ASIO officers broke law on warrant
“Whilst operational staff complied with ASIO’s operational planning procedures, these procedures were inconsistent with other ASIO policies and were insufficient to ensure that ASIO acted lawfully.”
The agency’s watchdog, tasked with unravelling the breach, has echoed growing concern about flawed and confusing new anti-terror laws.
News
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“One of the things that I have experienced myself … is the utter stress of living on Centrelink payments that are inadequate. Me having to choose between going to therapy to actually get better or having food.”
A wide-ranging review of Australian mental health has pointed to the welfare system, particularly the troubled jobactive program, as a key driver in the crisis.
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A new study highlighting systemic racism in the Australian media has called for stronger guidelines to regulate against both overt and covert prejudice.
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Activism and secondary boycotts
Although the Coalition is talking tough about criminalising consumer advocacy, legal experts say any attempt to do so will be hamstrung by reality.
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“They are known in PNG as the ‘negatives’. Australia doesn’t want them, America doesn’t want them, Papua New Guinea doesn’t want them.”
Ahead of a senate vote that could repeal the medevac legislation, the fate of more than 200 asylum seekers in Port Moresby hangs in the balance.
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India’s PM rejects East Asia trade pact
US to formally leave Paris climate agreement. Australia joins trade pact but Narendra Modi declines. Daesh attacks continue in Africa. Delhi closes schools and restricts car use over smog.
Opinion
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Anthony Kelly
Brutality checks on activists
“For those who have watched the evolution of public-order policing in Victoria over recent years, the sort of police violence we saw at the International Mining and Resources Conference (IMARC) protests in Melbourne would’ve come as no real surprise.”
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Paul Bongiorno
Post-election blues all round
“Never has it been more obvious: getting elected is one task, governing is another. While Labor tries to move on from its election loss review, delivered to the executive on Thursday, Scott Morrison is finding that running the country is harder than winning the unwinnable election. ”
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Gadfly
Voters look back in anger
Here we are six months after the federal election and upon swaths of citizens it has dawned that they have bought tickets to a flop. If it’s cringeworthy now, imagine another two-and-a-half years of this clapped-out music-hall routine.
Letters, Poem & Editorial
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Maxine Beneba Clarke
Waltzing Matildas
a lot can go down
along the 200 red burning
metres of track
between the victory lap
and the starter gun
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Editorial
Everything is not okay
Labor’s campaign was flawed but its policies were right. Its failure came in acknowledging that the country needs to change. More than anything, Australians want a prime minister who covers for their shortcomings – who says not to worry, and that most of you will be okay.
Culture
An audience with Antonio Banderas
Drawing on his recent experience of a heart attack, as well as his decades-long friendship with director Pedro Almodóvar, Antonio Banderas has produced what may be his finest performance in Pain and Glory. “We hadn’t worked together in eight or nine years, but suddenly he calls me and says, ‘Hey, I’m gonna send you something. You’re going to find a lot of references to people that you and I know.’ And I received Pain and Glory. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe it because he was there, it was such an opportunity. So, I went to him as a soldier, as a very, very plain soldier, ready to listen. Really listen.”
Electronic musician FKA twigs is at the height of her powers on her new album, Magdalene, which combines formal ingenuity with visceral emotion.
“People think I made the decision to leave Islam quite easily. It’s not true. This has been a lifelong journey, filled with grief. I spent many years trying not to be exiled for things that non-Muslims take for granted. You’re never enough. No matter how practising you are as a Muslim, especially as a woman, you’re always toeing the line of exile.”
Life
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Nimbin’s recreational cannabis trial
Medicinal cannabis may be garnering the majority of research attention but a new study by Monash University is investigating how the ratio of chemical compounds in the drug affects long-term recreational users.
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Alicia Molik eyes Fed Cup glory
As Australia sets itself for its first Fed Cup final since 1993, team captain Alicia Molik reflects on her own on-court highs and lows and assesses what makes world No. 1 Ash Barty so special.
Books
Puzzles
1. Name the Kahlil Gibran book, first published in 1923, that comprises 26 prose poetry fables.
2. American rapper Belcalis Marlenis Almánzar is known professionally by what name?
3. Who are the subjects of Michelangelo’s Pietà?
4. What are the first names of Justin Trudeau’s parents?
5. What is -80 divided by -2?
6. Which Australian rock band’s name is an anagram of “old clichés”?
7. What is the meaning of the Greek root word bio?
8. The West End of London’s is best known for which field of the arts?
9. When looking towards the bow of a ship, is the port side on the left or the right? (Bonus point for naming which colour navigation light indicates the port side.)
10. Name the nosy neighbour on the TV series Bewitched.
Quotes
ENTERTAINMENT
“Look, we’re having a conversation about Phoebe’s gender here, which is fucking ridiculous.”
The actor dismisses suggestions writer Phoebe Waller-Bridge was brought onto the forthcoming James Bond movie as a diversity hire. You know a franchise is fusty when hiring an award-winning RADA graduate who’s descended from landed gentry is read as a PR play to make things seem more “modern”.
RESPECTABILITY
“No, I fucking don’t. If you go low, I’m gonna come for you.”
The writer and activist rejects Michelle Obama’s catchcry “When they go low, we go high” on Q&A. Both mantras remain decidedly more useful than “If you have a go, you get a go”.
BARGAIN HUNTING
“The travel was within normal guidelines.”
The Defence Industry minister charged taxpayers $77,254 for a recent European trip. Explains where she was hiding all that time when she had the Environment portfolio.
SELF-AWARENESS
“If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get my consent. It won’t last forever, you’ve gotta ask again…”
The state’s police force shares a catchy rework of the Spice Girls hit “Wannabe” to illustrate the importance of consent, in the same week it is accused of strip searching more than 120 under-age girls.
MELBOURNE CUP
“It’s a lovely story. This is the horse that grew here, not flew here.”
The Herald Sun journalist manages to find a xenophobic take on Australia’s best-known race in personal best time, though still a few lengths off the record set by previous Sunrise guests.
NOBILITY
“We were so afraid we wouldn’t be able to interview Kate and Will that we … quashed the story.”
The ABC America anchor is caught by a hot mic expressing her anger at the US network spiking her story about Jeffrey Epstein three years ago. Because no number of Pulitzers, nor bringing down “America’s most prolific paedophile”, is worth jeopardising your Royals special.
