters against others. A party or candidate could then become that group’s champion, and hello election victory. Simple narrative construction.

Read more:
We tracked election ad spending for 4,000 Facebook pages. Here’s what they’re posting about – and why cybersecurity is the bigger concern

This was easy when competition for our attention was less fierce. John Howard’s 2001 election-opening “we decide” statement about immigration was pure wedge politics.

The aim is still the same now, but in a competitive environment for our attention and retention, modern methods have allowed for new ways to reach the average voter. Having not seen them before, people are more susceptible to believing them.

Clive Palmer has used spam text messages over the years to grab some attention, although it hasn’t necessarily translated into electoral success.

A more inventive use of the internet to campaign was Pauline Hanson’s cartoon series. The first three episodes racked up 750,000 views in two weeks on YouTube.

Both Labor and Liberal have had a strong presence on Snapchat. In 2016, the Liberals were among the first to make a filter on the app. Labor was the only major party to use it during the 2022 federal election campaign.

These are all new ways of communicating a party’s key messages, including scare or smear campaigns.

Think “Mediscare”, so well done by Labor in 2016 via SMS, and then the revenge sequel of death taxes in 2019 by the Coalition. They used Facebook groups very well.

Angertainment is now seen as being more likely to get the message across, and thereby victory, than anything else.

A significant aspect of these campaigns was disinformation, including the misrepresentation or impersonation of candidates. Senator David Pocock was a key target in the ACT in 2022, but successfully ran a challenge through the Australian Electoral Commission.

But this is 2024, and two years is an aeon in social media. The Jacqui Lambie Network (JLN) website trick we saw this week is an old-school one. Unlike some of the other strategies, it’s not effective. It is, however, childish.

So why bother? The attacking party would be obvious to most, if not by the authorised name as required by electoral laws. This dilutes the effect and it likely reinforces the reasons to vote for the JLN.

But political parties do it to capitalise on those who don’t realise they’re receiving a message in bad faith. Even if it’s a minority, it’s someone. In a tight political climate, it might be enough to tip the scales in their favour.

The collateral damage, of course, is the spread of misinformation and public disillusionment with politics and elections.

Read more:
Few restrictions, no spending limit, and almost no oversight: welcome to political advertising in Australia

Can we stop this?

We can, easily.

Cybersquatting is in a grey area legally. There are gaps in the relevant legislation that make it very difficult for those affected to get websites taken down. They’re often managed by international organisations with laborious processes.

But the government can ban cyber hijacking or squatting of politicians or parties’ web addresses or social channels. It can restrict negative advertising, and bring in green ticks to verify truthful advertising.

Government can also ensure social media companies take more responsibility for content, and tolerate fewer excuses for poor behaviour. This isn’t restricting freedom of speech, only restricting disinformation. Some independents have already introduced bills in parliament on this issue.

If it’s so easy, why hasn’t it been done? Because that requires political support. Considering politicians are the ones who benefit most from the existing framework, we don’t need a negative ad to tell us how unlikely they are to do anything about it anytime soon.

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

– ref. The Jacqui Lambie Network is the latest victim of ‘cybersquatting’. It’s the tip of the iceberg of negative political ads online – https://theconversation.com/the-jacqui-lambie-network-is-the-latest-victim-of-cybersquatting-its-the-tip-of-the-iceberg-of-negative-political-ads-online-225774

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicole Lee, Adjunct Professor at the National Drug Research Institute (Melbourne based), Curtin University

Widely reported data released from the National Wastewater Drug Monitoring Program this week appears to show the rising use of methamphetamine (also known as methylamphetamine). You may know it as speed (the powder form) or ice (the crystal form).

But this reporting appears to contradict data released in recent weeks from the National Drug Strategy Household Survey. This 2022-23 survey shows methamphetamine use is falling and is at its lowest in more than a decade.

So what’s going on? Is methamphetamine use rising or falling?

Read more:
Meth use is declining in Australia – but the public still sees it as the most worrying drug

Looking at wastewater

The National Wastewater Drug Monitoring Program collects samples of wastewater from sewage treatment plants. University researchers then test samples for traces of different drugs.

The way the samples are analysed differentiates between drugs that have been consumed and drugs that have been disposed of before consumption. This means we know the drugs detected have actually been used and excreted via urine, not just thrown down the toilet.

Read more:
Drugs in bugs: 69 pharmaceuticals found in invertebrates living in Melbourne’s streams

But there are limitations

The report of the wastewater data mentions measuring “consumption”, “demand” and “harm” from drugs. But the wastewater program doesn’t measure these directly.

It only measures overall amount of a drug consumed in the community at a single point in time.

Wastewater data can’t tell us whether a small number of people have used a large amount of a drug or a large number of people each used a very small amount of a drug. It can only tell us the overall volume of a drug used.

Some of the sampling sites have been chosen specifically because the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, which runs the program, has an actual or potential concern that drug use is high in those areas. This kind of targeted sampling may overestimate how much of a drug has been used across Australia or at any given time point.

Read more:
Weekly Dose: ice and speed, the drugs that kept soldiers awake and a president young

Surveys give us different answers

The National Drug Strategy Household Survey is a sample of, usually, around 20,000-25,000 households in Australia. It asks one person from each household aged 14 years and over about their use of a range of drugs in the past year and in their lifetime. Researchers refer to this as “self report”.

The survey asks about quantity, frequency and harms of drug use, and reports the data by a range of demographic measures such as age and gender. It also surveys the community’s attitudes to drugs. So the data is much more detailed than wastewater data.

Surveys have limitations too

The National Drug Strategy Household Survey relies on people being honest about their drug use.

People tend to forget or downplay their use, especially for illicit drugs, so the survey results likely underestimate use. But the underestimate is probably similar across years because the way the data is collected has remained very similar across time.

However, as the survey is anonymous and there are no consequences to disclosing this information (for example, no risk of being arrested for drug use) it’s probably reasonably accurate.

The survey is best for looking at trends over time.

Read more:
Young people are drinking less in real life. But film and TV paints a different picture

So what can we make of this?

Over the years, there have been some ups and downs in methamphetamine volumes reported in the wastewater data. However, the average national volume (in kilos) of methamphetamine reported in the latest wastewater report is pretty close to the average for the past seven years.

The most recent report shows an increase in consumption per 1,000 population in regional areas, but a decrease in capital cities, representing an overall decrease. The total volume of methamphetamine used has increased, however. But as the population has also increased during that time, this complicates the picture.

Changes up and down in volume of drug used could also be seasonal or in response to short-term changes in availability. So it’s better to look at long-term changes over time together with other data.

The proportion of the population who report using methamphetamine in the National Drug Strategy Household Survey has fallen, continuing a long-term trend.

Read more:
2,200 deaths, 32,000 hospital admissions, 15.7 billion dollars: what opioid misuse costs Australia in a year

What’s the take-home message?

These two datasets measure different things at different time points using different methods.

The wastewater data found the average volume of methamphetamine had increased, but consumption per 1,000 population had decreased. This drop in consumption is in line with the survey, which found a drop in the percentage of people reporting methamphetamine use, the lowest in over a decade.

So is methamphetamine use in Australia rising or falling? Both sets of data actually suggest use is falling, even though you’d never know it from the recent headlines.

It’s a good demonstration of why we shouldn’t take data in isolation and why we need to consider a range of factors in interpreting data.

The last thing we want is sensationalised headlines, leading to the type of stigma that makes it harder for people who use drugs to ask for support.

If you are worried about your own or someone else’s drug use or just want further information you can call the free and confidential National Alcohol and Other Drug Hotline on 1800 250 015 or contact Counselling Online. Both services are available 24/7.

Nicole Lee works as a paid consultant in the alcohol and other drug sector. She has previously been awarded grants by state and federal governments, National Health and Medical Research Council and other public funding bodies for alcohol and other drug research. She is a Board member of drug checking organisation The Loop Australia. She is CEO at Hello Sunday Morning, which receives funding from the Australian government.

– ref. Is meth use really going up? Let’s look at the evidence behind the latest scary headlines – https://theconversation.com/is-meth-use-really-going-up-lets-look-at-the-evidence-behind-the-latest-scary-headlines-225657

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stanislav Roudavski, Senior Lecturer in Digital Architectural Design, The University of Melbourne

When we make roads, houses or farmland, we often find large old trees in the way. Our response is often to lop off offending branches or even cut the tree down.

This is a bad idea. The more we learn about large old trees, the more we realise their fundamental importance to birds, mammals, insects, plants and other inhabitants. More than 300 species of Australian birds and mammals need large old trees to live.

Why focus on mature trees? It’s because they have many features that younger trees simply don’t have: cracks, hollows, dead branches, peeling bark and large quantities of nectar and seeds. The limbs and leaves that fall on the ground make excellent homes for many small creatures.

Our new research sheds light on the importance of such grand old trees for birds. We used lidar (scanning using lasers) to map small, medium and large tree crowns in unprecedented detail. On average, we found large old trees had 383 metres of the horizontal or dead branches preferred by birds, while medium trees had very little and young trees none. Some old trees had almost 2 kilometres of branches.

Why are branches so important?

If we think of long, overhanging branches, chances are we may think “threat”. Some large trees can drop limbs without warning, although some arborists have pointed out the threat is overstated. To reduce the risk, councils and land managers may remove the limbs of large old trees.

But if you cut down a 300-year-old river red gum, you can’t simply replace it with a sapling of the same species. It will take centuries for the sapling to take up the same ecological role as its predecessor.

In our research, we mapped more than 100,000 branches from many millions of laser samples and recorded how birds use branches through years of field observations.

Read more:
The illegal killing of 265 trees on Sydney’s North Shore is not just vandalism. It’s theft on a grand scale

When we spot a bird using a branch, we can safely infer the bird has chosen it for a reason, whether resting, socialising, feeding, hunting or nesting.

What our data shows is that not all branches are equal. Birds find it easier to perch on horizontal or slightly inclined branches. Branches with few or no leaves offer clear vantage points for birds to land, hunt or see predators. You may have noticed crows and currawongs choosing dead branches for these reasons.

As trees mature, their branches begin to grow horizontally. Some branches may die due to lightning strikes, fire, wind damage, or attacks by insects or fungi, while the rest of the tree continues living. These long-term patterns of growth, decay and random events are necessary to produce the horizontal and dead branches prized by birds. For a large eucalypt, that process can take up to 200 years.

Mapping the canopy with lasers

Until recently, it’s been hard to map the tree canopy. Traditional methods rely on researchers visually assessing this vital habitat. But we know eye observations don’t do well at capturing parts of trees such as branches.

That’s where lidar comes in. Lidar sends out laser pulses, which bounce back when they hit objects. By recording the time taken for the light to return, we can build very detailed three-dimensional models. It’s a little like echolocation, but using light rather than sound.

This laser-scanning technology has been used in the jungles of Central America to find the ruins of lost Mayan cities. But it can do much more.

In forests, lidar is now increasingly used to estimate how dense the tree cover is, and how variable. This useful data feeds into how we assess a forest’s ability to store carbon, how much timber is present, and the current fire risk. We can even use it to spot animal pathways.

To get the canopy detail we wanted, we used lidar on the ground rather than from the air, and processed the data with algorithms that can recognise and describe about 90% of branches in even the largest trees.

We mapped trees in an area near Canberra. We chose this area because it represents the plight of temperate eucalypt woodlands, which have shrunk by up to 99% since European colonisation.

Read more:
An act of God, or just bad management? Why trees fall and how to prevent it

What should we do?

The very things that make branches good real estate for birds can make them seem dangerous or aesthetically displeasing to us. We tend to cut dead or long, horizontal branches and leave the living or more upright ones. But for birds, this is a disaster as many cannot live without such branches.

Young trees are no substitutes for their older counterparts. Planting saplings or installing nest boxes cannot replicate the ecological value of large, mature trees.

We can live alongside large old trees. To reduce the chance of injury or worse from falling limbs, we could use exclusion zones, add artificial supports for branches, and install devices to catch or redirect falling limbs. We can also look at emergency solutions such as prosthetic hollows on younger trees or even artificial replicas of old trees.

We should preserve these trees wherever we can and aim to keep them intact with their complex crowns and dead branches. We should also make sure there is a pipeline of young and medium trees to make sure there will be old trees in the future.

Read more:
An act of God, or just bad management? Why trees fall and how to prevent it

Stanislav Roudavski has received relevant funding from the Australian Research Council and the ACT Parks and Conservation.

Alex Holland has received relevant funding from the Australian Research Council and the ACT Parks and Conservation Service.

Jason Thompson receives funding from The Australian Research Council and National Health and Medical Research Association.

Philip Gibbons receives funding from the Environment, Planning and Sustainable Development Directorate of the ACT Government, the Natural Resources Commission, NSW Government and Riverview Projects Pty Ltd.

– ref. Large old trees are vital for Australian birds. Their long branches and hollows can’t be replaced by saplings – https://theconversation.com/large-old-trees-are-vital-for-australian-birds-their-long-branches-and-hollows-cant-be-replaced-by-saplings-225276

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Lee, Associate Professor of History, UNSW Sydney

On March 14, the National Archives of Australia (NAA) released documents from the Howard Government’s National Security Committee (NSC) of cabinet. They all relate to Australia’s entry into the Iraq War in 2003.

This tranche goes beyond the archive’s release of a selection of the records of full cabinet on January 1 2024.

So what do they tell us about the decision to send Australia to war?

Read more:
Cabinet papers 2003: Howard government sends Australia into the Iraq war

What was the National Security Committee?

Australian cabinets have usually been assisted by standing and ad hoc committees. The NSC was the peak decision-making body for national security and major foreign policy matters during the Howard government (1996 to 2007).

Its meetings were attended by relevant ministers and senior officials. These officials included the heads of the departments of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) and Defence, the Chief of the Defence Force and the head of the Office of National Assessments. Unlike other cabinet committees, decisions of the NSC did not require the endorsement of the cabinet itself.

In the release of cabinet records from 2003, discussion of Iraq was scant. This made clear that a full appreciation of the work of a federal cabinet requires including the documents and records of important cabinet committees.

For the Howard government, that was the NSC. Future releases of cabinet records from Kevin Rudd’s government might need to include the Strategic Priorities Budget Committee (SPBC) or “Gang of Four”.

The release of 2003 cabinet records in January 2024 was followed by a concerted media campaign for the full release of government records on Iraq. The prime minister intervened, ordering a review conducted by former senior public servant, Dennis Richardson. One of the review’s key recommendations concerned the National Archives. This was that its yearly proactive release of cabinet records should include those of the NSC.

What do the 2003 NSC documents tell us?

The NSC records reveal planning for Australian military involvement in Iraq was under way well before the formal cabinet decision to join President George W. Bush’s “coalition of the willing” on March 18 2003. For some historians, this will confirm Australia effectively made the decision to join the war at least as early as 2002.

In a record of a meeting on January 10 2003, the minister for defence, Robert Hill, and the defence force chief noted that some deployment of Australian Defence Force (ADF) units would be necessary within a month to meet indicative planning from US Central Command “on the likely time-frame for possible military action against Iraq”.

At the same meeting, the NSC agreed to approve specific forward deployments of ADF units from a list the committee had previously agreed on August 26 and December 4 2002. These ADF units were admittedly not to engage in any military action against Iraq unless the government expressly authorised it. But the reference to decisions to forward deploy the ADF in 2002 points to the necessity for these records to be made public.

In the meeting on January 10, Howard made clear any Australian decision formally to commit the ADF in Iraq would be referred to the full cabinet. He also noted he had “foreshadowed to the governor-general the general direction of steps under consideration by the government in relation to Iraq”.

These steps, we know, did not include Howard’s originally planned reference of the Iraq matter to the governor-general via the executive council. The decision not to do so was probably because the governor-general, Peter Hollingworth, had asked for legal advice on the war from the attorney-general.

Howard later advised Hollingworth that reference of the Iraq decision to the governor-general was unnecessary, and the ADF could be deployed under section 8 of the Defence Act.

Another of the NSC files includes the minute of March 18 2003, containing full cabinet’s authorisation of military action in Iraq. The full cabinet file had nothing else. The NSC file includes a submission from Hill, “circulated in the cabinet room on 17 and 18 March” seeking cabinet agreement on a national policy for possible military operations in Iraq.

Hill’s submission indicated that before the Australian government had received a formal request for support for Coalition operations, it had authorised the ADF to conduct “prudent contingency planning” for a range of capabilities in Iraq. US targeting strategy, Hill reported, included supporting “regime change” along with incapacitating Iraq’s “delivery of weapons of mass destruction (WMD)”.

This document illustrates the tensions between Australian and US war aims in Iraq. The paramount US objective was regime change. Australian policy was not to foster regime change, “although the Government has recognised this may be a desirable, even inevitable, outcome of military action”.

The file also includes the “memorandum of advice” constituting the legal justification for Australian participation in Iraq. The advice was authored not by the solicitor-general but by first assistant secretaries in DFAT and the Attorney-General’s Department.

When published, the memorandum was sharply criticised by legal scholars and former solicitor-general Gavan Griffith. The later release of departmental documents will permit us to see what other legal opinions on the war were held in the two departments.

Read more:
Iraq war, 20 years on: how the world failed Iraq and created a less peaceful, democratic and prosperous state

Now we need to know more

The proactive digitisation of NSC documents on Iraq is a welcome development for which the National Archives should be congratulated. It should be commended, too, for foreshadowing the release of other NSC records from 2003.

However, fuller understanding of how and why Australia went to war in Iraq requires the release of NSC documents from 2002 and 2001.

David Lee was the National Archives of Australia’s cabinet historian for the releases of records from 2002 and 2003 and is a member of Australian s for War Powers Reform.

– ref. Release of ‘missing papers’ from 2003 shines a light on how Australian troops were sent to fight the Iraq War – https://theconversation.com/release-of-missing-papers-from-2003-shines-a-light-on-how-australian-troops-were-sent-to-fight-the-iraq-war-225650

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ken Nosaka, Professor of Exercise and Sports Science, Edith Cowan University

We’re living longer than in previous generations, with one in eight Australians aged over 85. But the current gap between life expectancy (“lifespan”) and health-adjusted life expectancy (“healthspan”) is about ten years. This means many of us live with significant health problems in our later years.

To increase our healthspan, we need planned, structured and regular physical activity (or exercise). The World Health Organization recommends 150–300 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise – such as brisk walking, cycling and swimming – per week and muscle strengthening twice a week.

Yet few of us meet these recommendations. Only 10% meet the strength-training recommendations. Lack of time is one of the most common reasons.

Walking is cost-effective, doesn’t require any special equipment or training, and can be done with small pockets of time. Our preliminary research, published this week, shows there are ways to incorporate strength-training components into walking to improve your muscle strength and balance.

Read more:
Am I too old to build muscle? What science says about sarcopenia and building strength later in life

Why walking isn’t usually enough

Regular walking does not appear to work as muscle-strengthening exercise.

In contrast, exercises consisting of “eccentric” or muscle-lengthening contractions improve muscle strength, prevent muscle wasting and improve other functions such as balance and flexibility.

Typical eccentric contractions are seen, for example, when we sit on a chair slowly. The front thigh muscles lengthen with force generation.

Our research

Our previous research found body-weight-based eccentric exercise training, such as sitting down on a chair slowly, improved lower limb muscle strength and balance in healthy older adults.

We also showed walking down stairs, with the front thigh muscles undergoing eccentric contractions, increased leg muscle strength and balance in older women more than walking up stairs. When climbing stairs, the front thigh muscles undergo “concentric” contractions, with the muscles shortening.

It can be difficult to find stairs or slopes suitable for eccentric exercises. But if they could be incorporated into daily walking, lower limb muscle strength and balance function could be improved.

This is where the idea of “eccentric walking” comes into play. This means inserting lunges in conventional walking, in addition to downstairs and downhill walking.

In our new research, published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology, we investigated the effects of eccentric walking on lower limb muscle strength and balance in 11 regular walkers aged 54 to 88 years.

The intervention period was 12 weeks. It consisted of four weeks of normal walking followed by eight weeks of eccentric walking.

The number of eccentric steps in the eccentric walking period gradually increased over eight weeks from 100 to 1,000 steps (including lunges, downhill and downstairs steps). Participants took a total of 3,900 eccentric steps over the eight-week eccentric walking period while the total number of steps was the same as the previous four weeks.

Read more:
It’s OK to aim lower with your new year’s exercise resolutions – a few minutes a day can improve your muscle strength

We measured the thickness of the participants’ front thigh muscles, muscle strength in their knee, their balance and endurance, including how many times they could go from a sitting position to standing in 30 seconds without using their arms. We took these measurements before the study started, at four weeks, after the conventional walking period, and at four and eight weeks into the eccentric walking period.

We also tested their cognitive function using a digit symbol-substitution test at the same time points of other tests. And we asked participants to complete a questionnaire relating to their activities of daily living, such as dressing and moving around at home.

Finally, we tested participants’ blood sugar, cholesterol levels and complement component 1q (C1q) concentrations, a potential marker of sarcopenia (muscle wasting with ageing).

What did we find?

We found no significant changes in any of the outcomes in the first four weeks when participants walked conventionally.

From week four to 12, we found significant improvements in muscle strength (19%), chair-stand ability (24%), balance (45%) and a cognitive function test (21%).

Serum C1q concentration decreased by 10% after the eccentric walking intervention, indicating participants’ muscles were effectively stimulated.

The sample size of the study was small, so we need larger and more comprehensive studies to verify our findings and investigate whether eccentric walking is effective for sedentary people, older people, how the different types of eccentric exercise compare and the potential cognitive and mental health benefits.

But, in the meantime, “eccentric walking” appears to be a beneficial exercise that will extend your healthspan. It may look a bit eccentric if we insert lunges while walking on the street, but the more people do it and benefit from it, the less eccentric it will become.

Read more:
Health Check: in terms of exercise, is walking enough?

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

– ref. Only walking for exercise? Here’s how to get the most out of it – https://theconversation.com/only-walking-for-exercise-heres-how-to-get-the-most-out-of-it-224159

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicole Black, Associate Professor of Health Economics, Monash University

For the past few years, it has been impossible to escape the impact of inflation. Meeting our most basic needs – such as food, housing and health care – now costs significantly more, and wage increases haven’t kept up.

There are signs relief could be on the horizon. Inflation has fallen to its lowest levels since January 2022.

But Australia now also finds itself in the midst of an economic downturn, putting further pressure on households.

Read more:
You don’t have to be an economist to know Australia is in a cost of living crisis. What are the signs and what needs to change?

Rising prices have an obvious negative impact on our financial health. But they can also have a profound effect on our physical and mental wellbeing, which is often overlooked.

Australians may continue to feel the health effects of high inflation for quite some time.

It’s costing more to live well

Between March 2021 and March 2023, the price of goods and services rose substantially, marking a period of high inflation.

Worryingly, the prices of basic needs that are important for staying healthy – nutritious food, health care, housing and utilities – rose between 11% and 36%.

Who is affected the most?

Higher prices on essentials are virtually impossible to dodge, but they impact certain groups of people more than others.

Wealthier households have managed their higher expenses by cutting back on discretionary spending and dipping into savings.

However, lower income households spend a much larger portion of their income on housing and other essentials.

Without a savings buffer, these households experience severe financial strain and poor health outcomes.

Financial stress affects our health

Our research shows that high inflation has a range of effects on people’s health.

These effects fall into three main groups: material hardship, psychosocial, and behavioural.

1. Material hardship

People facing material hardship can’t meet their basic needs because they can’t afford to pay for them.

Material hardship can present itself in a variety of ways:

• food insecurity – not getting adequate nutrition
• energy poverty – struggling to pay for electricity and gas
• deferred health care – putting off medical treatment
• housing insecurity – struggling to find a stable place to live.

Between August 2022 and February 2023, when inflation hit its highest levels in 33 years, over half (53%) of surveyed Australians reported struggling to afford their basic needs.

Finding ourselves in this situation can have far-reaching implications for our health.

For example, food insecurity is linked to an increased risk of poor nutrition, obesity and chronic illness, as households facing cost-of-living pressures shift towards cheaper, lower-quality food options.

Energy poverty is linked to physical and mental health problems as people struggle to keep warm in wintertime, and cool in the summer.

Delaying health care increases the risk of facing severe health problems, staying in hospital for longer, and being admitted to the emergency department. This isn’t just worse for individuals, it’s also far more costly for our health care system.

2. Psychosocial effects

Psychosocial effects are the ways in which cost-of-living pressures impact our mind and social relationships.

Difficulties in meeting our basic needs are strongly associated with increased levels of psychological distress, including symptoms of anxiety and depression.

This impact can worsen over time if individuals experience sustained financial stress.

By undermining our ability to work well, the psychosocial effects of prolonged financial stress can initiate a “vicious cycle”, leading to reduced productivity and lower earnings.

Financial stress can also have a detrimental impact on spousal relationships, which can affect the mental health of other household members such as children.

3. Behavioural effects

Cost-of-living pressures can also cause a number of changes in the way we behave.

For many, these pressures have become a reason to work longer hours and gain additional income.

Last year, Australians collectively worked 4.6% longer, an extra 86 million hours.

But working longer hours reduces people’s overall health, especially among parents of young children facing greater time constraints.

It also leaves less time for activities that help to keep people healthy, such as getting regular exercise and cooking healthy meals.

How can policymakers respond?

In theory, the Reserve Bank of Australia’s primary tool for combating inflation – raising interest rates – should help. By reducing aggregate spending in the economy, it is designed to put downward pressure on prices.

But by bluntly increasing the cost of borrowing, it also puts significant short-term financial pressure on both lower-income mortgage holders and renters.

Better acknowledgement of this fact, and of inflation’s broader impact on people’s physical and mental health, would be a great start.

When formulating policy responses to high inflation, governments could factor health and wellbeing impacts into their assessment of the trade-offs between alternative policy responses.

This could help minimise any policy’s long-term negative health consequences and its impact on the health care system.

Policymakers could also focus on making sure affordable and timely access to health care, especially mental health support, is made available to those most vulnerable to cost-of-living pressures.

This work was funded by the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation.

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

– ref. Undernourished, stressed and overworked: cost-of-living pressures are taking a toll on Australians’ health – https://theconversation.com/undernourished-stressed-and-overworked-cost-of-living-pressures-are-taking-a-toll-on-australians-health-223625

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Griffiths, Deputy Program Director, Budgets and Government, Grattan Institute

The federal government is in the process of abolishing a powerful independent body that reviews government decisions on everything from child support to migration status. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) is being replaced by a new body, the Administrative Review Tribunal (ART), at least in part because of concerns about political stacking.

Appointments to the AAT represent one of the most egregious examples of political stacking in Australia in recent years. However, there is currently no guarantee the new body won’t succumb to the same fate.

To build public confidence in the ART, the government must ensure a best-practice appointments process, at arm’s length from political interference.

Read more:
Nowhere to hide: the significance of national cabinet not being a cabinet

Political appointments undermined the AAT

Appointments to the AAT were prestigious, powerful and very well paid (full-time members were paid between $207,310 and $530,630 per year). This made the tribunal an attractive target for political appointments – a nice job for a mate, a place to “park talent”, or perhaps a chance to return a favour.

In 2022, Grattan Institute research showed a staggering 20% of the AAT’s 320 tribunal members had a direct political connection to the government that appointed them. It is unlikely such a high proportion of former politicians, political advisers and party officials would emerge from a completely merit-based recruitment process.

Political appointments to the AAT grew in recent years, as the chart below shows. Many of these appointments were made in the lead-up to the 2019 and 2022 federal elections.

Political appointments to the AAT have increased in recent years

Politicisation of appointments to the AAT undermined the independence of this important expert body. Administrative merits review provides a critical check on government decisions to ensure they are right in all circumstances – recognising that routine government decisions can have a significant impact on people’s lives. Independence is vital to ensure public confidence in these decisions.

The new body must be squeaky clean

The government has decided to cut its losses and start again – creating a whole new tribunal.

In announcing this decision in December 2022, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said:

The AAT’s public standing has been irreversibly damaged as a result of the actions of the former government over the last nine years.

Given the government’s concerns about politicisation of the AAT, one would expect a best-practice appointments process for the new body. But the government’s bill to establish the ART leaves a lot of wriggle room on appointments.

A best-practice appointments process

A 2022 Grattan Institute report recommended a better appointments process for all public boards, tribunals and statutory appointments (as shown below).

A better process for public appointments

Key recommendations are:

• all public board, tribunal and statutory appointments should be advertised, along with the selection criteria for each position

• an independent panel should do the shortlisting

• the minister should choose from the shortlist, or redefine and republish the selection criteria, but should not directly select any candidate not shortlisted

• a new public appointments commissioner should oversee the process and report to parliament.

The ART bill implements some elements of this process. Notably, it requires all positions to be advertised. But other elements are incomplete or absent.

The bill allows for a minister to establish an assessment panel but does not require an independent panel.

The minister must be “satisfied” a candidate “was assessed as suitable” through a “merit-based” process. “Merit-based” is defined in the bill, but not who makes the assessment.

And the new appointments process lacks the oversight of a public appointments commissioner who could report to parliament and provide further information on the process when questions inevitably rise about an appointment.

Read more:
The fix is in: how to restore public faith in government appointments

What should happen now

The government will need to negotiate to get its bill through the Senate, and a Senate committee is considering the bill.

The Coalition, Greens and cross-benchers in the Senate should be calling for a best-practice appointments process to ensure the ART doesn’t suffer its predecessor’s fate.

And if Labor is serious about cleaning up jobs for mates, it should look much further than the AAT. My research shows political appointments are common across many powerful, prestigious and well-paid public boards.

A best-practice appointments process for all public board, tribunal and statutory appointments would reduce jobs for mates, improve our institutions and ultimately enhance Australia’s political culture.

The Grattan Institute began with contributions to its endowment of $15 million from each of the Federal and Victorian Governments, $4 million from BHP Billiton, and $1 million from NAB. In order to safeguard its independence, Grattan Institute’s board controls this endowment. The funds are invested and contribute to funding Grattan Institute’s activities. Grattan Institute also receives funding from corporates, foundations, and individuals to support its general activities as disclosed on its website.

– ref. The federal government’s new Administrative Review Tribunal must avoid the pitfalls of ‘jobs for mates’ – https://theconversation.com/the-federal-governments-new-administrative-review-tribunal-must-avoid-the-pitfalls-of-jobs-for-mates-225663

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kelly McWilliam, Associate Professor of Communication and Media, University of Southern Queensland

Ben Feldman leads Stan Original’s new 12-episode series Population: 11 as Andy, a hapless American banker who travels to a tiny, outback town of 12 in search of his estranged father Hugo, played by Darren Gilshenan.

Inevitably, things do not go to plan.

Upon his arrival at Bidgeegud – a town of “Outback UFO” tours with “guaranteed sightings”, a zoo comprised of a single crocodile, and a pub where the priest holds confessional – Andy soon discovers Hugo has gone missing. His subsequent search for clues is helped by fellow outsider Cassie (Perry Mooney).

The pair progressively uncover the innumerable secrets of the town, one suspicious resident at a time.

A fair go (at humour), mate

Population: 11 is a comedic crime-thriller created by Phil Lloyd, perhaps best known for his writing on 2014 miniseries The Moodys and 2016-17 series Here Come the Habibs!

It draws on the same heavy-handed comedy featured in Lloyd’s previous exploits. As an example, the Chinese restaurant in Bidgeegud sells “camel-toe pies”.

But most heavy-handed is the show’s revelling in Aussie stereotypes. Self-centred Andy is frustrated that “everything bites” after kicking a termite’s nest. He criticises the only person trying to help him in a mock Australian accent, and lashes out at the “dingo dollars or whatever you people call your money”.

Equally, the locals tell Andy “Americans always want something” and later on say “bloody yanks think you can buy everyone off”.

Australia through the eyes of international leads

Australian-based streamer Stan is arguably best known for its Australian content and local audience.

But Population: 11 appears to be part of an emerging trend of offering Australian content from an international lead’s perspective: think The Tourist (led by Jamie Dornan), Gold (led by Zac Efron) or Wolf Like Me (led by Josh Gad).

The push for international talent has long been an important strategy to draw wider audiences to local content, but it sits uncomfortably when this content is so heavily based – at least in places – on Australian stereotypes.

That said, after what is perhaps an inauspicious start, Population: 11’s finale offers a genuinely satisfying conclusion. It ties up a scatter-gun of loose ends, allows the charismatic Feldman to relax into a more fully realised version of Andy, and emphasises what wasn’t always obvious: this is a story about belonging.

Throughout its 12 half-hour episodes, one of the show’s strengths is its talented crew. Directors Helena Brooks and Trent O’Donnell work alongside a veteran supporting cast.

This cast includes the always-entertaining Katrina Milosevic as highly sexed local cop Geraldine, Stephen Curry as general store owner Noel, Tony Briggs as Jimmy the priest and Chai Hansen as station hand Gareth.

Lost in … Larrimah?

If the premise of Population: 11 sounds somewhat familiar, it’s because it was reportedly “inspired” by the 2017 disappearance of Patrick “Paddy” Moriarty and his dog Kellie from the remote, 11-person town of Larrimah in the Northern Territory.

While neither Moriarty nor Kellie has been found, the coroner concluded “Paddy was killed in the context of and likely due to the ongoing feud he had with his nearest neighbours”.

Moriarty’s disappearance has been touted as Australia’s own “Tiger King” tale, after being made the subject of Kylie Stevenson and Caroline Graham’s Walkey Award-winning podcast Lost in Larrimah (2018), a subsequent book titled Larrimah (2021) and HBO documentary Last Stop Larrimah (2023).

While there are clear links with Population: 11’s central mystery, quirky interpersonal drama and outback town of misfits, the show is otherwise only loosely related to the Larrimah mystery. Population: 11’s opening scene, for instance, shows Hugo seemingly being abducted by aliens.

Screening the Kimberly

Where Larrimah is more than 400 kilometres south-east of the Northern Territory capital Darwin, Population: 11 was filmed in Derby and the wider Kimberley region of Western Australia. Strikingly beautiful landscapes feature throughout the series.

Stan partnered with Hollywood studio Lionsgate and Jungle Entertainment to film in the region, making it one of the first Stan Original series to be filmed in the state. The other is the upcoming series Invisible Boys.

The combined effect of its cinematography, real-life inspiration and genuinely likeable cast make Population: 11 – even when it stumbles – an engaging view. I hope it encourages Stan to bring more work to the region, and to other Australian regions it has yet to visit. Because local content is always worth encouraging.

Population: 11 premieres on Stan on March 14.

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

– ref. Larrimah-inspired series Population: 11 is a charming watch – if a tad heavy on the Aussie cliches – https://theconversation.com/larrimah-inspired-series-population-11-is-a-charming-watch-if-a-tad-heavy-on-the-aussie-cliches-225173

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Petra Butler, Amo Matua–Executive Dean, Faculty of Law, University of Canterbury

The conviction of Joseph Matamata in 2020 on ten counts of human trafficking and 13 counts of slavery was a watershed moment in recognising modern slavery is not just a foreign problem.

Some three years later, an Immigration New Zealand investigation into migrant worker exploitation again highlighted some extremely precarious working conditions.

Rest breaks, minimum wage rates, written agreements and proper leave provisions simply don’t exist for those caught on the wrong side of the employment divide.

And yet New Zealand still has no specific legislation designed to deal with the problem. The Modern Slavery Reporting Bill drafted by the previous Labour government last year has been sitting in limbo since the election.

Having initially signalled support for the bill, the workplace relations and safety minister, Brooke van Velden, said earlier this year that Cabinet was “yet to make decisions” about its progress.

While it’s hard to predict the bill’s eventual fate, overseas it has been mainly centre-left governments that have driven comparable laws. Conservative governments have been less supportive.

Problems with the bill

As it stands, the draft Modern Slavery Reporting Bill would require all kinds of commercial entities to take reasonable action if they become aware of modern slavery or worker exploitation in their domestic operations and supply chains.

Businesses with NZ$20 million–$50 million in annual revenue would also have to disclose the steps they are taking to address modern slavery. Businesses with annual revenues above $50 million would have to do due diligence to prevent, mitigate and remedy modern slavery and worker exploitation.

Read more:
Previous governments blocked it, but anti-slavery law should now be an urgent priority for New Zealand

The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) defines worker exploitation as “[n]on-minor breaches of employment standards in New Zealand”.

But the bill faces more than just political uncertainty. Even if it became law, many New Zealand businesses would fall below the $20 million and $50 million thresholds.

In other words, they would remain unaffected by the reporting and due diligence requirements in the bill. Given worker exploitation happens just as much in smaller businesses, such a law would only address one part of the problem.

NZ absent from international discussion

Those concerns aside, if the bill (or a version of it) was passed, New Zealand would join many other nations (including the UK, France and Germany) with laws to hold corporations liable for human rights abuses. Australia has recently completed a statutory review of its 2018 Modern Slavery Act.

The European Union has also suggested a draft directive on human rights due diligence for corporations. Member states would be obliged to legislate to implement the directive.

Read more:
More forced marriages and worker exploitation – why Australia needs an anti-slavery commissioner

Beyond national and regional regulation, there are the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. But while these enjoy close to universal acceptance by nations and corporations, they rely mainly on voluntary efforts by businesses to exercise human rights due diligence.

Dissatisfied with reliance on soft law, a growing number of countries have been advocating for an international treaty on business and human rights. Under the auspices of the UN Human Rights Council, a working group has been developing a draft proposal for such a treaty.

In a nutshell, countries that ratified it would commit themselves to implementing national legislation to establish human rights due diligence for corporations and their subsidiaries. New Zealand has so far been absent from these discussions.

Read more:
Here’s what businesses and consumers can do to tackle modern slavery in supply chains

Filling the gap

Without bespoke modern slavery law, concerns over worker exploitation in New Zealand can be brought under OECD guidelines via the National Contact Point for Responsible Business Conduct (NCP), overseen by MBIE.

The NCP will examine complaints and may facilitate mediation. It publishes key findings (preserving confidentiality of the parties) and may follow up after a year. But the OECD complaint mechanism offers little to victims of modern slavery compared to the remedies available under real anti-slavery legislation in those jurisdictions that have it.

In the absence of a local law, however, the NCP process would at least shine a light on problems in New Zealand and encourage the adoption of best practice by foreign and local multinational businesses.

Unfortunately, since its establishment in 2002, the NCP has received only six complaints. Of these, only three were resolved, and only one resulted in a facilitated agreement. More to the point, none of the complaints involved an incident of modern slavery.

As the OECD noted in its 2023 peer review of New Zealand, there is a low awareness of the due diligence requirements and available compensation for violations of modern slavery guidelines.

But, in the absence of purpose-built modern slavery legislation, it can only be hoped the OECD guidelines and complaints mechanism will be used more to fill this gap in New Zealand’s commitment to ethical business and human rights.

The author acknowledges Pierre Thielbörger, Professor of German Public Law and Public International Law at Ruhr University Bochum, whose recent lecture at Victoria University of Wellington inspired this article.

Petra Butler is a member of the NCP Liaison Group, MBIE.

– ref. NZ urgently needs modern anti-slavery law – why is the legislation sitting in limbo? – https://theconversation.com/nz-urgently-needs-modern-anti-slavery-law-why-is-the-legislation-sitting-in-limbo-225643

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian McCallum, Discipline Lead – Engineering, University of the Sunshine Coast

As the days shorten, many of us, particularly in Australia’s south-east, are looking forward to cooler times, and perhaps the allure of snow on the horizon. In the past week many in this region experienced their warmest days for over a century. What does this bode for times to come?

Research released overnight suggests ski areas in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand will soon have much less snow due to climate change. German researcher Veronika Mitterwallner and her colleagues show average annual snow-cover days may decline by 78% in the Australian Alps and 51% in the Southern Alps of Aotearoa New Zealand (under a high-emissions scenario) by 2071–2100. Worldwide, they found 13% of ski areas will lose all natural snow cover by the end of the century.

It’s often said Australia gets more snow than Switzerland, though the evidence says otherwise. The fact remains that the Australian Alps cover a large area, more than 12,000km, with a third or more covered in snow at peak times. So these changes will have a broad impact on local economies and threaten fragile alpine ecosystems.

How did the study make these findings?

Mitterwallner’s team used a high-resolution climate data set for the global land surface area to identify the annual number of natural snow-cover days. Then, they projected those data under three emissions scenarios, and looked at historical (1950-2010), present (2011-2040), immediate future (2041-2070) and near future (2071-2100) data to examine changes over time.

Under most modelled emission scenarios, they found the annual number of snow-cover days will greatly decrease worldwide. For Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand, in particular, they found the average number will decrease by 78% and 51% respectively. These were the two regions with the greatest losses of snow.

However, under a low-emissions scenario, the good news is no regions will fall below an average of 100 snow-cover days a year. This is historically the minimum number of days a ski resort needs in seven out of ten winters to remain viable (cover must be at least 30–50cm).

How will we adapt to the loss of snow?

Will the way we use our alpine areas have to change permanently? Many resorts have already pivoted to activities such as mountain biking that don’t rely on snow. Skiing may be off the agenda – tennis anyone?

The prognosis of such research has driven the formation of groups such as Protect Our Winters. The mission of the Australian section is to help Australia’s outdoor community protect the integrity of our unique alpine environment and lifestyle from climate change.

Beyond Australia, New York recently had its highest snowfall in two years. Across the United States in general, though, they just experienced the warmest winter ever.

What is going on? And what might this new research mean, particularly for Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand?

These predictions, for almost all emissions scenarios, do not bode well for the skiers among us. More importantly, as many communities in the Himalaya are finding out, snow is not just a recreational “nice to have”. It’s a life-source for alpine communities, both human and non-human, and all those that depend on rivers sustained by snow melt around the globe.

Perhaps a greater concern in our region is the potential for ecological damage as resorts seek to increase ski slope metreage in areas that remain snow-covered. Expanding resort footprints is not a sustainable approach to a problem that probably won’t be going away.

Is artificial snow an option?

So how might we support the goals of Protect Our Winters? What alternatives do we have? How about artificial snow, would that work?

As part of my PhD studies many years ago, at the University of Cambridge’s Scott Polar Research Institute, I made masses of “polar snow” in a cold room (while effectively destroying the air-conditioning units at the same time). Artificial snow can be created quite readily, assuming enough water is at hand.

Artificial snow will have a different form and its density and microstructure will differ, potentially affecting longevity. (You can read more about snow mechanics here.)

But once on the ground, artificial snow, like natural snow, is subject to the vagaries of our weather. If the sun is shining and the day is hot, snow won’t last long, regardless of whether it’s natural or artificial.

There’s a lot to think on here as we contemplate what our world and our region might look like when skiing and snow-covered ground become no more than a memory in some areas. Yes, our recreational activities might change as we wonder whether it’s worth waxing up the skis this year – or is it time to break out the racquets? The ongoing survival of many communities might be jeopardised as a result.

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

– ref. Tennis anyone? Bad news for skiers as snow season could shrink by 78% this century – https://theconversation.com/tennis-anyone-bad-news-for-skiers-as-snow-season-could-shrink-by-78-this-century-225581

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julia Cook, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, University of Newcastle

This article is part of The Conversation’s series examining the housing crisis. Read the other articles in the series here.

Young Australians who would have once been locked out of home ownership are increasingly relying on the so-called Bank of Mum and Dad to get a deposit or to guarantee a bank loan.

The Bank of Mum and Dad has become so large as a home loan enabler that the Productivity Commission says if it was an actual bank it would be somewhere between the fifth and ninth biggest mortgage lender.

While not all home loan assistance from parents is in the form of gifts, the Productivity Commission says the number of children receiving them from parents has doubled in the past 20 years.

Although this is helping young Australians get into the housing market (perhaps at the expense of pushing up housing prices), it is far from clear whether such financial assistance works well for the parents providing the support.

Transfers of $5,000 to $500,000

Financial elder abuse is the third most common form of elder abuse in Australia. The perpetrators of elder abuse are most likely to be adult children, with sons more likely to commit financial elder abuse than daughters.

Yet mortgage brokers, financial advisers and even government officials appear to be encouraging older people to provide financial help to adult children wanting to buy homes without considering whether there might be consequences for the parents.

To find out how intergenerational financial assistance works, we conducted interviews with 52 parents and adult children who have recently given or received financial assistance with home ownership.

The amounts transferred ranged from A$5,000 to $500,000. The average was $75,000. Some amounts were much higher.

The common themes in our interviews were a lack of clarity about whether the payments were gifts or loans, the mischaracterisation of loans as gifts, and undocumented agreements entered into without any documentation or legal advice.

‘Gifts’ offered without legal advice

Most lenders want older Australians to provide a “gift letter” stating the money they are providing to their adult child is a gift rather than a loan.

This is because a loan would reduce the amount the adult child could borrow from their lender, which may make it harder for them to get a mortgage.

Parents may feel obligated to provide “gift letters” even when they and their adult children regard the transfer as a loan.

There are no requirements for parents to obtain independent legal advice before signing such a letter and no cooling-off period.

Few of the parents we spoke to sought legal or financial advice.

Travis, aged 58 – who provided $50,000 to his son – told us:

No, didn’t need to. But I guess we didn’t think about it. We didn’t consider doing that, no. But it’s family, so it’s not needed, I don’t think.

Rosa, who became a guarantor to her daughter and also provided $10,000 to her son, said she “didn’t think about it too much”.

I just thought, why not, I guess. It’s no worries to me, and it really helps them along. […] I didn’t think about it too much because it was a simple process, really. And you do anything for your children.

Little protection from the banks

Australia’s Banking Code of Practice does little to encourage banks to support parents who provide financial assistance with home ownership to their children.

While it commits banks to “taking extra care” with customers who are experiencing elder abuse, the only documentation usually required for transfers from parents is a statutory declaration (gift letter) written by the parent to the adult child’s lending institution, which may be a different bank.

The code acknowledges that older people’s banks may only become aware of their circumstances “if you tell us about them”.

Shame, and the desire to avoid getting their adult children into trouble, make it unlikely that older people will report financial abuse to their bank.

Loans become unintended gifts

Many of the parents we talked to found it difficult and uncomfortable to talk about money. As a result, the parents and adult children often had different understandings of whether the assistance was a gift or a loan, and when (if at all) it would be repaid even when it was a loan.

This ambiguity extended to the parents’ financial positions, with most of the adult children in our study having very little understanding of whether their parent(s) could afford to assist them without compromising their own financial wellbeing.

John (aged 59) told us he gave $150,000 to his daughter and her partner to help them purchase a property.

When we asked his daughter Caroline (aged 32) whether the money was a gift or a loan, she responded, “a loan, yeah, definitely a loan.” However, when asked whether she had begun repayments she responded:

Not yet. I’m not quite sure, but I think we will work it out when it comes to it.

When we asked John the same question, he responded:

Yes, that’s a good question. We said loan, but I’m never going to see that money [laughs]. Maybe a little bit of it, but not the full amount. Definitely not. But we’ll see.

John’s decision to present the assistance as a loan, despite the expectation it would not be repaid in full, was echoed by multiple participants.

Although their reasoning varied, in general, donors who framed the assistance as a loan did so to either manage their children’s feelings of entitlement, to help their children develop “good” saving habits, or to try to avoid their children feeling dependent or infantilised.

The reasoning behind differing views of whether money is a gift or a loan is less important than the more general point that financial assistance of this type is often not defined clearly from the outset.

Little legal protection

Legally, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, funds provided by Australian parents to their children are presumed to be gifts.

This unfortunate presumption carries the assumption older adults’ money will be “passed down” to their children, representing this as the default state of affairs in the absence of evidence otherwise.

It means older adults’ money is represented as not entirely their own, and puts the burden of proof on them to prove that what they had understood to be a loan was a loan – a task made more difficult by the existence of a “gift letter” and the potential of financial elder abuse.

Our study does not find that intergenerational financial assistance is inherently exploitative, but it does point to risks – risks made more likely by the lack of protection offered to parents by banks and the legal system, their understandable desire to help their adult children, and the presumption that financial transfers are “gifts”.

Read more:
It’s not just housing: the ‘bank of mum and dad’ is increasingly helping fund the lives of young Australians

Julia Cook receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Peta Cook receives funding from National Health and Medical Research Council. She was previously a member of the Board of Directors for Council on the Ageing (COTA) Tasmania, and is a current member of Elder Abuse Action Australia (EAAA) and the Australian Sociological Association (TASA).

– ref. The ‘Bank of Mum and Dad’ is exposing older Australians to the risk of financial abuse – https://theconversation.com/the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-is-exposing-older-australians-to-the-risk-of-financial-abuse-224361

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nathan Kilah, Senior Lecturer in Chemistry, University of Tasmania

Vinegar and baking soda are staples in the kitchen. Many of us have combined them in childhood scientific experiments: think fizzy volcanoes and geysers.

But people also frequently mix vinegar and baking soda to produce a reportedly effective household cleaner. Unfortunately, the chemistry behind the bubbly reaction doesn’t support the cleaning hype. The fizzy action is essentially a visual “placebo”, formed by the combination of an acid and a base.

So, how does it work, and is it worth using these chemicals for cleaning? To understand all this, it helps to know a little more about chemistry.

Read more:
A new TikTok trend has people drinking toxic borax. An expert explains the risks – and how to read product labels

What’s an acid?

Foods with a sour taste typically contain acids. These include citric acid in lemon juice, malic acid in apples, lactic acid in yoghurt and phosphoric acids in soft drinks. Most vinegars contain around 4–10% acetic acid, the rest is water and small amounts of flavour chemicals.

There are other naturally occurring acids, such as formic acid in ant bites and hydrochloric acid in our stomachs. Industrially, sulfuric acid is used in mineral processing, nitric acid for fertiliser manufacturing and the highly potent hydrofluoric acid is used to etch glass.

All of these acids share similar properties. They can all release hydrogen ions (positively charged atoms) into water. Depending on their potency, acids can also dissolve minerals and metals through various chemical reactions.

This is why vinegar is an excellent cleaner for showers or kettles – it can react with and dissolve mineral deposits like limescale.

Other common acidic cleaning ingredients are oxalic acid, used for revitalising timber decks, hydrochloric acid in concrete and masonry cleaners, and sulfamic acid in potent toilet cleaners.

What’s a base?

In chemistry, bases – the opposite of acids in many ways – can bind, rather than release hydrogen ions. This can help lift and dissolve insoluble grime into water. Bases can also break apart fat molecules.

Baking soda (also known as sodium hydrogen carbonate, sodium bicarbonate, or bicarb) is a relatively weak base. Stronger common bases include sodium carbonate (washing soda), sodium hydroxide (lye) and ammonia.

Sodium hydroxide is a potent drain cleaner – its strong base properties can dissolve fats and hair. This allows blockages to be broken down and easily flushed away.

Mixing a base and an acid

Mixing vinegar and baking soda causes an immediate chemical reaction. This reaction forms water, sodium acetate (a salt) and carbon dioxide – the fizzy part.

The amount of carbon dioxide gas that is produced from baking soda is remarkable – one tablespoon (around 18 grams) can release over five litres of gas! But only if you add enough acid.

Reactions in chemistry often use equal quantities of chemical reagents. A perfect balance of acetic acid and baking soda would give you just water, carbon dioxide and sodium acetate.

But the majority of vinegar and bicarb cleaner recipes use a large excess of one or the other components. An example from TikTok for a DIY oven cleaner calls for one and a half cups of baking soda and one quarter cup of vinegar.

Crunching the numbers behind the chemical reaction shows that after the fizz subsides, over 99% of the added baking soda remains. So the active cleaning agent here is actually the baking soda (and the “elbow grease” of scrubbing).

Ovens can be cleaned much more rigorously with stronger, sodium hydroxide based cleaners (although these are also more caustic). Many modern ovens also have a self-cleaning feature, so read your product manual before reaching for a chemical cleaner of any sort.

What about the sodium acetate?

Devotees of vinegar and baking soda mixtures might be wondering if the product of the fizzy reaction, sodium acetate, is the undercover cleaning agent.

Unfortunately, sodium acetate is an even weaker base than baking soda, so it doesn’t do much to clean the surface you’re trying to scrub.

Sodium acetate is used in crystallisation-based heating packs and as a concrete sealant, but not typically as a cleaner.

Fun fact: sodium acetate can be combined with acetic acid to make a crystalline food additive called sodium diacetate. These crystals give the vinegar flavour to salt and vinegar chips without making them soggy.

Sorry to burst your bubbles

There are a few rare cases where mixing vinegar and baking soda may be useful for cleaning. This is where the bubbling has a mechanical effect, such as in a blocked drain.

But in most cases you’ll want to use either vinegar or baking soda by itself, depending on what you’re trying to clean. It will be less visually exciting, but it should get the job done.

Lastly, remember that mixing cleaning chemicals at home can be risky. Always carefully read the product label and directions before engaging in DIY concoctions. And, to be extra sure, you can find out more safety information by reading the product’s safety data sheet.

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

– ref. Vinegar and baking soda: a cleaning hack or just a bunch of fizz? – https://theconversation.com/vinegar-and-baking-soda-a-cleaning-hack-or-just-a-bunch-of-fizz-225177

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew Sussex, Associate Professor (Adj), Griffith Asia Institute; and Fellow, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University

Time for an early announcement: Vladimir Putin has won the upcoming Russian presidential election on March 15–17. It’s hardly a spoiler. Russian elections have been performative exercises in phoney democracy for many years now, and this latest round of theatre promises to be no different.

Official state analysts peg Putin’s likely support at around 75%. His only rivals are state-permitted and largely endorse both his platform and leadership. They include the Communist Party’s ageing Nikolai Kharitonov, who is polling around 4%, and Leonid Slutsky, the comparatively spry candidate from the misnamed Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (it’s actually an ultra-nationalist party), who is polling about the same.

Perhaps the most “liberal” candidate on the ballot is Vladislav Davankov, the deputy chair of the State Duma – Russia’s lower house of parliament. Davankov has called for peace talks in Ukraine “on our terms, and with no roll-back”, and his main campaign slogan is the rather vague “Yes to changes!”. He is expected to receive perhaps 5% of the vote.

As Russians obediently line up to cast what amounts to little more than a mandatory expression of fealty, the only real questions worth asking are:

• is there any semblance of opposition left?

• and what kind of leader Putin will be in his fifth full term as president?

No real opposition figures left

There is increasing evidence that Putin will become even more repressive. The Kremlin has overseen the elimination or marginalisation of any charismatic individual who might serve as a hub for popular opposition, and hence pose a threat to Putin – either on the ballot, or off it.

The death of Alexei Navalny in a Siberian prison camp certainly sent that message, underscored by the arrests of several people who attended his funeral.

But throughout Putin’s tenure, plenty of other challengers, dissidents or opponents have been executed or attacked. They include:

• Boris Nemtsov, the popular moderate politician assassinated in 2015

• Anna Politkovskaya, the human rights journalist shot dead in her apartment in 2006

• Natalya Estemirova, the anti-war activist kidnapped and killed in 2009

• Sergei Magnitsky, the lawyer who uncovered evidence of massive corruption and died after being beaten and denied medical care in 2009

• Aleksandr Litvinenko, the former intelligence agent poisoned with polonium in 2006

• Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, who were poisoned with Novichok in the United Kingdom in 2018

• and the convenient plane crash that killed Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin last year.

Other potential challengers have been ostracised or imprisoned. Nemtsov’s protégé, Vladimir Kara-Murza, for example, was arrested in 2022 and subsequently imprisoned for 25 years.

And so far this year, the Kremlin has jailed the elderly human rights campaigner Oleg Orlov for “discrediting the military”; issued an arrest warrant for the exiled Russian author Boris Akunin for being a “foreign agent”; and labelled the exiled Russian chess grand master Garry Kasparov an “extremist and terrorist”.

In just the last day, Navalny’s former chief of staff, Leonid Volkov, has been hospitalised in Lithuania after being sprayed in the face with tear gas and beaten repeatedly with a hammer.

Elections mean very little

The Kremlin has persisted with the charade of free elections throughout Putin’s rule, but with recent changes to this year’s ballot, those who have proven too popular have found themselves disqualified.

The ex-TV journalist Yekatarina Duntsova, for example, was barred from running due to “violations” in the paperwork for her candidacy. She had been widely scorned as a Kremlin stooge, even though she planned to run on an anti-war platform.

So, too, was Boris Nadezhdin, who attracted significant attention for his pledge to end the war in Ukraine peacefully. But he also ran afoul of Russia’s Central Electoral Commission, which alleged he had failed to collect the necessary 100,000 signatures to qualify as a candidate.

In the end, the political pantomime around who gets to contest Russia’s elections really doesn’t matter.

There has been ample evidence of systemic electoral fraud in Russia for years. This includes ballot stuffing, “carouselling” (bussing voters to different booths to vote multiple times) and simple vote-rigging.

As early as 2011, United Russia – Putin’s de facto party of power in the parliament – was winning an unlikely 99% of the vote in Chechnya.

In the 2018 presidential elections, millions of votes were recorded in districts that had surprisingly precise turnout figures of 85%, 90% and 95%. Some 1.5 million votes (about 2% of the total) simply appeared as “extras” after the final day of voting.

Evidently irked by repeated findings from monitors for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) about the lack of freedom in Russian elections, the Kremlin simply denied them access in 2024.

Putin the autocrat

It is often said that a marker of authoritarian governments is they generally tend to tolerate dissent. Autocratic governments, on the other hand, do not. That’s because they are the sole custodians of political power. Anyone seeking to challenge that is – by definition – an enemy.

Putin is embracing the autocratic type in his next stanza as president. That makes him incredibly dangerous. Now 71 years old, he has deliberately not anointed a successor, but has bound the fortunes of Russia’s leadership cadres to his own via political blood pacts.

Read more:
What can we expect from six more years of Vladimir Putin? An increasingly weak and dysfunctional Russia

He has created a polity comprised of serfs who compete for his attention, among whom he can place no trust. As the embodiment of Russia’s political gravity, his expectations of utter loyalty will increase. Every failure and setback will only serve to deepen a despotic determination to nourish his delusions of grandeur.

As Russia’s electoral circus unfolds in slow motion, we are already witnessing signs of this. In recent days, former president Dmitry Medvedev prominently displayed a future map of Ukraine. The majority of it was swallowed by Russia, with Medvedev noting that “historic parts of Russia need to come home”.

Around 40% of government spending is now going to the war in Ukraine. And alarm bells have sounded in both Europe and the US that Putin’s ultimate aim is to fracture the West, either through war or the threat of it.

The only way to respond to Putin, therefore, is to resist him as vigorously as possible. After his sham election, he will preside over a regime that may exude strength, but is both fragile and brittle. Should this edifice come down, the results will be both terrible and terrifying for Russians.

But it increasingly seems that will be Putin’s legacy: not as Russia’s champion, but its wrecker.

Matthew Sussex has received funding from the Australian Research Council, the Fulbright Foundation, the Carnegie Foundation, the Lowy Institute and various Australian government departments and agencies.

– ref. Russia is about to hold another presidential election. It needn’t bother – https://theconversation.com/russia-is-about-to-hold-another-presidential-election-it-neednt-bother-225645

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Wilson, Co-founder and director of Hate & Extremism Insights Aotearoa (HEIA) and director, Master of Conflict and Terrorism Studies, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

As our research has previously revealed, the man who attacked two mosques in Christchurch in 2019, killing 51 people, posted publicly online for five years before his terrorist atrocity.

Here we provide further information about Brenton Tarrant’s posting. This article has two main goals.

First, by placing his online posting against his other online and offline activities, we gain a far more complete picture of the path to his attack.

Second, we want to show how his online community played a role in his radicalisation. This is important, as the same can happen to others immersed in that community.

In combining his online and offline activity here we do not seek to attribute blame to those who might have been expected to detect this behaviour. It is exceptionally difficult to identify terrorists online.

And yet, history is full of difficult problems that have been overcome. We use the benefit of hindsight to provide greater understanding of Tarrant’s pathway than has previously been available.

The aim is to prevent similar attacks by better understanding how such people act and how they might be detected.

Read more:
Christchurch terrorist discussed attacks online a year before carrying them out, new research reveals

Words and deeds

In the timeline below, we focus on Tarrant’s activity in 2018, following his first visit to Dunedin’s Bruce Rifle Club on December 14 2017, until his final overseas trip in October. It is for this period that we have the most comprehensive online posting history.

In 2024, we have both the benefit of hindsight and the accumulation of information relating to the attack. However, this triangulation of online and offline activities illustrates the ways those contemplating terrorist violence might act.

We can now see, for example, that Tarrant bought high-powered firearms on three occasions over a six-week period in March and April 2018. And he posted publicly twice on the online imageboard 4chan about his plans for racially motivated violence, and his veneration of a perpetrator of a similar attack.

Tarrant therefore not only “leaked” his plans for violence, he did so at the very moment he was buying weapons for it.

Read more:
The road to March 15: ‘networked white rage’ and the Christchurch terror attacks

Over 20 days in July and August, Tarrant presented to hospital with gunshot wounds, and began selling weapons online under the username Mannerheim (the name of a Finnish nationalist leader revered for defeating the communists in the country’s civil war).

He also posted publicly about his anger at the presence of mosques in South Island cities (claiming one had replaced a church). He wrote “soon” when another poster suggested setting fire to these places of worship.

A month later he attempted to sell weapons on online marketplace TradeMe, using a prominent white nationalist slogan – “14 Words” – in his username. (Strangely, this clear red flag was mentioned only once in the royal commission report on the attacks.)

TradeMe removed one of these advertisements for violating its terms of use. That caused Tarrant to move to another forum – NZ Hunting and Shooting Forums – to complain.

Read more:
Can ideology-detecting algorithms catch online extremism before it takes hold?

Extremist community

Our study has also revealed how important the 4chan community is to the radicalisation of individuals like Tarrant. In contrast to the fleeting human interaction he had with others as he travelled the world, 4chan was Tarrant’s community.

4chan’s /pol/ (politically incorrect) board became his home. Here he interacted with others over long periods, imagining he was speaking to the same people over months and years, and assuming many of them had become his friends.

We have found that, while creating a sense of belonging and community, /pol/ also works to create extremists in both direct and indirect ways.

Its anonymous nature (users are assigned a unique ID number for each thread, rather than a username) has two effects. One is well known, the other identified in our study.

First, anonymity encourages behaviour that would be absent if the poster’s identity was known. Second, anonymity is frustrating for those who wish to “be someone”, who crave respect and notoriety.

We have documented the way Tarrant (and others) strive to gain status in a discussion, only to have to start again when they move to a new thread and are given a new ID. This lack of ongoing recognition is agonising for some individuals, who go to lengths to obtain respect.

Read more:
Violent extremists are not lone wolves – dispelling this myth could help reduce violence

Anonymity and peer respect

And just like a real-world fascist movement, /pol/ venerates violent action as necessary for the vitality and regeneration of the community.

When a terrorist attack, school shooting or other violent event occurs, users celebrate these events in so-called “happening” threads. These threads are longer, more emotional and excited than any other discussions. Participants often claim the individual at the centre of the event is “/ourguy/” (a reference to the /pol/ board).

The threads are also highly anticipatory: many users believe this event will finally push society into violent chaos and race war.

These dynamics are closely connected. For those who seek recognition and status on the bulletin board, such as Tarrant, the excited attention and adoration given to those who perpetrate high-profile violence is the clearest path to the peer respect that the anonymity of the board otherwise denies them.

As harrowing as this finding is, we contend that gaining respect from their online community is in itself a crucial motivation for some perpetrators of far-right terrorism.

The nature of this extreme but easily accessible corner of the internet means any hope Tarrant was a one-off – and that this won’t happen again – is misguided.

The authors acknowledge the expert contribution of tactical and forensic linguist and independent researcher Julia Kupper. More information about our study will be released at heiaglobal.com. Our research was approved by the University of Auckland Human Participant Ethics Committee. A paper based on this study has been submitted for peer review and publication.

Chris Wilson is the director and co-founder of Hate & Extremism Insights Aotearoa (HEIA).

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

– ref. Christchurch attacks 5 years on: terrorist’s online history gives clues to preventing future atrocities – https://theconversation.com/christchurch-attacks-5-years-on-terrorists-online-history-gives-clues-to-preventing-future-atrocities-225273

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Davis, Chair of Women’s Health, Monash University

Despite decades of research, navigating menopause seems to have become harder – with conflicting information on the internet, in the media, and from health care providers and researchers.

Adding to the uncertainty, a recent series in the Lancet medical journal challenged some beliefs about the symptoms of menopause and which ones menopausal hormone therapy (also known as hormone replacement therapy) can realistically alleviate.

So what symptoms reliably indicate the start of perimenopause or menopause? And which symptoms can menopause hormone therapy help with? Here’s what the evidence says.

Remind me, what exactly is menopause?

Menopause, simply put, is complete loss of female fertility.

Menopause is traditionally defined as the final menstrual period of a woman (or person female at birth) who previously menstruated. Menopause is diagnosed after 12 months of no further bleeding (unless you’ve had your ovaries removed, which is surgically induced menopause).

Perimenopause starts when menstrual cycles first vary in length by seven or more days, and ends when there has been no bleeding for 12 months.

Read more:
Perimenopause usually begins in your 40s. How do you know if it has started?

Both perimenopause and menopause are hard to identify if a person has had a hysterectomy but their ovaries remain, or if natural menstruation is suppressed by a treatment (such as hormonal contraception) or a health condition (such as an eating disorder).

What are the most common symptoms of menopause?

Our study of the highest quality menopause-care guidelines found the internationally recognised symptoms of the perimenopause and menopause are:

• hot flushes and night sweats (known as vasomotor symptoms)
• disturbed sleep
• musculoskeletal pain
• decreased sexual function or desire
• vaginal dryness and irritation
• mood disturbance (low mood, mood changes or depressive symptoms) but not clinical depression.

However, none of these symptoms are menopause-specific, meaning they could have other causes.

In our study of Australian women, 38% of pre-menopausal women, 67% of perimenopausal women and 74% of post-menopausal women aged under 55 experienced hot flushes and/or night sweats.

But the severity of these symptoms varies greatly. Only 2.8% of pre-menopausal women reported moderate to severely bothersome hot flushes and night sweats symptoms, compared with 17.1% of perimenopausal women and 28.5% of post-menopausal women aged under 55.

So bothersome hot flushes and night sweats appear a reliable indicator of perimenopause and menopause – but they’re not the only symptoms. Nor are hot flushes and night sweats a western society phenomenon, as has been suggested. Women in Asian countries are similarly affected.

Depressive symptoms and anxiety are also often linked to menopause but they’re less menopause-specific than hot flushes and night sweats, as they’re common across the entire adult life span.

The most robust guidelines do not stipulate women must have hot flushes or night sweats to be considered as having perimenopausal or post-menopausal symptoms. They acknowledge that new mood disturbances may be a primary manifestation of menopausal hormonal changes.

The extent to which menopausal hormone changes impact memory, concentration and problem solving (frequently talked about as “brain fog”) is uncertain. Some studies suggest perimenopause may impair verbal memory and resolve as women transition through menopause. But strategic thinking and planning (executive brain function) have not been shown to change.

Who might benefit from hormone therapy?

The Lancet papers suggest menopause hormone therapy alleviates hot flushes and night sweats, but the likelihood of it improving sleep, mood or “brain fog” is limited to those bothered by vasomotor symptoms (hot flushes and night sweats).

In contrast, the highest quality clinical guidelines consistently identify both vasomotor symptoms and mood disturbances associated with menopause as reasons for menopause hormone therapy. In other words, you don’t need to have hot flushes or night sweats to be prescribed menopause hormone therapy.

Often, menopause hormone therapy is prescribed alongside a topical vaginal oestrogen to treat vaginal symptoms (dryness, irritation or urinary frequency).

However, none of these guidelines recommend menopause hormone therapy for cognitive symptoms often talked about as “brain fog”.

Despite musculoskeletal pain being the most common menopausal symptom in some populations, the effectiveness of menopause hormone therapy for this specific symptoms still needs to be studied.

Some guidelines, such as an Australian endorsed guideline, support menopause hormone therapy for the prevention of osteoporosis and fracture, but not for the prevention of any other disease.

What are the risks?

The greatest concerns about menopause hormone therapy have been about breast cancer and an increased risk of a deep vein clot which might cause a lung clot.

Oestrogen-only menopause hormone therapy is consistently considered to cause little or no change in breast cancer risk.

Read more:
Making sense of menopausal hormone therapy means understanding the benefits as well as the risks

Oestrogen taken with a progestogen, which is required for women who have not had a hysterectomy, has been associated with a small increase in the risk of breast cancer, although any risk appears to vary according to the type of therapy used, the dose and duration of use.

Oestrogen taken orally has also been associated with an increased risk of a deep vein clot, although the risk varies according to the formulation used. This risk is avoided by using estrogen patches or gels prescribed at standard doses

What if I don’t want hormone therapy?

If you can’t or don’t want to take menopause hormone therapy, there are also effective non-hormonal prescription therapies available for troublesome hot flushes and night sweats.

In Australia, most of these options are “off-label”, although the new medication fezolinetant has just been approved in Australia for postmenopausal hot flushes and night sweats, and is expected to be available by mid-year. Fezolinetant, taken as a tablet, acts in the brain to stop the chemical neurokinin 3 triggering an inappropriate body heat response (flush and/or sweat).

Unfortunately, most over-the-counter treatments promoted for menopause are either ineffective or unproven. However, cognitive behaviour therapy and hypnosis may provide symptom relief.

Read more:
Lots of women try herbs like black cohosh for menopausal symptoms like hot flushes – but does it work?

The Australasian Menopause Society has useful menopause fact sheets and a find-a-doctor page. The Practitioner Toolkit for Managing Menopause is also freely available.

Susan Davis is an NHMRC Leadership Investigator and Head of the Women’s Health Research Program Monash University. She holds research funding from the NHMRC, the MRFF and the Heart Foundation She has given educational presentations ( her own work) for Theramex, Besins Healthcare, Mayne Pharma and Abbott Laboratories and has served on Advisory Boards for Theramex, Astellas, Besins Healthcare, Mayne Pharma, Abbott Laboratories and Gedeon-Richter.

– ref. What are the most common symptoms of menopause? And which can hormone therapy treat? – https://theconversation.com/what-are-the-most-common-symptoms-of-menopause-and-which-can-hormone-therapy-treat-225174

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

Treasurer Jim Chalmers will say lower commodity prices and a softening labour market mean this year’s revenue upgrade will be modest, when he outlines on Thursday the government’s strategy for the May 14 budget.

At the same time, Chalmers will all but confirm the budget will be in the black, declaring, “We are still shooting for a second surplus”.

He also will indicated the government is likely to bank a maller proportion than prteviously of what revenue upgrade there is. In earlier budgets it banked almost all of it. This time, he says, “we’ll bank what we can” of the upgrade.

Chalmers’ first two budgets were each helped by revenue upgrades of more than $100 billion, but there won’t be any such bonanza this year.

Read more:
Grattan on Friday: Treasurer Jim Chalmers prepares a new ‘growth’ script for his third budget

“In fact we are even looking at much less than the $69 billion we booked in the latest mid-year budget update,” Chalmers will tell a Committee for Economic Development of Australia function.

On the commodities front, the iron ore price has been falling. “In the last week alone it has fallen by almost 10% due to concerns about the demand for steel in China,” Chalmers says in his address, part of which was released ahead of delivery. Earlier this week, it was trading at less than $94 a tonne.

“Its current price is around 20% cent lower than it was this far out from last year’s budget.”

Thermal coal has been on the general path Treasury assumed in the December mid-year budget update. But its present price is about a third lower than this time last year.

The strong labour market contributed a good part of the revenue upgrades of the previous budgets.

Chalmers says while the labour market remains resilient, it is softening. “So we won’t get the very substantial revenue upgrades we’ve seen from outperforming expectations here.

“At the end of last year, there were 14.2 million Australians in work – this is around 500,000 more than Treasury was forecasting at the time of the election.

“We welcome this, but we don’t expect to get such upside forecast surprises this time around.”

Chalmers says the three biggest drivers of the government’s strategy for this budget are “global uncertainty, persistent cost of living pressures, and slowing growth”.

“These pressures necessitate an approach to the third budget which is a little bit different, but not a lot different, to the first two,” he says.

“There will still be a premium on what’s responsible, affordable, meaningful and methodical.

“There will still be a primary focus, but not a sole focus, on inflation.”

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

– ref. Jim Chalmers warns budget revenue upgrades will be modest but flags expected surplus – https://theconversation.com/jim-chalmers-warns-budget-revenue-upgrades-will-be-modest-but-flags-expected-surplus-225665

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lizzie Speechley, Behavioural Ecologist, The University of Western Australia

If you’ve ever had the pleasure of encountering Australia’s iconic magpies, you know these birds are intelligent creatures. With their striking black and white plumage, loud warbling voices and complex social behaviours, magpies possess a level of avian brilliance that fascinates birders and scientists alike.

But what enables these clever birds to thrive? Are their sharp cognitive abilities innate – something coded into their genetic makeup? Or are magpie smarts more a product of their environment and social experiences?

In a new study, we shed light on the “nature versus nurture” debate – at least when it comes to avian intelligence.

Bigger social groups, smarter birds

Our study focused on Western Australian magpies, which unlike their eastern counterparts live in large, cooperative social groups all year round. We put young fledglings – and their mothers – through a test of their learning abilities.

We made wooden “puzzle boards” with holes covered by different-coloured lids. For each bird, we hid a tasty food reward under the lid of one particular colour. We also tested each bird alone, so it couldn’t copy the answer from its friends.

Through trial and error, the magpies had to figure out which colour was associated with the food prize. We knew the birds had mastered the puzzle when they picked the rewarded colour in 10 out of 12 consecutive attempts.

We tested fledglings at 100, 200 and 300 days after leaving the nest. While they improved at solving the puzzle as they developed, the cognitive performance of the young magpies showed little connection to the problem-solving prowess of their mothers.

Instead, the key factor influencing how quickly the fledglings learned to pick the correct colour was the size of their social group. Birds raised in larger groups solved the test significantly faster than those growing up in smaller social groups.

Fledglings living in groups of ten or more birds needed only about a dozen tries to consistently pick the rewarded colour. But a youngster growing up in a group of three took more than 30 attempts to learn the link between colour and food.

How the social environment shapes cognition

Why would living in a larger social group boost cognitive abilities? We think it probably comes down to the mental demands that social animals face on a daily basis, such as recognising and remembering group members, and keeping track of different relationships within a complex group.

Magpies can learn to recognise and remember humans, too. The bird populations we work with live in the wild, but they recognise us by our appearance and a specific whistle we make.

A young magpie living in a group gets plenty of mental exercise recognising and remembering numerous individuals and relationships. Working to make sense of this stream of social information may boost their ability to learn and solve problems.

Our findings go against the idea that intelligence is something innately “set” within an animal at birth, based solely on genetic inheritance. Instead, we show how cognition can be shaped by the environment, especially in the first year after leaving the nest when young magpies’ minds are still developing.

While we focused specifically on Australian magpies, the implications of our research could extend to other highly social and intelligent species.

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

– ref. The surprising key to magpie intelligence: it’s not genetic – https://theconversation.com/the-surprising-key-to-magpie-intelligence-its-not-genetic-225654