“This is a story about what happened to a once-prosperous town, which because of the mine can be said to ‘functionally no longer exist’, according to Queensland’s Land Court.”
A Queensland town’s decades-long legal fight against being subsumed by a coalmine could end next week as the case reaches the High Court of Australia. But not before a final turn of the screws.
News
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Bushfire hearings spotlight climate change
Experts called during the opening week of the bushfires royal commission warned the Black Summer will not be an isolated event.
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Economic fallout of the $60b JobKeeper error
As the government tries to justify how its JobKeeper forecast was out by $60 billion, two economists who questioned the initial figures explain what might be next for Australia’s economy.
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How Covid-19 will change cities
“Walking around, it is clear that the CBD has become an estranged place. Its mood has dampened; it is no longer convivial and lively … It feels that there is an undercurrent of social anxiety.”
With Covid-19 restrictions easing, plans are afoot to revitalise Australia’s city centres, even though international students and office workers may never return in the same numbers.
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Temporary visa holders at risk
For women living in Australia on temporary visas, the Covid-19 lockdown has placed them at greater risk of domestic violence and coercive control.
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Beijing security laws reignite HK protests
United States belts Victoria over Beijing ties. Deal to broadcast Australian television content across the Pacific. China’s national security law reignites Hong Kong protests. Boris Johnson’s chief adviser keeps job despite lockdown trip.
Opinion
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Patricia Turner
Collaboration on Closing the Gap
“It was only three months ago that the prime minister stood up in parliament to make his latest report on the progress of Closing the Gap. Just two of seven targets, he revealed, are on track to be met by 2025. The gap itself is a difficult concept. By its very nature, improvements do not always mean it is narrowed. For instance, while Indigenous mortality rates and child mortality rates have improved slightly, so have those for non-Indigenous Australians, meaning the gap remains – and Indigenous children still face a mortality rate twice that of their non-Indigenous peers. ”
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Paul Bongiorno
Unplugging the economy’s life support
“At the National Press Club on Tuesday, Scott Morrison went all medical as he framed his prescription for economic recovery. Key ministers in the room smiled their nodding approval when he said: ‘At some point you’ve got to get your economy out of ICU. You’ve got to get it off the medication before it becomes too accustomed to it.’ ”
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The ABC people know a trick or two about ratings triumphs. Having Grouper Greg Sheridan on Insiders as frequently as possible is a sure-fire winner. There’s the grizzled Grouper, with his tinted locks, nice and warm in his jumper and comfy jacket, dragging more viewers to the show by extolling the virtues of fossils and pooh-poohing market mechanisms to put a price on them: “Coal is still the best option for Australia; the second-best option would be gas; nuclear would be a very good option.”
Letters, Cartoon & Editorial
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First there was the ceasefire, ushered in by the pandemic. Now, Scott Morrison says, is the time for unions and the government to lay down their weapons and come to the table to negotiate the terms of the peace. As a show of good faith the prime minister has put away the stick – shelving the Ensuring Integrity Bill, for the time being. What’s being offered as a carrot is less clear.
Culture
Since releasing her first album, Gordi has experienced three years of emotional upheaval, which she has channelled into a new record, Our Two Skins. She speaks to Nick Buckley about losing her grandmother, falling in love over the phone and creating music in self-enforced isolation. “That’s when I feel most creative, when I don’t have everything at my disposal. You know, how I might make one sound if I don’t have that thing. It’s like creating unique moments out of nothing.”
Young Vic’s A Streetcar Named Desire
The Young Vic’s 2014 production of A Streetcar Named Desire, recently rebroadcast during the Covid-19 lockdown, reminds this viewer of the work’s power but also of the test of matching the smouldering energy of Marlon Brando and Vivien Leigh.
“I have been walking on the weekends to visit the goddess garden. Sometimes I wish that all life expected of me was one walk each day, to admire the things that grow without our encouragement. I wish that once my walk was over, I could disappear in the bowels of my home, to neither suffer nor experience joy, as I find both to be quite tiring. Instead, I have a job and a family I love, who love me back. I have meals to cook and eat, and a cat with a litter tray in the laundry.”
Life
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For the author, the Covid-19 lockdown has allowed time to contemplate art’s ability to bring life into sharper focus, and to remember what beauty lies in simplicity and stillness.
Books
Puzzles
1. Which Beatles song features the lyrics, “All the lonely people / Where do they all come from? All the lonely people / Where do they all belong?”
2. The Three Capes Track is in which Australian state or territory?
3. What word beginning with ‘r’ is another name for the flowering plant canola?
4. What is the specific scientific name of the virus that causes Covid-19?
5. Which country is Tennent’s Lager from?
6. In what decade did The Australian Women’s Weekly magazine go monthly: (a) 1960s; (b) 1970s; (c) 1980s; or (d) 1990s?
7. Singer Claire Elise Boucher is known professionally by what mononym? (Bonus point for naming her partner.)
8. Virgin Australia was launched in August 2000 under what name?
9. Isis is an ancient goddess of which country?
10. Who is deputy premier of NSW?
Quotes
OPENINGS
“I hate this dictatorship.”
The senator threatens to file a legal challenge unless Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk reopens the state’s borders, continuing One Nation’s storied legacy of advocating open borders.
INFINITY
“Open your eyes, look up to the skies.”
The Tesla founder and father of X Æ A-Xii tweets ahead of his company SpaceX’s first crewed flight. Liftoff was cancelled on Thursday due to bad weather.
INTELLIGENCE
“Here’s a message for those on Twitter who buy the crazy conspiracy theory about me working as a spy for Hillary Clinton.”
The former Foreign minister tells his followers that it’s “lucky I’m not litigious”.
MINING
“Rio Tinto has worked constructively together with the PKKP People on a range of heritage matters.”
The mining giant commemorates National Reconciliation Week by demolishing a 46,000-year-old Aboriginal sacred site in Western Australia’s Pilbara region.
EQUALITY
“I don’t think I am so different and that there is one rule for me and one rule for other people.”
The special adviser to Boris Johnson defends his breaching of Britain’s lockdown laws after driving 400 kilometres to his father’s country estate.
FUNDRAISING
“Turns out that studying acting at university doesn’t make me a lawmaker.”
The comedian responds to a court decision that the $51 million she raised for the New South Wales Rural Fire Service cannot be shared with other charities.
