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

There’s a nice story about Arthur Fadden – the Country Party leader who became PM in the 1941 hung parliament amid conservative leadership turmoil – deciding not to move into the Lodge after a colleague told him he’d “scarcely have enough time to wear a track from the backdoor to the shithouse before you’ll be out”.

The warning was prophetic: Fadden was dispatched in little over a month, replaced in a House of Representatives vote by Labor’s John Curtin.

Scott Morrison, ensconced in Kirribilli, has already had a longer spell than Fadden, and his government appears safe in parliament, despite losing its majority. Regardless of these differences, Morrison’s likely trajectory seems as clear as that of “Artie” all those years ago.

The widespread feeling that the Morrison government is doomed will only be reinforced by this week’s outbreak of hostilities between the former and current prime ministers.

At one level, it’s hard to believe we’re seeing a rerun of this old script; at another, it confirms that disunity has become baked into a Liberal party probably unable to get beyond its dysfunction without a cleansing period in opposition.

For three years, Turnbull had to endure the sniping of Tony Abbott, the man he brought down. Now Turnbull is the sniper at the window, though Morrison didn’t cause his fall (unless you buy the conspiracy theory).

Turnbull’s mood is dark. That is understandable. It is also dangerous for the government, especially as many voters neither understood nor welcomed the leadership change.

This week’s fallout from Turnbull’s Indonesian excursion has undermined Morrison on foreign policy – about which he gave his first major address on Thursday – and cast doubt on his personal credibility.

As is now well known, Turnbull’s trip representing Australia at a conference about oceans included talks with President Joko Widodo, who was smarting from Morrison’s announcement that Australia would consider moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. After the talks, Turnbull met the media and issued a strong warning against such a move.

On Thursday, an obviously frustrated Morrison told 2GB’s Alan Jones the former prime minister wouldn’t be sent on any more missions. “He was there to actually attend an oceans conference, the issues of trade and other things of course were not really part of the brief,” Morrison said, in what turned out to be an unfortunate gloss.

Turnbull immediately took to Twitter, to set out “a few facts”.

He said Morrison had “asked me to discuss trade and the embassy issue in Bali and we had a call before I left to confirm his messages which I duly relayed” to the President. “There was a detailed paper on the issue in my official brief as well”, Turnbull added.

That left Morrison with some explaining to do. In a statement he said he’d invited Turnbull to represent him at the oceans conference and to be “head of delegation”.

“He was briefed on appropriate responses on other issues that could be raised in any direct discussions with the President, in his role of head of delegation. Accordingly there were briefings dealing with the issues he [Turnbull] has referred to,” Morrison said, reiterating that “the purpose of his attendance was the Oceans conference”.

The different emphases in the two accounts stands out. Turnbull suggests he was asked to actively convey messages; Morrison’s version is that Turnbull was given “responses” to provide.

Obviously it was risky for Morrison to send Turnbull in the first place; equally, it was provocative of Turnbull to speak publicly about the content of his talks and, especially, to air his disagreement with government policy.

Read more: View from The Hill: When you’re not PM but behave like you are

The week has been another demonstration of those “transaction” costs of an ill-advised switch of leaders – costs also reflected in Monday’s Newspoll, showing the Coalition going backwards to trail Labor 46-54%.

After some initial favourable publicity Morrison is now widely referred to, often disparagingly, as coming from a “marketing” background. His political fixes are viewed, cynically but accurately, through that prism.

Read more: Poll wrap: Morrison’s ratings slump in Newspoll; Wentworth’s huge difference in on-the-day and early voting

Take for example the government’s plan to remove the remaining about 40 children from Nauru by Christmas.

It is responding to increasing public concern. But one can’t help thinking it probably calculates that if just the children (and their families) are taken off, the immediate public pressure will go away too. No need for it to feel much urgency about all those male refugees on Manus, because they don’t have the same political salience.

What it says about even the children is, however, grudging and misleading. Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton insists they’ll not stay in Australia, but eventually end up elsewhere, whether the US, another third country or their home country.

In practice, from all we know from the past, many or most will remain here. But the government won’t admit that, supposedly because to do so might encourage the people smugglers. Does it really think they are so easily fooled? What actually deters them is the Australian flotilla ready to turn back their boats.

Dutton on Thursday also effectively ruled out sending people to New Zealand, even if Labor passed the legislation to close the “back door” to Australia.

“My judgment at the moment, based on all of the advice available to me is that New Zealand would be a pull factor at this point in time,” he told Sky.

The strategy seems clear. Fix the issue of the children, then paint Labor’s commitment to send people to New Zealand as one that would encourage the boats to restart.

Presumably Turnbull will be asked about refugees when he does Q&A next Thursday. With a full program to himself, he’ll be quizzed about a lot of matters, including energy and climate change policy, as well as the Jerusalem debate – which did not rate even a mention in Morrison’s Thursday speech.

There’s inevitable speculation about whether Turnbull will wear his leather jacket. The real question is what persona the man in the jacket, whether it’s leather or cloth, will choose to adopt. Morrison, for one, will be sweating on the answer.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrea Carson, Incoming Associate Professor at LaTrobe University. Former Lecturer, Political Science, School of Social and Political Sciences; Honorary Research Fellow, Centre for Advancing Journalism, University of Melbourne

Today on Media Files, a podcast about the major themes and issues in the media, we’re looking at the future newsroom.

We often hear about the doom and gloom of established media companies as they shed staff and revenues, but is there hope for journalism and a new style of digital newsroom? We ask of the man with an ambitious mission to launch 100 media start-ups in three years: what does the future newsroom look like?

Our guest is co-founder and CEO of Splice Media, Alan Soon. Based in Singapore, Alan is a former journalist and producer at Yahoo, CNBC, Bloomberg and Kyodo News, and is promising a million dollars to give to start-ups to transform media in Asia.

We talked about:

• Challenges and opportunities for start-ups

• His pledge to launch 100 digital media start-ups in Asia over three years with a $1 million fund – and where the money comes from

• Why he thinks Asia lacks a robust ecosystem around media start-ups.

• How to build communities around membership and make a media start-up financially sustainable.

• Media trends and innovations that he expects we will see more of in the future.

• How limiting the different regulatory environments and political norms such as regard for freedom of expression may be in parts of Asia.

And much, much more.

Read more: Media Files: Guardian Australia’s Katharine Murphy and former MP David Feeney on the digital disruption of media and politics

Media Files is produced by a team of journalists and academics who have spent decades working in and reporting on the media industry. They’re passionate about sharing their understanding of the media landscape, especially how journalists operate, how media policy is changing, and how commercial manoeuvres and digital disruption are affecting the kinds of media and journalism we consume.

Media Files will be out every month, with occasional off-schedule episodes released when we’ve got fresh analysis we can’t wait to share with you. To make sure you don’t miss an episode, find us and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, in Pocket Casts or wherever you find your podcasts. And while you’re there, please rate and review us – it really helps others to find us.

You can find more podcast episodes from The Conversation here.

Read more: Media Files: ABC boss Michelle Guthrie sacked, but the board won’t say why

Recorded at the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Advancing Journalism. Producer: Andy Hazel. Production assistance Gavin Nebauer.

Additional audio

Theme music by Susie Wilkins.

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

Anne Summers, who has worn many hats during her career – journalist, editor, activist, senior public servant, and prime ministerial advisor – is concerned about the slow progress in Australia in addressing sexual harassment and assault.

“I don’t know what it is that is holding [MeToo] back here,” Summers tells The Conversation. She believes there should be more naming of perpetrators, with the proviso that “obviously it’s got to be justified, obviously you don’t do it rashly and without and very credible evidence”.

“I don’t see why you can’t name somebody who has been shown to have abused his position like that,” she said.

Summers, who’s long campaigned on the issue of violence against women, declares “a forensic approach is urgent”. “I worry some of the research is not really problem-solving and focusing on how to end violence. It’s seeking more to understand the impact – and I think we already know the impact.”

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

Anne Summers, who has worn many hats during her career – journalist, editor, activist, senior public servant, and prime ministerial advisor – is concerned about the slow progress in Australia in addressing sexual harassment and assault.

“I don’t know what it is that is holding [MeToo] back here,” Summers tells The Conversation. She believes there should be more naming of perpetrators, with the proviso that “obviously it’s got to be justified, obviously you don’t do it rashly and without and very credible evidence”.

“I don’t see why you can’t name somebody who has been shown to have abused his position like that,” she said.

Summers, who’s long campaigned on the issue of violence against women, declares “a forensic approach is urgent”. “I worry some of the research is not really problem-solving and focusing on how to end violence. It’s seeking more to understand the impact – and I think we already know the impact.”

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Allan, Postdoctoral research fellow, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland

Just 20 countries are home to 94% of the world’s remaining wilderness, excluding the high seas and Antarctica, according to our new global wilderness map, published today in Nature.

A century ago, wilderness extended over most of the planet. Today, only 23% of land – excluding Antarctica – and 13% of the ocean remains free from the harmful impacts of human activities.

More than 70% of remaining wilderness is in just five countries: Australia, Russia, Canada, the United States (Alaska), and Brazil.

We argue that wilderness can still be saved. But success will depend on the steps these “mega-wilderness nations” take, or fail to take, to secure the future of Earth’s last remaining wild places.

Wilderness areas are vast tracts of untamed and unmodified land and sea. Regardless of where they are – from the lowland rainforests of Papua New Guinea, to the high taiga forests of Russia’s Arctic, to the vast deserts of inland Australia, to the great mixing zones of the Pacific, Antarctic and Indian Oceans – these areas are the last strongholds for endangered species, and perform vital functions such as storing carbon, and buffering us against the effects of climate change. In many wilderness areas, indigenous peoples, who are often the most politically and economically marginalised of all peoples, depend on them for their livelihoods and cultures.

Yet despite being important and highly threatened, wilderness areas and their values are completely overlooked in international environmental policy. In most countries, wilderness is not formally defined, mapped or protected. This means there is nothing to hold nations, industry, society and community to account for wilderness conservation.

Beyond boundaries

Almost two-thirds of marine wilderness is in the high seas, beyond nations’ immediate control. This effectively makes it a marine wild west, where fishing fleets have a free-for-all. There are some laws to manage high-seas fishing, but there is no legally binding agreement governing high-seas conservation, although the United Nations is currently negotiating such a treaty. Ensuring marine wilderness is off-limits to exploitation will be crucial.

Read more: New map shows that only 13% of the oceans are still truly wild

And we cannot forget Antarctica, arguably Earth’s greatest remaining wilderness and one of the last places on the planet where vast regions have never experienced a human footfall.

While Antarctica’s isolation and extreme climate have helped protect it from the degradation experienced elsewhere, climate change, human activity, pollution, and invasive species increasingly threaten the continent’s wildlife and wilderness.

Parties to the Antarctic Treaty must act on their commitments to help reduce human impacts, and we need to urgently curb global carbon emissions before it is too late to save Antarctica.

Read more: Earth’s wildernesses are disappearing, and not enough of them are World Heritage-listed

Our maps show how little wilderness is left, and how much has been lost in the past few decades. It is hard to believe, but between 1993 and 2009 a staggering 3.3 million square kilometres of terrestrial wilderness – an area larger than India – was lost to human settlement, farming, mining and other pressures. In the ocean, the only regions free of industrial fishing, pollution and shipping are confined to the poles or remote Pacific island nations.

Saving wilderness

Almost every nation has signed international environmental agreements that aim to end the biodiversity crisis, halt dangerous climate change, and achieve global sustainable development goals. We believe Earth’s remaining wilderness can only be secured if its importance is immediately recognised within these agreements.

At a summit in Egypt later this month, the 196 signatory nations to the Convention on Biological Diversity will work alongside scientists on developing a strategic plan for conservation beyond 2020. This is a unique opportunity for all nations to recognise that Earth’s wilderness are dwindling, and to mandate a global target for wilderness conservation.

A global target of retaining 100% of all remaining wilderness is achievable, although it would require stopping industrial activities like mining, logging, and fishing from expanding to new places. But committing explicitly to such a target would make it easier for governments and non-governmental organisations to leverage funding and mobilise action on the ground in nations that are still developing economically.

Similarly, the role of wilderness in guarding against climate change – such as by storing huge amounts of carbon – could also be formally documented in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which holds its annual conference in Poland next month. This would incentivise nations to make wilderness protection central to their climate strategies.

Mechanisms such as REDD+, which allows developing nations to claim compensation for conserving tropical forests they had planned to clear, could be extended to other carbon-rich wilderness areas such as intact seagrasses, and even to wildernesses in rich countries that do not receive climate aid, such as the Canadian tundra.

Nations have ample opportunities, through legislation and rewarding good behaviour, to prevent road and shipping lane expansion, and enforcing limits on large-scale developments and industrial fishing in their wilderness areas. They can also establish protected areas to slow the spread of industrial activity into wilderness.

Read more: The moral value of wilderness

A diverse set of approaches must be embraced, and the private sector must work with governments so that industry protects, rather than harms, wilderness areas. Key to this will be lenders’ investment and performance standards, particularly for organisations such as the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation, and the regional development banks.

Our planet faces not just a species extinction crisis, but also a wilderness extinction crisis. Once lost, our wild places are gone forever. This may be our last opportunity to save the last of the wild, we cannot afford to miss it.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Robertson, Professor and Director, Robinson Research Institute, University of Adelaide

Women are regularly reminded of their ticking biological clock. It turns out men should also pay attention to age when it comes to having a family.

A new study published today in the British Medical Journal provides persuasive evidence that children – and pregnant mums – are more likely to have health problems when dads are older.

Men’s fertility declines with age, but not as sharply as women’s. Men can continue to father children into later life – as Mick Jagger and other celebrity fathers demonstrate.

But it takes longer to get pregnant. One study in European men showed a 50% lower chance of conceiving after a year of trying at age 35, compared with men younger than 25.

Plus, women with partners age 35 and older may be more likely to experience miscarriage than those with younger partners.

Read more: Most men don’t realise age is a factor in their fertility too

Higher odds of premature birth

The latest study shows that the chances of pregnancy and birth problems are also increased when dads are older.

Researchers at Stanford University in California analysed data on all 40 million live births in the United States between 2007 and 2016 to look at how paternal age affects outcomes for the infant and the mother.

As the father’s age increased, so did the chances of the infant being born prematurely, having a low birth weight, or requiring medical intervention after delivery, such as assisted ventilation, admission to neonatal intensive care, or antibiotics.

When fathers were aged 45 years or more, their children had 14% higher odds of being born premature (less than 37 weeks) and their babies had a 14% greater risk of low birth weight (less than 2.5kg) than when fathers were aged 25 to 34 years.

Infants with fathers aged 45 years or more were also 14% more likely to be admitted to a neonatal intensive care unit, and 18% more likely to have seizures.

If the father was 55 years or older, newborns also tended to score less well on the Apgar test used to assess the health of a child at birth.

These effects were present after adjusting for the mother’s age, smoking, race, education, and number of prenatal visits.

Future risk of disease

These latest findings add to earlier studies showing older age in fathers is linked with a variety of health conditions affecting the offspring.

Scientists in Denmark have calculated the chances of congenital problems linked to older fatherhood and show that several conditions become more prevalent. These include rare developmental conditions such as achondroplasia (dwarfism) and cleft palate.

Cancer rates among offspring also seem to rise as dads become older.

Read more: Why men need to think about their fertility too

Arguably the most concerning impact is on neurodevelopment and mental health. Offspring of older fathers have an increased risk of schizophrenia, mental retardation, and autism spectrum disorders.

The risk of schizophrenia increases by 47% when fathers are over 45 years old.

The rate of childhood autism increases by 80% when dads conceive after age 45.

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So what’s going on?

Changes in the sperm of older men are likely to contribute. The number of defective sperm containing DNA mutations increase steadily every year as men age. These arise as exposure to radiation, environmental toxins, alcohol and smoking take their toll.

Ageing itself results in less testosterone and a decline in the number and function of testicular cells.

However, genetics isn’t the full explanation. In particular, increased risk of psychiatric illness doesn’t seem to be due to spontaneous mutations in sperm DNA. While mutations contribute, they account for only about 10% to 20% of the effect.

Another possibility is that genetic risk factors naturally more prevalent in men destined to be older fathers might be passed on to their offspring, rather than new mutations.

Mothers also at risk

The latest data showed negative effects of delayed fatherhood not just for the infants, but also the pregnant mothers.

The risk of gestational diabetes for pregnant women increased in line with the age of the father, with women carrying the child of a man aged 55 years or older having a 34% higher odds of gestational diabetes.

The researchers estimate that around 13% of premature births and 18% of gestational diabetes in pregnancies associated with older fathers were attributable to the advanced age of the father.

Read more: What’s the point of sex? It’s communication at a biological level

This is hard to reconcile with a genetic explanation. Other biological effects of seminal fluid on pregnancy health may be to blame.

The female immune system responds to seminal fluid by generating immune tolerance, which protects against inflammatory exposures that can harm the fetus. Human seminal fluid contains signals known to stimulate the female immune response, but it’s not yet proven whether these factors decline as men age.

What does this all mean for men contemplating fatherhood?

Most older dads don’t have fertility problems and can father babies without serious physical or developmental problems.

Overall, the father’s age is substantially less important than the mother’s age, and generally the pregnancy disorders and infant health problems are rare. So the current research evidence doesn’t justify dissuading older men from becoming fathers.

But the medical community must do a better job of communicating to couples an understanding of the risks of advanced paternal age.

Most importantly, we must include men in conversations about pregnancy planning and preconception care, to ensure all couples have the best chance of raising a healthy child.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendan Coates, Fellow, Grattan Institute

This week we’re exploring the state of nine different policy areas across Australia’s states, as detailed in Grattan Institute’s State Orange Book 2018. Read the other articles in the series here.

You might think that being a state (or territory) treasurer is a boring job. The federal treasurer gets all the media attention and controls many of the big economic levers, including income and company tax, massive Australia-wide spending and trade and competition policy.

But you would be wrong.

Grattan Institute’s State Orange Book 2018 shows that if state treasurers relied less on taxes that hurt the economy and more on the ones that are the very best they could provide a huge boost to their economies.

The big prize

Almost every tax hurts economic growth, but some hurt more than others.

Our state treasurers know this, yet they continue to make poor choices.

Taxes on transactions, such as stamp duties on real estate purchases, are particularly inefficient.

They make it more expensive to move home to take a new job across town or in a different town, encouraging people to stay put. They make it more expensive to move into bigger or smaller homes, encouraging people to renovate instead.

Read more: To make housing more affordable this is what state governments need to do

With the typical stamp duty bill now above A$40,000 in Sydney and Melbourne, this is more than just an idle theory.

In contrast, taxes on land are extraordinarily efficient, and council rates equally so.

ACT is showing the way

The Australian Capital Territory has Australia’s most efficient tax base – every dollar of revenue raised costs the economy just 21.9 cents.

New South Wales has the least efficient – every dollar of revenue raised costs the economy 29.7 cents.

While most states are going backwards

Unfortunately, in most states taxes have became less efficient over the past five years.

Booming property prices in Sydney and Melbourne inflated stamp duties, giving them a growing share of the tax base in NSW and Victoria.

They should copy the ACT

All state treasurers should follow the lead of the ACT and replace stamp duties with broad-based property taxes.

Our calculations suggest that doing so could make Australians up to $17 billion a year better off, while also making housing more affordable.

And stamp duties are unfair. They make some families pay more tax than others simply because they move home more often.

Read more: Infrastructure splurge ignores smarter ways to keep growing cities moving

An annual flat tax set at between A$5 and A$7 for every A$1,000 of unimproved land value would be enough to fund the abolition of property stamp duties.

Which won’t be easy

Proposals to make the switch have stalled because the politics is hard.

Recent purchasers would be reluctant to pay an annual tax so soon after paying stamp duty. A property tax would pose difficulties for people who are asset-rich but income-poor, especially retirees.

And property taxes cause angst: quarterly property tax bills remind people that they are taxpayers more often than does a one-off stamp duty with each purchase.

So state treasurers should make the switch gradually, as in the ACT: slowly wind back stamp duty and ramp up broad-based property tax over time.

Read more: Australia’s dangerous fantasy: diverting population growth to the regions

It would provide the states with an increasingly stable revenue stream while reducing the disparity between those who bought a home just before the change and just afterwards.

To ensure that asset-rich but income-poor households could stay in their homes, state treasurers would have to allow them to defer paying the levy (with interest) until they sell their properties.

And they should axe insurance tax

State treasurers should also replace state taxes on property, life, health and motor vehicle insurance with a broad-based property levy. Most states have already abolished insurance levies to fund fire and emergency services.

Insurance taxes deter people and businesses from buying adequate insurance, leaving them exposed to risks such as flood or fire damage to their home, or motor vehicle theft.

And charge for rezoning

And state treasurers should follow another ACT lead and introduce explicit “betterment taxes” to capture some of the windfall gains from rezoning of land.

Government permission to build higher-density housing, or convert farmland into greenfield housing land, generates large unearned windfall gains for landowners.

Taxing these windfall gains would be a particularly efficient form of taxation, would reduce the opportunities for corruption in the planning system, and would enable state treasurers to reduce other more economically harmful and regressive taxes.

And apply payroll tax widely

Finally, state payroll taxes should be broadened by abolishing carve-outs for small businesses.

This would enable state treasurers to cut payroll tax rates across the board.

Generous thresholds and exemptions have weakened states’ payroll tax bases and increased the economic costs of the tax.

Read more: Grattan Institute Orange Book 2018. State governments matter, vote wisely

Astoundingly, around 90% of NSW businesses are exempt from payroll tax.

We believe that, taken together, this set of reforms would make a big difference to economic growth.

Voters might even reward the treasurers and their premiers.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Senior Lecturer and Course Director of Postgraduate Studies in Education, Charles Sturt University

Primary school students have over 4,000 recess and lunch periods a year. This is a substantial period of time we can utilise to improve play habits and behaviour.

To enhance the quality of outdoor play, primary schools across Australia are moving away from more traditional, fixed school play facilities (such as monkey bars and slides) and embracing everyday equipment.

This includes loose, recycled or scrap parts (blocks for climbing/building, tunnels, pipes, crates, foam, rubber and plastic parts) and sports equipment (balls, bats, boards and hoops). The equipment can be transformed according to students’ play needs over time.

Sourced from households and the community, the equipment strategy has been recognised as cost-effective, sustainable and continues to produce cognitive, social and physical benefits for primary school students.

Read more: Should we just let them play?

The benefit of every day items for play

Australian research has found the introduction of everyday equipment into outdoor school spaces has resulted in significant increases in primary school students’ physical activity intensity during active play, step counts, types (and complexity) of play, physical quality of life, enjoyment and can complement the national curriculum.

Students have used the movable equipment to work cooperatively in different team roles to design, plan, construct, observe, negotiate and learn from each other to discover new ideas to solve problems.

Teachers have reported improvements in social inclusion, behaviour, staff/student happiness, confidence, self esteem, levels of aggression, injury and bullying incidences from introducing everyday equipment. Head teachers in the United Kingdom have even reported improvements in students’ classroom engagement.

Research is unveiling that everyday equipment can align with the play needs of girls within school spaces, as girls tend to enjoy play opportunities that are more creative, imaginative and social.

Read more: Play-based learning can set your child up for success at school and beyond

Creative potential

The introduction of every day “mobile” equipment has the potential to improve students’ creativity and initiative by increasing the number of play variables (such as colours, shapes, sizes, types, quantities, potential locations) available. Students can then take advantage of increased play options to make their own games, discoveries and obstacle courses.

With more play options, students are more challenged, preventing frustration and boredom. Boredom can result from being exposed to the same fixed playground equipment lodged in the same location year after year.

Read more: Being in nature is good for learning, here’s how to get kids off screens and outside

What can parents do at home?

Because everyday equipment is sourced from homes, play can be replicated beyond school time. Here are a few tips:

1. make sure kids have enough space for multiple play areas to avoid collisions

2. ensure the area is clear of any hazards such as wires and glass. Grass areas with trees are best, allowing a softer surface for landing. Hard-surface undercover areas can be an alternative during wet conditions

3. source movable equipment from either the home or community, including milk crates, pipes, plastic sheets, tyre tubes, wooden planks, plastic sheets, assorted play balls, bats and rope. Cardboard boxes and plastic objects such as buckets, baskets and hula hoops can be useful short-term play options, but can be less sustainable

4. start by introducing around five types of equipment and occasionally add more items over time. Teachers have reported this strategy works better than giving too many options at once

5. provide a large storage area (container, pod or cage) to put all the equipment away at the end of the the week, session or before rainy weather. Cardboard boxes can go out of shape quickly, especially with rain.

6. although supervision is important, make sure children can direct their own play without too much adult intervention. Self-directed play and providing adequate levels of risk and challenge is vital for children’s development. Adults also need to be accepting that it could get messy

7. have a rule that allows kids to have specific equipment for the entire week and then be distributed to others the following week. Consider rules such as no stacking or jumping from equipment above waist height on harder surfaces

8. have a routine for an adult to regularly check for any damaged equipment (such as removing equipment with wooden/plastic splinters). The adult can also reflect on how the children are using the equipment (for example, consider if anything should be added or removed to aid the play structures).

We need to give kids more space to be creative, especially in outdoor school spaces, to develop the cognitive, social and physical capabilities they’ll need into adulthood.

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

This article is the second in the Reclaiming the Fair Go series, a collaboration between The Conversation, the Sydney Democracy Network and the Sydney Peace Foundation to mark the awarding of the 2018 Sydney Peace Prize to Nobel laureate and economics professor Joseph Stiglitz. These articles reflect on the crisis caused by economic inequality and on how we can break the cycle of power and greed to enable all peoples and the planet to flourish. The Sydney Peace Prize will be presented on November 15 (tickets here).

Scientific understanding of the consequences of inequality has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years. Thanks to the pioneering work of scholars such as Joseph Stiglitz, Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson, and Tony Atkinson, we know that persistent social and economic inequality exacts an enormous toll: on mental and physical health, the stability and efficiency of communities, and macroeconomic performance.

Read more: The fair go is a fading dream, but don’t write it off

How, then, should this pervasive and multidimensional problem best be tackled? Statistically, we can measure income inequality at three different levels. And those levels provide a natural categorisation of the policies needed to combat it.

First, inequality can be measured in incomes received before government steps into the picture. This “market income” includes wages and salaries, income from personal investments, profits and dividends from businesses, and other sources. Inequality is highest for market income, and has grown notably over the last generation.

Second, we measure inequality again after government has collected taxes and made transfer payments back to households. “Disposable income” thus reflects the cash redistribution arising from government fiscal and social policies. So long as income taxes are progressive and transfer programs (like unemployment benefits, child benefits and age pensions) are broadly accessible (or even targeted at lower-income households), inequality in disposable income is lower than for market income.

Finally, inequality in final living standards should consider the value of non-monetary public sector programs. Public services like education, health care, recreation and transportation do not put money into consumers’ pockets but they do enhance their standard of living. And the impact of these public goods and services is larger (relative to income) for lower-income households. Inequality in “final consumption” is therefore lower still than inequality in disposable income.

Government matters in reducing inequality

The importance of government programs in reducing inequality is starkly visible in this three-tiered framing. In Australia, for example, taxes and transfer payments reduce inequality by about one-third (comparing market to disposable income). And public services reduce inequality by another third (comparing final consumption to disposable income). This makes it especially important to reject calls to cut taxes (even taxes paid by working people) and the public programs that taxes fund.

Read more: Who gets what? Who pays for it? How incomes, taxes and benefits work out for Australians

In international terms, Australia’s fiscal policies do a relatively poor job of moderating inequality. This is mostly because taxes and public programs are small (relative to GDP) compared to other countries, and hence have less redistributive effect (even though Australia’s income supports are highly targeted at low-income residents).

Australia therefore ranks slightly worse in inequality in disposable income (25th out of 36 OECD countries according to the Gini coefficient) than in market income (21st). Preserving and expanding taxes and income supports – like Newstart benefits, which have languished in real terms for decades – and expanding public services over time are essential for reducing Australia’s inequality.

However, the redistributive hand of government can only do so much to moderate the inequality that the so-called “market” produces, and reproduces. Government fiscal and social policies cannot single-handedly overcome a starting point that gets worse and worse over time.

Labour market changes are driving up inequality

For most households, labour income is the most important source of private income. Two related factors are undermining labour incomes and driving up inequality.

First, the share of total national income paid out in wages, salaries and superannuation has eroded dramatically since the neoliberal economic reforms of the 1980s and 1990s. Wages are barely keeping up with inflation, let alone matching labour productivity growth.

The result is a steady fall in workers’ collective share of the pie. This reached a postwar low in 2017, as shown in Figure 1.

There has been an offsetting rise in the share of income going to business owners and investors. Not surprisingly, wealthy people own the largest portion of that wealth, so redistributing income from labour to capital increases inequality.

At the same time, the distribution of a shrinking slice among workers has itself become more unequal. This also reflects the erosion of Australia’s once-vaunted labour market institutions. These were deliberately set up in the postwar era to build a more equal, inclusive society (the “fair go”). Most important in this regard have been:

The institutions that were designed to lift wages and make them more equal have been consciously dismantled. So it’s no surprise that only a shrinking minority of workers can now (thanks to particular skills or position in the economy) win wage increases of the sort most workers once took for granted. Others face low, stagnant and insecure incomes.

This transformation in the labour market has been the fundamental driver of the growing gap so visible in our communities.

So what needs to be done?

Fixing this problem requires an ambitious, multidimensional effort to rebuild the policy levers of inclusive growth. Minimum wages should be high enough that anyone working full-time can escape poverty. Supplemental measures like penalty rates and casual loading should be strengthened, not eroded. The award system should again aim to support wage growth for all workers, not just those at the bottom.

Relaxing Australia’s unique and punitive restrictions on collective bargaining and allowing workers to negotiate multi-firm or industry-wide agreements would also lift wages across the board. Instead of being vilified and persecuted, unions should be accepted and supported as an essential and constructive part of a normal labour market.

Unionists and social advocates are now forcefully prosecuting the argument to “change the rules” of Australia’s labour market. This will be one of the top issues in the run-up to the next federal election. And this debate is long overdue – because tackling inequality has to start in the labour market.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Misty Adoniou, Associate Professor in Language, Literacy and TESL, University of Canberra

The Victorian Coalition has promised $2.8 million for “decodable readers” for schools if they win the upcoming election.

Money for books must surely be a good thing. But what exactly is a “decodable reader”? After all, surely all books are decodable. If they weren’t decodable they would be unreadable.

Read more: Lost for words: why the best literacy approaches are not reaching the classroom

What is decoding?

The Australian curriculum provides a clear definition of decoding:

A process of working out the meaning of words in a text. In decoding, readers draw on contextual, vocabulary, grammatical and phonic knowledge.

However the Victorian Coalition is defining decoding as “sounding out letters”. As their policy platform states:

Decodable books are designed to align with explicit, systematic phonics instruction. They are simple stories constructed using almost exclusively words that are phonetically decodable, using letters and letter-groups that children have learned in phonics lessons.

The “decodable readers” they are funding are books that are contrived to help children practise a particular letter-sound pattern taught as part of a synthetic phonics program.

For example, the following sentences are from a decodable reader designed to focus on the consonants “N” and “P” and short vowel /a/

Nan and a pan.

Pap and a pan.

Nan and Pap can nap.

Books like this have no storyline; they are equally nonsensical whether you start on the first page, or begin on the last page and read backwards.

While they may teach the phonics skills “N” and “P”, they don’t teach children the other important decoding skills of grammar and vocabulary.

And as many a parent will testify, they don’t teach the joy of reading.

Read more: The way we teach most children to read sets them up to fail

What about the children’s vocabulary development?

Meaning and vocabulary development are not the focus of decodable readers. Yet, research shows the importance of vocabulary for successful reading.

Students need to add 3,000 words a year to their vocabulary to be able to read and write successfully at their year level.

Limited vocabulary in books translates to lack of vocabulary growth.

What is the alternative to ‘decodable readers’?

Supporters of decodable readers are hopeful these books will support students with reading difficulties, by focusing closely on the sounds in words. However, focusing on sounds alone is not sufficient to support a struggling reader.

The reality is all children learning to read need to listen to, and read books that are written with rich vocabulary, varied sentence structures and interesting content knowledge that encourages them to use their imagination.

Compare the text about Pan and Nap with the opening lines of Pamela Allen’s very popular story Who Sank the Boat?:

Beside the sea, on Mr Peffer’s place, there lived a cow, a donkey, a sheep, a pig, and a tiny little mouse. They were good friends and one sunny morning, for no particular reason, they decided to go for a row on the bay. Do you know who sank the boat?

This book immediately engages children and asks them to question, imagine and help solve a problem. Children always ask for this book to be read again and again and they enjoy joining in. They learn new vocabulary and incidentally learn about complex sentence structures, which they emulate in their oral language and story writing.

Read more: A balanced approach is best for teaching kids how to read

Using books to teach all the decoding skills

Using rich authentic texts supports all the decoding skills described in the Australian curriculum – phonics, vocabulary and grammar.

In Pamela Allen’s story above, we can look at the word “bay” and notice the parts /b/ – /ay/, which help us to say and spell the word. What happens if we change the beginning – how many other words could we write and read? For example, day, say, play, and so on.

We can look at the “frequent” words. These are the words that we can’t always “sound out” but which make up the 100 most frequent words in English. For example, do, you, they, were, the.

These words are very important to teach children, as these 100 words make up 50% of all written language.

We can develop their vocabularies with words and phrases such as “for no particular reason”, “decided” and “beside” .

We can introduce them to beautifully literate sentence structures, for example, “Beside the sea, on Mr Peffer’s place, there lived a cow, a donkey, a sheep, a pig, and a tiny little mouse”.

Decodable readers can only do the phonics part of the reading puzzle. They are a very inefficient way to teach reading.

So what do we want for all children learning to read?

When teaching children to read, we hope they will learn reading is pleasurable and can help them to make sense of their lives and those around them.

The strategies children are taught to use when first learning to read greatly influence what strategies they use in later years. When children are taught to focus solely on letter-sound matching to read the words of decodable readers, they often continue in later years to over-rely on this strategy, even with other kinds of texts. This causes inaccurate, slow, laborious reading, which leads to frustration and a lack of motivation for reading.

A book must be worth reading and give children the opportunity to learn the full range of strategies needed to read any text.

Children who grow up with real books, with rich vocabularies, beautiful prose and genuine storylines reach a higher level of education than those who do not have such access, regardless of nationality, parents’ level of education or socioeconomic status.

And yet it’s children from disadvantaged backgrounds who are less likely to have access to these books in their homes. It’s crucial schools fill the gap.

A$2.8 million spent on beautifully written books to fill Victorian classroom libraries would be a far more effective use of the education budget.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yeslam Al-Saggaf, Associate Professor, Charles Sturt University

Have you ever been around people who spend more time looking at their phone than they do at you? Then you know what it feels like to be “phubbed” – and you’re probably guilty of doing it yourself.

Phubbing is the practice of looking at your phone while in the presence of others. And as smartphones become ever more entwined in the everyday lives of Australians, phubbing has become so common that many people think it’s normal.

People phub during work meetings, while socialising with friends at cafés, while having dinner with their family, while attending lectures and even while in bed.

But how common is phubbing in Australia? And in what social situations is it most prevalent?

To find out, we surveyed 385 people and asked them how often they look at their smartphones while having face-to-face conversations with others. They recorded their answers as: never, rarely, sometimes, often, or all the time.

Read more: She phubbs me, she phubbs me not: Smartphones could be ruining your love life

We’re more likely to phub family than colleagues

We found 62% of those surveyed reported looking at their smartphone while having a face-to-face conversation with another person or persons.

Gender made no difference to how often someone phubbed. Neither did geography, with people living in the city and the country phubbing equally as often. But younger people phubbed others more frequently than older people. And people phubbed their partners most of all.

The study also revealed smartphone users phubbed their parents and children more frequently than they phubbed their colleagues at work, clients and customers. These findings suggest a professional attitude towards using the smartphone in the workplace.

We phub more in bed than when socialising

Some social situations are more conducive to phubbing than others.

We found people phubbed each other more when commuting together on public transport, during work coffee or lunch breaks, when in bed with their partners, when travelling together in private transport and when socialising with friends.

People were less likely to phub others during meetings, during meal times with family, and during lectures and classes.

Read more: The importance of actually unplugging on National Day of Unplugging

Boredom isn’t the main reason people phub

We were interested in finding out whether boredom plays a role in phubbing behaviour so we asked our survey participants to complete an eight-item Boredom Proneness Scale.

Sample questions included “I find it hard to entertain myself” and “many things I have to do are repetitive and monotonous.”

We found boredom did explain why people phub, but that the influence of boredom is very small. Other factors, such as the “fear of missing out” (FOMO), lack of self-control, and internet addiction may play a more important role in phubbing behaviour.

The effect of phubbing depends on the situation

Looking at the smartphone while a person is having a face-to-face conversation with another person is a relatively new phenomenon. While it may violate some people’s expectations, it’s no simple task to categorise the behaviour as good or bad.

One theory suggests that when people get phubbed they might judge the behaviour according to how important the phubber is to them. For example, phubbing among friends is probably more acceptable than a subordinate phubbing a manager during a work-related meeting.

Read more: How the smartphone affected an entire generation of kids

While that might be good news for the workforce, it’s not great for close relationships. Phubbing partners can make them feel less important and this can decrease the satisfaction with the relationship. In the case of children, especially those at a vulnerable age, phubbing them can make them feel unloved, which can have a detrimental effect on their well-being.

Our findings can be used to inform programs, policies and campaigns that aim at addressing the phubbing phenomenon.

It’s clear from the research smartphone users are more likely to phub those who are closely related to them than those less close to them. So next time you get phubbed when you are out with someone, take it as a compliment – it could mean they consider you a close friend.

The research discussed in this article will be published in the Proceedings of the 2018 International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS).

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Shirley Jackson, PhD Candidate in Economic Sociology, University of Melbourne

In October hundreds of thousands of workers took to the streets to campaign for better wages and conditions as part of the Australian Council of Trade Unions’ Change The Rules campaign.

The response from critics of the movement, including the Commonwealth government, has been to decry the temporary loss of economic output and to blame the rallies on a mix of union anarchy and militancy.

But they’ve missed the point.

The evidence shows that conditions for Australian workers have been getting worse as trade union membership has declined.

There are five ways to look at this.

Wage growth

The Australian Bureau of Statistics tally of average weekly earnings has grown impressively since 1995, from around A$550 to A$1,200.

But changes in the average wage don’t tell us much about changes in the typical wage.

That’s because, being an average, it is highly sensitive to changes in the composition of the workforce and to increases in the very high pay earned by Australia’s highest earners.

If low-income workers lose their jobs the average wage will go up.

If high-flying executives get paid even more it will also go up.

Real wage growth

A better measure of typical wages, the ABS wage price index, is also growing.

But it too is misleading.

Real wage growth – which is the amount wages have been growing over and above prices – tells us much more.

While the wage price index has grown by 65% over the past two decades, real wages have increased by only 12%.

For many young people, it’s even worse: their share of wage growth has been negligible or even negative.

This means that for an increasing number of Australians wages are failing to keep pace with the cost of living.

Share of gross domestic product

Another way to measure wages is to look at how much of what Australia produces is being paid out to workers.

The most common measure of what’s produced is gross domestic product.

That very basic measurement suggests that the economy has been growing for 27 years – a fact The Economist newspaper celebrates when describing Australia as the most successful economy in the developed world.

But wage earners are sharing in the success less than others.

While GDP has certainly been rising every year, the percentage of it spent on wages has been falling.

Those who praise Australia’s economic growth sometimes miss the wood for the trees.

Gross domestic product has indeed grown over the past 27 years, but in that same period the share of it paid to workers has fallen by four percentage points.

The pie has been growing, but the slices for workers have been getting thinner.

Inequality

The most common measure of income inequality is the Gini coefficient.

A coefficient of 1 would mean all the income was all in one person’s hands. A coefficient of zero would mean it was evenly distributed.

Unfortunately, Australia’s Gini coefficient has been climbing further away from zero.

The International Monetary Fund has found that there is a likely causal relationship between low trade union density and high income inequality.

In Australia income inequality has grown as trade union membership has fallen.

Union militancy

The minister for jobs and industrial relations, Kelly O’Dwyer, says the union movement wants a return to the “dark days of mass union militancy”.

It wants workplace division and disruption, it wants the ability to flagrantly break any industrial laws it doesn’t like, and it demands union officials be given the power to subject businesses up and down the country to their every demand, regardless of the capacity of those businesses to accede to those demands.

It is certainly true that more trade union activity leads to more days lost per year to industrial action.

However, there doesn’t seem to be much evidence to support O’Dwyer’s claim that any increase in the days lost to strikes will wreak havoc on the economy.

For example, in 1988 Australia reached the height of “industrial militancy” and lost a total of 1,641 days to industrial action across all industries.

Yet in that year GDP grew by 3.4%.

Read more: Five questions (and answers) about casual employment

Compare this to 2017, when only 148 days were lost to industrial action and GDP grew by only 2.3%.

In the past few months GDP growth has since bounced back to 3.4% with no noticeable change in the days lost to strikes.

While there doesn’t seem to be a link between declining industrial action and GDP, there does seem to be one between industrial action and the share of GDP paid out in wages.

The recent resurgence of the union movement is an attempt to get the share back up.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tanya M. Smith, Associate Professor in the Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution, Griffith University

Increasing variation in the climate has been implicated as a possible factor in the evolution of our species (Homo sapiens) 300,000 years ago, as well as the more recent demise of our enigmatic evolutionary cousins, the Neanderthals.

But knowing the impact of that change on a year-by-year basis has always been a challenge.

Most prehistoric climate models are derived from large-scale records such as deep-sea cores or terrestrial sediment layers. These methods yield information on the scale of thousands of years, making it impossible to understand how seasonal climate patterns directly impacted ancient humans and their evolutionary kin.

My colleagues and I have found a solution using clues from our own mouths, as we detail today in an article in Science Advances. We used teeth to reveal climate records formed during the development of ancient hominins.

Read more: Archaeology can help us prepare for climates ahead – not just look back

In the teeth

Teeth are a really useful indicator of past environments.

This is possible because teeth have biological rhythms and key events get locked inside them. These faithful internal clocks run night and day, year after year, and include daily growth lines and a marked line formed at birth.

Read more: How we’re using fish ear bones as ‘time capsules’ of past river health

Histologists like me carefully saw teeth, remove tiny slices and painstakingly map records of microscopic growth during childhood.

For this new study, we examined the enamel in fossilised teeth from two Neanderthal children (dated to 250,000 years ago) and one modern human child (dated to 5,000 years ago) from an archaeological site in southeastern France known as Payre.

Using the sensitive high-resolution ion microprobe (SHRIMP) at the Australian National University we measured how the oxygen isotope ratios varied on a weekly basis in these ancient teeth.

Our approach is based on the fact that two naturally-occurring atomic variants of oxygen vary in predictable ways.

During prolonged periods of warm weather, surface water is higher in the heavy variant of oxygen. The opposite pattern occurs during cool periods.

When individuals drink from streams or pools of water, values from these sources are recorded in the hard mineral component of forming teeth.

The SHRIMP measurements allowed us to create multiyear paleoenvironmental records from the fossil teeth.

What the teeth reveal

The oxygen records show that the two Neanderthals inhabited cooler and more seasonal periods than the modern human who grew up in the same place more recently.

This is consistent with our basic understanding of ancient climates in France, as 250,000 years ago this region was cooler than it has been over the past 10,000 years, when the unlucky modern human child lived and died.

We’ve already shown that teeth preserve faithful records of milk intake during nursing, proving that orangutan mums are lactation champs – they nurse their infants for eight or more years.

In the current study we were able to pair seasonal cycles during tooth formation with nursing behaviour, showing that one Neanderthal child was born in the spring and stopped consuming its mother’s milk 2.5 years later, during the autumn.

Even more surprising is the fact that both Neanderthal children were exposed to lead at least twice during cooler times of the year, likely through consumption of contaminated food and/or water.

Lead occurs naturally in several historic mines in this region of France, and this is the oldest known prehistoric exposure to this neurotoxic substance. No level is considered safe for humans or animals, and these exposures occurred during a critical time in the early lives of these Neanderthals.

More teeth needed

These findings raise intriguing questions about Neanderthal behaviour that require further study, and youngsters with unworn teeth are especially helpful. Although dozens of young Neanderthals have been unearthed, coaxing teeth from the curators of collections for this kind of semi-destructive study is a tall order.

But the more teeth we are able to examine in such detail, the more information we will gather about the lives of ancient people on a year-by-year basis.

Our approach will also facilitate much-needed tests of theories about the impact of climate change on human technological development, and insight into Neanderthal nursing behaviour — a key determinant of population growth and life history.

Previously, my colleagues and I discovered that an eight-year-old Belgian Neanderthal was weaned at 1.2 years of age. This probably was atypical as the nursing signal dropped off rapidly and the individual showed stress in its first molar at this exact time.

We’re not sure if this means that it was separated from its mother or just really sick – but it’s likely that Neanderthals kids nursed for longer when they could.

Our new approach allows scientists to flesh out the lives of ancient children with unprecedented detail, including fine-scaled views of life in Ice Age Europe, through the remarkable tales their teeth tell.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lyndsey Collins-Praino, Senior Lecturer in School of Medicine, University of Adelaide

A spinal cord injury can change your life in the blink of an eye.

But today, research published in two leading scientific journals shows that walking again is possible for individuals following spinal cord injury.

Read more: Yes there’s hope, but treating spinal injuries with stem cells is not a reality yet

Targeted electrical stimulation

Grégoire Courtine’s research group from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne reported that a kind of treatment called targeted neurotechnology allowed three individuals who had suffered a spinal cord injury to walk again. The technique delivers timed electrical stimulation, called EES, over the surface of the spinal cord.

The EES was effective despite the injury having occurred more than four years previously, and even though the individuals showed either permanent motor deficits (loss of muscle function) or complete paralysis – even after extensive previous rehabilitation.

Improvements were seen immediately following EES: the people were able to voluntarily activate muscles to produce a desired movement – such as extension of the ankle – in the paralysed leg.

Optimising the EES for each individual allowed them to time their movements to EES sequences appropriately. Within five days, participants were able to walk overground and even adjust their leg movements and walking speed.

Perhaps most excitingly, after a few months of targeted EES, participants regained voluntary control over their previously paralysed muscles, even in the absence of EES. This allowed them to walk or even cycle outside of the laboratory.

What is spinal cord injury?

Damage to the spinal cord is typically caused by a traumatic event – such as motor vehicle accidents, sports related incidents or falls. Within Australia, 250-350 new cases of spinal cord injury occur each year, with more than 10,000 people currently living with a spinal cord injury.

Read more: Without mandatory safety standards, indoor trampoline parks are an accident waiting to happen

When an incident occurs, the vertebrae, or bones, that make up the spinal column may dislocate or fracture. This results in bone pushing on and compressing the delicate spinal cord, causing bleeding and bruising.

The damage results in loss of both motor (muscular) and sensory function below the level of injury. Injuries below the cervical (neck region) typically result in tetraplegia, where all four limbs are affected. Injuries in the thoracic or lumbar region of the cord typically result in paraplegia, causing paralysis of the trunk, legs and lower part of the body.

It is uncommon to completely severe the spinal cord, with some small function often remaining below the level of injury in most individuals.

Communication highway

Our spinal cord serves as the communication highway between our brain and our body.

If a highway is damaged or closed, you can’t travel along it to reach your destination. Similarly, when the spinal cord is damaged, the signals and messages that are normally transmitted between our brain and our body can no longer reach their target destination. This results in loss of muscle control, loss of sensation, bowel and bladder problems and sexual dysfunction.

Walking and other voluntary movements are controlled by signals that travel from the front of the brain, down to other nerve cells in the spinal cord, and then nerves that travel from the spinal cord to the muscles involved.

What is so exciting about this new research is that it suggests several months of EES may be able to restart activity of these pathways. This is consistent with the group’s previous work, but is the first time such an effect has been demonstrated in humans.

Read more: Controversial brain study has scientists rethinking neuron research

An exciting step

This is an exciting step forward in a field of research where so many trialled treatments to improve function after spinal cord injury have failed.

Other attempts have been unsuccessful for a number of reasons. First, many of the models used to explore spinal cord injury don’t accurately mimic the specific types of problems seen in individuals following spinal cord injury. This makes it difficult to translate findings from experimental work into meaningful advancements in the clinic.

Also, spinal cord injury itself is a real mixed bag – not all injuries are created equal. As a result, it’s difficult to find treatments that may be effective for all individuals.

Indeed, even in the study by Courtine’s group, only individuals with less complete injuries to the spinal cord were included. This may limit the applicability of the research to individuals with more severe types of injury.

The success of Courtine’s method also seems to be tied to the use of timed, rather than continuous, EES for the treatment – this allowed the people in the trial to retain a sense of where their legs were placed in space (a sense known as proprioception). Other trials had not used this approach.

What the future holds

While these studies are an exciting advance, future studies in this area will need to overcome some limitations.

First, this method required the people involved to undergo an invasive and resource-intensive series of steps to implant the EES electrodes and determine the best stimulation approach. This may be prohibitive for others due to physical or financial constraints.

In addition, so far the therapy has only been trialled in a very small number of individuals who have experienced relatively mild, incomplete injuries of the spinal cord. This is not indicative of the severity of injury for many.

It is critical that future studies investigate whether EES may be effective even with more severe injuries, including complete injuries where only a few or no undamaged nerves remain.

Read more: Take it from me: neuroscience is advancing, but we’re a long way off head transplants

We still don’t know if this technology can lead to improvements in everyday activities.

And it’s important to remember that motor function is only one of a host of symptoms experienced by those with spinal cord injury. In a survey of individuals with paraplegia, they said improvement of bladder and bowel control and restoration of sexual function was more important for their quality of life than being able to walk again.

So while those who have suffered a spinal cord injury have reason to feel cautiously optimistic, there is still much work to be done in this area.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Silke Meyer, Senior Lecturer in Domestic and Family Violence Practice, CQUniversity Australia

On average, at least one woman is killed every week at the hands of a current or former partner in Australia. Last month, the numbers were even more alarming. Nine women were killed in October – seven allegedly in the context of a current or former intimate relationship, the other two also suspected to have died at the hands of male perpetrators.

While these deaths are a disturbing reflection of the pervasive nature of violence against women in Australia, they have largely gone unnoticed. Aside from a small number of female journalists who called on Australia’s leaders to address the crisis, the media more broadly, as well as governments and the wider public, have mostly remained silent.

These recent incidents raise questions around the effectiveness of awareness and educational campaigns developed under Australia’s National Plan to Reduce Violence Against Women and their Children, released in 2011 to improve the country’s response to domestic violence.

Read more: The Violence Against Women Act is unlikely to reduce intimate partner violence – here’s why

How well are current awareness campaigns faring?

Research suggests that campaigns aimed at raising awareness about domestic violence, such as the federal government’s “Let’s Stop it at the Start” campaign, can increase public understanding of gendered violence and the types of support available for those affected.

Evidence of this can be seen in the substantial increase in calls to police and applications for domestic violence protection orders following the roll-out of awareness campaigns in recent years.

However, efforts to change public attitudes towards domestic violence, especially attitudes ascribing blame to victims, have been less successful. The National Community Attitudes Survey shows persistent victim-blaming attitudes in society when it comes to this issue.

Read more: Blaming victims for domestic violence: how psychology taught us to be helpless

This is concerning because research shows a clear link between victim-blaming attitudes and the perpetration, as well as tolerance, of domestic violence.

What do current campaigns get wrong?

Part of the reason why current campaigns have been ineffective at changing public attitudes may lie in how they frame the issue of domestic violence.

Campaigns need to go beyond communicating what constitutes domestic violence in intimate relationships and where to get help. They need to explain how and why this type of violence can affect anyone. And they need to illustrate how perpetrators control their victims and manipulate those around them.

By failing to do so, we allow domestic violence to remain an issue solely of concern to victims, making it less worthy of public concern.

A narrow focus on victim experiences and awareness creates a false and dangerous sense of security among the general public. It also perpetuates the assumption that domestic violence only impacts those who make “poor relationship choices”. And it implies that a woman’s choice in partner or her behaviour in a relationship plays a role in the domestic violence she experiences.

Read more: Young Australians’ views on domestic violence are cause for concern – but also hope

Research clearly shows the behaviour of victims has little bearing on the likelihood of domestic violence in intimate relationships. Domestic violence can happen to anyone, regardless of age, race or socioeconomic status.

Highlighting how perpetrators manipulate their victims can be effective in bringing this to light. Perpetrators tend to be charming, manipulative and extremely skilled at image management. They are rarely openly abusive from the start. By the time their abusive behaviours become obvious, they have frequently isolated their victims and manipulated others into perceiving them as a good partner.

What can we do better?

Awareness campaigns should reinforce why domestic violence is everyone’s business, not just a problem for those directly affected.

Men play a crucial role. While men living in Australia are far less likely to be killed by an intimate partner, especially if they have never been abusive to that partner, women have a one in four chance of experiencing emotional, physical and/or sexual violence in at least one of their intimate relationships.

Instead of responding to awareness campaigns with questions about why male victims are overlooked by society, men need to become a voice in this fight.

For those unsure how or why, activists like Jackson Katz offer compelling reasons and strategies. As role models, men’s voices are crucial in calling out violence against women.

Some campaigns are starting to hold the general public accountable for violence prevention. Queensland’s #dosomething campaign, for example, emphasises that domestic violence is a societal issue that impacts everyone.

Victoria’s “Respect Women: Call it Out” campaign specifically highlights the role of men in preventing domestic violence and offers user-friendly examples of how it can be done. More importantly, it removes some of the concerns that bystanders have when trying to help or speak out against this type of violence.

In order to make domestic violence everyone’s business rather than an issue solely for women, awareness campaigns need to follow these examples. More importantly, they need to address how perpetrators manipulate victims, their families and their communities, and how we all play a role in speaking out against such violence.

If we aren’t able to do this, women’s deaths will continue to be met with silence and Australia will continue to tolerate the alarming prevalence of domestic violence.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vincent Ho, Senior Lecturer and clinical academic gastroenterologist, Western Sydney University

If you’ve ever thought your poo is just a bunch of dead cells, think again. Most of it is alive, teeming with billions of microbes. Here’s what studies in healthy adults reveal makes up our poo.

Water

Our faeces is largely (75%) made up of water, although this differs from person to person.

Vegetarians have a higher water content in their stools. Those who consume less fibre and more protein have a lower water content. Fibre has a high water-carrying ability and makes our stools more bulky, increases the frequency of bowel movements and makes the process of passing bowel motions easier.

Read more: Health Check: what your pee and poo colour says about your health

The other 25% of faeces is made up of solids, which are mainly organic (relating to living matter) materials. A small proportion of solids is made up of inorganic material such as calcium and iron phosphate as well as dried constituents of digestive juices.

Around 25-54% of the organic material is made up of microbes (dead and living), such as bacteria and viruses.

Microbes

Bacteria in faeces have been extensively studied. It’s estimated there are nearly 100 billion bacteria per gram of wet stool.

One study that looked at a collection of fresh stools in oxygen-free conditions (as oxygen can damage certain types of bacteria) found almost 50% of the bacteria were alive.

The different types of bacteria present in faeces can influence how hard or loose stool samples can be. For example, Prevotella bacteria, which can be found in the mouth, vagina and gut, are more commonly seen in those with soft stools. In fact, a high-fibre diet is strongly associated with these bacteria.

Ruminococcaceae bacteria, which are common gut microbes that break down complex carbohydrates, favour harder stools.

Viruses have been less studied than bacteria as components of the gut microbiota – the population of bacteria and viruses that live in our gut. It is estimated there are 100 million to 1 billion viruses per gram of wet faeces in most of us.

This number can change considerably when people become sick with viral gastroenteritis, such as in norovirus infections, where levels of more than a trillion viruses per gram of stool can be found.

Certain types of viruses that infect bacteria, called bacteriophages, have been linked to diseases of the gut like Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis.

Read more: So you think you have IBS, coeliac disease or Crohn’s? Here’s what it might mean for you

Archaea are bacteria-like microbes that can inhabit some of the most extreme environments on Earth such as hot springs, deep sea vents or extremely acidic waters. Archaea that produce methane are known to live in the human gut and account for around 10% of non-oxygen-dependent microbes.

Such methane-producing archaea like Methanobrevibacter are associated with harder stools and constipation as methane can slow down intestinal movement. It is believed there are around 100 million archaea per gram of wet faeces.

Single-celled fungi (yeasts) are present in the gut of about 70% of healthy adults. They occur in estimated concentrations of up to a million microorganisms per gram of wet faeces but comprise only a small proportion (0.03%) of all microbes.

Other organic material

Some of the organic material includes carbohydrates or any other undigested plant matter, protein and undigested fats. Faeces does not contain large quantities of carbohydrates as the majority of what we eat is absorbed. However, undigested amounts remain as dietary fibre.

Some 2-25% of organic matter in faeces is due to nitrogen-containing substances such as undigested dietary protein, and protein from bacteria and cells lining the colon that have been shed.

Fats contribute 2-15% of the organic material in our faeces. The amount of fat excreted into our stools is highly dependent on dietary intake. Even with no fat intake, though, we do get some excretion of fat into our faeces. Fat in faeces can come from bacteria in the form of short-chain fatty acids when they ferment foods, in addition to undigested dietary fat.

Plastic particles

A recent study has found that microscopic plastic particles can appear in our faeces when we drink from plastic bottles or eat foods that have been wrapped in plastic.

This small study of eight participants who were exposed to plastics in their food and drink identified up to nine different types of plastics in their stools. But we need larger studies and additional analytical research to understand the clinical significance of this.

Poo is different in disease

Not everyone’s poo is going to be the same. Diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease can lead to changes in the type of bacteria in our gut and result in raised inflammatory proteins that can be detected in our stool.

The presence of blood in the stool could signal bowel cancer, though this isn’t always the case. Fortunately there is a good screening test that can pick up the presence of trace blood in the stools and lead to further investigations such as a colonoscopy.

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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Wood, Program Director, Energy, Grattan Institute

This week we’re exploring the state of nine different policy areas across Australia’s states, as detailed in Grattan Institute’s State Orange Book 2018. Read the other articles in the series here.

Energy policy in Australia is a major failure. The federal government has been unable to forge an effective policy to ensure affordable, reliable and low-emissions electricity. It’s time for the states to step up.

Internationally, responsibility for climate change policies rests with national governments. The federal government says it remains committed to Australia’s target under the Paris Agreement, but it has abandoned the emissions-reduction obligation of the National Energy Guarantee (NEG). This leaves Australia’s electricity sector, which is responsible for 34% of our overall emissions, with no credible policy to reduce those emissions.

The states should fill this policy vacuum if it persists. They should work together on a nationwide emissions reduction scheme through state-based legislation, independent of the federal government. A Commonwealth-led national policy would be best, but a state-based policy is far better than none.

Read more: The too hard basket: a short history of Australia’s aborted climate policies

In October 2018 the COAG Energy Council agreed to continue work on the reliability element of the NEG. The states and territories should maintain this support and implement this policy with the Commonwealth government, and so support the reliability of the National Electricity Market during a challenging transition.

The Grattan Institute’s State Orange Book 2018 shows that there is also much the states can do to reduce energy prices. Consumers are understandably upset – household retail prices have increased by more than half in the past decade, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (see page 7 here).

The federal government is certainly focused on price – Prime Minister Scott Morrison has referred to Energy Minister Angus Taylor as the “minister for getting electricity prices down” – but many important pricing policies depend on state action.

Retail pricing is the obvious example. Poorly regulated retail electricity markets have not delivered for consumers. Retail margins are higher than would be expected in a truly competitive market. Many consumers find the market so complicated they give up trying to understand it.

Read more: A high price for policy failure: the ten-year story of spiralling electricity bills

State governments should work alongside the federal government to help consumers navigate the retail “confusopoly”. Governments should require retailers to help consumers compare offers and get the best deal. They should also stop retailers using excessive pay-on-time discounts (which tend to confuse rather than help consumers and can trap lower-income households), and ensure vulnerable customers do not pay high prices.

However, governments should resist the temptation to use price caps as a quick fix. If set too low, price caps could reduce competition and drive longer-term price increases.

Read more: Capping electricity prices: a quick fix with hidden risks

Western Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory, which have not yet adopted retail competition, should move in that direction – while learning from the mistakes of others.

Network costs make up the biggest share of the electricity bill for most households (see page 8 here) and some small businesses. This is particularly an issue in New South Wales, Queensland and Tasmania, where network values increased substantially under public ownership and those costs were passed on to consumers.

These states should write down the value of their overvalued networks or provide rebates to consumers, so the price of the networks is more closely aligned to the value they provide to consumers. Given the poor performance of publicly owned networks, any network businesses still in government hands should be privatised.

Responsibility for setting network reliability requirements should be transferred to the Australian Energy Regulator to prevent risk-averse state governments from imposing excessive reliability standards, which would drive up network costs again.

Read more: Amid blackout scare stories, remember that a grid without power cuts is impossible… and expensive

Until recently, it seemed state governments had learned the lessons from the bad old days of excessively generous subsidies for rooftop solar. That was until August 2018, when the Victorian government committed more than A$1 billion to pay half the cost of solar panels for eligible households and provide an interest-free loan for the remainder. Most of these systems would pay for themselves without subsidy. The Victorian government should abandon this waste of taxpayers’ money.

Read more: Policy overload: why the ACCC says household solar subsidies should be abolished

Finally, Australia’s gas market is adding to the price pain of homes and businesses. As international prices rise, there is no easy way to avoid some painful decisions. But some state policies are making matters worse.

The Victorian and Tasmanian governments’ moratoria on gas exploration and development constrain supply and drive up prices. The moratoria should be lifted. Instead, these states should give case-by-case approval to gas development projects, with safeguards against specific risks.

Australia needs reliable, affordable electricity to underpin our 21st-century economic prosperity. That must be protected while we also decarbonise the energy sector.

Energy market reform was at the forefront of national competition policy in the mid to late 1990s. But reform has since slowed, and the states are partly responsible. The states can rekindle the fire by pursuing a clear, nationally consistent action plan for affordable, reliable and low-emissions electricity.

Australia’s households and businesses – and the environment – are relying on the states to step up.

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bronwyn Bate, PhD Candidate, Urban Research Program, Western Sydney University

In Australia, when we think of home, we think of ownership. This normalisation of home ownership is reflected in the “Great Australian Dream”, the belief that it’s the best way to achieve financial security. This “dream” is based on the premise that if you work hard you will one day be able to buy a home. Home ownership is an important goal for many Australians. Home ownership implies success.

Linked to the importance of home ownership are our conceptions of home – what home means and the ways home can and should be made. Popular understandings of home suggest that feelings of home are most easily created between a house and the person who owns it.

Read more: ‘Just like home’. New survey finds most renters enjoy renting, although for many it’s expensive

What is home?

So ingrained is this relationship between home and ownership that in my recently published paper I argue that research rarely considers the ways non-owners make and think about home. This is problematic, given recent housing trends.

Recent changes in housing, particularly the increased cost of home ownership and curbing of public housing, have created a greater demand for rental housing. As a result, there is an undersupply of privately rented housing in Australia.

Australian tenancy laws add to the insecurity of the private rental sector. Tenancy laws and policy reflect cultural norms in Australia, where private renting is seen as a form of short-term, transitional housing.

Recently, significant media and public attention has been directed at the impact of state-based tenancy legislation. It is argued that tenancy laws need to be changed to reflect current housing trends and the needs of many tenants to have long-term, secure housing.

Read more: When falling home ownership and ageing baby boomers collide

Rental insecurity is a persistent source of stress for many tenants. It’s a key reason that many tenants struggle to feel at home in their rental property. A person’s ability to identify feelings of home with their dwelling has been shown to impact psychological health and overall well-being.

My research findings suggest that while tenancy law affects the ways we understand and make home, likewise, our meanings of home affect how we shape and understand tenure and policy. Australian tenancy law reflects broader cultural values that associate the meaning and making of home with home ownership.

While researchers and policymakers focus on how tenancy law can negatively affect or restrict renters within their homes, the actual practices of home-making by renters are often overlooked. Current understandings of home typically reference what home means to home owners. My research points to the importance of understanding the ways private renters make home – and make home meaningful – so that any changes to tenancy law reflect the needs of tenants.

Read more: Life as an older renter, and what it tells us about the urgent need for tenancy reform

Is having a home a right or a privilege?

While there is no doubt that small changes are being made, perhaps the lack of consideration for tenants in tenancy laws and policy is indicative of our larger beliefs about what it is to “feel” at home and make a home. The “Great Australian Dream” is based on the belief that hard work will eventually lead to home ownership. Yet owning a home is becoming impossible for many people, irrespective of how hard they work.

If we understand home to be a basic right, then we will have policies that reflect this. If we understand home to be a privilege, reserved only for those who manage to achieve home ownership, then we will forever live in a country where tenure security and a feeling of being “home” are reserved for those who are able to buy a house. Consequently, our policies will continue to support the idea that, ultimately, a rental property cannot be “home” to a tenant.

The question then remains: do we consider home a right or a privilege? This issue is at the very heart of Australia’s housing crisis. Until we change our meaning of home by separating it from ownership, we will never be able to “fix” Australia’s housing crisis.

Read more: What do single, older women want? Their ‘own little space’ (and garden) to call home, for a start

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David R. Gallagher, Malcolm Broomhead Chair in Finance, The University of Queensland

The most telling part of the long-awaited review into the rotten culture of elite Australian cricket is what it doesn’t say. Or more correctly, what it does say, but what the establishment that owns and controls professional cricket won’t let us read.

Even a chunk of the executive summary of the report is redacted, like state secrets from a confidential intelligence dossier. A further 22 other pages in the report also have redacted material, in some parts quite extensive.

There may be other reasons for the dozens of redactions, but it’s hard not to conclude the principle motivation is that some criticisms of Cricket Australia, and of specific individuals, are just too close to the bone.

The redactions are at odds with the “complete transparency” talked about by Cricket Australia chairman David Peever.

They are emblematic of Cricket Australia’s lack of accountability to the game’s most important stakeholders – the cricketing public.

A very public scandal

The report stems from the ball-tampering scandal in March 2018, when the leaders of the Australian men’s cricket team were involved in a brazen attempt to cheat during a match with South Africa. Three players, including captain Steve Smith and vice-captain Dave Warner, were given unprecedented 12-month suspensions.

Cricket Australia then commissioned the respected Ethics Centre to conduct an independent review covering “cultural, organisational and/or governance issues” related to cricket’s administration.

Read more: Australian cricket’s wake-up call on a culture that has cost it dearly

The investigation has spanned the entire organisation (including the member state associations that are essentially the shareholders of Cricket Australia). It has looked at selection processes, values, leadership and the financial arrangements involving players, sponsors and broadcasters.

Sins of omission

The report says the leadership of Cricket Australia should accept responsibility for several failures. We don’t know what the first failure is, because it has been redacted. But the second is an “inadvertent (but foreseeable) failure to create and support a culture in which the will-to-win was balanced by an equal commitment to moral courage and ethical restraint”.

The review does – as far as we can tell – save Cricket Australia from blame for promoting a “win at all costs” culture. But it levels a charge almost as serious.

In our opinion, CA’s fault is not that it established a culture of ‘win at all costs’. Rather, it made the fateful mistake of enacting a program that would lead to ‘winning without counting the costs’.

It is this approach that has led, inadvertently, to the situation in which cricket finds itself today – for good and for ill.

A series of unfortunate events

Several significant and controversial decisions were made in the weeks prior to the report’s delayed release. After a “global search”, the board appointed Cricket Australia insider Kevin Roberts to replace retiring chief executive James Sutherland. It then re-appointed long-time board chairman David Peever for a further three-year term.

These decisions suggest Cricket Australia’s highest echelons just aren’t taking responsibility. Doesn’t the buck stop with the chairman and board? How can a significant review finding cultural problems across the entire structure not lead to any meaningful changes in its leadership and governance?

Read more: Cricket Australia’s culture sore: captains of the finance industry should take note

Notable rejections

Cricket Australia says it will adopt most of the independent review’s 42 recommendations. It accepts “sin bin” measures for cricketer bad behaviour, that annual cricketer awards take into account sportsmanship and character, establishing an ethics commission to strengthen accountability, and to finally include sledging in an anti-harassment code.

There are, however, two notable rejections.

One is that, “subject to issues of confidentiality (commercial and otherwise)” the board publish the minutes of its meetings, as is done by the Board for Control of Cricket in India. Another cross marked here against transparency.

Operating in a parallel universe

All this points to a critical problem with Cricket Australia’s governance and leadership.

On page 13, the report includes a definition of cricket’s stakeholders: “All parties who hold a stake in the success of CA and Cricket-in-Australia (the general public was not included in the scope for research).”

This seems to sum up Cricket Australia’s attitude perfectly: it pays lip service to the fans, but in practice treats them as a cash cow, not real stakeholders.

Cricket is a sporting monopoly, like other sporting codes. Cricket Australia is a company limited by guarantee, and owned by the state and territory associations. It controls the game as a lucrative business. The general public might love the game, but we have no ownership or direct influence over it.

The only means we might have to effect meaningful reform is by voting with our feet.