Mike Seccombe With wages stagnating since the Coalition took office, Labor is hoping to make the election a fight on industrial relations – even if it doesn’t have solutions.

Sarah Krasnostein As Chief Judge Peter Kidd steadily reads his sentencing of George Pell, the author sits among those assembled in court, watching the cardinal, and considering the nature of power in the justice system.

Alex McKinnon With just a week to go until the NSW election, the major parties are campaigning hard to woo voters. But it’s the micro-parties that may end up deciding who will govern.

Harry Windsor While Claire Denis seeks to avoid metaphor in her films, the French director’s sci-fi prison drama High Life, starring Juliette Binoche and Robert Pattinson, can’t help but raise big questions about the universe, the nature of time and even the meaning of life. “Everything in screenwriting is painful and yet it’s great. It’s great because the pain is the price you have to pay to be allowed to dream things, to make them real.”

Nayuka Gorrie In 2001, Victoria’s own inquiry into public drunkenness recommended decriminalisation, citing that ‘for historic, cultural and instrumental reasons the impact of the criminalisation of public drunkenness has a disproportionate effect and impact upon Indigenous communities’. The committee pushed for the establishment of sobering-up centres across the state, including specific centres for Indigenous people, which would form part of a ‘holistic treatment service’.

Paul Bongiorno This week began with the Coalition government recording its 50th consecutive Newspoll loss, and that by a margin of eight points. A National Party source has no doubt it was that result that triggered Barnaby Joyce’s declaration of war on metropolitan Liberals, as he demanded the government underwrite a coal-fired power station in north Queensland. Prompting his outburst was his assessment that the government is doomed. It is now everyone for themselves.

Richard Ackland Kerri Judd, QC, the Victorian DPP, defender of the faith and protector of the courts, has possibly up to 100 media organisations and reptiles in her sights for alleged contempt. In her possession is a bristling letter from Justin Quill, whose firm, Macpherson Kelley, is acting for 53 potential media parties. This correspondence is a fallout from the Pell trial suppression orders and headlines after the cardinal’s secret conviction for “historic sexual abuse crimes”.

To the streets, tens of thousands of students went on Friday, picketing for climate action. We cannot wait, their common refrain. There is no time. Meanwhile, unimpassioned, our leaders squabble still over coal. And the deja vu sets in – the climate battles of the past two decades, hashed and rehashed, an endless circular argument as the stakes and the temperatures rise.

Paddy Manning A write-down of the NBN, as well as necessary upgrades, may cost taxpayers tens of billions of dollars, according to leaked emails from an industry expert forum.

Jonathan Pearlman Daesh's last Syrian enclave set to fall. Oil spill off Solomon Islands. Russia plans to disconnect local internet from the web. May's Brexit chaos continues.

Dave Faulkner Karen O and Danger Mouse’s collaboration has delivered in Lux Prima a brilliant album of dark pop, with a hint of Pink Floyd grandeur.

Neika Lehman

Displayed in a historic homestead built on the cusp of Federation, Those Monuments Don’t Know Us examines colonisation and cultural expression and challenges ingrained assumptions of what fits where.

Kath Kenny Lunch with School Strike 4 Climate lead organiser Jean Hinchliffe.

Annie Smithers

Cindy MacDonald When it comes to making holiday plans, some are happier abandoning terra firma and giving in to the pull of the ocean.

Dani Valent As a girl, the author grew up knowing three things were certain – death, taxes and Carlton FC success. So when, suddenly and shockingly, the Blues became a team that let her down, she had to find new ways to keep the love alive.

Cindy MacDonald Test your general knowledge with our weekly quiz.