News

CSIRO steps back on Adani approval

“CSIRO and Geoscience Australia were not provided with copies of Adani’s full revised plans until after they had made their responses to the environment department.”

Karen Middleton As Scott Morrison readied to call the election, Melissa Price rushed to give federal approval to Adani’s Carmichael mine, citing support from the CSIRO.

News

News

Election 2019: welcome to the age war

“Across a broad range of political issues, from Muslim immigration to climate change, younger, better-educated voters take the progressive view. ”

Mike Seccombe While older Australians reap the benefits of the government’s fiscal policies, it is millennials who are fast becoming the nation’s largest voting bloc, but they are not becoming more conservative as they age.

News

Controlling social media

Martin McKenzie-Murray After the Christchurch massacre, the Coalition and Labor passed a bill prohibiting the sharing of abhorrent material on social media, but experts argue the new law will achieve little.

News

Delays in citizenship applications

Santilla Chingaipe Under the Coalition government, the processing of citizenship paperwork has increased to often upwards of 300 days, causing a huge backlog of applications and infuriating refugee groups.

News

Sliding house prices and negative gearing

“The impact of negative gearing on the property market has been ‘exaggerated’, says AMP Capital’s chief economist, Shane Oliver. He adds that reforms are necessary, but restricting the policy to new buildings may distort the market. ”

David Ross As house prices fall around Australia, opinions are divided about the impact of the Labor Party’s proposed reforms to negative gearing.

World

Likely fifth term for Benjamin Netanyahu

Jonathan Pearlman Libya after Gaddafi. Indonesians choosing not to vote. Nine guilty over Occupy movement. Israeli election results.

The big story. Every day. Listen now.

7am is a daily news podcast from Schwartz Media. Every day it tells you what you need to know: who's involved, what it means and why it matters. It's news with narrative, every weekday. Returning January 24.

Follow 7am wherever you get your podcasts.

Opinion

Opinion

Paddy Manning
The funding gap on education

“Melbourne’s Caulfield Grammar is building a pool with a moveable floor, while Presbyterian Ladies College will soon have an orchestra lift – which would all be fine, if it wasn’t part-funded by taxpayers.”

Opinion

Paul Bongiorno
PM sets tone for May 18 election

“The prime minister seems to have decided the best way to win over voters is to treat them like mugs. ‘Their problem,’ one Labor strategist says of the government, ‘is the voters aren’t as dumb as they think.’”

Diary

Gadfly
The A-Team’s heroes for hire

Richard Ackland There’s a sense of relief that the nation is now in caretaker mode – a nice change from the usual arrangement where the affairs of state are conducted with unremitting carelessness.

Letters, Poem & Editorial

Poem

Maxine Beneba Clarke
The Changemakers

the pollsters are gleeful

        saying

                abbott’s time has come

 

 

things, they are about to change

around warringah way

Read More

Editorial
Untold damages

Eryn Jean Norvill never wanted to be there. And yet there she was, sitting in the front row of the packed Sydney courtroom, waiting for the judgement to be handed down in Nationwide News Pty Limited v Rush. There she was, against her wishes, waiting to hear Justice Michael Wigney label her an incredible witness, one “prone to exaggeration and embellishment”.

Letters

The video hit on Michael Daley

As a long-time New South Wales Labor supporter, I am grateful to the Liberals for spilling the beans on Michael Daley (Paddy Manning, “Inside the Liberal Party’s dirt unit”, April 6–12). …

Controlling the story

Martin McKenzie-Murray suggests “the pockets of PR hacks aren’t usually rewarded with silence. It’s words that make them money.” (“A different kind of spin”, April 6–12). …

Read More

Culture

Profile

Rosslynd Piggott’s sense of self

Steve Dow

As Rosslynd Piggott prepares for I Sense You But I Cannot See You – the second retrospective of her career at the National Gallery of Victoria – she reflects on her childhood in Frankston, her ambition as a young artist and her life’s work. “I did a year of teaching in 1981 in the remote Victorian country at Werrimull. I’d just come out of post-punk Melbourne, thrust up there in the middle of nowhere. I was never going to do three years up there. After that, I just ran away, basically, to St Kilda, doing dishwashing and waitressing. I knew I wanted to be an artist.”

Film

Transit

Christos Tsiolkas

In Transit, Christian Petzold transposes a story of World War II refugees into a contemporary setting. By pulling off this feat, he confronts viewers with their complicity in the treatment of asylum seekers today.

Books

Sarah Maddison
The Colonial Fantasy

Meg Keneally
Fled

Melina Marchetta
The Place on Dalhousie

Life

Food

Chocolate marquise dacquoise sandwich

Annie Smithers

Travel

Apartment living in Hong Kong

Elizabeth Flux While old-style public housing apartment blocks conjure fond memories of the ‘real’ Hong Kong, a flawed system has seen them unable to keep up with demand, leading to near-intolerable living conditions for many tenants.

Sport

Ash Barty’s rise to world tennis’s top 10

Alecia Simmonds and James Jiang While the bad boys of Australian tennis have been grabbing the headlines and squandering their talent, Ash Barty has been quietly climbing the rankings by way of hard graft, deft skills and old-school modesty.

Puzzles

The Cryptic

Crossword No. 248

The Quiz

1. The Seychelles is located in which ocean?
2. Where in the body is the ulnar nerve?
3. In nautical terms, what does avast mean?
4. Who are the two main stars of the 1985 film Out of Africa?
5. The MMR vaccine immunises against which three illnesses?
6. Which singer links the albums Erotica, Bedtime Stories and Rebel Heart?
7. Tirana is the capital of which south-eastern European country?
8. In which fictional town is the TV series Postman Pat set? (Bonus point for naming Pat’s cat.)
9. What does the Latin phrase tempus fugit mean in English?
10. Tennis player Ash Barty recently claimed the biggest singles title of her career by defeating whom to win the Miami Open women’s final?

Click through for answers.

Quotes

SPORT

“Drunks, homosexuals, adulterers, liars, fornicators, thieves, atheists, idolators…”

Israel FolauThe Australian rugby union player tells everyone fun to repent. And the Lord did offer advice unto him: consider retirement.

SPELLING

“No, Huang, H-U-A-N-G.”

Louise PrattThe Labor senator corrects Ian Macdonald after he asked if Penny Wong is related to Chinese billionaire Huang Xiangmo. All assembled were pleasantly surprised when Macdonald didn’t bow his head and say “arigato” in reply.

LOBBYING

“Did you know @billshortenmp is my father? Hi dad, love you!”

Captain GetUpAdvance Australia launches its new mascot. The conservative lobbyists said the character was “political satire”, though it could also be described as a waste of $400,000.

SOLIDARITY

“We are going to stand by our tradies and we are going to save their utes.”

Michaelia CashThe small business minister vows to protect apprentices from Bill Shorten’s electric vehicle push. One can only assume said tradies are not unionised.

WIKILEAKS

“Julian Assange did not ‘walk out of the embassy’. The Ecuadorian ambassador invited British police into the embassy...”

WikiLeaksThe organisation tweets news of its founder’s arrest in London. Ecuador said it requested he not be extradited to a country where he could face the death penalty.

POLITICS

“To pay someone more, you’ve got to sack someone else to do it.”

Scott MorrisonThe prime minister and former treasurer displays his economic acumen. To give a go, you’ve got to take a go.