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

The architect of the ingenious mechanism at the heart of Labor’s plan to sharply cut carbon emissions is about to leave the parliament.

Throughout the pandemic, Greg Hunt has been best known as Australia’s health minister. But before that, when the Coalition was swept to office in 2013, he became Tony Abbott’s environment minister, charged with destroying Labor’s carbon tax.

(I’m calling it a “carbon tax” here to distinguish it from the mechanism Greg Hunt quietly slipped in to replace it, and also because the Bureau of Statistics decided it was a tax when it recorded it as a tax in the national accounts.)

Labor’s scheme taxed (or “charged” if you must) each big emitter in the industries covered A$23 for each tonne of carbon dioxide or equivalent they pumped into the atmosphere.

There were all sorts of problems with Labor’s scheme, problems Hunt was keenly aware of, having co-authored a prize-winning research paper on carbon taxes at university and having been immersed in the topic when Labor was last in power, as the Coalition’s environment spokesman under leaders Nelson, Turnbull and Abbott.

One big problem was that Australian exporters (of products such as steel and aluminum) would be placed at a disadvantage by having to pay the tax, while their overseas competitors did not.

Steel and aluminium would still be sold to the eventual customers but from a country other than Australia that didn’t charge the tax, a phenomenon known as carbon leakage.

Labor’s carbon tax had problems

And not only exporters. Australian producers of products for local consumption stood to suffer in the same way, losing sales to foreign suppliers who weren’t charged the tax, a problem the European Union is trying to fix at the moment by imposing a so-called Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, or “carbon tariff”.

Labor’s solution was to grant firms in “emissions-intensive trade-exposed” sectors free permits to the tune of 94.5% of industry average carbon costs in the first year (and less exposed firms free permits to cover 66% of costs), a gift that would be wound back 1.3% each year.

Another solution, being pursued by Hunt as he took soundings while in opposition, was to limit Australian facilities to emitting no more than they are now.

Over time the entitlement could be wound back.

But the problem was it would stop firms expanding.

BHP, for instance, might get a big contract that required it to double its output of steel but be unable to fulfil it without halving its emissions intensity – the amount it emitted per unit of steel produced.

Hitting on a baseline winner

Hunt’s solution, the one he and independent senator Nick Xenophon slipped into legislation being drawn up to replace the carbon tax with direct grants, was to set up “baselines” for each large emitter.

To be determined by the Clean Energy Regulator in accordance with rules set by the minister and disallowable by parliament, the baselines set the maximum amount each big plant can emit without being in breach and paying penalties.

Importantly, the baselines were to be calculated on the basis of previous emissions. Facilities were to be allowed to emit what they had, but no more.

More importantly, plants could have their baselines calculated on the basis of emissions intensity – the amount emitted per unit of production, which would mean they would be able to expand so long as they didn’t emit more per unit.

More importantly still, the Clean Energy Regulator is in the process of converting almost all baselines to emissions intensity baselines.

All Labor has to do, and what intends to do, is to make use of the mechanism Hunt and Xenophon put in place.

Business is backing baselines

Each facility that emits more than 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year – 215 of them – is subject to a baseline.

What Labor has pledged to do, and it is backed by the Business Council, is to get the Clean Energy Regulator to wind down those baselines “predictably and gradually over time” to support the transition to net zero.

Businesses that are already reducing their emissions want this, because they want other firms to be made to do the same.

The beauty of the mechanism set up on Abbott’s watch is that each facility, each
“gas well, aluminium smelter and coal line” as Labor’s Chris Bowen puts it, will have its tightened baseline calculated individually.

Each will be asked to do no more than what is needed after considering what it can cope with.

Within minutes of Friday’s announcement, Energy Minister Angus Taylor labelled it “a sneaky new carbon tax on agriculture, mining and transport”, but it is better described as a system of guidelines and penalties, one legislated by Taylor’s side of politics.

Quite a lot will be needed. Labor’s modelling, released on Friday, didn’t spell out what would be needed to get emissions to net-zero by 2050, but the Coalition’s modelling, released in November, did.

No matter what reasonable assumptions the model included, including “global technology trends”, it couldn’t get all the way to net-zero by 2050.

Read more:
Labor’s 2030 climate target betters the Morrison government, but Australia must go much further, much faster

So the Coalition’s modellers added in something fanciful which they named “further technology breakthroughs” to get the remaining 15%.

Greg Hunt retires as health minister and retires from parliament at the next election. He has set us on the path to getting where we will need to be.

Peter Martin 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. Who’s the unsung architect behind Labor’s climate plans? A retiring Coalition minister – https://theconversation.com/whos-the-unsung-architect-behind-labors-climate-plans-a-retiring-coalition-minister-173313

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joe Dortch, Adjunct Senior Research Fellow, The University of Western Australia

Western Australia’s Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Bill 2021 is set to become law, replacing the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1972. The Bill will be read tonight for the third and final time in Western Australia’s state parliament upper house.

It has been spruiked by the McGowan government as a step forward for the management of heritage in WA in the wake of the 2020 Juukan Gorge disaster.

However many First Nations peoples in WA instead fear it will continue a long tradition of Labor and Liberal WA Aboriginal Affairs ministers signing off on heritage destruction.

The key objection to the new legislation is that a single elected official will have the final say on whether a heritage site can be destroyed for development.

Read more:
Australia has a heritage conservation problem. Can farming and Aboriginal heritage protection co-exist?

A history of failure to protect Aboriginal heritage

In the 49 years since the existing Act was created, successive ministers on both sides of politics have proven weak on heritage protection in Western Australia. Almost every minister for Aboriginal affairs, on either side of the political spectrum, has failed to protect Aboriginal heritage.

*Look at the history. *

Read more:
The NSW government needs to stop prosecuting Aboriginal fishers if it really wants to Close the Gap

How this proposed bill is more of the same

No matter how important the site, the minister for Aboriginal affairs has rarely rejected a development application. Of 463 mining-related applications to impact sites under section 18 of the Act since 2010, none were rejected. This bill gives little reason to expect change.

Much like the old Aboriginal Heritage Act, the proposed bill allows that when a developer wishes to impact a site despite objections by Aboriginal Traditional Owners or custodians, a government-appointed council overseen by the minister will be the one to make decisions.

However the developer can appeal to the state administrative tribunal over ministerial decisions they don’t like. The Aboriginal custodians for that area will not have an equivalent right of appeal.

There is a convoluted process requiring engagement between Aboriginal people and developers. However, developers will be able to decide when they must talk to Aboriginal parties about possible impact on a cultural heritage site. Aboriginal people will not have the right to prevent such an impact, only the right to be told about it.

Aboriginal parties will have no on-going resourcing to fulfil new responsibilities to manage heritage listings and protect sites. This is a concern for smaller and less resourced groups and sets up obvious conflicts if the developer is to fund all costs for managing heritage on a project, as currently proposed.

Read more:
Why the Australian government must listen to Torres Strait leaders on climate change

We need a better way forward

All this flies in the face of the findings of the recommendations of the report released in October of the federal inquiry into the Juukan Cave disaster, A Way Forward. This report called for, among other things, the right for Indigenous people to withhold consent to destruction of an important place.

This fundamental human right is not a veto against development. Impacting Juukan Gorge was not critical to the success of the Brockman 4 mine proposal. A robust business case does not depend on access to a single site.

Where the Bill fails heritage, it creates risk for business certainty and undermines “social license” – the support that large businesses need in the community. Last month, ACSI and HESTA, representing major funds commanding hundreds of billions of dollars, publicised their concerns about investing in WA projects that would be approved under the proposed system.

Aboriginal community support is thin. In October, Aboriginal Affairs Minister Stephen Dawson was unable to identify any Aboriginal organisation that supports the bill. Since then, one Aboriginal organisation voiced support. Their view must be respected, but this does not represent consensus across affected communities.

A Way Forward sets out better models. For example, in the Northern Territory there is an authority board of Aboriginal law men and women who administer the functions of their Act, with practical independence from the NT Minister for Aboriginal Affairs.

To Premier McGowan and Minister Dawson, we say:
If you want to change a history of heritage destruction to a future of heritage protection, Aboriginal people should have an independent right of review for ministerial decisions, and have genuine power to make decisions about heritage sites.

Joe Dortch is a Director of Dortch Cuthbert (a heritage consultancy), and Adjunct Senior Research Fellow at the University of Western Australia. He is the President of the Australian Archaeological Association and a Full Member of the Australian Association of Consulting Archaeologists Incorporated. Both organisations have made submissions to the Joint Standing Committee on Northern Australia on the destruction of sites at Juukan Gorge and to the Western Australian Government on the Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Bill. In 2019-2020 he was a Heritage Advisor at Rio Tinto but was not involved with any of the events mentioned in the article, which are documented in public sources.

Anne Poelina is affiliated with the following:

Murray Darling Basin Authority Advisory Committee on Social, Economic and Environmental Science

Jo Thomson is the owner of Thomson Cultural Heritage Management (a heritage consultancy), and PhD candidate at the University of Western Australia. She is a Full Member of and the Chairperson of the Western Australian chapter of the Australian Association of Consulting Archaeologists Incorporated (AACAI); is a full international member of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS); and is a member of the Australia ICOMOS Indigenous heritage reference group. Both organizations have made submissions to the WA government on the proposed WA Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Bill and also to the Joint Standing Committee on Nothern Australia on the destruction of sites at Juukan Gorge.

Kado Muir is chair of the National Native Title Council and affiliated with Aboriginal Heritage Action Alliance. Kado once served a term as Specialist Anthropologist with the Aboriginal Cultural Materials Committee.

– ref. A history of destruction: why the WA Aboriginal cultural heritage bill will not prevent another Juukan Gorge-like disaster – https://theconversation.com/a-history-of-destruction-why-the-wa-aboriginal-cultural-heritage-bill-will-not-prevent-another-juukan-gorge-like-disaster-173232

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Heather Handley, Adjunct Associate Professor, Monash University

The eruption of Mount Semeru in Indonesia on Saturday tragically claimed the lives of 22 people, with another 22 still missing and 56 injured. More than 5,000 people have been affected by the eruption, and more than 2,000 people have taken refuge at 19 evacuation points.

Saturday’s eruption produced an ash plume that reached 15km into the atmosphere, along with hot pyroclastic flows – dense, fast-moving clouds of solidified lava, ash and gas. Volcanic mudflows called lahars also tumbled down the volcano’s steep slopes. Heavy ash blanketed nearby villages and plunged some areas into temporary darkness.

Several villages have been buried in up to 4 metres of volcanic material and debris, more than 3,000 buildings have been damaged, and Gladak Perak Bridge, which connected Lumajang with the nearby city of Malang, has collapsed.

The Volcano Observatory Notice for Aviation (VONA) has since reported further pyroclastic flows travelling down the the volcano’s slopes, and ash plumes reaching 4.5km above its summit. There are also reports of lava flows at the summit crater.

Mt Semeru is one of the most active volcanoes in Java, with activity taking place in 74 of the past 80 years. The volcano’s current eruptive phase began in 2014, with frequent emissions of ash plumes to hundreds of metres above the crater, pyroclastic flows and glowing lava avalanches.

Unexpected larger-scale eruption

But Saturday’s eruption was, unexpectedly, much larger than the ongoing background of activity. The Head of the Geological Agency of the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources, Eko Budi Lelono, said a thunderstorm and persistent rain had eroded part of the volcano’s lava dome – a “plug” of solidified lava at the summit. This caused the dome to collapse, triggering the eruption.

Lava dome collapse is a common trigger of volcanic eruptions, and has been behind some of the deadliest eruptions in history. Collapse of the unstable dome of solidified lava is rather like taking the top off a fizzy drink bottle, depressurising the system and triggering an eruption. Lava domes sometimes collapse under their own weight as they grow, or they can be weakened by external weather conditions, as was evidently the case at Mt Semeru.

The fact that Saturday’s eruption was triggered by an external factor, rather than conditions inside the volcano, would have made this event harder to forecast.

Volcano monitoring typically relies on signs of increased unrest inside a volcano. Increased earthquake activity can be a sign that magma is moving around beneath the ground. Another warning sign is a change in the temperature or type of gases emitted. Sometimes, small changes in the shape of the volcano or lava dome can be detected on the ground or from satellites.

Another fatal, hard-to-predict explosive eruption happened in 2019 at Whakaari (White Island) in New Zealand. That event was thought to have been driven by an explosion of pressurised steam rather than by magma, which made it challenging to predict.

Read more:
Why White Island erupted and why there was no warning

Living with active volcanoes

As the world’s population grows, more and more people are living close to active volcanoes. According to one estimate, more than a billion people (14% of people on the planet) live within 100km of an active volcano.

In Indonesia, more than 70% of the population live within 100 km one or more of the country’s 130 active volcanoes – that’s a staggering 175 million people. More than 8.6 million Indonesians live within 10km of an active volcano – well within range of deadly pyroclastic flows.

Read more:
Under the volcano: predicting eruptions and coping with ash rain

The fertile soils typically found near volcanoes mean these communities need to balance their livelihoods with the risks. Keeping an eye on dozens of active volcanoes poses a continuous challenge to Indonesia’s volcano monitoring and disaster management authorities.

Heather Handley receives funding from the Australian Research Council. She is Co-Founder of Women in Earth and Environmental Sciences Australasia (WOMEESA) and Co-Founder of the Earth Futures Festival. Heather is Governing Councillor of the Geological Society of Australia.

– ref. Mount Semeru’s deadly eruption was triggered by rain and storms, making it much harder to predict – https://theconversation.com/mount-semerus-deadly-eruption-was-triggered-by-rain-and-storms-making-it-much-harder-to-predict-173240

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sonya Suares, Guest Lecturer, WAAPA, Edith Cowan University

Review: Moulin Rouge! The Musical

Someone wise once observed that theatre is the only artform to acknowledge its audience, and that’s why it will never die. As patrons press eagerly into Melbourne’s Regent Theatre, Derek McLane’s blood-red set is already pulsating and several pairs of eyes regard us coolly.

Liquid limbs and lacey-leather costuming set an unmistakably erotic tone. Two women swallow swords for our amusement. Enter the impresario, Harold Zidler (Simon Burke).

Just as he greets aspiring songwriter, Christian (Des Flanagan), bohemians Toulouse-Lautrec (Tim Omaji) and Santiago (Ryan Gonzalez), and The Duke of Monroth (Andrew Cook), Zidler enthuses in our direction:

Welcome, you gorgeous collection of reprobates and rascals, artistes and arrivistes, soubrettes and sodomites!.

We take our seats inside the Moulin Rouge.

Those familiar with Baz Luhrmann’s wildly successful movie musical (2001) are primed and practically frothing for Lady Marmalade. Samantha Dodemaide, Olivia Vasquez, Ruva Ngwenya and Christopher J Scalzo do not disappoint. They tear into the number, teeth and all, and we’re away!

A fiercely talented line-up

This long-awaited local incarnation of the ten-time Tony award-winning Broadway production follows the film’s storyline pretty faithfully.

Our penniless, poetic hero falls instantly for Satine (Alinta Chidzey), superstar of the Moulin Rouge. She, mistaking him for the wealthy Duke she must seduce, lets her guard drop long enough to be swept up in love at first sight. The club, home to waifs, strays and lost souls, hangs in the balance of their doomed romance. Oh – and to add to the urgency of it all, Satine is dying of consumption.

Read more:
To make films is human, to Baz Luhrmann, divine

There are some notable points of departure. The orientalism that was so heavy-handed in the film is mercifully diminished. There are counterpoint scenes set against the backdrop of the Parisian elite. And the score has been revamped considerably.

More than 70 songs propel us through this tragic love story. Anthems and chart-toppers like Chandelier and Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) give way to unexpected strains of Such Great Heights. Omaji delivers a haunting version of Nature Boy. Katy Perry’s 2010 hit Firework is wonderfully re-imagined to reveal the dual imperatives at play for Satine: her fatigue and fast-declining health versus her desire to explode onto the stage with the full force of her being.

As Satine, Chidzey does exactly that. It is a virtuoso performance, powerful and mercurial, vocally dexterous, technically precise and piercingly vulnerable. From the moment of her arrival, all eyes slide towards her. While this effect is clearly supported by lavish staging, lighting, costuming and choreography, it is the humanity she brings to the role that compels us.

In a fiercely talented lineup of artists, special mention is also due to Tim Omaji for his playful yet deeply raw portrayal of the artist-cum-revolutionary, Toulouse-Lautrec; Andrew Cook for his reinvention of the dastardly Duke as supremely assured and menacing; Samantha Dodemaide for her rough-edged, comic yet wonderfully layered Nini; and Simon Burke for his huckster-with-a-heart-of-gold, Zidler.

The ensemble stand out in their own right. As impressive as they are diverse, they give the lie to the tired (read: racist, gendered, etc) assumption that inclusive casting somehow means “sacrificing standards”.

These are performers who can belt out a tune, dance a tango and quite literally fly through the air – sometimes simultaneously. This depth of representation on stage lends authenticity to the depiction of the Moulin Rouge as a haven for marginalised artists.

Darker dynamics

And now that we’re back to the club and our relative positions therein, I must note that the audience experience remains jarringly safe throughout.

Though we are seated within the Moulin Rouge and are told that Satine came to be there via child prostitution, we are never made to feel uncomfortable or complicit in her commodification.

We hear of the fate of those discarded by merciless patrons and ex-lovers: slit throats, acid disfigurement – we even see it stylised in the Roxanne dance sequence. But the violent dynamics of this world are attributed purely and simply to the character of the Duke.

They are individualised in the text in precisely the same way that the social phenomenon of male violence against women is attributed to individual men. It’s not the system that’s rotten, it’s just a few bad apples.

Yes I know – this is a critique of the book and not the production, which is intended as a raunchy romp. But I believe in audiences. We can handle a bit of complexity, especially when it lends resonance to a work.

Still, the show is an undeniable theatrical accomplishment – a spectacular, spectacular feast for the senses. Its key creatives should be enormously proud. My final shout out is to the musical directors, a category of creative often overlooked in reviews of musicals, oddly enough.

Kudos to Luke Hunter and Vicky Jacobs, local legends both, for their wrangling of this extravagant and demanding score. Melbourne audiences, do not miss this sparkling diamond of a show.

Moulin Rouge! The Musical is at the Regent Theatre until May 2022, after which it transfers to Sydney.

Sonya Suares 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. Moulin Rouge! The Musical is a spectacular feast for the senses – https://theconversation.com/moulin-rouge-the-musical-is-a-spectacular-feast-for-the-senses-172866

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Prudence Flowers, Senior Lecturer in US History, College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, Flinders University

Last week, the US Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case that is the most significant threat to abortion rights in the US in decades.

The case, Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, centres on a 2018 Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks except in “medical emergencies or for severe fetal abnormality”.

It is part of a wave of state abortion bans passed since the 2016 US presidential election that take aim at Roe v Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that guaranteed abortion as a constitutional right.

So, what is this Mississippi challenge based on and could it eventually lead to the overturning of Roe v Wade?

Two issues at stake in the Mississippi case

The Supreme Court, which likely won’t make a decision in the case until mid-2022, is faced with two key issues.

One of the central elements of Roe is that the state and federal governments cannot ban abortion before viability, the point at which a fetus can theoretically survive outside the pregnant person’s body (defined as approximately 23-24 weeks gestation).

The Mississippi ban falls well short of the viability threshold. As such, the Supreme Court is now considering whether all pre-viability bans on elective abortions are unconstitutional.

Read more:
Supreme Court signals shift on abortion – but will it strike down Roe or leave it to states to decide when ‘personhood’ occurs?

The second issue is respect for legal precedent. Since the Supreme Court was established in 1789, it has reversed its own constitutional precedents only 145 times, or in 0.5% of cases.

Roe v Wade, decided 48 years ago, is sometimes described as a “super precedent” decision, because the Supreme Court has repeatedly reaffirmed it.

Constitutional scholar Michael Gerhardt defines “super precedents” as

constitutional decisions in which public institutions have heavily invested, repeatedly relied, and consistently supported over a significant period of time.

Conservatives, including several on the Supreme Court, reject the inclusion of Roe v Wade in this definition.

Why does the court’s makeup now matter?

In oral arguments, Mississippi’s lawyers invited the Supreme Court to use this case to overturn Roe v Wade. Anti-abortion lawyers and activists are optimistic their arguments will fall on receptive ears.

In 2016, Donald Trump, like every Republican presidential candidate dating back to Ronald Reagan, campaigned on a promise to appoint “pro-life judges” to the Supreme Court.

Despite serving only one term in office, Trump was able to deliver. He appointed Neil Gorsuch in 2017, Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, and Amy Coney Barrett in 2020 to fill Supreme Court vacancies. Conservatives on the bench now have a 6-3 majority.

While conservative Chief Justice John Roberts is no supporter of abortion rights, he has been a swing vote on a range of issues and has an established interest in protecting the reputation of the Supreme Court. However, after Barrett was sworn in, conservatives no longer needed to appeal to him to form a majority.

And while Kavanaugh claimed in his confirmation hearings to believe Roe v Wade was “settled as a precedent of the Supreme Court”, last week in oral arguments he read from a list of Supreme Court cases that overturned precedent.

Read more:
Who is US Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, and where does he stand on abortion?

How states have chipped away at abortion access

Abortion rights have survived serious attacks before.

In Planned Parenthood v Casey (1992), three appointees of Republican presidents sided with two liberal justices to uphold Roe v Wade, arguing “liberty finds no refuge in a jurisprudence of doubt.”

That judgement reiterated the viability threshold for legal abortions, but allowed states to pass restrictions as long as they did not place an “undue burden” on the right to an abortion.

Since the 1990s, anti-abortion lawmakers have pushed to find the limits of an “undue burden,” pursuing laws and test cases that erode abortion access.

Many states now mandate 24- or 72-hour waiting periods, ultrasounds, parental consent requirements for teenagers and counselling that repeats anti-abortion claims.

Since 2010, conservative states have also passed hundreds of targeted regulation of abortion provision (TRAP) laws, which place prohibitive and medically unnecessary restrictions on doctors and clinics that provide abortion care.

This anti-abortion strategy of chipping away at Roe v Wade has been extraordinarily successful.

Between 2011–16, over 160 abortion providers closed or stopped offering terminations, the largest rate of closures since 1973. Multiple states, including Mississippi, have one remaining abortion clinic in operation.

New strategy: more aggressive challenges to Roe v Wade

After Trump’s victory, opponents of abortion shifted to a more aggressive strategy of directly challenging Roe v Wade.

Most of these recent laws, such as Alabama’s 2019 near-total abortion ban, have been blocked by the lower courts.

A new Texas law banning abortion after six weeks is currently in effect while the Supreme Court considers whether its unique enforcement mechanism, which allows private citizens to sue anyone they think has broken the law, can be challenged in the courts.

Read more:
Jim Crow tactics reborn in Texas abortion law, deputizing citizens to enforce legally suspect provisions

And the partisan makeup of the current Supreme Court makes it almost certain that Mississippi’s law will stand.

What is not clear is whether the justices will restrict themselves to the question of fetal viability or whether they will completely overturn Roe v Wade, allowing states to ban abortion at will.

If the Supreme Court allows the states to ban abortion before viability, this will have a significant impact on the small number of pregnant people who seek abortions in the second trimester.

Generally, these people have either received a devastating medical diagnosis or they have complex personal circumstances, including domestic violence, mental illness, and/or drug addiction. These patients, as well as the doctors that provide this care, are highly stigmatised.

The long-term effects of overturning Roe v Wade

If Roe v Wade is overturned and abortion rights are returned to the states, access to abortion will effectively be a geographical lottery.

Twenty-two states have laws that could be used to ban or severely restrict abortion, while 15 states and the District of Columbia have laws that protect the right to abortion.

Abortion is a routine, common type of reproductive health care. Approximately one in four American women will have an abortion before they are 45.

Despite the political controversy and polarising rhetoric, polling this year indicated that 80% of Americans support abortion in all or most cases, and at least 60% support Roe v Wade.

However, while abortion is common, three-quarters of US abortion patients are low income and more than half are people of colour. They already face significant financial and logistical barriers in accessing this essential health care.

If Roe v Wade is overturned, abortion will still be safely and legally accessible for those who can afford it. The devastating consequences of such a decision will fall primarily on the shoulders of those least able to bear it.

Prudence Flowers has received funding from the South Australian Department of Human Services. She is a member of the South Australian Abortion Action Coalition.

– ref. Will Roe v Wade be overturned, and what would this mean? The US abortion debate explained – https://theconversation.com/will-roe-v-wade-be-overturned-and-what-would-this-mean-the-us-abortion-debate-explained-173156

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Swanson, PhD Student, University of Otago

Christopher Luxon’s ascendancy to the National Party leadership has highlighted – once again – the precarious balance between the party’s liberal and conservative wings. So his newly appointed shadow cabinet attempts to establish some equilibrium, particularly in the choice of liberal Nicola Willis as deputy.

But persistent questioning about Luxon’s own evangelical Christian faith tends to reinforce perceptions that National’s “broad church” is not an entirely unified congregation.

These perceptions have their roots in National’s origins as a political party. The question now is, why does this need for balance exist? And why, under MMP, has National not devolved into multiple, more ideologically coherent, parties that negotiate with each other come election time?

To answer those questions we need to look at the formation of National from a merger between the United and Reform parties in 1936. In that history we can see the origins of the modern party and the challenges it faces in the MMP era.

The birth of a party

The United and Reform parties had first formed a coalition in 1931 to see off a challenge from the Labour Party, and won that year’s general election. But in 1935 the coalition lost to Labour, leading to the formal merger as National.

United’s predecessor, the Liberal Party, dominated New Zealand politics up to the first world war, and was the country’s first organised political party. The Liberals enjoyed support from urban liberals and workers, but the formation of the Reform Party in 1909 and Labour in 1916 saw a steady decline in the party’s fortunes.

Read more:
Luxon takes the controls – can the former Air NZ CEO make National straighten up and fly right?

For its part, the Reform Party was the first consolidation of conservative politicians in New Zealand, coming to power for the first time in 1912 and staying in government until 1928.

It’s establishment went back to the Liberal government’s land and welfare reforms, which were branded as “socialism” and an attack on farmers. Support from social conservatives and rural communities continued to be core components of the Reform Party until the 1936 merger.

Meanwhile, a group of Liberal members had formed the United Party in 1927, supplanting the Liberals as the main challenger to the Reform Party. United gained support from urban centres, the business community and socially liberal (in the 1920s sense) interest groups.

The MMP effect

If this all seems oddly familiar, that’s because many aspects of the United and Reform parties still exist within National today.

Under the First Past the Post (FPP) electoral system, the merger of those two parties made sense. Forming a single block that represented the centre-right in New Zealand allowed them to build a well-supported political apparatus.

More importantly, the merger allowed the two parties to stop fighting each other, and instead counter Labour.

Under MMP (which replaced FPP in 1996), however, the need for single parties that dominate whole sides of the political spectrum has decreased. Instead, there’s an opportunity for parties to have more refined policy platforms based on clear ideologies, rather than broad-based appeal.

Read more:
Judith Collins may be gone but New Zealand’s search for a credible and viable opposition is far from over

This doesn’t mean socially conservative or liberal parties can’t work together – MMP allows for this as part of governing coalition negotiations, rather than the tensions playing out as internal party machinations.

Proportional representation systems tend to increase diversity within political systems – not just in terms of gender or ethnicity, but also by providing more specific political channels for different ideological perspectives, and encouraging open collaboration and compromise between those various groups.

Looked at this way, the obvious outcome is for a devolution of major “one size fits all” parties into smaller ones that take clearer policy and ideological positions. To some extent this has already happened on the left, with the advent of New Labour, and subsequently the Alliance (which contained the Green Party), splitting out of Labour in the early 1990s.

No motive for change

So, if that’s the way MMP works, could such a devolution occur within National, and what might that look like? Might we see modern versions of United and Reform – one socially liberal, the other conservative – emerge to represent different groups on the right?

Similarly, could we witness the same process on the left, with socially conservative elements of Labour forming their own party, separate from but aligned to the Labour Party?

It’s not impossible, but for the time being seems unlikely. The main reason for that is scale – staying a single entity gives a party size, and size brings resources. So while devolution might make sense in theory, the current system rewards major political blocs, particularly through campaign funding.

Read more:
Labour makes it easier to change leaders, but Jacinda Ardern has no reason to go – yet

Segmenting into new parties would also result in a splintering of support, with consequences for funding streams. The consolidation of resources and support was, of course, one of the main forces that pushed United and Reform together in the first place.

Unless there’s major fallout within National, with one cohort having severely reduced influence over policy, it’s unlikely there will be significant change any time soon. For decades, National’s liberal-conservative balance has seen the party able to unify a broad base around core values, making National the key player on the centre-right.

Given all of this, until the 2023 election we can expect to hear far more about Christopher Luxon’s conservatism being balanced out by the urban liberal values of Nicola Willis. For now at least, there will be no going back to the future for National.

Michael Swanson is a member of the National Party

– ref. History made the National Party a ‘broad church’ – can it hold in the MMP era? – https://theconversation.com/history-made-the-national-party-a-broad-church-can-it-hold-in-the-mmp-era-173319

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Simon Chapple, Director, Institute for Governance and Policy Studies, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

When Minister of Finance Grant Robertson announced in this year’s budget that his government was developing a social unemployment insurance scheme, people could have been forgiven for seeing this as largely positive.

Robertson suggested the scheme would be “ACC-like” and hinted it would pay low and middle-income earners who lost their jobs about 80% of their previous earnings (up to some maximum cap) for somewhat less than a year.

What’s not to like? We argue there is actually more than a little cause for concern, not least because there has been a worrying lack of public consultation on policy alternatives.

Furthermore, there’s the risk of creating a two-tier welfare system, given those eligible will be people with a stable employment history and payments will be related to their pre-redundancy earnings.

Private insurance problems

In our just published Policy Quarterly paper we ask what problems a social insurance scheme might solve, and we conclude the case for one is not persuasive.

To see why, it helps to look at how existing private insurance markets work. People generally want to protect themselves from things like job loss, illness, death, theft or destruction of property – so they buy insurance policies.

However, there are two problems with the private insurance market, meaning they under-provide relative to people’s real need.

Read more:
Why is New Zealand’s Labour government trying to push through a two-tier benefit system?

The first problem is called “adverse selection”, meaning people choosing to buy insurance have better information about the risks facing them than insurance businesses do, and no good reason to disclose that information.

To protect themselves from this, insurance companies set premiums higher. In turn, due to the costs, this leads to people being under-insured. Ultimately, society’s best interests aren’t met.

There’s also the problem of “moral hazard” – if a person has insurance they may take on more risk, without the insurer knowing exactly which customers are adopting riskier behaviour.

Again, insurance companies set higher premiums and people are generally under-insured. And again, this isn’t in society’s best interests.

What would justify change?

These market failures mean there is potential for well-designed government interventions to meet the social interest. In particular, making everyone join a social insurance scheme would fix the adverse selection problem.

But a compulsory social insurance system also expands the scope for moral hazard. People might change their behaviour to increase their eligibility for an insurance payout. They might take on jobs with higher redundancy risks, or be less motivated to look for work, because the consequences are now less severe.

Read more:
10 ways New Zealand employers can turn the ‘great resignation’ into a ‘great recruitment’

Market failure isn’t the only possible rationale for a compulsory social insurance scheme, however. Economies of scale, for example, could allow the government to reduce the cost of such a scheme – subsidising the private sector to lower premiums would be an alternative.

Finally, there is the paternalistic justification: if people are unwilling, financially unable or simply too shortsighted to insure themselves, the government can do it for them.

What is already working?

But the government also needs to consider what other kinds of insurance already exist and are working. A (now dated) study from 2012 estimated that one in six New Zealand households had private income protection of some sort for sickness or unemployment.

Of course, there is already the working age welfare system to mitigate the risks of unemployment. Informally, as well, people insure against job loss by saving, upskilling, accumulating annual leave and reducing household costs.

Double-income, couple households have a form of in-built insurance in each other, and wider families often provide for one another when a person loses work.

Read more:
Are low-paid jobs really a stepping stone to better pay? A new study suggests it’s not that simple

Some workers will already have redundancy provisions in their employment contracts. A decade ago, the OECD reported more than half of displaced workers in New Zealand had an average redundancy entitlement of over NZ$28,000. That’s not inconsiderable insurance.

Similarly, the student loan scheme funds education and training, including re-skilling if one is made redundant. What’s more, the three million plus people with KiwiSaver accounts (which had an average value of $26,000 in 2021) can access the funds in emergencies, including unemployment.

Lastly, an effective monetary and fiscal policy that keeps unemployment low and stable is likely to eliminate much of the need for an unemployment insurance system.

Reasons to be cautious

While always imperfect, these substitutes go a considerable way to mitigating the failure of the primary private insurance market. Policymakers advocating for state-provided social insurance need to ask the question: does a social insurance solution add anything to this existing mix?

If it turns out there are gaps in the current system, advocates of social insurance must also consider:

• such a scheme may simply be substituting for one or several of the existing solutions, which would then reduce if the scheme were introduced

• reforming and improving what already exists may be preferable in terms of cost, effectiveness and equity than introducing an entirely new system

• there may be implications for both equity and erosion of the core welfare system of creating a separate, higher tier of assistance for some.

Read more:
Young and ethnic minority workers were hardest hit at the start of COVID, but not anymore

Too many unknowns

Like what it seeks to replace, social insurance will itself be an imperfect substitute for the private insurance market because it’s a one-size-fits-all solution with no allowance for human diversity.

And it creates significant incentives for both employers and employees to game the system by shifting the costs of employment disputes (such as performance management and personal grievances) onto third parties – other levy payers.

The behavioural responses to such a scheme and thus the size of the policy gamble being taken are anyone’s guess.

Failures in the policy process to ask and answer these kinds of questions mean we remain unpersuaded about the social insurance conclusions to which the Labour government has apparently jumped.

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

– ref. NZ’s unemployment insurance scheme will be the biggest welfare shakeup in generations – is it justified? – https://theconversation.com/nzs-unemployment-insurance-scheme-will-be-the-biggest-welfare-shakeup-in-generations-is-it-justified-170710

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Karin Hammarberg, Senior Research Fellow, Global and Women’s Health, School of Public Health & Preventive Medicine, Monash University

At age 35, one in four Australian women and one in three men were hoping to have a child or more children in the future. But by age 49, about half report they haven’t yet had the number of children they hoped for.

That’s according to the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) 2021 report, released today. Over 20 years, HILDA has tracked more than 17,500 people in 9,500 households.

While some of the 49-year-old men may still father a child later in life, this is unlikely to be the case for women at that age.

In Australia and other high-income countries, there has been a long-term downward trend in the fertility rate: the average number of births per woman. In 2019, Australia hit a record-low of 1.66 babies per woman.

Read more:
Australians want more children than they have, so are we in the midst of a demographic crisis?

Low fertility rates are partly a result of more people not having children, either by choice or through circumstance. About a quarter of Australian women in their reproductive years are likely to never have children.

Why are women having fewer children?

There are many reasons why people have no or fewer children than planned towards the end of their reproductive years.

One contributing factor is the average age when women have their first child has increased in the last few decades and is now almost 30 years. This is in part explained by women spending more time in education and the workforce than they used to.

Read more:
Balancing work and fertility demands is not easy – but reproductive leave can help

Another reason is some women don’t find a suitable partner or have a partner who is unwilling or “not ready” to commit to parenthood.

It’s also possible limited knowledge about the factors affecting fertility leads to missed opportunities to have the number of children originally planned.

But whatever the reason, having children later in life will inevitably affect the number of children people ultimately have. While most women who try for a baby will succeed, some won’t, and some will have fewer children than they had planned to have.

Fertility declines with age – so does IVF success

The risk of not achieving pregnancy increases as a woman gets older because the number and quality of her eggs decline.

By 40, a woman’s fertility is about half the level it was when she was 30. And sperm quality decreases with age too, starting at around age 45.

Increasingly, people who struggle to conceive turn to assisted reproductive technology (ART) such as in-vitro fertilisation (IVF).

There was a 27% increase in the number of treatment cycles in the 2020–2021 financial year compared to the previous year, according to data released today by the Victorian Assisted Reproductive Treatment Authority (VARTA).

But unfortunately, IVF is not a good back-up plan for age-related infertility.

On behalf of VARTA, researchers at the University of New South Wales tracked thousands of women who started IVF in Victoria in 2016 to see what had happened to them by June 30, 2020. The graph below shows the proportions of women who had a baby after one, two or three stimulated IVF cycles, including the transfer of all fresh and frozen embryos that resulted from these.

Women who started IVF when they were 30 years old had a 48% chance of a baby after one stimulated cycle, a 62% chance after two cycles and a 67% chance after three cycles.

But for a woman who started IVF at age 40, there was only a 13% chance of a baby after one stimulated cycle, a 21% chance after two cycles and a 25% chance after three cycles.

Fertility options for over-35s

So, what are the options for women in their mid-30s who want to have a child or more children?

The Victorian Assisted Reproductive Treatment Authority data reveal some women aren’t waiting to find a partner. Over four years, there has been a 48% increase in single women using donor sperm to have a child, and a 50% increase among same-sex couples.

But the number of men who donate sperm in Victoria has remained the same, so there is now a shortage of donor sperm.

The option of freezing eggs for later use is also used by more and more women. Almost 5,000 women now have frozen eggs in storage in Victoria, up 23% on the previous year.

But it’s important to remember that although having stored eggs offers the chance of a baby, it’s not a guarantee.

For women in their 40s, using eggs donated by a younger woman increases their chance of having a baby. Our study showed women aged 40 and over who used donor eggs were five times more likely to have a live birth than women who used their own eggs.

But finding a woman who is willing to donate her eggs can be difficult. Most women who use donated eggs recruit their donor themselves and some use eggs imported from overseas egg banks.

So while people might think pregnancy will happen as soon as they stop contraception, having a baby is not always easy.

Read more:
Egg freezing won’t insure women against infertility or help break the glass ceiling

Karin Hammarberg receives funding from The Australian Government Department of Health. She is a Senior Research Officer at the Victorian Assisted Reproductive Treatment Authority.

– ref. Half of women over 35 who want a child don’t end up having one, or have fewer than they planned – https://theconversation.com/half-of-women-over-35-who-want-a-child-dont-end-up-having-one-or-have-fewer-than-they-planned-173151

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Diana Bogueva, Team Manager/ Adjunct Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Sydney

Eating meat comes with an enormous environmental footprint, with food systems responsible for an estimated 34% of global emissions. And yet, in most countries, meat consumption is continuing to rise.

Our new study investigated whether meat consumption increases as income increases. We specifically tested if there’s a point at which improvements in GDP per capita are no longer associated with greater meat consumption. In other words, in a world of increasing GDP, when might meat consumption peak?

After analysing data for 35 countries, we identified such a tipping point at around US$40,000 (A$57,000) of GDP per capita. Only six of the 35 countries, however, had reached this, with other countries continuing on an increasing trajectory.

Overall, we found each person worldwide ate, on average, 4.5 kilograms more meat per year in 2019 than in 2000. While we can’t say what’s behind the general choice to eat more meat, our study identifies some insightful trends.

The problem with meat

Emissions from meat production are largely due to land clearing, including deforestation, to create more pasture and grow feed for livestock.

To put it into perspective, human settlements occupy only 1% of the planet’s landmass, while livestock grazing and feed production use 27%. Compare this to 7% used for crop production for direct human consumption, and 26% occupied by forests.

As a result, a recent UK study found a vegetarian diet produces 59% less emissions than a non-vegetarian one. And interestingly, it found that the average diet for men in the UK had 41% more emissions than that of women, because of their greater intake of meat and other animal-based products.

Despite the growing evidence and awareness of the climate impact of our diets, we found the average amount of meat – beef, poultry, pork and sheep – a person ate each year increased from 29.5kg in 2000 to 34kg in 2019.

Poultry is the most popular option (14.7kg), followed by pork (11.1kg) and beef (6.4kg).

Poultry on the rise

Nearly all countries studied (30 of 35) experienced a steady increase in annual per capita poultry consumption between 2000 and 2019. It doubled in 13 countries, with more than 20kg eaten each year in Peru, Russia and Malaysia.

In addition to the poultry industry’s long-term focus on creating cheap and convenient food, many western consumers are now replacing beef with poultry. One possible reason is because of its smaller environmental footprint: chickens require less land and generate much lower emissions than cattle.

However, this comes at a price. It exposes the world, including Australia, to new virus outbreaks such as the bird flu, and results in the overuse of antibiotics in farm animals. This could lead to antimicrobial resistance developing, and the loss of antibiotics to treat human bacterial infections.

Industrial farming practices have added further pressures, with animals raised in confined spaces where they’re easily exposed to pathogens, viruses and stress, making them more prone to disease.

We have seen similar impacts in China, the world’s largest producer and consumer of pork. Our analysis revealed major dietary fluctuations, such as when pork consumption dropped substantially in 2007 after prices increased by over 50%, following outbreaks of swine influenza and SARS outbreaks in humans at the time.

Which countries have reached peak meat?

While meat consumption increased around the world on average, taking a closer look at individual countries reveals a more complicated story.

Of the 35 countries we studied, 26 had a clear correlation between GDP growth and meat consumption levels. For the remaining nine, there was no such a correlation, while six appeared to have reached a meat consumption peak: New Zealand, Canada, Switzerland, Paraguay, Nigeria and Ethiopia. The reasons for this span both sides of the economic wealth spectrum.

Read more:
Coronavirus: live animals are stressed in wet markets, and stressed animals are more likely to carry diseases

The three western countries may have reduced meat consumption because of conscious preferences for plant-based foods, as the health and environmental benefits become more well known. Most notably, people in New Zealand decreased their average consumption from 86.7kg in 2000 to 75.2kg in 2019.

For the remaining three countries, reaching the peak probably wasn’t voluntary, but related to economic downturn, weather calamities and virus outbreaks. In Paraguay, for example, an outbreak of foot and mouth disease in 2011 resulted in cattle slaughter.

Australia continues to be one of the world’s top meat-eating countries, with an annual consumption of 89.6kg per capita in 2019, up from 88.2kg per capita in 2000. Most of this was poultry.

Outdoor livestock are extremely vulnerable to extreme weather events, such as droughts, heat waves and floods. This is one reason the share of beef in Australia’s meat exports decreased by 15%, due to weather extremes and drought during 2019. Beef consumption in Australia still remains high in relative terms.

Meat was left out of climate talks

Meat consumption was largely left out of the debates at the international climate change summit in Glasgow, Scotland, last month. Our study makes it clear this omission is unacceptable.

The food we eat is a personal choice, but it needs to be an informed personal choice. The climate, environmental and health and welfare implications of our food choices require awareness and role setting not only by climate warriors such as activist Greta Thunberg, but also by policy leaders.

Read more:
Meat eating is a big climate issue – but isn’t getting the attention it deserves

There were two positive developments at the climate summit: the agreement to put a stop to deforestation (which was joined by Australia) and the collective pledges to reduce the levels of methane (which Australia did not join).

The relationships between deforestation and livestock, and between methane emissions and livestock, must be made transparent. Otherwise, it will be difficult to expect people to shift their food preferences towards more plant-based meals.

The change could start with what we put on our plates this holiday season.

Clare Whitton receives funding from an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship, and is a member of the Public Health Association of Australia, and the Citizens’ Climate Lobby.

Clive Phillips consults occasionally to PETA and Animals Australia. He has received funding for his research from RSPCA Australia, Voiceless, Open Philanthropy Project, Australian Veterinary Association, Humane Slaughter Association, Humane Society International, Meat and Livestock Australia, the Australian Research Council, and the Australian, NZ, Malaysian and EU governments. He sits on the Voiceless Scientific Committee and several Queensland government committees associated with animal welfare. He is also a director of Humane Society International.

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

– ref. How much meat do we eat? New figures show 6 countries have hit their peak – https://theconversation.com/how-much-meat-do-we-eat-new-figures-show-6-countries-have-hit-their-peak-172507

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rohan Fisher, Information Technology for Development Researcher, Charles Darwin University

While southern Australia experienced a wet winter and a soggy spring, northern Australia has seen the opposite. Extreme fire weather in October and November led to bushfires across 120,000 square kilometres of southern savanna regions.

Significant fires continue to burn in the Kimberley, the Top End, Cape York and the northern deserts. And while recent rain across the central deserts has reduced the current fire risk, it will significantly increase fuel loads which creates the potential for large wildfires in summer.

We are professional fire watchers. The lead author of this article, Rohan Fisher, maps and monitors fires across the tropical savannas and rangelands that comprise 70% of the Australian continent. The scale of burning we’re now seeing astounds us – almost as much as the lack of interest they generate.

This continent’s fire ecology is poorly understood by most Australians, despite recent significant bushfire events close to big cities. But as we enter the Pyrocene age under worsening climate change, good fire knowledge is vitally important.

Read more:
Australia, you have unfinished business. It’s time to let our ‘fire people’ care for this land

In the desert, fire and water are linked

Fires in arid Australia are extensive, largely unmanaged, often destructive and significantly under-reported. Improving their management involvement is crucial to both Traditional Owners and the ecological health of our continent.

To improve pyro-literacy, we developed a mobile app to map fires across most of Australia in real-time.

This year, Western Australia and the Northern Territory experienced serious heatwaves late in the year and a late start to the wet season. This provided the perfect bushfire conditions.

In contrast, central Australia has experienced rare flooding rains, including at Alice Springs which recorded the wettest November on record. This creates dangerous fuel loads heading into summer.

In the desert, water and fire is coupled in both space and time. Fire burns where water flows, because that’s where fuel – in the form of vegetation – is heaviest.

The below satellite image from the Pilbara illustrates this point. It shows the path of an arid-zone fire flowing like water along dry creeks and drainage lines.

Where country is not managed for fire, it can lead to catastrophic outcomes.

The incidence of previous fire also influences fire spread. Without the regular application of fire, large tracts of desert can accumulate heavy fuel loads, primed for ignition.

Over a few months in 2011, our data show more than 400,000 square kilometres in central Australia burned – almost twice the size of Victoria. It was one of the largest single fire events in recent Australian history and coincided with the wet La Nina period in 2010-12.

Watching from satellites in space, we mapped the spread of the fires in near-real time, as this video shows:

Fire management through time

For many thousands of years, Australia’s Indigenous people have skilfully burned landscapes to manage country. Most fires are relatively low-intensity or “cool” and do not burn large areas. This results in a fine-scale mosaic of different vegetation types and fuel ages, reducing the chance of large fires.

Researchers have looked back in time to provide insight into fire management as it once was. This was done using aerial photography taken in the 1940s and 1950s in preparation for missile testing at Woomera in South Australia.

The below aerial photo from 1953 reveals a complex mosaic of burn patterns and burn ages – a result of fine-scale land management by Traditional Owners.

But following the displacement of Indigenous people and the decline of traditional burning practices, fire regimes changed dramatically. The average fire size today is many orders of magnitude greater than those set under Aboriginal management.

The change has been implicated in the decline and extinction of some mammals and plant species. One massive and fast-moving October fire in the Tanami desert – home to endangered bilbies – burned nearly 7,000 square kilometres over a few days, our data show.

Read more:
Not all blackened landscapes are bad. We must learn to love the right kind

Back to desert burning

Like everywhere on this continent, fire in our vast deserts must be well-managed. Getting people back on desert country to reintroduce complex fire mosaics is difficult work but will have significant benefits for both nature and Indigenous people.

Challenges include building capacity amongst ranger groups and communities, overcoming legal and insurance hurdles and employing novel techniques to apply “cool” fires at a near-continental scale.

The role of Indigenous ranger groups is critical here. Organisations such as 10 Deserts – a partnership between Indigenous and conservation organisations – are supporting desert fire work.

Peter Murray is chair of the 10 Deserts project and a Ngurrara Traditional Owner from the Great Sandy Desert. On the importance of this work, he says:

Right now, we’re working on Indigenous “right way” cultural burning as a means of preventing wildfires. We’re developing dedicated male and female ranger teams to look after the land and develop tourism. And we’re encouraging traditional owners to return to the desert to share and exchange knowledge as well as collecting and storing that knowledge to pass onto younger generations.

Living in the Pyrocene

As climate change worsens, we’re now living in a global fire age dubbed the Pyrocene. This will bring challenges across the Australian continent.

Throughout remote Australia, increasing extreme fire weather will see more severe bushfires. Good fire management in these landscapes is urgently needed. In the northern tropical savannas, Indigenous-led fire management at the landscape scale is already producing some of the worlds best fire management outcomes.

The challenge is to introduce similar scales of fire management across our vast deserts. These regions are rich with nature and culture, and they deserve far more attention than they’ve received to date.

Read more:
5 big ideas: how Australia can tackle climate change while restoring nature, culture and communities

Rohan Fisher receives funding from the federal Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment and the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources.

Neil Burrows is affiliated with the Liberal party

– ref. We are professional fire watchers, and we’re astounded by the scale of fires in remote Australia right now – https://theconversation.com/we-are-professional-fire-watchers-and-were-astounded-by-the-scale-of-fires-in-remote-australia-right-now-172773

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Roger Wilkins, Professorial Fellow and Deputy Director (Research), HILDA Survey, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne

Around 400,000 people under the age of 25 leave full-time education and embark on their careers each year. The latest HILDA Survey Statistical Report, released today, shows how they have been faring since 2001. Full-time work has become harder, and the pay advantage university graduates enjoy has decreased. Yet, overall, new recruits to the workforce remain at least as happy with their jobs as they have been over the past two decades.

Over most of this century, and probably much of the 20th century, getting a foothold in the labour market and progressing up the career ladder has been a significant challenge for these young people.

Today, about 40% find full-time work in their first year out of full-time education. A further 35-40% get part-time work.

Their median hourly earnings are about two-thirds of median earnings of all workers. But, because many don’t have full-time jobs, their median weekly earnings are just over half those of the median worker.

Read more:
Students’ choice of university has no effect on new graduate pay, and a small impact later on. What they study matters more

Five years after entering the workforce, about 85% are employed, two-thirds of them full-time. Earnings have also increased relative to the median worker five years after entry, but remain about 10% lower.

The educational attainment of young new entrants has increased considerably since 2001. The proportion with a university degree has increased from 15% in the early 2000s to 23% in recent years. The proportion who did not complete high school has halved from 24% to 12%.

Poorer rewards for better qualifications

Despite having better qualifications, young people’s employment outcomes and trajectories have not improved at all. Indeed, since the boom years before the global financial crisis (GFC), there has been a marked deterioration.

Full-time employment in the year of labour market entry has fallen from 50% to 41%. Unemployment has risen from 8.4% to 11.2%. Full-time employment rates in the following years have similarly fallen.

Read more:
1 in 4 unemployed Australians has a degree. How did we get to this point?

The fall was most dramatic between the pre-GFC boom years (2004-2007) and the 2012-2015 period, and has been especially large for university graduates.

Those graduating in the pre-GFC boom years had a full-time employment rate of 68%. This fell to 53% for those graduating between 2012 and 2015.

In the boom years, graduates’ median earnings were 97% of overall median earnings in the year after graduation. By 2012-15, that proportion had fallen to only 82%.

There has since been a slight improvement. Some 56% of those who graduated between 2016 and 2018 were employed full-time in the year following graduation. However, outcomes for graduates were still considerably down on the early years of this century.

Read more:
Want to improve your chances of getting a full-time job? A double degree can do that

Perhaps most striking is the decline in the relative earnings of university graduates in the years after they join the workforce. Career trajectories are now considerably “flatter” for more recent graduates.

For example, five years after entering the workforce, median earnings for those graduating in the first three years of this century were 23% greater than overall median earnings. By contrast, for graduates who entered the labour market in 2013 and 2014, median earnings five years later were still slightly below overall median earnings.

More part-timers, paid less, but fairly satisfied

In short, new entrants to the workforce are more likely to be part-time and paid less relative to the general population of workers. Curiously, however, they do not seem to be unhappy about their jobs. In some ways, quite the reverse is true.

The HILDA Survey measures workers’ satisfaction with a variety of aspects of their jobs. These aspects include the job overall, pay, job security and flexibility to balance work and non-work commitments.

Moreover, a battery of questions are administered each year that provide measures of “job quality”. These include the extent to which the job makes (excessive) demands of the worker, the level of autonomy the worker has, the interest and variety of the work, the security of employment and the fairness of the pay.

On all of these measures of job satisfaction and job quality, young new entrants report their jobs being at least as good now as they did in the early years of this century.

It is of course possible that job quality has on average improved. Aspects that come to mind include job security, flexibility to balance work and non-work commitments, job demands, autonomy and task variety.

However, it remains somewhat perplexing that, on a 0-10 scale (0 represents complete dissatisfaction and 10 complete satisfaction), average satisfaction with pay has increased from 6.7 to 7.4 between early this century and recent years. Similarly, average agreement of workers with the statement that they are fairly paid has risen from 4.4 to 4.9 on a 1-7 scale (1 corresponds to strong disagreement and 7 to strong agreement).

Objectively, pay has declined for new entrants relative to the broader workforce, particularly for university graduates. It therefore seems new entrants’ expectations have been recalibrated to reflect the harsher reality of the modern labour market.

Still, it is hard to understand why subjective assessments of jobs have improved in the context of objective data to the contrary. Perhaps young new entrants have lowered their expectations too much.

Roger Wilkins receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. Graduates lose pay advantage in tougher times, but overall workforce entrants seem surprisingly satisfied – https://theconversation.com/graduates-lose-pay-advantage-in-tougher-times-but-overall-workforce-entrants-seem-surprisingly-satisfied-173152

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Giuseppe Carabetta, Senior Lecturer, Sydney University Business School, University of Sydney

Australia’s Fair Work Commission has made its first ruling against an employer mandating COVID-19 vaccination as condition of work. But this isn’t the decision those opposed to vaccine mandates have been hoping for.

On Friday a full bench of the commission ruled that global miner BHP’s directions to employees at its Mt Arthur coal mine, in NSW’s Hunter Valley, regarding deadlines for vaccination were not lawful and reasonable.

This is a significant decision by Australia’s industrial relations umpire in a number of ways. It is the first ruling to question the validity of mandatory vaccination policies, and the first regarding an employer COVID-19 mandate not backed by a public health order. It is also a full bench decision, involving five tribunal members, which gives the ruling extra weight.

But contrary to social media chatter, it’s not a decision spelling defeat for employers mandating COVID-19 vaccination as condition of work.

Indeed the ruling isn’t really about the overall validity of Mt Arthur’s vaccine mandate. Its focus is instead management’s failure to properly consult with its employees under work health and safety laws.

It doesn’t question employers’ general right to introduce issue mandatory vaccination policies. In fact, it endorses this right – so long as they are “lawful and reasonable”.

Background to the BHP vaccine dispute

The dispute on which the Fair Work Commission adjudicated arose from management at BHP’s Mt Arthur mine site announcing on October 7 that all workers had until November 9 to show they had received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine (and to be fully vaccinated by 31 January 2022).

After November 9 passed, about 50 workers were stood down without pay for failing to show evidence of vaccination.

About 1,700 people work at the mine. About 700 are covered by the Mt Arthur Coal Enterprise Agreement 2019 and represented by the Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union.

The union applied to have the Fair Work Commission rule on whether management directions to employees covered by the enterprise agreement were lawful and reasonable.

Unions have made similar claims in the past about employers failing to adequately consult on mandatory vaccination policies, such as the Australian Manufacturers Workers Union’s gripe with Victorian fruit-canning company SPC Australia.

Read more:
Why unions support vaccination — but not employer mandates

General principles confirmed

The full bench agreed management had not sufficiently consulted with workers over its announcement of deadlines for vaccination.

Its judgement reaffirmed two general principles made in previous rulings regarding non-COVID vaccination policies.

First, employers have a right to ask an employee to be vaccinated without a public health order, an express term in an employment contract or other specific law, but the direction must be be “lawful and reasonable”.

Read more:
Qantas has grounds to mandate vaccination, but most blanket policies won’t fly

Second, whether a direction is reasonable depends on factors including the nature of the work, established practices, industrial instruments (such as awards and enterprise agreements); and consultation requirements such as those under work health and safety laws.

In other words, its reasonableness depends on the circumstances.

Broad observations on vaccine policies

While noting “it is not appropriate to make general statements about whether a direction of a particular character is a lawful and reasonable direction”, the Full Bench did think there was “some utility in making some broad observations” relating to such policies.

These were:

• If the purpose of a direction is to safeguard workplace health and safety, it is likely to be lawful, because it falls within the scope of the employment contract and there is nothing unlawful about being vaccinated.

• The reasonableness of a direction is essentially a question of “fact and balance”, assessed case by case.

• There may be a range of options open to a particular employer that satisfy reasonableness, and it is not necessary to show a policy accords with ‘best practice’.

Factors in favour of a mine mandate

In the case of the Mt Arthur mine dispute, the ruling lists six factors that would count in favour of the reasonableness of the vaccine mandate:

• It was directed at ensuring the health and safety of workers of the mine.

• It was logical and understandable.

• It was a reasonably proportionate response.

• It was developed having regard to the circumstances at the mine.

• The timing was determined by reference to local circumstances.

• It was implemented only after the employer had spent considerable time encouraging vaccination.

The mine’s management fell short on one crucial thing – its obligation under under work health and safety law to consult with employees. As the ruling states:

Had the Respondent consulted the Employees in accordance with its consultation obligations − such that we could have been satisfied that the decision to introduce the Site Access Requirement was the outcome of a meaningful consultation process – the above considerations would have provided a strong case in favour of a conclusion that the Site Access Requirement was a reasonable direction.“

So this is an important victory for employees and unions, acknowledging the importance of genuine and meaningful consultation. But any celebration by those opposed to vaccinations is likely to be short-lived.

The ruling leaves room for BHP to recommence the consultation process. The Fair Work Commission has offered to facilitate these discussions. BHP can then reintroduce the policy.

Following the full bench’s requirements provides a “road map” for other major employers to follow without a detour to the industrial relations tribunal.

Giuseppe Carabetta 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. BHP’s vaccine policy ‘not lawful and reasonable’ – but this is no win for mandate opponents – https://theconversation.com/bhps-vaccine-policy-not-lawful-and-reasonable-but-this-is-no-win-for-mandate-opponents-173234

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacqueline Burgess, Associate Lecturer in International Business, University of the Sunshine Coast

Some of the most popular video game series are those that use historical settings, and research has revealed players have extremely high standards when it comes to the accuracy of the history presented.

We surveyed players of the Assassin’s Creed series, one of the most famous video game series to use historical settings, to understand how important accurate depictions of history in video games were for players.

The Assassin’s Creed series depicts a millennia-old conflict between the secret Assassin Brotherhood and Templar Order. In the majority of games, the player takes control of a historical assassin in a historical setting, but with cuts to a modern-day, science-fiction framing story.

The games are known and loved for their historical tourism appeal. The series has allowed players to explore Cleopatra’s Egypt, the Middle East during the Third Crusade and the Italian Renaissance among other settings.

And players expect to see due diligence done when it comes to reflecting real-life historical facts and settings.

Respecting history in gaming

58% of players felt video game developers should minimise changes to the historical record. Another 21% felt it depended on the game. For example, some respondents accepted developers could and should make changes for alternate history or fantasy games.

One noted, “unless a major part of the gameplay is creating an alternative history, or there’s a major sci-fi/fantasy element making the historical accuracy unimportant, developers should strive to make their games as accurate as possible”.

In general, respondents felt games needed to be fun and entertaining, so changes to history should be made to ensure that. Otherwise, the history developers were using should be respected.

As another respondent put it, “the developers should stay as close as possible [to historical fact] unless doing so would hinder the gameplay or story.”

Some respondents even thought changes to the historical record should be disclosed to players in some way.

Accuracy in gaming

Video games are one of the newer popular entertainment media but are sometimes still thought of as an industry for adolescents, despite the average age of players in Australia being 35.

Our research shows players have high expectations when it comes to the accuracy of information being presented to them.

With over three billion worldwide players, video games are how a lot of people are being exposed to history.

And they are very influential in shaping players views about history. Video games are interactive which means their players can actively engage with historical events and people and explore historical worlds.

Some of the most popular and long-running video game series, such as Assassin’s Creed, Total War, and Civilization use historical settings as a key part of the game’s plot and appeal. For example, the Assassin’s Creed series alone has sold more than 150 million copies since 2007.

Introducing audiences to history

It used to be that film was the most influential media for exposing audiences to history. Thanks to the popularity and interactivity of video games, this has shifted somewhat.

Video game developers have embraced historical accuracy when creating their games. For example, during the development of L.A Noire, a film-noire inspired game set in Los Angeles in 1947, over 180,000 sources including newspaper articles, photographs, and police records were examined to ensure the city was recreated accurately.

The Assassin’s Creed series itself is also well-known for hiring historians and academics as consultants and recreating detailed versions of historical cities for its games.

Read more:
Assassin’s Creed TV series: why it’s so hard to adapt video games for the screen

For Assassin’s Creed Unity, set in Revolutionary Paris, developers consulted over 150 maps of the city and spent two years modelling Notre Dame. This even involved tweaking individual bricks and consulting historians to establish which paintings were on display.

The audience hunger for this sort of rigorous research and details in games has created opportunity for video game developers and companies.

Developers can add their use of history to their marketing. Branded podcasts, social media, tie-in books and website content can explore the research developers have undertaken. They can also present information about the actual history and explain why changes were made.

The popular History Respawned podcast, which explores the history presented in popular video games, is one model the industry can use. Another is the in-game historical encyclopaedia the Assassin’s Creed series features, and other games could use.

Video games also regularly offer high-priced collector and limited editions with statues, soundtracks and artbooks included, and these could be another avenue for providing players with the historical information they want.

Including historical inaccuracy

However, what is accurate and what is not is not always obvious.

Notre Dame, as it appears in Assassin’s Creed Unity, features the cathedral’s famed spire. However, historically it wasn’t installed yet, and was added after test players felt the cathedral was inaccurate if it wasn’t featured.

When it comes to making video games with historical settings, developers must carefully choose what accurate and inaccurate aspects they include. Sometimes, making a game that matches what a player believes is authentic to the time period actually requires inserting inaccurate aspects.

And, of course, a game has to be fun. The ship-to-ship combat in Assassin’s Creed Black Flag, set during the Golden Age of Piracy, is much, much faster than actual naval battles and features tactics real-life pirates would never use. And yet Black Flag is one of the most beloved games of the series.

Developers have a tricky paradox to navigate. To give the players what they want, they sometimes have to give them what it appears they do not want.

Jacqueline Burgess 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. Even in the colourful world of video games, most players demand historical accuracy – https://theconversation.com/even-in-the-colourful-world-of-video-games-most-players-demand-historical-accuracy-172307

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

Labor’s Chris Bowen made a very pertinent contribution on Monday to the debate over whether the Liberals should run Gladys Berejiklian, the subject of an ICAC investigation, in the Sydney seat of Warringah.

What would the Liberals and the media be saying if it were a Labor figure in a similar position? Bowen asked.

Of course we know the answer. They’d be outraged And they’d be justified.

The push within the Liberal party, backed by Scott Morrison, for Berejiklian to stand is a case of the “whatever it takes” brand of politics.

The Liberals are desperate to get this seat back from independent Zali Steggall. And they are spurred by the continued high popularity of Berejiklian. The polling and focus groups tell them people think she was a good premier, and has been hardly done by.

She’s probably the only Liberal who would be competitive with Steggall, who’s dug in solidly since she ousted Tony Abbott in 2019.

The close of nominations for Liberal preselection for Warringah has been delayed from last Friday until January 14 to give the former premier time to make a decision.

The ICAC won’t bring down its finding before then, so if Berejiklian ran there’d be a cloud hanging over her.

Behind the scenes, some indication will come before Christmas about how things are likely to go, when counsel assisting the ICAC present their submissions to the parties and the commissioner.

But while this could be important in Berejiklian making up her mind, the material won’t be public. If she ran, the speculation about it would be rife, which would surely be unhelpful.

Read more:
Berejiklian says Maguire was part of her ‘love circle’ but was not significant enough to declare – will this wash with ICAC?

Morrison has this week returned to attacking the ICAC over Berejiklian’s treatment. In the recent parliamentary sitting he denounced this as “an absolute disgrace”. “The Australian people know that the former premier of New South Wales was done over by a bad process and an abuse of process,” he said.

On Monday he said her treatment had been “shameful”. There was no suggestion she’d done anything criminal, he said, and he found the playing of intimate conversations she had (with then secret boyfriend, Daryl Maguire) “just awful”.

Morrison’s opposition to giving a national integrity commission the right to hold public hearings was adamant during recent government discussions, which ended with no legislation being introduced into federal parliament.

Morrison said Berejiklian was “put in a position of actually having to stand down and there was no finding of anything. Now I don’t call that justice.”

Without saying it explicitly he creates the impression the ICAC forced her to quit her job. In fact, she chose to resign, judging that just standing aside while the inquiry was on was politically untenable.

Steggall on Monday pushed back strongly against Morrison, saying the words he’d used in parliament were “outrageous”. “We should be seeing leadership to raise trust, call for more accountability, not undermine accountability.”

The ICAC is investigating whether Berejiklian breached public trust in relation to two grants awarded to the electorate of Wagga Wagga, then held by Maguire. It is also inquiring into whether her conduct “was liable to allow or encourage” corrupt conduct by Maguire.

Berejiklian, when she was treasurer and then premier, did not disclose to her colleagues her close personal relationship with Maguire, and has defended her failure to do so, arguing “I didn’t feel it was of sufficient standing”.

The PM and some other Liberals dismiss her lapse basically on the grounds that here was a woman who’d just had a bad boyfriend.

Read more:
Women play a critical role in diplomacy and security, so why aren’t more in positions of power?

In Morrison’s view integrity bodies should not be looking at “who your boyfriend is”, as he put in in parliament.

Leaving aside the rather patronising attitude this implies – the gullible woman as an explanation – it doesn’t wash in terms of political ethics. If you are premier, your relationships are relevant. With this relationship, private life impinged on public life.

Does Morrison really think it was okay for Berejiklian not to disclose her closeness to Maguire, who was well known as an urger of the first degree?

That certainly wasn’t the view of former NSW premier Mike Baird, a good friend of Berejiklian, who said in evidence at the ICAC “certainly I think [the relationship] should have been disclosed”. Baird is another high profile figure the Liberals have pursued to stand in Warringah, but without success.

If the Liberals fielded Berejiklian ahead of the ICAC report, they would be adding insult to injury in their performance on integrity issues.

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. View from The Hill: Running Berejiklian ahead of ICAC report would send the worst of signals on integrity – https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-running-berejiklian-ahead-of-icac-report-would-send-the-worst-of-signals-on-integrity-173262

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joshua Gilbert, Researcher (Indigenous Policy) Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education & Research and Higher Degree Research Student at Charles Sturt University, University of Technology Sydney

Much of the debate on Indigenous agriculture in Australia has focused on a contested pre-colonial definition as to whether Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people deserve the English title of “farmer”.

However this view stifles the real story of Indigenous engagement in Western agriculture. It also fails to recognise the inherent need for Indigenous peoples’ involvement in the sector.

In 2020, the Australian Department of Agriculture, Water and Environment conducted a series of roundtables to develop the National Agriculture Workforce Strategy.

The strategy noted the urgency of transforming the agricultural workforce into a “complex, modern, sophisticated sector”.

There is no doubt the agricultural workforce is changing.

However, there’s a worryingly unsophisticated understanding of workforce diversity within the sector – especially in terms of Indigenous involvement in agriculture.

Read more:
Indigenous peoples are crucial for conservation – a quarter of all land is in their hands

Agriculture must connect with Indigenous people

There is a critical and overdue need for agriculture to connect with Indigenous people.

This is best demonstrated through the Indigenous land holdings across the nation.

The Guardian Australia recently noted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people own up to 54.17% of Australia’s landmass.

This is comparable to the National Indigenous Australians Agency estimate of Indigenous land ownership, which puts the figure at around 40%.

This extensive landholding by First Nations people is an essential component of the continued practice of agriculture in Australia. But despite Indigenous people owning these vast areas of land, only 1% of the agricultural workforce identify as Indigenous.

This rate is unacceptably low, given 3.3% of Australia’s population more broadly identify as Indigenous.

The National Agriculture Workforce Strategy identifies solutions to this lack of Indigenous workforce. Solutions such as promoting Indigenous people in agriculture through marketing, and fostering Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leadership in this sector.

However, these proposed strategies fail to acknowledge broader concerns about inadequate Indigenous representation in the sector.

Better data and a pipeline of Indigenous graduates

To date, there has been no concerted effort across the agriculture sector to understand the size and scale of current Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander involvement, nor their agricultural production.

For example, the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Agriculture Census does not provide the opportunity for farmers to identify as Indigenous. Agriculture research and development corporations usually don’t collect these data, either.

There are also pipeline issues regarding Indigenous involvement in the sector. A recent study of 15 years of data by one of us (James Pratley) demonstrated universities had a low attraction and retention rate for Indigenous students. Fewer than five Indigenous students graduate in agriculture across Australia each year.

Despite the lack of university graduates, Australia has a growing Indigenous youth demographic, which could contribute to a much-needed workforce in future.

To encourage Indigenous people to enter agriculture, we need to show Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people belong in the sector. They need to feel welcome in our universities and TAFEs and we must better support those entering the industry.

Charles Sturt University has developed an Indigenous agriculture initiative drawing attention to the lack of Indigenous agriculture graduates. It also provides Indigenous students scholarships to study agriculture and/or do postgraduate research on aspects of Indigenous agriculture.

This provides Indigenous people with a pathway into agricultural industries and shows Indigenous people what opportunities exist.

Attracting and retaining Indigenous talent

It’s also imperative larger agricultural companies develop Reconciliation Action Plans (detailed, long-term strategies to meaningfully advance reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people within an organisation). Big firms must also start or renew their efforts towards building more diverse workforces and supply chains.

Over 1,100 Australian organisations have followed this path.

Agricultural companies such as Incitec Pivot, OBE Organics and Bayer have recently developed Reconciliation Action Plans. Other agricultural businesses and industries need to ensure their houses are in order too.

Reconciliation Action Plans provide a pathway for organisations to advance reconciliation across their business. This can be done through identified actions such as increasing Indigenous staff and initiatives for staff. Organisations are accountable for these actions through the Reconciliation Action Plan they develop.

As these Reconciliation Action Plans mature, employers in the agricultural sector will seek out Indigenous talent to meet targets and to crucially provide new perspectives.

Indigenous people’s input and talent is vital to modernising the agricultural sector. There is a huge opportunity to build employment pipelines from schools through universities into the broader agrifood industry.

A clear understanding of the size and scale of current Indigenous agricultural contributions is sorely needed.

Industry leaders who work to establish and grow the talent pipelines and develop Reconciliation Action Plans will reap the rewards.

Read more:
A law on workplace gender equality is under review. Here’s what needs to change

Josh Gilbert receives funding from the Food Agility CRC. He is affiliated with KU Children’s Services, the NSW Aboriginal Housing Office, Reconciliation NSW, and Bridging the Gap Foundation. Josh formally worked at PwC’s Indigenous Consulting.

James Pratley 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’s agriculture sector sorely needs more insights from First Nations people. Here’s how we get there – https://theconversation.com/australias-agriculture-sector-sorely-needs-more-insights-from-first-nations-people-heres-how-we-get-there-173154

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Norton, Professor in the Practice of Higher Education Policy, Australian National University

The Coalition and Labor took very different higher education policies to the 2019 federal election. The contest was between tightly capped total spending under the Coalition and a restored demand-driven system under Labor, letting universities enrol unlimited numbers of students for bachelor degrees.

Labor leader Anthony Albanese’s announcement yesterday of extra university places if Labor wins the 2022 federal election offers more money and slightly changed criteria for distributing it among universities. Unlike in 2019, it is not a radically different alternative to the government’s policies. But there are ways of better achieving its goals.

Up to 20,000 more places

Labor promises to deliver up to 20,000 extra student places over two years. Enrolment data for 2020 and 2021 are not yet available, but on 2019 figures Labor is offering, in theory, about a 3% increase in total places.

Read more:
Albanese offers more university places and free TAFE spots

The expected cost is A$481.7 million over the new few years. To put this in context, the federal budget forecasts tuition subsidies of just over $7 billion a year.

Under the Coalition’s Job-Ready Graduates policy, which began in 2021, the link between funding and student places is not straightforward, which explains Labor’s “up to” caveat.

In earlier funding systems, the idea of a student place was central. A student place was the equivalent of one year’s study for a full-time student. Each university had a minimum number of places it had to deliver for its funding. New places were often allocated in specific numbers by discipline or course.

Under the current system, universities are funded without setting minimum numbers of student places. Universities decide how to distribute that money between student places, which under Job-ready Graduates have a wide range of dollar values.

In 2021, law, business and most arts student places have an annual public subsidy of $1,100. An extra $1 million in public funding would finance 909 of those places. But nursing, engineering and science have a public subsidy of $16,250, so $1 million would cover only 62 places.

The Job-ready Graduates framework creates a tension between maximising opportunities to study, which is done most effectively in courses with low subsidies, and promoting courses with in-demand skills, which consume more of each university’s available funding.

Read more:
New analysis shows Morrison government funding won’t cover any extra uni student places for years

Labor’s criteria for distributing new funding

Labor sets out three broad criteria for allocating its new money to universities:

• ability to offer extra places in areas of national priority and skills shortage, including clean energy, advanced manufacturing, health and education

• efforts to target under-represented groups such as the first in their family to go to university, people in regional, remote and outer-suburban areas, and First Nations people

• student demand.

Labor’s priority fields are high-subsidy courses, so will generate fewer student places per million dollars spent. This creates a tension with equity goals.

The most successful policy to date for increasing representation was demand-driven funding. After lifting funding caps, growth in enrolments of students from low socioeconomic status backgrounds outpaced the rate for other socioeconomic groups.

Enrolments in lower-subsidy courses would help meet access goals, even if these course choices do not match Labor or Liberal views of what students should be studying.

Student applications data reflect student demand, Labor’s third criterion for allocating funding. The data show increased student interest in the “society and culture” cluster of courses. This includes arts and law with the $1,100 public funding rate, despite their high student contribution of $14,500 a year.

Read more:
3 flaws in Job-Ready Graduates package will add to the turmoil in Australian higher education

Parallels with Coalition policy

Labor’s interest in using higher education policy to meet national priorities and skills shortages is conceptually similar to the Coalition’s “job-ready graduates” approach, although with slightly different lists of preferred courses.

Labor’s equity criteria for allocating funding to universities also have parallels with the Coalition. The current policy is to focus funding growth on regional universities and campuses in areas with relatively high population growth.

The main novelty in Labor’s list is that “first in family” has not explicitly been used in policy before. But new students have been asked about their parents’ education since 2010. The Coalition’s policy on regional and high population growth areas is likely to catch areas with relatively high proportions of first-in-family students.

The Coalition reintroduced demand-driven funding for Indigenous students from regional areas this year. They also have high rates of first-in-family enrolment.

The key difference between the parties is the amount of extra funding for the chosen universities rather than the underlying criteria for how it is distributed. But more funding converted into more places undoubtedly matters for under-represented groups.

A more ambitious agenda?

Demand-driven funding, as Labor promised in 2019, is the most effective funding policy response to the problems it sees. It best matches the supply of places with student demand, by giving the funding system the capacity to create enrolments in the courses students want to take.

Furthermore, applications tend to follow the labour market without any special policy incentives. With demand-driven funding there is no trade-off between access goals and priority shortages to overcome skills shortages.

Labor’s decision to abandon demand-driven funding is probably due to the Commonwealth budget being more stretched now, as a result of COVID-19, than it was in 2019.

Labor knows the so-called “Costello baby boom” students will reach university age in the mid-2020s. They create a real need for more student places, but also mean demand-driven funding could drive a big increase in higher education spending.

Read more:
Demand-driven funding for universities is frozen. What does this mean and should the policy be restored?

Modest changes at no cost to government

While demand-driven funding is probably not going to return in the next few years, Labor could make other changes that will ease current policy tensions and be fairer for students.

There is a direct relationship between student contributions and the subsidy rate. A modified funding system could narrow the range of contributions, which this year stretch from $3,950 to $14,500 a year.

Discipline-based subsidies that are less varied than the 2021 range of $1,100 to $27,000 would ease, although not eliminate, the tensions between promoting courses in areas of skill shortage and increasing student places.

Such a system could deliver more student places per $1 million of public funding in skill priority courses than under current policies.

Fundamental flaws remain in place

For universities and prospective students there is no obvious downside to Labor’s proposal. On the announcements to date it would not fix the structural problems created by Job-ready Graduates, but I doubt such a flawed policy will last long-term, regardless of who wins the next election.

Andrew Norton works in the higher education sector and has previously advised Coalition higher education ministers on policy issues.

– ref. Labor offers extra university places, but more radical change is needed – https://theconversation.com/labor-offers-extra-university-places-but-more-radical-change-is-needed-173219

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mike Lee, Professor in Evolutionary Biology (jointly appointed with South Australian Museum), Flinders University

How did the crocodiles survive the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs? – Éamonn, age 5, Western Australia

Hi Éamonn! This is a great question, and one many scientists have asked.

There are two main reasons. First, crocodiles can live for a very long time without food. Second, they lived in places that were the least affected when the asteroid hit Earth.

When the asteroid hit earth

About 66 million years ago, dinosaurs ruled Earth. But then a massive asteroid, more than 9 kilometres wide, slammed into the shallow sea near what is now Mexico.

The explosion from this was so huge, it led to global earthquakes, tidal waves, bushfires and even poisonous rain.

Also, the asteroid hit at one of the worst possible places, where the rocks could easily be “exploded” (or vapourised). This threw up massive amounts of dust into the sky, blocking out the Sun for many months and sending Earth into a long, dark and freezing winter.

Without sunlight, the green plants died, followed by the plant-eating animals that ate them to survive, and the meat-eaters that ate the plant-eaters.

Read more:
Curious Kids: What effect did the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs have on plants and trees?

Scientists think three-quarters of all the different kinds (species) of animals on Earth were wiped out – including most dinosaurs.

But some managed to survive for a range of reasons.

One important group of dinosaurs sailed through, helped by their ability to fly and find food in faraway places. Their feathers protected them from the cold, and their beaks let them eat buried seeds found near dead plants.

Amazingly, these dinosaur survivors are still with us today. We call them birds!

Read more:
How small birds evolved from giant meat eating dinosaurs

Crocodiles had some keys to survival

Crocodiles were another group that famously survived the asteroid. Obviously they can’t fly, don’t have feathers, and don’t eat seeds! But they had other secrets to success.

Firstly, crocodile bodies use very little energy. They lie around a lot, breathe slowly and even have a very slow heartbeat. This is how they can hold their breath underwater for more than an hour.

It also means they can go without food for months, and sometimes more than a year. This would have been very helpful when food (such as other animals) became hard to find once the asteroid hit.

Dinosaurs, on the other hand, were generally more active, which means they needed more energy – especially meat-eaters like Velociraptor. Without food, they would have died quickly.

Crocodiles also lived in places where losing green plants didn’t make a big difference. Think of a forest or a grassland (where many dinosaurs lived): if the plants there die, then all the animals that need them die too, including the meat-eaters which are left with no food.

But the crocodile survivors mostly lived in places like rivers, lakes and coasts. The animals living in these places don’t need green plants as much. Dead plants and animal material washes in from surrounding land, which is eaten by tiny creatures, which are then eaten by larger creatures including crocodiles.

So unlike dinosaurs living on the land, crocodiles in a river would not have starved as soon as the green plants died.

Our mammalian ancestors also survived

A similar reason helps explain why human beings’ ancestors also survived the asteroid impact. These were the small mammals that lived near the end of the age of dinosaurs, which eventually gave rise to all the different kinds of mammals around today (including humans).

They were mainly small, rat-like things that scurried about in the dead leaf litter on the ground, eating insects and worms. These tiny creatures relied not on living green plants, but on dead leaves and bark falling from the trees, or being blown and washed in from elsewhere.

So just like the crocodiles, our tiny ancestors survived the asteroid partly because they didn’t depend heavily on living plants. A good thing too: these lucky survival skills are the reason you and I are here today!

Mike Lee receives research funding from The Australian Research Council and Flinders University.

– ref. Curious Kids: how did crocodiles survive the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs? – https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-how-did-crocodiles-survive-the-asteroid-that-killed-the-dinosaurs-172390

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

This week’s Newspoll, conducted December 1-4 from a sample of 1,518, gave Labor a 53-47 lead, unchanged since the previous Newspoll, three weeks ago. Primary votes were 38% Labor (steady), 36% Coalition (down one), 10% Greens (down one), 3% One Nation (up one) and 13% for all others (up one).

Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s ratings were steady at 52% dissatisfied, 44% satisfied, for a net -8 approval. Labor leader Anthony Albanese gained five points on net approval for a -6 rating. This is the first time since the pandemic began that Albanese’s net approval has been better than Morrison’s.

Morrison led Albanese by 45-36 as better PM (it was 46-38 three weeks ago). By 47-37, voters expected Labor to win the next election.

The Joyce factor

In late October, there was an increase in Labor’s poll lead across several polls. At the time, I thought the best explanation was the involvement of Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce in the Coalition’s internal climate change negotiations.

With Joyce fading from the limelight, the Coalition has recovered. Newspoll was 54-46 to Labor in late October, but is now 53-47. There has also been movement to the Coalition in the Resolve and Essential polls. The Morgan poll’s move to Labor is probably illusory.

Many expected the last two weeks of federal parliament, which included the release of the Jenkins report finding that one in three parliamentary staff had experienced sexual harassment, to be damaging for the Coalition.

Read more:
With Labor gaining in polls, is too much Barnaby Joyce hurting the Coalition?

However, we don’t know how much impact this has had on voters. And in April, I wrote that a backlash against political correctness could be making sexual misbehaviour more acceptable.

The economy and COVID will be important factors at the next election, due by May 2022. While the Australian GDP tanked 1.9% in the September quarter due to lockdowns, it will rebound in the current quarter. However, a rise in inflation could hurt the government.

Meanwhile, will the new Omicron COVID variant require restrictions to be reintroduced?

Coalition gains in Resolve poll

A Resolve poll for Nine newspapers, conducted November 16–21 from a sample of 1,606, gave the Coalition 39% of the primary vote (up two since October), Labor 32% (down two), the Greens 11% (steady), One Nation 3% (steady) and independents 9% (steady).

As usual with Resolve, no two-party vote was given, but analyst Kevin Bonham estimated a 50-50 tie, a two-point gain for the Coalition since October.

Despite the Coalition’s voting intentions gain, Morrison’s ratings slumped. His good rating for his performance in recent weeks was down seven to 40% and his poor rating up six to 49% for a net approval of -9, down 13 points.

Albanese also dropped four points to a net -14 rating. Morrison led Albanese by 40-29 as preferred PM, down from 44-26 in October.

Of those polled, 34% thought the government’s commitments on climate action were “not enough”, 28% “about right” and 16% “too far”. That’s a 44-34 lead for “too far”, plus “about right” over “not enough”.

By 49-16, voters supported raising the 26-28% emissions reduction target for 2030, but that’s down from 57-13 in October.

The Liberals and Morrison led Albanese and Labor by 40-24 on economic management (45-23 in October). On COVID, they led by 36-23 (40-22 in October).

Essential voting intentions

The Essential poll’s new website has a graph of voting intentions. We had a voting intentions release in late October, but there are two November data points on the graph.

In late October, Labor led by 49-44 on Essential’s “two party-preferred-plus” measure that includes undecided voters – other polls exclude undecided to get their two party estimates. In early November, Labor’s lead was reduced to 46-44 and in mid-November it rose slightly to 48-45.

In the mid-November poll, the federal government’s ratings for handling COVID dropped to 45-29 good from 48-29 in early November. There was a 34-34 tie between the Coalition and Labor on managing the economy generally. When economic management was asked along with other issue questions in early November, the Coalition led by 41-33.

Morgan poll

In a mid-November Morgan poll from a sample of almost 2,800, Labor led by 55.5-44.5, a 2% gain since the early November poll. Primary votes were 35.5% Coalition (down 1%), 35.5% Labor (up 0.5%), 12% Greens (up 0.5%), 3.5% One Nation (up 0.5%) and 13.5% for all others (down 0.5%).

Morgan is using respondent allocated preferences, while Newspoll uses preference flows at the 2019 election. Bonham is very sceptical of Morgan’s blowout Labor lead.

Morgan Victorian poll: Labor extends huge lead

A Morgan SMS Victorian state poll, conducted November 24 from a sample of 1,105, gave Labor a 59.5-40.5 lead, a 1.5% gain for Labor since November 11. Primary votes were 45% Labor (up 2%), 29% Coalition (down 2%), 10.5% Greens (down 0.5%), 4% UAP (up 1%), 2% Derryn Hinch’s Justice (steady) and 6% independents (down 0.5%).

Premier Daniel Andrews had a 63.5-36.5 approval rating (60.5-39.5 on November 11). By 76-24, voters agreed with the health policy that an employee is not allowed to enter their employer’s workplace unless fully vaccinated.

Read more:
Victorian Labor’s pandemic bill would pass easily if electoral reforms were enacted before 2018 election; Labor way ahead in polls

NSW Resolve poll: Coalition comfortably ahead

In a NSW Resolve poll for The Sydney Morning Herald, the state Coalition had 41% of the primary vote (steady since September), Labor 31% (up one), the Greens 10% (down one), the Shooters 2% (steady) and independents 12% (up two). Bonham estimates 53-47 to the Coalition after preferences.

Premier Dominic Perrottet led Labor’s Chris Minns as preferred premier by 34-23 (48-21 to former premier Gladys Berejiklian in September). This poll would have been conducted with the federal Resolve polls in October and November from about 1,100 respondents.

“Almost two-thirds” supported voluntary assisted dying and just 11% were opposed. Of those polled, 43% said Berejiklian should not have resigned based on revelations before ICAC. Berejiklian’s net likeability (positive minus negative views) was between +30 and +40 before her resignation. It dropped to +20 before the ICAC hearings, but has rebounded to +31.

Adrian Beaumont 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. Labor maintains clear Newspoll lead, but there’s been an overall shift to the Coalition since October – https://theconversation.com/labor-maintains-clear-newspoll-lead-but-theres-been-an-overall-shift-to-the-coalition-since-october-172956

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katherine (Kate) Power, Lecturer in Management, School of Business, The University of Queensland

In the arts in Australia, precarious employment, unpaid work and short-lived careers are the norm.

Many artists and arts workers have “portfolio careers”, piecing together a mixture of jobs while competing for limited funding and career opportunities in the arts.

COVID-19 shone a glaring spotlight on this precarity, exposing the lack of permanent jobs in the sector. Some 81% of artists work as freelancers or on a self-employed basis, without access to sick leave or other entitlements many Australians take for granted.

But the unsustainability of creative careers was already well known to artists, academics and governments.

Career sustainability

In 2019, I set out to understand what “sustainability” means to Australia’s arts and culture sector. I analysed 564 annual reports published between 2010 and 2018 and over 2,700 submissions in the 2014 and 2015 Senate Inquiry into arts funding. I also interviewed 33 artists and arts managers representing all parts of the performing arts sector.

One interviewee defined a “sustainable career” as:

one in which you’re employed in your practice to the extent that you can live. For a lot of artists that’s just about a roof over their head and feeding themselves. […] I think we should be able to have mortgages and raise kids […] I look at some of the singers that I work with and that’s really hard for them to do.

Even artists who are successful in multiple facets of their career – including some of our most celebrated theatre directors – can feel like these careers are not sustainable.

One contributor to the Senate Inquiry observed:

Artists can have successful exhibitions, be collected by national and international institutions, and still not make a sustainable living.

Interestingly, I observed significant differences in how different arts companies wrote about sustainability in their annual reports. Career sustainability was mentioned more often by theatre companies than other art forms. Opera and circus tied in second place. While comparable data is not available for Australia, findings from the UK suggest a high percentage of freelancers working in theatre might explain this difference.

Inherent demands

Working in the performing arts involves both physical demands and mental strain. Artists described to me how they have to maintain “the body of an elite athlete” and how the “obsessive requirement to be excellent all the time” leads to “consistent performance-related anxiety.”

The inevitable long hours and extensive travel also make this a family-unfriendly career. Artists explained the expectation they work outside of ordinary business hours, the need to “travel where the work is” and feeling like they needed to leave the arts if they wanted to raise a family.

These pressures arise from both the limited opportunities and intense competition within the arts and culture sector, which make many people feel they have to accept any opportunity – and work under any conditions – in order not to be left behind.

In my research, I found all of these issues became compounded when measures of diversity were considered.

Gender inequity presents one barrier to career sustainability. Interviewees also told me First Nations artists, deaf and disabled artists, regional and remote artists, and artists from lower socio-economic backgrounds face even greater challenges. Recent research by the Australia Council for the Arts reveals the same is true for culturally and linguistically diverse artists.

Read more:
The problem with arts funding in Australia goes right back to its inception

Financial constraints

In the interviews taken as part of my research, I repeatedly found financial constraints underpin three problems causing career unsustainability in the arts.

1. Low incomes:

being brutal about it […] I have as good a freelance load as anyone probably going around Australia […] and my wife needs to be working full-time for us to be financially sustainable.

2. Unpaid work:

you really only get paid if you’re performing and if you’re lucky enough, you might get paid for the rehearsals beforehand

3. Excessive workloads:

the level of burnout in this industry is pretty shocking […] we’re all overworked and constantly tired.

The obvious solution is more abundant and ongoing public and philanthropic support. As one interviewee explained:

Increased government funding for the arts is […] the first and most important step in the career sustainability of artists because it flows through everything else.

But other creative solutions are also needed to make artistic careers more sustainable. These include: increasing diversity within arts sector leadership; teaching student artists to develop an “adaptive entrepreneurial identity”; and fostering community and collective support among artists and arts managers.

Read more:
NZ Budget 2021: we need the arts to live, but artists need to earn a living

Moving towards ‘decent work’ for all

The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 8 calls for “full and productive employment and decent work for all.”

In 2019, the International Labour Organization began exploring what “decent work” means for arts and culture. Australian politicians, policymakers, and sector leaders need to do the same.

These three steps will help.

1. Recognise artists are workers.

This would mean paying serious attention to the conditions of contemporary artistic labour, which would pave the way to addressing both precarity and structural inequalities within the arts and culture sector.

2. Accept decent work is a human right.

This would mean acknowledging artists and arts managers (like all people) are entitled to gain a living from their work, then developing policies to prioritise the creation of good jobs within the arts and culture sector.

3. Implement decent work for artists.

For artists, this means rejecting any expectation creatives might “work for exposure.” For arts companies, it means putting artists on payroll, embedding fair pay and conditions within all arts organisations, and supporting cultural change across the sector.

Kate Power receives funding from The Advance Queensland Industry Research Fellowships program.

– ref. The crisis of a career in culture: why sustaining a livelihood in the arts is so hard – https://theconversation.com/the-crisis-of-a-career-in-culture-why-sustaining-a-livelihood-in-the-arts-is-so-hard-171732

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Denise Fisher, Visiting Fellow, ANU Centre for European Studies, Australian National University

France is persisting with its decision to hold the final of three independence referendums in New Caledonia on December 12, disregarding Indigenous independence leaders’ calls for a postponement of the vote and now for “non-participation” – effectively a boycott – due to the impact of the COVID pandemic on their communities.

The decision threatens France’s own 30-year peace process in the semi-autonomous territory, as well as stability in its preeminent Pacific possession. A boycott of the vote by the Indigenous Kanak population could potentially return the territory to the turmoil of the 1980s, with regional consequences.

Why is another independence referendum happening?

The Indigenous-based independence movement gathered strength in New Caledonia in the 1970s and early 1980s as France rolled back autonomy provisions it had agreed to and encouraged immigration from other parts of France to outnumber independence supporters.

By the 1980s, Kanak frustration led to violent protests in the territory and a boycott of an independence referendum in 1987. This was followed by deadly shootings between Kanaks and French militias months later during the French presidential elections.

The Matignon/Oudinot Accord in 1988, negotiated by the French government between pro- and anti-independence groups, ended the violence. This was followed by the Noumea Accord in 1998, which promised a three-vote process for independence.

Read more:
Explainer: New Caledonia’s independence referendum, and how it could impact the region

The first two referendums, held in 2018 and 2020, delivered record turnouts (over 80%) and a slight majority for staying with France. There was, however, a large (and growing) Kanak support base for independence, rising from 43.3% to 46.7%. Just 10,000 votes separated the two sides in 2020.

A third vote was expected to be close, with both sides courting the 25,000 people who abstained in 2020 (of 180,000 total eligible voters). However, Kanak “non-participation” would render the vote politically void, as it did in 1987.

This final vote can be held any time before October 2022. The loyalist parties who support remaining a part of France favoured an earlier vote to consolidate their majority and allow for speedy recovery of the stagnating economy.

Independence parties preferred a later vote to maximise their chances to gain a majority.

To avoid overlap with French elections next year, the French government chose December 12 for the referendum over the opposition of independence parties.

France takes a less neutral approach

In the first two campaigns, France scrupulously observed impartiality and invited international observers. For this final vote, it has been less neutral.

For starters, the discussions on preparing for the final vote did not include all major independence party leaders. The paper required by French law explaining the consequences of the referendum to voters favoured the no side this time, to the point where loyalists used it as a campaign brochure.

The French government also selectively commissioned and released opinion polls on the role of France in New Caledonia, while the local media has highlighted the potential negative effects of independence on health and other services.

Visiting Tahiti in July, President Emmanuel Macron spoke in strong terms of the threats to small isolated Pacific islands without France to protect them. France is also deploying more security personnel to New Caledonia for this year’s vote.

Read more:
Why New Caledonia’s instability is not just a problem for France

An ominous impasse with the Kanaks

The impact of the COVID pandemic has played a major role in this year’s referendum.

New Caledonia had experienced few cases and no deaths from the start of the pandemic until the Delta variant made its way to the territory in September. Since then, there have been nearly 300 deaths, most in the Kanak community.

Citing Kanak mourning rites involving lengthy community grieving, independence leaders sought a postponement of the December 12 vote, emphasising the potential effect on campaigning and turnout.

The Customary Senate, the assembly of the Kanak area councils, declared a 12-month mourning period, while the pro-independence leaders threatened Kanak “non-participation” in the vote.

However, France’s overseas territory minister, Sebastien Lecornu, confirmed the December date. He said France’s non-compulsory voting system allowed anyone to choose not to participate if they wished.

The reaction among Kanaks was strong. Independence leaders reaffirmed their call for peaceful non-participation, eschewing the term “boycott” because of its association with the 1987 referendum boycott and the violence that followed. They noted, though, their 30,000 young Kanak supporters would not necessarily obey.

They also formed a new strategy committee to prepare a response to France’s decision to proceed with the vote. One leader described the decision as an “apparent declaration of war on Kanaks”.

On December 5, a group of largely Kanaks asked France’s highest court of appeal to urgently review the decision and postpone the vote until after the June French elections.

The pro-independence parties have said they would contest the result if the referendum goes ahead, and would not participate in discussions about the territory’s future that France has proposed for the day after the vote.

What the referendum means for the region

If there is instability or violence in New Caledonia, or a contested referendum outcome, it will impact the region.

France’s role in the Pacific will again be at issue, as it was in the 1980s. Then, regional governments focused international attention on France’s handling of its territories’ decolonisation demands and its nuclear testing in French Polynesia, ultimately leading France to change its ways.

Read more:
315 nuclear bombs and ongoing suffering: the shameful history of nuclear testing in Australia and the Pacific

France’s revised policies and serious diplomatic efforts have enabled it to forge new partnerships with Australia, New Zealand and Pacific island governments. Thus, France’s treatment of its overseas territories ultimately underpins its role in the region and its Indo-Pacific vision.

Regional leaders and analysts have urged the French government to have a rethink of its handling of this decisive vote.

The Melanesian Spearhead Group, comprising Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and New Caledonia’s independence coalition, has called for postponing the referendum in the United Nations.

A “Pacific Elders Group” has also written to Macron, seeking respect for Kanak grieving custom. Vanuatu Prime Minister Bob Loughman and French Polynesian independence leader Oscar Temaru have lent their vocal support to the independence leaders.

And late last month, over 60 international academics with years of experience working on New Caledonia expressed concern over the referendum date in an open letter published by Le Monde.

For France, Australia and the rest of the region, New Caledonia’s referendum may not be the democratic beacon for the future it was designed to be, but instead, a portent of instability.

Denise Fisher 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 New Caledonia’s final independence vote could lead to instability and tarnish France’s image in the region – https://theconversation.com/why-new-caledonias-final-independence-vote-could-lead-to-instability-and-tarnish-frances-image-in-the-region-172128

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tristan Kennedy, Associate professor, Macquarie University

Mainstream media is often understood as a reflection of national identity. Television media in Australia has documented Australian lives since its inception in 1956.

For First Nations people however, their voices in this reflection have been largely absent. Non-Indigenous presenters and journalists have historically been in charge of telling the stories about Indigenous people.

In recent times, meaningful self-reflection by some elements of the media industry has seen improvements. However, there is still a need for greater representation of First Nations peoples’ perspectives in the media – particularly in relation to Indigenous issues.

Read more:
First Nations kids make up about 20% of missing children, but get a fraction of the media coverage

Racism in Australian media

The link between racism in the media and racism in our communities is no new thing. In 1991, the National Inquiry into Racist Violence in Australia found:

considerable evidence to indicate that racism in media reporting can damage community relations and create a social climate which is tolerant of racist violence.

Nearly 30 years later, Muruwari journalist Allan Clarke wrote about taking a break from Australian journalism due to the ongoing inequalities he observed in the Australian media industry. Clarke wrote:

Rarely are deaths in custody presented in context; rarely is our culture presented in context; rarely is our history presented in context.

The exclusion of Indigenous voices in the media causes more than minor discomfort. The under-representation of Indigenous perspectives contributes to the marginalisation of Indigenous peoples. Young Indigenous people turn on their television to see only scarce representation of their own people and culture. This sends a message that First Nations people come second to the white majority.
That message sticks.

In addition, non-Indigenous peoples who fail to think critically about what they see on mainstream media are similarly affected. The overwhelming representation of whiteness on morning breakfast shows, for instance, reinforces the notion that Australia is first and foremost a country of white people and excludes Indigenous peoples.

This is just one of the 47 conditions of daily experience non-Indigenous academic Jenny Tannoch-Bland outlined in her article in 1998 that characterises white race privilege.

Representation of Indigenous perspectives

Representations of Indigenous Australian peoples in mainstream media has been clumsy and offensive in many cases.

Bill Leak famously caused outrage with a racist cartoon depicting Indigenous fathers as disinterested alcoholics. Channel Seven made headlines for its 2018 discussion of adoption of Indigenous children where social commentator Prue McSween intimated she thought a new Stolen Generation might be necessary.

After much criticism of mainstream media, broadcasters in Australia are increasing Indigenous representation in their teams.

The ABC has benefited from the work of renowned journalists like Bundjalung woman Miriam Corowa and Dja Dja Wurrung and Yorta Yorta woman Bridget Brennan.

ABC News has also recently replaced sports anchor Paul Kennedy with Barranbinya man and ex-footballer Tony Armstrong. As Armstrong told the Sydney Morning Herald earlier this year,

I really look different. And that’s obviously a broader issue the Australian media’s got.

The introduction of NITV, launched by SBS in 2012, is described as both “a channel made by, for and about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people”. And, “a channel for all Australians” has brought more Indigenous perspectives into Australian living rooms.

Researcher Amy Thomas and Indigenous researcher Yin Paradies noted recently the increased “inclusion” of Indigenous perspectives across mainstream newspaper and television networks. However, they found this often doesn’t go further than “surface level inclusion”.

According to Thomas and Paradies, surface level inclusion is:

absence of negative stereotypes, but excluding Indigenous authors, perspectives, historical and cultural contexts, and voices.

However, positives can be seen in the rise of social media. A recent report highlighted how Indigenous peoples saw social media as a rich site for self-publishing. This provides a platform for First Nations people to challenge mainstream media exclusion and misinformation about them.

Social media is fast becoming a viable alternative to mainstream media outlets, such as television and news platforms that continue to fail First Nations people. Those media outlets will slowly become less relevant as Indigenous peoples embrace new and innovative channels which allow self-publication of stories and opinions that matter to them.

Indigenous young people need to see their valuable place in society by seeing themselves better represented on television and in newspapers. Australian media need to take a close look at whose voices they are privileging.

Tristan Kennedy 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. Media inclusion of Indigenous peoples is increasing but there is still room for improvement – https://theconversation.com/media-inclusion-of-indigenous-peoples-is-increasing-but-there-is-still-room-for-improvement-172130

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christian Brakenridge, PhD Candidate, Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute

New figures show global diabetes prevalence has increased by 16% in the past two years, with 537 million adults (aged 20-79) now estimated to be living with the chronic condition.

Over this same time period, COVID has stopped us doing some of the things that help prevent and manage diabetes. One particularly concerning example is an increase to sedentary behaviour (sitting down for long periods of time), which was already at dangerous levels pre-COVID. Some estimates indicate the pandemic added an average three hours to our sitting time each day.

Now lockdowns have eased in many places, it is vital we get moving again – and in the right way – to change this picture.

Reducing sitting time is a good starting place to help people with diabetes, pre-diabetes and other chronic conditions to reach healthier levels of physical activity.

Read more:
Fewer diabetes patients are picking up their insulin prescriptions – another way the pandemic has delayed health care for many

A growing global problem

Data from the International Diabetes Federation’s 10th Diabetes Atlas, officially launched today, shows about 10% of the world’s population aged 20–79 now live with diabetes, and diabetes prevalence is predicted to steadily increase to around 784 million adults by 2045.

Most of these people live with type 2 diabetes, a chronic condition that affects the way the body processes blood sugar (glucose). In type 2 diabetes, repeated fluctuations in blood glucose levels eventually mean the body doesn’t respond properly with insulin – the hormone produced that allows glucose to go from the blood to the cells.

This can progress to common diabetes complications such as blindness, nerve damage, heart disease and kidney disease. Recent reports point to an even wider range of diabetes impacts like increased risk of liver disease, dementia, depression, and some cancers.

Our research highlights regular movement as a key way to help manage diabetes and help prevent complications. Getting moving effectively improves glucose control, blood pressure, vascular health and memory.

Read more:
A disease that breeds disease: why is type 2 diabetes linked to increased risk of cancer and dementia?

Moving out of lockdown

As we transition to COVID-normal, we must leave lockdown levels of physical inactivity and sedentary behaviour behind.

Reducing sitting time is a good “first step” because it appears more achievable for many and less daunting than a new exercise regime, especially for people who have been highly inactive or who live with a chronic health condition.

Simple lifestyle strategies to reduce sitting time and replace it with either standing or, even better, light physical activity improve metabolism, and for people with type 2 diabetes can prevent and help “sponge up” rising blood glucose levels if insulin isn’t being produced properly.

Breaking up sitting every hour with just two or three minutes of walking can make a difference to glucose control compared with prolonged and uninterrupted sitting. And some evidence shows greater time spent doing light activities daily like household chores, playing with pets, or light garden work, can provide greater blood sugar control over 24 hours than structured workouts.

We are currently testing how these small changes influence diabetes in a clinical trial. Our goal is to help desk workers with diabetes reduce and break up their sitting time.

Lorys’ story

One of our trial participants, Lorys, 64, was gutted when he was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes 11 years ago.

Like many people, he was leading a sedentary lifestyle. A demanding job involving long hours at the computer meant he was sitting for most of the day, stressed and anxious about his health. Diabetes medication wasn’t improving his blood glucose levels as much as he would have liked. Then the pandemic arrived and working from home exacerbated the problem because he was doing less everyday activity, such as walking to and around the office.

As part of the trial, Lorys has started using a sit-stand workstation and an activity tracker to encourage regular short walks throughout the day. He’s focussed on gradual lifestyle changes, small steps that feel achievable and have already added up to make a big difference.

Since the start of this year, Lorys’ HbA1c level – a key diabetes health marker – has almost halved. He’s lost weight and says his mental outlook is more positive. He says he no longer thinks of diabetes as a “death sentence”.

Read more:
Got pre-diabetes? Here’s five things to eat or avoid to prevent type 2 diabetes

5 ways to quit the sit

Whether we have type 2 diabetes, pre-diabetes, or just want to get back to a healthier lifestyle post-lockdowns, most of us can benefit from some simple changes:

1. try using a height-adjustable (sit-to-stand) desk. Start standing for a few minutes each day and gradually scale up to standing or walking for 30 minutes of every hour

2. use phone meetings or phone calls as a prompt to stand

3. try walking work meetings or catching up with friends for a walk

4. after finishing a work task or an episode of your favourite TV show, take a short walk around the block

5. set a calendar reminder or use a wearable device to prompt you to stand up and move regularly throughout the day.

It’s been a tough couple of years, especially for people living which chronic health conditions. But it’s not too late to make changes to prevent and manage diabetes and its complications.

Christian Brakenridge receives funding from a Research Training Program scholarship through Australian Catholic University and is supported by the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute.

David Dunstan receives funding from National Health and Medical Research Council and Diabetes Australia.

– ref. COVID saw us sitting longer – and diabetes rose globally by 16% in 2 years. Time to get moving – https://theconversation.com/covid-saw-us-sitting-longer-and-diabetes-rose-globally-by-16-in-2-years-time-to-get-moving-171945

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa Marie Emerson, Senior Lecturer in Child and Family Psychology, University of Canterbury

Research has tremendous potential to help the estimated 93,000 autistic New Zealanders live the lives they want to live. The trouble is, funding for autism research is currently skewed away from the areas autistic people themselves say would be most useful.

When asked what future autism research should be prioritised, autistic people and autism communities often point to the need for support and services in education, health and well-being across all ages.

Yet we found a staggering two-thirds of funding for autism research awarded in Aotearoa New Zealand has been invested in projects that seek to understand biological differences associated with autism.

By contrast, 32% of total funding was invested in research into support for autistic people. There was no investment in research aimed at maximising the quality of life of autistic people by addressing the accessibility and quality of services, or into the needs of autistic people as they age.

Read more:
Autism advocacy and research misses the mark if autistic people are left out

Biology bias

Within Aotearoa there are multiple perspectives on autism. According to a Western viewpoint, it’s a neuro-developmental condition characterised by differences in the way people think, how they perceive the world and how they process social information, including communication and interaction with others. Indigenous understandings emphasise the valuing of such differences within the community.

A medicalised view that sees autism as a deficit may have contributed to a dominance of biological research. But looking through the window of biology gives us only one perspective on the vulnerabilities autistic people may face.

Read more:
Autism advocacy and research misses the mark if autistic people are left out

This is out of step with the preferences autistic people actually describe, yet the pattern is largely similar across Western countries.

In 2019, the International Autism Coordinating Committee published a report looking at autism research funding in the UK, Canada, US and Australia. Across all countries, the largest proportion of funding was allocated to basic science research, with 36% invested in biological research and 23% invested in causes and risk factors such as genetics and epigenetics. Only 16% was invested in supports, and 5% in services.

Support in daily life

For autism research to be more relevant to the autistic community, it must realign with their own priorities. To that end, an international movement toward genuine partnership in autism research has evolved. Autistic people are being included in the research process, from generating ideas through to carrying out the research and sharing the findings.

In the UK and Australia, researchers and autistic people have co-produced autism research priorities driven by community perspectives. The highest-rated priorities included more applied research, which seeks to find solutions to practical challenges autistic people face.

Read more:
How to help autistic children socialise in school

For example, research can address problems in education and the workplace, and how more inclusive spaces and practices might enable autistic people to be accepted and valued.

Research that aims to find ways of improving public knowledge and acceptance of autism could help address discrimination and stigma. Such a neurodiversity perspective frames neurological differences not as deficits but as natural variations of human experience.

Away from tokenism

To establish the research priorities of the autistic community in Aotearoa New Zealand, the Health Research Council has funded a project I’ve been leading throughout 2021, involving a team of autistic and non-autistic researchers.

From a series of community focus groups (including parents and whānau, Māori, healthcare and education practitioners, Pacific peoples and other researchers) we designed an online survey that is now open to the autism community.

Read more:
Research on facial expressions challenges the way we think about autism

We are also interviewing autistic young people to find out what they think. We plan to share all findings with the community, researchers and funders next year.

My hope is that this partnership project can inform the future direction of autism research in Aotearoa New Zealand – both in terms of the questions we ask and the way we try to answer them.

By listening to the preferences and priorities of the autistic community we hope to go beyond the tokenistic towards a genuine inclusiveness in research. Autistic partnership in the research moves us away from “research on” to “research with”, and can directly tackle the problems created by the present lack of balance in autism research.

Lisa Marie Emerson receives funding from the Health Research Council, Cure Kids and A Better Start.

– ref. Autistic people need a greater say in where NZ’s autism research funding is spent – here’s a way forward – https://theconversation.com/autistic-people-need-a-greater-say-in-where-nzs-autism-research-funding-is-spent-heres-a-way-forward-171948

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Justin St. P. Walsh, Associate professor of art history and archaeology, Chapman University

A new era of space stations is about to kick off. NASA has announced three commercial space station proposals for development, joining an earlier proposal by Axiom Space.

These proposals are the first attempts to create places for humans to live and work in space outside the framework of government space agencies. They’re part of what has been called “Space 4.0”, where space technology is driven by commercial opportunities. Many believe this is what it will take to get humans to Mars and beyond.

There are currently two occupied space stations in low Earth orbit (less than 2,000km above Earth’s surface), both belonging to space agencies. The International Space Station (ISS) has been occupied since November 2000 with a typical population of seven crew members. The first module of the Chinese station Tiangong was launched in April 2021, and is intermittently occupied by three crew.

The ISS, however, is slated to retire at the end of the decade, after nearly 30 years in orbit. It has been an important symbol of international cooperation following the “space race” rivalry of the Cold War, and the first truly long-term space habitat.

Plans for multiple private space stations represent a major shift in how space will be used. But will these stations change the way people live in space, or replicate the traditions of earlier space habitats?

Commercialising life in space

The change is driven by NASA’s support for commercialising space. This emphasis really started about a decade ago with the development of private cargo services to supply the ISS, like SpaceX’s Cargo Dragon, and private vehicles to deliver astronauts to orbit and the Moon, such as SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, Boeing’s Starliner, and Lockheed Martin’s Orion capsules.

Start-up Axiom Space was awarded a $140 million contract by NASA in February 2020 for a private module to be attached to the ISS. Axiom announced Philippe Starck will design a luxurious interior.

Starck compares it to “a nest, a comfortable and friendly egg”. There’s also a huge viewing area with two-metre-high windows for tourists to look out at Earth and space.

The first module is due to be delivered to the ISS in 2024 or 2025, with others following each year. By the time the ISS is decommissioned around 2030, Axiom’s modules will become a free-flying station.

Axiom has signed a contract with French-Italian contractor Thales Alenia Space, which built close to 50% of the ISS’s habitable volume for NASA and the European Space Agency, to produce its habitat.

But there’s more. Three other groups have just been selected for the first phase of NASA’s Commercial LEO Destinations competition to build free-flying space stations to replace ISS.

First, a group composed of Nanoracks, Voyager Space, and Lockheed Martin proposed a station called Starlab to provide research, manufacturing, and tourism opportunities. This was almost immediately followed by a competing project called Orbital Reef, by Blue Origin, Sierra Space, and Boeing. A third project, by Northrop Grumman, will be made of modules based on its existing Cygnus cargo vehicle.

But how are space stations actually used?

Less clear is whether the private space stations will be more liveable than earlier generations of space stations, like Salyut, Mir, and ISS.

Typically, older space stations were designed to meet engineering constraints rather than starting with crew comfort. What lessons have been learned to make life better in space?

Until recently, there was little research that focused on the lived experience of astronauts on space stations. That’s where social science approaches, such as the ones we are using in the International Space Station Archaeological Project, come in.

Read more:
How to live in space: what we’ve learned from 20 years of the International Space Station

Since 2015, we have developed new, data-driven understandings of how ISS crew adapt to life in a context of confinement, isolation, and microgravity. We observe and measure their interactions with built spaces and the objects surrounding them. What are the patterns of usage of different spaces and items?

Asking these kinds of questions reveals information never considered in habitat design before. It turns out the crew don’t necessarily use the spaces inside the ISS the way they were designed – for example, they personalise different areas with visual displays of items that reflect their beliefs, interests, and identity.

The crew also doesn’t use all spaces inside ISS equally. People from different genders, nationalities, and space agencies appear in some modules more than others among the 16 that make up the station. These patterns are related to the way work is divided up between crews and agencies, as well as the layout of the modules themselves.

One big challenge of life in orbit is the lack of gravity. Objects like handrails, Velcro, bungee cords, and resealable plastic bags act as “gravity surrogates” by fixing objects in place while everything else floats around. Our research is mapping how crew adapt these gravity surrogates to make their activities more efficient, and how the placement of the surrogates changes the way different spaces are used.

Society and culture in space

Even with added luxury features like large windows, designers and engineers have a long way to go to make space stations efficient, comfortable, and welcoming, especially for the predicted space tourism market.

The plans for privately-owned and -operated space stations are undeniably ambitious and could transform how humans live in this environment. But it’s likely that the companies working on them don’t yet know what they don’t know about how people actually use space habitats.

Only by turning towards new kinds of questions and research from a social and cultural perspective will they be able to make real changes that can improve mission success and crew well-being.

The International Space Station Archaeological Project receives funding from the Australian Research Council. ISSAP is employing Axiom Space to help implement an experiment on ISS in 2022.

Alice Gorman receives funding from the Australian Research Council for the International Space Station Archaeological Project. She is a member of the Advisory Council of the Space Industry Association of Australia.

– ref. Private space stations are coming. Will they be better than their predecessors? – https://theconversation.com/private-space-stations-are-coming-will-they-be-better-than-their-predecessors-170871