Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lachlan G. Howell, Research Fellow | Centre for Integrative Ecology, Deakin University

Federal Environment Minister Sussan Ley is reportedly poised to decide whether some koala populations should be listed as endangered, as new research shows her government continues to approve land clearing in koala habitat.

Analysis released by the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) on Tuesday found that in the decade since koalas were declared vulnerable to extinction, the federal government had approved the clearing of 25,000 hectares of the species’ habitat.

It follows the Morrison government’s announcement last month of A$50 million to restore koala habitat, monitor populations and research the animals’ health.

But until the problems of habitat loss and land clearing are addressed, national koala populations will continue to dwindle. And as our recent research shows, much of the new funding is inadequate at the scale required.

Koala cash-splash

The Threatened Species Scientific Committee, which advises the federal government, has recommended the status of koalas in Queensland, New South Wales and the ACT be upgraded from vulnerable to endangered.

Ley is expected to respond to the recommendation by next month. Listing the koala as endangered would be a serious escalation in its threat status.

The federal government’s recent $50 million of koala funding supports various initiatives. They include:

• $20 million for large habitat and health protection projects delivered by Indigenous groups, industry, state and territory governments and non-government organisations

• $10 million for community-led habitat restoration, health and care facilities, and citizen science projects

• $10 million to extend the National Koala Monitoring Program

• $2 million to fund applied research in koala health

• $1 million to fund vet staff and koala care, treatment and triage.

These are important investments. But we see two major issues with the federal government’s approach.

Habitat loss: the biggest problem

Until koala habitat is protected, conservation efforts – largely funded by the taxpayer – will continue to be undermined.

Other recent federal koala funding includes $24 million after the Black Summer bushfires.

The NSW government wants to double the number of koalas in that state by 2050. To that end, it pledged $193 million over five years in the current budget. This followed the $44.7 million of koala funding it announced in 2018.

All this comes on top of the millions of dollars in international and national community donations for koala conservation efforts after the Black Summer bushfires.

But the primary driver of koala population decline is the clearing of its habitat. No amount of money can save koalas unless we tackle this.

The ACF research released on Tuesday confirmed the extent of the problem. The federal government approved the clearing of 25,000 hectares of koala habitat in the past decade, comprising 63 projects.

Most were mining projects, followed by land transport and housing developments.

Two recent federal decisions demonstrate this active undermining of koala conservation efforts:

• approval to clear more than 75 hectares of critical koala habitat for housing west of Brisbane, reportedly in breach of the government’s own policy

• approval of the Brandy Hill Quarry, which would clear 52 hectares of koala habitat to produce gravel and stone.

These projects were also approved by respective state governments, and were enabled by weak koala protections under both national and state environment laws.

Read more:
Stopping koala extinction is agonisingly simple. But here’s why I’m not optimistic

Barely scratches the surface

Second, the federal funding for koala monitoring is inadequate.

We recently modelled the costs of conducting large-scale koala population surveys with methods that could be incorporated into the National Koala Monitoring Program.

We examined the cost of surveying 1.9 million hectares of fire-affected places in NSW considered “high and very high suitability” koala habitat.

We put the price tag at $9.5 million to $11.5 million for on-ground techniques, or about $7 million for efficient and cost-effective drone thermal imaging.

Read more:
Let there be no doubt: blame for our failing environment laws lies squarely at the feet of government

That’s just for one survey round. Even if the 1.9 million hectares was fairly distributed to key sampling areas, which is likely, the surveys must still be repeated at regular intervals to monitor koala populations over time.

The latest funding announcement for the National Koala Monitoring Program brings the total to $12 million since the initiative was announced in 2020. Given the vast extent of the koala’s range across five states and territories, this monitoring funding barely scratches the surface.

Read more:
Drones, detection dogs, poo spotting: what’s the best way to conduct Australia’s Great Koala Count?

The federal government must step up

Koala conservation is largely funded by the taxpayer and koalas receive far more funding than other threatened species.

So it’s only fair to expect this funding to deliver results. To protect the important public and community investment in koalas, the federal government must:

• review current funding levels and provide adequate investment to support all Australia’s wildlife, including koalas

• endorse the expert recommendation to list the koala as endangered in parts of Australia

• finalise the Draft National Recovery Plan for the koala, which has been pending since 2012

• enforce strong protections for koalas and other native wildlife, with independent oversight. The measures should follow the recommendations in Professor Graeme Samuel’s review of federal environment law.

In this, an election year, the Morrison government has the chance to show Australians it’s committed to saving our threatened wildlife.

Read more:
Heat-detecting drones are a cheaper, more efficient way to find koalas

Lachlan G. Howell is affiliated with Deakin University, the Centre for Integrative Ecology, the University of Newcastle, and FAUNA Research Alliance. Lachlan is funded by the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC. Lachlan is a member of the Australasian Wildlife Management Society. Lachlan would like to acknowledge several co-authors on the research study referenced in this article including John Clulow, Neil R. Jordan, Chad T. Beranek and Adam Roff.

Ryan R. Witt receives funding from Taronga Conservation Society Australia, the Mid North Coast Joint Organisation, WWF-Australia’s Regenerate Australia Program, and the Paddy Pallin Foundation administered by the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales. He is affiliated with the University of Newcastle and FAUNA Research Alliance. Ryan is a member of the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales, is a scientific associate of Taronga Conservation Society Australia, and is the Australasian board member of the Companion Animals and Non-Domestic Endangered Species Committee of the International Embryo Technology Society.

Shelby A. Ryan receives a Vice-Chancellor’s PhD Training Priority Scheme Scholarship from the University of Newcastle. Her PhD project receives funding from Taronga Conservation Society Australia, the Mid North Coast Joint Organisation, WWF-Australia’s Regenerate Australia Program, The Margaret Middleton Fund for endangered Australian native vertebrate animals administered by the Australian Academy of Science, and the Paddy Pallin Foundation administered by the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales. She is affiliated with the University of Newcastle and FAUNA Research Alliance.

– ref. Morrison government spends $50 million saving koalas while taking away their homes – https://theconversation.com/morrison-government-spends-50-million-saving-koalas-while-taking-away-their-homes-176370

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Hudson, Sessional Instructor, Victoria University, and Doctor of Education candidate, The University of Melbourne

As students across Australia return to onsite learning, the possibility of Omicron disrupting schools remains high. Commonwealth Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly has warned transmission of the virus will increase with schools reopening. This may lead to school closures and staff shortages across the country.

Education departments across Australia have developed plans to counter workforce disruptions. Schools can call on pools of retired teachers to help fill the gaps. The plans also include adjusted timetables and collapsed classes in response to staff shortages.

Although these measures may help to keep onsite learning going, they have been decided at a policymaker level through a metro-centric lens. The voices of rural and remote educators have largely been neglected. As a result, the plans fail to consider the existing challenges of staffing rural and remote schools.

The emphasis is on schools remaining open across Australia this year. But it isn’t clear how the national framework that guides the return-to-school plans of the states and territories will deal with the chronic teacher shortages outside the big cities.

Read more:
Test all students and staff twice a week, or only close contacts? States have different school plans – here’s what they mean

For schools in rural and remote Australia, the challenge of teacher shortages is already daunting. If increased COVID-19 transmission through school communities affects their staffing, this will have big impacts on teaching and learning.

A metro-centric response isn’t always going to work for rural and remote schools.

The nearest retired teacher might be 200km away. Rural schools with limited resources can only manipulate timetables so much. Collapsing classes may not always be a reasonable and safe option in rural and remote schools with limited space and capability to do so.

And, in contrast to metropolitan school principals, many rural and remote principals already have a teaching load on top of their leadership role. Any added workload can’t be shifted to them.

Read more:
We need a radical rethink of how to attract more teachers to rural schools

Isolation magnifies staffing challenges

Research shows the significant impact teachers have on student learning outcomes. Continuing to deliver high-impact teaching will be difficult if large numbers of teachers test positive for COVID-19.

The Australian Education Union believes recent changes to the isolation rules for teachers will compromise the safety of the entire school community. If transmission increases in schools, we can’t deny teachers – more than one in five are in the more vulnerable age groups over 55 – the right to focus on their health. Especially when they are overworked and considering leaving the profession in droves.

Read more:
COVID and schools: Australia is about to feel the full brunt of its teacher shortage

Personal and professional isolation is an added challenge for teachers in rural and remote schools. This leads to even more staffing pressure and attrition than in metropolitan schools.

What is needed is an approach that supports all schools in Australia to safely tackle COVID-related staff shortages. It must be done in a way that also ensures high-quality teaching and learning.

City-rural gap threatens to widen

The Australian government-commissioned Independent Review into Regional, Rural and Remote Education (IRRRRE) highlighted the widening achievement gap between metropolitan students and rural and remote students in Australia. Rural and remote students score lower on NAPLAN and PISA tests, are less likely to finish secondary school and are less likely to go on to higher education than students in the major cities.

Read more:
How to solve Australia’s ‘rural school challenge’: focus on research and communities

The exodus of teachers from rural and remote schools restricts the ability of students and their communities to succeed in a globalised and technological world.

Action is now needed to ensure the achievement gap doesn’t widen further.

What needs to be done?

The IRRRRE report calls for a national focus on improving teaching and learning in rural and remote schools. The goal is to ensure, regardless of location or circumstances, that every young person in Australia has access to high-quality schooling and employment opportunities. One recommendation is targeted support for recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers for rural and remote schools that are struggling to do this.

Victoria, Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory all provide funding and incentives to recruit and retain teachers in rural and remote schools. However, despite 20 years of research into staffing non-metropolitan schools, Australia has not managed to achieve significant long-term improvements in this area.

Read more:
The best way to boost the economy is to improve the lives of deprived students

The first step towards achieving lasting change is for governments to include the voices of rural and remote school educators when deciding how best to keep their schools open this year. Ongoing dialogue and reflection can lead to innovative problem-solving that matches the context in which rural and remote schools operate.

Next, differentiated support needs to be offered to rural and remote schools as part of the nation’s return-to-school plans. Providing additional targeted assistance and resources to keep these schools open is more valuable than the one-size-fits-all metro-centric guidance provided to date.

Christopher Hudson receives funding from the Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship (Fee Offset)

– ref. Return-to-school plans overlook chronic teacher shortages outside the big cities – https://theconversation.com/return-to-school-plans-overlook-chronic-teacher-shortages-outside-the-big-cities-176250

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jim Stanford, Economist and Director, Centre for Future Work, Australia Institute; Honorary Professor of Political Economy, University of Sydney

With the official unemployment rate now 4.2% – the lowest since 2008 – Prime Minister Scott Morrison has predicted a rate “with a 3 in front of it this year”. The Reserve Bank of Australia agrees, forecasting unemployment below 4% in coming months.

Many economists have been surprised at how quickly employment has rebounded from the effects of COVID-19. Now they are scratching their heads for another reason.

With unemployment so low, why aren’t wages growing more quickly?

Real wages falling

If something is in short supply, its price is supposed to rise. That’s according to conventional economics, which treats the price of labour (wages) much like any other commodity, from pork bellies to rapid antigen tests.

But there is little sign of that happening.

Since 2013, growth in nominal wages (not accounting for inflation) has been weaker than any time since the 1930s, with the average annual rate of 2.1% growth half the typical rate of earlier years.

After grinding to a halt during the lockdowns, wage growth has rebounded – but only to those anaemic pre-pandemic rates (up just 2.2% in the past 12 months). Nominal wages are now lagging well behind consumer prices. Real wages (accounting for inflation) are therefore falling – the opposite of what free-market theory predicts when unemployment is low.

Read more:
Unemployment below 3% is possible for the first time in 50 years – if Australia budgets for it

This outcome puzzles those economists who focus on market forces to explain income distribution. But it’s not surprising to those who consider a broader array of structural, institutional and social determinants of wages.

Unemployment may matter to wage trends, although not necessarily for the same reasons assumed by market-focused theories. But many other factors – including minimum wages, collective bargaining, the award system, and even politics and culture – also explain who gets paid what.

Market-based ideas driving policy

A simple market-based understanding of wages has guided the policy stance of the government and the RBA for a generation.

Both still ascribe, for example, to the concept of a “non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment” (or NAIRU).

The Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU)

This refers the lowest unemployment rate achievable without causing wages to grow and inflation to rise. Both keep changing their estimates of its precise level, with the treasury’s most recent calculations putting it at 4.5% to 5% in the years before the pandemic.

One reason the estimates shift is because the concept is impossible to measure. Many countries have abandoned this widely criticised concept. Yet it still underpins Australia’s fiscal and monetary policies.

A gentler approach acknowledges wages will accelerate gradually, instead of taking off suddenly, as unemployment approaches the estimated non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment (NAIRU).

This relationship is expressed graphically in what is called the Phillips Curve.

The Phillips Curve

As unemployment falls, wage growth should gradually gain steam. That allows policy makers, especially the RBA, to try to guide the economy to a “sweet spot” on the Phillips Curve: with wage growth consistent with the RBA’s inflation target.

Nice in theory, not in reality

Unfortunately for both theories, the expected automatic relationship between unemployment and wages isn’t visible in the real world. Australia’s unemployment rate has fallen through successive estimates of the NAIRU (first 6%, then 5%, now 4%) with no sign of inflationary take-off.

The Phillips Curve is also morphing, changing both its vertical position and its shape. The accompanying figure plots unemployment versus the annual rate of growth in wages.

Wage growth and unemployment, 2000-2021

Before 2013 only a weak relationship was visible between wages and unemployment. Since 2013 the curve has shifted down and flattened, with hardly any discernable connection between unemployment and wages.

Other factors at play

The only way to explain this seeming anomaly is to look at the broader, structural determinants of wages.

No economy simply sets the market loose to determine how much people get paid.

Regulations, institutions and processes mediate the distribution of income across classes, occupations and jobs. They can be used to create a more equitable distribution. Or they can be used to reward certain groups and suppress the incomes of others. Either way, it is institutions and policies – shaped fundamentally by politics and power – that determine how the economic pie gets divided.

Circumstances now provide a telling insight into how important those institutions are – and how dramatically they have changed. The accompanying table compares labour market outcomes and institutional parameters today, to those that prevailed the last time unemployment was below 4%.

Fifty years ago nominal wages were growing robustly, at more than 10%. Inflation was high (close to 6%) but real wages still rose. Now inflation is half that rate, yet wages are falling behind prices.

This is due to a night-and-day contrast between labour-market institutions then and now.

The minimum wage now is much lower relative to the average. The awards system has been restructured to serve only as a safety net, rather than leading improvements in wages and conditions. Unions and collective bargaining have been decimated, with strikes almost non-existent. Workers’ bargaining power has been further eroded by the spread of part-time work, casual jobs and other non-standard employment, including digital gigs.

Fifty years ago workers had institutional power to win decent wage increases – even when unemployment was relatively high. That power has been steadily and deliberately stripped away through privatisation, suppression of union activity and liberalisation of insecure employment.

Read more:
Top economists expect RBA to hold rates low in 2022 as real wages fall

Higher wages would strengthen household finances, support consumer spending and achieve a fairer distribution of income. But there’s no magic unemployment rate that will deliver that outcome.

If we want higher wages, we must win them through deliberate wage-boosting policies.

Jim Stanford is a member of the Australian Services Union.

– ref. Why there’s no magic jobless rate to increase Australians’ wages – https://theconversation.com/why-theres-no-magic-jobless-rate-to-increase-australians-wages-176538

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Graham, Lecturer in Economics, University of Sydney

Having floated the prospect of introducing rent controls just last week, it seems the government has already ditched the proposal.

In tentatively raising the idea, Associate Minister for Housing Poto Williams pointed out the need for policy solutions to the problem of rapidly rising housing costs. However, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has now adamantly stated: “We are not considering rent controls.”

There will undoubtedly be some disappointment at this, given the state of New Zealand’s housing and rental markets. In the year to September 2021, rental rates rose between 3.2% and 7.8%, while annual wage growth was just 2.6%.

On the face of it, controlling rents might be an attractive option for a government looking to tackle declining housing affordability. Unfortunately, the evidence does not support the use of these policies.

Economists have carefully studied rent-control policies for more than 50 years and found they are often ineffective, poorly targeted, and with many unintended consequences.

What rent control can’t control

While rent-control policies vary from place to place, one way or another they aim to limit increases in housing costs. For example, New York was once famous for essentially holding rents frozen in time (recall Monica’s apartment in the TV show Friends). Rents in Sweden are negotiated between tenant and landlord associations, and rental rates in Germany are tied to rents on similar housing units.

In the first place, rent control certainly seems to lower the cost of affected rentals. Studies using data from New York in the 1960s show tenants in rent-controlled apartments paid less for their housing than tenants in similar non-controlled apartments.

Similarly, studies of the end of rent control in Massachusetts in 1995 and the introduction of rent control in Germany in 2015 both show reduced rental rates paid by tenants, although these effects appear to have been short-lived.

Read more:
‘Greedy landlord’ stereotype is not true for all in private sector – some use power responsibly

Many other studies, however, show the response of landlords to rent control undermines the goals of the policies. One careful analysis of San Francisco, for example, found an expansion of rent control in 1994 led to a 25% decline in available rental units among the newly rent-controlled apartments.

Rather than lease their units at sub-market rates, landlords either sold property into the owner-occupied market or demolished and reconstructed the apartments to escape rent control. Unfortunately, many apartments that had previously been rented by low-income tenants then shifted into the hands of higher-income tenants and homeowners.

A further problem is that controls can lead to higher rents on non-controlled housing. Research suggests landlords may compensate for losses on their rent-controlled units by raising rents on units not covered by rent controls. Although controls may keep a lid on the cost of individual rentals, they’re unlikely to reduce housing costs overall.

Good for some, but not all

There’s no doubt rent-controlled houses are great for tenants – if they can find them. In Sweden, rent-controlled apartments are in such great demand the government manages decade-long waiting lists of prospective tenants.

Of course, renters won’t simply wait in the cold, so existing tenants sublet their apartments to new tenants (without government permission) at prices much closer to market rates. Landlords are also known to charge what are called “key payments” before possession of a rental changes hands.

Part of the reason it’s so hard to find rent-controlled housing is that tenants tend to stick around for much longer than they otherwise would. Studies from San Francisco and Denmark show rent control significantly reduces the likelihood of a tenant moving out of their apartment.

Read more:
Five ways landlords unfairly control people’s lives

While those tenants might be quite happy staying put, there are costs involved. A 2003 study of New York showed many tenants and dwellings were “mismatched”, with their rent-controlled apartments too big, too small or too far from the right amenities.

Tenants subject to rent control can face longer commute times and are less likely to search for work outside their local area if they become unemployed.

Another potential problem is that rent control may discourage landlords from maintaining properties, leading to lower-quality housing for tenants. Massachusetts landlords subject to rent control skimped on upkeep, failing to maintain paint, plaster or damaged floors and walls.

In New York, landlords allowed housing quality to deteriorate faster when the difference between market rents and controlled rents was larger.

Read more:
Rents can and should be reduced or suspended for the coronavirus pandemic

Housing supply remains the best solution

Rent controls could exacerbate New Zealand’s housing issues. Rental accommodation may be harder to find, no less expensive, and in worse condition than many rentals are already today. But this begs the question of what the government should do instead.

The goal should be well-targeted policies that do not significantly disrupt the functioning of the rental housing market. Policies that too readily interfere with the rental market are likely to be worse for tenants than they are for landlords.

Subsidies for low-income households are one possible solution. But, as has been argued elsewhere, accommodation subsidies tend to raise rents further when housing supply is limited.

Rather, the government needs to work faster on fixing the various roadblocks to increasing New Zealand’s housing supply. While this poses significant challenges, they cannot be avoided with a quick-fix policy like rent control.

And while previous governments should have started work on housing supply 20 years ago, the next best time to get started is today.

James Graham 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. Why the NZ government is right to rule out rent controls as a housing crisis solution – https://theconversation.com/why-the-nz-government-is-right-to-rule-out-rent-controls-as-a-housing-crisis-solution-176460

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

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan now includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team.

This week they discuss the imbroglio over Scott Morrison’s religious discrimination bill, approved by the Coalition on Tuesday after extensive debate but with dissidents threatening its fate in the House of Representatives.

Moderate Liberal MPs have serious concerns: Bridget Archer, who holds the marginal Tasmanian seat of Bass, told Parliament she would not vote for the bill, while Trent Zimmerman, from NSW, in the party room reserved his right not to do so. Meanwhile, Labor has yet to decide its attitude – if it supports the legislation that would ensure its passage.

Amanda and Michelle also discuss Tuesday’s parliamentary apology to victims of bad behaviour in the parliamentary workplace – with Morrison saying “sorry” to Brittany Higgins.

Meanwhile the opposition immediately homed in on the aged care crisis, which saw the government this week sending in the defence forces to help out in facilities.

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

– ref. Word from The Hill: On Scott Morrison’s battle for Religious Discrimination Bill – https://theconversation.com/word-from-the-hill-on-scott-morrisons-battle-for-religious-discrimination-bill-176700

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

Scott Morrison has said “sorry” to Brittany Higgins during a parliamentary acknowledgement of victims of bullying, harassment and sexual assaults in the parliamentary workplace.

“I am sorry to Ms Higgins for the terrible things that took place here,” he told parliament.

“The place that should have been a place for safety and contribution, turned out to be a nightmare.”

He said he was also sorry for those who had endured similar things before her in parliament house.

But Higgins had had “the courage to stand, and so here we are. We are sorry for all of these things, and in doing so, each of us take on accountability for change”.

The acknowledgement, made on behalf of a cross-party taskforce and reflecting the parliament, was read to both houses by their presiding officers.

In the House of Representatives, opposition leader Anthony Albanese, Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce and Greens leader Adam Bandt spoke, as did Zali Steggall, member of Warringah on behalf of the crossbenchers.

The statement said: “We acknowledge the unacceptable history of workplace bullying, sexual harassment and sexual assault in Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces”. Such behaviour was unacceptable and wrong, “and we say sorry”.

Higgins watched from the gallery, one of a handful of women activists. Her partner David Sharaz tweeted the women were “last minute invites”. Parliament house is currently closed to the public.

Former Australian of the Year Grace Tame, who was not present in the chamber, tweeted: “How about some proactive, preventative measures and not just these preformative, last-minute bandaid electioneering stunts?”

Morrison said the review into parliament house culture by Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins had found “generations of culture, in this place and in the building before it, of bullying and harassment”.

“A power imbalance over that time that has been exploited. And that exploitation, abuse and harassment has played itself out through terrible traumatic and harrowing experiences. The harassment of staff, particularly female staff, as well as the harassment of female members and senators.”

This had to change and was changing, Morrison said.

Albanese also paid special tribute to Higgins and her courage.

“You have torn through a silence that has acted as the life support system for the most odious of status quos,” he said.

Albanese said to everyone who took part in the Jenkins review that their action “took a level of courage that you should never have needed to show. But you did, and we thank
you for it.

“We also acknowledge everyone who has experienced misconduct but could not take part. Indeed, there are many who are not ready to speak and perhaps never will be.

“I hope that you can take some heart from knowing that this very institution that failed you is at last acknowledging your hurt. Most importantly, we are sorry. On
behalf of the Australian Labor Party, I am sorry.”

“We are committing to change.”

Albanese said Higgins, Tame and others had “found the strength to lift the weight of their own experience and hold it high until no one could look away”.

Higgins and Tame will make a joint appearance at the National Press Club on Wednesday.

Michelle Grattan 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. Scott Morrison says ‘sorry’ to Brittany Higgins for ‘terrible things’ that happened – https://theconversation.com/scott-morrison-says-sorry-to-brittany-higgins-for-terrible-things-that-happened-176686

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

Sometimes the best things you can do are invisible.

Such as fighting cholera by ensuring drinking water wasn’t contaminated by sewage, as happened in London in the 1840s.

Or setting up an emissions trading scheme, which drove emissions down, despite former prime minister Tony Abbott attacking it as a “so-called market in the non-delivery of an invisible substance to no one”.

Air free from contamination is as invisible as uncontaminated water, but the case for it isn’t yet as widely accepted as the case for clean water.

Air pollution from motor vehicles kills about 280 Australians per year, yet Australian petrol is allowed to contain 15 times as much sulphur as petrol sold in the US, the UK, Europe, Korea, Japan and New Zealand. Australia is planning to adopt in 2024 the standard adopted elsewhere in 2015.

And poor air quality harms us in ways that fall short of death.

Poor air harms performance

A new six-nation study of office workers in countries from China to the United States found that where ventilation is poor and levels of particulate matter are high, workers perform worse or more slowly on tests involving adding and subtracting and colour-coding words.

Another study on the relationship between indoor air quality and competitive chess players found that when the concentration of fine particulate matter with a diameter smaller than 2.5 micrometres (0.0025mm, better known as PM2.5) climbs as much as it can, players are 26% more likely to make mistakes.

The effect is worse if the players are running out of time.

Smart employers recognise this. When Google moved into a new headquarters in Mountain View, California, it was offered air filtration that cut pollutants to 0.0001 parts per billion. It opted for zero parts per billion, and paid more to get it.

Read more:
Australian children are learning in classrooms with very poor air quality

If performance and education matter (and they do – on Monday the government launched a new inquiry into productivity) we ought to be treating clean air as an investment in productivity, over and above its undoubted benefit in containing the spread of COVID.

Here’s my big idea. The A$14 billion Building the Education Revolution program Labor put in place during the global financial crisis both helped fight the crisis and left Australia with thousands of school halls.

As far as legacies go, this wasn’t bad. The halls have been used for assemblies and plays and before and after school care.

Read more:
Poorly ventilated schools are a super-spreader event waiting to happen. It may be as simple as opening windows

But a program designed to contain the spread of COVID that left Australia with schools and workplaces in which the occupants were able to think clearly, and rarely caught infections – that would deliver an enduring dividend.

Many schools have openable windows, as do some workplaces. But in winter and for security reasons they are often closed and not reopened.

Distinguished Professor Lidia Morawska, director of International Laboratory for Air Quality and Health at the Queensland University of Technology, says outside air typically contains about 400 parts per million of carbon dioxide.

Beyond a few hundred parts per million, the aerosols that carry circulate rather than get blown away. In closed classrooms and offices they can travel long distances and remain aloft for hours. Beyond 1,000 parts per million – and indoors, many times 1,000ppm is common – our ability to concentrate starts to drop.

In order to fight COVID in classrooms, education authorities in Victoria, NSW, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania the ACT and the Northern Territory say they are prepared to install air purifiers where needed.

The ACT is reusing those it bought to filter smoke during the 2020 bushfires. Victoria has gone the furthest – ordering 51,000 from Samsung.

These so-called high efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filters work by removing ultra-fine particles rather than bringing in air from the outside.

Portable purifiers are a stopgap

As a stop-gap for fighting COVID Professor Morawska thinks purifiers are okay. But she says as soon as COVID passes they are likely to be put in cupboards and not used til next time. They are unlikely to produce a lasting benefit.

A far, far cheaper and perhaps more enduring solution would be to buy or mandate cheap carbon dioxide (C0₂) meters (portable meters cost less than $100) for every classroom, office and shop.

Heavy duty meters can be mounted on walls and set to glow red when the air is bad. They are in schools throughout Germany.

C0₂ meters do more than monitor carbon dioxide.

By calculating how much of it is in rooms where humans have been, they measure ventilation. They are a good guide as to whether air is circulating and viruses and toxins are being diluted.

Installing meters and ensuring their output is displayed might just be one of the best-value interventions to fight COVID there is – leaving us with the lasting benefit of air that is safe in the same way as our water is safe.

Meters make the invisible visible

The initial cost would be low compared to the $14 billion spent on school halls.

The lasting benefit would be an awareness of when and where we needed to open windows and spend money installing better air flow systems, and when and where we did not.

The cost of poor indoor air can be measured not just in billions, but in billions per year. Back in the late 1990s the CSIRO calculated a cost of $12 billion per year. Two decades on, coronaviruses and bushfire smoke would make it greater still.

We’ve been offered a cost-effective chance to make the invisible visible and extend our productivity and lifespans. I reckon we should grab it.

Read more:
Australia must get serious about airborne infection transmission. Here’s what we need to do

Peter Martin 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. An investment in clean indoor air would do more than help us fight COVID – it would help us concentrate, with lasting benefits – https://theconversation.com/an-investment-in-clean-indoor-air-would-do-more-than-help-us-fight-covid-it-would-help-us-concentrate-with-lasting-benefits-176547

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Wake, Program Manager, Journalism, RMIT University

ABC Chair Ita Buttrose is “delighted” and Managing Director David Anderson says he now has “certainty” for planning. However, the Morrison government’s pre-election announcement it would restore the ABC’s budget to 2018 levels doesn’t come close to making up for what has been lost in cuts to funding and staff.

Seven weeks ahead of the budget, Communications Minister Paul Fletcher has announced the ABC will receive $3.284 billion over three years from July 2022, while SBS will receive $953.7 million over the same period.

Significantly, the government says it is scrapping its controversial indexation freeze on the ABC’s budget. This was imposed by then-Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in 2018 and meant the broadcaster’s funding did not keep pace with inflation. It led to drastic cuts in programming and staffing in June 2020.

Read more:
Latest $84 million cuts rip the heart out of the ABC, and our democracy

Fletcher also announced the ABC funding would include $45.8 million for another three years for the broadcaster’s “enhanced news gathering” program, which is earmarked for local public interest journalism in regional communities.

However, the funding comes with strings attached.

The Morrison government has published what it calls a statement of expectations, a requirement for the ABC and SBS to provide a report each year detailing staff numbers in regional and remote Australia, as well as hours of programming tailored to those audiences.

Fletcher also said the ABC and SBS weren’t currently required to report on the number of hours of Australian drama and documentaries they show each year. Although these hours are published in the ABC annual report, the government will now require the ABC and SBS to provide further reporting on this through a national framework.

Impressive figures but it’s doesn’t undo the damage

To those who haven’t been following the ABC’s funding situation closely, the announcement may seem like impressive numbers. Certainly, the government’s line is the ABC will be “boosted” by scrapping the indexation freeze.

However, the end of the index freeze and the retention of the news gathering program still do not make up for the massive cuts already inflicted on the ABC.

As we noted in our research in 2019 and 2020, a total of $783 million was removed from ABC funding between 2014 and 2022. As the table below shows, these accumulated funding losses include a series of budget announcements, cancelled funding contracts, reduced or ended specific programs and implemented major cuts.

In fact, taking into account the government’s latest announcement, we now calculate the ABC’s accumulated lost funding from fiscal years 2014-15 to 2024-25 will reach a staggering $1.201 billion.

Tallying the ABC’s accumulated losses over a decade

To get to this figure, we used our previous research as a baseline and factored in this week’s funding announcements. This takes account of no additional plans by the government to restore any of the earlier ABC funding cuts, and the ongoing impact of the three-year indexation pause.

While ending the freeze means future ABC funding will take some account of inflation, it does not address the impact of the freeze itself from 2019.

The ABC has said this is a problem. In answer to a Senate Estimates question in October 2021, the broadcaster said this would result in a funding shortfall of just over $40 million annually, which would continue to be felt in future years.

Our research also factors in the ABC’s loss of the ten-year Australia Network contract in 2014. This resulted in a reduction in funding of $186 million, which is represented across the balance of the contract term in the table above.

Certainly, the ABC does continue to do some international broadcasting, particularly in the Pacific, but it is no longer the dominant broadcaster in the region it once was. Restoring and even boosting the funding that was given to the Australia Network would go some way to improving Australia’s standing in the Indo-Pacific region.

We found the total lost funding continues to accumulate at well over $100 million annually through 2024-25. In other words, if the government truly wanted to restore the ABC’s funding, it would need to increase its budget by at least 10% annually.

It is difficult to be definite with the numbers because the triennial funding total announced by Fletcher lacks detail.

It is not clear, for instance, how much will be available for the broadcasters’ operations after funds are allocated for broadcast distribution and transmission contracts that go to third-party suppliers. In the ABC’s case, these contracts are worth almost $600 million over the next three-year budget cycle.

It must also be noted Fletcher rejects the assertion the ABC’s funding has been cut at all in the current three-year funding period from 2019–22.

In fairness to the minister, while the indexation freeze and other funding reductions continue to reduce the available funds to the ABC, they were not announced during the current three-year period.

The ABC lacks funds for future-proofing

This week’s announcement was warmly greeted as a significant change in the government’s position towards the public broadcasters. It is also certainly a positive response to the dire state of journalism in some areas, particularly in the suburbs and regional and remote communities, where the closure of commercial newsrooms has left many without a local journalist or any local news service.

But we’d argue more needs to be done. The ABC still gets only about half the per capita government funding other democratic countries provide to their national broadcasters.

Read more:
Local news sources are closing across Australia. We are tracking the devastation (and some reasons for hope)

This funding will also not future-proof the ABC or SBS with the extra resources needed to remain at the forefront of delivering digital content to Australians as they continue to change the way they access quality and trusted news and information.

The announcement may at least prevent the ABC from becoming an election issue.

The Friends of the ABC had been gearing up its campaigning across the nation, fundraising to target key marginal seats. And last week, the Guardian Australia reported the majority of Australians would support restoring funding to the ABC.

It remains to be seen if the announcement is sufficient to convince Australians who love and trust the national broadcasters that the Coalition has actually has done enough to support them.

Alexandra Wake was a senior journalist with the ABC, and did her last shift with ABC Radio Australia in 2015.

Michael Ward is a Ph.D. candidate in media and communications at the University of Sydney. From 1999 to 2017 he worked for the ABC, including as a senior executive.

– ref. The ABC’s budget hasn’t been restored – it’s still facing $1.2 billion in accumulated losses over a decade – https://theconversation.com/the-abcs-budget-hasnt-been-restored-its-still-facing-1-2-billion-in-accumulated-losses-over-a-decade-176532

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maartje Sevenster, Research Scientist Climate Smart Agriculture, CSIRO

The need to feed a rising global population means agriculture is one of the most difficult sectors to decarbonise. This is especially true for growing grains – think wheat, barley, legumes and canola.

Australia is the third largest exporter of wheat after Russia and the US, with 11% of the world’s wheat trade shipped from our shores in 2017. Likewise, Australia is responsible for up to 20% of the world’s barley exports.

But our new report, published today, has found a way to potentially increase grain production by up to 40%, while reducing the carbon footprint per tonne of grain by up to 15%. The key is improving our use of fertiliser.

To produce the world’s grains with as few greenhouse gas emissions as possible, all countries, including Australia, need to play their part. The carbon footprint (greenhouse gas intensity) of Australian grain is lower than elsewhere, so on a global scale we have some room to increase production to help meet the demands of a growing population, ensuring Australian grains remain competitive in the global market.

Emissions from the grain sector

Our initial task was to estimate the greenhouse gas emissions the grains sector released in 2005. This is because 2005 is the standard baseline year we compare Australia’s emissions to today, in line with our obligations under the Paris Agreement.

We found the sector released 13.75 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2005. Grain emissions in 2005 were primarily under two categories: on-farm emissions (61%) and “embedded” emissions (39%). This breakdown is likely to be very similar for today’s grain sector emissions, but this needs to be confirmed with further data collection.

Read more:
Australia’s agriculture sector sorely needs more insights from First Nations people. Here’s how we get there

On-farm emissions are dominated by applying fertiliser, and the breakdown of plant residue, such as stalks, roots and grain that falls to the ground during harvest. On-farm emissions alone are responsible for 1.7% of Australia’s total.

Embedded emissions are associated with the supply chain of a product, such as the manufacturing of fertiliser and chemicals. We found the production of fertiliser was the largest contributor to embedded emissions.

It’s clear how we use and produce fertiliser is greenhouse gas intensive. However, fertilisers – along with the the breakdown of plant residue – are key in improving productivity on farms.

Grappling with fertiliser

Nitrogen from fertilisers and carbon from plant residues link two important greenhouse gases: nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide.

The relationship between nitrogen in fertiliser and carbon in plants is tightly interwoven – changing levels of nitrogen inputs will change the levels of carbon in the system, and vice versa.

To unpack this complex system, we ran simulations for different farm management practices. Our findings were surprising.

Counter-intuitively, we found increasing fertiliser (in a way that minimises nitrogen losses) sees almost constant net on-farm emissions, while considerably increasing the production of grains. This translates to a lower greenhouse gas intensity (carbon footprint). Let’s explore why.

Read more:
Land of opportunity: more sustainable Australian farming would protect our lucrative exports (and the planet)

Plants need nitrogen to grow. If not enough fertiliser is applied, the plants will take it from the soil. And when the soil loses nitrogen, carbon dioxide is also released into the atmosphere to balance the soil’s nitrogen and carbon levels.

Applying fertiliser in way that results in more efficient use of nitrogen will lead to greater plant growth and avoid depleting the soil. This will, in turn, see more plant residue go into the soil, again increasing the soil’s carbon levels.

But there’s a catch. Because those extra fertilisers must be manufactured, embedded emissions increase. Nevertheless, we found the increase in total emissions to be smaller than the increase in total production. Therefore, the greenhouse gas intensity associated with the production of a tonne of grain decreases.

Where to from here?

These findings are a small but important part of the global effort to reduce emissions from the agriculture sector and maintain Australian industry competitiveness.

The next step is to conduct further research and develop technology to put our findings into practice, as well as develop more targeted incentives for customers, investors and other stakeholders.

With the increase in emissions taking place in the manufacture of fertiliser, rather than on the farm itself, it’s important the industry helps drive those embedded emissions down.

Some initiatives are already happening, especially the development of green hydrogen. Hydrogen is a key ingredient in the manufacture of fertiliser, so using green hydrogen can reduce fertiliser embedded emissions.

Read more:
Our global food systems are rife with injustice: here’s how we can change this

The research described in this article was co-funded by the Grains Research and Development Corporation.

Aaron Simmons is a Technical Specialist in Climate Change Mitigation with the NSW Department of Primary Industries, and a an adjunct Senior Research Fellow with The University of New England. He receives funding from the Commonwealth government and rural research and development corporations.

Lindsay Bell receives funding from the Grains Research and Development Corporation

– ref. How Australia can boost the production of grains, while lowering its carbon footprint – https://theconversation.com/how-australia-can-boost-the-production-of-grains-while-lowering-its-carbon-footprint-176366

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ilana Finefter-Rosenbluh, Lecturer, Faculty of Education, Monash University

The recent case of a Christian school in Queensland asking parents to sign a contract, stating, among other things, homosexuality is immoral and their children will only identify as their birth gender, sparked a furore across the country. It also highlighted an ethical issue many staff face: what action to take if their school’s values conflict with their own.

One teacher who resigned from the school told Channel 10’s The Project of the difficulty of her decision. While she wanted to be there for the students affected by the attitudes shown in the contract, she also needed them to know there were “Christians out there that love them and aren’t hiding.”

She said:

I couldn’t agree to be a teacher in a school that had that vocabulary and language around some of the most vulnerable kids […] as an educator, my priority is to make sure that each child […] feels safe […] but when a child tells us with tears in their eyes that they don’t feel safe, what are we doing?! […] I can’t work for an organisation that does that to kids.

The dilemma of working in an institution whose morals conflict with your own happens in most professions. Research shows people find different ways of dealing with this. Some choose to exit the workplace or the profession, adhering to their personal and professional integrity. Others may choose to voice their moral dissatisfaction, either loudly or clandestinely opposing unacceptable things from the inside. Finally, there are professionals who stay loyal to the institution and turn a blind eye to practices that make them feel uncomfortable.

As for teachers, a 2020 study I conducted in the US suggests they may choose a variant of the last option. This is despite them having endured moral trauma, which means experiencing dire feelings of immorality caused by doing something against their genuine desire to choose an alternative course of action.

Read more:
Is learning more important than well-being? Teachers told us how COVID highlighted ethical dilemmas at school

The study showed teachers’ ethical struggles with student discipline in Catholic and Jewish schools. It revealed most teachers decided to remain loyal to the system. Others turned a blind eye to things such as severe incidents of misconduct. Some quietly determined their own disciplinary procedures, while others left the schools – either moving to the public school system or leaving the teaching profession altogether.

Another recent study I conducted with two colleagues identified secular teachers’ struggles working in Jewish religious schools in Australia, the US and Israel. Based on interviews with 25 secular teachers, we found they employed similar strategies as the studies above as a way of coping with personal and institutional dilemmas.

Some opposed from the inside

Nine of the teachers we spoke to employed the opposition strategy: they stayed but did things differently inside the school, as they saw fit.

Teaching evolution, although it was not part of the curriculum, one Israeli science teacher described how they navigated the Big Bang vs the creationism debate:

We talk about the creation of the universe, the Big Bang […] These themes evoke many emotional responses […] It’s mainly enrichment, broadening their horizons […] and if a student comes and says, ‘I don’t want this,’ I respect it, and I let him leave the class or do something else.

Taking a similar stand, another American teacher passed on some morning prayers:

I have a hard time with the morning prayers that should take about 45 minutes […] so, in my class, in my own small world, I pray with my students like 25 minutes […] If we have a test or I need to finish a unit […] I’m not going to waste my time on prayers.

Others adapted

Eleven teachers took more of an adaptation strategy, aligning their practices with their school’s vision. They accepted or celebrated their school’s religious and organisational culture, with some even attempting to conceal their secularity.

These teachers said they were very cautious when expressing their opinions – feeling obligated to represent their school’s perspective. Wanting to avoid conflicts, they sought to separate their personal and professional identities.

One Australian teacher said:

The students ask me sometimes: ‘Did you fast?’ […] I manage to escape these questions […] because I don’t think I need to expose myself […] it might provoke some questions and problems.

Likewise, an American teacher noted:

I try […] walking between the raindrops […] not to contradict something that they can hear in other places […] at home.

And some sat on the fence

Other teachers mainly employed the fence-sitting strategy. They learned to live with their inner conflicts and maintain a low profile in school.

As one of the teachers said, “I come to school, do my things, and leave”. Another teacher said she would not let her students know she is not religious as she “doesn’t step on landmines.”

Unlike the adaptors, the fence-sitters did not appear to have a sense of belonging to the school. Lamenting the ethically impossible situation, one of the teachers defined herself as a “second-class teacher”, contending that “it’s like [her] university degree doesn’t really count.”

Such complications can contribute to teacher shortages

Teachers’ moral-professional dissatisfaction can prompt them to leave not just the school but the profession. This reflects a demoralisation, where they feel they are unable to enact the values that motivate and sustain their work. Demoralisation peaks when educators believe they are violating the basic moral expectations of their profession.

This should be given policy weight in Australia, as demoralisation can lead to teacher attrition and the increasingly high teacher turnover.

Read more:
COVID and schools: Australia is about to feel the full brunt of its teacher shortage

There are also educational and social benefits to having diverse teachers employed in religious schools. Our previous research
shows, for example, teacher diversity can motivate children to interact with people of different cultural affiliations which can enhance their ability to understand different perspectives.

Neither disengagement, concealment or exit are beneficial for teachers and students. Educational leaders should openly discuss their school’s policies and potential points of conflict to coordinate mutual moral-professional expectations. Similarly, teachers may seek to explore strategies for (re)moralisation that can help them navigate such challenges.

The study interviewing 25 secular teachers in Jewish schools was conducted with Dr Lotem Perry-Hazan and Elizabeth Muzikovskaya from the University of Haifa, Israel.

Ilana Finefter-Rosenbluh receives external funding, including from the Trawalla Foundation, the Besen Family Foundation, the Loti and Victor Smorgon Family Foundation and a Victorian government school.

– ref. ‘I’m not going to waste my time on prayers’: how secular teachers navigate working in religious schools – https://theconversation.com/im-not-going-to-waste-my-time-on-prayers-how-secular-teachers-navigate-working-in-religious-schools-176534

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Davina Jackson, Honorary Academic, School of Architecture and Planning, University of Kent

Between the first and second world wars, Australia’s high-end architecture was strongly influenced by exotic scenery from Hollywood’s rapidly accelerating movie industry.

Southern California’s style of seductive glamour and decadent hedonism – recalling the sun-blessed heydays of Roman emperors and Mughal sultans – especially inspired developers and designers of lavish cinemas, mansions, blocks of flats and leisure gardens with swimming pools.

The best of Hollywood

Sydney’s Potts Point peninsula was a crucible of this trend, especially after music publishing mogul Frank Albert hired English architect Neville Hampson to create his splendid residence Boomerang, facing Elizabeth Bay.

In 1924, Hampson and Albert visited Los Angeles to find ideas from “the best of Hollywood”. The pinnacle then was La Cuesta Encantada, a vast hilltop estate that media magnate William Randolph Hearst was developing, in Spanish, Italian and French neo-classical styles, with architect-engineer Julia Morgan.

Their own version of Hearst’s castle included the Baroque cathedral-inspired Casa Grande, three large guest houses and “the most sumptuous swimming pool on Earth”.

Hampson and Albert probably also visited Russian actress Alla Nazimova’s Garden of Alla estate in West Hollywood, which was notorious for risqué parties around her swimming pool and lush garden. Her terracotta-roofed mansion exemplified the Spanish-Italian vineyard-villa style that was also being promoted in Australia by architects William Hardy Wilson, Robin Dods, Walter Bagot, Harold Desbrowe-Annear, and Australia’s first dean of architecture, Professor Leslie Wilkinson.

When Wilkinson founded the University of Sydney’s Faculty of Architecture in 1919-20, he strongly criticised the ornamental features and complex roofs typical of the waning Arts and Crafts movement. Instead, he promoted a Mediterranean mode of relaxed, sun-responsive elegance; based on “the work of Spain, of southern Italy, of Provence, with, perhaps, a little of the Orientalism of Northern Africa.”

He also praised Los Angeles updates of west coast Spanish missions, with their adobe walls, arched arcades, timber beam ceilings and rounded terracotta roof tiles, as “a delightful and appropriate style of building”.

This aligned his 1920s Australian clique to the medley of Spanish-Mediterranean styles that were embraced by Hollywood property developers, architects and newly rich stars from the silent films industry.

The interwar decades

During the interwar decades, many mansions, villas, bungalows and blocks of flats were built in Spanish-Italian renaissance styles, often combined with flat roofs, low proportions and curved corners from the then-new Streamline Moderne movement. Typical features were centre-opening French doors, curved Juliet balconies and columned porticos, colonial-style (multi-pane) windows, loggias and arcades, piazza-inspired courtyards and ceremonial staircases rising around entry foyers.

Outstanding Sydney, examples included Wilkinson’s own villa, Greenway, in Vaucluse; Burnham Thorpe and many other palatial North Shore residences by Frederic Glynn Gilling (with Howard Joseland), and Craigend in Darling Point by Frank Ironstein l’Anson Bloomfield (with Roy Stuart McCulloch).

Two other Hollywood-Mediterranean standouts were The Lodge in Canberra, by Melbourne architects Percy Oakley and Stanley Parkes, and Pine Hill (Bruce Manor) at Frankston, Victoria, by Sydney architects Prevost, Synnot & Rewald (with Robert Bell Hamilton). Both of these cream-painted, terracotta-roofed mansions shared the same first occupants: Prime Minister Stanley Melbourne Bruce and his family.

As well as residences, Spanish-Mediterranean styles were adopted for various new types of buildings; especially blocks of flats, petrol stations, car showrooms, hotels and shopping centres, and beach pavilions for new surf lifesaving clubs; notably the Bondi Pavilion by Robertson & Marks.

Spanish aesthetics also suited Catholic schools and churches, such as St Columba’s in South Perth, and crematoria for modern funerals. Two superb cremation complexes were designed by Frank Bloomfield at Sydney’s Rookwood and Northern Suburbs Memorial Gardens.

Cinemas, theatres and opera houses

Australia’s most spectacular interpretations of Mediterranean architecture were the “atmospheric” cinemas designed by Henry Eli White and other antipodean acolytes of John Eberson, America’s leading interwar architect of theatres and opera houses.

Atmospheric interiors tended to feature extravagant ornamentation, scenic trompe l’oeil paintwork and dramatic lighting effects that lent audiences the fantasy of spending a starry night watching performances in the courtyard of Granada’s Alhambra Palace. His over-the-top décor influenced Hollywood scenery styles that seemed sophisticated and exotic in the mid-20th century, but today are often described as “camp” and “kitsch”.

White, a New Zealander, set up his practice in Sydney in 1913 and expanded his career on both sides of the Tasman during the 1920s. Historian Ross Thorne revealed that White worked with Eberson on Sydney’s Capitol and State theatres. He also designed the Palais, Athenaeum and new Princess theatres in Melbourne, the Civic in Newcastle, and Wintergardens at Ipswich, Rockhampton and Townsville.

Sydney architects Bohringer, Taylor & Johnson also completed some notable atmospheric cinemas in the late 1920s, including the State (today’s Forum) in Melbourne and the Ambassadors in Perth.

Spanish-Mediterranean architecture was well suited to Australia’s post-Federation culture because it gave a more exotic flavour than the Colonial Georgian revival that accompanied the reigns of kings George V and George VI from 1910 to 1952. And it connected Australia to the exhilarating, glamorous spirit of Hollywood in the roaring twenties.

Now that Australia’s own Hollywood-aligned film culture is prospering, these vintage architectural icons remain alluring.

This is an edited extract from Australian Architecture: A History, by Davina Jackson, published by Allen & Unwin.

Davina Jackson 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. The seductive glamour and decadent hedonism of Hollywood influences on Australian architecture – https://theconversation.com/the-seductive-glamour-and-decadent-hedonism-of-hollywood-influences-on-australian-architecture-175624

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rhonda Garad, Senior Lecturer and Research Fellow in Knowledge Translation, Monash University

For Mary*, being told she’d entered menopause much earlier than expected was a shock …

It was sort of like I’d gone from 39 […] instead of turning 40, I’d almost turned 80. So I’d sort of skipped 40 years.

Around 10% of women – including many who believe they have the prospect having children ahead of them – are suddenly told they are at the end of their fertile life, and at greater risk of diseases normally associated with middle age.

In the course of our work with women and research, hundreds of women have shared their experiences of early menopause. They provide insights into how the physical changes have affected their sense of self and their relationships.

Read more:
Making sense of menopausal hormone therapy means understanding the benefits as well as the risks

What is early menopause?

Menopause refers to the time in a woman’s life when the ovaries stop producing eggs, periods stop, and oestrogen levels dramatically drop.

The usual age of menopause, defined as 12 months without periods, is around 51 years. Early menopause occurs before 45 years. Premature menopause or premature ovarian insufficiency (POI), occurs before age 40.

Early menopause can happen without warning and the causes may never be known; although a family history of POI, autoimmune disease, smoking, early development and social factors are risk factors. It can also result from medical care such as chemotherapy, radiotherapy or the surgical removal of both ovaries. Except for women who have their ovaries removed, predicting who will experience early menopause is very difficult.

Hot flushes, night sweats and the rest

The symptoms of early menopause can be similar to those associated with usual menopause (hot flushes, night sweats, mood changes, vaginal dryness, sleep disturbance, sexual problems, fatigue, joint pain, and brain fade), but happen to much younger women and may be more severe. The problem is that no one expects young women to be experiencing menopausal symptoms.

Some women may not have any menopausal symptoms and only experience their periods stopping without warning. Others discover they are unable to become pregnant.
Sonia* remembers:

Around 35, 36 I started to skip periods […] I just thought it was stress and overwork, and that sort of thing. But then the gaps between periods got longer and longer, and I started to experience night sweats. And I became concerned at that point, not because I thought that I was going through menopause – it didn’t occur to me.

Although we think of oestrogen as a reproductive hormone, it also plays an important role in brain function, particularly memory. Women who experience early menopause often report frustration at not mentally performing in the way they used to, and also find mood changes difficult to cope with. The cause of early menopause (such as chemotherapy) and the symptoms experienced (like sleep disturbance) can also impact thinking and mood.

Read more:
‘Brain fog’ during menopause is real – it can disrupt women’s work and spark dementia fears

Feeling less than sexy

Early menopause can affect sexual function in many ways. Vaginal dryness can cause pain with sexual intercourse. Women often say they lose desire for sex, which can strain intimate relationships.

Cathy told us she wanted to be left alone:

It changed who I felt I was […] It’s hard to be sexy when you’re cranky […] To think of yourself as a sexual being [is difficult] when you are experiencing hot flushes every hour and you’re going, ‘I don’t want anyone near me. All I want to do is feel cool.‘

Losing a future family

For many women who go through early menopause the sudden lose of fertility can be devastating. Jenni remembers going through menopause at an age when many of her peers were becoming parents:

Watching the joy my friends were experiencing getting pregnant and giving birth, felt like a special kind of hell. I was so happy for them, but I had to distance myself because it was just too hard.

Women describe feelings of shock and trauma after being told they were infertile. They feel grief for the children they had hoped to have.

Rarely, women with spontaneous POI will conceive. For the majority, pregnancy is only possible with assisted reproduction technology using donor egg or embryo.

No cure but symptoms can be treated

There is no cure for early menopause and no way to restore egg production. Instead, the focus of treatment is on managing symptoms and the increased risks of bone and heart disease after menopause.

Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is usually recommended up until the age of usual menopause to manage symptoms and reduce your risk of heart disease and osteoporosis. The risks of taking HRT seen in older women do not necessarily apply to younger women. Consult with your doctor about the best HRT for you.

If you have not had a period for 4-6 months (and you are not pregnant or on treatment that stops periods) then you should see your doctor about whether you may be experiencing early menopause or POI. You can also find doctors who have a special interest in women’s health and menopause.

We developed the AskEarlyMenopause website and app to provide accurate information and a discussion forum for women to share experiences and get expert advice.

*Names changed for privacy

Amanda Vincent receives grant funding from NHMRC and MRFF. She has received honoraria from Besins and Theramex, manufacturers of menopausal hormone therapy. .

Rhonda Garad 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 changed who I felt I was.’ Women tell of devastation at early menopause diagnosis – https://theconversation.com/it-changed-who-i-felt-i-was-women-tell-of-devastation-at-early-menopause-diagnosis-176015

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Parwinder Kaur, Associate Professor | Director, DNA Zoo Australia, The University of Western Australia

It used to be the stuff of science fiction: bringing a long-dead species back from extinction by painstakingly piecing together its full DNA sequence, or genome.

It’s not quite as straightforward as Jurassic Park would have us believe, but in the age of DNA editing, the idea of cloning an extinct species is no longer purely the realm of fantasy.

Today, our team at the DNA Zoo has hopefully taken a step towards creating a blueprint to clone one of Australia’s most loved, and most missed, extinct species: the thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger.

We’ve done it not by studying the thylacine itself, but by completing a chromosome-length 3D genome map of one of its closest living relative: the numbat.

The striped, termite-eating numbat is Western Australia’s faunal emblem, and now lives only in small pockets of that state, although it once roamed throughout southern Australia. Crucially, numbats and thylacines shared a common ancestor that lived some time between 35 million and 41 million years ago – relatively recent in evolutionary terms.

Both these enigmatic creatures have stripes, but that’s not where the similarity ends – as much as 95% of their DNA may be identical.

Decoding the full numbat genome therefore raises the tantalising prospect of being able to piece together the thylacine’s genetic sequence, which in turn would offer the tantalising prospect of reintroducing one of Australia’s most iconic lost species.

No doubt this will be more challenging than the famous bid to resurrect the woolly mammoth using DNA from the Asian elephant. But the release of the numbat genome makes the thylacine’s resurrection a more realistic prospect than ever before.

The numbat is the latest marsupial genome sequence from this family compiled by our team at the DNA Zoo, following on from the Tasmanian devil, quoll and dunnart. We acquired samples of more than 500 mammals from around the world, and aim to make all their genomes available for conservation and open-access research.

We are also working on a detailed genomic analysis of most Australian carnivorous marsupials, and will ultimately produce a full peer-reviewed publication in a journal. But today, by sharing the sequence publicly at this stage of our research, we can offer a valuable resource to other scientists and conservationists studying numbats and other marsupials. Given the conservation threats they face, time is ticking fast.

Genes from thylacines

The first draft of the Tasmanian tiger genome was pieced together in 2018, using the century-old museum samples. But this version is very fragmentary – several key gaps still need to be filled to piece this puzzle together into a comprehensive genome sequence. Unfortunately, the old museum samples didn’t provide enough high-quality DNA to resolve these issues.

So how do you reconstruct something without some seemingly essential ingredients? This is where the genome of the thylacine’s closest living cousin – the numbat – can help. Our new high-resolution numbat genome map can help us fill in the missing bits of the thylacine genome.

There will still be significant hurdles between having a complete thylacine genome and cloning a thylacine for real. But what takes this scenario from science fiction to potential reality is CRISPR gene-editing technology – a set of enzymes that allow scientists to target very particular snippets of DNA.

Read more:
What is CRISPR, the gene editing technology that won the Chemistry Nobel prize?

CRISPR has been referred to as a kind of “molecular scissors” that allow the precise selection and insertion of DNA from specimens, making “de-extincting” the thylacine or other species a realistic prospect by allowing geneticists to selectively “repair” the missing bits of its genome.

With the help of this and other “synthetic biology” tools, geneticists could conceivably piece together a set of chromosomes that could then be inserted into an egg cell with its existing nucleus removed, allowing the new DNA to act as the egg’s genetic blueprint. This is the technique being pursued by a US research group aiming to clone the mammoth by using the DNA of its closest living relative, the Asian elephant, to fill in the missing bits of mammoth DNA.

Science fiction or science future?

Around the world, rapid advancements in embryology and genetics are opening up the possibility of resurrecting extinct species — or at least creating something that’s close enough to the original that it will develop and grow properly.

In 1996, British scientists successfully cloned a sheep, called Dolly. Then, in 2017, Chinese researchers used the same technique to create two genetically identical long-tailed macaques.

Read more:
Dolly the Sheep and the human cloning debate – twenty years later

Through the growing field of synthetic biology and precise genome-editing technologies such as CRISPR, Harvard geneticist George Church has launched Colossal, a biotech company that has initially set on creating an elephant-mammoth hybrid, with the first calves expected in six years.

Helping numbats first

Of course, the numbat is one of Australia’s most loved native marsupials in its own right.

Like the Tasmanian Tiger, it too was on the verge of extinction during the late 20th century, but extensive conservation efforts as well as government and community intervention are helping its numbers gradually bounce back.

Still, with fewer than 1,000 numbats left in the wild and the species still officially listed as endangered, our genetic blueprint hopefully paves the way for better numbat conservation information for our scientists on the front line. Many of these scientists are fighting the very genetic diseases threatening to exterminate numbats.

There is a still a long road ahead before the thylacine could be cloned. But if it works, the end goal of any de-extinction effort surely is to reintroduce animals to the wild.

Read more:
Tasmanian tigers were going extinct before we pushed them over the edge

If that were to happen, the thylacine already has one advantage over many de-extinction candidates: appropriate habitat. With reserves covering about half of Tasmania today, there would be ample places for thylacines to live, still teaming with the prey animals they used to eat.

There is no question it could be put back into the Tasmanian bush. There is also good reason to do so: the thylacine was Tasmania’s key carnivore. Putting it back atop the food chain could help restabilise ecosystems that are under threat.

If and when that dream becomes reality, thylacines would owe a debt of gratitude to their little cousin, the humble numbat.

Parwinder Kaur 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. We’ve decoded the numbat genome – and it could bring the thylacine’s resurrection a step closer – https://theconversation.com/weve-decoded-the-numbat-genome-and-it-could-bring-the-thylacines-resurrection-a-step-closer-176528

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Paola Magni, Senior Lecturer in Forensic Science, Murdoch University

Rivers, lakes and the sea frequently host scenes of death and crime. When a body is pulled from a watery grave – due to, for instance, drowning, floods, tsunamis, shipwrecks, air crashes or murder – specialist investigative techniques are used to piece together what may have happened.

This discipline, known as aquatic forensics, brings together knowledge from underwater archaeology, anthropology, marine biology and marine science. But it is still in its infancy and there’s much left to learn.

The investigation of a body recovered from the water is challenging enough, with so much evidence washed (or eaten!) away, and the chemistry of decomposition so profoundly affected by water. But when only the bones or the teeth of a victim are found, the mystery becomes nearly impossible to solve.

To help bridge this knowledge gap, we’ve spent years studying archaeological bones collected from historical shipwrecks that have rested on the seabed for centuries. We’re searching for ways to use recovered bones and teeth to better understand time spent in the sea, and the overall journey of the mortal remains.

Our findings may one day assist forensic investigations on more recent bones, such as when complete or partial skeletons (human or non-human) are recovered from oceans, lakes or rivers – or are just beached on the shore.

Read more:
Crime won’t stop because of COVID. So how should we protect crime scene investigators?

Reconstructing the chain of events

The study of bones and teeth help investigators learn about the person’s sex and age, and potentially identify a specific individual by studying dental restorations and DNA. In the best case scenario, a facial reconstruction will be be possible. However, sometime we can only determine if it’s not a human bone after all but rather that of an animal.

But special characteristics of bones and teeth and the organisms connected to them can help investigators reconstruct the chain of events that occurred after death and before the recovery. This reconstruction is the object of taphonomy research.

Taphonomy is a scientific term coined in 1940 to describe the processes through which organic remains, such as bone and teeth, are transformed over time and pass from the biosphere (the world of life) to the lithosphere (the world of rocks and dust).

Shipwreck bones

Our team has been analysing sheep, pig and cow bones discovered in decayed wooden barrels during underwater archaeological excavations of historical shipwrecks off the coast of Western Australia.

The bones and the teeth of this study are part of the collections of the WA Shipwrecks Museum.

They belong to the underwater archaeological sites of:

• the Batavia, a Dutch East India Company ship wrecked in 1629

• the Vergulde Draeck a Dutch East India Company ship wrecked in in 1656

• the Zeewijk, a Dutch East India Company ship wrecked in 1727, and

• the Rapid, an America-China trader wrecked in 1811.

The first three were wrecked while sailing towards Jakarta, following what was known as the Brouwer Route, whereas Rapid was sailing from Boston to Canton (now Guangzhou).

The wrecks were located between the 1960s and 1970s – some accidentally and some after long research – by recreational divers and underwater archaeologists. The wrecks contained many other artefacts, including piles of silver coins.

Our research has been looking at bones submerged in seawater and/or surrounded by marine sediment for anywhere between 169 and 347  years. The work is ongoing but, so far, we’ve:

• identified special chemical clues or “geochemical fingerprints” of a process known as diagenesis (meaning the changes that occur on skeletal material over time)

• reported new insights into how marine single-celled organisms called foraminifera affect the dissolving spaces inside submerged bone. These microorganisms, largely used for ecological and paleontological studies, can provide a treasure trove of information for investigators trying to work out how much time has passed since death.

• built a better understanding of how bioerosion by bacteria and coloniser animals such as barnacles affects bones underwater.

Bones can be found in the sea after a long time only if they have been contained and protected by hard structures, such as the hull of a ship or the cabin of an aircraft. Otherwise, marine animals will attack, scatter and fragment them. Other animals will use them as a shelter.

After a long time within the remnants of a wreck, bones can become enclosed in concretions formed by iron objects that were aboard the ship. As time passes, the chemical elements of the bones change, with the addition of chemical elements normally absent in living bone.

The combination of everything added and removed from bones during their long rest underwater can help investigators reconstruct the events after death.

This knowledge can be crucial in forensic investigations.

Edda Guareschi is Visiting Researcher at the WA Shipwrecks Museum.

Paola Magni 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. How centuries-old bones from Australia’s historic shipwrecks can help us solve crimes – https://theconversation.com/how-centuries-old-bones-from-australias-historic-shipwrecks-can-help-us-solve-crimes-174963

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nathan Bartlett, Associate Professor, School of Biomedical Sciences and Pharmacy, University of Newcastle

Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt said last week he expects the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) to change the definition of “fully vaccinated” to three doses instead of two.

It comes as evidence emerges suggesting the highly infectious Omicron variant has the ability to escape the protection two vaccine doses offer.

So, how effective are two doses compared to three against Omicron?

Let’s break it down.

Two doses don’t protect much against Omicron

Vaccine protection against Omicron is reduced for two reasons.

First, antibodies generated by vaccination gradually wane over time. There are now many countries that are more than a year into their COVID vaccine rollout, so many people have received their second COVID jab over six months ago.

Without boosting, their antibody levels will have dropped significantly. Australia was a little slower off the mark – but now finds itself in a similar situation.

The second reason is Omicron can escape vaccine-induced immunity because of its constellation of mutations. Its spike protein (the bit that helps the virus access our cells) is significantly different to Delta’s, and to the original virus from which our vaccines are based.

The critical part of the spike protein is the “receptor binding domain”. It latches onto a protein on our cells called ACE-2 so the virus can gain entry. Delta had two mutations in the receptor binding domain, and Beta had three. Omicron has 15 mutations in its receptor binding domain. As a result, only some of the antibodies the vaccine induces will still bind to Omicron’s spike and inhibit it getting into your cells.

For these reasons, emerging evidence suggests two doses of a COVID vaccine provide just 0-10% protection against infection with Omicron five to six months after the second jab.

So, you really cannot claim you are “fully vaccinated” with just two doses now, particularly if it’s been months since your second dose.

Some protection against severe disease and hospitalisation remains. UK data suggests two doses of AstraZeneca or Pfizer offer around 35% protection against hospitalisation by six months after the second dose.

What about three doses?

Having a booster dose bumps up your antibodies – which is particularly important for Omicron because only some of those antibodies are protective. Emerging evidence suggests protection from symptomatic Omicron infection is restored to 60-75% two to four weeks after a Pfizer or Moderna booster dose.

However, third-dose protection also wanes, down to 30-40% against Omicron infection after 15 weeks.

So, unfortunately breakthrough infections will still be common. Fortunately, protection against hospitalisation remains much higher, up around 90% after a Pfizer booster dose and only dropping to 75% after 10-14 weeks, and 90-95% up to nine weeks after a Moderna booster.

Pfizer and Moderna are currently developing vaccines matched to Omicron, which if approved, should induce better immunity against this variant.

Read more:
Will an Omicron-specific vaccine help control COVID? There’s one key problem

Will we need a new dose every three months?

Israel is currently rolling out fourth Pfizer doses to some high-risk groups.

Some people will be concerned this trend means we’ll need a new dose every few months. But I don’t think that will be the case.

We can’t keep boosting people every few months chasing waning immunity. It’s likely after each round of boosting, faith in the vaccines will diminish. It’s worth remembering we have never tried to vaccinate against a respiratory coronavirus so we are still learning about how to best generate protective immunity.

There’s also the ethical question of rolling out multiple rounds of booster doses in wealthy countries when many people in some parts of the world haven’t received their first two doses yet.

While there are high levels of infection in countries with low rates of vaccination, all countries remain at risk of outbreaks, particularly if new viral variants emerge – which is sure to happen while there’s so much transmission globally.

Read more:
Israel is rolling out fourth doses of COVID vaccines. Should Australia do the same?

But better vaccines are coming. Universal COVID vaccines are in development, which target areas of the virus that don’t easily mutate, meaning they’ll likely be effective across different variants.

In the future, we may get a yearly COVID vaccine combined with the flu vaccine. Treatments will improve, too, so you can minimise symptoms at home.

These developments will reduce the impact the virus has on us, so eventually COVID will stabilise to a predictable level of transmission that doesn’t cause disruption – that is, it becomes endemic.

Your existing immunity will be boosted with naturally acquired infections every year or so that will almost always be asymptomatic or very low (cold-like) symptoms.

However, for those more vulnerable, such as the elderly and those who are immune compromised or have chronic diseases, vaccines are less effective and the virus will still be able to cause severe illness and death, similar to the flu. So we need to continue to progress research into new treatment approaches that will better protect these individuals.

A silver lining

One silver lining from COVID has been intensified research efforts towards vaccines and treatments.

We’re seeing multiple new anti-viral drugs being approved which will reduce disease and death.

Some of these treatments are likely to be effective across different viruses, not just COVID.

And mRNA vaccine technology can churn out new vaccines in a matter of months, which was completely inconceivable two years ago.

All this means we’re better prepared against COVID, but also future respiratory virus outbreaks and pandemics, whether that’s a new coronavirus, influenza virus or any of the multitude of other respiratory viruses out there.

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

– ref. What’s the difference in protection against Omicron between 2 doses and 3 doses of vaccine? – https://theconversation.com/whats-the-difference-in-protection-against-omicron-between-2-doses-and-3-doses-of-vaccine-176447

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachael Fowler, Post doctoral research fellow plant evolution, The University of Melbourne

Each year, many new species of Australian plants, animals and fungi are discovered and described. It’s detailed, time-consuming work, and much of it could not be done without the contribution of older Australians.

I’m an evolutionary botanist and I use DNA sequencing to better understand relationships between plant species – a field known as phylogenetics. My job involves collecting plant specimens in the furthest corners of Australia.

Time and again I’m helped by older, generally retired Australians with a passion for the plants I’m working on. In their own time and with their own resources, they take it upon themselves to explore and document a particular geographic area or group of plants.

Many have a professional scientific background, although not necessarily in the field they now contribute to. For these dedicated men and women, passion is their driver and time their secret weapon.

Without these older Australians, my research wouldn’t be where it is today. So let me introduce you to a few of them.

Bevan Buirchell, Ron Dadd and Russell Wait

From opposite sides of the country – Bevan and Ron in Western Australia and Russell in Victoria – these three collectors discover, sample and grow extensive collections of emu bush (Eremophila).

More than 200 species of emu bush have been described, and many are rare, threatened or endangered.

Emu bush is a culturally important plant for many Indigenous Australians, and recent research has revealed the genus contains many new chemical compounds of interest for medicinal use.

Each year, the trio spends weeks four-wheel driving in arid and remote parts of Australia where emu bush is thought to be found.

When the men come across something interesting, they record scientific details and collect a cutting for propagation in their own or each other’s gardens.

Between them, Bevan, Ron and Russell have collections of almost every described species of emu bush, and new species awaiting formal description. So far, Bevan has described 16 new species or subspecies.

In this way, their gardens are like living museums of species diversity. They’re a great resource for the inclusion of species in phylogenetic research.

Read more:
The ancient, intimate relationship between trees and fungi, from fairy toadstools to technicolour mushrooms

Don Franklin

In the tablelands of Far North Queensland, retired ecologist Don Franklin spends his time expanding his knowledge of eucalypts.

A colleague put me in touch with Don when I was planning fieldwork to collect eucalypt species for my latest research project. Don was happy to help, assisting me with planning my collection route to ensure I sampled not just every species possible, but all the interesting variants he knows from different regions.

This on the ground experience is invaluable for my work, and impossible to gain from published literature alone.

Don is writing a comprehensive field study for eucalypt species spanning about 80,000 square kilometres. Over the past five years he’s travelled every road in the area, marking species distributions, morphological variants and regions of hybrid zones.

Don was my guide and assistant for a few weeks of field work, and my understanding of this group of plants benefited immeasurably.

Read more:
Get to know blackwood better: a magnificent timber and a tough, towering wattle that can survive landslides

Margaret Brookes

Margaret is a retired horticulturalist. For the past decade she’s volunteered at the National Herbarium of Victoria and the University of Melbourne Herbarium, where she helps curate the collections.

Over this period, Margaret’s work has included mounting thousands of new specimens submitted by researchers like me, and processing the backlog of old collections. Margaret has also transcribed historical field notes for plant collectors in decades and even centuries past.

Margaret’s work makes these plant collections accessible to researchers and the general public all over the world.

Continual advances in genetic sequencing technology mean we can increasingly access DNA from older and older dried specimens. In this way, the work done by Margaret and other herbarium volunteers becomes even more essential in discovering and classifying new species.

Read more:
From Joseph Banks to big data, herbaria bring centuries-old science into the digital age

Combining forces with senior-citizen scientists

As an early career researcher I am bound by two to three year funding contracts. In that short time, samples must be collected and genetically sequenced, then analysed and the results interpreted.

And to come up with plausible hypotheses to understand species’ relationships, my expertise must be broad. I’ve got to be good in the lab, proficient at analysis and across the latest literature.

To produce high-quality work in such tight time frames, I rely on the hidden “grey army” of older people such as those described above.

And while I can only speak from personal experience, I daresay many fields of natural science also benefit from a dedicated older generation quietly contributing to the body of scientific knowledge.

We must recognise the invaluable contributions made by older volunteer researchers. And if we’re to have any chance of better understanding the estimated 70% of Australia’s biodiversity unknown to science, their continued involvement is imperative.

For those interested in volunteering or citizen science projects, try contacting your nearest herbaria. You could also check out the Atlas of Living Australia’s DigiVol volunteer portal or the Australian Citizen Science Association.

Read more:
About 500,000 Australian species are undiscovered – and scientists are on a 25-year mission to finish the job

Rachael Fowler 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. ‘Time is their secret weapon’: the hidden grey army quietly advancing species discovery in Australia – https://theconversation.com/time-is-their-secret-weapon-the-hidden-grey-army-quietly-advancing-species-discovery-in-australia-175189

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Zaphir, Researcher, UQ Critical Thinking Project, The University of Queensland

It’s fairly common to see many claims or arguments end with a curt “do your research”. In some ways, it’s a bold call to action.

“Come on people! Wake up! You’ll see the truth of the matter if only you see it with your own eyes!”

This type of statement is highly evocative and persuasive – in an emotionally manipulative way. Here are four reasons why we should avoid telling others to do research when discussing a topic.

Read more:
How to make good arguments at school (and everywhere else)

1. Burden of proof

There’s a general rule in argumentation: “What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.” What this means is that if we make a claim about the world, we bear the burden of proving that our claim is true. Carl Sagan famously argued this as “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence”.

This is an essential part of public discourse – if we want the public to agree with us, we must accept the burden of proof for demonstrating our ideas.

Say we want to make a claim like:

“The COVID-19 vaccine is poison.”

This is an extraordinary claim. We have a well-established track record of safe vaccines. To begin to take the “poison” claim seriously, we’ll need some serious facts to back it up.

Perhaps there are studies that demonstrate that a vaccine is poisonous or causes significant adverse reactions. But it’s still our job to provide that evidence – no one is required to take us seriously until we do.

Once that evidence is provided, we can evaluate whether that evidence is reliable and whether it relates to the main claim.

Read more:
Feel free to disagree on campus … by learning to do it well

2. Confirmation bias

Our minds don’t always work by being slow, reasonable and deliberate – that would be exhausting. Instead we use what’s called heuristics (mental shortcuts) to enable us to act and behave quickly.

We use heuristics to make choices while driving in traffic, or deciding which way to dodge in a football game, or when to turn down the heat when cooking. There are simply too many tiny decisions to make every day to not have these shortcuts.

A cognitive bias is similar to a heuristic but with an important distinction – it comes with an error embedded in the decision.

A specific type of cognitive bias is a confirmation bias: the tendency to interpret facts and information in a way that supports what we already believe. For example, if we’re distrustful of government, we’re more likely to believe news stories about corruption and fraud on the part of our elected officials.

The problem with confirmation bias is that it leads us to irrationally privilege certain types of information over others. It’s much harder to change our minds when they’re already primed to believe certain things – about vaccines, for example. In our search for information, we’ll look to sources that support claims we already agree with or deny claims we don’t like. If we are already suspicious or fearful of a vaccine and someone says “do your research on the harms of the vaccine”, we’re more likely to cherry-pick individual cases of adverse vaccine effects.

Read more:
First impressions count, and have an impact on the decisions we make later on

3. Poor intellectual virtue

Someone who tells others to do the research is looking for others to come to the same conclusions they’ve already drawn. That’s not discussion or debate. It’s seeking uncritical agreement and social acceptance.

We all seek validation of our perspectives and beliefs, but we need to do more than this. We should welcome sincere engagement and criticism.

Effective democracies require that we engage with each other using intellectual virtues like honesty, open-mindedness and rigorousness. We should aim to be truth-seekers, looking to evaluate evidence and determine credibility in all things.

Read more:
Changing your mind about something as important as vaccination isn’t a sign of weakness – being open to new information is the smart way to make choices

4. Unreasonable expectations

We can’t expect that everyone has the time to thoroughly examine every publication on a given topic. Even if it took only ten minutes to read a scientific article on vaccination safety (which is a huge underestimation for a paper that is thousands of words long), effective research would have us reading at least half a dozen of them to see what experts in the field are saying.

And that’s just reading. It isn’t counting the time to learn various terms and vocabulary in that field, to learn about the disagreements and schools of thought, or to form our own opinion on the quality of that research.

At a minimum, we’d be looking at hours of investigation for someone else’s argument. If the arguer puts forward their evidence, we’d still need to do our research on whether that evidence was accurate – but at least now we’re talking about minutes, not hours.

Becoming better at arguing

One of the most fundamental virtues in listening to each other and improving the quality of our discourse is curiosity. One of the real dangers for our lives is becoming uninterested in other perspectives – or, worse still, becoming uninterested in the truth itself.

We’ll never have a full picture of complex social and scientific problems. Our lives are busy and complex themselves and we simply don’t have the time to properly investigate every topic put before us. If someone wants to be taken seriously, the least they can do is present their argument in full.

We can still meaningfully engage with each other, but we have to be honest about our information and where we got it from.

It’s no good telling others to do our homework for us.

Read more:
Actually, it’s OK to disagree. Here are 5 ways we can argue better

Luke Zaphir is affiliated with the University of Queensland’s Critical Thinking Project

– ref. 4 reasons why you should never say ‘do your research’ to win the argument – https://theconversation.com/4-reasons-why-you-should-never-say-do-your-research-to-win-the-argument-175231

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Senior Lecturer, Canberra School of Politics, Economics and Society and NATSEM, University of Canberra

This financial year the Australian government plans to spend at least A$150 billion on so-called tax expenditures – tax concessions or exemptions applying to particular activities or classes of taxpayer.

And that’s just on the top ten tax categories, covering homes, superannuation, trusts, depreciation, food, education and health.

In 2020-21 the cost of these ten tax breaks totalled $118.6 billion. This suggests revenue lost to tax expenditures has climbed 24% in the past financial year.

Tax expenditures are spending by another means. Although accounted for in the budget as revenue forgone) rather than revenue spent, they have the same effect as revenue spent on their beneficiaries and on the budget.

Here’s a quick quiz:

• Are Family Tax Benefits accounted for in the budget as direct spending or revenue forgone?

• Is the Private Health Insurance Rebate accounted for in the budget as direct spending or revenue forgone?

The answer is it makes no difference. Both of these examples have been classified one way, and then the other. The effect for beneficiaries and the budget is the same.

Optics, however, do make a difference to which accounting measures governments prefer.

Spending attracts attention

Measures on the books labelled as “spending” attract attention. The government’s expenditure review committee tries to keep spending down. Measures labelled “concessions” get less attention, and are seen as a way to keep tax down.

So measures with similar purposes get treated differently. Spending on age pensions gets scrutinised, for example, while superannuation tax concessions become part of the landscape.

If you want government support for your cause or your type of people with minimal attention, therefore, you should get that support classified as a “concession” rather than “spending”.

Tax breaks ‘disguise’ expenditure

The term “tax expenditure” was introduced to Australia by the 1973 report of the review of expenditure policies established by the Whitlam government in 1972.

The review, led by former Reserve Bank of Australia governor H.C. Coombs, had been asked to examine spending but also looked at 48 “disguised” tax expenditures.

Since 1980, major tax expenditures have been included in budget papers. Since 1986, at the behest of then treasurer Paul Keating, the federal treasury has prepared an annual tax expenditures statement.

Read more:
Boosting super will cost the budget more than it saves on age pensions

In 1996 then treasurer Peter Costello made the statement a formal requirement in the Charter of Budget Honesty.

Benefits for the better-off

This year (as with most years) the biggest tax expenditures are:

• exemptions from capital gains tax for private homeowners ($64 billion)

• tax concessions on superannuation fund earnings ($22.6 billion)

• tax concessions on superannuation contributions ($20.5 billion)

• the treatment of only half of each capital gain as taxable ($11.7 billion)

Soaring home prices have pushed up the cost of the homeowner tax concessions 28%, while the stronger share market has pushed up the cost of the concession on superannuation fund earnings 15%.

At least in these two big instances, the biggest tax expenditures go to the most well-off Australians. This isn’t universally the case – the exemption of fresh food from the goods and services tax, for example, disproportionately benefits Australians on low incomes – but generally the more of a tax someone would be liable for, the greater their gain from any concession.

‘Revenue forgone’ versus ‘revenue gain’

The cost of tax concessions has traditionally been described in terms of revenue forgone. But critics make the point this isn’t equal to the revenue that would be gained if the concessions were removed.

It might be (for instance) that people would put their money elsewhere if they knew the capital gains on their homes would be taxed the same way as other assets. It might be that they would put less into superannuation if they knew the returns would be taxed at standard rates.

Partly to reflect these concerns, the name of the “tax expenditures statement” was changed to “tax benchmarks and variations statment” in 2018.

The federal treasury has begun preparing what it calls “revenue gain” estimates alongside “revenue forgone” estimates – an acknowledgement that less will be gained by removing tax breaks than appears to be lost by putting them in place.

For example, the GST exemption for fresh food is said to cost $8.4 billion in forgone revenue, but the treasury estimates only $8 billion would be gained if exemption was removed because some people would switch to prepared food.

Probably the most striking thing about the treasury’s revenue gain estimates is how little they differ from the revenue forgone estimates.

Read more:
Boosting super will cost the budget more than it saves on age pensions

The concessions for superannuation fund earnings, for example, are said to cost $20.5 billion, and the gain from abolishing a similar $19.6 billion. This reflects both the compulsory nature of superannuation and a belief that most Australians who save for retirement will continue to do it, if not through super then through another mechanism that attracts tax.

Tax expenditures tell us a lot about the size of government commitments and what they cost. The Coombs review wanted each limited to three years and then replaced with direct spending that achieved the same effect.

We’ve yet to get a treasurer prepared to embrace that reform.

John Hawkins was formerly a Treasury officer and served as secretary to the Senate Economics Committee.

– ref. How to camouflage $150 billion in government spending? Call it ‘tax expenditure’ – https://theconversation.com/how-to-camouflage-150-billion-in-government-spending-call-it-tax-expenditure-176236

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Golding, Associate professor, Swinburne University of Technology

John Williams, the man who changed the way we hear the movies, turns 90 today.

As the key Hollywood composer during the blockbuster era of the 1970s and 1980s, Williams had an astronomical career alongside the likes of filmmakers Steven Spielberg and George Lucas.

With his music for their movies, Williams revived the romantic orchestral sound of Hollywood’s Golden Age – the sound pioneered by composers Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Max Steiner at the dawn of the talkies – and reinvented it for a new era.

“John Williams has been the single most significant contributor to my success as a filmmaker,” said Spielberg in 2012.

On the numbers alone, Williams has had a career like no other. If you were going to the movies between 1970 and 1990, every second year would have had a number one box office hit with music by Williams.

This prolific era saw Williams write music for Jaws, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman and E.T. The Extra Terrestrial – an abundant run by any standard.

Read more:
45 years on, the ‘Jaws’ theme manipulates our emotions to inspire terror

Williams today holds 52 Academy Award nominations (and five wins), the most nominations of any living human and second in history only to Walt Disney. Williams can add to that 72 Grammy Award nominations (and 25 wins), 16 BAFTA nominations (seven wins) and six Emmy nominations (three wins).

He has written music for the Olympics (in 1984, 1988, 1996 and the 2002 Winter Olympics), for a Presidential inauguration (for Barack Obama in 2009) and for the nightly news (NBC – also used by Channel Seven in Australia).

When adjusted for inflation, one-fifth of the top 100 films at the North American box office have music by Williams.

The sound of the silver screen

By re-energising the sound of the Hollywood orchestra in the 1970s, Williams linked history with the present. The films he is most associated with from this era – things like Star Wars and Indiana Jones – are deliberate throwbacks to an older form of storytelling.

Outside the multiplex in the 1970s, the public worried about Watergate, Vietnam and the threat of Cold War nuclear war. Inside cinemas however, with the music of Williams, was a moment of escape and excitement.

Then there are those melodies. By now, reading this article, it’s likely you’ve already hummed some John Williams to yourself or are suffering an earworm. Between his major hits of the blockbuster era and his later work like the Home Alone and Harry Potter franchises, Williams has written some of the most widely-recognisable melodies on earth.

This is no coincidence: despite the orchestral complexity of his music, Williams admits he often spends the most time devising his melodies and perfecting them, lifting a note here, lowering another there.

For the five note alien “hello” in Close Encounters Williams formulated hundreds of variations before settling on the one heard in the final film.

For several of his themes – The Imperial March from The Empire Strikes Back, or Superman’s theme, for example – it feels less like Williams composed them as he simply reached into our collective consciousness and redeployed what was already there.

The art of homage

For much of the period of his success, Williams has been looked down upon by some in the classical establishment as writing simple popular ditties, or worse, as a rampant plagiarist of the classical canon.

It is no secret Williams’ music takes influence from the greats, like Stravinsky, Holst and Dvořák. Sometimes, the influence becomes direct allusion, as with Howard Hanson’s Romantic Symphony and the conclusion of E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial.

But these “gotcha” comparisons are superficial, dull, and miss the point.

“Any fool can see that,” Brahms is meant to have said when asked about the similarities between his second symphony and Beethoven.

Williams was writing music for films that were also deliberate throwbacks. One might as well complain about how Star Wars borrows Flash Gordon’s opening crawl, or the plot of Kurosawa’s Hidden Fortress or that scene from John Ford’s The Searchers with the burning homestead.

This is how the most popular culture of the 20th century gained its meaning: through evocation, reworking and memory.

In looking to the music of the past, Williams was not having a lend of us. He was asking us to think more deeply about what we were seeing and hearing.

Read more:
How one man changed the landscape of film music

The celebrity composer

Today, these complaints have little momentum. Go to any symphony orchestra and you will find at least a few players who picked up their instruments for the first time in order to puzzle out a tune from Star Wars or Indiana Jones.

When Williams made his conducting debut with the famed Vienna Philharmonic in 2019, the musicians asked him for autographs like a celebrity at a sports game.

The classical establishment can now count cellist Yo-Yo Ma, conductor Gustavo Dudamel and violinists Anne-Sophie Mutter and Itzhak Perlman as among the biggest of Williams’ admirers – a who’s who of the elite.

At 90, John Williams is not just one of our most acclaimed living composers. With the power of the movies, and their unparalleled reach, it’s likely Williams is also now one of the most-heard composers to have ever lived.

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

– ref. From Jaws to Star Wars to Harry Potter: John Williams, 90 today, is our greatest living composer – https://theconversation.com/from-jaws-to-star-wars-to-harry-potter-john-williams-90-today-is-our-greatest-living-composer-176245

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

Scott Morrison has announced Australia’s international border will finally open on February 21 and is deploying up to 1700 Australian Defence Force personnel to help with the aged care crisis, as he prepares for a torrid parliamentary sitting.

Nearly two years after the border was shut, tourists and other visa holders will now be able to come to Australia.

They will need to be double vaxxed – but not triple vaxxed, as is being recommended for Australians locally. Anyone not fully vaccinated will need a valid travel exemption, and will have to meet state and territory quarantine requirements.

The restrictions have been recently lifted for some entrants to Australia, including students, but the tourist industry has continued to suffer from visitors not being allowed to come.

The deployment of defence personnel into aged care will include clinical support teams, and general support help as well as logistical and planning assistance.

Four quick response teams, consisting of nurses and general support staff, will be deployed this week. This will expand to ten teams from next week.

Defence is preparing specialist teams of 50 personnel in the four states under greatest pressure – Queensland, NSW, Victoria and South Australia. It will expand this up to 200 people in each state and territory, or up to 1700 personnel, if needed.

Over the weekend, ADF personnel undertook training for the deployment and joined civilian staff in aged care facilities.

Some of the work they will do includes screening people coming into facilities, providing companionship to residents, helping with meals, and other duties to take pressure off qualified aged care workers and medical staff. They will assist with medical duties where they are qualified.

Morrison, who has repeatedly said the ADF is not a shadow aged care workforce, stressed that this was “a very targeted bespoke effort”. He pointed out that aged care was an industry where there were 285,000 workers.

The sector is being hit with acute staff shortages as workers are off duty because they have COVID or are furloughed because they are close contacts. The result has been diminished care for many residents. In some facilities, residents have been in effective lockdown because of COVID outbreaks, unable to see their families.

The announcements came ahead of parliament’s resumption on Tuesday, when the government will be under attack over a range of issues including the aged care crisis and leaked text messages attacking the prime minister’s character.

The government is also struggling with internal division over its religious discrimination legislation, which it had hoped to have passed this week. The legislation is due to be debated in the House of Representatives on Tuesday.

A number of moderate Liberals are critical of the legislation. Bridget Archer, who holds the highly marginal seat of Bass in Tasmania, on Monday threatened to cross the floor.

“I’m not sure that there’s any way to bridge the divide between the
bill as it currently looks like and my concerns.”

“So as it is I’m not sure how I can support it”, Archer told the ABC.

Archer said she was concerned about the legislation overriding
Tasmanian anti-discrimination laws.

As he tries to placate moderate critics, Morrison has promised separate legislation that would ban schools from expelling students on the basis of their sexuality.

Morrison told a news conference on Monday that the religious discrimination legislation was “an important bill”.

He said Labor had put measures into the sex discrimination act that meant children could be expelled because of their sexuality. He was proposing to put forward an amendment to this.

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

– ref. Australia opens border on February 21, beckoning tourists – https://theconversation.com/australia-opens-border-on-february-21-beckoning-tourists-176571

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

Critics say Anthony Albanese is still an unknown quantity, but in this podcast the opposition leader insists he already has a “legacy” and connections with communities around the country.

“I have a relationship going back [from his time in government] to communities right around Australia during that period and relationships with the business community and with people in electorates from east to west and north to south”.

He says in his almost three years as opposition leader “the government hasn’t been able to attack any of my legacy”, which says “a lot about the achievements and how effective I was as a minister”.

As for the 2019 defeat, Albanese says Labor had a lot of policies but lacked “a narrative”.

This time, Labor has a story to tell. “We want a stronger Australia coming back” based upon three subthemes. These are “future made in Australia”, “rising living standards”, and “more secure work”.

Asked to give an assurance that the overall level of taxation would not be higher under a Labor government than at present, Albanese says: “We’re not planning anything in that direction at all. And we’ve made that very clear. The truth is, that our record as the former Labor government – taxes were lower than they are today under this government”.

Michelle Grattan 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. Politics with Michelle Grattan: Anthony Albanese on his ‘legacy’ – so far – https://theconversation.com/politics-with-michelle-grattan-anthony-albanese-on-his-legacy-so-far-176573

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

One of the many challenges over the course of the past two years has been in understanding the importance of the different routes of transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID. Understanding the role of the different infection pathways plays a vital role in prioritising what we should be doing to prevent disease.

The World Health Organization advises COVID transmission mainly occurs during close personal contact and via aerosols in poorly ventilated or crowded spaces. But the WHO also acknowledges people can become infected by touching their eyes, nose or mouth after coming into contact with contaminated objects or surfaces.

Over time we’ve seen a reduced emphasis on preventing surface transmission and a greater focus on preventing person-to-person and aerosol transmission. This focus reflects how our understanding of transmission pathways has improved but it is still important to understand as much as we can about surface transmission.

New Japanese research – published online and not yet reviewed by expert peers – examines how long the SARS-CoV-2 virus survives on skin and plastic. It investigates differences in survivability between the original Wuhan strain of the virus and subsequent variants – Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Omicron. The study claims to be the first to include Omicron in such side-by-side comparisons.

The researchers report SARS-COV-2 variants are able to survive on skin and plastic more than twice as long as the original Wuhan strain. Of particular interest, the Omicron variant was found to survive on plastic for 193.5 hours and on skin for 21.1 hours. What’s inferred is that this longer survival on these surfaces contributes to Omicron’s increased infectivity, because there’s more likelihood of picking up viable virus from surfaces. But is that really likely?

The study has yielded interesting results, but has limitations that mean understanding the significance of these findings to the real world is difficult.

How much virus?

The most important limitation of the study, and one that is shared with similar survivability studies published earlier in the pandemic, is generalising survival times in the laboratory to survival times in the real world. The main reason for this is the lack of a clear rationale for the decision on the amount of virus added to the surfaces tested.

This is important because the ability to detect viable virus on a surface over time is hugely influenced by the amount of virus seeded on the surface in the first place. Theoretically – and not to suggest the researchers in this study did this – you could contrive any survival time in the laboratory if you deposit enough virus at the outset.

How the amount of virus used in this study relates to how much virus might be deposited on a real world surface by an infected person is not clear from the preprint article.

Read more:
COVID will soon be endemic. This doesn’t mean it’s harmless or we give up, just that it’s part of life

The laboratory versus the real world

It’s also worth noting the study was completed under highly controlled laboratory conditions. It is reasonable to speculate real world conditions would be harsher and more changeable – in terms of temperature and humidity – which may reduce virus survival times considerably.

On the plus side, researchers used the same set of conditions when assessing all variants so comparisons of survival times are likely to be a good indicator of relative environmental stability. Therefore the increased survival time of the Omicron variant compared to other variants is likely to indicate mutations that make it more resilient. This could contribute to its increased infectiousness – but the extent of any increase in the amount of surface transmission, the relative contribution of surface transmission to Omicron infections, and what causes this enhanced environmental stability are key questions that were beyond the scope of the study.

Read more:
Catching COVID from surfaces is very unlikely. So perhaps we can ease up on the disinfecting

A secondary finding of the study suggests that in vitro (in other words, in test tubes or culture dishes) the Omicron variant was slightly more resistant to the disinfectant properties of ethanol than the Wuhan strain. But an evaluation on human skin in the laboratory demonstrated that a 15 second exposure to 35% alcohol was equally effective at inactivating the virus, regardless of the strain.

So the good news is that all of the variants seemed equally vulnerable to alcohol-based disinfectants when used on skin.

In terms of which findings from this study are of public health significance, confirmation of the effectiveness of disinfectants may be the most important. At times criticised as “hygiene theatre”, disinfecting retains an important role in infection control practices.

Let’s be clear. These results don’t prove that we’re at increased risk of picking up the Omicron variant from surfaces. But what it does do is confirm that wiping down surfaces and hand sanitising with disinfectants are effective methods of killing any live virus that may be lurking there.

Hassan Vally 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. Fresh research says Omicron lasts much longer on surfaces than other variants – but disinfecting still works – https://theconversation.com/fresh-research-says-omicron-lasts-much-longer-on-surfaces-than-other-variants-but-disinfecting-still-works-176156

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sukhmani Khorana, Senior Research Fellow, Western Sydney University

An anthology film usually makes us think of romantic comedies released over Christmas that showcase a global city through interconnected plot lines, or a series of vignette-like character studies by critically-acclaimed directors.

Produced by Western Sydney-based company Co-Curious and Emerald Productions, Here Out West doesn’t follow the traditional anthology film formula, and it doesn’t showcase the glamorous post codes of Sydney, or assemble the works of big name creatives and cast. Nonetheless Here out West, a film that intertwines eight distinct interconnected scenarios set in Western Sydney, is as globally-oriented and locally-inspired as Australian cinema gets.

That is because Western Sydney is one of the the most culturally diverse regions of the nation. The sheer diversity of languages, foods, religious practices and creative traditions of its residents has historically not been enough to change the perception of the region as deprived of cultural capital.

The writing and producing team of Here Out West set out to shift that perception by re-conceptualising what it means to tell contemporary Australian tales to a broad audience while staying true to the suburbs and communities they grew up in.

Consisting of stories from the Vietnamese, Filipino, Indian, Bangladeshi, Lebanese, Iraqi, Chinese, Turkish and Chilean migrants who call Western Sydney home, the film while imperfect in that some stories are stronger than others, is a nuanced examination of race and class.

Exploring Western Sydney through film

Beginning with the story of a newborn kidnapped from a public hospital, we move through many other everyday locations associated with living in the west, including a soccer field, a parking lot, an apartment block, a recently arrived refugee family’s house, rides in buses as well as cars, a Chinese restaurant where the owner insists on wearing traditional garb, and the site of a new housing development with house and land packages on offer.

These settings are as diverse as the people who live, work and move through them. At the same time, the film attempts to bring them together through the themes of kinship – with one’s own biological family and with the community of those many familiar and imagined others who feel a similar sense of pride in being a “Westie”.

One of the most poignant stories from the film is that of intercultural friendship between three young men, written by Arka Das. As one witnesses them chasing each other around run-down apartment blocks and under motorways, every stereotype of racialised masculinity surfaces.

The audience is led to believe that they will shortly be irrationally violent with one another, or that the chase involves illicit substances – but instead it turns out there is a comedy of errors entailing romantic interest, family and forgiveness.

An LGA of concern

Premiering at the Sydney Film Festival in October 2021, the film surprised everyone (including its 8 young writers and 5 female Australian directors) by being picked as the opening night film. After all, Western Sydney was home to a lot of the areas branded COVID “LGAs of concern” by that stage, making it feel even more remote and dangerous to visit by the rest of the city.

The disproportionate impact of the Delta outbreak led a number of writers and journalists with connections to the west to start raising their concerns. They were vocal about how Western Sydney was represented in the media, treated by the NSW government with harsher restrictions during lockdown, and the resilience and civic practices of many of its communities.

In a similar way, the writers and directors of Here out West are writing back to misrepresentations and negative perceptions of Western Sydney with this film. In an interview following its theatrical release, two of the writers, Vonne Patiag and Bina Bhattacharya talked about how there is a burgeoning artistic community in Western Sydney and it is finally getting some recognition through the film. Patiag noted, “the local aspect is key to storytelling by people of colour”.

The new second generation

This narrative of taking things in their own hands, with a little help from the right mentors and funding agencies is not an isolated incident.

In Australia and in comparable immigrant countries, there is a growing population of young, second-generation migrants who have grown up with YouTube and Netflix. For these young people, watching year after year of national commercial television where they don’t see themselves reflected is no longer enough.

In the era of globally-accessible digital media, many creative practitioners from these communities are bypassing mainstream executives and institutions to find ways to create and showcase their own content, mostly on their own terms. Referred to as “the new second generation” in the US, they are claiming their agency and right to be represented as legitimate national subjects in TV and film.

They are resorting to self-representation and advocacy after having been let down by practices and mindsets that persist in creative arts and media industries. These include typecasting actors from ethnic backgrounds in roles that stereotype their communities, or only funding a certain number of “diverse” projects per cycle to tick a box.

Stories that centre marginalised subjects, however, still need to reach wide audiences to shift perceptions and policies. What remains to be seen is whether Here out West will also be part of a broader tide of change that includes these communities in future decision-making – in the arts and beyond it – instead of merely consulting with them when convenient.

Sukhmani Khorana received funding from the Australian Research Council Linkage Grant, ‘Migration, Cultural Diversity and Television: Reflecting Modern Australia’ (2016-2020).
Sukhmani Khorana has also worked on a community engagement project (2018-2019) with CuriousWorks, which is a sister company of Co-Curious.

– ref. Here Out West: a film that centres Western Sydney through tales of marginality – https://theconversation.com/here-out-west-a-film-that-centres-western-sydney-through-tales-of-marginality-176449

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rick Sarre, Emeritus Professor of Law and Criminal Justice, University of South Australia

Last night, Channel Nine’s 60 Minutes program revisited the harrowing tale of the abduction of four-year-old Cleo Smith from a campsite near the Western Australian town of Carnarvon last October.

As the program unfolded, Cleo’s parents, Ellie Smith and Jake Giddon, revealed the horrific details of their 18-day ordeal. They will reportedly receive $2 million in return for the interview.

A Carnarvon man, Terence Kelly, has pleaded guilty to the abduction. He remains in custody until his next court appearance in March. He faces a maximum prison term of 20 years when he’s sentenced in the coming months. The case still has a long way to run.

The decision by Nine to broadcast such an interview so far ahead of the completion of the judicial process was a risky one. There was no pressing need to run this story now.

In fact, the WA police involved in solving the case said they would not take part in the broadcast, with the West Australian quoting unnamed police sources as saying it is

highly inappropriate for any episode to be airing prior to completion of the judicial process.

It is not inconceivable the WA District Court might consider 60 Minutes in contempt. Let’s examine this possibility.

What is contempt of court and sub judice contempt?

Contempt of court (a common law criminal offence) can arise if any words or actions are deemed to interfere with the administration of justice or constitute a disregard for the authority of the court.

There are a number of ways in which contempt of court can occur, such as by breaching a suppression order, revealing jury deliberations or making comments that damage public confidence in the capacity of the judiciary or the courts to dispense justice (referred to as “scandalising” contempt). A conviction for contempt typically attracts a fine or imprisonment.

But the potential contempt in this case is what is often referred to as sub judice contempt.

Sub judice (“under a judge”) contempt relates to any public discussion of a court process while it is still running that may prejudice the decision-making ability of a jury or, in the Cleo Smith case, a judge’s consideration of sentence.

There need only be evidence the content – whether it be a media article or broadcast, a social media post or some other public discussion – had a tendency to affect the outcome. Actual proof is not required.

Read more:
In Australia, criticising a judge can land you in jail. This is a danger for democracy

Have the media been fined before?

There have been some high-profile examples of sub judice contempt in Australia in recent years.

In 1987, former NSW Premier Neville Wran declared his belief in the innocence of the then High Court judge Lionel Murphy, who had been convicted of perverting the course of justice.

The trial judge had warned against anyone discussing the case publicly pending an appeal. Wran was fined $25,000, while the Daily Telegraph was fined $200,000 for publishing his comments.

Read more:
The Lionel Murphy papers shed more light on a controversial life

More recently, in 2016, Krystal Johnson, a journalist for Yahoo7, wrote an article four days into a murder trial which said the accused had previously displayed a violent propensity towards the victim. The trial had to be aborted. Yahoo7 was fined $300,000 for sub judice contempt and Johnson was given a two-year good behaviour bond.

There is an interesting paradox here. Judges pride themselves on their ability to consider only the evidence before them (in relation to matters of guilt and innocence) and only the submissions made to them (on sentencing decisions), and not to be swayed by external voices such as opinions aired in the media.

Yet, the law of contempt is implicitly saying judges, too, can be influenced by peripheral information and need to be protected from it.

It should also be noted the First Amendment of the US Constitution allows fully open reporting of a trial even while it is in progress, including interviews with counsel, the families of the accused and the victims.

Even though public airing of US juror revelations is somewhat constrained by an accused’s Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury, the contrast with the Australian legal “contempt” landscape could not be more stark.

Did the 60 Minutes interview cross the line?

I should say from the outset even speculating on this question in an article could be deemed to have a tendency to influence the outcome of judicial processes in the Cleo Smith case.

So, speaking generally, it could be argued the mere revisiting of the details of the case in the 60 Minutes interview had the effect of unduly maligning the character of the perpetrator.

Although the bulk of the program was focused on the way Cleo and her parents had been affected by the ordeal and how they planned to move forward from it, her parents did speak of their “anger” and “disgust” of Kelly’s actions.

Read more:
When missing children return: how can we avoid adding to Cleo Smith’s trauma?

Even if the interview is deemed not to have the potential to sway the judge’s sentencing order, it could be seen as whipping up public reproach for the accused. And if the public then views the judge’s sentence as too lenient, their comments could be deemed to be bringing the administration of justice into disrepute and “scandalising” the court.

Social media posts related to the interview that cast aspersions on Kelly could also be seen as sub judice contempt. The law requires Nine to delete any adverse comments posted on its Facebook or Twitter pages to avoid a contempt charge.

However, trying to control the words of thousands of social media commentators on other platforms with a blunt sub judice tool would be an almost impossible task.

Parliaments around Australia are currently facing growing calls to overhaul their contempt of court laws, with many advocates arguing the status quo does not meet public expectations when it comes to reporting the courts.

Given we are living in a social media age where public scorn is not uncommon, these cases are likely to be repeated. It is high time reform of our contempt laws appears on every legislative notice paper.

Rick Sarre is affiliated with the SA Council for Civil Liberties and the SA Labor Party.

– ref. Cleo Smith interview: does Channel Nine run the risk of being in contempt of court? – https://theconversation.com/cleo-smith-interview-does-channel-nine-run-the-risk-of-being-in-contempt-of-court-176459

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Philippa Burne, Lecturer, BFA Screenwriting, Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne, The University of Melbourne

Could the screen door really have slammed shut for the last time on Ramsay Street?

Channel 5, who took over from the BBC in broadcasting the show in the UK in 2008, has chosen not to renew their contract with Fremantle, the Australian producers of the show, and will screen their final episode in August 2022.

If Fremantle cannot find another UK buyer the show will cease production.

Channel 10 continues its commitment to screen the show in Australia (albeit having moved it a few years ago from the main channel to Ten Peach), but the budget for making the show (while tiny in TV terms) relies on the UK sale.

In Australia, Neighbours receives about 200,000 viewers per day – about half the viewers of Home and Away. Its popularity is more assured in the UK, with about 1.5 million views per day, although this is still less than UK soaps such as Coronation Street and Eastenders, with around 5 and 3 million viewers, respectively.

Purportedly Channel 5 is choosing to put the money into locally produced UK drama. We can only guess what is going on behind the scenes. I was working for Fremantle in Europe in 2007 when Neighbours moved from the BBC to Channel 5 and there were machinations at work in that decision beyond budgets and viewing figures (and beyond my full knowledge).

Television is a big complex business most of us will never understand.

Growing up on Ramsey Street

While many will say “good riddance” and “about time” if Neighbours does end after 37 years and nearly 9,000 episodes, there has to be some reason it has survived this long and remains so beloved for so many people.

There will be deep grief in the UK audience if the show does end, and significant repercussions for the Australian screen industry.

This is the show that launched the beloved Kylie Minogue and featured guest appearances by British icons from Emma Bunton to Michael Parkinson and Russell Brand, Matt Lucas and David Walliams. British celebrities have been honoured to walk onto the wobbly sets of Neighbours and into the cul-de-sac of Ramsay Street.

Many viewers have literally grown up with the people of Erinsborough. Karl and Susan, Toadie and relentless manipulator Paul Robinson are like family members to them. I met someone at a party once who burst into tears and screamed Madge Bishop was like a grandmother to her when she discovered I was involved in scripting Madge’s death.

When you have watched characters go through their relatable trials and tribulations daily for most of your life, they matter to you.

Complex, far-fetched, and beloved

One of the favourite moments I was involved in scripting was the return of Paul Robinson to Ramsay Street in 2004.

For the end of year cliffhanger episode, we wrote a fire which devastated the Lassiters complex and in the final shot the smoke cleared to reveal Paul standing watching.

In the story room, we were filled with glee by such a huge moment – but it was nothing compared to the audience reaction. This was the return of a character who had debuted on the show in episode one in 1985 and was bringing his evil ways back to Erinsborough.

Literally two weeks ago, one of my VCA Screenwriting students told me, as a young child in the UK, he remembers his mother watching that episode and screaming: “Paul! It’s PAUL.”

Recently, the show has made a real strength of bringing back characters beloved by audiences and continuing their stories and their lives, much to the joy of devoted audience members.

Neighbours has created a whole world: complex (Dee Bliss returning from the dead, except it was actually her separated-at-birth twin Andrea); far-fetched (Harold drifting off rocks and returning four years later with amnesia); and just plain silly (Susan slipping on milk and reverting to thinking she was 17 again).

And then there was the pinnacle moment of madness, in which a dog dreamt of marrying the dog next door.

Indeed this world has, at times, been so complex, as writers we turned to the fan website The Perfect Blend as the show’s bible when we couldn’t remember all the many cousins and aunts and loves of so many characters.

Neighbours University

In Australia, while less beloved by audiences, Neighbours is hugely respected in the screen industry.

Neighbours achieved longevity in a changing and cut-throat world of free to air broadcast and has given a start, training and long term employment to many writers, directors, producers, actors and crew over 37 years.

Read more:
After 30 years, can Neighbours and Australians become good friends?

Fremantle actively embraces this industry development as a role of the show, and screenwriters often call it Neighbours University – yes, the show looks clunky on screen, but that’s due to the small budgets and high speed production, not the dedication and skill of those making the show.

They say you have to do 10,000 hours to become an expert in anything, and I easily clocked those hours storylining, script editing and writing for Neighbours. (Plus it was the most secure income I’ve ever had as a screenwriter.)

The loss of this training ground will have a major – if largely unrecognised – impact on the screen industry in the next decades in terms of a place to learn craft, find a creative voice and for peers to meet.

If Neighbours does end it will leave a major hole. It’s been an important cultural icon – easy to criticise, hard to ignore.

Philippa Burne worked for Fremantle as a screenwriter on and off between 2000 and 2017. She continues to receive royalties from episodes written for Neighbours. In her current role as lecturer at VCA, she occasionally has students who intern on Neighbours.

– ref. I easily clocked 10,000 hours working on Neighbours. Its loss will leave a huge hole in Australian TV – and UK hearts – https://theconversation.com/i-easily-clocked-10-000-hours-working-on-neighbours-its-loss-will-leave-a-huge-hole-in-australian-tv-and-uk-hearts-176529

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Bradley, Professor Emeritus (Psychology), Charles Sturt University

Was Charles Darwin a one-hit wonder? According to scientists who take a gene’s-eye view of evolution, the 19th-century English naturalist contributed one crucial idea to understanding how species change: natural selection, or “design without a designer”.

However, a book of Darwin’s that is little read by modern evolutionists – The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals – turns out to contain valuable lessons for scientists seeking to understand how and why humans do what we do.

Published 150 years ago, the book has long bemused scientific readers because it hardly mentions natural selection. Instead, it puts how organisms behave at the heart of evolutionary adaptation – an idea that is becoming commonplace in 21st-century biology.

Read more:
Curious Kids: how do scientists know evolution is real?

Putting agency into evolution

Since the 1940s, evolutionists have viewed natural selection as an aimless mechanism: random genetic variations arise, and chance environmental events allow the most beneficial (or “fittest”) ones to survive.

More recently, biologists have found it necessary to introduce the actual behaviour of living creatures into this picture. From this perspective, organisms adapt to their circumstances, and genetics then stabilises the changes.

As I show in my book Darwin’s Psychology, or Darwin, the agency of organisms – their ability to do things – was the key, whether in driving the struggle for existence, or in explaining the antics of climbing plants, babies and earthworms.

This was because actions produce reactions: what a creature does has consequences for itself and its surroundings.

Those consequences shape its own subsequent actions, and how its descendants eventually evolve.

Read more:
Social plants: in the wild, staghorn ferns grow in colonies to improve water storage for all members

Some consequences prove injurious or fatal. Others enhance the doer’s life, even if it is in ways that are not immediately obvious, such as forest trees and honeybees who render “mutual aid” to other members of their own species.

Darwin took this view of agency and applied it to what he called the most social of social species, ourselves.

Expressions and meaning

He analysed in great detail more than 70 different components and types of facial expressions plus other non-facial gestures.

Darwin concluded the movements we call expressions, such as smiling and crying, did not evolve to communicate. For Darwin, smiles and tears do not arrive at the body’s surface already steeped in emotional meanings brewed in the hidden recesses of the expresser’s mind. They are accidental side-effects of other “habits”, or of the ways the nervous system works.

“Expressions” only become meaningful when others read them as such, so the meaning of any so-called “emotional expression” depends on context and other people.

Viewed this way, Darwin’s book argues an expression could only ever have evolved or “become instinctive” if the ability to recognise it had also evolved and “likewise become instinctive”. And if recognising expressions is instinctive, Darwin reasoned, humans should be born able to understand gestures and facial displays.

Child’s play

To find out whether this was the case, Darwin carefully studied the social behaviour of his firstborn child, Doddy. He observed Doddy understood, “at a very early period, the meaning or feelings” of those who took care of him, “by the expression of their features”.

Darwin tells us he aimed many “odd noises and strange grimaces” at his four-month-old son. These did not scare Doddy, however, being “taken as good jokes”, because they were “preceded or accompanied by smiles” – the smiles proving legible to Doddy as making humorous his father’s otherwise-fearsome growling and gurning.

These observations pre-empted by more than a century modern psychology’s discovery babies have an inbuilt capacity for sympathetic mind-reading and mental sharing.

Universal emotions?

Darwin made clear his book presented a theory of expression rather than a theory of emotion. While he painstakingly pioneered a modern physiological way of studying the human movements it discusses, he found the meanings of such movements – whether emotional or not – to be inescapably social.

Modern psychologists argue over a split between supposedly “basic”, “biological” or “universal” emotions such as anger, which are held to be directly linked to one’s physical state, and “social” emotions such as envy, which are supposed to result from our readings of others.

Darwin’s work sidesteps this controversy, arguing only the observable patterns of facial action we call “expressions” can ever be universal. Whatever meanings are attributed to those actions must derive from the social relationships they reflect.

Reading faces

In Darwin’s time, the traditional way of studying emotions was to ask people about why they were smiling or what they were angry about. However, Darwin’s research went the opposite way: he asked people about how they understood the expressions of others.

He asked expatriate Europeans living on six continents to fill in a survey about the forms of expressive movement they had seen in diverse indigenous peoples “who have associated but little with Europeans”.

He also asked 20 or so well-educated members of his circle to judge what meanings they saw in photographs of 11 facial displays neurologist Guillaume Duchenne had produced by attaching electrodes to muscles in the faces of volunteers so as to simulate different emotional expressions.

Darwin held that only photographs which judges agreed about could be called “genuine” expressions. Pictures of terror, sorrow or laughter produced unanimous responses. Other photos, including Duchenne’s portrait of hatred, proved indecipherable.

Blushing

The masterstroke of The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals comes in its longest chapter, on blushing. Blushes, Darwin shows, result from the rebounding of our faculty for reading others: it is “the thinking what others think of us which excites a blush”.

Thus blushers will blush when they imagine someone blames them for something, even when they are innocent. This conclusion, that one’s reading of others’ attitudes shapes how one acts, underpins the treatments of conscience and morality, sexual coquetry and culture which fill Darwin’s earlier book The Descent of Man (1871).

It also inspired social theorist George Herbert Mead’s invention of what sociologists now call “symbolic interactionism” – the view that all human actions are shaped by what they signify in the groups where they occur.

Read alongside The Descent of Man, of which it was at first intended to form part, The Expression of the Emotions proves that Darwin’s vision of nature as a theatre of agency did more than anticipate biology’s newest theory of adaptation. That same vision laid the groundwork for an idea of psychology based in evolution, where all human meaning has a social origin.

Read more:
Guide to the classics: Darwin’s The Descent of Man 150 years on — sex, race and our ‘lowly’ ape ancestry

Ben Bradley 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. 150 years ago, Charles Darwin wrote about how expressions evolved – pre-empting modern psychology by a century – https://theconversation.com/150-years-ago-charles-darwin-wrote-about-how-expressions-evolved-pre-empting-modern-psychology-by-a-century-170880

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kelly Menzel, Assistant Professor – First Nations Health, Bond University

Over the past few weeks we have seen First Nations people protesting alongside alt-right “freedom” protesters at Old Parliament House in Canberra.

With this we saw a classic example of the alt-right trying to recruit disaffected marginalised people for their own ends.

This is not only dangerous given what we know about the history of First Nations peoples’ interactions with police, it also perpetuates a stereotype of First Nations people that we are dysfunctional, disunited and do not know what we want.

Read more:
A short history of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy – an indelible reminder of unceded sovereignty

White supremacy and the Aboriginal Tent Embassy

The Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra was established in 1972. The Embassy is a permanent, heritage-listed protest site representing the political rights of the Indigenous Peoples of Australia. It is the longest living Indigenous protest site in the world.

However, in recent months a clash of extremist white protesters alongside some Indigenous people, attempted a hostile invasion of the site in a bid to co-opt the Embassy’s cause. The group that descended the area included key white supremacist figures, including members of the Proud Boys.

These alt-right, extremist invaders are aligned with the global Sovereign Citizens (SovCits) movement, whose roots are racist and antisemitic. Sovereign Citizens are anti-government and believe they are sovereign from the laws of the country where they live.

These extremists misappropriated the long-term struggle of First Nations people, and created chaos and division.

It seems these groups find ways to recruit others by tapping into the distrust of authority. They potentially exploited this to recruit Indigenous people to an alt-right cause.

The presence of Indigenous people in these protests further perpetuates the narrative we are dysfunctional peoples who cannot agree – a stereotype white people as a collective do not have to worry about.

Indigenous people being perceived as dysfunctional springs from white deficit narratives about Indigenous communities. This deficit discourse represents our people in terms of incivility, discord and failure.

So whose sovereignty is really being fought for?

Sovereignty is one of the foundational principles of international law. Unfortunately, sovereignty under traditional Western Euro-centric international law was purposefully designed and restricted to what are considered “civilised” nations and Indigenous Peoples were (and one could argue still are) “objects” under the law.

Indigenous Sovereignty remains a separate concept and means something entirely different but is marginalised to Indigenous politics. It remains marginalised because of the history of Terra Nullius being applied to justify colonisation and the refusal of contemporary politicians to advocate on the issue. Indigenous Sovereignty has deep significance in the fight for recognition, and there are many models of what Indigenous Sovereignty looks like.

However, sovereignty cannot simply exist, it can only be asserted, claimed, or taken – which is the antithesis of Indigenous law and lore.

Sovereignty and the assertion of sovereignty is a critical item of Indigenous activism in Australia – the only commonwealth country without an agreement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples. Terra Nullius was enacted in Australia because the colonial invaders believed the Indigenous Peoples were uncivilised and thus did not possess sovereignty, therefore did not have the right to exclude the invaders from their lands. Therefore, the notion of Indigenous Sovereignty is intertwined with the activism for Treaty and the pursuit of self-determination.

Sovereignty however, has been hijacked by the alt-right and their version of sovereignty is about the rights of (white) individuals to do what they like without the subordination of the outside authorities.

How does this impact Indigenous people?

White protesters co-opting Indigenous causes for their own “sovereignty” agenda is problematic in a number of ways.

First Nations people are often expected to educate those around us, and to freely give emotional and cultural labour. Providing such labour when educating about systemic violence while concurrently facing disadvantage due to white privilege in systems takes a significant toll. However, speaking out and protesting has very real life and death consequences for Indigenous People that white people do not need to consider.

First Nations People in Australia are the most criminalised and incarcerated in the world, and are at a higher risk of dying in custody.

White people also do not need to manage the same burdens, cultural loads or responsibilities, such as being asked to be the representative of their entire race. Nor are they collectively condemned when one white person does something that is considered “wrong”.

The far-right appropriating Indigenous causes is not new and often used to justify acts of violence. The far-right appropriate language about “rights” and twist them to fuel their own propaganda. This has been an effective tool to recruit all sorts of disenfranchised people.

Read more:
Who are the ‘Original Sovereigns’ who were camped out at Old Parliament House and what are their aims?

In order to stop the momentum of these groups and their toxic way of thinking, we must ensure white people are no longer ignorant of the power of white privilege and the effect dysfunctionality speech, deficit narratives and systemic racism have on Indigenous Peoples and communities.

Many people may feel we are living in uncertain times, and these protest groups might try to pretend they have the answers people seek. But they do not. These groups encourage a pattern of ignorance that maintains social inequity for marginalised groups.

Instead these groups fuel hate speech, create further division in communities, and do nothing to bring stability to uncertain times.

Kelly Menzel 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. Whose sovereignty is really being fought for? What happens when First Nations People are dragged into extremist protests – https://theconversation.com/whose-sovereignty-is-really-being-fought-for-what-happens-when-first-nations-people-are-dragged-into-extremist-protests-168368

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Aphrodite Vlahos, Adjunct Lecturer, The University of Melbourne

A woman walks into a plastic surgeon’s office with an image she has found online. She wants her body to look like the same, and thinks she knows how to get it. She tells the consulting surgeon exactly what she wants: round, 350cc implants, with full projection. She believes this will get her to a full D-cup shape.

But after the operation, once the physical pain subsides and the scars heal, she’s dissatisfied with the decidedly unnatural-looking result. It’s nothing like the image she hoped to emulate. Because that body was not hers.

This woman wasn’t stupid. In spending many hours online pondering her options and making decisions she was doing exactly what expert services from plastic surgeons to financial advisers encourage clients to do.

Yet, as our research shows, this trend has also shifted responsibility and risks onto customers.

Charged with “doing their own research”, drawing on anecdotal information online to inform their decision making, consumers can become overconfident about their level of understanding. The result is an increasing number of bad outcomes.

How we did our research

To understand more about the paradox of “informed” customers, we conducted a qualitative study of women seeking breast augmentation surgery.

Our research involved a deep immersion into plastic surgery forums over two years. This included an analysis of YouTubers who documented their breast augmentation in online videos, and participation in a private Instagram group designed for women seeking breast augmentation surgery. From this Instagram group, we then formally interviewed 20 women aged between 18 and 34 who had breast augmentation surgery.

Read more:
The five most surprising cosmetic surgery trends across the globe

Turning to the internet

The results of our research suggest many women turn to the internet because consulting a plastic surgeon is expensive. An appointment costs, on average, about US$500 (A$700), with the cost of breast augmentation in the US generally ranging from US$4,000 to US$15,000 (A$ 5,600 to $A21,000).

Many women only see their surgeon once, for 30 to 40 minutes, before their surgery. In this consultation everything must be decided – from aesthetic decisions to discussing any medical conditions that may complicate the surgery.

For this reason, customers often spend weeks and months online to prepare and educate themselves before they meet their surgeon. They learn about terminology and techniques, find pictures they like, and talk to others who have gone through the procedure.

They even conduct DIY experiments, such as the “rice-test”, which involves filling two bags with rice and placing them inside their bra as a way of understanding breast implant sizes.

Many women go to these efforts to build some form of expertise for their doctor consultations, to communicate what they want to a professional and get their money’s worth.

The limits of individual expertise

Our study suggests the more women solely relied on lay expertise to dictate how their breast surgery should go, the more likely they were to be disappointed with the outcome. Better results occurred when they carefully selected their doctors and were open to working with them.

Creating aesthetically beautiful breasts must consider myriad factors. But online forums for breast augmentation mostly focus on size and often ignore risks.

Those who reported trying to control the decision making, by asking for very specific products or techniques – as the woman in our introduction did – were more likely to be disappointed by the result. They described feeling their breasts were too small, too large, too perky, too fake-looking or not fake-looking enough.

When asked about why these bad outcomes occurred, they blamed themselves for being bad decision makers. “I should have asked more questions,” one said. “I should have researched more,” said another. “I should have communicated what I wanted better,” said yet another.

But more questions and research were not the solution. What they needed to question was the premise that a medical service provider should simply do what a customer asks.

Research and ‘responsibilisation’

This is part of a wider trend, in which access to unfettered information online has emboldened many people to believe they can work things out for themselves.

It is also reflects a trend in expert services that require deep technical knowledge, termed “responsibilisation”, in which customers are encouraged to do their own research and take responsibility for “coproducing” those services.

While being prepared is superficially good advice, such encouragement also shifts risks to individual customers, who invest a lot of time and effort to become educated through the internet because it is easily accessible and free. But all this “research” does not necessarily lead to better outcomes.

Read more:
Distrust of experts happens when we forget they are human beings

Our research also highlights the downside problem when people lose faith in medical expertise.

Women in our study reported happier outcomes when they listened to the doctor.

One woman we interviewed related telling her surgeon what she wanted and being told no. “You will never have that shape,” he said, referring to an image she had shown him. The doctor then discussed with her what was possible. She credits her satisfaction with the outcome to this process of working with her surgeon.

Our research offers a cautionary tale of the limits of lay expertise in online forums. The best outcomes occurred when consumers’ preferences were respected within the limits of medical possibilities.

So it pays to listen to experts. There is certainly a space for online research, but not to the extent that it makes us think we always know better.

Aphrodite Vlahos received funding from the Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarship.

Anna E Hartman receives financial support provided by the Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship.

Julie Ozanne 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. Dissatisfied plastic surgery clients show the downsides of online research – https://theconversation.com/dissatisfied-plastic-surgery-clients-show-the-downsides-of-online-research-175060

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

The religious discrimination bill is due to be debated in parliament this week. This has been a long time coming – Prime Minister Scott Morrison first promised a religious discrimination bill before the last federal election, more than three years ago.

In large part, the delay stems from vast disagreement – both inside parliament and in the community – about what the bill should contain. There is broad agreement a person should not be discriminated against on the basis of their faith or lack of faith. However, the extent to which religion should be a licence to discriminate against others remains enormously contentious.

As MPs return to Canberra, who supports the bill? Who opposes it? What might happen?

Two inquiries into the bill

After Morrison introduced the bill into parliament in December 2021, it was sent to the legal affairs and human rights committees.

On Friday, both recommended the bill be passed – but only after a series of changes. In their reports, both committees said there were serious doubts about the constitutional validity of some elements of the bill.

Both committees chaired by government MPs. But any committee member can make additional comments or dissent from the main findings.

Overriding state protections

One of the key sticking points is a clause allowing religious schools to discriminate against staff members on religious grounds if the school has a written policy on its religious position.

This provision overrides also existing federal, state and territory protections against discrimination and permits schools to sack LGBTIQ+ teachers.

Read more:
Third time lucky? What has changed in the latest draft of the religious discrimination bill?

Attorney-General Michaelia Cash’s office has acknowledged discrimination against gay staff will be allowed, provided it is done under the guise of religious views.

Parliament’s human rights committee said this provision “is an important measure to […] maintain the religious ethos of the school” even though it “may limit the right to freedom of religion and equality and non-discrimination for others”.

Statements of belief

Another sticking point concerns statements of belief. This provision overrides every federal, state and territory anti-discrimination law to make “statements of belief” immune from legal consequences if they are based on a genuinely held religious view.

For example, statements of belief could include a male boss saying to a female employee, “women should not hold leadership positions” or a doctor saying to a patient, “disability is a punishment for sin”.

Parliament’s human rights committee said this clause “operates, in the main, to give reassurance to people of faith that they are able to make moderately expressed statements of religious belief”.

But in extra comments to the legal affairs committee report, NSW Liberal senator Andrew Bragg,warned:

Strong evidence has been provided to the committee that the statement of belief is unworkable and undesirable. Numerous employers, religious organisations, anti-discrimination groups and legal experts are against it.

The Australian Human Rights Commission is also concerned this statement of belief provision might make it more difficult to deal with cases of sexual harassment at work.

No protection for gay and trans kids at school

On Thursday, Morrison promised he would amend the Sex Discrimination Act to take away the right of religious schools to expel LGBTIQ+ students.

This promise was met with fierce opposition from conservative groups: FamilyVoice Australia called it a “betrayal”. Christian Democratic Party campaign director Lyle Shelton said Christian parents had been “thrown under a bus”.

But even if Morrison delivers on this promise about expulsion, this will not stop religious schools discriminating against gay and trans kids while they are at school, providing they aren’t expelled.

Religious groups are divided

It is important to note religious groups do not agree among themselves.
Conservative religious groups like the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference and the Sydney Anglican Diocese support the bill.

Read more:
The debate about religious discrimination is back, so why do we keep hearing about religious ‘freedom’?

But other religious groups disagree. The broader Anglican Church opposes the bill in its current form. Its Public Affairs Commission says the bill gives “too much unnecessary scope and encouragement for harmful discriminatory behaviour in the name of religion”.

Catholic welfare agencies feel the same. The St Vincent de Paul Society says “people will be hurt […] and will have no legal remedy”, while Sacred Heart Mission says the bill “will exclude people from accessing essential services”.

Minority religious groups are also worried. The Buddhist Council of NSW believes, the bill “may worsen religious discrimination against people from minority faith groups”.

The major parties are divided

Meanwhile, the bill’s path through parliament is still uncertain. Moderate Liberal MPs such as Dave Sharma, Trent Zimmerman and Bridget Archer are threatening to cross the floor unless the bill is watered down. Bragg has called for the statement of belief provision to be removed and for protections to be introduced to shield both students and teachers from discrimination by religious schools.

Labor’s extra comments to the legal affairs committee report warned the bill should not “remove existing protections Australians already enjoy against other forms of discrimination”.

But the opposition is trying to walk both sides of the street. Labor members on the parliamentary committees signed up to the main reports but added extra comments emphasising the need for amendments. This allows Labor to say it supports the bill and that it wants to change the controversial bits – depending on who it’s talking to.

If Morrison risks some of his own MPs crossing the floor and calls a vote on the bill as it currently stands, Labor will have to declare its hand. Labor is expected to finalise its position for this week’s debate at its regular parliamentary meeting on Tuesday.

Where is this heading?

There’s almost no time left before the election to make amendments (or at least properly thought out amendments) and pass the bill. The Senate sits for only five days before the election is expected to be called.

Following the Citipointe Christian College scandal last week, it is not clear that passing laws to allow discrimination against gay and trans people is a vote winner for either the Coalition or Labor.

Seemingly pre-empting the bill passing, the Pentecostal school asked parents to sign “contracts” agreeing that being gay or trans is as “destructive to human relationships and society” as paedophilia, and trans kids would only be welcome if they did not attend as the gender with which they identify. A backlash from families forced the school to back down and the principal is now on “extended leave”.

If Pentecostal families don’t support this kind of thing, it’s hardly likely families from more mainstream religious groups would either. But if the bill is passed without significant changes, we can expect to see many more situations like Citipointe’s.

The messy debate over religious discrimination in Australia continues.

Luke Beck made submissions to the parliamentary inquiries considering the Bill, is a member of the Australian Labor Party and is on the board of the Rationalist Society of Australia Inc. This article reflects only his personal views.

– ref. As parliament returns for 2022, the religious discrimination bill is still an unholy mess – https://theconversation.com/as-parliament-returns-for-2022-the-religious-discrimination-bill-is-still-an-unholy-mess-176362

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Ward, PhD Candidate, The University of Queensland

In the 250 years since Europeans colonised Australia, native birdlife has disappeared across the continent. Our new research has, for the first time, registered just how much Australia has actually lost – and our findings are astonishingly sad.

We focused on 72 species of birds faced with extinction today, including the Kangaroo Island glossy black cockatoo, regent honeyeater, and night parrot. We found 530 million hectares, or 69%, of Australia, has lost at least one bird species. In some parts of the country, we’ve lost up to 17 birds.

Land clearing, along with threats such as cat predation, have driven ten birds to disappear from over 99% of their historical habitat. Indeed, we show the last 250 years has seen more than 100 million hectares of now-threatened bird habitat cleared on mainland Australia – that’s 15% of Australia’s landmass.

For many of the species we examined, their remaining habitats occur in patches surrounded by farmland, towns and cities. To give birds and other animals a chance at survival, we need effective national leadership not only to protect existing habitats, but also to restore lost habitat and manage future habitat under climate change.

Lost, but not forgotten

In the last 250 years, 22 native birds have gone extinct. We found two more currently listed as threatened under Australia’s environmental legislation may also be now extinct.

One is the eastern star finch. This bird was once found from northern New South Wales to Queensland’s Burdekin River. A victim of overgrazing, it has not been seen since 1995. Surprisingly, this bird is only listed as “endangered” rather than “critically endangered” under [Australian law]

The other is the Tiwi Islands hooded robin, which has not been seen for 27 years. Changed fire patterns from European colonisation and invasive species such as cats and weeds have likely driven it to extinction.

Other species are on their last legs. The western ground parrot, for example, once swept across large parts of Western Australia, but are now in just two locations: Cape Arid National Park and Nuytsland Nature Reserve.

They’ve become locally extinct across more than 99% of their historical habitat because of habitat destruction, invasive species, and changed fire patterns. They’re at significant risk from isolated catastrophic events such as major bushfires. For example, the 2019-2020 fires alone destroyed 40% of the bird’s last remaining habitat.

The plight of the regent honeyeater is another tragic story of decline. Flocks of thousands once occurred from Adelaide to north of Brisbane, with the naturalist John Gould writing in 1865:

I met with it in great abundance among the brushes of New South Wales […] I have occasionally seen flocks of from fifty to a hundred in numbers, passing from tree to tree as if engaged in a partial migration from one part of the country to another, or in search of a more abundant supply of food.

Today, only 100 breeding pairs are left, and almost all breed in just three sites in NSW. The species has lost more than 86% of its historical habitat, with land clearing the main driver of decline. So few remain that young birds cannot learn to sing properly, so have trouble attracting a mate.

The extinction wave

Our research used a combination of historical field guides, reference books, research papers, government records, spatial data, and expert elicitation to create maps of past habitats, and compared those to current habitats.

We found certain areas across continental mainland Australia to be in worse shape than others.

For example, we revealed extinction hotspots in areas between Swan Hill in Victoria and Marmon Jabuk range in South Australia. In this region, up to 17 birds have gone extinct (red areas in map), such as the black-eared miner.

Likewise, over the last century, almost 10% of all known breeding land-based birds have vanished in SA’s Mount Lofty ranges. This includes the rufous fieldwren, bush stone-curlew, ground parrot, king quail, azure kingfisher, barking owl, regent honeyeater, and swift parrot.

The story of decline is not limited to only threatened species, with more common birds such as willie wagtails, brolgas, boobook owls, and even magpies now disappearing from many places they were once common.

Indeed, the loss of so many species is the canary in the coal mine of total ecosystem collapse. And total ecosystem collapse poses an existential threat to food systems, water quality and climate stability.

If we don’t make fundamental changes in the way we manage and use landscapes, the extinction wave will continue to inundate Australia.

What can we do about it?

We need federal leadership to curb the extinction crisis, and an important start is to implement promises we’ve already signed up to in, for example, the UN’s Aichi biodiversity targets.

At the ongoing international biodiversity conference – COP15 – a key ask is for countries to halt human-induced species extinctions from now onwards, to bring the overall risk of species extinctions to zero, and to bring population abundance of native species back to 1970s levels by 2050. This is a basic commitment to Australia’s heritage and culture.

Crucially, we need fundamental reform of Australia’s key environment legislation: the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act.

A major, independent review last year revealed that the EPBC Act has failed native wildlife. One of its key recommendations was to implement strong national environmental standards, such as not allowing any degradation of critical habitat.

These standards must be put in place as a matter of urgency. They must be legally enforceable, concise, specific, and focused on the conservation outcomes to properly protect Australian biodiversity and reverse the decline of our iconic places.

A huge thank you to all my wonderful co-authors, without which, this research would not be possible: James E.M. Watson, Hugh P. Possingham, Stephen T. Garnett, Martine Maron, Jonathan R. Rhodes, Chris MacColl, Richard Seaton, Nigel Jackett, April E. Reside, Patrick Webster, Jeremy S. Simmonds.

Michelle Ward received funding from the Research and Training Program by the Federal Government. She is Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Queensland and a Conservation Scientist at WWF Australia.

– ref. Native birds have vanished across the continent since colonisation. Now we know just how much we’ve lost – https://theconversation.com/native-birds-have-vanished-across-the-continent-since-colonisation-now-we-know-just-how-much-weve-lost-176239

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brooke Williams, Postdoctoral research fellow, The University of Queensland

Only about 16% of the world’s coastal regions are in relatively good condition, according to our world-first research released today, and many are so degraded they can’t be restored to their original state.

Places where the land meets the sea are crucial for our planet to function. They support biodiversity and the livelihoods of billions of people. But to date, understanding of the overall state of Earth’s coastal regions has been poor.

Our research, involving an international team of experts, revealed an alarming story. Humanity is putting heavy pressure on almost half the world’s coastal regions, including a large proportion of protected areas.

All nations must ramp up efforts to preserve and restore their coastal regions – and the time to start is right now.

Our coasts are vital – and vulnerable

Coastal regions encompass some of the most diverse and unique ecosystems on Earth. They include coral reefs, kelp forests, seagrass, tidal flats, mangroves, estuaries, salt marshes, wetlands and coastal wooded habitat.

Many animal species, including those that migrate, rely on coastlines for breeding, foraging and protection. Coastal sites are also where rivers discharge, mangrove forests exchange nutrients with the ocean, and tidal flows are maintained.

Humans also need coastlines. Among other functions, they support our fisheries, protect us from storms and, importantly, store carbon to help mitigate climate change.

As much as 74% of the world’s population live within 50 kilometres of the coast, and humans put pressure on coastal environments in myriad ways.

Read more:
Wetlands have saved Australia $27 billion in storm damage over the past five decades

In marine environments, these pressures include:

• fishing at various intensities
• land-based nutrient, organic chemical and light pollution
• direct human impacts such as via recreation
• ocean shipping
• climate change (and associated ocean acidification, sea-level rise and increased sea surface temperatures).

On land, human pressures on our coastlines include:

• built environments, such as coastal developments
• disturbance
• electricity and transport infrastructure
• cropping and pasture lands, which clears ecosystems and causes chemical and nutrient runoff into waterways

To date, assessments of the world’s coastal regions have largely focused solely on either the land or ocean, rather than considering both realms together. Our research sought to address this.

A troubling picture

We integrated existing human impact maps for both land and ocean areas. This enabled us to assess the spectrum of human pressure across Earth’s coastal regions to identify those that are highly degraded and those intact.

Both maps use data up to the year 2013 – the most recent year for which cohesive data is available.

No coastal region was free from human influence. However, 15.5% of Earth’s coastal regions remained intact – in other words, humans had exerted only low pressure. Many of the intact coastal regions were in Canada, followed by Russia and Greenland.

Large expanses of intact coast were also found elsewhere including Australia, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Chile, Brazil and the United States.

Troublingly, 47.9% of coastal regions have been exposed to very high levels of human pressure. And for 84% of countries, more than half their coastal regions were degraded.

What’s more, human pressures were high in about 43% of protected coastal regions – those regions purportedly managed to conserve nature.

Coastal regions containing sea grasses, savannah and coral reefs had the highest levels of human pressure compared to other coastal ecosystems. Some coastal regions may be so degraded they cannot be restored. Coastal ecosystems are highly complex and once lost, it is likely impossible to restore them to their original state.

Read more:
5 major heatwaves in 30 years have turned the Great Barrier Reef into a bleached checkerboard

So where to now?

It’s safe to say intact coastal regions are now rare. We urge governments to urgently conserve the coastal regions that remain in good condition, while restoring those that are degraded but can still be fixed.

To assist with this global task, we have made our dataset publicly available and free to use here.

Of course, the right conservation and restoration actions will vary from place to place. The actions might include, but are not limited to:

• improving environmental governance and laws related to encroaching development

• increasing well-resourced protected areas

• mitigating land-use change to prevent increased pollution run-off

• better community and local engagement

• strengthening Indigenous involvement in managing coastal regions

• effective management of fishing resources

• addressing climate change

• tackling geopolitical and socioeconomic drivers of damage to coastal environments.

In addition, there’s an urgent need for national and global policies and programs to effectively managing areas where the land and ocean converge.

Humanity’s impact on Earth’s coastal regions is already severe and widespread. Without urgent change, the implications for both coastal biodiversity and society will become even more profound.

Read more:
How Traditional Owners and officials came together to protect a stunning stretch of WA coast

Brooke Williams receives funding from an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship.

James Watson has received funding from the Australian Research Council and National Environmental Science Program. He serves on scientific committees for Bush Heritage Australia and BirdLife Australia.

Amelia Wenger 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. Just 16% of the world’s coastlines are in good shape – and many are so bad they can never fully recover – https://theconversation.com/just-16-of-the-worlds-coastlines-are-in-good-shape-and-many-are-so-bad-they-can-never-fully-recover-176445