Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Encarnacao, Musician, lecturer, Western Sydney University

My default mental image of Olivia Newton-John is from the mid-1970s: long, flowing floral dresses; long, centre-parted light brown hair; big inquisitive eyes; and, when called for, an irresistible smile perfect for the cover of TV Week.

It seemed like the counterculture had passed her by.

But even in the heights of my hippie and punk-inspired (imagined, toothless) rejections of society and a perceived mainstream, I respected Olivia, a figure so ubiquitous in popular culture during my first 20 years on the planet it feels natural to call her by her first name.

There was something about her voice, her way with a song. Through her phrasing and timbre, there was always a personal appeal to her singing.

Like heatstroke in December-through-February, Olivia was part of the Australian landscape. The country felt a little less hostile for her being in it – or beamed into it from the northern hemisphere, while we claimed her as “ours”.

There was a big sister who understood and sympathised.

Read more:
Pop icon Olivia Newton-John was the rare performer whose career flourished through different phases

1. What she taught me about murder

Despite all this, Olivia did contribute to a certain loss of innocence.

Some of us are unlucky enough to encounter death personally as children; for the rest it will be a song or a TV show, a passing remark or a news item.

Newton-John’s recording of the folk ballad Banks of the Ohio was released in 1971. It concerns the protagonist luring their loved one down to the river to stab them through the heart.

I held a knife against his breast
As into my arms he pressed
He cried: My love! Don’t you murder me
I’m not prepared for eternity.

I can’t think of an earlier exposure to the idea of death, let alone murder. I associate it with the tinny sound of a portable AM radio. I have the honeyed tones of ONJ forever linked to the visceral realisation one human being could wilfully kill another.

Heavy metal and hip hop are the traditional punching bags of parents worried about harmful content. But people let their guards down around ONJ.

2. What she taught me through a cover band

Shaggin’ Wagon, a cover band of mine instigated around 1993, did what it said on the label: rocked the hell out of songs from the 1970s.

We combined relatively obscure minor chart hits – say, Silver Lady by David Soul, or Ebony Eyes by Bob Welch – with what we thought of as a classic lineage of power pop by the likes of Big Star, The Soft Boys, The dB’s, The Sweet and Abba.

There was always a smattering of hard rock – Kiss, Alice Cooper – and Australian artists like The Numbers, Models and Dragon. Though the repertoire was always changing, there were a few big crowd pleasers to bring the house down.

One of mine, as part-time singer, was Hopelessly Devoted to You. What started as half a joke I took to with gusto. It is a great song, with a fantastic key change from A major in the verses to F major in the chorus via a devastating G minor chord.

“There’s nowhere to hide”, wallows the protagonist on that pitiful chord, harmonically so removed from the plaintive longing of comfortable A major we’ve swooned through thus far.

I started to search for other Olivia songs. I picked up a 45 of A Little More Love and realised it was a kind of masterpiece; like Hopelessly it was composed by longtime Newton-John collaborator John Farrar.

It is another beautifully structured song, somewhat labyrinthine. Even now I find it a thrill to play on the guitar.

Despite my party trick of (usually) being able to hit the high F at the end of Hopelessly, sustaining the upper octave required for the choruses of A Little More Love was beyond me.

The attempt further educated me about the technical demands Olivia shrugged off. The range is so wide that no matter how I transposed it, I could not pull off both low verses and high choruses.

I already knew she was good – and I’d never claim to be anywhere near ONJ’s league – but this was further proof being learned by my body.

3. What she taught me about the girl-next-door

Olivia wasn’t entirely convinced about Physical. She loved the song but wondered: could she get away with it?

Tired of the flirtation and game-playing, the protagonist wants to get down to it: “There’s nothin’ left to talk about unless it’s horizontally”.

The record was banned in Utah and South Africa due to its explicit content (!). The video further fanned the flames, with its closing “gay scene” (two guys leaving the gym holding hands).

Every bit of controversy just further hyped what was a superlative pop record. Physical topped the US charts for 10 weeks in 1981 and was one of the biggest songs of the decade. And if Physical wasn’t enough, the follow up single was Make a Move On Me.

You’d be forgiven for sensing a theme.

Physical, the album, is about more than a seasoned pop star trying on a slightly more risqué persona. None of the six images of Newton-John on the cover feature her looking at the camera, or even with her eyes open.

She does not challenge the camera or voyeur with her direct gaze, and so may be seen to be offering herself as an object to be consumed; the assumption along this line of reasoning is she avails herself of the male gaze.

I find it more compelling to consider her lost in her body. The viewer, the whole world outside her physical sensation, is irrelevant.

Despite the fact the music remains eminently accessible, she is not looking to her audience for approval.

Physical is the definitive statement of independence – from country music radio, from her pre-1978 image as girl-next-door, from a certain level of conservatism in her audience.

She even cut her hair.

John Encarnacao 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. Three lessons Olivia Newton-John taught me about music – and life – https://theconversation.com/three-lessons-olivia-newton-john-taught-me-about-music-and-life-188446

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rodney Tiffen, Emeritus Professor, Department of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney

“These are dark times for our nation”, former US President Donald Trump declared when he announced his mansion at Mar-A-Lago had been raided by FBI agents on Monday night Florida time. An assault like this “could only take place in broken, Third World countries […] corrupt at a level not seen before”.

“They even broke into my safe!” he went on, comparing the FBI action to Watergate:

What is the difference between this and Watergate, where operatives broke into the Democrat National Committee? Here, in reverse, Democrats broke into the home of the 45th President of the United States.

Watergate was the hotel–office complex in Washington, home to the Democratic Party national headquarters, which was famously burgled in June 1972 by political operatives working for the re-election of Richard Nixon. After more than two years of tortuous judicial and political inquiries, Nixon became the first – and still the only – American president to resign.

The differences between the raid on Trump’s mansion and Watergate are obvious. Trump’s mansion was raided by law officers executing a legally issued search warrant. They entered by the front door and searched openly. Watergate was an illegal break in by political operatives acting secretly.

And where Trump, playing to his shrinking base, claimed last night’s raid was undertaken by “Democrats”, it was in fact conducted by a group of FBI agents. The Florida raid took place to enforce the law; the Watergate action broke the law.

Read more:
The January 6 hearings have been spectacular TV, but will they have any consequences for Trump?

Speculation intense

As of late Monday night Washington time, neither the FBI nor the Justice Department had made an official announcement about the raid. However, on the basis of background comments by various officials, most media reports agree that its purpose was to secure various documents, including classified material, from Trump’s presidency. Some reports said the FBI officers left with 15 boxes of documents.

Trump had failed to meet the requirements of the innocuous-sounding national Archives Act, which exists to minimise the scope for corruption and abuse of process. Trump has treated these legal obligations, and any accountability provisions, with contempt. Indeed, a soon to be published book by New York Times political correspondent, Maggie Haberman, includes photos showing Trump used to flush unwanted documents down the toilet.

The FBI raid follows the recent critical scrutiny of Trump’s actions in inciting a riot against the Capitol on January 6 2021, when the congressional vote for the presidential election was declared. While politically humiliating to Trump, it is not clear that any legal action will follow from those hearings. Congress has no power to initiate such action, and some speculate that Attorney-General Merrick Garland is reluctant to be seen to be undertaking politically motivated prosecutions.

Trump, speaking of himself in the third person, asserted in his statement on the FBI raid that “the political persecution of President Donald J. Trump has been going on for years.”

Read more:
Watergate at 50: the burglary that launched a thousand scandals

Loyalty or else

More than anything, that response is testimony to Trump’s paranoid worldview, which demands the loyalty of those around him despite any inconvenient principle or evidence to the contrary. In another soon-to-be published book, Trump’s former White House chief of staff, John Kelly, a retired marine general, recounts how Trump said he wanted his generals to be loyal to him the way Hitler’s were loyal to him under Nazi rule.

One of the Watergate reporters, Bob Woodward, wrote a series of books about Trump and interviewed him several times. He reported an episode where Trump went through the faces of various Democratic congressional figures watching him deliver his State of the Union address, most of whom – according to Woodward – looked bland, bored or unemotional. After each of them, Trump exclaimed to Woodward “look at the hate” – “they hate me”.

“It was a remarkable moment,” Woodward commented.

A psychiatrist might say it was a projection of his own hatred of Democrats. But it was so intense that it did not resemble the subdued reaction of the Democrats. His insistence that it was “Hate!” was unsupported by the images […] This Trump spectacle was unforgettable and bizarre.

From the Roe v. Wade anti-abortion and anti-gun control rulings of the Supreme Court, to charges against Trump’s supporters for violence on January 6, to the various dubious activities of Trump himself, much in American politics looks likely to be played out in the courts over the next year or two – far more than is healthy in a democracy.

Read more:
US Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade – but for abortion opponents, this is just the beginning

But when Trump has slashed and burnt his way through many political conventions, recourse to legal sanction may be the only means of protecting democracy. These are dark times for the American nation, but for precisely the opposite reason Trump asserted.

Rodney Tiffen 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. As the FBI raids Mar-A-Lago, Donald Trump reaches for unconvincing historical parallels – https://theconversation.com/as-the-fbi-raids-mar-a-lago-donald-trump-reaches-for-unconvincing-historical-parallels-188455

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wasim Raja, Research scientist, CSIRO

Within 24 hours of accessing the first stage of Australia’s newest supercomputing system, researchers have processed a series of radio telescope observations, including a highly detailed image of a supernova remnant.

The very high data rates and the enormous data volumes from new-generation radio telescopes such as ASKAP (Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder) need highly capable software running on supercomputers. This is where the Pawsey Supercomputing Research Centre comes into play, with a newly launched supercomputer called Setonix – named after Western Australia’s favourite animal, the quokka (Setonix brachyurus).

ASKAP, which consists of 36 dish antennas that work together as one telescope, is operated by Australia’s national science agency CSIRO; the observational data it gathers are transferred via high-speed optical fibres to the Pawsey Centre for processing and converting into science-ready images.

In a major milestone on the path to full deployment, we have now demonstrated the integration of our processing software ASKAPsoft on Setonix, complete with stunning visuals.

Traces of a dying star

An exciting outcome of this exercise has been a fantastic image of a cosmic object known as a supernova remnant, G261.9+5.5.

Estimated to be more than a million years old, and located 10,000-15,000 light-years away from us, this object in our galaxy was first classified as a supernova remnant by CSIRO radio astronomer Eric R. Hill in 1967, using observations from CSIRO’s Parkes Radio Telescope, Murriyang.

Supernova remnants (SNRs) are the remains of powerful explosions from dying stars. The ejected material from the explosion ploughs outwards into the surrounding interstellar medium at supersonic speeds, sweeping up gas and any material it encounters along the way, compressing and heating them up in the process.

Read more:
Curious Kids: If a star explodes, will it destroy Earth?

Additionally, the shockwave would also compress the interstellar magnetic fields. The emissions we see in our radio image of G261.9+5.5 are from highly energetic electrons trapped in these compressed fields. They bear information about the history of the exploded star and aspects of the surrounding interstellar medium.

The structure of this remnant revealed in the deep ASKAP radio image opens up the possibility of studying this remnant and the physical properties (such as magnetic fields and high-energy electron densities) of the interstellar medium in unprecedented detail.

Putting a supercomputer through its paces

The image of SNR G261.9+05.5 might be beautiful to look at, but the processing of data from ASKAP’s astronomy surveys is also a great way to stress-test the supercomputer system, including the hardware and the processing software.

We included the supernova remnant’s dataset for our initial tests because its complex features would increase the processing challenges.

Data processing even with a supercomputer is a complex exercise, with different processing modes triggering various potential issues. For example, the image of the SNR was made by combining data gathered at hundreds of different frequencies (or colours, if you like), allowing us to get a composite view of the object.

But there is a treasure trove of information hidden in the individual frequencies as well. Extracting that information often requires making images at each frequency, requiring more computing resources and more digital space to store.

While Setonix has adequate resources for such intense processing, a key challenge would be to establish the stability of the supercomputer when lashed with such enormous amounts of data day in and day out.

Key to this quick first demonstration was the close collaboration between the Pawsey Centre and the ASKAP science data processing team members. Our teamwork enabled all of us to better understand these challenges and quickly find solutions.

These results mean we will be able to unearth more from the ASKAP data, for example.

Read more:
How Australia’s supercomputers crunched the numbers to guide our bushfire and pandemic response

More to come

But this is only the first of two installation stages for Setonix, with the second expected to be completed later this year.

This will allow data teams to process more of the vast amounts of data coming in from many projects in a fraction of the time. In turn, it will not only enable researchers to better understand our Universe but will undoubtedly uncover new objects hidden in the radio sky. The variety of scientific questions that Setonix will allow us to explore in shorter time-frames opens up so many possibilities.

This increase in computational capacity benefits not just ASKAP, but all Australia-based researchers in all fields of science and engineering that can access Setonix.

While the supercomputer is ramping up to full operations, so is ASKAP, which is currently wrapping up a series of pilot surveys and will soon undertake even larger and deeper surveys of the sky.

The supernova remnant is just one of many features we’ve now revealed, and we can expect many more stunning images, and the discovery of many new celestial objects, to come soon.

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

– ref. A new Australian supercomputer has already delivered a stunning supernova remnant pic – https://theconversation.com/a-new-australian-supercomputer-has-already-delivered-a-stunning-supernova-remnant-pic-188375

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Paul Haskell-Dowland, Professor of Cyber Security Practice, Edith Cowan University

Less than two weeks after the announcement of its acquisition of US healthcare company One Medical, Amazon is continuing its expansion with a US$1.7 billion offer for iRobot, the manufacturer of Roomba automated vacuum cleaners.

The acquisition will bolster Amazon’s line of smart home products and add to the retail giant’s vast store of consumer data. The move also raises a number of questions.

Why is Amazon doing this? Should we, as consumers, be concerned? What will Amazon do with yet another product that generates large volumes of data about its users?

Read more:
Amazon just took over a primary healthcare company for a lot of money. Should we be worried?

What has happened?

The purchase seems like a natural fit for Amazon’s apparent plan to conquer the home. The tech giant already has a foothold in houses around the world, through the Alexa voice assistant system and products such as Echo smart speakers, Ring surveillance cameras, and drones.

Amazon already produces a “home monitoring” robot called Astro, although it is only sold “by invitation”.

However, the purchase of iRobot may be less about products and more about data. That US$1.7 billion price tag may seem a lot, but Amazon gains not only iRobot’s trove of consumer data, but also access to its existing fleet of constantly scanning robots.

Mapping our homes

Roombas gather a particular kind of data about customers – or, to be precise, about their homes. While the original robot vacuum cleaners bumbled around, avoiding obstacles as best they could, the latest models map users’ homes in great detail.

This is great if you want your vacuum cleaner to autonomously clean your house and avoid falling down the stairs – but it raises a number of privacy concerns.

What about privacy?

A vacuum cleaner storing the layout of your home is not of great concern in itself – it simply makes it more efficient. But when the map data are stored in the cloud, we lose some control over them.

At present, Roomba maps are, in theory, only accessible by iRobot. But under Amazon’s ownership, we can’t be sure who will have access to the data or how the data will be used.

When asked about the potential use and storage of map data, an Amazon spokesperson noted that the deal hasn’t yet been closed with iRobot, so they do not have the details to share.

They added that the company doesn’t sell customer data to third parties or use customer data for purposes to which customers haven’t consented.

In the recent One Medical takeover, Amazon made very clear that medical data would be “handled separately from all other Amazon businesses as required by law”. However, it added:

Amazon will never share One Medical customers’ personal health information outside of One Medical for advertising or marketing purposes of other Amazon products and services without clear permission from the customer.

“Clear permission” sounds good, but in practice consumers routinely give “permission” to all kinds of activities explained only in lengthy and rarely read terms and conditions. In practice, this means permission is often ill-informed.

So it should come as no surprise if Roomba users are one day asked to agree to an update to the terms and conditions in which they grant permission for Amazon to use their in-home location data to enable greater optimisation of products and services. In essence, to sell more stuff, or make other products work “better”.

The future?

While Roomba owners are unlikely to see any significant change in the coming months, it is very likely they will soon have updated user agreements hitting their email inboxes and apps.

While these will initially simply reflect the change in ownership and associated legal responsibilities, at some point we may also see data sharing requests.

Where could this take us? Well, smart homes might actually becomes a little bit smart (yes, there are some positives).

If Roomba integrates with in-home cameras, for instance, it might automatically detect and clean up spills. Using location data, the Roomba could make sure it finishes cleaning before its owner arrives home from work.

Even home security systems could use future Roomba devices with cameras as a sentry. (It’s probably for the best that iRobot sold off its military division in 2016.)

While gun-toting robots are probably not on the Amazon product road map just yet, the Roomba maps may give the company an even more detailed view of customers.

Where is all this going?

With smart speakers and cameras already listening and watching, vast amounts of consumer purchasing behaviour monitored through its website and partners, and security systems integrated into our homes, Amazon already knows a lot about us.

In a Black Mirror-style extrapolation of the tech giant’s recent moves, you can imagine a future where Amazon health insurance (discounted for Prime subscribers, naturally) uses Ring cameras and Roomba to study your living conditions and behaviour patterns, and suggest interventions and set prices accordingly.

Amazon Care (this already exists) might inform you that it knows you haven’t taken a recommended trip to the gym because you’ve been at home all day. Or perhaps it’s a question of diet – and the ever-dutiful Amazon Robot Mower has reported a pile of empty pizza boxes and beer bottles outside by the bins.

For now, this is just a fantasy – but Amazon is in possession of most of the technology and data to make it reality.

Paul Haskell-Dowland 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. iRobot’s Roomba will soon be owned by Amazon, which raises privacy questions – https://theconversation.com/irobots-roomba-will-soon-be-owned-by-amazon-which-raises-privacy-questions-188355

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Paul Haskell-Dowland, Professor of Cyber Security Practice, Edith Cowan University

Earlier today, reports began emerging Google was down.

While it has since returned, it once again highlights our dependence on technology service providers and shows how reliant many people are on a single operator for daily functions.

There are few things we completely rely upon in our modern lives, but for many people, Google is one.

Its brief disappearance from the internet felt, for many, like an almost-apocalyptic moment – underscoring how deeply “googling” has been integrated into our lives.

As I wrote when the cloud computing firm Fastly had an outage last year,

It’s disconcerting when the sites we rely on suddenly become inaccessible, and even more so when it happens on such a vast scale.

Read more:
Fastly global internet outage: why did so many sites go down — and what is a CDN, anyway?

What happened?

We don’t know yet. Google has so far not commented publicly on the outage.

According to Downdetector there was a significant spike in outage reports for Google earlier today. The news wire Reuters reported:

There were more than 40,000 incidents of people reporting issues with the world’s largest search engine, according to Downdetector, which tracks outages by collating status reports from a number of sources including user-submitted errors on its platform.

Downdetector also reported people had experienced problems accessing Google Maps, while The Guardian reported problems with Gmail and Google images, too.

The outage affected a wide range of Google sites, with internet monitoring website ThousandEyes reporting over a thousand servers being impacted.

Despite the scale of the incident, it seems to have only lasted for around 30–40 minutes before services started to return to normal.

Not an isolated occurrence

Google, like all technology providers, is vulnerable to a wide range of potential service failures.

This is not the first Google outage – other outages occurred in 2020 (including a very large one in December reportedly caused by lack of capacity in their authentication systems).

But outages such as these, however brief, do underscore how dependent we have become on “googling” for many aspects of life.

It’s not all bad news

Although any outage at Google becomes major news around the world, today’s incident was short lived – as were all previous cases.

Google certainly has the capacity and capability to act swiftly to resolve service problems when they do occur.

And, as many people noted, you can still search online even when Google is down – you might just have to use a different search provider, such as Bing or DuckDuckGo.

It would seem that even when an almost unthinkable outage occurs, our capacity to search for cat photos will not be impacted.

Read more:
Goodbye Internet Explorer. You won’t be missed (but your legacy will be remembered)

Paul Haskell-Dowland does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Today’s Google outage was brief but disconcerting – https://theconversation.com/todays-google-outage-was-brief-but-disconcerting-188452

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Angela Brown, Midwifery Program Director , University of South Australia

So far, there have been 57 confirmed and probable cases of monkeypox reported by Australian authorities.

In July, the Australian government issued a health alert for monkeypox as a communicable disease following the World Health Organization’s declaration of it as a public health emergency.

The disease has been reported at higher rates among men who have sex with other men. But this does not mean it can’t be spread to anyone. In fact, it has been seen in pregnant and birthing women and their newborn babies in some Western countries.

What do we know about monkeypox?

Monkeypox is a viral disease spread between animals and people.

The UK government guidance described the first case of “Monkey Pox” in 1958, when it was found in monkeys used for research purposes.

It was 1970 when it was first reported in human populations in the African country, Democratic Republic of the Congo. The disease is now endemic in some African countries including Nigeria, Liberia, Sierra Leone and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Read more:
How does monkeypox spread? An epidemiologist explains why it isn’t an STI and what counts as close contact

What does this mean for pregnant women?

Fortunately, monkeypox does not spread easily. The infection is spread by close physical contact, and so far there is limited information available about the impact on pregnancy, particularly in high income countries.

The virus can enter the body via broken skin, the respiratory tract or mucous membranes (the moist inner lining of cavities and some organs in the body).

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises the virus can be transmitted to a baby before birth via the placenta, and after the baby is born by close physical contact.

It also recommends pregnant, postnatal and breastfeeding women should be prioritised for medical treatment as there is a significant risk to the baby.

The Australian government’s treatment guidelines identify pregnant and breastfeeding women at high risk of severe disease from monkeypox infection. They also identify these groups as eligible for treatment and encourage health care providers to consult infectious disease specialists.

What symptoms should you watch for?

Symptoms of monkeypox can include headaches and fever, muscle and joint pain, tiredness, swollen lymph glands and a telltale rash with lesions that develop anywhere on the body.

The lesions change and will eventually burst, scab over and heal. The amount and location of the lesions can vary from lots all over the body to only a few that are isolated to one or two areas.

Read more:
Monkeypox in Australia: should you be worried? And who can get the vaccine?

Deadly for some

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control has said most people (who are not pregnant) have mild disease with recovery within a few weeks, but that the Nigerian cases have had a fatality rate of roughly 3%. Mortality is likely higher in vulnerable groups such as newborn babies and pregnant or breastfeeding women.

A recent paper published in medical journal The Lancet provides guidelines for doctors and midwives on the management of monkeypox infection during pregnancy. These guidelines include increased fetal monitoring and increased surveillance of the mother in hospital isolation rooms if necessary, depending on her symptoms.

If the woman has genital lesions at the time of birth, she may be offered a caesarean. The newborn baby will need careful monitoring and precautions to reduce the risk of transmission from the mother. Consultation with a specialist infectious diseases paediatrician is recommended in these cases.

The Australian government has supplies of a monkeypox vaccine called Jynneos, and this may be considered in cases in which a woman has had close physical contact with an infected person or meets other criteria. The safety profile of this medication in pregnancy is unknown, but it is thought to be able to be used following a risk and benefit analysis by the medical practitioner. Women should not seek vaccination without risk factors being present.

Read more:
Australia secures 450,000 new monkeypox vaccines. What are they and who can have them?

Known cases

Several cases of monkeypox infection were reported in the Democratic Republic of the Congo as a part of a larger study. The study wasn’t specifically looking at pregnant women, but four women were found to be pregnant in the study of more than 200 people with monkeypox infection.

Of the four women with monkeypox infection in pregnancy, two experienced miscarriage, one gave birth to a stillborn baby, and one gave birth to a living full-term baby. The three women who had fetal losses all experienced moderate to severe disease and lost their babies either in the first or second trimester of pregnancy.

Australian women shouldn’t be overly concerned at this stage given the low numbers of infected people in Australia. Women are highly unlikely to catch monkeypox unless they have had close contact with someone already infected with the disease or they have visited countries where the disease is endemic.

There are no known cases of women infected in pregnancy within Australia to date but there are such cases in the UK and US.

Avoiding contact with infected people and seeking early medical care if exposure is suspected is the best strategy as we watch the monkeypox situation evolve. Women can also monitor monkeypox advice from Australian authorities and speak with their midwife or obstetrician if they have any concerns.

Angela Brown 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. Monkeypox can be transmitted to babies during and after pregnancy. We should be watchful but not alarmed – https://theconversation.com/monkeypox-can-be-transmitted-to-babies-during-and-after-pregnancy-we-should-be-watchful-but-not-alarmed-188283

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dominic McAfee, Postdoctoral researcher, marine ecology, University of Adelaide

Australia once had vast oyster and mussel reefs, which anchored marine ecosystems and provided a key food source for coastal First Nations people. But after colonisation, Europeans harvested them for their meat and shells and pushed oyster and mussel reefs almost to extinction. Because the damage was done early – and largely underwater – the destruction of these reefs was all but forgotten.

No longer. We have learned how to restore these vital reef systems. After a successful pilot in 2015, there are now 46 shellfish reef restorations underway – Australia’s largest marine restoration program ever undertaken. It’s not a moment too soon. There’s just one natural reef remaining for the Australian flat oyster, which is teetering on extinction.

How did shellfish reefs go from forgotten to frontline? Our new research shows how this historical amnesia was overcome through a national community of researchers, conservationists, and government and fisheries managers.

This matters, because oysters and mussels are ecological superheroes. As we restore these reefs, we give local marine life a real boost and support human livelihoods reliant on healthy seas. These cold-water reefs play a similar role to coral in tropical seas. They give hiding places and food to baby fish, filter seawater and defend coastlines against erosion from waves.

What killed our original shellfish reefs?

Just 200 years ago, shellfish reefs carpeted Australia’s temperate regions, filling up sheltered bays and estuaries around over 7,000 kilometres of coastline.

Archaeological research from Queensland shows First Nations people were sustainably harvesting local shellfish reefs over at least 5,000 years, replenishing oyster populations by building reefs with stone and shell.

This ended as Europeans took the lands and waters from Traditional Owners. Shellfish became one of colonial Australia’s first fisheries. Oysters were fished extensively for food, while their shells were burnt to manufacture lime for fertiliser and cement. If you walk past a colonial-era building, look at the mortar. Chances are, a lot of oyster shells went into it.

Read more:
The world’s most degraded marine ecosystem could be about to make a comeback

Even though the wild fishery ended a century ago, these shellfish weren’t able to return. That’s because they can’t just grow on bare sand. Their preferred substrate are the shells of their ancestors, left behind on the sea bottom. Once the substrate was scraped by dredge or smothered by sediment, there was nowhere for baby oysters and mussels to settle and grow.

Today, there’s just one small natural flat oyster reef (Ostrea angasi) and six remnant Sydney Rock oyster (Saccostrea glomerata) reefs remaining, across all Australian waters.

How to kick-start shellfish reef restoration

Shellfish can’t recover by themselves. But it turns out with a little human help, they can. Think of it as making up for our unsustainable use.

For a decade before the first large-scale restoration, recreational fishing groups and community groups worked on smaller projects, sometimes with government backing.

To begin larger-scale restoration work, we first had to remember how it used to be.
Because the ecological collapse of Australia’s shellfish reefs was so profound, they were almost lost to human memory. Historical records guided us as to what a restored ecosystem should look like, and where these reefs used to be.

Our job was made easier because of the huge benefits shellfish reefs provide to marine life. Intact oyster and mussel reefs are natural fish factories providing nursery habitats for economically important fish species like bream and whiting.

Read more:
The surprising benefits of oysters (and no, it’s not what you’re thinking)

Even better, these filter-feeding shellfish are the kidneys of the coast, cleaning water cloudy with sediment or overloaded with nutrients. A single oyster can filter 100 litres of water a day. Shellfish reefs also act as living defences against the energy of waves, store carbon in their shells and help protect intertidal communities from the warming climate through shade and moisture at low tide.

People working on reef restoration turned to our thriving oyster and mussel farming industry to understand their life cycles and what they needed to thrive. The fact these farms are successful indicated many areas remained suitable for shellfish reefs.

Environmental NGO The Nature Conservancy connected the emerging reef restoration community as well as bringing practical experience from longer-running shellfish restoration projects in America. Reef restoration work is now being led by conservation NGOs, local and state governments, and, increasingly, by community groups.

So does it work? Yes. It’s as if the oysters have been waiting for this opportunity. Many human-made reefs have been settled by millions of baby oysters within months of construction, such as the largest project to date, the 20 hectare Windara Reef in South Australia. Some restored reefs are closing in on oyster densities in line with natural reefs.

Looking forward

We hope the rapid rise of shellfish reef restoration is the beginning of a new era for large-scale marine restoration in Australia.

Today, community-led restorations are growing in scale and number, and public support for shellfish restoration is widespread.

It is an impressive story. This is a national program of recovery showing significant successes with a relatively modest investment. These restoration efforts show large-scale action to repair nature can work – and work quickly – when experts from a range of disciplines work with communities towards a common goal.

As the restored oyster and mussel reefs mature, we will see more fish in our seas and more recreation and tourism opportunities emerging. That, in turn, could give more communities the idea to restore their own shellfish reefs. Together, we can bring back the reefs which lived in our cooler seas for millennia.

Read more:
Huge restored reef aims to bring South Australia’s oysters back from the brink

Dominic McAfee receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Christine Crawford receives funding from The Nature Conservancy for short-term contracts.

Ian McLeod received funding from the National Environmental Science Program Marine Biodiversity Hub.

Sean Connell receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

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

– ref. Once the fish factories and ‘kidneys’ of colder seas, Australia’s decimated shellfish reefs are coming back – https://theconversation.com/once-the-fish-factories-and-kidneys-of-colder-seas-australias-decimated-shellfish-reefs-are-coming-back-184063

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Baker, Professor of Housing Research, University of Adelaide

The federal government’s confirmation on Monday that it will set up a National Housing Supply and Affordability Council has not received much media or public attention. But, dollar for dollar, it might be the year’s most important and impactful housing announcement.

The announcement by the minister for housing and homelessness, Julie Collins, at this week’s National Homeless Conference is a major step towards a considered and long-overdue national plan for housing.

Australia’s approach to the challenges of housing supply and affordability over the past decade could easily be described as “ramshackle”. This has meant policies, interests and outcomes have clashed.

Reliable, trusted data have not existed. Booms and busts have crept up on us unseen, making house prices difficult to predict. And housing affordability has become an “intractable” problem.

A National Housing Supply and Affordability Council (NHSAC) promises to provide a shared resource on national targets, achievements and milestones. It will be able to systematically report on these over time.

The council will bring together a transparent advisory panel of experts to advise governments.

It might surprise some people, but Australia hasn’t been doing any of this.

Read more:
‘I left with the kids and ended up homeless with them’: the nightmare of housing wait lists for people fleeing domestic violence

Housing crisis has been years in the making

What we do know, though, is that Australia has a much-debated housing supply crisis. Though estimates vary, it’s widely acknowledged there is a chronic shortfall of new housing, and of affordable social housing for rent in particular.

Even before COVID-19, modelling for the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI) suggested more than 1.5 million Australian households – or about one in seven households – were in housing need. That is, these households are unable to access market-provided housing or require some form of rent assistance to afford housing.

This predicted shortfall has grown through the pandemic. Yet there is now a sustained downturn in dwelling completions, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

It’s a massive structural problem for our nation. Housing affects our economy, our quality of life, the shape of our cities, and our health and welfare sectors.

It’s also a problem we should have seen coming. Houses aren’t invisible, and they’re pretty easy to count.

Read more:
Australia’s social housing system is critically stressed. Many eligible applicants simply give up

What many of us don’t realise, is that a great majority of the housing statistics discussed in the media and used by policymakers are produced by advocacy groups, industry, governments and think tanks – each with their own agendas.

Furthermore, in the absence of reliable data and forecasts, the housing development industry simply delays new development until a boom kicks off, then jumps in as quickly as possible. This just fuels house price inflation.

Our current arrangements are ad hoc at best, and overly influenced by vested interests at worst.

Read more:
After COVID, we’ll need a rethink to repair Australia’s housing system and the economy

What difference can the council make?

The new housing council can cut through all this by providing the nation with a single, authoritative voice to advise, interpret and monitor change over time. It is a positive development because it will formalise the way advice is developed, and build on the transparency and independence of shared data.

Yes, this will lead to a series of seemingly boring outcomes, such as setting construction targets, being a national resource for quality data, and providing advice to governments. Yet the impact of this reform will be enormous. It promises to provide order, evidence and centralised leadership to Australia’s chaotic housing system.

It will provide the reliable, trusted housing data and evidence Australia has long needed. It will enable us all to sing from the same song sheet when it comes to urban development and new construction. No longer will we rely on a largely haphazard combination of privately commissioned, government-provided and self-collected data.

Australia’s housing crisis is finally getting the serious policy attention it deserves. Collins told the conference the Albanese government was committed to a comprehensive reform agenda and a national housing and homelessness plan, guided by Cabinet.

This commitment to action and better, more up-to-date insights is an important first step towards delivering the housing future we all deserve.

Emma Baker receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the National Health and Medical Research Council, and the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute. She serves on the SA Board of Habitat for Humanity.

Andrew Beer receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute and the National Health and Medical Research Centre.

– ref. Australia has been crying out for a national housing plan, and new council is a big step towards having one – https://theconversation.com/australia-has-been-crying-out-for-a-national-housing-plan-and-new-council-is-a-big-step-towards-having-one-188365

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Catherine Strong, Associate professor, Music Industry, RMIT University

Olivia Newton-John was a versatile artist with an appeal that spanned generations, and who played an important role in claiming a space for Australian popular culture on the world stage.

She was the rare performer whose career flourished through different phases, and who found success exploring many facets of her talent.

Born in Cambridge in 1948, Newton-John moved to Melbourne at age 6 (becoming one of a myriad of non-Australian celebrities wholeheartedly claimed by this country).

In her teens she started to build up her profile on the local performing circuits, also appearing on pop music television program The Go!! Show.

In the 1960s, Australian musical acts saw moving to the UK as a vital part of their career progression. Newton-John became part of the steady stream of expats pursuing their music in “the mother country” after winning a talent competition that provided her with tickets.

When her friend Pat Carroll joined her, the two found success touring as a pop duo, before visa troubles meant Carroll had to return to Australia.

This led to new opportunities for Newton-John as a solo artist. Her first album If Not For You (1971) was a success in the UK and Australia, establishing her as a household name in those countries – and leading to opportunities such as a performance at Eurovision representing the UK in 1974 (she lost to ABBA).

Her break in the US market came as she found a niche in the country music genre. Country/pop crossover songs such as Let Me Be There were huge hits, and in 1972 she won a Grammy for Best Country Female – the first of four Grammys she would win across her career.

Her move to the US in the mid-1970s was accompanied by a string of number one hits in that country, establishing her as an international superstar.

Life on the silver screen

Her star continued to rise with the release of the musical Grease in 1978.

Sandy established her as a genuinely iconic pop culture figure.

Grease was a huge box-office success, and produced a multi-million copy selling soundtrack. Tracks such as You’re the One That I Want and Summer Loving were not only hits in their own right at the time but have become embedded in our cultural memory, transcending generations with their appeal.

Grease was the peak of her movie career. Attempts to re-create the on-screen magic between herself and co-star John Travolta in Two of a Kind and the fantastical Xanadu (a personal childhood favourite) failed to gain traction with audiences or critics.

But her contributions to the soundtracks of these films – including Magic and Twist of Fate – still charted highly as her musical career stayed strong.

Read more:
Conversing with the divine – why we still need our muses

Away from the spotlight

In the early 1980s she was seen as part of the “Australian invasion”, a period where Oz culture was particularly prominent on the international stage through acts such as Air Supply and the Little River Band.

Newton-John leaned into the moment. In 1983, she launched her Koala Blue boutique selling Australian fashion and cultural items, in collaboration with her previous singing partner Pat Carroll. The boutique lasted a little over a decade, during which time Newton-John had a family and put less focus on her music career.

A planned comeback in 1992 had to be put on hold when Newton-John was diagnosed with breast cancer shortly before beginning her tour.

Her journey with the disease inspired her to take up advocacy and fundraising work in this area. The Olivia Newton-John Cancer Wellness and Research Centre fundraises in various ways, including through events such as the annual Wellness Walk.

The return of Newton-John’s cancer in 2017, which would eventually lead to her death, also spelled the end of her touring career.

A lasting legacy

Newton-John leaves a legacy as a sweet girl-next-door type with a sublime voice, who embraced the country that claimed her as its own, but who also at times showed a more risqué side, such as in Sandy’s leather jumpsuit, or the cheeky video to the unapologetically sexual Physical.

She has already been recognised through awards and honours.

She has been inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame. In 2020 she was appointed a Dame in the Queen’s New Year honours list. She has also been a continuing part of the cultural conversation through appearances on pop culture staples such as Drag Race.

She remained down-to-earth and friendly, regularly turning up to events like the Wellness Walks to chat to participants and encourage them on.

Like many Australians, ONJ has been part of the soundtrack to my life – from arranging my own little performances to Xanadu in kindergarten, to singing along to the Grease megamix at school discos, to discovering her earlier work through my research much later in life – and many have benefitted from her non-musical work, too.

She will be missed but never forgotten.

Read more:
The Australian Music Vault moves the canon beyond pub rock

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

– ref. Pop icon Olivia Newton-John was the rare performer whose career flourished through different phases – https://theconversation.com/pop-icon-olivia-newton-john-was-the-rare-performer-whose-career-flourished-through-different-phases-188428

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Gilroy, ARC Research Fellow in Indigenous Health, Disability and Community Development, University of Sydney

The Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability continues. Its terms of reference acknowledge “the particular situation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and culturally and linguistically diverse people with disability”.

Recent public hearings aired the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disabilities and their engagement with the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) in remote communities.

According to the 2015 Survey of Disability, Ageing, and Carers (the most reliable survey of disability prevalence in Australia) there were around 38,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability living in outer-regional and remote regions.

As an Aboriginal disability scholar, I know governments have long been aware of the key issues affecting us mob living in remote communities but have continually failed us.

The art of political distraction

Like the old Roman breads and circuses, it seems that when government wants to delay action on a social or political problem, they call an inquiry. We’ve seen this with child protection and the stolen generations, education and employment.

As far back as the early 1980s, the Grimes report informed the development of 1986’s Disability Services Act and 1985’s Home and Community Care Act. But the Grimes report only mentioned Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability living in remote communities in a few hundred words.

My research and that of others shows the challenges faced by this group were always characterised as a “specialised field”. This means governments were aware of the issues but still failed to properly engage with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability in remote regions.

Read more:
Why Aboriginal voices need to be front and centre in the disability Royal Commission

Defining disability in language

Many people and government agencies state “there is no Aboriginal definition of disability”. This statement has the effect of scuttling debate and unjustifiably throwing the blame or responsibility on us mob.

Firstly, it’s true that so far we haven’t found a word equivalent to the English collective noun “disability” in any Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander language.

However, many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages around the country have traditional words for disability types, such as deafness and physical disabilities. There are examples from the NPY Women’s Council and recorded as far back as Edward Curr’s 1886 colonial reports in the Australian Race. If disability service providers claim to be person-centred they should be able to tailor disability services in a culturally and linguistically respectful way.

Secondly, government has never had a consistent concept of disability for their funded and administered disability services and programs.

The Disability Support Pension has a different definition to that of the NDIS. ABS census surveys use different definitions of disability among their data collection instruments and methodologies.

The research I’ve done with colleagues shows people and government authorities have incorrectly stated that around 40% of the Aboriginal population experiences disability. This figure is taken from the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Survey (NATSISS). If this statistic was true, then official population projections mean over 350,000 Aboriginal and Torres strait Islander people would be experiencing disability today.

The NATSISS blends disability and identified health conditions into one category. As such, the Royal Commission has situated and justified itself on incorrect and poorly understood statistics.

Acknowledging the experience of ‘racial-ableism’

The Commission has captured and acknowledged experiences of racism and ableism. I coined the term “racial-ableism” to capture the intersectionality of these experiences at the cultural interface. Separating the two is impossible.

This intersection has been noted in other parts of the world too. Racism and ableism have been described as “parallel systems of oppression” that ignore the experience of people of colour/ethnicity with disabilities and also how their circumstances may be pathologised in racist and colonial ways. In simplest terms, I experienced this as a child as playground insults that referred to my speech and hearing impairment in the same phrase as a racial slur about my skin colour.

I continue to fight and observe this form of discrimination everyday, at both the personal and policy level. The Commission must place more emphasis on racial-ableism as this oppresses Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability to the lowest classes of Australia at a systemic level from childhood to adulthood. The existence of racial-ableism in Australia contravenes the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled Persons to which it is a signatory. The UN convention cites “full and effective participation and inclusion in society” as a core principle.

Read more:
Here’s why the planned NDIS reforms discriminate against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people

Toxic foundations

The Royal Commission has not properly focused on the ideological foundations of the NDIS for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living in remote communities. Instead, government has been heavily focused on actuarial studies of the “market” to ascertain where disability service gaps exist in these regions.

The NDIS is a model that attempts to blend the “for profit” values of the business sector with the “not for profit” values of the charity sector. Business profits are only achieved where there exists a “supply” and “demand”. Reports have repeatedly shown the NDIS has not yet fairly benefited Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living in remote, rural, and regional communities because the absence of local services. This is because there is no “business market” compared to the metropolitan regions and can be seen in provider shrinkage in areas such as East Arnhem land. This is geographic discrimination and racial-ablism.

All of the money spent on the Royal Commission should have been spent on grounded community initiatives under the NDIS in regional, rural, and remote communities. These could have included advocacy programs, secondary and tertiary education programs, long-term government service funding agreements, training of NDIA and allied health staff, Aboriginal employment in the NDIA, and Aboriginal-owned and operated disability support programs.

It is not time for another inquiry and another report. It’s time for action.

Read more:
First Nations people in the NT receive just 16% of the Medicare funding of an average Australian

John Gilroy receives funding from the ARC.

– ref. Indigenous people with disabilities face racism and ableism. What’s needed is action not another report – https://theconversation.com/indigenous-people-with-disabilities-face-racism-and-ableism-whats-needed-is-action-not-another-report-187528

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Henry Maher, Lecturer in Politics, Department of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney

The much-debated term “neoliberalism” again entered the political debate last week, with Greens leader Adam Bandt using a National Press Club speech to decry neoliberalism in the Labor Party.

Bandt claimed that since the Keating and Hawke governments, Labor has adopted neoliberalism by “privatising public services, cutting taxes for the wealthy and adopting more austerity”. Keating hit back, calling Bandt “a bounder and distorter of political truth”, angrily rejecting suggestions that Medicare and compulsory superannuation could be related to “conservative neoliberalism”.

Neoliberalism as insult

Bandt’s speech reflects a more general trend in which “neoliberalism” is used as an insult or political swearword. Even in academic debates, the usefulness of the term has been questioned, with recent articles describing neoliberalism as “a conceptual trash heap”, “hopelessly confused” and “so baggy and unclear that it means almost nothing”.

Read more:
Was embracing the market a necessary evil for Labour and Labor?

However, that does not mean it should be abandoned altogether. Many key political terms such as democracy, populism and justice also contain competing and sometimes contradictory meanings. In arriving at a working definition of neoliberalism, it is helpful to consult the writings of those who developed the body of thought.

Origins and definition

Most scholars agree the origins of neoliberalism can be traced to the Mont Pelerin Society, an academic organisation founded in 1947 by Austrian–British economist and philosopher Friedrich von Hayek. The group counted among its members leading neoliberal thinkers such as Milton Friedman, Ludwig von Mises, and James Buchanan.

Contrary to the popular caricature of neoliberalism as a free market, anti-state ideology, these early neoliberal thinkers developed a political and economic philosophy that attempted to combine governments and markets.

Where the classical liberals of the 19th century favoured a non-interventionist, laissez-faire approach to economic policy, the key aim of neoliberalism was to recognise that functioning markets must be actively created and maintained by an interventionist state. Neoliberal thinkers argued the chief role of government was to create and enforce the rules of the marketplace.

Read more:
Partially right: rejecting neoliberalism shouldn’t mean giving up on social liberalism

The ideas of the Mont Pelerin Society entered the political mainstream most prominently in the 1980s under the governments of Margaret Thatcher in the UK and Ronald Reagan in the US. Their policies included privatisation of government owned industries, extensive tax cuts, and creating more “flexible” labour markets by restricting the power of trade unions.

A mixed bag in Australia

In Australia, many of the key reforms of the Hawke-Keating government utilised neoliberal logic to mixed results. For instance, Keating’s signature compulsory superannuation policy replaced the universal pension with a market-oriented system of private savings, allowing workers to gain a share of rising profits on the stock market.

But the system also exposed workers to market downturns. This was most evident during the Global Financial Crisis of 2008, when losses of A$160 billion forced many older Australians to postpone retirement or even return to work.

The superannuation system also reinforces the gender pay gap. Men hold on average 42% more in superannuation savings than women, significantly increasing vulnerability to poverty for older women. Keating was also responsible for repeated privatisations, including the sales of Qantas and the Commonwealth Bank, and broader deregulation of the financial sector which further expanded the scope of the market.

Read more:
What is neoliberalism? A political scientist explains the use and evolution of the term

But the Hawke-Keating government was not entirely neoliberal, most notably in its expansion of Medicare. Their relationship with trade unions was also different from the combative stance adopted by Thatcher and Reagan in their countries.

Australian legacy

Taken together, the legacy of these different reforms is complex. However, the Hawke-Keating government was clearly guided by a neoliberal desire to expand the scope of the market.

Neoliberalism in Australia would intensify under Coalition government of John Howard – a card-carrying member of the Mont Pelerin Society and prime minister from 1996 to 2007. He did this through continued privatisation of state assets and deregulation of the financial sector.

Early indications suggest the current Labor government is likely to maintain some market-oriented policies. The refusal to increase JobSeeker payments for unemployed Australians is guided by a neoliberal belief that individuals should attain their basic needs through the market.

And while the exact details of how the government intends to meet its 2030 emissions reduction target are still forthcoming, a market-based approach again seems likely.

Though some may recoil at the neoliberal label they associate primarily with the political right, recent history suggests the neoliberal system has been and will likely remain a bipartisan standard in Australia.

Henry Maher 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. Explainer: how neoliberalism became an insult in Australian politics – https://theconversation.com/explainer-how-neoliberalism-became-an-insult-in-australian-politics-188291

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tara McAllister, Research Fellow, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

Given most New Zealand universities have goals for increasing Māori and Pacific student and staff numbers, we need to ask why their numbers still remain stubbornly low in the research sector – and even lower within “STEM” (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) departments.

Our previous research showed that one New Zealand university had failed to employ a Māori or Pacific academic in their science department for at least 20 years.

But while the numbers provided a snapshot of the workforce, they don’t explain why so few Māori and Pacific researchers stay in the tertiary system. Our latest research aims to explain this better by looking at the experiences of 43 past and present postgraduate STEM students.

We show that simply bolstering university enrolments and plugging more students into a broken pipeline will not solve the under-representation of Māori and Pacific peoples. Furthermore, a lack of representation is negatively affecting those Māori and Pacific postgraduate students already in STEM courses.

Isolated and invisible

Universities are charged with training the next generation of scientists and growing a sustainable scientific workforce. Graduates will go on to perform research that provides solutions to emerging crises, informs national policy and creates new knowledge to help understand the world we live in.

But are universities providing an environment where Māori and Pacific postgraduate students can thrive and develop into the researchers society needs? In 2021 just 13% of domestic doctoral students were Māori and 5% were Pasifika.

Read more:
Māori and Pasifika scholars remain severely under-represented in New Zealand universities

Our research suggests universities still have a lot of work to do. These low numbers of Māori and Pacific students and staff also affect their educational experiences. Frequently isolated, some of those who participated in the research said they felt invisible. As one put it:

The lack of Māori and Pacific postgraduate researchers made life for me as a Pacific researcher difficult.

Having come from a different background, with a different perspective and different skills to bring to the table, I found it hard to make any real connections with my fellow researchers.

This at that time felt isolating and was exacerbated by the fact that there were no Māori and Pacific staff members in my areas of expertise.

Persistent racism

Many Māori and Pacific postgraduates in STEM subjects reported experiencing forms of racism. This ranged from being mistaken for being Māori when they were Pasifika, to having to dispel common myths about receiving a free education and only being at university due to targeted admission schemes.

Māori and Pacific postgraduates reported their identities being erased if they didn’t fulfil stereotypes about what they should know or how they should act. One of our interviewees said they were even told they must consider themselves “white” because they did not “act Māori”.

Read more:
Who will call out the misogyny and abuse undermining women’s academic freedom in our universities?

It is often noted that Māori and Pacific academics experience “excess labour” – meaning they fulfil dual roles of being Māori or Pacific as well as being an academic. But our research found this often begins at the postgraduate level.

Excess labour involves dealing with racism, expectations of cultural expertise, performing cultural protocols (such as karakia and mihi whakatau), and fulfilling
tokenistic diversity roles such as being photographed for university advertising.

According to one person we spoke to:

I was instantly deemed an expert on kaupapa Māori yet had only begun my journey of exploring this. We were often put on the spot and expected to explain tikanga, te reo Māori, mātauranga Māori to others, while simultaneously being experts in non-Indigenous science.

No more ticking boxes

Our research also shows that New Zealand’s research funding system can lead to ethically questionable exercises in “box ticking” involving the token inclusion of Māori and Pacific postgraduate students.

This ranged from students being included in funding applications despite having declined to participate, to Pacific people being named as Māori investigators.

There were also allegations that Pākehā academics gained research funding for projects purporting to include Māori people and knowledge when in reality Māori were not included at all. As one of our collaborators wrote:

My name (my mana and reputation) was used against my will to secure funding for a project that I refused multiple times to be part of.

Read more:
More investment in literacy skills is needed if NZ is serious about ending persistent disparities for Pasifika students

Where to from here?

By including the often unheard perspectives of Māori and Pacific postgraduates in STEM subjects, our research adds to the growing evidence detailing how Māori and Pacific people are excluded in universities.

In sharing these experiences of racism, exclusion and marginalisation, we want to remind other Māori and Pacific students they are not alone.

We also want to use this research to challenge New Zealand’s universities to move beyond tokenistic attempts at “inclusion” and “diversity”, and to begin
dismantling the structures that continue to marginalise Māori and Pacific people and knowledge systems.

Our research highlights the urgent need for universities to change the culturally unsafe environment that continues to marginalise Māori and Pacific postgraduates.

Universities must create an environment where Māori and Pacific postgraduates in STEM subjects can move from surviving to thriving. That way they can get on with tackling cancer, solving the freshwater crisis or addressing the effects of climate change on their ancestral islands.

Tara McAllister receives funding from MBIE.

Sereana Naepi receives funding from Waipapa Taumata Rau | University of Auckland and Rutherford Discovery.

Leilani Walker 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. Racism, exclusion and tokenism: how Māori and Pacific science graduates are still marginalised at university – https://theconversation.com/racism-exclusion-and-tokenism-how-maori-and-pacific-science-graduates-are-still-marginalised-at-university-188052

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Patrick Taylor, Chief Environmental Scientist, EPA Victoria; Honorary Professor, Macquarie University

There’s nothing like the fresh eggs from your own hens, the more than 400,000 Australians who keep backyard chooks will tell you. Unfortunately, it’s often not just freshness and flavour that set their eggs apart from those in the shops.

Our newly published research found backyard hens’ eggs contain, on average, more than 40 times the lead levels of commercially produced eggs. Almost one in two hens in our Sydney study had significant lead levels in their blood. Similarly, about half the eggs analysed contained lead at levels that may pose a health concern for consumers.

Even low levels of lead exposure are considered harmful to human health, including among other effects cardiovascular disease and decreased IQ and kidney function. Indeed, the World Health Organization has stated there is no safe level of lead exposure.

So how do you know whether this is a likely problem in the eggs you’re getting from backyard hens? It depends on lead levels in your soil, which vary across our cities. We mapped the areas of high and low risk for hens and their eggs in our biggest cities – Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane – and present these maps here.

Our research details lead poisoning of backyard chickens and explains what this means for urban gardening and food production. In older homes close to city centres, contaminated soils can greatly increase people’s exposure to lead through eating eggs from backyard hens.

What did the study find?

Most lead gets into the hens as they scratch in the dirt and peck food from the ground.

We assessed trace metal contamination in backyard chickens and their eggs from garden soils across 55 Sydney homes. We also explored other possible sources of contamination such as animal drinking water and chicken feed.

Our data confirmed what we had anticipated from our analysis of more than 25,000 garden samples from Australia gardens collected via the VegeSafe program. Lead is the contaminant of most concern.

The amount of lead in the soil was significantly associated with lead concentrations in chicken blood and eggs. We found potential contamination from drinking water and commercial feed supplies in some samples but it is not a significant source of exposure.

Unlike for humans, there are no guidelines for blood lead levels for chickens or other birds. Veterinary assessments and research indicate levels of 20 micrograms per decilitre (µg/dL) or more may harm their health. Our analysis of 69 backyard chickens across the 55 participants’ homes showed 45% had blood lead levels above 20µg/dL.

We analysed eggs from the same birds. There are no food standards for trace metals in eggs in Australia or globally. However, in the 19th Australian Total Diet Study, lead levels were less than 5µg/kg in a small sample of shop-bought eggs.

The average level of lead in eggs from the backyard chickens in our study was 301µg/kg. By comparison, it was 7.2µg/kg in the nine commercial free-range eggs we analysed.

International research indicates that eating one egg a day with a lead level of less than 100µg/kg would result in an estimated blood lead increase of less than 1μg/dL in children. That’s around the level found in Australian children not living in areas affected by lead mines or smelters. The level of concern used in Australia for investigating exposure sources is 5µg/dL.

Some 51% of the eggs we analysed exceeded the 100µg/kg “food safety” threshold. To keep egg lead below 100μg/kg, our modelling of the relationship between lead in soil, chickens and eggs showed soil lead needs to be under 117mg/kg. This is much lower than the Australian residential guideline for soils of 300mg/kg.

To protect chicken health and keep their blood lead below 20µg/kg, soil concentrations need to be under 166mg/kg. Again, this is much lower than the guideline.

How did we map the risks across cities?

We used our garden soil trace metal database (more than 7,000 homes and 25,000 samples) to map the locations in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne most at risk from high lead values.

Deeper analysis of the data showed older homes were much more likely to have high lead levels across soils, chickens and their eggs. This finding matches other studies that found older homes are most at risk of legacy contamination from the former use of lead-based paints, leaded petrol and lead pipes.

What can backyard producers do about it?

These findings will come as a shock to many people who have turned to backyard food production. It has been on the rise over the past decade, spurred on recently by soaring grocery prices.

People are turning to home-grown produce for other reasons, too. They want to know where their food came from, enjoy the security of producing food with no added chemicals, and feel the closer connection to nature.

While urban gardening is a hugely important activity and should be encouraged, previous studies of contamination of Australian home garden soils and trace metal uptake into plants show it needs to be undertaken with caution.

Contaminants have built up in soils over the many years of our cities’ history. These legacy contaminants can enter our food chain via vegetables, honey bees and chickens.

Urban gardening exposure risks have typically focused on vegetables and fruits. Limited attention has been paid to backyard chickens. The challenge of sampling and finding participants meant many previous studies have been smaller and have not always analysed all possible exposure routes.

Mapping the risks of contamination in soils enables backyard gardeners and chicken keepers to consider what the findings may mean for them.

Particularly in older, inner-city locations, it would be prudent to get their soils tested. They can do this at VegeSafe or through a commercial laboratory. Soils identified as a problem can be replaced and chickens kept to areas of known clean soil.

Mark Patrick Taylor received funding via an Australian Government Citizen Science Grant (2017-2020), CSG55984 ‘Citizen insights to the composition and risks of household dust’ (the DustSafe project). The VegeSafe and DustSafe programs are supported by publication donations to Macquarie University. He is a full-time employee of EPA Victoria, appointed to the statutory role of Chief Environmental Scientist.

Dorrit E. Jacob and Vladimir Strezov 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. Backyard hens’ eggs contain 40 times more lead on average than shop eggs, research finds – https://theconversation.com/backyard-hens-eggs-contain-40-times-more-lead-on-average-than-shop-eggs-research-finds-187442

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By A J Brown, Professor of Public Policy & Law, Centre for Governance & Public Policy, Griffith University

Last Friday’s twist in the long prosecution of Australian Taxation Office whistleblower Richard Boyle – now headed for its fifth year – brings into relief the serious flaws in our nation’s whistleblowing laws.

Boyle aired his concerns about oppressive debt collection by the ATO in a joint ABC–Fairfax media investigation released in 2018. But he went public only after raising his concerns within the ATO and later with the inspector-general of taxation (IGT).

Various reviews confirmed his complaints under the Public Interest Disclosure Act 2013 – the whistleblower protection law for federal public servants – were reasonable. Despite dismissing his original complaint, the ATO ensured the suspect practices, which it claimed resulted from “miscommunication” and “misunderstanding”, were fixed.

A Senate committee labelled the ATO’s initial investigation into Boyle’s complaint as “superficial”. The IGT found merit in the matters Boyle raised but had no jurisdiction to intervene because it is not a “disclosure recipient” under the 2013 Act.

These events make the Boyle prosecution an important test case. Under the act, the key test of whether he has a defence against charges of making unauthorised recordings and disclosures is whether he believed “on reasonable grounds” the ATO investigation into his first disclosure was “inadequate”.

In Friday’s Kafkaesque twist, the ATO and Commonwealth prosecutors have sought suppression orders to prevent media reporting of Boyle’s efforts to assert that defence, in case it prejudices the trial. (Delays have already pushed the trial itself back to October 2023.) It’s the ultimate illustration of how current public interest disclosure laws can end up undermining their own primary purpose.

Read more:
Dreyfus ends prosecution of lawyer over alleged leaking about Australian spying in against Timor-Leste

Add the time, costs and negative impacts on Boyle’s life and health, the resources invested by the ATO and Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, the case’s impact on the Australian government’s reputation and the messages it sends to other potential whistleblowers, and we see just how badly the federal approach to whistleblowing needs an overhaul.

The law needs urgent reform to ensure that:

• whistleblower protection thresholds are more workable and consistent

• when they apply, the protections themselves are worthwhile

• new institutions are created to enforce the laws — especially a whistleblower protection commissioner to short-circuit the legal quagmire and make sure the public interest is efficiently served.

Crossing the threshold

The right thresholds are important because it is easy and normal for organisations to not see employees’ actions as covered by whistleblower protections, simply because other disputes and processes are also in train. The whistleblowing complaint might also include an employment dispute, for example, or a policy disagreement. Or other public interest factors – like national security – might need to be weighed up.

In fact, our research shows this complexity is the norm. Our study of more than 17,000 employees across 46 large and small public and private sector organisations found that up to half (47%) of all disclosures involve a mixture of public interest issues and personal grievances. Only 20% were solely “public interest”.

The law needs to be clearer that the other 30%, purely personal grievances, belong in other processes. But clear and properly implemented thresholds are the key to whether most whistleblowers will get any protection at all.

Recently, Labor Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus intervened to stop the prosecution of Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery for disclosing confidential information about the Australian government’s alleged commercial bugging of the Timor-Leste cabinet room.

But the actual whistleblower in that case – Witness K, the spy who took his internal complaints about the bugging to Collaery – missed out, because he, too, didn’t fit the thresholds. He had already been forced to plead guilty for revealing the wrongdoing because, no matter how heinous the crime, the mere fact it involved national intelligence left him with no chance of a defence at all.

Ensuring effective protections

Even if the thresholds are met, what value are current protections?

Prime ministers Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison started to lift the bar in the private sector in 2019, amending the Corporations Act to surpass the 2013 public sector whistleblowing laws in key ways.

But even if the public sector laws catch up, problems remain. A whistleblower can only receive compensation for the personal and professional impacts of their disclosures if those impacts were, in effect, punishment or payback motivated by awareness of a disclosure.

While okay for a criminal offence, that principle means any whistleblower will struggle to secure compensation if the damage flowed from simple negligence, collateral employment actions or breakdowns in organisational support. No whistleblower has yet succeeded in winning such compensation.

And some whistleblowers deserve justice even if the detriment was beyond anyone’s control. In 2017, the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services recommended Australia should establish a reward scheme that would share with the whistleblower some of the penalties imposed on wrongdoers or the money saved thanks to a disclosure, irrespective of fault. The United States and Canada are just two countries with such schemes.

Creating the right institutions

But who would administer such a scheme, or even take on the existing job of ensuring that legal protections for whistleblowers deliver justice, consistently across the public and private sectors? Does anyone have the job of investigating whether a whistleblower was properly treated, or of actively helping federal agencies sort out these often messy cases?

The short answer is no. The Commonwealth ombudsman and the Australian Securities and Investment Commission can require organisations to set up internal disclosure systems, but have little scope, in law or practice, to enforce protections.

The 2017 parliamentary joint committee recommended a whistleblower protection authority or commissioner to fill this stark gap. Since 2018, federal crossbench MPs including Cathy McGowan, Helen Haines, Adam Bandt and Andrew Wilkie have proposed this function be included in the Albanese government’s planned National Anti-Corruption Commission reforms.

This makes sense because the new agency will become the most obvious place in Australia for people to safely take complaints about serious wrongdoing and be listened to, or referred to the right place, with the necessary protections applying.

Read more:
After a border dispute and spying scandal, can Australia and Timor-Leste be good neighbours?

The need for an agency to coordinate a one-stop-shop process rather than a bureaucratic “pass the parcel” has been identified by no less than four statutory or parliamentary inquiries. These include the 2016 Moss Review and 2017 Senate Select Committee on a National Integrity Commission, but stretches right back to a 1994 Select Committee on Whistleblowing chaired by Tasmanian Liberal Senator Jocelyn Newman.

Just as the outgoing Coalition government was proposing further changes to whistleblowing laws, it is welcome news that Dreyfus is keeping at least some of that reform on the agenda.

For Australia to retain its record of pursuing world’s best practice in recognising, managing and protecting the role of whistleblowers, it will be vital for that agenda to include all three major elements of overdue reform.

A J Brown has received funding from the Australian Research Council and all Australian governments for research on public interest whistleblowing, integrity and anti-corruption reform through partners including Australia’s federal and state Ombudsmen, Australian Securities & Investments Commission, and other Commonwealth and State regulatory agencies, parliaments, anti-corruption bodies and private sector peak bodies (see most recently ‘Whistling While They Work 2: Improving Managerial and Organisational Responses to Whistleblowing in the Public and Private Sectors’ (https://whistlingwhiletheywork.edu.au/). He was a member of the Commonwealth Ministerial Expert Panel on Whistleblowing (2017-2019) and is also a board member of Transparency International, globally and in Australia.

– ref. Tax office whistleblowing saga points to reforms needed in three vital areas – https://theconversation.com/tax-office-whistleblowing-saga-points-to-reforms-needed-in-three-vital-areas-187608

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Erik Eklund, Professor of History, Australian National University

Last week, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton sought to revive the hoary old debate of nuclear power in Australia, announcing an internal review into whether the Liberals should back the controversial technology.

Dutton said the review would examine whether nuclear technologies could help shore up Australia’s energy security and reduce power prices. His call comes as prices soar for uranium, which is vital to nuclear power and nuclear weapons.

Australia’s powerful mining lobby has long pushed for Australia to both lift its nuclear ban and expand its uranium mining industry, to help provide apparently zero-emissions energy.

All this comes as Australia embarks on an ambitious maritime defence transition to nuclear-powered submarines. History suggests as the nuclear debate heats up in Australia, so will the pressure to expand our uranium exports. So where will all this lead?

Uranium is back in vogue

Australia has the world’s largest reserves of uranium and is the world’s fourth largest uranium exporter. Two uranium mines operate here – BHP’s Olympic Dam and Heathgate’s Beverley facility, both in South Australia. A third mine, Boss Energy’s Honeymoon project, is set to restart production.

Russia’s war on Ukraine – and its willingness to shut off gas supplies to Europe – means uranium is in high demand. In March this year, refined uranium was A$86 a pound, up from A$27 a pound in late 2017.

As countries scramble to shore up energy security, some are turning to nuclear. Japan plans to reopen closed nuclear reactors. France is planning new reactors to begin replacing its ageing and troublesome fleet of 56 reactors. Belgium has kept reactors from closing while Poland is planning new ones.

This is triggering fresh uranium investment. That includes in Queensland’s sparsely populated northwest, where Australian and Canadian mining companies are acquiring new mineral leases and quietly adding uranium to their ore inventories.

Read more:
If the opposition wants a mature discussion about nuclear energy, start with a carbon price. Without that, nuclear is wildly uncompetitive

Australia is unusual in being a major uranium exporter while also explicitly ruling out using nuclear power. Some nuclear proponents, such as the influential Minerals Council of Australia, are quick to point out this apparent contradiction.

The council is lobbying for an expansion of uranium exports. It says the existing industry is one of several factors making Australia “a partner of choice for private venture capital-funded new nuclear power”.

And Boss Energy managing director Duncan Craib said in May the opportunities to expand Australia’s uranium mining industry are “immense” and would help decarbonise our energy sector. He told the ABC:

Last year, we exported about 6,000 tonnes of uranium. That’s enough to provide for 75 per cent of Australia’s national energy market with zero emissions.

A politically fraught topic

The issues of uranium mining and nuclear energy surface regularly in Australia’s political debate.

Australia’s uranium industry flourished over the many years of the Menzies government. Menzies even sought to possess nuclear weapons in the 1950s. And one of his successors, John Gorton, pushed to build a major nuclear reactor at the Jervis Bay Territory in the late 1960s.

The Whitlam government did not pursue the Jervis Bay plan. It initially supported uranium mining and even the possibility of domestic uranium enrichment, necessary to produce nuclear fuel. But as the Cold War heated up, the party became divided on its nuclear stance, due to concerns about weapons proliferation.

Bob Hawke played a key role in overcoming this anti-nuclear sentiment while as a union chief and then as Labor prime minister. By 1984, Labor agreed to accept more uranium mines and international customers if domestic reactors did not expand beyond the Lucas Heights research facility in Sydney.

As recently as last year, Labor’s election platform walked a similar line: no nuclear reactors or waste dumps, but yes to mining and selling uranium, with safeguards around inspection and non-proliferation.

In recent years, the Coalition’s strongest support for nuclear came in 2006 when then prime minister John Howard established a nuclear taskforce to examine uranium mining and processing, and the feasibility of a domestic nuclear industry. The taskforce found it was possible to build a reactor in 10 to 15 years – assuming the public supported it and regulations were in place.

The Coalition did not pursue nuclear energy during its last nine years in government, despite Howard continuing to call for more uranium mines and investigation of domestic nuclear energy. But since losing government, the Coalition has warmed to the technology.

Read more:
Yes, Australia is buying a fleet of nuclear submarines. But nuclear-powered electricity must not come next

Where to now?

So where does all this leave the prospect of nuclear power in Australia? And how likely is expansion of the uranium industry?

Some elements of Labor support nuclear energy. And Labor will be aware of US efforts to revive its own uranium mining industry.

The AUKUS deal struck under the Morrison government would see Australia acquire nuclear-powered but conventionally armed submarines. It raised the obvious question of whether nuclear power would follow.

But before being elected, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Labor supported the AUKUS agreement only if it did not require a domestic civil nuclear industry.

Albanese is also a long-time opponent of uranium mining in Australia – as shown in 2006 when he opposed Labor’s decision to dump a policy that banned new uranium mines.

And while uranium prices may be surging, nuclear energy remains a risky economic prospect for Australia. Large reactors like the UK’s Hinkley C have struggled with enormous cost overruns while the small modular reactors pitched as the future of nuclear power are still expensive and still far away. Meanwhile, wind and solar remain the cheapest new build option.

The Coalition may, after its internal review, decide to adopt nuclear energy as part of its 2025 federal election pitch. But for this term of government at least, those wanting progress on nuclear power or expanded uranium mining are likely to be left disappointed.

Read more:
Uranium: what the explosion in prices means for the nuclear industry

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

– ref. Uranium prices are soaring, and Australia’s hoary old nuclear debate is back in the headlines. Here’s what it all means – https://theconversation.com/uranium-prices-are-soaring-and-australias-hoary-old-nuclear-debate-is-back-in-the-headlines-heres-what-it-all-means-188149

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Janelle K Johnstone, PhD Candidate, La Trobe University

The iconic Joni Mitchell’s recent surprise performance at the 2022 Newport Folk Festival prompted a world-wide outpouring of love and respect.

This was her first musical performance since suffering from a brain aneurysm in 2015 that left her unable to walk and talk. Last year, she spoke of having polio as a child as “a rehearsal for the rest of my life”.

The tributes for Mitchell celebrated her triumph from illness to recovery, but they also paid homage to Mitchell’s career that has pivoted on protest.

Mitchell is largely associated with folk scenes of the 60s and 70s. She has produced a prolific body of work, advocating for social change. As a committed activist she has spoken against environmental degradation, war, LGBTQI+ discrimination, and most recently, removed her music catalogue from Spotify in a protest against anti-vaccine propaganda.

Now, with the strokes of a guitar solo she repositioned herself from folk hero to punk provocateur, defying the “permissible” ways older women “should” behave.

In commanding public space and using one of the most traditionally masculinised expressions of popular music practice, she directly challenged the sorts of expectations many people have around gendered norms, particularly what women in their elder years look and sound like.

Not everyone gets to age on stage

Some of the most persistent social restrictions placed on women and gender diverse musicians are in relation to age.

Ongoing expectations of older women are to be passive, quiet and very much in the background. They are rarely asked, or expected, to “take up space” in the same ways their male counterparts do.

Whereas men step through phases of youthful experimentation into established music legends, there are tiresome obstacles for female and gender diverse people to do the same.

And while exceptions are often exceptional, they are not plentiful.

It’s not just age. Women have long been sidelined when it comes to acknowledging their skills on the electric guitar. Much like Mitchell.

The electric guitar has been an important part of rock and punk genres. There is a symbiotic relationship between how these genres – and the instrumentation that defines them – have unwittingly become gendered. The electric guitar solo in particular has come to be associated with machismo: fast, loud, expert, brave.

If you like to imagine a world where women don’t exist, google “best guitar solos ever”.

A recent New York Times article suggested things are starting to change. Citing guitarists like Taja Cheek and Adrianne Lenker, the Times suggested the guitar solo has shifted from a macho institution into a display of vulnerability, a moment (perhaps many) of connectivity.

Mitchell’s performance sits somewhere in this domain.

For the hundreds of thousands of women and gender diverse guitarists world-wide, myself included, the electric guitar and the genres it is entwined with offer a cool, optional extra: to test the cultural norms of gender with other markers of identity like class, culture, sexuality and age, to blur ideas of what we should and shouldn’t do.

Read more:
We crunched the numbers on ten recent ‘world’s best guitarist’ lists. Where are the women?

Australian women to the front

Australian women and gender diverse rock and punk musicians are often subject to a double act of erasure – missing from localised histories, and also from broader canons of contemporary music, which often remain persistently rooted in the traditions of the UK and the US.

Tracey Thorn’s brilliant biography of the Go-Between’s drummer Lindy Morrison is a love lettered homage that steps out the complex local, emotional, personal and structural ways that Australian women and gender diverse people are often omitted from cultural spaces.

“We are patronised and then we vanish,” writes Thorn.

The work of women and gender diverse artists is often compared to the glossy pedestal of the male creative genius.

In this light, we don’t play right, we don’t look right, we don’t sound right.

And then, somehow, we don’t age right.

Other reasons are far more mundane. Women contribute around 13 hours more unpaid work than men each week.

Carrying plates overflowing with generous gifts of labour, the maintenance of a music practice – a largely underpaid endeavour – is often the first to fall by the wayside.

Add to the mix ingrained social networks of knowledge sharing, and the dominance of men making decisions higher up the chain, and it is easy to see how women and gender diverse musicians stay submerged as men rise to the limited real estate of music elders.

The problem isn’t so much about starting up. It’s about finding the time to keep up.

Read more:
Friday essay: punk’s legacy, 40 years on

Our female and gender diverse music elders

There are so many Australian female and gender diverse music elders. Some are visible, but many ripple beneath the surface.

Regardless of genre, in maintaining decades-long practice, they are the super punks whose legacy can be heard in venues across the country.

The challenge now is to support the current crop of excellent musicians beyond the flushes of youth so that we have a more sustainable, textured and diverse Australian music culture. One where Mitchell’s defiance of expectations represents the status quo of how older women should and can be.

Read more:
Her Sound, Her Story shows that women’s voices are louder than ever in Australian music

Janelle K Johnstone has received funding from Creative Victoria and the Australia Council.

– ref. With the strokes of a guitar solo, Joni Mitchell showed us how our female music elders are super punks – https://theconversation.com/with-the-strokes-of-a-guitar-solo-joni-mitchell-showed-us-how-our-female-music-elders-are-super-punks-188075

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lucas Cernusak, Associate Professor, Plant Physiology, James Cook University

Have you ever wondered just how much water plants need to grow, or indeed why they need it? Plants lose a lot of water when they take in carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, so they need up to 300 grams of water to make each gram of dry plant matter.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. In a new paper published in Nature Plants, we report on a natural secret that could ultimately be used to help plants thrive while using less water.

An essential ingredient for plant growth

Plants are mostly made up of water – about 80% by weight. So we might expect plants would need around four grams of water for each gram of dry mass to achieve their ideal level of hydration.

That may be so, but they need a lot more water to grow. To produce one gram of new dry mass, a plant needs about 300 grams of water.

Why such a large difference between the amount of water required for hydration and the amount required for growth? Because almost all the water plants take up from the soil through their roots soon rises out into the atmosphere through their leaves.

Read more:
I spent a year squeezing leaves to measure their water content. Here’s what I learned

Plant leaves are covered in microscopic valves called stomata. Stomata open to let in carbon dioxide from the air, which plants need for photosynthesis and growth.

But when the stomata are open, the moist internal tissue of the leaf is exposed to the drier outside air. This means water vapour can leak out whenever the stomata are open.

A long-held assumption

Plant scientists have long assumed the opening and closing of the stomata almost entirely controlled the amount of water evaporating from a leaf. This is because we assumed the air in small pockets inside the leaves was fully saturated with water vapour (another way to say this is that the “relative humidity” is 100%, or very close to it).

If the air inside the leaf is saturated and the air outside is drier, the opening of the stomata controls how much water diffuses out of the leaf. The result is that large quantities of water vapour come out of the leaf for each molecule of carbon dioxide that comes in.

Why did we assume the air inside the leaves has a relative humidity near 100%? Partly because water moves from more saturated places to less saturated places, so we thought cells inside leaves could not sustain their hydration if exposed directly to air with relative humidity much lower than 100%.

But we also made this assumption because we had no method of directly measuring the relative humidity of the air inside leaves. (A recently developed “hydrogel nanoreporter” that can be injected into leaves to measure humidity may improve this situation.)

A secret revealed

However, in a series of experiments over the past 15 years, we have accumulated evidence that this assumption is not correct. When air outside the leaf was dry, we observed that the relative humidity in the air spaces inside leaves routinely dropped well below 100%, sometimes as low as 80%.

What is most remarkable about these observations is that photosynthesis did not stop or even slow down when the relative humidity inside the leaves declined. This means the rate of water loss from the leaves stayed constant, even as the air outside increased its “evaporative demand” (a measure of the drying capacity or “thirstiness” of air, based on temperature, humidity and other factors).

If the leaves restricted their loss of water only by closing their stomata, we would expect to see photosynthesis slowing down or stopping. So it appears plants can effectively control water loss from their leaves while stomata remain open, allowing carbon dioxide to continue diffusing into the leaf to support photosynthesis.

Using water wisely

We think plants are controlling the movement of water using special “water-gating” proteins called aquaporins, which reside in the membranes of cells inside the leaf.

Our next experiments will test whether aquaporins are indeed the mechanism behind the behaviour that we observed. If we can thoroughly understand this mechanism, it may be possible to target its activity, and ultimately provide agriculturalists with plants that use water more efficiently.

Read more:
Rising carbon dioxide is making the world’s plants more water-wise

Over the coming decades, global warming will make the atmosphere increasingly thirsty for evaporated water. We are pleased to report that nature may yet reveal secrets that can be harnessed to boost plant production with limited water resources.

The authors would like to acknowledge the contributions to this work of Graham Farquhar, Martin Canny (deceased), Meisha Holloway-Phillips, Diego Marquez and Hilary Stuart-Williams.

Lucas Cernusak receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Chin Wong 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. 15 years of experiments have overturned a major assumption about how thirsty plants actually are – https://theconversation.com/15-years-of-experiments-have-overturned-a-major-assumption-about-how-thirsty-plants-actually-are-188072

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Natasha Yates, Assistant Professor, General Practice, Bond University

Everyone feels tired sometimes. But how do you know whether your tiredness is a problem worth seeing a doctor about? And with all the mental and emotional strain we have been under from the pandemic, isn’t it just normal to feel tired?

Tiredness is subjective; what’s normal for one person won’t be for the next. Many people see their GPs reporting tiredness (a recent study in Ireland found that it was present in 25% of patients).

As a GP, my first question to someone who feels tired is: “how well can you function?”.

If tiredness is interfering with your everyday life and your ability to do what you like to do, it should be explored further.

Read more:
Fatigue after COVID is way more than just feeling tired. 5 tips on what to do about it

Some common causes of persistent tiredness

Poor sleep is an obvious and very common cause of tiredness. Often patients tell me “Oh, lack of sleep is not the cause, I sleep fine, possibly too much!” But on questioning they admit they don’t wake up feeling refreshed.

That’s a bit of a giveaway because it means their sleep quality is poor, even if the quantity seems enough. They could be suffering from sleep apnoea, where breathing stops and starts while a person is asleep. Apnoea can lead to serious long-term health problems, so it’s worth investigating.

Alcohol can also wreak havoc on a person’s sleep quality and they wake feeling unrefreshed.

Another common cause of tiredness is depression – and don’t forget, someone can be depressed without feeling they have low mood. For example, they may feel irritable or frustrated, or struggle to concentrate. This is concerning, because such patients may fly under the radar and not realise this is actually depression. Unexplained tiredness may be the predominant symptom of depression, with other symptoms only coming to light with careful questioning.

Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) is a serious long-term illness that, among other symptoms, causes people to feel extreme fatigue – well beyond the range of “normal” tiredness. It can begin with patients noticing a degree or type of tiredness different from their past experience, and can be difficult to diagnose in the early stages.

There are other potential causes of tiredness – problems such as low iron, thyroid disease, diabetes, kidney disease, heart disease and many more. Treatment for these can alleviate the tiredness too.

Tiredness also accompanies many illnesses, but should not persist after recovery.

The take-home message is this: if tiredness is interfering with your life, there are many possible causes and it’s worth speaking to a GP about it.

What does ‘interfering with life’ actually look like?

Screening tools for a concerning level of tiredness include the Epworth Sleepiness Scale and the STOP-BANG score. You can do both tests at home and take the results to your GP.

But even if you have normal scores, your tiredness is worth investigating if you:

• feel too tired to exercise (this can be a vicious cycle because regular exercise can actually give you more energy – however, it can be risky for people with ME/CFS to exercise, so caution is required for these patients)

• feel too tired to go out, see friends or do activities you once enjoyed

• hit the alarm snooze button a lot because you don’t wake feeling refreshed

• doze off in front of the TV regularly

• spend the whole day wishing you could go back to bed.

If, along with tiredness, you also have any of the following “red flags”, it is vital you see a GP sooner rather than later: unexplained weight loss, shortness of breath, recurrent fevers, bleeding from your bowels or gums, swollen and sore joints, or other new symptoms concerning you.

I sometimes get asked if wanting an afternoon nap is a red flag. That’s a tricky one; a late afternoon energy slump is pretty normal physiologically (we have whole cultures built around the idea of a siesta, and I often wish Australia was more open to the idea!).

And, of course, many of us lead busy lives and are subject to crushing expectations around work, study and parenting. Tiredness may not always be sign of a physical health problem, but rather that the balance between work and rest is not right.

OK, I’m starting to realise my tiredness might be a problem. What now?

Talk to your doctor. What happens next depends on the individual and unique factors at play.

Some people need investigating immediately if possible serious underlying causes are suspected.

However, there are often obvious ways to address lifestyle factors, and we’d start there. Is alcohol or caffeine interfering with your sleep? Do you have good sleep hygiene habits? Is your exercise level appropriate and your diet not too high in sugar?

After we’ve tackled lifestyle factors, we can look at whether to investigate for health conditions that might be contributing to the tiredness.

What about post-COVID fatigue?

As I have written before, fatigue is about more than feeling just tired:

Tiredness can get better with enough rest, while fatigue persists even if someone is sleeping and resting more than ever.

If you’re especially concerned about fatigue after recovering from COVID and are worried about long COVID, definitely talk to a doctor.

The factors at play are complex and unique to the individual, so a good doctor can help you work out when tiredness has crossed over into true fatigue.

Read more:
Still coughing after COVID? Here’s why it happens and what to do about it

Natasha Yates is affiliated with the RACGP

– ref. Why am I so tired and when is it time to see the doctor about it? A GP explains – https://theconversation.com/why-am-i-so-tired-and-when-is-it-time-to-see-the-doctor-about-it-a-gp-explains-187984

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alison Hilton, Academic Chair Secondary Education, Murdoch University

There is no shortage of articles about how teachers are stressed, due to their complex jobs and high workloads.

But what is happening before they make it to the classroom?

There are lots of reasons why Australia has a teacher shortage and my new research sheds light on one deterrent that is not often talked about.

This is the high-stakes Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Teacher Education, known as LANTITE.

What is LANTITE?

Introduced in 2017, LANTITE is made up of two separate computer-based tests: one for numeracy, and one for literacy.

Read more:
‘This is like banging our heads against the wall’: why a move to outsource lesson planning has NSW teachers hopping mad

The multiple-choice tests are administered independently of universities by the Australian Council for Educational Research. Universities have no visibility of the tests, or how students perform, even after results are released.

It costs A$196 to sit both tests, or A$98 to sit just one of them.

Students must find time to prepare for and attempt LANTITE on top of their theory and practical study in a teaching degree. They must pass both the literacy and numeracy components of LANTITE in order to graduate.

The pass rate is more than 90%.

A stress test

For my doctoral research, I surveyed 189 student teachers about their experience with LANTITE through an online questionnaire. They came from 33 universities across Australia. From this group, 27 students also completed in-depth interviews to further describe their experiences. I also spoke to 41 teachers and teacher educators.

Among the many stories and experiences were students like Monique* who described the test as “fun” and “just like doing an IQ test”. However, it was far more common for interviewees to report negative experiences, with a particular emphasis on the impact on mental health and wellbeing. As Suraya told me:

I ended up having a really bad panic attack, where I blacked out. I could not comprehend anything that was going on in front of me.

Suraya was not alone. My research uncovered other alarming accounts of panic attacks and even suicidal ideation from students after they had sat the test. For some students who did not pass, the stress and pressure of having to reattempt the tests resulted in prolonged mental health conditions.

Any test or exam creates a certain amount of stress. But for student teachers, LANTITE comes on top of existing study and practical teaching pressures as they finalise their degrees. For those students who need to reattempt one or more component of LANTITE, the stress escalates, as was the case for Vince.

My journey has been a nightmare. I was panicking when it came to the last questions. I was running out of time and some of the words I didn’t understand because I was panicked.

It is expensive

I also found students are paying a high price to become a teacher. While the cost to sit both components of LANTITE is just under $200 per attempt, many students purchase professional study materials and pay tutors or attend workshops to help them prepare.

One student in the study reported spending $6,000 on private tutoring. These costs have to be paid upfront, unlike HECS loans which can be deferred.

Teacher educators I interviewed echoed concerns about these costs and pressures. As Wynette said:

As a student you already have time pressures, you already have stressors and financial demands […] and to have this extra thing on top is a bit more stressful.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, culturally and linguistically diverse students, and students with disability were more likely to emphasise how harsh the LANTITE experience can be. This suggests it may hindering a more diverse workforce. As Mary, another teacher educator, explained:

If they are coming from a background or environment where they have not done a lot of high-stakes testing that will also mean that they don’t have the same experiences that your mainly more mainstream white-Anglo students do.

We don’t need this test

Yes, teachers need to have certain levels of literacy and numeracy going into the classroom. But we don’t need LANTITE to determine this.

Student teachers already have a wide range of assessments throughout their courses. These are both practical and theory-based and implicitly assess numeracy and literacy. For example, prior to graduating, students complete a nationally mandated individual teacher performance assessment, which looks at the practical skills and knowledge of a graduating teacher.

Teacher education programs also have ongoing accreditation requirements to ensure “quality” of graduates.

Read more:
Student teachers must pass a literacy and numeracy test before graduating – it’s unfair and costly

Standardised assessments in timed situations are also becoming less common in university studies, as programs seek more nuanced ways to assess the complex skills graduates need to teach.

A more sensible approach, which trusts the profession and universities to do their jobs training new teachers, is needed.

As other studies have argued, LANTITE is an ineffective quality control mechanism anyway, as you can resit the test multiple times if you fail. It does little to change who becomes a teacher and who does not.

If anything, LANTITE has only served to teach our future teachers how to sit a standardised test and pass. In the meantime, students’ graduation is delayed, resources are wasted and students are even more stressed.

As student Michael, summed it up, “it hurt my heart and my wallet”.

*All names have been changed

If this article has raised issues for you, or if you’re concerned about someone you know, call Lifeline on 13 11 14.

Alison Hilton 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. ‘It hurt my heart and my wallet’: the unnecessary test stressing teachers before they even make it to the classroom – https://theconversation.com/it-hurt-my-heart-and-my-wallet-the-unnecessary-test-stressing-teachers-before-they-even-make-it-to-the-classroom-187860

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Farr-Wharton, Associate Dean of Management, Edith Cowan University

Former AFL star Eddie Betts’ revelations about the 2018 Adelaide Crows training camp, which left him feeling like he had been brainwashed and sapped his passion for football, raises all sorts of questions.

But the most obvious is how could the Crows’ management, running an elite organisation with a team that had made the grand final the year before, treat its most valuable assets – its players – so badly?

Who decided the bullying and abusive behaviour that reportedly traumatised individuals and fractured the team was a good idea?

We can’t answer that. But as academics with experience in the “motivational industry”, we’re not all that shocked such things occurred.

The market for programs and processes to improve individual and organisational performance is huge, and with it comes faddish ideas with little or no basis in evidence.

A shattering experience

Betts’ account of the 2018 training camp, in his recently published autobiography The Boy from Boomerang Crescent, describes scenes of humiliation, misappropriation of Indigenous cultural practices and an emphasis on toxic aspects of masculinity.

The four-day preseason camp followed Adelaide making the 2017 AFL grand final but being trounced by the Richmond Tigers.

Betts describes being blindfolded, led onto a bus with papered-over windows and taken to a random location with Richmond’s club song (“Tigerland”) being played loudly over and over again.

He says there were criticism sessions in which “counsellors” yelled taunts at him about personal matters he believed he had disclosed in confidence:

I was exhausted, drained and distressed about the details being shared. Another camp-dude jumped on my back and started to berate me about my mother, something so deeply personal that I was absolutely shattered to hear it come out of his mouth.

The experience clearly left a lasting impression. Betts says his performance and relationship with his family suffered.

His account is disturbing. Equally concerning is how easily these kinds of inappropriate, confrontational and ethically dubious experiences occur in the name of “training” and “motivation”.

A tough idea with no evidential basis

As industry-engaged academics, we are experienced in developing, implementing and evaluating training and interventions that build psychological capital, resilience and wellbeing.

We can only presume the rationale for the training camp was to develop greater mental toughness.

But while it might be a commonly held belief that placing people in highly stressful and emotionally confronting circumstances will help them “sink or swim” and “face their fears”, the evidence shows this is not helpful. Indeed, it has the potential to be very harmful.

The brain is a highly efficient learning machine. It uses emotions (the automatic deployment of chemicals in the brain as a response to stimuli) to “bake in” memories – and, for that matter, skills.

When external stimuli trigger negative emotions, this leads to a “flight, fight or freeze” response. Long after the trigger and experience, the emotional and physiological reaction to the memory can remain.

This is called trauma. As described by Martin Seligman – often referred to as the “father of positive psychology” – if that trauma isn’t resolved it can lead to anxiety and depression, and even post-traumatic stress disorder.

Read more:
What is complex PTSD and how does it relate to past abuse and trauma?

The time and place for ‘post-traumatic growth’

Decades of research in the field of psychology has led to the general understanding that there are times when it is appropriate for people to face emotionally confronting circumstances, particularly childhood experiences, that may have had a defining impact on a person’s behaviour or cognition.

However, there are very strict guidelines and protocols as to when and under what conditions this occurs. In Australia this is governed by the Psychology Board of Australia and underpinned by the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law Act.

In brief, such confrontation should only occur when a qualified and registered practitioner believes the person they are treating feels safe and supported, so the emotional and physiological reaction can occur in a contained way. When this occurs, it is called “post-traumatic growth” – and it must be done by a dedicated expert practitioner.

There are no circumstances under which an organisation, or those acting on behalf of it, should deliberately subject its employees to experiences that have the potential to be emotionally traumatic.

Indeed, Australia’s work health and safety regulations are increasingly making employers legally responsible for “psycho-social hazards” – anything that could cause psychological harm – at work. This includes aggressive, bullying behaviour and exposure to traumatic events.

In some workplaces, exposure to emotionally confronting events is unavoidable.
Examples include aged-care and health-care workers who regularly have to confront human frailty and death; paramedics who have to attend car accidents; and police officers who are exposed to the very worst of human nature. Particularly for paramedics and police, substantial organisational resources are deployed to help mitigate the impact of exposure to trauma – although, sometimes, they can still fall through the cracks.

Read more:
Team-building exercises can be a waste of time. You achieve more by getting personal

All workplaces should be safe and respectful

The idea of provoking trauma for some organisational benefit is wrong. Do not ever believe that any good is done by doing harm. There is no evidence to support this.

Helping someone to achieve personal growth requires standard mental-health first-aid skills: listening; giving support and information; and encouraging them to seek appropriate professional help.

Read more:
How hope can keep you healthier and happier

Betts’ reported experience is a reminder that engagements with colleagues, managers, subordinates, customers and clients at work should always be safe and respectful.

Deliberately exposing someone to an emotionally confronting situation is only likely to harm their ability to perform.

The research conducted by Ben Farr-Wharton has received funding from several sources over the last decade. Sources include: the Australian Army, Ramsay Health Care, Dept. Treasury and Finance (Tas), Humanitas Hospital, the Dept. of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Dept. of Water and Environmental Regulation (WA), Sydney Water, and the Centre for Work, Health and Safety (NSW).

The research conducted by Matthew J. Xerri has received funding from several sources over the last decade. Sources include the Australian Army and Ramsay Health Care.

Yvonne Brunetto receives funding from Ramsay Health Pty, Ltd, Queensland and NSW Health departments, Wesley Mission Queensland, McKenzie Aged Care Pty Ltd, Australian Army, Centre for Work, Health and Safety (NSW Govt) and Erasmus UN Funding.

– ref. Eddie Betts’ camp saga highlights a motivational industry rife with weird, harmful ideas – https://theconversation.com/eddie-betts-camp-saga-highlights-a-motivational-industry-rife-with-weird-harmful-ideas-188354

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Heather Handley, Associate Professor of Volcanology and Geoscience Communication, University of Twente and Adjunct Associate Professor, Monash University

The Fagradalsfjall volcano in Iceland began erupting again on Wednesday after eight months of slumber – so far without any adverse impacts on people or air traffic.

The eruption was expected. It’s in a seismically active (uninhabited) area, and came after several days of earthquake activity close to Earth’s surface. It’s hard to say how long it will continue, although an eruption in the same area last year lasted about six months.

Climate change is causing the widespread warming of our land, oceans and atmosphere. Apart from this, it also has the potential to increase volcanic activity, affect the size of eruptions, and alter the “cooling effect” that follows volcanic eruptions.

Any of these scenarios could have far-reaching consequences. Yet we don’t fully understand the impact a warming climate could have on volcanic activity.

Cold volcanic regions

First, let’s take a look at volcanic regions covered in ice. There’s a long-established link between the large-scale melting of ice in active volcanic regions and increased eruptions.

Research on Iceland’s volcanic systems has identified a heightened period of activity related to the large-scale ice melt at the end of the last ice age. The average eruption rates were found to be up to 100 times higher after the end of the last glacial period, compared to the earlier colder glacial period. Eruptions were also smaller when ice cover was thicker.

But why is this the case? Well, as glaciers and ice sheets melt, pressure is taken off Earth’s surface and there are changes in the forces (stress) acting on rocks within the crust and upper mantle. This can lead to more molten rock, or “magma”, being produced in the mantle – which can feed more eruptions.

The changes can also affect where and how magma is stored in the crust, and can make it easier for magma to reach the surface.

Magma generation beneath Iceland is already increasing due to a warming climate and melting glaciers.

The intense ash-producing eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajökull volcano in 2010 was the result of an explosive interaction between hot magma and cold glacial melt water. Based on what we know from the past, an increase in Iceland’s melting ice could lead to larger and more frequent volcanic eruptions.

Weather-triggered eruptions

But what about volcanic regions that aren’t covered in ice – could these also be affected by global warming?

Possibly. We know climate change is increasing the severity of storms and other weather events in many parts of the world. These weather events may trigger more volcanic eruptions.

On December 6 2021, an eruption at one of Indonesia’s most active volcanoes, Mount Semeru, caused ashfall, pyroclastic flows and volcanic mudflows (called “lahars”) that claimed the lives of at least 50 people.

Local authorities hadn’t expected the scale of the eruption. As for the cause, they said several days of heavy rain had destabilised the dome of lava in the volcano’s summit crater. This led to the dome collapsing, which reduced pressure on the magma below and triggered an eruption.

Signals of volcanic unrest are usually obtained from changes in volcanic systems (such as earthquake activity), changes in gas emissions from the volcano, or small changes in the shape of the volcano (which can be detected by ground-based or satellite monitoring).

Predicting eruptions is already an incredibly complex task. It will become even more difficult as we begin to factor in risk posed by severe weather which could destabilise parts of a volcano.

Read more:
Mount Semeru’s deadly eruption was triggered by rain and storms, making it much harder to predict

Some scientists suspect increased rainfall led to the damaging 2018 Kīlauea eruption in Hawaii. This was preceded by months of heavy rainfall, which infiltrated the earth and increased underground water pressure within the porous rock. They believe this could have weakened and fractured the rock, facilitating the movement of magma and triggering the eruption.

But other experts disagree, and say there’s no substantial link between rainfall events and eruptions at Kīlauea volcano.

Rain-influenced volcanism has also been proposed at other volcanoes around the world, such as the Soufrière Hills volcano in the Caribbean, and Piton de la Fournaise on Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean.

Changes to the ‘cooling effect’

There’s another layer we can’t ignore when it comes to assessing the potential link between climate change and volcanic activity. That is: volcanoes themselves can influence the climate.

An eruption can lead to cooling or warming, depending on the volcano’s geographical location, the amount and composition of ash and gas erupted, and how high the plume reaches into the atmosphere.

Volcanic injections that were rich in sulphur dioxide gas have had the strongest climatic impact recorded in historic times. Sulphur dioxide eventually condenses to form sulfate aerosols in the stratosphere – and these aerosols reduce how much heat reaches Earth’s surface, causing cooling.

As the climate warms, research shows this will change how volcanic gases interact with the atmosphere. Importantly, the outcome won’t be the same for all eruptions. Some scenarios show that, in a warmer atmosphere, small to medium-sized eruptions could reduce the cooling effect of volcanic plumes by up to 75%.

These scenarios assume the “tropopause” (the boundary between the troposphere and stratosphere) will increase in height as the atmosphere warms. But since the volcano’s eruption column will stay the same, the plume carrying sulphur dioxide will be less likely to reach the upper atmosphere – where it would have the largest impact on the climate.

On the other hand, more powerful but less frequent volcanic eruptions could lead to a greater cooling effect. That’s because as the atmosphere gets warmer, plumes of ash and gas emitted from powerful eruptions are predicted to rise higher into the atmosphere, and spread rapidly from the tropics to higher latitudes.

One recent study has suggested the major Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcanic eruption in January may contribute to global warming, by pumping massive amounts of water vapour (a greenhouse gas) into the stratosphere.

Read more:
How a volcanic bombardment in ancient Australia led to the world’s greatest climate catastrophe

Heather Handley receives funding from the Australian Research Council. She is a Science and Technology Australia Superstar of STEM, Co-Founder of Women in Earth and Environmental Sciences Australasia (WOMEESA) and Co-Founder and Director of the Earth Futures Festival.

– ref. A volcano is erupting again in Iceland. Is climate change causing more eruptions? – https://theconversation.com/a-volcano-is-erupting-again-in-iceland-is-climate-change-causing-more-eruptions-187858

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amy Maguire, Associate Professor in Human Rights and International Law, University of Newcastle

Israel launched multiple air strikes on Gaza on August 5, in another eruption of open warfare between Israel and Palestinian militants. The latest attacks come just over a year after hundreds were killed in an intense period of conflict in the territory.

Israel announced its missile strikes were targeting military leaders of the al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad militant organisation in Gaza. Israel alleged Islamic Jihad forces were making “threatening movements” near the Israeli border.

Israel’s strikes killed two key leaders of Islamic Jihad in Gaza and severely damaged its military capabilities.

Palestinian Islamic Jihad responded by launching hundreds of rockets into Israel. The Israel Defence Forces reported its Iron Dome missile defence system was operating at a 97% success rate in intercepting rockets launched from Gaza. No Israelis had been killed or seriously injured.

But the past three days of intense conflict have extracted a very heavy civilian toll in Gaza. The Palestinian Health Ministry reports at least 44 dead and over 350 civilians wounded. Reportedly among the dead were 15 Palestinian children, including five boys killed by a missile strike as they visited their grandfather’s grave.

An Egyptian-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Islamic Jihad has now begun. It is too early to say whether the ceasefire will hold, or for how long.

The Palestinian governing authority in Gaza is Hamas, which was elected in 2006. Hamas does not recognise the legitimacy of the Israeli state and aims to liberate Palestine through armed resistance. Yet Hamas has not engaged in the most recent outbreak of warfare.

Blockaded Gaza in humanitarian crisis

The Gaza Strip is a 365-square-kilometre territory that has been under Israeli control since 1967, along with the other Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Over 2 million Palestinians live in the densely populated territory. Nearly 80% depend on aid to survive.

Gaza has been under blockade for 15 years. Israel controls its airspace and territorial waters, along with two of three border crossings (Egypt controls the third). Gaza is often referred to as “the world’s largest open-air prison”.

Humanitarian organisations blame the blockade for the extreme humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Statistics tell a dire story of life in Gaza today:

• around two-thirds of the Palestinian population of Gaza are refugees, with over 500,000 living in eight refugee camps across the Gaza Strip, in some of the highest population densities in the world

• 97% of Gaza’s water is undrinkable, and contaminated water is poisoning people

• people in Gaza receive a daily average of 12 hours of electricity supply and are subject to rolling power cuts

• healthcare services in Gaza are in perpetual crisis, starved of power, vital equipment, staff and essential medicines

• 39% of patients needing specialist care in the West Bank or Israel were denied or delayed permission to leave Gaza by Israel this year

• the unemployment rate is 46.6%, and over 62% for young people

• four in five children in Gaza report living with fear, grief and depression, often manifesting in self-harm

• tens of thousands are displaced within Gaza due to the bombardment and ruin of their homes.

What hope for a solution?

The UN special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, has called the latest Israeli strikes on the territory illegal and irresponsible.

Her predecessor, S. Michael Lynk, concluded earlier this year that Israel’s occupation of Palestine constitutes apartheid. He accused the international community of failing to hold Israel to account for breaching fundamental international norms over its 55-year occupation, saying:

For more than 40 years, the UN Security Council and General Assembly have stated in hundreds of resolutions that Israel’s annexation of occupied territory is unlawful, its construction of hundreds of Jewish settlements are illegal, and its denial of Palestinian self-determination breaches international law.

The Council and the Assembly have repeatedly criticized Israel for defying their resolutions. They have threatened consequences. But no accountability has ever followed. If the international community had truly acted on its resolutions 40 or 30 years ago, we would not be talking about apartheid today.

Israel’s most powerful ally, the United States, rejects such characterisations. In relation to the most recent warfare, the US ambassador to Israel, Tom Nides, tweeted:

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss echoed this position:

There is no sign that the most recent outbreak of warfare has or will alter the status quo. No peace process is operating to find durable solutions to the conflict.

Recent years show no trend away from perpetual conflict and entrenchment of positions anathema to a two-state solution for Palestine and Israel.

For the people of Gaza, the stalemate becomes increasingly untenable every day.

Amy Maguire 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. Amid death and destruction, the latest conflict in Gaza highlights the depths of its humanitarian crisis – https://theconversation.com/amid-death-and-destruction-the-latest-conflict-in-gaza-highlights-the-depths-of-its-humanitarian-crisis-188351

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Hronis, Clinical Psychologist, University of Technology Sydney

It’s no secret COVID is having a drastic impact on people’s wellbeing, and has worsened an already a rising trend in mental health problems. The Australian Institute for Health and Welfare’s latest figures indicate some of our most vulnerable are struggling even more than most.

People with disabilities are experiencing very high rates of mental health difficulties and psychological distress. Yet health professionals often don’t feel equipped to treat people who are experiencing both disabilities and mental health difficulties.

About one in six Australians have a disability, equating to around 4.4 million people. The latest figures show two-thirds of people with a disability report low to moderate levels of psychological distress, while around a third report high or very high levels of psychological distress.

This compares to 92% of people without disability who report low to moderate psychological distress, and 8% who report high or very high distress. Almost a quarter of adults living with a disability report their mental health has worsened during the pandemic period.

Why the difference?

Research tells us there’s a strong link between physical health and mental health. Some health behaviours are likely to have a detrimental effect on wellbeing, such as poor diet and inactivity.

In general, people with a disability are more likely to engage in risky health behaviours than people without a disability. This includes not eating enough fruit and vegetables per day (47% compared to 41%), being overweight or obese according to body mass index (72% compared to 55%), and not doing enough physical activity for their age (72% compared to 52%).

Not only do people with disabilities have higher rates of mental health difficulties and health risk behaviours, they also face significant barriers when it comes to accessing effective and timely healthcare. These barriers include lengthy wait times for healthcare, inaccessibility of buildings, costs and experiences of discrimination, including by health professionals.

Read more:
Long COVID should make us rethink disability – and the way we offer support to those with ‘invisible conditions’

Be disabled or have mental health problems – but not both

Working across the mental health and disability sectors, it is not uncommon to hear of people falling between the cracks of services. Someone may present to a disability-specific health service, and be turned away due to a co-occuring mental health difficulty. They might then present to a mental health service and be turned away due to having a disability.

A range of factors contribute to this issue. Services are often funded in a way that requires them to have certain criteria for the clients who can be seen. This unfortunately means those who do not meet the criteria are turned away.

Health and mental health practitioners agree people with disabilities have the right to receive good mental heath care and access to services. But clinicians such as psychologists and counsellors report low confidence when working with people with disabilities, and insufficient training in how to best help them.

Read more:
‘Sometimes I don’t have the words for things’: how we are using art to research stigma and marginalisation

Barriers can cause discrimination

For a long time, people with certain disabilities such as intellectual disabilities were excluded from many mental health treatments. It was assumed that due to difficulties with learning and processing information, they did not have the capacity to engage in therapy.

Only in the past decade has this started to shift, with emerging mental health treatment programs developed specifically for people with disabilities.

A lack of training can also result in a form of discrimination called “diagnostic overshadowing”. This is when a health practitioner attributes a person’s symptoms to an already existing disability or mental illness, rather than fully exploring the symptoms and considering alternate diagnoses.

Often, once a patient has a confirmed diagnosis, there is a tendency to attribute all new behaviours or symptoms to that diagnosis. As a result, diagnoses may be inaccurate or get missed. And treatment might not be adequate or effective.

Read more:
Hospitals only note a person’s intellectual disability 20% of the time – so they don’t adjust their care

Investment and training is needed

If we are to improve the mental health and wellbeing of people living with a disability, greater investment is needed. Doctors and practitioners require specialised training to work with clients with both disabilities and mental illness.

We also need greater collaboration between health, disability and mental health professionals, and increased communication so services work together rather than in isolation. We can look to the University of New South Wales’ Department of Developmental Disability Neuropsychiatry, University of Technology Sydney’s Graduate School of Health and Westmead Children’s Hospital for examples of mental health and disability needs being integrated. Other services should follow this path.

As always, prevention and early intervention is key. While it is important we can effectively treat people who require help, it is also important for us to curb the rising trend of mental illness.

Anastasia Hronis has received funding from the James N Kirby Foundation for research into adapting therapy for children with intellectual disabilities.

– ref. Mental distress is much worse for people with disabilities, and many health professionals don’t know how to help – https://theconversation.com/mental-distress-is-much-worse-for-people-with-disabilities-and-many-health-professionals-dont-know-how-to-help-187078

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Shaw, Honorary Senior Fellow in Urban Geography and Planning, The University of Melbourne

Australian cities are good at growing – for decades their states have relied on it. The need to house more people is used to justify expansion out and up, but it is the rates, taxes and duties that flow from land transfers and construction that drive the endless development of Melbourne and Sydney in particular. Property development is the single largest contributor to Victorian and New South Wales government revenues.

For example, the City of Melbourne’s draft spatial plan proposes new suburbs to the west and north. It’s continuing on a course mapped out in the post-recession 1990s, when Australian governments focused on building on or digging up our great expanses. The plan neither questions the rationale for growth nor, apparently, the deeper effects of the pandemic.

The city council is understandably anxious to attract people back to the centre.
The city plan presumes a return to Australia’s high population growth of the 2000s. Expectations of a renewed influx of students, workers and tourists from overseas are based more on hope, however, than reason.

Read more:
COVID halved international student numbers in Australia. The risk now is we lose future skilled workers and citizens

The drivers of population growth are more uncertain and we can no longer depend on global mobility at pre-pandemic levels. Birth rates are falling across the developed world, online international education is improving, and research suggests pandemics will persist while cities encroach on the habitats of so many other species.

Meanwhile, the towers thrown up in the heady years of growth are half-empty and cracking, poorly ventilated, reliant on central air conditioning and not built for more extreme weather or low energy consumption. Melbourne and Sydney’s showcase regeneration projects at Docklands and Barangaroo are more dismal and deserted than ever.

Better needn’t mean bigger

Now is not the time for anyone to announce that their city will become “bigger and better”. Cities don’t have to get bigger to evolve, and sooner or later all will have to reckon with the concept of degrowth.

Australia must become less reliant on imports of skilled workers, students, tourists and materials. We can make better use of local resources and produce much more of what we need here.

Australian cities have very good bones. They have amazing cultural scenes. Their biomedical capabilities are among the world’s best. Our education sector remains eminently exportable online and via existing overseas campuses. The manufacturing sector still has a base to build on and provide many more of the products Australians need. And our renewable energy capacity is unlimited.

We can support our local hospitality and cultural venues better, and increase intercity and interstate patronage. We can invest in research and development and maintain wealth through innovation and production, rather than the eternal consumption of land.

Read more:
To really address climate change, Australia could make 27 times as much electricity and make it renewable

Rethink what we build and why

Adapting to global environmental conditions means rethinking not just what and how we build, but why. Before designating land for yet more housing estates, for example, let’s consider that a million homes – 10% of Australia’s housing stock – were empty on census night last year. Nearly 600,000 were in Victoria and New South Wales.

Think tank Prosper Australia has for years demonstrated
shocking numbers of vacant dwellings unavailable for rent. A hefty vacancy tax – much greater than the Victorian rate of 1% of property value, while NSW still has none for Australian owners – would lead to many more homes being released onto the market.

The property developers’ argument that we have to build more because that’s the only way to make housing more affordable has been repeatedly refuted by years of careful research.

Read more:
Affordable housing policy failure still being fuelled by flawed analysis

Tens of thousands of upmarket dwellings have been added to the inner cities of Melbourne and Sydney over the past 20 years, with no reduction in prices across the board. While upmarket unit prices might drop a little when vacancy rates in that submarket increase, their developers are keenly alert to any dip in profits. At the slightest hint of surplus they just stop building.

If housing affordability is the object of urban expansion, let’s grasp that nettle: the only way to achieve it is to build affordable housing, it’s that simple. More than enough land is available within the urban growth boundaries for residential development.

Recent research from Prosper shows there are 84,000 undeveloped housing lots on nine Australian master-planned estates alone. This does not include the many inner-city regeneration projects already under way. Social housing in these areas should be the focus of urban planning before any more land is released.

What about ‘under-developed’ urban lands?

Further expansion of the inner cities of Melbourne and Sydney can only encroach onto low-lying, flood-prone industrial lands that were long ago deemed unsuitable for residential development. It would be folly, or very expensive, to build housing there.

These areas are and still can be used for manufacturing, however, and not just the new niche urban manufacturers that gentrifying councils so love to love. Older industries that are even now being displaced from Fishermans Bend in Melbourne and Blackwattle Bay in Sydney can easily coexist with artisanal bakeries and coffee roasters.

The imperative to promote sustainable local production is stronger than ever now that the pandemic and war have exposed the vulnerabilities of global supply lines. Our diminishing industrial lands really should be kept for industry, until such time as sea-level rise claims them as wetlands.

Read more:
‘Building too close to the water. It’s ridiculous!’ Talk of buyouts after floods shows need to get serious about climate adaptation

This is not an argument for decreasing construction activity: there is much work to be done retrofitting existing buildings. These need to be re-clad, better ventilated, opened to passive cooling and adapted to a warming climate.

The ongoing regeneration projects in Melbourne and Sydney need a lot more attention. Docklands, Darling Harbour and Barangaroo could become useful with some serious interventions. The emerging Fishermans Bend and Blackwattle Bay developments have already released more land than their planners know what to do with.

A forward-looking city plan would consolidate and advance what that city already has. That’s the way to build revenue streams that are environmentally, socially and politically sustainable.

Kate Shaw 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 case for degrowth: stop the endless expansion and work with what our cities already have – https://theconversation.com/the-case-for-degrowth-stop-the-endless-expansion-and-work-with-what-our-cities-already-have-187929

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kirsten Stevens, Lecturer in Arts and Cultural Management, The University of Melbourne

Australia, and the world, has lost a unique voice with the passing last week of acclaimed director and writer Shirley Barrett.

Barrett gained international fame in 1996 when she won the Caméra d’Or – Cannes Film Festival’s award for best first feature – for Love Serenade. Following growing global attention, by 1997 the New York Times would celebrate her as “a pragmatic Australian with an offbeat take on the world.”

Barrett’s offbeat take infused her work, including two more films – Walk the Talk (2000) and South Solitary (2010) – recognisable television dramas such as Love My Way, Offspring and A Place to Call Home, and novels Rush Oh! and The Bus on Thursday.

Barrett passed away peacefully in her sleep at her home in Sydney at age 60, following a battle with metastatic breast cancer.

A social media post from Barrett’s daughter Emmeline Norris confirmed the passing of her mother on Wednesday morning.

In the post, Norris marked the loss of

not only a brilliant filmmaker and writer, but more importantly a loving mother to me and my sister, the lifelong soulmate of our dad, and the best friend one could ask for.“

Exploring desire in wayward places

Barrett’s films presented a unique perspective on love, desire, and the workings of life at the margins – both social and geographic – of Australian society.

Between 1996 and 2010 Barrett wrote and directed three films, an accomplishment in the Australian industry where second features can be difficult to make (especially for women).

From the isolated tedium of geographically remote settings of Love Serenade and South Solitary, and the more seedy fringes of fame on the RSL circuits of the Gold Coast in Walk the Talk, these films were marked by the power of their locations to shape the stories and desires of their characters.

Love Serenade, selected for Un Certain Regard – the Cannes Film Festival’s program for exploring new cinematic horizons – highlights Barrett’s unique perspective on storytelling.

Celebrated for one of the most un-erotic stripteases in cinema history, Love Serenade subtly subverted the conventions of the romantic comedy genre. The film follows sisters Vicki-Ann and Dimity Hurley, played by Rebecca Frith and Miranda Otto respectively, through their misguided seductions, and later disposal, of new-in-town Brisbane radio DJ Ken Sherry.

Far from indulging the expected love triangle and romantic tensions, the film instead focuses on the oppressiveness of the film’s setting: the middle-of-nowhere town of Sunray.

In this place, the sister’s desiring of Ken stands in for a wider set of longings; a “yearning for something else”, as Barrett described it.

Barrett would return to the themes of female desire and the power of (social) geography to shape it in her third feature, South Solitary, released in 2010. Again starring Otto, this time as the spinster niece of a lighthouse operator, South Solitary examined the lives of the tiny communities that tend the lighthouse islands in the Tasman Sea.

Diving into the archives to research the film, Barrett noted the appeal of this isolated setting where humans were forced to rely on unruly animals and even more unruly neighbours to survive.

As Barrett explained,

there are fascinating accounts of tension that would quickly develop between people, in this setting, with nothing else to alleviate them. Things would often go badly awry.

South Solitary was more than simply a story about an isolated community, it was a film made by and for women. With a creative team mainly composed of women, Barrett would joke it was “a film written for middle-aged women, by middle aged-women.”

Even today, such a description is considered a risky proposition for a film’s success.

Read more:
We’re right to make a scene about gender equity in the Australian screen industry

From the screen to the page

In 2014 Barrett released her first novel, Rush Oh!, with a backdrop telling the true story of a symbiotic relationship between a whaling town on the NSW south coast and a pod of killer whales, which aided the whalers’ work.

The story of Eden had begun life as a film script, developed through the years that Barrett worked on seeing South Solitary to the big screen. After languishing as an unrealised project for several years, Barrett transformed the story into a book.

Following Rush Oh! Barrett would continue to write work for beyond the screen, releasing The Bus on Thursday in 2018 and drafting another manuscript over recent years.

Earlier this year Barrett wrote two articles for The Guardian about her experience with cancer and her terminal diagnosis.

By March, Barrett observed the strangeness of the passing of her last lychee season and the task of planning her funeral. She wrote, “it gets to a point where you just can’t do it any more, and I am at that point now. I just want to fade quietly into oblivion.”

Read more:
‘I want to stare death in the eye’: why dying inspires so many writers and artists

A source of inspiration

In 2018 I was lucky enough to meet Shirley Barrett, when we screened Love Serenade as the opening night film of the Melbourne Women in Film Festival.

Barrett, alongside the film’s producer Jan Chapman and editor Denise Haratzis, introduced their film and spoke with audience members at the after-film party.

Although brief, this meeting had an impact on myself as well as many emerging filmmakers in the room. Barrett’s generosity of time and spirit were incredible gifts. Her passing has resulted in an outpouring of memories and grief from the people she encountered.

Barrett’s films and novels leave a legacy that lies in her unique perspective and engaging storytelling, and in her generosity as an artist to encourage and inspire.

Kirsten Stevens is deputy director of the Melbourne Women in Film Festival

– ref. Remembering Shirley Barrett: an offbeat and generous Australian director and writer – https://theconversation.com/remembering-shirley-barrett-an-offbeat-and-generous-australian-director-and-writer-188292

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Santosh Tadakamadla, Associate professor and Discipline Lead for Dentistry, La Trobe University

What is inside teeth? – Nicholas, age 5, Australian Capital Territory

Great question, Nicholas. It is important for us to know what’s inside teeth as they help us eat, and eating gives us the energy to do our daily activities.

Our teeth are not just for chewing, though. We also need teeth for speaking, because different teeth contribute to different sounds. For example, we need upper front teeth to speak words starting with “f” or “v” sounds.

How teeth develop

The teeth in the upper jaw are called as maxillary or upper teeth, and those on the lower jaw are called as mandibular or lower teeth. Then each jaw has two side-to-side halves. All up, that’s four quadrants of teeth.

We have two sets of teeth. There are 20 teeth in the first set. We commonly call these “milk teeth” or “primary teeth”. They start forming while we are in the womb, even before we are born! The first one starts coming out of the gums when we are six months old, and most people have all their milk teeth by the age of three.

We keep our milk teeth until we are six years old, when we start losing them and the “adult teeth” or “permanent teeth” start coming in. By 14 or 15 years of age, most of us will have all our adult teeth except the last tooth in each side of the jaws. Some people call these “wisdom teeth”. There are 32 teeth in an entire adult set, with an equal number of teeth on each side.

We have four different types of teeth:

• incisors – front teeth to help cut food
• canines – sharp and pointy teeth on each side for tearing food and controlling how the teeth slide on each other
• premolars – that we only get in the adult teeth set
• molars – back teeth which work with premolars to help chew, grind and crush food.

Read more:
Curious Kids: what is brain freeze?

Protection, pain and the bit in between

Each tooth can be divided into two parts. The crown is the part of the tooth we can see in the mouth, while the root sits within the gum and bone of the jaw. Some teeth have more than one root.

And each tooth has two layers: enamel and dentine, with pulp at the centre which has nerves and blood. Roots do not have enamel but another layer called cementum.

Enamel is the hardest substance in the body and protects the dentine and pulp, just like a helmet protects your head.

Dentine is the second layer and makes up most of the tooth.

We feel pain in the tooth when the innermost part, pulp, is involved.

Scientists have been working hard to find how special cells called “stem cells” in pulp could be used to repair other parts of the teeth, gums and even other body parts such as the spinal cord, brain and heart.

Read more:
Curious kids: why don’t whales have teeth like we do?

Protecting the whole tooth

Hopefully you’ve already got into the habit of brushing twice every day with a fluoridated toothpaste for at least two minutes.

Tooth decay is caused by germs that love to feast on sugary or treat food in our mouth. We can stop that happening by saving lollies and sweets for special occasions and cleaning every tooth really well.

When teeth are not well cared for, they can develop tooth decay, which could cause pain when it involves that pulp deep inside your teeth. It’s important to visit an oral health professional (such as your family dentist or hygienist) regularly. They can tell you how to take good care of your teeth and treat damaged teeth when required.

s.tadakamadla@latrobe.edu.au receives funding from NHMRC. Santosh is a recipient of NHMRC Early Career Fellowship (2019-2022). Santosh also receives funding from Australian Dental Research Foundation for their research projects related to child oral health.

– ref. Curious kids: what is inside teeth? – https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-what-is-inside-teeth-187258

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stu Hayes, Lecturer, Tourism, University of Otago

Recent warnings of a “doomsday” scenario
if foot and mouth disease (FMD) arrived in New Zealand inevitably singled out the agriculture sector. But overseas experience tells us FMD can also result in potentially severe impacts on the tourism sector.

As the 2001 FMD crisis in Britain highlighted, inadequate planning and crisis management can cause a reduction in trade, job losses and damage to a destination’s image.

This matters, because destination image is one of the leading factors influencing tourists’ decisions. Accurate or not, negative images in the media can directly affect demand.

As New Zealand ramps up preparations for a potential outbreak, important lessons from the UK’s experiences must be heeded if the local tourism sector is to avoid its own doomsday scenario.

Focus on agriculture

Following the detection in July of FMD fragments in meat products imported into Australia, the New Zealand government has expressed serious concern the disease could also find its way across the Tasman.

The economic impact of this for the agriculture sector would be catastrophic: a reduction in agricultural productivity, suspended trade in animal products, and the ongoing reputational damage of the country losing its FMD-free export status.

Read more:
What is foot and mouth disease? Why farmers fear ‘apocalyptic bonfires of burning carcasses’

These concerns were foregrounded in the 2018 Foot and Mouth Disease Response and Recovery Plan. The risk to the agriculture sector has also seen a recent strengthening of biosecurity measures, including at the border where people arriving from Indonesia (FMD was detected there on April 28) are now required to disinfect their footwear.

But when it comes to government planning for (and media reporting about) FMD, there appears to be no mention of the potential impacts of an outbreak for the tourism sector. Should we be worried? A brief look at what happened in the UK in 2001 suggests yes.

The UK’s FMD tourism disaster

FMD was discovered in an abattoir in Essex on February 19, 2001. The unexpectedly rapid spread of the virus resulted in the UK government’s decision to effectively close the countryside to avoid wider contamination.

The effects on the tourism sector were severe. A National Audit Office report indicated that the sector and supporting industries lost revenues of between £4.5 billion and £5.4 billion. Over the course of the crisis, overseas visitor numbers to the UK dropped by 10%. In worst hit rural areas, the tourism sector virtually collapsed.

Read more:
Yes, wash your shoes at the airport – but we can do more to stop foot-and-mouth disease ravaging Australia

Inevitably, there were significant tourism-related job losses associated with the decline in visitor numbers and spending.

At the same time, the government decision to cull livestock rather than vaccinate resulted in huge pyres of burning carcasses visible throughout farming districts. It ended with what was described as a “media frenzy showing the UK as a giant barbeque”.

The images damaged the reputation and image of the UK as a tourism destination and further contributed to the loss of tourism revenue and jobs. But could these impacts have been lessened? Past research suggests they could – and with this come important lessons for New Zealand.

Read more:
Australian agriculture’s biggest threat needs a global approach

Lessons from the 2001 UK FMD crisis

Reviews of the UK FMD crisis highlighted several key planning and crisis management failings that contributed to the severity of the impacts felt across the tourism sector.

These failings included:

• a lack of appreciation of the potential impacts of FMD for the tourism sector

• a lack of consultation with relevant stakeholders from the tourism sector in crisis planning for an FMD outbreak

• and lack of an integrated communication strategy to counter media tendencies to exaggerate the impacts.

To help limit the potential impacts of an FMD outbreak for the New Zealand tourism sector, the government should consider several urgent actions:

1) model the potential impacts of FMD on the tourism sector, including potential job losses, loss of tourism trade and potential impacts on destination image and reputation

2) prepare crisis management plans with the full engagement of key actors in the tourism sector, including relevant ministries and sector bodies

3) establish an integrated communication approach and offer public relations training for tourism enterprises to help maintain a positive destination image in the event of an FMD outbreak.

As the 2001 UK FMD crisis demonstrated, failure to act could be disastrous for the tourism sector in New Zealand.

Stu Hayes 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. A foot and mouth outbreak in NZ would affect more than agriculture – tourism needs a plan too – https://theconversation.com/a-foot-and-mouth-outbreak-in-nz-would-affect-more-than-agriculture-tourism-needs-a-plan-too-188150

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Holly Thorpe, Professor in Sociology of Sport and Physical Culture, University of Waikato

Given recent and often sensationalist media coverage of the issue, it’s easy to overlook the fact that transgender athletes have participated in elite sport for decades – at least as far back as tennis player Renée Richards competing in in the 1976 US Open.

Transgender athletes have also been able to compete in the Olympic Games since 2004. But in the past year, the visibility of transgender women athletes such as New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard and American swimmer Lia Thomas has triggered considerable media interest and public debate.

Most recently, international water sports federation FINA has released a new policy that will only allow transgender women athletes who’ve transitioned before the age of 12 to take part in elite international swimming competitions. Some have called the policy trans-exclusionary and an “unacceptable erosion of bodily autonomy”.

Clearly, the topic raises critical questions of sex, gender and sport categorisation, requiring complex argument and nuanced understanding of transgender issues. Media coverage, however, can frame those questions in starkly oppositional terms, suggesting there are only two sides to the debate (for or against inclusion) and that “fairness” and “inclusion” are irreconcilable.

Our research, published this week (and in a forthcoming book, Justice for Trans Athletes: Challenges and Struggles), suggests news media are not neutral in their reporting of these issues and they play a powerful role in shifting public perception and shaping policy regarding transgender people’s participation in sport.

Language, framing and voice

To examine this, we analysed the written media coverage surrounding New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard’s qualification and participation in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. We examined 620 English-language articles across three time periods, from the announcement of her qualification, during the Games and after the event.

Building on previous research into media coverage of transgender people, we started by establishing a language “codebook” that included categories such as inclusion, fairness, mis-gendering and medical transition details.

Second, we created subcategories based on content tone and implied meaning, coding for every speaker in a given article.

Read more:
Why the way we talk about Olympian Laurel Hubbard has real consequences for all transgender people

We found that despite helpful media guides produced by LGBTQI+ organisations such as Athlete Ally, GLAAD and the Trans Journalists Association, much of the coverage continued to repeat old patterns, including the use of problematic language such as “deadnaming” (using a pre-transition name).

Overall, our study revealed a common framing of the topic as a “legitimate controversy” (a term coined by communications scholar Daniel Hallin in his analysis of media coverage of the Vietnam War).

The significant majority of media in our sample framed Hubbard’s inclusion in polarising “for or against” terms, and explicitly and implicitly narrated her Olympic inclusion and participation as highly questionable, and the topic as open for public debate.

One of the more sensationalist pieces argued her participation would be a “terrible mistake that destroys women’s rights to equality and fairness – and will kill the Olympic dream for female athletes”.

Nuance and complexity

Most reports, however, took a less extreme approach, instead presenting the details of Hubbard’s life – her transition and how she met IOC criteria – in a way that invited the audience to take a position on her inclusion.

But while selectively seeking and using quotes from advocates and opponents might be perceived as balanced and good journalistic practice, it also risks stifling a more nuanced dialogue. Some media sources even used public polling, further framing this as a debate that everyone – regardless of expertise – should join.

Although Hubbard’s view was often included in the form of prepared statements from press releases or quotes from older interviews, she was presented as just one voice – not necessarily an important one – in the debate about her own inclusion.

Read more:
The debate over transgender athletes’ rights is testing the current limits of science and the law

Our research shows that what has been lacking in much media coverage is a sense of Hubbard’s humanity and her own experiences of her athletic career. In essence, she was denied the one thing she ever asked of the media: “to be treated the way that other athletes have been treated”.

Scientists’ views were given the most credence, particularly those focused narrowly on the effects of testosterone. Journalists rarely acknowledged that the scientific community itself is divided, or that research on this subject remains contested, with little focusing specifically on trans women athletes.

Previous research has demonstrated the psychological harm, including stress and depression, done by negative or stereotypical media depictions of transgender people. This includes framing their participation in society and sport as “up for debate” or “out of place”.

Read more:
A win for transgender athletes and athletes with sex variations: the Olympics shifts away from testosterone tests and toward human rights

Ethical and responsible reporting

However, a few journalists in our sample adopted more ethical approaches in their reporting on Hubbard’s inclusion. We interviewed several, who spoke of their efforts to further educate themselves and to limit harmful rhetoric. As one American sports journalist explained:

In general, this notion that journalists serve their audience by just “here’s both sides, you decide” is a fallacy. It is our job to try to sort through some of this, where there is disproportionate harm, disproportionate blame.

Another Australian journalist spoke of the need for more nuanced coverage:

I wish that there was more of a will inside the media to expand the conversation […] to paint the complexities. But unfortunately […] everything is a very quick response, often with no foundation or research, no time given to it. [So] the temptation is you just go for the headline. And I think that’s where the media is failing a lot of these more complex discussions.

We also acknowledge how challenging this issue is to write about well, accurately, non-sensationally and constructively. This is similarly experienced by many academics.

To move this conversation forward productively will require responsible journalism that considers the complexities of the subject, engages critically with science, and respects and values the voices and lived experiences of transgender athletes and those from the wider transgender community.

Jaimie Veale receives research funding from Te Apārangi The Royal Society of New Zealand.

Holly Thorpe, Monica Nelson, and Shannon Scovel 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. Polarising, sensational media coverage of transgender athletes should end – our research shows a way forward – https://theconversation.com/polarising-sensational-media-coverage-of-transgender-athletes-should-end-our-research-shows-a-way-forward-187250

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Smith, Associate Professor in American Politics and Foreign Policy, US Studies Centre, University of Sydney

There have now been nine televised hearings of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. The main purpose of these hearings has been to publicly present evidence of former President Donald Trump’s culpability for the January 6 riot.

The mostly Democratic congressional committee, assisted by two of Trump’s fiercest Republican opponents, has made the hearings into a compellingly produced TV spectacle. The hearings drew an average of 13.1 million viewers across multiple networks, which is slightly more than the average viewership of the 2021 Major League Baseball World Series.

Surveys suggest this audience, like the committee itself, is overwhelmingly Democratic. They may have already been convinced of Trump’s responsibility for the January 6 riot, but 64% of Democrats say they have learned new information about the attacks from the hearings.

Some of the evidence presented in the hearings has been spectacular. Multiple video depositions from Trump allies and even family members showed how they tried to convince him the election was lost. This did not stop him from pressuring officials to overturn election results and trying to enact a bizarre and illegal plan to stall the vote count.

When Vice President Mike Pence refused Trump’s demands to halt the vote certification, rioters stormed the Capitol chanting “Hang Mike Pence”. They apparently believed Trump’s claims that day that Pence had the power to reject electoral college votes but “didn’t have the courage” to do it.

Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson testified that, when Trump heard the “Hang Mike Pence” chant, he told aides that the vice president “deserves it”. Pence’s secret service staff were so worried by the mob incursion that some of them made goodbye calls to family members.

For more than three hours, Trump watched the riot unfold on Fox News while doing nothing to stop it. Trump made a video the next day to condemn violence, but refused to say “the election is over”.

Read more:
The United States was founded on allegiance to laws, not leaders. The Jan 6 rioters turned that on its head

Is there enough evidence to indict Trump?

Many Democrats argue the evidence against Trump is now so damning that the Justice Department should charge him with obstruction of justice and official proceedings, criminally defrauding the United States, and possibly seditious conspiracy.

While there are reports the Justice Department is investigating Trump, and that Trump’s lawyers are preparing defences against criminal charges, it is far from certain he will be charged. Apart from the difficulty of proving the case to a jury, Attorney-General Merrick Garland may be concerned that prosecuting the de facto leader of the Republican Party would politicise the Justice Department – in the same way Trump himself often did during his presidency.

But even if Trump again escapes legal consequences for his actions, he may still face political consequences. More independent voters than ever now hold him responsible for the January 6 riot. And members of Trump’s own party are weighing his viability.

Congressional Republicans have mostly boycotted the January 6 hearings and tried to cast doubt on their legitimacy. The majority of Republican voters remain convinced Trump did nothing wrong on January 6. This is bolstered by a widespread belief that Democrats stole the 2020 election, which would mean the January 6 rioters were not insurgents but patriots trying to protect their country.

But there are signs a constant focus on the 2020 election and its aftermath is hurting Trump with Republicans. Two recent polls have suggested about a third of Republicans don’t want Trump to run again in 2024. These are significant increases on previous polls.

A New York Times/Siena College poll of Republicans in July found only 49% would support Trump if the presidential primary were held now. He is still far ahead of his nearest rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is on 25%.

But Trump no longer commands the large majorities he used to have in these polls. DeSantis increasingly seems like a viable right-wing alternative to Trump, and two July polls have shown him ahead of Trump in their shared home state of Florida.

Politically, Trump may be a spent force

Trump has not been fading gradually since he left office. His standing with Republicans actually increased throughout 2021, leading many to worry that he would pay no penalty for his attempts to undermine democracy. In 2021, Trump loyalists seized hundreds of offices in state Republican organisations, creating the appearance of an “iron grip” on the party.

But there have been signs in 2022 that grip is not as strong as it looked. While many Republican candidates have sought Trump’s endorsement by declaring he won the 2020 election, Trump-backed candidates have had mixed fortunes in the Republican primaries.

Democrats have been so confident of the unelectability of some of these candidates they have actively supported them against stronger Republican moderates.

Before the January 6 hearings began, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger both won massive Republican primary victories, despite earning Trump’s continuing wrath for refusing to overturn the 2020 election result in their state.

Significantly, Trump also seems to be losing some of his most valuable media supporters in the wake of the January 6 hearings. The Rupert Murdoch-owned New York Post and Wall Street Journal both editorialised against Trump after the last televised hearing. The Post declared him “unworthy to be this country’s chief executive again”, and the Journal praised Mike Pence, a likely 2024 rival.

In late July, Murdoch’s Fox News opted to show a Pence speech live rather than a much anticipated Trump speech, continuing a recent pattern of ignoring Trump and giving airtime to his competitors.

As much as Republicans have derided the January 6 hearings, they are a reminder that nothing can unite and mobilise Democrats like Trump. Democrats and many others detested him as president; his attempts to overturn the 2020 election mean there is no chance they will develop nostalgia or even indifference towards him.

Read more:
Can Fox News survive without Trump in the White House?

Joe Biden’s approval ratings are currently so low that even large numbers of Democrats are saying he also shouldn’t run again in 2024.

But they would still turn out to vote against Trump, as would a small but significant chunk of Americans who usually vote Republican, because they see him as a threat to democracy itself. This may be a factor in the electoral calculations of many Republicans who continue to appreciate Trump, but would prefer a different candidate.

Trump is not helping his own cause by insisting that Republicans should still be fighting to overturn the 2020 election result. As recently as July, Trump contacted the speaker of Wisconsin’s State Assembly, demanding he “take back” the state’s 2020 electoral votes after a court decision restricting absentee ballot boxes.

In Trump’s mind, this should be a central issue for Republicans, and it is the main subject of most of his speeches. Trump has made his endorsements contingent on it.

In March this year Alabama Congressman Mo Brooks, a loyal ally who had spoken alongside Trump at the January 6 rally, told Republicans they should move on from 2020 and look ahead to the 2022 and 2024 elections. Trump responded by accusing Brooks of going “woke” and rescinding his endorsement. Brooks subsequently lost his primary race.

Trump would still be the heavy favourite if Republican primaries were held tomorrow. And he may announce his candidacy far sooner than anyone else, in the belief this will help shelter him from prosecution for his role in the January 6 riots. But the January 6 hearings, and continuing Republican unease about Trump’s endless relitigation of 2020, have increased the chances he will face a genuinely competitive primary race in 2024. His opponents would not be “never-Trump” pariahs, but Trump supporters who believe they can carry his agenda further than he can.

David Smith 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 January 6 hearings have been spectacular TV, but will they have any consequences for Trump? – https://theconversation.com/the-january-6-hearings-have-been-spectacular-tv-but-will-they-have-any-consequences-for-trump-187766

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deborah Lupton, SHARP Professor, leader of the Vitalities Lab, Centre for Social Research in Health and Social Policy Centre, UNSW Sydney, and leader of the UNSW Node of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society, UNSW Sydney

People with long COVID are going online to look for support. But these valuable discussion forums, chat groups and other online peer-support networks can also spread harmful misinformation.

Online groups allow unproven therapies to be promoted, sometimes by members who believe they are sharing helpful information. Sometimes entrepreneurs are promoting their unproven therapies directly.

Health researchers admit there are few evidence-based treatments for long COVID. In the face of such uncertainty, people with debilitating symptoms can be tempted by unproven options such as “blood washing”, stem cell infusions and ozone treatments.

Some despairing people with long COVID say they are willing to try any therapy if there’s hope it improves their health.

Read more:
Long COVID: with no treatment options, it’s little wonder people are seeking unproven therapies like ‘blood washing’

The fight for recognition and medical attention

People with long COVID can suffer debilitating health problems that make it difficult to return to work or activities they once enjoyed. Symptoms include fatigue, brain fog, chronic pain, depression and anxiety.

They have had to fight to receive medical attention or recognition of their symptoms. Indeed, it was patient-led activism that first made the public and health professionals aware how symptoms can extend for months, even after an initially mild COVID infection.

Read more:
Social media, activism, trucker caps: the fascinating story behind long COVID

Online communities made a huge difference

Online discussion forums such as Reddit, as well as networks on Facebook and Twitter, have made a major difference to the long COVID community.

In the face of a lack of medical knowledge about long COVID and sometimes denial it exists, these peer networks offer emotional support and share important information about symptoms and treatments.

Reddit has a forum with tens of thousands of members discussing supplements and treatments for long COVID. This approach has been called “crowdsourced medicine”.

Read more:
Long COVID: female sex, older age and existing health problems increase risk – new research

But there are pitfalls

However, there are pitfalls and potential dangers of this kind of online networking and crowdsourced medicine – the potential for spreading misinformation.

This issue has been a problem for a long time, particularly with other “contested illnesses” the medical profession has often dismissed. These include the chronic pain condition fibromyalgia and myalgic encephalomyelitis (chronic fatigue syndrome).

We’ve also seen the spread of health misinformation in online patient forums and social media content about earlier infectious diseases, such as Zika virus, as well as throughout the current pandemic on topics including masks and vaccines.

Read more:
Explainer: what is fibromyalgia, the condition Lady Gaga lives with?

The misinformation

Medical science is attempting to research long COVID and find treatments, but this kind of research takes time.

Meanwhile, people wanting answers and help for their symptoms are forced to turn to online sources, where the testing and review of treatments are under far less expert scrutiny.

On Reddit and other sites, the volume of content members must somehow make sense of is overwhelming.

Individuals, doctors and pharmaceutical company representatives are among those who have promoted experimental therapies that have not been thoroughly tested with clinical trials.

Some individuals or groups are exploiting people’s desperation, using long COVID support networks to attempt to profit from offering treatment plans or alternative therapies such as vitamin supplements and ozone treatment.

Some long COVID groups are are still recommended drugs such as the now scientifically discredited COVID treatment ivermectin.

Some patients have spent large sums of money on dubious therapies. Serious ethical concerns are raised by these actions, including the potential for these therapies to cause harm and worsen people’s health.

Read more:
A major ivermectin study has been withdrawn, so what now for the controversial drug?

How could we improve things?

People with long COVID

People with long COVID should carefully weigh any anecdotal recommendations about treatment they come across online and think twice before sharing it.

Some have suggested a code of conduct for long COVID support groups that prohibits members from recommending treatments while allowing them to discuss their own experiences. This could help limit the spread of false information. A code of conduct could also ban the promotion of for-profit treatment programs to remove the risk of members being scammed.

However, this would require close moderation and not all sites or social media groups have such resources.

Hunting down the source of information about long COVID treatments and seeing if there’s any links to published scientific evidence is another way to exercise caution.

Health workers

There are important lessons for health-care providers in understanding the needs of people with long COVID.

This includes the importance of providing a timely diagnosis and access to up-to-date valid medical information as well as acknowledging the uncertainties and distress many people feel.

Partnering with patients by acknowledging their lived expertise and together working for a solution would go a long way to help people who feel unheard and want to play an active role in improving their health.

The medical profession is beginning to recognise these issues and has also begun to identify how a better understanding of long COVID could cast light on better recognition and treatment for other contested illnesses.

Information about long COVID is available on websites from the federal and state health departments; you can find a support group via the Lung Foundation of Australia; or try the covidCAREgroup, which brings together patient-led expertise with evidence-based medical knowledge from around the world.

Deborah Lupton is affiliated with the independent expert advisory group OzSAGE.

– ref. Ivermectin, blood washing, ozone: how long COVID survivors are being sold the next round of miracle cures – https://theconversation.com/ivermectin-blood-washing-ozone-how-long-covid-survivors-are-being-sold-the-next-round-of-miracle-cures-186047

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julie Sonnemann, Principal Advisor Education, Grattan Institute

This Friday, state and federal education ministers will meet for the first time since the federal election.

The stakes are high. Ministers meet as teacher shortages and workload pressures are dominating education headlines and severely stressing schools. We need to address teacher supply concerns and better support the teachers who are already in schools.

But as our new research shows, we can’t just focus on teachers. We also need to look at teaching assistants, who often fly under the radar, but represent a significant part of the workforce.

Read more:
Growing numbers of unqualified teachers are being sent into classrooms – this is not the way to ‘fix’ the teacher shortage

Who are teaching assistants?

Teaching assistants work across all school sectors – government, independent and Catholic.

They can do a variety of tasks, from helping teachers prepare lessons and delivering targeted literacy and numeracy support to maintaining student records and supporting students with additional intellectual, physical or behavioural needs.

Teaching assistants are generally required to have a certificate III or IV in school-based education support (or similar), which takes between six to 12 months to complete and can be done at TAFE or other registered training organisations. Their titles vary by state and territory and include education aides, integration aides, school learning support officers or school services officers.

They are mostly female, work part-time, and are typically in their mid-40s.

Our research

Our new analysis, based on Australia Bureau of Statistics data, shows Australia spends more than A$5 billion on teaching assistants each year. This is about about 8% of recurrent school expenditure.

Today there are more than 105,000 teaching assistants working in classrooms across the country. This is almost a four-fold increase since since 1990 and is well above the increase in students and teachers over that period.

It’s not clear why teaching assistant numbers have expanded so rapidly. However, a possible reason could be they have been hired to help with increasing numbers of students with additional needs in mainstream schools. Along with this, there has been greater school autonomy in recruitment and increased administrative loads.

What do they do?

We know teaching assistants are permitted to perform a wide variety of tasks, but we don’t know exactly which tasks they are given, or how tasks are being carried out. Governments have not paid close attention to their work.

So, we know what teaching assistants do in theory, but very little about what they do in practice.

And we need to make sure we are using them well. They can have huge benefits. But when used poorly, through no fault of their own, they can slow down student learning.

The upsides of teaching assistants

The evidence shows teaching assistants can certainly help and be a cost-effective way to ensure students catch-up.

Targeted literacy and numeracy interventions can see teaching assistants help struggling students achieve an extra four months of learning over the course of a year.

Some studies show teaching assistants can also achieve similar results to teachers when delivering these targeted interventions, especially in literacy, provided the interventions are well structured.

Beyond academic learning, teaching assistants can chase permission slips, keep records, coordinate extra-curricular activities, or help with yard duty. This can free up teachers to focus on planning, assessment, and teaching in class.

We know teachers need more support

Australia’s teachers are crying out for more time to teach. A 2021 Grattan Institute survey of 5,000 Australian teachers found that around nine in ten teachers say they “always” or “frequently” do not get enough time to prepare for effective teaching, or to effectively plan their lessons.

Teachers we surveyed estimated they could save an extra two hours a week to focus on teaching if non-teaching staff took on their extra-curricular activities, such as supervising sports and student clubs, or doing yard duty.

The potential risks

Alongside the benefits, we also need to understand the dangers if teaching assistants are not use intelligently.

The United Kingdom invested heavily in teaching assistants in the early 2000s, but this did not boost student learning. Teaching assistants were often given poorly structured tasks, working primarily with struggling students. This cut the amount of time these students spent with their teacher and lead to worse academic results. These risks can be avoided with better planning and training.

Currently, we don’t know enough about how teaching assistants are used in Australia, but there are some worrying signs. A 2016 study of four schools in the ACT found students with a learning difficulty or disability were primarily receiving instruction from a teaching assistant, and spending less time with their teacher.

What should happen next

Education ministers and Catholic and independent school leaders need to ensure Australian students are getting the most from our large teaching assistant workforce.

First, governments should investigate how teaching assistants are being deployed in schools today – exactly how they work with teachers and students, and what tasks they are (or are not) being given.

Second, governments should fund pilot programs to evaluate the best ways for teaching assistants to support teachers and students. We need to identify what works best, and then spread that practice across all schools.

Some states and territories have done more on this issue than others. The NSW government’s recent commitment to trial new administrative staff in schools, including a detailed study of which staff members are best placed to do different tasks, is a step in the right direction.

So, teaching assistants should be on the agenda at Friday’s meeting. And any new commitments could go into the next National Schools Reform Agreement – which sets out nationally agreed changes for the next five years – due to be signed in late 2023.

Julie Sonnemann is a board director of two not-for-profit organisations, The Song Room which provides arts learning in disadvantaged schools and The Ochre Foundation which provides free curriculum resources across Australia.

Dr Jordana Hunter is the Director of the Education Program at the Grattan Institute, an independent, not-for-profit think tank. Grattan received funding from the Origin Energy Foundation to support Grattan’s Making Time for Great Teaching report series.

– ref. Australia spends $5 billion a year on teaching assistants in schools but we don’t know what they do – https://theconversation.com/australia-spends-5-billion-a-year-on-teaching-assistants-in-schools-but-we-dont-know-what-they-do-187918

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alex Simpson, Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Macquarie University

Crown Resorts’ striking new A$2 billion casino on Sydney’s Barangaroo Point opens its doors to gamblers for the first time this week. But only if they are “VIPs”.

Its licence to operate remains conditional, after being found unfit to run a casino by the inquiry headed by former Supreme Court judge Patrica Bergin.

Victorian and Western Australian inquiries into Crown’s Melbourne and Perth casinos reached the same conclusion. Agreements have been made, directors have resigned, major shareholder James Packer has divested, and US private equity player Blackstone Group has taken over.

But will this be enough to stop the major reason Victoria’s inquiry found Crown had engaged in illegal, dishonest, unethical and exploitative practices; its complicity in money-laundering potentially worth billions of dollars?

This is not unique. The NSW inquiry into rival casino Star Sydney has also heard allegations of billions of dollars being funnelled through the casino in contravention of anti-money-laundering rules.

If Crown’s experience is anything to go by, being found unfit to hold a casino licence is still not enough for governments to revoke a licence.

This fact appears to be an implicit acceptance that illegality comes with legal casinos. Which is true. Gambling, whether illegal or legitimate, will always attract criminals.

Why criminals love gambling

When casinos were illegal they were a lucrative revenue stream for those prepared to take the risk.

A 1974 study of Sydney’s dozen or so illegal casinos estimated they made annual profits of about A$15 million – equivalent to A$130 million now – even after paying out about A$1.4 million (about A$12 million now) in bribes to police and politicians.

Licensing and regulating casinos was meant to free the industry from criminal associations and protect public institutions from corruption.

But as the revelations of the four casino inquiries in the past two years show, legal casinos remain plagued by associations with crime and criminals because of their value – knowingly or not – as sites for laundering money.

Have money, need laundering

Significant proceeds from crime, be it drug trafficking or fraud, have to be “washed” before criminals can spend it.

Why? Because law-abiding citizens are expected to declare their income, and pay tax on it. Any individual with no obvious income source but lots of assets will attract attention.

Read more:
How Sydney’s Barangaroo tower paved the way for closed-door deals

Making “dirty money” appear as if it comes from a clean source is a massive global industry. The United Nations’ Office on Drugs and Crime estimates up to US$4.2 trillion (A$6 trillion) is laundered globally each year – 2-5% of global GDP.

In Australia the value of local crime proceeds laundered each year is estimated to be more than A$13 billion, plus billions more in foreign crime proceeds.

Australia has “become one of the world’s most attractive destinations for money launderers”, according to financial crime expert Nathan Lynch, author of The Lucky Laundry (HarperCollins, 2022).

How to launder dirty money

There are a variety of ways to launder money. One is to own a legitimate business, such as a car wash, and declare the dirty money as revenue.

Another is to buy real estate using obfuscatory legal mechanisms. Federal agencies estimate tens of billions of dollars are laundered through Australia’s property market each year.

But the easiest is through gambling.

In 2018, an estimated A$25 billion flowed through Australia’s gambling industry – one of the highest amounts per capita in the world. Of this, almost A$5 billion was spent in casinos.

Laundering money in a casino is surprisingly simple. Walk in with a bag of “dirty” cash. Convert it into chips. Play for a while – win a bit, lose a bit – then cash out.

Now all that dirty money you walked in with is clean. If anyone asks, say you won it – and who’s to say different?

Regulations are not enough

Australia has some of the toughest anti-money-laundering regulations in the world – and those rules are getting tougher.

Since 2020, any transaction greater than A$10,000, and the recipient’s identity, must be recorded and reported to Australia’s anti-money-laundering agency, AUSTRAC.

But this has only narrowed the ability to launder vast sums at a time. With every change, criminals respond.

Even poker machines in the local pub or club can be used to launder money.

The NSW Crime Commission is currently inquiring into the nature and extent of money laundering through the state’s poker machines.

Of chief concern is the lack of transparency. Tickets from poker machines are anonymous if less than $5,000 is claimed. Anyone can place up to $4,999 of “dirty cash” into these pokies, place one $5 bet, then redeem the rest as “clean winnings”.

With more than $85 billion pouring into the state’s 95,000 machines dispersed across 4,000 venues each year, policing them is next to impossible.

What can be done?

In her damning report, Commissioner Bergin raised the possibility of a statewide scheme to combat money laundering through mandatory use of a “gambling card” that would enable the tracking of cash through a casino.

She made the point that casinos were already free to introduce their own mechanisms “of a similar kind for their own patrons”.

NSW appears to have cooled on the idea, in yet another sign that Australian governments aren’t serious enough about tackling the collateral damage associated with gambling.

Until things change, the implicit message will remain that if you want to launder dodgy money, head to your most convenient gambling venue.

Read more:
Responsible gambling – a bright shining lie Crown Resorts and others can no longer hide behind

Alex Simpson 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. Crown Sydney casino opens – another beacon for criminals looking to launder dirty money – https://theconversation.com/crown-sydney-casino-opens-another-beacon-for-criminals-looking-to-launder-dirty-money-184253