Including pronouns in introductions, your email signature or your social media bio may seem like a minor detail. Pronouns are just small words we use in place of names all the time. But, like names, pronouns have personal significance. They say something about who we are.
Linguistic shifts towards gender inclusivity are occurring worldwide, and the use of gender-neutral or inclusive pronouns is not a new nor exclusively Western phenomenon.
Chinese, one of the world’s oldest languages and spoken by more than one billion people, illustrates how languages adapt to reflect shifting understanding of gender. Its pronoun system may be on the cusp of significant change.
The modern Chinese pronoun system is fascinating for two reasons.
First, gendered pronouns have only been part of the Chinese language for 100 years: the feminine pronoun 她 (she) was only adopted in the 1920s.
Second, although there are now distinct Chinese characters for “he”, 他, and “she”, 她, these are both pronounced tā in Mandarin. You can have a whole conversation about someone without revealing their gender.
The lack of gender-distinct pronouns in spoken Mandarin has prompted calls for written Chinese to follow suit. Queer Chinese speakers have proposed several gender-inclusive pronouns that would be pronounced tā, just like 他 (he) and 她 (she).
Queer Chinese speakers have proposed several gender-inclusive pronouns. Mogome01/Shutterstock
These include the romanised form “TA” and new Chinese characters 「⿰无也」 and 「⿰㐅也」. These new characters might look strange: they are written like this to clarify that they should be read as one Chinese character. Currently, they take up the space of two Chinese characters because they are not yet in Unicode and cannot be typed properly.
Other people hope to see the now-masculine 他 regain its original function as an ungendered pronoun.
What pronouns do queer Chinese speakers use?
To understand how Chinese pronouns are changing, I surveyed more than 100 queer Chinese speakers across 12 countries. I asked survey respondents, a third of whom were nonbinary or otherwise gender-diverse, about their pronoun preferences and perceptions. I also analysed how pronouns are used in a large database of contemporary Chinese texts.
My research found gender-inclusive pronouns accounted for about a quarter of first-choice pronouns, and nearly half of all pronouns used by survey respondents. TA was overwhelmingly preferred by gender-diverse individuals (70%), with the English “they” (20%) the next most popular option.
While cisgender and transgender men almost exclusively used masculine pronouns, cis and trans women showed significant openness to using gender-inclusive pronouns alongside feminine ones. After 她 (she), TA was the second most common pronoun for women (40%) and second most common overall (17%).
Notably, 他 (he) was not used by any women or gender-diverse people, except one who considered it gender-neutral. This suggests reviving its original ungendered usage may be difficult.
Survey participants were overwhelmingly positive about TA. Chay_Tee/Shutterstock
TA emerged as the most recognised gender-inclusive pronoun, with nearly all respondents (97%) familiar with it regardless of their age, gender, region or language background. In contrast, fewer than 8% had encountered the new character-based pronouns 「⿰无也」 or「⿰㐅也」 and no one reported using them.
What makes TA so popular?
Survey participants were overwhelmingly positive about TA, with 63% expressing favourable views. As one respondent explained:
The look and feel is good, it suits people’s everyday pronunciation habits, and doesn’t create issues with having to specify someone’s gender.
TA functions similarly to English singular “they”. It works in two ways: as a gender-neutral pronoun when gender is unknown (like saying “someone left their umbrella”), and as a gender-inclusive pronoun specifically including gender-diverse people.
Many survey respondents called TA “respectful” and “inclusive” but also simply “convenient”.
However, some respondents were concerned TA is “untraditional” and “pollutes the Chinese language”.
Practical considerations for using emerging Chinese pronouns also extend to the technical challenges of typing new Chinese characters. Before a new character can be typed on computers or phones, it needs to be officially encoded in Unicode, the global standard for digital text.
My research shows this requirement is strongly influencing which emerging Chinese pronouns can gain traction.
While some survey respondents hoped to see a gender-inclusive Chinese character adopted, they weren’t optimistic about 「⿰无也」or 「⿰㐅也」 becoming mainstream.
As one noted:
「⿰无也」is good, but it’s hard to type and it takes a long time to explain.
User-friendly and easily understandable
TA is currently the most popular emerging Chinese gender-inclusive pronoun, crucially because it mimics how people use tā in spoken Mandarin.
It is already part of people’s vocabulary, and already used (at least as a gender-neutral pronoun) by mainstream Chinese media and on online platforms.
This 2023 TEDxSuzhouWomen talk is titled ‘We are all gender misfits’ (你我ta都是”性别酷儿)
Unlike other recently proposed pronouns, TA is versatile, user-friendly and easily understandable for queer and non-queer Chinese speakers alike. This makes TA a strong contender for widespread adoption into contemporary Chinese.
Like the introduction of a Chinese feminine pronoun 她 (she) in the 1920s, the emergence of TA as a gender-inclusive pronoun in the 2020s is about recognising a wider spectrum of identities.
Pronouns are not a political statement, just a personal statement. When you use someone’s correct pronouns, you’re saying, “I see you, and I respect who you are”. That’s something worth talking about, in any language.
Janet Davey is supported by an Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarship.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Charles Livingstone, Associate Professor, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University
Casino operator Star Entertainment has been under financial pressure for some time. The company’s share price has tanked, and the business, with its three casino properties, has been bleeding money.
Last year’s opening of a new riverside casino in Queen’s Wharf, Brisbane, was seen as a way to revitalise the business. But Star has swung from one lifeline to another.
Just as it was set to run out of cash on Friday March 7, Star announced a last-minute rescue package. This centred on selling its 50% stake in the Queens Wharf casino to Hong-Kong-based joint venture partners for $53 million.
Star has also started documentation for a $250 million bridging loan but still needs to finalise a proposal for long-term refinancing.
All of this remains subject to details being finalised, and regulatory approvals. An alternative $250 million takeover offer from US casino operator Bally’s currently isn’t Star’s preference because it is considered too low.
But Star is far from out of the woods yet. Whatever happens to it and its casino assets, there are bigger questions about whether the age of unfettered gambling revenue for casinos may have already ended.
Elsewhere, gambling is booming
If Australian casinos are struggling, it’s not because punters are giving up gambling. Whereas most of the gambling market recovered rapidly after the end of pandemic restrictions, casinos floundered.
Between 2018–19 and 2022–23, before and after pandemic restrictions were in place, total Australian gambling expenditure (in other words, gamblers’ losses) grew by 6.8% in real terms (adjusted for inflation).
Real wagering losses grew by 45%. This segment has clearly emerged as the second-biggest gambling market in the country, with gambling expenditure of $8.4 billion.
But over the same period, expenditure at casinos declined by more than 35% nationally, and by 42% in New South Wales.
Both Star and Australia’s other major casino operator, Crown, have emerged from a range of high-profile scandals in recent years.
Media reporting, inquiries, and royal commissions into Crown, and then Star, give some insight into how the casino business used to be run in Australia.
Star’s (and Crown’s) business model appears to have previously relied on two major revenue streams: benefiting from the proceeds of crime (by operating as a cash laundry for organised criminal gangs), and exploiting every vulnerable person who walked onto their premises.
Both casinos facilitated money laundering, particularly via junket operators, organisers of casino visits by high rollers. Unfortunately, many of these people had strong links to organised crime gangs keen to launder their illegally acquired money.
This wasn’t just high rollers. Ordinary people were also encouraged to use poker machines for hours without any attempt at encouraging a break, as mandated by “responsible gambling” codes.
The Victorian Royal Commissioner, investigating Crown, regarded its “responsible gambling” failures as particularly heinous.
Although neither casino chain closed its doors, regulatory breaches led to appointment of special managers to oversee the business and hold the licences. Further change included beefing up regulators’ powers and resources.
Turning a page
Without significant funds from the proceeds of crime, or exploitation of the vulnerable, casinos are clearly struggling.
In NSW and Victoria, the casinos have been required to introduce “cashless gaming” systems.
This takes cash out of the system, deterring money launderers. Gamblers must also set a limit on their gambling spend, and adhere to it. The system is in the process of being introduced in Queensland.
Competition from online wagering and pokie venues may also be playing a part. These businesses are not currently regulated as effectively as casinos.
Precommitment systems for online wagering would be relatively easy to introduce. They would require punters to set a limit on deposits or bets, or indeed the time they spend gambling, and enforce these technically.
Getting these in place, however, may be as formidable a task as getting gambling ads banned from sporting broadcasts, if not more so.
The gambling industry understandably opposes this. After all, these measures would reduce the amount that people lose. From a public health perspective, however, they provide an effective system to prevent harm in the first place, rather than simply picking up the pieces.
Without effective reform of local gambling venues and online wagering, casinos may try to mount an argument for less effective regulation. That would be an admission that their “tourism” attractiveness has waned. It’s also a powerful argument to speed up the transition of effective regulation to all gambling operators.
Charles Livingstone has received funding from the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation, the (former) Victorian Gambling Research Panel, and the South Australian Independent Gambling Authority (the funds for which were derived from hypothecation of gambling tax revenue to research purposes), from the Australian and New Zealand School of Government and the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, and from non-government organisations for research into multiple aspects of poker machine gambling, including regulatory reform, existing harm minimisation practices, and technical characteristics of gambling forms. He has received travel and co-operation grants from the Alberta Problem Gambling Research Institute, the Finnish Institute for Public Health, the Finnish Alcohol Research Foundation, the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Committee, the Turkish Red Crescent Society, and the Problem Gambling Foundation of New Zealand. He was a Chief Investigator on an Australian Research Council funded project researching mechanisms of influence on government by the tobacco, alcohol and gambling industries. He has undertaken consultancy research for local governments and non-government organisations in Australia and the UK seeking to restrict or reduce the concentration of poker machines and gambling impacts, and was a member of the Australian government’s Ministerial Expert Advisory Group on Gambling in 2010-11. He is a member of the Lancet Public Health Commission into gambling, and of the World Health Organisation expert group on gambling and gambling harm. He made a submission to and appeared before the HoR Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs inquiry into online gambling and its impacts on those experiencing gambling harm.
One of the most enduring questions humans have is how long we’re going to live. With this comes the question of how much of our lifespan is shaped by our environment and choices, and how much is predetermined by our genes.
A study recently published in the prestigious journal Nature Medicine has attempted for the first time to quantify the relative contributions of our environment and lifestyle versus our genetics in how we age and how long we live.
The findings were striking, suggesting our environment and lifestyle play a much greater role than our genes in determining our longevity.
What the researchers did
This study used data from the UK Biobank, a large database in the United Kingdom that contains in-depth health and lifestyle data from roughly 500,000 people. The data available include genetic information, medical records, imaging and information about lifestyle.
A separate part of the study used data from a subset of more than 45,000 participants whose blood samples underwent something called “proteomic profiling”.
Proteomic profiling is a relatively new technique that looks at how proteins in the body change over time to identify a person’s age at a molecular level. By using this method researchers were able to estimate how quickly an individual’s body was actually ageing. This is called their biological age, as opposed to their chronological age (or years lived).
The researchers assessed 164 environmental exposures as well as participants’ genetic markers for disease. Environmental exposures included lifestyle choices (for example, smoking, physical activity), social factors (for example, living conditions, household income, employment status) and early life factors, such as body weight in childhood.
They then looked for associations between genetics and environment and 22 major age-related diseases (such as coronary artery disease and type 2 diabetes), mortality and biological ageing (as determined by the proteomic profiling).
These analyses allowed the researchers to estimate the relative contributions of environmental factors and genetics to ageing and dying prematurely.
What did they find?
When it came to disease-related mortality, as we would expect, age and sex explained a significant amount (about half) of the variation in how long people lived. The key finding, however, was environmental factors collectively accounted for around 17% of the variation in lifespan, while genetic factors contributed less than 2%.
This finding comes down very clearly on the nurture side in the “nature versus nurture” debate. It suggests environmental factors influence health and longevity to a far greater extent than genetics.
Not unexpectedly, the study showed a different mix of environmental and genetic influences for different diseases. Environmental factors had the greatest impact on lung, heart and liver disease, while genetics played the biggest role in determining a person’s risk of breast, ovarian and prostate cancers, and dementia.
The environmental factors that had the most influence on earlier death and biological ageing included smoking, socioeconomic status, physical activity levels and living conditions.
Interestingly, being taller at age ten was found to be associated with a shorter lifespan. Although this may seem surprising, and the reasons are not entirely clear, this aligns with previous research finding taller people are more likely to die earlier.
Carrying more weight at age ten and maternal smoking (if your mother smoked in late pregnancy or when you were a newborn) were also found to shorten lifespan.
Probably the most surprising finding in this study was a lack of association between diet and markers of biological ageing, as determined by the proteomic profiling. This flies in the face of the extensive body of evidence showing the crucial role of dietary patterns in chronic disease risk and longevity.
But there are a number of plausible explanations for this. The first could be a lack of statistical power in the part of the study looking at biological ageing. That is, the number of people studied may have been too small to allow the researchers to see the true impact of diet on ageing.
Second, the dietary data in this study, which was self-reported and only measured at one time point, is likely to have been of relatively poor quality, limiting the researchers’ ability to see associations. And third, as the relationship between diet and longevity is likely to be complex, disentangling dietary effects from other lifestyle factors may be difficult.
So despite this finding, it’s still safe to say the food we eat is one of the most important pillars of health and longevity.
What other limitations do we need to consider?
Key exposures (such as diet) in this study were only measured at a single point in time, and not tracked over time, introducing potential errors into the results.
Also, as this was an observational study, we can’t assume associations found represent causal relationships. For example, just because living with a partner correlated with a longer lifespan, it doesn’t mean this caused a person to live longer. There may be other factors which explain this association.
Finally, it’s possible this study may have underestimated the role of genetics in longevity. It’s important to recognise genetics and environment don’t operate in isolation. Rather, health outcomes are shaped by their interplay, and this study may not have fully captured the complexity of these interactions.
This study found environmental factors influence health and longevity to a far greater extent than genetics. Ground Picture/Shutterstock
The future is (largely) in your hands
It’s worth noting there were a number of factors such as household income, home ownership and employment status associated with diseases of ageing in this study that are not necessarily within a person’s control. This highlights the crucial role of addressing the social determinants of health to ensure everyone has the best possible chance of living a long and healthy life.
At the same time, the results offer an empowering message that longevity is largely shaped by the choices we make. This is great news, unless you have good genes and were hoping they would do the heavy lifting.
Ultimately, the results of this study reinforce the notion that while we may inherit certain genetic risks, how we eat, move and engage with the world seems to be more important in determining how healthy we are and how long we live.
Hassan Vally does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Shamit Saggar, Executive Director, Australian Centre for Student Equity and Success and Professor of Public Policy, Curtin University
Two months out from an Australian federal election, the polling is pointing to a very tight race between the two major parties. This means, if the polls are correct, neither party will likely win enough seats to command a parliamentary working majority.
Australia’s most recent experience of a hung parliament was the Gillard-Rudd government of 2010–13. Many still see that as an unhappy era, with internal division within Labor’s party room in Canberra, and yet another leadership coup, as the lasting, bitter memory.
So, it is time to reassess whether – or how well – Australia might be governed in similar circumstances.
Building a stable coalition
The answer depends on us being open to the meaning of a stable, inter-party coalition. This is particularly tricky in Australia for three reasons. First, although the political parties themselves are coalitions of philosophies and factions, this is often masked by high levels of party discipline. With very few exceptions, MPs elected through the major parties pretty much do as they are told when they go to Canberra.
Second, the popular vote share that goes to the two major parties has been in long-term decline, from about 90% 40 years ago, to about 70% of late. The drift hasn’t just gone towards populist insurgents and protests, but increasingly to the benefit of the Greens and, more recently, the Teals. The national preferential voting system pushes candidates to compete in the traditional left-right middle ground. But this overlooks the fact that some voters’ sympathies lie in single-issue campaigns.
Third, and most importantly, our model of minority government is conspicuously one-dimensional. For instance, party leaders and managers think purely in terms of confidence and supply agreements. These are important, of course, but they provide artificial stability by limiting disagreement in parliament that might bring down a government.
One eye-catching proposition for stable minority government involves Labor and the Coalition coming together to agree not to topple the other for an arbitrary period of half a parliamentary term.
There are several better options. The UK’s Conservatives and Liberal Democrats ran a joint government from 2010–15, with some distinction. A big party and small party formed a coalition, and once they had agreed to disagree, they ringfenced specific policy areas as belonging to one party and the other party signed up to it as a policy priority of the whole government. This resulted in the full implementation of their respectively most prized policies.
And just two months ago, Ireland’s centre-right Fianna Fáil and Fine Gail parties, working with unaligned independents and a more formal Independent Ireland, came up with similar coalition agreement.
The inference is that stable multi-party government involves a mature negotiation on the issues, priorities and policies that can unite across party lines. It also requires a readiness to prioritise policy issues within parties.
Of course, this is an indirect way of asking if the Teals can and wish to operate as a de facto party. And while the Greens are a political party to begin with, the extent of their party discipline has not been tested to the full.
Meanwhile, there is evidence of pressure to keep both the Teals and Greens at a distance from any such agreement, with reports that lobby groups for the hospitality and coal sectors respectively will fund major party candidates to help defeat hostile crossbenchers.
As politicians mull these challenges, we should consider the likely “safe” issues – as against the “tricky” ones – in the coming parliament that a stable minority government or coalition would face. Their appetite to govern will be affected accordingly.
‘Safe’ and ‘tricky’ issues in a minority government
From Labor’s perspective, the nucleus is around a disparate set of economic and social modernisation policies. Since many of these have begun in this parliament, the focus in the next will be on pursuing them to full implementation.
For the Coalition, reshaping tax and spending, increasing housing affordability checking workplace employee rights and a bold nuclear power proposal sit at the core. This is accompanied by wariness of immigration and identity politics. Survey research points to its broad appeal certainly but less is known about the depth of this support.
Finding a middle path on these issues that would satisfy enough crossbenchers to help one of the major parties form government will be the challenge. It is not necessarily a bad outcome for the nation. But it means all MPs will have to take into account the greatly enhanced premium on stable government before any serious horse-trading happens.
Shamit Saggar does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Olga Boichak, Senior Lecturer in Digital Cultures, Australian Research Council DECRA fellow, University of Sydney
More than three years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a 30-day ceasefire between the two warring countries may be imminent. But much more needs to happen before a just and lasting peace is achieved.
The Russian-Ukraine war is one of the most visible, analysed and documented wars in human history. Since the night of February 24 2022, millions of Ukrainian citizens, military personnel, journalists, officials and civil society activists have shared first-hand eyewitness accounts, updates, commentaries and opinions on the war.
Around the world, many online communities have also sprung into action to counter Russian propaganda and raise awareness of what is happening inside Ukraine.
We have been studying these communities for the past three years, conducting hours of interviews with members and observing their activity on social media. To conduct much of this research and connect with members, we had to join some of these communities – a common requirement for researchers working in online settings.
Our work reveals a range of skills and strategies activists use in the online fight against Russia. More broadly, it shows how social media users can mobilise during times of war and other international crises and have a material impact offline.
In some cases, social media platforms have aided the Russian cause. At the same time, they have suppressed evidence of war crimes.
For example, in the first year of the Russian invasion, independent investigative journalism organisations such as Disclose documented thousands of war crimes committed by Russian soldiers against Ukrainian civilians. These crimes included murder, torture, physical and sexual violence, forced relocation, looting, and damage to civilian infrastructure such as schools and hospitals.
Much of this content included graphic imagery, violence and offensive language. As a result, it was permanently removed from platforms such as Instagram and YouTube.
On the other hand, content containing disinformation evaded moderation. For example, a 2023 investigation by the BBC revealed thousands of fake TikTok accounts created as part of a Russian propaganda campaign spreading lies about Ukrainian officials.
This often led to a distorted information environment online. Russian disinformation was visible, while the true extent of Russian violence against Ukrainians was hidden.
Boosting Ukrainian voices
In this context, thousands of internet users formed online communities to creatively support Ukraine without attracting the attention of content moderators.
This isn’t new or unique to the war in Ukraine. For example, in 2019, US TikToker Feroza Aziz shared a makeup tutorial in which she subtly raised awareness of China’s treatment of the Uyghurs – a topic that is often suppressed on the Chinese-owned platform.
It started in May 2022 when a young man with the online name Kama mashed up a Reddit meme of a Shiba Inu dog nicknamed Cheems and a picture of a dilapidated Russian tank. This was a celebration of a Ukrainian battlefront victory. It was only intended to mock Russia.
But as Kama changed his profile picture to the meme, the trend started spreading quickly to his followers on X (formerly Twitter). They quickly grew into an online collective dedicated to fighting Russia online. Members – or “fellas”, as they are known – from many regions around the world were brought together by its rituals using internet and popular culture memes.
Calls to action
In many similar posts across Facebook, X and TikTok, users share selfies or other images to achieve high visibility while calling followers to action. In most cases, this involves raising funds for urgent military or humanitarian efforts to benefit Ukraine.
Another common strategy is storytelling. Some users share amusing or ridiculous anecdotes from their lives before closing with a donation request.
These requests often have a clear target and beneficiary. They are also often time-sensitive. For example, they may be aimed at purchasing a particular model of a drone for a particular brigade of Ukraine’s armed forces that will be delivered to the battlefront within days.
Through collaborations with Ukraine’s official fundraising platform, the North Atlantic Fella Organisation has collected more than US$700,000 towards Ukraine’s defence.
Combatting propaganda
Members of the North Atlantic Fella Organisation also try to combat Russian propaganda and disinformation.
Instead of arguing in good faith with highly visible disinformation-spreading accounts (often controlled by the Russian government), members try to derail the disinformation campaigns. They highlight their ridiculousness by responding with memes and jokes. They call this practice “shitposting”.
People spreading Russian disinformation often find themselves annoyed by the swarms of “meme dogs” in their replies. This has led some to respond aggressively. In turn, this has allowed North Atlantic Fella Organisation members to report them for violation of X’s terms of service and have their accounts suspended, as our forthcoming research documents.
However, from late 2022 onward, North Atlantic Fella Organisation members we interviewed as a part of our research reported decreased effectiveness of X’s response to problematic user conduct. This was soon after tech billionaire Elon Musk bought the social media platform.
Despite this, members continue to support each other and develop playful tactics to ensure they remain visible on the platform.
It seems war will continue online for as long as Russia wages its war on Ukraine’s territory.
Olga Boichak has received funding from the Australian Research Council. She is a director of the Ukrainian Studies Foundation in Australia and an executive committee member of the Ukrainian Studies Association of Australia and New Zealand. She has been a member of the North Atlantic Fella Organisation since 2022 for research purposes.
Kateryna Kasianenko has been a member of the North Atlantic Fella Organisation since 2022 for research purposes.
When two junior employees bump into each other in the corridor and start chatting about their manager’s overbearing manner, it’s typically considered gossip. But what about when two managers have an off-record catch-up to discuss an under-performing employee?
Both scenarios meet traditional definitions of gossip – the information being shared is about other people, the people it’s about are absent, the information is shared in a way that casts judgement on those people, and it’s informal. Yet the two situations are viewed very differently.
What counts as gossip is much more slippery than we might think. I reviewed 184 academic articles to understand what really constitutes workplace gossip.
The key, I found, is not any set of objective criteria, but rather people’s shared agreement that a situation counts as gossip.
This understanding of gossip helps us make sense of the “workplace gossip paradox” – the idea that gossip can be considered both a reliable source of social information (“the inside word”) and an unreliable information source (“just gossip”).
My work also provides insights into how businesses can manage gossip before it becomes a scandal.
Knowledge is power – but power controls knowledge
How does recognising the slipperiness of gossip help us understand the workplace paradox? The answer has to do with the role of power in legitimising information.
Leaders and managers need information to justify action. If a manager is going to investigate a sexual harassment claim, they can’t do so based solely on a hunch. They need to hear about from it someone.
If the victim of sexual harassment complains directly to their manager, an investigation is automatically justified. But what if the manager hears about harassment indirectly and unofficially (for example, through “gossip”), with the added complication that the alleged perpetrator is another manager?
If the manager does something about what they’ve heard and the source turns out to be unreliable, they could face negative consequences for acting on what was essentially “just gossip.” But if they don’t act, and the information turns out to be credible, they could face repercussions for ignoring the “inside word.”
There is evidence that such paradoxical situations play out quite frequently in real-world workplaces. For example, inside information about negligence towards patient safety in healthcare settings has, in the past, been dismissed as “just gossip” until it provoked a public scandal.
One case study from the United States found managers tended to keep an ear out for information passing through the grapevine and selectively use it to further their own interests.
If gossip threatened their power, they repressed it as “just gossip”. But if gossip provided “useful” information – ammunition against a subversive employee, for example – management legitimised gossip as “official information”.
To avoid workplace scandals when gossip is ignored, managers should co-opt the information and make it safe to address anti-social behaviour. La Famiglia/Shutterstock
How to manage the workplace gossip paradox
To avoid scandals stemming from when gossip is ignored, managers might consider “co-opting” gossip, bringing it into official communication channels.
But there’s a problem with this approach. Gossip gains its credibility as the inside word because it takes place outside official communication channels. Therefore, if managers try to co-opt gossip into formal management processes, it’s likely to have the unintended consequence of discrediting the shared information.
Instead, “managing gossip” requires a better understanding of its functions and motivations.
One function is to reduce uncertainty. Research suggests gossip often arises to fill information gaps. For example, people might speculate about a manager’s salary by gossiping about their expensive car or holiday.
Such gossip is likely to be exaggerated and counterproductive. However, it could be managed simply by being transparent about staff salaries, filling the information gap before gossip does.
Another key function of gossip is to warn against antisocial behaviours like bullying. But if employees feel comfortable speaking up about such behaviour — even when it’s perpetrated by those with official power – managers will not face the dilemma of whether to act on information that could turn out to be “just gossip.”
Gossip is a slippery and paradoxical form of communication. Some would say it’s unmanageable. But what can be managed are the workplace behaviours and hierarchical relationships that gossip loves to sink its teeth into.
The author would like to acknowledge Trish Corner, Helena Cooper-Thomas and Rachel Morrison for their contributions to developing this research.
James Greenslade-Yeats does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Cyclone Alfred will cost the March 25 budget at least A$1.2 billion, hit growth and put pressure on inflation, Treasurer Jim Chalmers says.
In a Tuesday speech previewing the budget, Chalmers will also say that on preliminary estimates, the cyclone’s immediate hit to GDP is expected to be up to $1.2 billion, which could wipe a quarter of a percentage point off quarterly growth.
“It could also lead to upward pressure on inflation. From building costs to damaged crops raising prices for staples like fruit and vegetables,” Chalmers says in the speech, an extract of which has been released ahead of delivery.
The treasurer says the temporary shutting of businesses due to the cyclone lost about 12 million work hours.
By last Thursday, 44,000 insurance claims had been lodged. Early modelling indicated losses covered by the Cyclone Reinsurance Pool were about $1.7 billion.
The estimated costs to the budget, which are over the forward estimates period, are preliminary.
The government has already co-sponsored with the states $30 million in support for immediate recovery costs, Chalmers says. Millions of dollars are being provided in hardship payments.
“The budget will reflect some of those immediate costs and we’ll make sensible provisions for more to come,” he says.
“I expect that these costs and these new provisions will be in the order of at least $1.2 billion […] and that means a big new pressure on the budget.”
This is in addition to the already budgeted for disaster relief.
“At MYEFO, we’d already booked $11.6 billion for disaster support nationally over the forward estimates.
“With all of this extra funding we expect that to rise to at least $13.5 billion when accounting for our provisioning, social security costs and other disaster related support.”
Chalmers will again argue in the speech his recent theme – that the economy has turned a corner. This is despite the global uncertainty that includes the Trump tariff policies, the full extent of which is yet to be spelled out.
Australia is bracing for the possibility our beef export trade could be caught in a new tariff round to be unveiled early next month.
Despite last week’s rebuff to its efforts to get an exemption from the aluminium and steel 25% tariffs, the government has vowed to fight on for a carve out from that, as well as trying to head off any further imposts on exports to the US.
In seeking the exemption, Australia was unsuccessful in trying to leverage its abundance of critical minerals, which are much sought after by the US.
Trade Minister Don Farrell told Sky on Sunday:
What we need to do is find out what it is that the Americans want in terms of this relationship between Australia and the United States and then make President Trump an offer he can’t refuse.
In Tuesday’s speech, Chalmers is expected to say the budget will contain fewer surprises than might be the case with other budgets.
This is because this budget – which would have been avoided if the cyclone had not ruled out an April 12 election – comes after the flurry of announcements already made this year and before further announcements in the campaign for the May election.
Those announcements already made include:
$8.5 billion to boost Medicare
$644 million for new Urgent Care Clinics
a multi-billion dollar package to save Whyalla Steelworks
$7.2 billion for the Bruce Highway and other infrastructure
funds for enhanced childcare and to provide some
student debt relief
new and amended listings for contraception, endometriosis and IVF on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.
Deloitte Access Economics in its budget monitor predicts the budget will have a deficit of $26.1 billion for 2024-25.
Deloitte’s Stephen Smith said that although a $26.1 billion deficit was slightly smaller than forecast in the December budget update, the longer-term structural deterioration should be “a reality check for politicians wanting to announce election sweeteners in the weeks ahead”.
Deloitte projects a deficit of nearly $50 billion in 2025-26.
Open to a ‘small’ Ukraine peacekeeping role
Over the weekend, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese took part in the “coalition of the willing” virtual meeting convened by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in support of Ukraine.
The meeting also included Ukraine, France, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Greece, Italy, Poland, Bulgaria, the Scandinavian countries, Canada and New Zealand. The United States did not participate. President Donald Trump is trying to force an agreement between Ukraine and Russia to end the conflict.
Albanese reiterated after the meeting: “Australia is open to considering any requests to contribute to a future peacekeeping effort in support of the just and lasting peace we all want to Ukraine”.
He added the obvious point: “Of course, peacekeeping missions by definition require a precondition of peace”.
Albanese said that any Australian contribution to a Ukraine peacekeeping force would be “small”.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has opposed sending Australians to a peacekeeping force.
Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
A former US diplomat, Nabeel Khoury, says President Donald Trump’s decision to launch attacks against the Houthis is misguided, and this will not subdue them.
“For our president who came in wanting to avoid war and wanting to be a man of peace, he’s going about it the wrong way,” he said.
“There are many paths that can be used before you resort to war.” Khoury told Al Jazeera.
The danger to shipping in the Red Sea was “a justifiable reason for concern”, Khoury told Al Jazeera in an interview, but added that it was a problem that could be resolved through diplomacy.
Ansar Allah (Houthi) media sources said that at least four areas had been razed by the US warplanes that targeted, in particular, a residential area north of the capital, Sanaa, killing 31 people.
The Houthis, who had been “bombed severely all over their territory” in the past, were not likely to be subdued through “a few weeks of bombing”, Khoury said.
“If you think that Hamas, living and fighting on a very small piece of land, totally surrounded by land, air and sea, and yet, 17 months of bombardment by the Israelis did not get rid of them.
‘More rugged space’ “The Houthis live in a much more rugged space, mountainous regions — it would be virtually impossible to eradicate them,” Khoury said.
“So there is no military logic to what’s happening, and there is no political logic either.”
Providing background, Patty Culhane reported from Washington that there were several factual errors in the justification President Trump had given for his order.
“It’s important to point out that the Houthi attacks have stopped since the ceasefire in Gaza [on January 19], although the Houthis were threatening to strike again,” she said.
“His other justification is saying that no US-flagged vessel has transited the Suez Canal, the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden safely in more than a year.
“And then he says another reason is because Houthis attacked a US military warship.
“That happened when Trump was not president.”
Is the world waiting for hundreds of thousands of people to die of hunger in Gaza to do something to save them ? pic.twitter.com/xMFJBNzJNY
— Ahmed Hassan 🇾🇪 أحمد حسن زيد (@Ahmed_hassan_za) March 14, 2025
Down to 10,000 ships She said the White House was now putting out more of a communique, “saying that before the attacks, there were 25,000 ships that transited the Red Sea annually. Now it’s down to 10,000 so, obviously, sort of shooting down the president’s concept that nobody is actually transiting the region.
“And it did list the number of attacks. The US commercial ships have been attacked 145 times since 2023 in their list.”
Meanwhile, at least nine people, including three journalists, have been killed and several others wounded in an Israeli drone attack on relief aid workers at Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, according to Palestinian media.
The attack reportedly targeted a relief team that was accompanied by journalists and photographers. At least three local journalists were among the dead.
The Palestinian Journalists’ Protection Centre said in a statement that Israel had killed “three journalists in an airstrike on a media team documenting relief efforts in northern Gaza”, reports
“The journalists were documenting humanitarian relief efforts for those affected by Israel’s genocidal war,” the statement added, according to Anadolu.
In a statement, the Israeli military claimed it struck “two terrorists . . . operating a drone that posed a threat” to Israeli soldiers in the area of Beit Lahiya.
“Later, a number of additional terrorists collected the drone operating equipment and entered a vehicle. The [Israeli military] struck the terrorists,” it added, without providing any evidence about its claims.
‘Liberation’ poetry In Auckland on Saturday, protesters at the Aotearoa New Zealand’s weekly “free Palestine” rallies gave a tribute to poet Mahmoud Darwish — the “liberation voice of Palestine” — by reciting peace and justice poetry and marked the sixth anniversary of the Christchurch mosque massacre when a lone white terrorist gunned down 51 people at Friday prayers.
Two of the pro-Palestine protesters hold West Papuan and Palestinian flags – symbolising indigenous liberation – at Saturday’s rally in Auckland. Image: APR
Paris-based global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has recalled that 20 journalists were killed during the six-year Philippines presidency of Rodrigo Duterte, a regime marked by fierce repression of the press.
Former president Duterte was arrested earlier this week as part of an International Criminal Court investigation into crimes against humanity linked to his merciless war on drugs. He is now in The Hague awaiting trial.
The watchdog has called on the administration of current President Ferdinand Marcos Jr to take strong measures to fully restore the country’s press freedom and combat impunity for the crimes against media committed by Duterte’s regime.
“Just because you’re a journalist you are not exempted from assassination, if you’re a son of a bitch,” Rodrigo Duterte said in his inauguration speech on 30 June 2016, which set the tone for the rest of his mandate — unrestrained violence against journalists and total disregard for press freedom, said RSF in a statement.
During the Duterte regime’s rule, RSF recorded 20 cases of journalists killed while working.
Among them was Jesus Yutrago Malabanan, shot dead after covering Rodrigo Duterte’s drug war for Reuters.
Online harassment surged, particularly targeting women journalists.
Maria Ressa troll target The most prominent victim was Maria Ressa, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and founder of the news site Rappler, who faced an orchestrated hate campaign led by troll armies allied with the government in response to her commitment to exposing the then-president’s bloody war.
“The arrest of Rodrigo Duterte is good news for the Filipino journalism community, who were the direct targets of his campaign of terror,” said RSF’s Asia-Pacific bureau director Cédric Alviani.
RSF’s Asia-Pacific bureau director Cédric Alviani . . . “the Filipino journalism community were the direct targets of [former president Rodrigo Duterte]’s campaign of terror.” Image: RSF
“President Marcos and his administration must immediately investigate Duterte’s past crimes and take strong measures to fully restore the country’s press freedom.”
The repression carried out during Duterte’s tenure continues to impact on Filipino journalism: investigative journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio has been languishing in prison since her arrest in 2020, still awaiting a verdict in her trial for “financing terrorism” and “illegal possession of firearms” — trumped-up charges that could see her sentenced to 40 years in prison.
With 147 journalists murdered since the restoration of democracy in 1986, the Philippines remains one of the deadliest countries for media workers.
Debate on Guam’s future as a US territory has intensified with its legislature due to vote on a non-binding resolution to become a US state amid mounting Pacific geostrategic tensions and expansionist declarations by the Trump administration.
Located closer to Beijing than Hawai’i, Guam serves as a key US strategic asset, known as the “tip of the spear,” with 10,000 military personnel, an air base for F-35 fighters and B-2 bombers and home port for Virginia-class nuclear submarines.
Local Senator William A. Parkinson introduced the resolution to the legislature last Wednesday and called for Guam to be fully integrated into the American union, possibly as the 51st state.
“We are standing in a moment of history where two great empires are standing face-to-face with each other, about to go to war,” Parkinson said at a press conference on Thursday.
“We have to be real about what’s going on in this part of the world. We are a tiny island but we are too strategically important to be left alone. Stay with America or do we let ourselves be absorbed by China?”
His resolution states the decision “must be built upon the informed consent of the people of Guam through a referendum”.
Trump’s expansionist policies Parkinson’s resolution comes as US President Donald Trump advocates territorially expansionist policies, particularly towards the strategically located Danish-ruled autonomous territory of Greenland and America’s northern neighbour, Canada.
“This one moment in time, this one moment in history, the stars are aligning so that the geopolitics of the United States favour statehood for Guam,” Parkinson said. “This is an opportunity we cannot pass up.”
Guam Legislature Senator William A. Parkinson holds a press conference after introducing his resolution. BenarNews screenshot APR
As a territory, Guam residents are American citizens but they cannot vote for the US president and their lone delegate to the Congress has no voting power on the floor.
The US acquired Guam, along with Puerto Rico, in 1898 after winning the Spanish-American War, and both remain unincorporated territories to this day.
Independence advocates and representatives from the Guam Commission on Decolonisation regularly testify at the UN’s Decolonisation Committee, where the island has been listed as a Non-Self-Governing Territory since 1946.
Commission on Decolonisation executive director Melvin Won Pat-Borja said he was not opposed to statehood but is concerned if any decision on Guam’s status was left to the US.
“Decolonisation is the right of the colonised,” he said while attending Parkinson’s press conference, the Pacific Daily News reported.
‘Hands of our coloniser’ “It’s counterintuitive to say that, ‘we’re seeking a path forward, a path out of this inequity,’ and then turn around and put it right back in the hands of our coloniser.
“No matter what status any of us prefer, ultimately that is not for any one of us to decide, but it is up to a collective decision that we have to come to, and the only way to do it is via referendum,” he said, reports Kuam News.
With the geostrategic competition between the US and China in the Pacific, Guam has become increasingly significant in supporting American naval and air operations, especially in the event of a conflict over Taiwan or in the South China Sea.
The two US bases have seen Guam’s economy become heavily reliant on military investments and tourism.
The Defence Department holds about 25 percent of Guam’s land and is preparing to spend billions to upgrade the island’s military infrastructure as another 5000 American marines relocate there from Japan’s Okinawa islands.
Governor Lou Leon Guerrero delivers her “State of the Island” address in Guam on Tuesday . . . “Guam cannot be the linchpin of American security in the Asian-Pacific if nearly 14,000 of our residents are without shelter . . .” Image: Office of the Governor of Guam/Benar News
Military presence leveraged The island has in recent years leveraged the increased military presence to demand federal assistance and the territory’s treasury relies on at least US$0.5 billion in annual funding.
“Let us be clear about this: Guam cannot be the linchpin of American security in the Asian-Pacific if nearly 14,000 of our residents are without shelter, because housing aid to Guam is cut, or if 36,000 of our people lose access to Medicaid and Medicare coverage keeping them healthy, alive and out of poverty,” Guerrero said.
Parkinson’s proposed legislative resolution calls for an end to 125-plus years of US colonial uncertainty.
“The people of Guam, as the rightful stewards of their homeland, must assert their inalienable right to self-determination,” states the resolution, including that there be a “full examination of statehood or enhanced autonomous status for Guam.”
“Granting Guam equal political status would signal unequivocally that Guam is an integral part of the United States, deterring adversaries who might otherwise perceive Guam as a mere expendable outpost.”
If adopted by the Guam legislature, the non-binding resolution would be transmitted to the White House.
A local statute enacted in 2000 for a political status plebiscite on statehood, independence or free association has become bogged down in US courts.
‘Reject colonial status quo’ Neil Weare, a former Guam resident and co-director of Right to Democracy, said the self-determination process must be centred on what the people of Guam want, “not just what’s best for US national security”.
“Right to Democracy does not take a position on political status, other than to reject the undemocratic and colonial status quo,” Weare said on behalf of the nonprofit organisation that advocates for rights and self-determination in US territories.
“People can have different views on what is the best solution to this problem, but we should all be in agreement that the continued undemocratic rule of millions of people in US territories is wrong and needs to end.”
He said the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence next year can open a new venue for a conversation about key concepts — such as the “consent of the governed” — involving Guam and other US territories.
The nambanga, or banyan tree, is the centrepiece of many a Vanuatu village. Its massive network of boughs provides shade, shelter and strength. I’ve only ever seen one knocked down, and that was in the wake of category 5 cyclone Pam in 2015, whose 250 kph winds had never been seen before or since in Vanuatu.
The blow on hearing of Marc’s passing this week feels the same.
In fairness, Marc Neil-Jones was often more like the wind than the tree. He’s knocked a lot of stuff over since he arrived in Vanuatu in 1989 with a few thousand bucks in his pocket, a Mac and a laser printer.
He also built the nation’s newspaper of record, and a tradition of fairness and truth in the media.
One of my first tasks as Marc’s successor as editor-in-chief at the Vanuatu Daily Post was overseeing coverage of the 2015 bribery trial that saw more than half of the MPs in Sato Kilman’s government convicted and sentenced. The saga had started with a front page photo, showing a hand-high stack of money — a bribe offered to an MP in exchange for his vote to oust the current PM and install Moana Carcasses.
On the witness stand, former Speaker Philip Boedoro was asked, “Why did you send the photo to the Daily Post? Why didn’t you just report it to the police?”
“Because I knew if people saw it in the Daily Post, they would know it was true,” he replied.
That’s a hell of a thing to say on the stand, and the fact that he could say it is indelible evidence of Neil-Jones’ legacy.
Marc was fearless, a swashbuckler in the truest sense. If he smelt a story, he’d swoop in on it, and the devil take the hindmost. His friends are fond of recalling how he broke up an international drug smuggling operation, exposing more than 500 kg of heroin buried in a local beach, and still made it to the kava bar on time.
Marc’s impact on the political scene was undeniable. But far too often, he paid for his courage with blood. He’s been assaulted with fists and furniture, attacked incessantly in the courts and even briefly deported.
In 2011, he was brutally assaulted by then-Minister Harry Iauko and a truckload of henchmen, including current MP Jay Ngwele. I went to check on Marc two days later. He related how it had all played out with trademark bravado, then he chuckled as he turned to go, and said, ‘I’m getting too old for this.’
He tried to laugh it off, but I could see in his eyes that this time was different. Eyewitnesses told me they felt that if Ngwele hadn’t convinced Iauko to relent, he might have killed him then and there.
Trauma, age and hard living took their toll. In 2015, he announced he was going to retire from the newsroom. Marc had struggled to cope with type 1 diabetes throughout his life, and the daily stress of running the paper was affecting both body and mind.
Marc Neil-Jones and Dan McGarry in Port Vila’s Secret Garden in 2016. Image: Del Abcede/Asia Pacific Report
I took over the newsroom in interesting times. The pressure was intense and immediate, but Marc’s staff were more than equal to the challenge, and made my life far easier than it might have been. Due to the paper’s reputation as a bastion of fairness and honest reporting, it attracted the best that Vanuatu had to offer.
When I joined it, there was well over a century and a half of experience in the room.
Personally and professionally, Marc was not the easiest person to deal with. He was driven by passion, and impulse often preceded insight. More than one editorial meeting ended in fury.
A close friend of his described him as “a unique combination of complete arsehole and loyal mate all wrapped up in a British accent and long hair”.
That was Marc. He made you love him or hate him. Those who knew him best did both, and measure for measure, matched his fierce devotion.
I choose to remember Marc as a giant. His shadow still looms across the Pacific, causing corrupt politicians to cast a nervous glance over their shoulder, emboldening those of us who still carry his passion for the truth.
But today, his loss feels like a gaping hole, an absence where once a mighty nambanga stood.
When it comes to antisemitism, politicians in Australia are often quick to jump on the claim without waiting for evidence.
With notable and laudable exceptions like the Greens and independents such as Tasmanian federal MP Andrew Wilkie, it seems any allegation will do when it comes to the opportunity to imply Arab Australians, the Muslim community and Palestinian supporters are trying to destroy the lives of the Jewish community.
A case in point. The discovery in January this year of a caravan found in Dural, New South Wales, filled with explosives and a note that referenced the Great Synagogue in Sydney led to a frenzy of clearly uninformed and dangerous rhetoric from politicians and the media about an imminent terrorist attack targeting the Jewish community.
It was nothing of the sort as we now know with the revelation by police that this was a “fabricated terrorist plot”.
As the ABC reported on March 10: “Police have said an explosives-laden caravan discovered in January at Dural in Sydney’s north-west was a ‘fake terrorism plot’ with ties to organised crime”, and that “the Australian Federal Police said they were confident this was a ‘fabricated terrorist plot’,” adding the belief was held “very early on after the caravan was located”.
One would have thought the political and media class would know that it is critical in a society supposedly underpinned by the rule of law that police be allowed to get on with the job of investigating allegations without comment.
Particularly so in the hot-house atmosphere that exists in this nation today.
Opportunistic Dutton But not the ever opportunistic and divisive federal opposition leader Peter Dutton.
After the Daily Telegraph reported the Dural caravan story on January 29, Dutton was quick to say that this “was potentially the biggest terrorist attack in our country’s history”. To his credit, Prime Anthony Albanese said in response he does not “talk about operational matters for an ongoing investigation”.
Dutton’s language was clearly designed to whip up fear and hysteria among the Jewish community and to demonise Palestinian supporters.
He was not Robinson Crusoe sadly. New South Wales Premier Chris Minns told the media on January 29 that the Dural caravan discovery had the potential to have led to a “mass casualty event”.
The Zionist Federation of Australia, an organisation that is an unwavering supporter of Israel despite the horror that nation has inflicted on Gaza, was even more overblown in its claims.
It issued a statement that claimed: “This is undoubtedly the most severe threat to the Jewish community in Australia to date. The plot, if executed, would likely have resulted in the worst terrorist attack on Australian soil.”
Note the word “undoubtedly”.
Uncritical Israeli claims Then there was another uncritical Israel barracker, Sky News’ Sharri Markson, who claimed; “To think perpetrators would have potentially targeted a museum commemorating the Holocaust — a time when six million Jews were killed — is truly horrifying.”
And naturally, Jilian Segal, the highly partisan so-called “Antisemitism Envoy” said the discovery of the caravan was a “chilling reminder that the same hatred that led to the murder of millions of Jews during the Holocaust still exists today”.
In short, the response to the Dural caravan incident was simply an exercise in jumping on the antisemitism issue without any regard to the consequences for our community, including the fear it spread among Jewish Australians and the further demonising of the Arab Australian community.
No circumspection. No leadership. No insistence that the matter had not been investigated fully.
As the only Jewish organisation that represents humanity, the Jewish Council of Australia, said in a statement from its director Sarah Schwartz on March 10 the “statement from the AFP [Australian Federal Police] should prompt reflection from every politician, journalist and community leader who has sought to manipulate and weaponise fears within the Jewish community.
‘Irresponsible and dangerous’ “The attempt to link these events to the support of Palestinians — whether at protests, universities, conferences or writers’ festivals — has been irresponsible and dangerous.” Truth in spades.
And ask yourself this question. Let’s say the Dural caravan contained notes about mosques and Arab Australian community centres. Would the media, politicians and others have whipped up the same level of hysteria and divisive rhetoric?
The answer is no.
One assumes Dutton, Segal, the Zionist Federation and others who frothed at the mouth in January will now offer a collective mea culpa. Sadly, they won’t because there will be no demands to do so.
The damage to our legal system has been done because political opportunism and milking antisemitism for political ends comes first for those who should know better.
Greg Barns SC is national criminal justice spokesperson for the Australian Lawyers Alliance. This article was first published by Pearls and Irritations social policy journal and is republished with permission.
Māori contributions to the Aotearoa New Zealand economy have far surpassed the projected goal of “$100 billion by 2030”, a new report has revealed.
The report conducted by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s (MBIE) and Te Puni Kōkiri, Te Ōhanga Māori 2023, shows Māori entities have grown from contributing $17 billion to New Zealand’s GDP in 2018 to $32 billion in 2023, turning a 6.5 percent contribution to GDP into 8.9 percent.
The Māori asset base has grown from $69 billion in 2018 to $126 billion in 2023 — an increase of 83 percent.
Of that sum, there is $66 billion in assets for Māori businesses and employers, $19 billion in assets for self-employed Māori and $41 billion in assets for Māori trusts, incorporations, and other Māori collectives including post settlement entities.
In 2018, $4.2 billion of New Zealand’s economy came from agriculture, forestry, and fishing which made it the main contributor.
Now, administrative, support, and professional services have taken the lead contributing $5.1 billion in 2023.
However, Māori collectives own around half of all of New Zealand’s agriculture, forestry, and fishing assets and remain the highest asset-rich sector.
Focused on need Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira manages political and public interests on behalf of Ngāti Toa, including political interests, treaty claims, fisheries, health and social services, and environmental kaitiakitanga.
Tumu Whakarae chief executive Helmut Modlik said they were not focused on making money, but on “those who need it most”.
Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira tumu whakarae chief executive Helmut Karewa Modlik . . . “We focus on long-term benefits rather than short-term gains.” Image: Alicia Scott/RNZ
Ngāti Toa invested in water infrastructure and environmental projects, with a drive to replenish the whenua and improve community health. Like many iwi, they also invest in enterprises that deliver essential services such as health, housing and education.
“We focus on long-term benefits rather than short-term gains, ensuring that our investments contribute to the sustainable development of our community,” Modlik said.
Between the covid-19 lockdown and 2023, the iwi grew their assets from $220 million to $850 million and increased their staff from 120 to over 600.
Pou Ōhanga (chief economic development and investment officer) Boyd Scirkovich said they took a “people first” approach to decision making.
“We focused on building local capacity and ensuring that our people had the resources and support they needed to navigate the challenges of the pandemic.”
The kinds of jobs Māori are working are also changing.
Māori workers now hold more high-skilled jobs than low-skilled jobs with 46 percent in high-skilled jobs, 14 percent in skilled jobs, and 40 percent in low-skilled jobs.
That is compared to 2018 when 37 percent of Māori were in high-skilled jobs and 51 percent in low-skilled jobs.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
SPECIAL REPORT:By Giff Johnson, editor of the Marshall Islands Journal and RNZ Pacific correspondent in Majuro
The late Member of Parliament Jeton Anjain and the people of the nuclear test-affected Rongelap Atoll changed the course of the history of the Marshall Islands by using Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior ship to evacuate their radioactive home islands 40 years ago.
They did this by taking control of their own destiny after decades of being at the mercy of the United States nuclear testing programme and its aftermath.
In 1954, the US tested the Bravo hydrogen bomb test at Bikini Atoll, spewing high-level radioactive fallout on unsuspecting Rongelap Islanders nearby.
For years after the Bravo test, decisions by US government doctors and scientists caused Rongelap Islanders to be continuously exposed to additional radiation.
Marshall Islands traditional and government leaders joined Greenpeace representatives in showing off tapa banners with the words “Justice for Marshall Islands” during the dockside welcome ceremony earlier this week in Majuro. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
The 40th anniversary of the dramatic evacuation of Rongelap Atoll in 1985 by the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior — a few weeks before French secret agents bombed the ship in Auckland harbour — was spotlighted this week in Majuro with the arrival of Greenpeace’s flagship Rainbow Warrior III to a warm welcome combining top national government leaders, the Rongelap Atoll Local Government and the Rongelap community.
“We were displaced, our lives were disrupted, and our voices ignored,” said MP Hilton Kendall, who represents Rongelap in the Marshall Islands Parliament, at the welcome ceremony in Majuro earlier in the week.
“In our darkest time, Greenpeace stood with us.”
‘Evacuated people to safety’ He said the Rainbow Warrior “evacuated the people to safety” in 1985.
Greenpeace would “forever be remembered by the people of Rongelap,” he added.
The Able US nuclear test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands on 1 July 1946. Image: US National Archives
In 1984, Jeton Anjain — like most Rongelap people who were living on the nuclear test-affected atoll — knew that Rongelap was unsafe for continued habitation.
There was not a single scientist or medical doctor among their community although Jeton was a trained dentist, and they mainly depended on US Department of Energy-provided doctors and scientists for health care and environmental advice.
They were always told not to worry and that everything was fine.
Crew of the Rainbow Warrior and other Greenpeace officials — including two crew members from the original Rainbow Warrior, Bunny McDiarmid and Henk Hazen, from Aotearoa New Zealand – were welcomed to the Marshall Islands during a dockside ceremony in Majuro to mark the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Atoll. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
But it wasn’t, as the countless thyroid tumors, cancers, miscarriages and surgeries confirmed.
As the desire of Rongelap people to evacuate their homeland intensified in 1984, unbeknown to them Greenpeace was hatching a plan to dispatch the Rainbow Warrior on a Pacific voyage the following year to turn a spotlight on the nuclear test legacy in the Marshall Islands and the ongoing French nuclear testing at Moruroa in French Polynesia.
A Rainbow Warrior question As I had friends in the Greenpeace organisation, I was contacted early on in its planning process with the question: How could a visit by the Rainbow Warrior be of use to the Marshall Islands?
Jeton and I were good friends by 1984, and had worked together on advocacy for Rongelap since the late 1970s. I informed him that Greenpeace was planning a visit and without hesitation he asked me if the ship could facilitate the evacuation of Rongelap.
At this time, Jeton had already initiated discussions with Kwajalein traditional leaders to locate an island that they could settle in that atoll.
I conveyed Jeton’s interest in the visit to Greenpeace, and a Greenpeace International board member, the late Steve Sawyer, who coordinated the Pacific voyage of the Rainbow Warrior, arranged a meeting for the three of us in Seattle to discuss ideas.
Jeton and I flew to Seattle and met Steve. After the usual preliminaries, Jeton asked Steve if the Rainbow Warrior could assist Rongelap to evacuate their community to Mejatto Island in Kwajalein Atoll, a distance of about 250 km.
Steve responded in classic Greenpeace campaign thinking, which is what Greenpeace has proved effective in doing over many decades. He said words to the effect that the Rainbow Warrior could aid a “symbolic evacuation” by taking a small group of islanders from Rongelap to Majuro or Ebeye and holding a media conference publicising their plight with ongoing radiation exposure.
“No,” said Jeton firmly. He wasn’t talking about a “symbolic” evacuation. He told Steve: “We want to evacuate Rongelap, the entire community and the housing, too.”
Steve Sawyer taken aback Steve was taken aback by what Jeton wanted. Steve simply hadn’t considered the idea of evacuating the entire community.
But we could see him mulling over this new idea and within minutes, as his mind clicked through the significant logistics hurdles for evacuation of the community — including that it would take three-to-four trips by the Rainbow Warrior between Rongelap and Mejatto to accomplish it — Steve said it was possible.
And from that meeting, planning for the 1985 Marshall Islands visit began in earnest.
I offer this background because when the evacuation began in early May 1985, various officials from the United States government sharply criticised Rongelap people for evacuating their atoll, saying there was no radiological hazard to justify the move and that they were being manipulated by Greenpeace for its own anti-nuclear agenda.
Women from the nuclear test-affected Rongelap Atoll greeted the Rainbow Warrior and its crew with songs and dances this week as part of celebrating the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Atoll in 1985 by the Rainbow Warrior. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
This condescending American government response suggested Rongelap people did not have the brain power to make important decisions for themselves.
But it also showed the US government’s lack of understanding of the gravity of the situation in which Rongelap Islanders lived day in and day out in a highly radioactive environment.
The Bravo hydrogen bomb test blasted Rongelap and nearby islands with snow-like radioactive fallout on 1 March 1954. The 82 Rongelap people were first evacuated to the US Navy base at Kwajalein for emergency medical treatment and the start of long-term studies by US government doctors.
No radiological cleanup A few months later, they were resettled on Ejit Island in Majuro, the capital atoll, until 1957 when, with no radiological cleanup conducted, the US government said it was safe to return to Rongelap and moved the people back.
“Even though the radioactive contamination of Rongelap Island is considered perfectly safe for human habitation, the levels of activity are higher than those found in other inhabited locations in the world,” said a Brookhaven National Laboratory report commenting on the return of Rongelap Islanders to their contaminated islands in 1957.
It then stated plainly why the people were moved back: “The habitation of these people on the island will afford most valuable ecological radiation data on human beings.”
And for 28 years, Rongelap people lived in one of the world’s most radioactive environments, consuming radioactivity through the food chain and by living an island life.
Proving the US narrative of safety to be false, the 1985 evacuation forced the US Congress to respond by funding new radiological studies of Rongelap.
Thanks to the determination of the soft-spoken but persistent leadership of Jeton, he ensured that a scientist chosen by Rongelap would be included in the study. And the new study did indeed identify health hazards, particularly for children, of living on Rongelap.
The US Congress responded by appropriating US$45 million to a Rongelap Resettlement Trust Fund.
Subsistence atoll life All of this was important — it both showed that islanders with a PhD in subsistence atoll life understood more about their situation than the US government’s university educated PhDs and medical doctors who showed up from time-to-time to study them, provide medical treatment, and tell them everything was fine on their atoll, and it produced a $45 million fund from the US government.
However, this is only a fraction of the story about why the Rongelap evacuation in 1985 forever changed the US narrative and control of its nuclear test legacy in this country.
The crew of Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior III vessel were serenaded by the Rongelap community to mark the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Islanders from their nuclear test-affected islands this week in Majuro. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
Rongelap is the most affected population from the US hydrogen bomb testing programme in the 1950s.
By living on Rongelap, the community confirmed the US government’s narrative that all was good and the nuclear test legacy was largely a relic of the past.
The 1985 evacuation was a demonstration of the Rongelap community exerting control over their life after 31 years of dictates by US government doctors, scientists and officials.
It was difficult building a new community on Mejatto Island, which was uninhabited and barren in 1985. Make no mistake, Rongelap people living on Mejatto suffered hardship and privation, especially in the first years after the 1985 resettlement.
Nuclear legacy history Their perseverance, however, defined the larger ramification of the move to Mejatto: It changed the course of nuclear legacy history by people taking control of their future that forced a response from the US government to the benefit of the Rongelap community.
Forty years later, the displacement of Rongelap Islanders on Mejatto and in other locations, unable to return to nuclear test contaminated Rongelap Atoll demonstrates clearly that the US nuclear testing legacy remains unresolved — unfinished business that is in need of a long-term, fair and just response from the US government.
The Rainbow Warrior will be in Majuro until next week when it will depart for Mejatto Island to mark the 40th anniversary of the resettlement, and then voyage to other nuclear test-affected atolls around the Marshall Islands.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The future of Māori radio in Aotearoa New Zealand requires increased investment in both online platforms and traditional airwaves, says a senior manager.
Matthew Tukaki, station manager at Waatea Digital, spoke with Te Ao Māori News about the future of Māori radio.
He said there was an urgent need for changes to ensure a sustainable presence on both AM/FM airwaves and digital platforms.
“One of the big challenges will always be funding. Many of our iwi stations operate with very limited resources, as their focus is more on manaakitanga (hospitality) and aroha (compassion),” Tukaki said.
He said that Waatea Digital had been exploring various new digital strategies to enhance viewership and engagement across the media landscape.
“We need assistance and support to transition to these new platforms,” Tukaki said.
He also highlighted the continued importance of traditional AM frequencies, particularly during emergencies like Cyclone Gabrielle, where these stations served as vital emergency broadcasters.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne
With 61% of enrolled voters counted in Saturday’s Western Australian election, the ABC is calling 40 of the 59 lower house seats for Labor, five for the Liberals and four for the Nationals, with ten remaining undecided.
Vote shares are 41.8% Labor (down 18.1% since Labor’s massive 2021 win), 28.6% Liberals (up 7.3%), 5.1% Nationals (up 1.1%), 10.5% Greens (up 3.6%), 3.7% One Nation (up 2.4%), 3.1% Australian Christians (up 1.6%), 2.3% Legalise Cannabis (up 1.9%) and 3.6% independents (up 2.9%).
While Labor had a big fall in its primary vote since winning 59.9% in 2021, this fall didn’t go directly to the Liberals and Nationals, with these parties’ combined votes up 8.4%.
The ABC’s two-party estimate shows a Labor win by 58.3–41.7, an 11.3% swing to the Liberals and Nationals from the 69.7–30.3 Labor margin at the 2021 election, which was a record victory in Australia for either major party at any state or federal election.
The Poll Bludger’s results have Labor leads in 45 of the 59 seats, the Liberals in seven, the Nationals in six and one independent lead. If these are the final numbers, Labor would lose eight seats from 2021, with the Liberals gaining five, the Nationals two and independents one.
The Poll Bludger’s two-party estimate is a little worse for Labor than the ABC’s, with a Labor lead by 57.4–42.6, a 12.2% swing to the Liberals and Nationals. If the Poll Bludger’s two-party estimate is right, the final Newspoll and DemosAU polls will be correct, while if the ABC’s is right, they will have understated Labor.
I said in my preview article that polls suggested that Labor would be well down on 2021, but that they would have a bigger win than in 2017 (41 of the 59 seats on a two-party vote of 55.5–44.5). The results show this will be the case. This will be the third landslide in a row for Labor in WA.
Most seats have counted their pre-poll votes and postal votes that arrived before election day. Remaining votes will mostly be absent votes (pre-poll and election day). These votes were cast outside a voter’s home electorate, and need to be posted back to the home electorate before they can be counted. In past elections, absent votes have assisted Labor.
There are also seats, such as Fremantle and Pilbara, where no two-candidate count has yet been provided. In those seats, the electoral commission initially selected the wrong two candidates and needs to re-do the two-candidate count. Fremantle is the only seat likely to be won by a non-major party candidate.
Federal implications and the upper house
I don’t think there are many federal implications from state elections, but this election will give a morale boost for federal Labor after losing the Queensland election last October and being narrowly behind the Coalition in the polls since December.
When a state party is the same as the federal government, that party is federally dragged, and performs worse than it would if the opposite party held government federally. Labor’s big win does not suggest federal drag was a factor in WA.
However, WA accounts for only 16 of the 150 federal seats. Victoria, where federal Labor is being dragged down by an unpopular state Labor government, has 38 seats.
The Poll Bludger wrote that the Liberals had done poorly in swing terms since the 2021 election in affluent Perth seats, suggesting that affluent metropolitan federal seats won’t swing back to the Liberals, and teal independents should retain their seats.
In my preview article, I wrote that during the last term Labor had scrapped the old very malapportioned upper house system, and all 37 upper house members will be elected by statewide proportional representation with preferences. A quota is 1/38 of the vote or 2.63%.
In the upper house, 46.7% of enrolled voters have been counted, well behind the 61.3% in the lower house. Labor has 41.3%, the Liberals 27.9%, the Nationals 5.6%, the Greens 10.8%, One Nation 3.4%, Legalise Cannabis 2.8%, the Christians 2.6%, an independent group 1.3% and Animal Justice 1.1%.
On current counts, Labor would win 15 of the 37 seats, the Liberals ten, the Nationals two, the Greens four, One Nation one, Legalise Cannabis one and the Christians one. That would leave three seats undecided, with Labor, the Liberals and the independent group ahead.
However, there’s much more counting to go in the upper house, and the current counts don’t include below the line votes. The major parties do relatively badly on below the line votes and the Greens relatively well.
Adrian Beaumont does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Activists in Aotearoa New Zealand marked International Women’s Day today and the start of Ramadan this week with solidarity rallies across the country, calling for justice and peace for Palestinian women and the territories occupied illegally by Israel.
The theme this year for IWD is “For all women and girls: Rights. Equality. Empowerment” and this was the 74th week of Palestinian solidarity protests.
First speaker at the Auckland rally today, Del Abcede of the Aotearoa section of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), said the protest was “timely given how women have suffered the brunt of Israel’s war on Palestine and the Gaza ceasefire in limbo”.
Del Abcede of the Aotearoa section of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) . . . “Empowered women empower the world.” Image: David Robie/APR
“Women are the backbone of families and communities. They provide care, support and nurturing to their families and the development of children,” she said.
“Women also play a significant role in community building and often take on leadership roles in community organisations. Empowered women empower the world.”
Abcede explained how the non-government organisation WILPF had national sections in 37 countries, including the Palestine branch which was founded in 1988. WILPF works close with its Palestinian partners, Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counselling (WCLAC) and General Union of Palestinian Women (GUPW).
“This catastrophe is playing out on our TV screens every day. The majority of feminists in Britain — and in the West — seem to have nothing to say about it,” Abcede said, quoting gender researcher Dr Maryam Aldosarri, to cries of shame.
‘There can be no neutrality’ “In the face of such overwhelming terror, there can be no neutrality.”
Dr Aldosarri said in an article published earlier in the war on Gaza last year that the “siege and indiscriminate bombardment” had already “killed, maimed and disappeared under the rubble tens of thousands of Palestinian women and children”.
“Many more have been displaced and left to survive the harsh winter without appropriate shelter and supplies. The almost complete breakdown of the healthcare system, coupled with the lack of food and clean water, means that some 45,000 pregnant women and 68,000 breastfeeding mothers in Gaza are facing the risk of anaemia, bleeding, and death.
“Meanwhile, hundreds of Palestinian women and children in the occupied West Bank are still imprisoned, many without trial, and trying to survive in abominable conditions.”
The death toll in the war — with killings still happening in spite of the precarious ceasefire — is now more than 50,000 — mostly women and children.
“Achieving durable and equitable peace demands addressing the root causes of violence and oppression. This means adhering to the International Court of Justice’s July 2024 advisory opinion by dismantling the foundational structures of colonial violence and ensuring Palestinians’ rights to self-determination, dignity and freedom.”
Action for justice and peace Abcede also spoke about what action to take for “justice and peace” — such as countering disinformation and influencing the narrative; amplifying Palstinian voices and demands; joining rallies — “like what we do every Saturday”; supporting the global BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) campaign against Israel; writing letters to the government calling for special visas for Palestinians who have families in New Zealand; and donating to campaigns supporting the victims.
Lorri Mackness also of WILPF (right) . . . “Women will be delivered [of babies] in tents, corridors, or bombed out homes without anasthesia, without doctors, without clean water.” Image: David Robie/APR
Lorri Mackness, also of WILPF Aotearoa, spoke of the Zionist gendered violence against Palestinians and the ruthless attacks on Gaza’s medical workers and hospitals to destroy the health sector.
Gaza’s hospitals had been “reduced to rubble by Israeli bombs”, she said.
“UN reports that over 60,000 women would give birth this year in Gaza. But Israel has destroyed every maternity hospital.
“Women will be delivered in tents, corridors, or bombed out homes without anasthesia, without doctors, without clean water.
“When Israel killed Gaza’s only foetal medicine specialist, Dr Muhammad Obeid, it wasn’t collateral damage — it was calculated reproductive terror.”
“Now, miscarriages have spiked by 300 percent, and mothers stitch their own C-sections with sewing thread.”
‘Femicide – a war crime’ Babies who survived birth entered a world where Israel blocked food aid — 1 in 10 infants would die of starvation, 335,000 children faced starvation, and their mothers forced to watch, according to UNICEF.
“This is femicide — this is a war crime.”
Eugene Velasco, of the Filipino feminist action group Gabriela Aotearoa, said Israel’s violence in Gaza was a “clear reminder of the injustice that transcends geographical borders”.
“The injustice is magnified in Gaza where the US-funded genocide and ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people has resulted in the deaths of more than 61,000.”
‘Pernicious’ Regulatory Standards Bill Dr Jane Kelsey, a retired law professor and justice advocate, spoke of an issue that connected the “scourge of colonisation in Palestine and Aotearoa with the same lethal logic and goals”.
Law professor Dr Jane Kelsey . . . “Behind the scenes is ACT’s more systemic and pernicious Regulatory Standards Bill.” Image: David Robie/APR
The parallels between both colonised territories included theft of land and the creation of private property rights, and the denial of sovereign authority and self-determination.
She spoke of how international treaties that had been entered in good faith were disrespected, disregarded and “rewritten as it suits the colonising power”.
Dr Kelsey said an issue that had “gone under the radar” needed to be put on the radar and for action.
She said that while the controversial Treaty Principles Bill would not proceed because of the massive mobilisations such as the hikoi, it had served ACT’s purpose.
“Behind the scenes is ACT’s more systemic and pernicious Regulatory Standards Bill,” she said. ACT had tried three times to get the bill adopted and failed, but it was now in the coalition government’s agreement.
A ‘stain on humanity’ Meanwhile, Hamas has reacted to a Gaza government tally of the number of women who were killed by Israel’s war, reports Al Jazeera.
“The killing of 12,000 women in Gaza, the injury and arrest of thousands, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands are a stain on humanity,” the group said.
“Palestinian female prisoners are subjected to psychological and physical torture in flagrant violation of all international norms and conventions.”
Hamas added the suffering endured by Palestinian female prisoners revealed the “double standards” of Western countries, including the United States, in dealing with Palestinians.
Filipino feminist activists from Gabriela Aotearoa and the International Women’s Alliance (IWA) also participated in the pro-Palestine solidarity rally. Image: David Robie/APR
For nearly half a century, Papua New Guinea has been more than just a home for Laurence “Rocky” Roe — it has been his canvas, his inspiration, and his great love.
A master behind the lens, Rocky has captured the soul of the nation through his photography, preserving moments of history, culture, and progress.
He bid farewell to the country he has called home since 1976 in June 2021 and is now retired and living in Australia. We reflect on the extraordinary journey of a man whose work has become an indelible part of PNG’s visual history.
A journey born of adventure Rocky Roe’s story began in Adelaide, Australia, where he was born in 1947. His adventure in Papua New Guinea started in 1976 when he arrived as a mechanical fitter for Bougainville Copper. But his heart sought more than the structured life of a mining camp.
In 1979, he took a leap of faith, moving to Port Moresby and trading a higher salary for a passion — photography. What he lost in pay, he gained in purpose.
“I wanted to see Papua New Guinea,” Rocky recalls. “And I got an opportunity to get paid to see it.”
Capturing the essence of a nation From corporate photography to historic events, Rocky’s lens has documented the evolution of Papua New Guinea. He was there when leaders rose to prominence, capturing moments that would later adorn national currency — his photograph of Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare graces the K50 note.
His work went beyond the formal; he ventured deep into the Highlands, the islands, and bustling townships, preserving the heart and spirit of the people.
With each shot, he chronicled the changing landscape of Port Moresby. From a city of well-kept roads and modest housing in the 1970s to its present-day urban sprawl, Rocky witnessed and documented it all.
The evolution of photography Rocky’s career spanned a transformative era in photography — from the meticulous world of slide film, where exposure errors were unforgiving, to the digital revolution, where technology made photography more accessible.
“Autofocus hadn’t been invented,” he recalls. “Half the world couldn’t focus a camera back then.” Yet, through skill and patience, he mastered the art, adapting as the industry evolved.
His assignments took him to mine sites, oil fields, and remote locations where only helicopters could reach.
“I spent many hours flying with the door off, capturing PNG from above. Looking through the camera made it all feel natural. Without it, I might have been scared.”
The man behind the camera Despite the grandeur of his work, Rocky remains humble. A storyteller at heart, his greatest joy has been the connections he forged—whether photographing Miss PNG contestants over the years or engaging with young photographers eager to learn.
He speaks fondly of his colleagues, the friendships he built, and the country that embraced him as one of its own.
His time in Papua New Guinea was not without challenges. He encountered moments of danger, faced armed hold-ups, and saw the country grapple with law and order issues. Yet, his love for PNG never wavered.
“It’s the greatest place on earth,” he says, reflecting on his journey.
A fond farewell, but not goodbye Now, as Rocky returns to Australia to tend to his health, he leaves behind a legacy that will live on in the countless images he captured. Papua New Guinea will always be home to him, and its people, his extended family.
“I may come back if someone brings me back,” he says with a knowing smile.
Papua New Guinea bids farewell to a legend, a visual historian who gave us the gift of memories frozen in time. His photographs are not just images; they are stories, emotions, and a testament to a life well-lived in the pursuit of beauty and truth.
Farewell, Rocky Roe. Your work will continue to inspire generations to come.
Independent Papua New Guinea journalist Malum Nalu first published this article on his blog Happenings in Papua New Guinea as part of a series leading up to PNG’s 50th anniversary this year. Republished with permission.
AMY GOODMAN: President Trump addressed a joint session of Congress in a highly partisan 100-minute speech, the longest presidential address to Congress in modern history on Wednesday.
Trump defended his sweeping actions over the past six weeks.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We have accomplished more in 43 days than most administrations accomplished in four years or eight years, and we are just getting started.
AMY GOODMAN: President Trump praised his biggest campaign donor, the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, who’s leading Trump’s effort to dismantle key government agencies and cut critical government services.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And to that end, I have created the brand-new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Perhaps you’ve heard of it. Perhaps.
Which is headed by Elon Musk, who is in the gallery tonight. Thank you, Elon. He’s working very hard. He didn’t need this. He didn’t need this. Thank you very much. We appreciate it.
AMY GOODMAN: Some Democrats laughed and pointed at Elon Musk when President Trump made this comment later in his speech.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It’s very simple. And the days of rule by unelected bureaucrats are over.
AMY GOODMAN: During his speech, President Trump repeatedly attacked the trans and immigrant communities, defended his tariffs that have sent stock prices spiraling, vowed to end Russia’s war on Ukraine and threatened to take control of Greenland.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We also have a message tonight for the incredible people of Greenland: We strongly support your right to determine your own future, and if you choose, we welcome you into the United States of America. We need Greenland for national security and even international security, and we’re working with everybody involved to try and get it.
But we need it, really, for international world security. And I think we’re going to get it. One way or the other, we’re going to get it.
‘A declaration of war against the American people.’ Video: Democracy Now!
AMY GOODMAN: During Trump’s 100-minute address, Democratic lawmakers held up signs in protest reading “This is not normal,” “Save Medicaid” and “Musk steals.”
One Democrat, Congressmember Al Green of Texas, was removed from the chamber for protesting against the President.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Likewise, small business optimism saw its single-largest one-month gain ever recorded, a 41-point jump.
REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMEMBER 1: Sit down!
REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMEMBER 2: Order!
SPEAKER MIKE JOHNSON: Members are directed to uphold and maintain decorum in the House and to cease any further disruptions. That’s your warning. Members are engaging in willful and continuing breach of decorum, and the chair is prepared to direct the sergeant-at-arms to restore order to the joint session.
Mr Green, take your seat. Take your seat, sir.
DEMOCRAT CONGRESS MEMBER AL GREEN: He has no mandate to cut Medicaid!
SPEAKER MIKE JOHNSON: Take your seat. Finding that members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum, the chair now directs the sergeant-at-arms to restore order, remove this gentleman from the chamber.
AMY GOODMAN: That was House Speaker Mike Johnson, who called in security to take Texas Democratic Congressmember Al Green out. Afterwards, Green spoke to reporters after being removed.
Democrat Congressman Al Green (Texas) . . . “I have people who are very fearful. These are poor people, and they have only Medicaid in their lives when it comes to their healthcare.” Image: DN screenshot APR
DEMOCRAT CONGRESS MEMBER AL GREEN: The President said he had a mandate, and I was making it clear to the President that he has no mandate to cut Medicaid.
I have people who are very fearful. These are poor people, and they have only Medicaid in their lives when it comes to their healthcare. And I want him to know that his budget calls for deep cuts in Medicaid.
He needs to save Medicaid, protect it. We need to raise the cap on Social Security. There’s a possibility that it’s going to be hurt. And we’ve got to protect Medicare.
These are the safety net programmes that people in my congressional district depend on. And this President seems to care less about them and more about the number of people that he can remove from the various programmes that have been so helpful to so many people.
AMY GOODMAN: Texas Democratic Congressmember Al Green.
We begin today’s show with Ralph Nader, the longtime consumer advocate, corporate critic, former presidential candidate. Ralph Nader is founder of the Capitol Hill Citizen newspaper. His most recent lead article in the new issue of Capitol Hill Citizen is titled “Democratic Party: Apologise to America for ushering Trump back in.”
Medicaid, Social Security, Medicare, all these different programmes. Ralph Nader, respond overall to President Trump’s, well, longest congressional address in modern history.
Environmentalist and consumer protection activist Ralph Nader . . . And he’s taken Biden’s genocidal policies one step further by demanding the evacuation of Palestinians from Gaza. Image: DN screenshot APR
RALPH NADER: Well, it was also a declaration of war against the American people, including Trump voters, in favour of the super-rich and the giant corporations. What Trump did last night was set a record for lies, delusionary fantasies, predictions of future broken promises — a rerun of his first term — boasts about progress that don’t exist.
In practice, he has launched a trade war. He has launched an arms race with China and Russia. He has perpetuated and even worsened the genocidal support against the Palestinians. He never mentioned the Palestinians once.
And he’s taken Biden’s genocidal policies one step further by demanding the evacuation of Palestinians from Gaza.
But taking it as a whole, Amy, what we’re seeing here defies most of dictionary adjectives. What Trump and Musk and Vance and the supine Republicans are doing are installing an imperial, militaristic domestic dictatorship that is going to end up in a police state.
You can see his appointments are yes people bent on suppression of civil liberties, civil rights. You can see his breakthrough, after over 120 years, of announcing conquest of Panama Canal.
He’s basically said, one way or another, he’s going to take Greenland. These are not just imperial controls of countries overseas or overthrowing them; it’s actually seizing land.
Now, on the Greenland thing, Greenland is a province of Denmark, which is a member of NATO. He is ready to basically conquer a part of Denmark in violation of Section 5 of NATO, at the same time that he has displayed full-throated support for a hardcore communist dictator, Vladimir Putin, who started out with the Russian version of the CIA under the Soviet Union and now has over 20 years of communist dictatorship, allied, of course, with a number of oligarchs, a kind of kleptocracy.
And the Republicans are buying all this in Congress. This is complete reversal of everything that the Republicans stood for against communist dictators.
So, what we’re seeing here is a phony programme of government efficiency ripping apart people’s programmes. The attack on Social Security is new, complete lies about millions of people aged 110, 120, getting Social Security cheques.
That’s a new attack. He left Social Security alone in his first term, but now he’s going after [it]. So, what they’re going to do is cut Medicaid and cut other social safety nets in order to pay for another tax cut for the super-rich and the corporation, throwing in no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security benefits, which will, of course, further increase the deficit and give the lie to his statement that he wants a balanced budget.
So we’re dealing with a deranged, unstable pathological liar, who’s getting away with it. And the question is: How does he get away with it, year after year? Because the Democratic Party has basically collapsed.
They don’t know how to deal with a criminal recidivist, a person who has hired workers without documents and exploited them, a person who’s a bigot against immigrants, including legal immigrants who are performing totally critical tasks in home healthcare, processing poultry, meat, and half of the construction workers in Texas are undocumented workers.
So, as a bully, he doesn’t go after the construction industry in Texas; he picks out individuals.
I thought the most disgraceful thing, Amy, yesterday was his use of these unfortunate people who suffered as props, holding one up after another. But they were also Trump’s crutches to cover up his contradictory behavior.
So, he praised the police yesterday, but he pardoned over 600 people who attacked violently the police [in the attack on the Capitol] on 6 January 2021 and were convicted and imprisoned as a result, and he let them out of prison. I thought the most —
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Ralph? Ralph, I —
RALPH NADER: — the most heartrending thing was that 13-year-old child, who wanted to be a police officer when he grew up, being held up twice by his father. And he was so bewildered as to what was going on. And Trump’s use of these people was totally reprehensible and should be called out.
Now, more basically, the real inefficiencies in government, they’re ignoring, because they are kleptocrats. They’re ignoring corporate crimes on Medicaid, Medicare, tens of billions of dollars every year ripping off Medicare, ripping off government contracts, such as defence contracts.
He’s ignoring hundreds of billions of dollars of corporate welfare, including that doled out to Elon Musk — subsidies, handouts, giveaways, bailouts, you name it. And he’s ignoring the bloated military budget, which he is supporting the Republicans in actually increasing the military budget more than the generals have asked for. So, that’s the revelation —
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Ralph? Ralph, if I — Ralph, if I can interrupt? I just need to —
RALPH NADER: — that the Democrats need to pursue.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Ralph, I wanted to ask you about — specifically about Medicaid and Medicare. You’ve mentioned the cuts to these safety net programmes. What about Medicaid, especially the crisis in this country in long-term care? What do you see happening in this Trump administration, especially with the Republican majority in Congress?
RALPH NADER: Well, they’re going to slash — they’re going to move to slash Medicaid, which serves over 71 million people, including millions of Trump voters, who should be reconsidering their vote as the days pass, because they’re being exploited in red states, blue states, everywhere, as well.
Yeah, they have to cut tens of billions of dollars a year from Medicaid to pay for the tax cut. That’s number one. Now they’re going after Social Security. Who knows what the next step will be on Medicare? They’re leaving Americans totally defenceless by slashing meat and poultry and food inspection laws, auto safety.
They’re exposing people to climate violence by cutting FEMA, the rescue agency. They’re cutting forest rangers that deal with wildfires. They’re cutting protections against pandemics and epidemics by slashing and ravaging and suppressing free speech in scientific circles, like CDC and National Institutes of Health.
They’re leaving the American people defenseless.
And where are the Democrats on this? I mean, look at Senator Slotkin’s response. It was a typical rerun of a feeble, weak Democratic rebuttal. She couldn’t get herself, just like the Democrats in 2024, which led to Trump’s victory — they can’t get themselves, Juan, to talk specifically and authentically about raising the minimum wage, expanding healthcare, cracking down on corporate crooks that are bleeding out the incomes of hard-pressed American workers and the poor.
They can’t get themselves to talk about increasing frozen Social Security budgets for 50 years, that 200 Democrats supported raising, but Nancy Pelosi kept them, when she was Speaker, from taking John Larson’s bill to the House floor.
That’s why they lose. Look at her speech. It was so vague and general. They chose her because she was in the national security state. She was a former CIA. They chose her because they wanted to promote the losing version of the Democratic Party, instead of choosing Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders, the most popular polled politician in America today.
That’s who they chose. So, as long as the Democrats monopolise the opposition and crush third-party efforts to push them into more progressive realms, the Republican, plutocratic, Wall Street, war machine declaration of war against the American people will continue.
We’re heading into the most serious crisis in American history. There’s no comparison.
AMY GOODMAN: Ralph Nader, we’re going to have to leave it there, but, of course, we’re going to continue to cover these issues. And I also wanted to wish you, Ralph, a happy 91st birthday. Ralph Nader —
RALPH NADER: I wish people to get the Capitol Hill Citizen, which tells people what they can really do to win democracy and justice back. So, for $5 or donation or more, if you wish, you can go to Capitol Hill Citizen and get a copy sent immediately by first-class mail, or more copies for your circle, of resisting and protesting and prevailing over this Trump dictatorship.
AMY GOODMAN: Ralph Nader, longtime consumer advocate, corporate critic, four-time presidential candidate, founder of the Capitol Hill Citizen newspaper. This is Democracy Now!
The original content of this programme is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States Licence. Republished by Asia Pacific Report under Creative Commons.
On March 3, US President Donald Trump paused all US military aid to Ukraine. This move was apparently triggered by a heated exchange a few days earlier between Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office.
In response, European Union leaders have now committed to rearm Europe by mobilising €800 billion (about A$1.4 trillion) in defence spending.
26 of the EU leaders (excluding Hungary) signed an agreement that peace for Ukraine must be accompanied by “robust and credible” security guarantees.
They agreed there can be no negotiations on Ukraine without Ukraine’s participation. It was also agreed the EU will continue to provide regular military and non-military support to Ukraine.
This jump in defence spending is unprecedented for the EU, with 2024 spending hitting a previous record high of €326 billion (A$558 billion).
At the same time, the United Kingdom has committed to the biggest increase in defence spending since the Cold War.
The EU’s united front will create strong defences and deter a direct attack on EU nations.
However, for Ukraine, it will not lead to a military victory in its war with Russia. While Europe has stepped up funding, this is not sufficient for Ukraine to defeat Russian forces currently occupying about 20% of the country.
For Ukraine, the withdrawal of US support will severely strain their ability to keep fighting. Ukraine will likely need to find a way to freeze the conflict this year. This may mean a temporary truce that does not formally cede Ukrainian territory to Russia.
A Trumpian worldview
The vastly different approaches of the US under Trump and the EU point to a deeper ideological divide.
While the Trump administration has acted more quickly and assertively in foreign affairs than many expected, its approach is not surprising.
Since Trump won the US presidential election in November last year, Europe and Ukraine have known that a shift in US policy would be on the cards.
Trump’s approach to Ukraine is not only about economic concerns and withdrawing US military aid. It is about a deeper, more significant clash of worldviews.
Trump (and, it appears, his core support base) hold a “great power politics” approach to world affairs.
This approach assumes we live in a competitive world where countries are motivated to maximise gains and dominate. Outcomes can be achieved through punishments or rewards.
Countries with greater military or economic strength “count” more. They are expected to impose their will on weaker countries. This viewpoint underpinned much of the colonial activity of the 19th and 20th centuries.
This worldview expects conflict – and it expects stronger countries to “win”.
Consistent with Trump’s outlook, Russia is a regional power that has the “right” to control smaller countries in its neighbourhood.
Trump’s approach to Ukraine is not an anomaly. Nor is it a temporary and spontaneous measure to grab the global spotlight.
Trump’s worldview leads to the logical and consistent conclusion that Russia will seek to control countries within its sphere of influence.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine represented an attempt to impose its will on a militarily weaker country that it considered to be in its rightful domain of control.
The EU alternative
Contrary to this view, the EU is founded on the premise that countries can work together for mutual gains through collaboration and consensus. This approach underpins the operation of what are called the Bretton Woods Institutions created in the aftermath of World War II.
This worldview expects collaboration rather than conflict. Mutually beneficial and cooperative solutions are found through dialogue and negotiation.
According to this perspective, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is about a conflict between the values of a liberal democracy and those of an oppressive authoritarian regime.
Zelensky has himself consistently framed the conflict as being about a clash of values: freedom and democracy versus authoritarianism and control.
A mix of both?
Since Trump’s second inauguration, European leaders have presented a united front, motivated by facing a world where US military backing cannot be guaranteed.
However, there is internal division within European countries. Recent years has seen a sharp rise in anti-EU sentiment within EU member states. The UK’s exit from the EU is an example of this phenomenon.
EU leaders previously followed a path of cooperation with Russia, with limited success. Following Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, France and Germany helped mediate the Minsk Agreements. These agreements, signed in 2014 and 2015, were designed to prevent further incursions by Russian-backed groups into Ukrainian sovereign territory.
This did not prevent Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
In an emerging new world order, leadership might require going beyond the seeming contradiction of a focus on military strength or cooperation. Leaders may need to integrate both.
Jessica Genauer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amy Peden, NHMRC Research Fellow, School of Population Health & co-founder UNSW Beach Safety Research Group, UNSW Sydney
Social media is awash with images of surfers chasing waves as Cyclone Alfred whips up seas off Australia’s east coast.
Queensland Premier David Crisafulli has branded beachgoers as “idiots”. On Friday morning, he said those going to the beach as the cyclone approaches put themselves and emergency services at risk, adding:
I plead to the people who might think that now is a great time to go out on the surf – it’s not. It’s not just for you I’m concerned, but for the innocent person who has to go in after you.
In Queensland, surfers have been warned they may face fines up to $16,000 for reckless behaviour.
Despite all this, surfers and others continue to enter the water. It’s important to ask why – and what will it take to get them to stop?
Only a surfer knows the feeling
I research injury prevention with a focus on drowning and safety in the water. As cofounder of the UNSW Beach Safety Research Group, I have also led research into surfing.
Surfers frequently chase waves in big surf. Research by my colleagues and I shows under normal conditions, surfers have a lower risk of dying during this activity than people taking part in other water-related activities such as swimming, wading, snorkelling and scuba diving.
Although drowning is the leading cause of death while surfing, other severe injuries are relatively rare.
Of course, injuries can occur. These include cervical spine fractures and other spinal cord injuries, head injuries and lacerations. These can be due to collision with a surfboard, a fin, or the ocean floor.
Yet most surfers usually manage to avoid serious injury. Throw some mega waves into the mix, however, and things can turn deadly, fast.
Research shows the risk of injury is almost 2.5 times higher when surfing in waves that were over head height or bigger, relative to other waves.
Research shows surfers are motivated by what’s known as “sensation seeking”. In other words, they are more likely to seek out intense experiences than those who participate in other, less extreme sports.
The desire to “master nature” – or go into battle with a big wave and come out on top – has been documented in analyses of surfing motivation.
For big wave surfers, the reward – and the risk – can can be even greater. The physical and mental preparation needed to take on such extremes are immense. Tragically, deaths do occur even when attempts are made to improve safety.
Beyond the waves, other hazards can cause increased risk of ill health and injury in stormy seas. Debris can increase the risk of blunt-force trauma, while fecal and other bacteria in stormwater can cause illness.
Sea foam should not be considered harmless either, having been implicated in rescues and tragic cases of drowning in the past.
In the long term, coastal erosion due to storm surges and powerful surf can create permanent changes, impacting infrastructure and changing the location and strength of rip currents – the number-one coastal drowning hazard.
Having a cyclone this far south is a rare event, so it’s only natural for people to want to take a look. But sometimes there’s no safe viewing distance, and the safest place to be is at home.
Unsafe behaviours in and around the surf are rife on social media. Mainstream media outlets often model unsafe behaviours too, with reporters delivering their “piece to camera” about the importance of staying away from the beach while themselves standing on the shore.
Conditions are unpredictable. These include powerful waves and storm surges that can knock you off your feet and sweep you out to sea.
Remember, emergency services are stretched right now. If you get into trouble in the surf, there may be no one to rescue you. Or untrained bystanders may come to your aid and get into trouble themselves.
With numerous flood warnings in place and roads closed, as well as the risks present on the coast, it’s best to stay away from beaches, rock platforms and coastal areas for now. Hit the waves again when conditions have calmed down.
Amy Peden receives funding from the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council, Surf Life Saving Australia and the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service. She maintains an honorary (unpaid) affiliation with Royal Life Saving Society – Australia.
People in southeast Queensland and northern NSW have spent days racing to prepare their homes ahead of Tropical Cyclone Alfred, now expected to make landfall over several hours on Saturday.
It’s not possible to completely cyclone-proof a house. But there’s a lot you can do – in the short and long term – to boost the resilience of your home and reduce damage caused by future cyclones.
How winds affects pressure on and in the house
Strong winds generate pressure pushing and pulling on the outside and inside of a house.
When wind gusts hit a building, the wind is pushing on what we call the windward wall and going up and over the roof, creating a suction effect. The wind is trying very hard to peel the roof off your house, and in a cyclone is hammering the building for many hours.
If a windward window or door blows in or gets broken by debris, wind instantaneously enters the space. This almost doubles the load that the roof now has to resist.
In southeast Queensland and northern NSW, housing is not typically designed to resist that extra upward load on the roof if a door or window blows in.
Cyclone resilience is about maintaining the function of a building during severe weather, so even if there is some damage, it still can be used after the storm has passed. So it’s vital the roof stays on.
In practice, that means thinking about what’s known as the “tie down chain” – how all pieces of the house are held together to carry the wind loads from the roof to the ground.
A weak link in this tie down chain can lead to winds lifting entire roofs from homes. All the connections involved in keeping a roof on the house are exceptionally important.
Weather resistance in building codes is generally designed for rain that falls straight down and flows off the roof.
But in a cyclone, rain can come horizontally. It can get pushed under the the roof, into gutters and under sliding doors. And it’s not just a little bit – buckets and buckets of water can inundate a house.
Wind pressure can also mean water is blown into the house through gaps you may not even know existed. Wind-driven rain ingress can happen at wind speeds that don’t cause structural damage.
It comes in under doors and through windows, including holes in window sills. It can lead to buildings being unusable and a large number of insurance claims.
Dispelling major myths
You might have seen people taping a big “X” on their windows and glass doors. Unfortunately, this doesn’t really do much to improve window strength.
Some people put the tape on and then, during the cyclone, sit there watching their glass flex, falsely believing tape magically makes the window stronger. This is incredibly dangerous. If that glass shatters, the bystander would be hit by shards of glass travelling at high speed.
Sometimes people open a window to reduce pressure inside the house that happens if a door or window breaks. It’s true this might reduce some pressure, but it depends which side of the house is currently being hit by wind. And given wind direction can change during a cyclone, emergency services recommend it’s better just to stay sheltered in the smallest room; they don’t want you standing in front of a window during a cyclone.
Close all internal doors so if any windows do blow in, the high pressure is restricted to just that room (not spread throughout the house).
Designing beyond the bare minimum
Building codes require buildings to build to a “wind classification” according to the “wind zone” of that area.
Buildings are often built only to the minimum standard of the Building Code. However, if we want a house to function after an extreme tropical cyclone, we should consider building beyond the minimum standard using resilience features that will keep your roof on in a cyclone and minimise the entry of rainwater.
Cyclone resilience also includes incorporating resilient building materials in your home – such as linoleum or vinyl floors instead of carpet, and ceilings from fibre-cement sheeting instead of plasterboard.
It’s also important all elements holding your house together are well maintained through the life of the building.
That means ensuring regular inspections by a trained professional to identify any potential weaknesses such as rot, rust or UV damage.
These inspections are not something you and a mate can do yourselves. It requires a building professionals to get into the roof and look for weak spots.
Think beyond your house. What about the carport? A pergola? That shed or patio you added? Are the solar panels installed correctly with the right fixings and brackets to resist the wind forces?
If all these things are not fixed down and maintained well, strong winds can pick them up and throw them at your house or your neighbours.
Just as you get your car serviced, you should get your house checked every five to seven years. Our homes have many important parts and a failure in one can lead to disastrous and expensive problems.
David Henderson serves on committees for Standards Australia. He is a member of Engineers Australia and has done consulting work with the Resilient Building Council.
Geoffrey Boughton serves on committees for Standards Australia. He is a member of Engineers Australia and has done consulting work with the Resilient Building Council.
In 2011, as Cyclone Yasi approached the Queensland coast, I sat in my home in the tropical far north of the state and worried what the future would hold. Would my family be OK? Would our home be destroyed? Would my workplace be damaged and my job uncertain? Would my community be devastated?
Now, as we wait for Cyclone Alfred to make landfall, I am watching on from my new home in Melbourne. I am safe. But last night, I couldn’t sleep. I’m having intrusive thoughts, remembering what it was like when Cyclone Yasi barrelled into us. I feel agitated, distracted and anxious. The news coverage of the impending cyclone makes my heart race, so I have turned off the television.
As someone who has researched the impact of disasters for more than 20 years, I recognise what I am feeling now is similar to how I felt all those years ago. Again, I am experiencing the normal range of stress reactions common after living through a disaster, even though I am not directly impacted by this one.
This is known as retraumatisation, where we re-live stress reactions experienced as a result of a traumatic event when faced with a new, similar incident.
As a researcher in emergency responses to a broad range of disasters, I understand why I am feeling like this.
However, many people may not realise the stress they are experiencing right now is related to an earlier disaster or traumatic event in their life. That earlier disaster could be another cyclone, or a different event, such as a flood or bushfire.
Some signs and symptoms of retraumatisation might be:
intrusive thoughts (for example, I keep remembering my fear of the predicted tidal surge of water rushing up at me in the darkness as Cyclone Yasi made landfall)
nightmares and having trouble sleeping
hypervigilance (for example, feeling “on edge” all day)
sensitivity to triggers (for example, the sound of intense wind and windows creaking can trigger intense feelings because they remind me of the night we lived through Cyclone Yasi passing over the top of us)
feeling isolated
thinking about, planning or attempting suicide
panic atacks
using/abusing substances, such as alcohol and other drugs
increase in unhealthy behaviours (for example, being more prone to aggression or violence).
For many of us, Cyclone Alfred is awakening memories and feelings, and the re-emergence of those stress reactions can be confronting. It can feel like re-opening a wound that hasn’t quite healed.
Disaster upon disaster take their toll
We are now beginning to understand the effects of being exposed to multiple disasters – bushfires, cyclones, floods, and let’s not forget the COVID pandemic – that erode our resilience.
This type of multiple exposure influences our feelings of safety, security and even our hope for the future, all increasing the risk of poorer mental health.
For people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), retraumatisation may cause people to relive their past traumas in intense detail. It can feel like past traumatic events are happening all over again.
What to do now, and in the future
However, there are steps we can take to help build our resilience in the face of multiple disasters.
For now
Right now, it is useful to understand how we respond to trauma. We may notice a range of physical responses (for example, my heart has been racing), psychological reactions (for example, I am feeling more anxious than usual) and social impacts (for example, I cancelled dinner plans last night as I did not want to leave the house).
So, even though I stayed home last night, I was on a group chat discussing the Real Housewives of Sydney with friends, which helped reduce both the physical and psychological stress reactions I was experiencing.
Staying connected to friends, family, neighbours and other supports will help. Caftor/Shutterstock
For later
In the longer term, it is useful to develop and implement a self-care plan that includes activities to support our emotional, physical and spiritual health.
Self-care means taking the time to do things that help your wellbeing and improve your physical health and mental health. This can help you manage the stress reactions that may emerge as part of retraumatisation. Even small acts of self-care in your daily life can have a big impact.
Today, I made the time to go for a short walk in the park and listened to some of my favourite music. It helped in the moment, but it also helps me in the longer term when I routinely include these small acts of self-care in my daily life.
Most importantly, we need to understand that the way we are feeling is normal. Be patient with yourself and look for small opportunities to take control of your reactions.
I am keeping the television turned off (except when the Real Housewives is on).
Some resources
The website blueknot, from the National Centre of Excellence for Complex Trauma, gives more information about how we respond to trauma. The Black Dog Institute guides you through developing a self-care plan.
If this article has raised issues for you, or if you’re concerned about someone you know, call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
Erin Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ramona Zharfpeykan, Lecturer, Department of Accounting and Finance, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
Despite large multinational companies such as Goldman Sachs, Paramount, Google and others removing their diversity, equity and inclusion policies, the evidence is clear: having a diverse team can help businesses make better, more empathetic decisions.
At the top level, a growing body of research shows having more women on corporate boards leads to better decision-making, stronger governance and improved environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance.
Women make up 50.8% of the population and hold 40.8% of parliamentary leadership roles. But they hold only 28.5% of board seats and 26.4% of executive roles in the New Zealand’s Stock Exchange (NZX) top 50 companies (the NZX50).
And while businesses are encouraged to disclose gender diversity policies by the NZX, there are no mandatory quotas, leaving progress uneven.
However, change is happening. Our new research looked at the the percentage of female directors in NZX-listed firms between 2016 and 2022.
What we found is positive. Using information from financial infrastructure and data provider LSEG’s database on global financial markets, we identified a rise in the number of female directors on corporate boards. We also saw a corresponding improvement in the firms’ ESG performance.
Despite making up 50.4% of the population, women hold only 28.5% of board seats and 26.4% of executive roles in NZX50 companies. T. Schneider/Shutterstock
Boosting performance
Between 2016 and 2022, the proportion of female directors in NZX-listed firms increased from 26% to 36%. These same businesses saw an average 33% improvement in their ESG performance.
Notably, governance – one of the key ESG pillars – improved significantly, with a 31% increase on average. Governance specifically refers to the effectiveness of the firm’s management systems, board structure and capacity to protect shareholder interests.
While it’s not possible to say outright that having more women on the board directly influenced governance outcomes, we saw a positive relationship between the two. This suggests having more women in leadership strengthens corporate oversight and ethical decision making.
Gender diversity does not have the same level of importance in all contexts. While social and environmental performance also improved, this study found no significant link between a more gender-diverse board and these higher scores in social and environmental performance.
Our findings are supported by overseas research suggesting board diversity does not strongly influence sustainability outcomes when it comes to issues and groups already covered by legislation.
Therefore, New Zealand’s proactive stance on issues such as the environment, poverty and human rights, as well as encouraging private companies to improve sustainability and transparency, may explain why board diversity had no notable impact on social and environmental performance in this study.
What women bring to the business
Our findings align with studies completed overseas.
In the US, one study found women business leaders tended to prioritise transparency, fairness and stakeholder interests. This made them strong advocates for sustainable and inclusive business practices.
It’s clear that addressing the gender gap in corporate New Zealand isn’t just about fairness. It’s about economic success. Businesses that embrace diversity perform better, attract top talent and enhance their reputations.
The solution isn’t simply about enforcing quotas, but ensuring more qualified women are placed in leadership roles. Companies need to move beyond a “compliance mindset” and recognise true diversity strengthens governance, reduces risk and drives long-term success.
As the world celebrates International Women’s Day on March 8, businesses need to realise that increasing female representation at the top isn’t just the right thing to do – it’s the smart thing to do.
Ramona Zharfpeykan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Prema Arasu, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research Centre, The University of Western Australia
In February, researchers from conservation organisation Condrik Tenerife were about two kilometres off the coast of Tenerife Island, looking for sharks, when they caught sight of something much stranger.
Photographer David Jara Boguñá filmed a humpback anglerfish (Melanocetus johnsonii, a species of black seadevil) swimming near the surface in sunlit waters. These fish have never before been seen alive in daylight, as they normally dwell in the “twilight zone” at depths from 200m to 600m.
The video has provoked an enormously empathetic response on social media, with some seeing the fish as a feminist icon or an Icarus-like figure who swam too close to the Sun. The reaction shows our views of the deep sea – long ignored or seen as a realm of monsters – may at last be changing.
The strange lives of anglerfish
Anglerfish are much smaller than you probably think they are. The specimen Boguñá filmed was a female, which typically grow up to 15cm long.
The creatures are named for their bioluminescent lure (or esca). This modified dorsal fin ray can produce a glow used to fish (or angle) for prey in the dim depths of the sea. The bioluminescence is produced by symbiotic bacteria that live inside the bulbous head of the esca.
Male anglerfish lack the iconic lure and are much smaller, usually reaching a length of only 3cm.
A male anglerfish spends the first part of his life searching for a female to whom he will then attach himself. He will eventually fuse his circulatory system with hers, depending on her entirely for nutrients, and live out his life as a parasite or “living testicle”.
It is unknown why this fish was swimming vertically near the surface. Researchers have speculated that the behaviour may have been related to changes in water temperature, or that the fish was simply at the end of her life.
Watchers observed the fish for several hours, until it died. Its body was preserved and taken to the Museum of Nature and Archaeology in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, where it will be further studied.
I like to think she is a respected old grandmother who has dreamed her entire life of seeing the sunlight and the world above the water. She knows her time is nigh so she bade farewell to her friends and family and swam up towards the light and whatever it might hold for her as her life as an anglerfish comes to a close.
One person described the fish as her “feminist Roman Empire”, in the sense of an inspirational obsession that filled the same role for her that the Roman Empire supposedly does for many men.
Boguñá and Condrik Tenerife have since commented on the public reaction. (The original post is in Spanish, but Instagram’s automated English translation is below.)
He’s become a global icon, that’s clear. But far from the romanticisation and attempt to humanise that has been given to its tragic story, I think that what this event has been for is to awaken the curiosity of the sea to PEOPLE, especially the younger ones, and perhaps, it also serves that messages about marine ecosystem conservation can reach so many more people.
From horrors to heroes
The outpouring of empathy for the anglerfish is unexpected. With their glowing lures and fang-filled mouths, the creatures have long been archetypal horrors of the abyss.
As I have written elsewhere, the anglerfish’s extreme sexual dimorphism and parasitism, along with its unsettling anatomy, have made it the “iconic ambassador of the deep sea”. Anglerfish or angler-inspired aliens have appeared as antagonists in films such as Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999), Finding Nemo (2003), The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie (2004) and Luca (2021).
Star Wars film The Phantom Menace features a large anglerfish-inspired sea monster. Disney
The reception of “Icarus” (as some call her) in popular culture indicates a perhaps surprising capacity for empathy toward animals that aren’t conventionally cute or beautiful. It stands in stark contrast to the fate of the deep-sea blobfish Psychrolutes marcidus, which in 2013 was voted the world’s ugliest animal.
Perhaps the name is a clue: people have seen in the fish a creature striving to reach the light, who died as a result of her quest.
But does our projection of human emotions and desires onto non-human animals risk misunderstanding scientific reality? Almost certainly – but, as US environmental humanities researcher Stacy Alaimo has argued, it may also have benefits:
Deep-sea creatures are often pictured as aliens from another planet, and I think that gets people interested in them because we’re all interested in novelty and weirdness and the surreal […] I think that can be positive, but the idea of the alien can also cut us off from any responsibility.
Prema Arasu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
If there is one thing we can thank US President Donald Trump for, it is this: he has decisively stripped away the ridiculous notion, long cultivated by Western media, that the United States is a benign global policeman enforcing a “rules-based order”.
Washington is better understood as the head of a gangster empire, embracing 800 military bases around the world. Since the end of the Cold War, it has been aggressively seeking “global full-spectrum domination”, as the Pentagon doctrine politely terms it.
You either pay fealty to the Don or you get dumped in the river. Last Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was presented with a pair of designer concrete boots at the White House.
The US president looked like a gangster as he roughed up Zelensky. But he wasn’t the one who stoked a war that’s killed huge numbers of Ukrainians and Russians. Image: www.jonathan-cook.net
The innovation was that it all happened in front of the Western press corps, in the Oval Office, rather than in a back room, out of sight. It made for great television, Trump crowed.
Pundits have been quick to reassure us that the shouting match was some kind of weird Trumpian thing. As though being inhospitable to state leaders, and disrespectful to the countries they head, is unique to this administration.
Take just the example of Iraq. The administration of Bill Clinton thought it “worth it” – as his secretary of state, Madeleine Albright, infamously put it — to kill an estimated half a million Iraqi children by imposing draconian sanctions through the 1990s.
Under Clinton’s successor, George W Bush, the US then waged an illegal war in 2003, on entirely phoney grounds, that killed around half a million Iraqis, according to post-war estimates, and made four million homeless.
Those worrying about the White House publicly humiliating Zelensky might be better advised to save their concern for the hundreds of thousands of mostly Ukrainian and Russian men killed or wounded fighting an entirely unnecessary war — one, as we shall see, Washington carefully engineered through Nato over the preceding two decades.
Henchman Zelensky All those casualties served the same goal as they did in Iraq: to remind the world who is boss.
Uniquely, Western publics don’t understand this simple point because they live inside a disinformation bubble, created for them by the Western establishment media.
Henry Kissinger, the long-time steward of US foreign policy, famously said: “It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy, but to be America’s friend is fatal.”
Zelensky just found that out the hard way. Gangster empires are just as fickle as the gangsters we know from Hollywood movies. Under the previous Joe Biden administration, Zelensky had been recruited as a henchman to do Washington’s bidding on Moscow’s doorstep.
The background — the one Western media have kept largely out of view — is that, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US tore up treaties crucial to reassuring Russia of Nato’s good intent.
Viewed from Moscow, and given Washington’s track record, Nato’s European security umbrella must have looked more like preparation for an ambush.
Keen though Trump now is to rewrite history and cast himself as peacemaker, he was central to the escalating tensions that led to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
In 2019, he unilaterally withdrew from the 1987 Treaty on Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces. That opened the door to the US launching a potential first strike on Russia, using missiles stationed in nearby Nato members Romania and Poland.
He also sent Javelin anti-tank weapons to Ukraine, a move avoided by his predecessor, Barack Obama, for fear it would be seen as provocative.
Repeatedly, Nato vowed to bring Ukraine into its fold, despite Russia’s warnings that the step was viewed as an existential threat, that Moscow could not allow Washington to place missiles on its border, any more than the US accepted Soviet missiles stationed in Cuba back in the early 1960s.
Washington pressed ahead anyway, even assisting in a colour revolution-style coup in 2014 against the elected government in Kyiv, whose crime was being a little too sympathetic to Moscow.
With the country in crisis, Zelensky was himself elected by Ukrainians as a peace candidate, there to end a brutal civil war — sparked by that coup — between anti-Russian, “nationalistic” forces in the country’s west and ethnic Russian populations in the east. The Ukrainian President soon broke that promise.
Trump has accused Zelensky of being a “dictator”. But if he is, it is only because Washington wanted him that way, ignoring the wishes of the majority of Ukrainians.
Reddest of red lines Zelensky’s job was to play a game of chicken with Moscow. The assumption was that the US would win whatever the outcome.
Either Russian President Vladimir Putin’s bluff would be called. Ukraine would be welcomed into Nato, becoming the most forward of the alliance’s forward bases against Russia, allowing nuclear-armed ballistic missiles to be stationed minutes from Moscow.
Or Putin would finally make good on his years of threats to invade his neighbour to stop Nato crossing the reddest of red lines he had set over Ukraine.
Washington could then cry “self-defence” on Ukraine’s behalf, and ludicrously fearmonger Western publics about Putin eyeing Poland, Germany, France and Britain next.
Those were the pretexts for arming Kyiv to the hilt, rather than seeking a rapid peace deal. And so began a proxy war of attrition against Russia, using Ukrainian men as cannon fodder.
The aim was to wear Russia down militarily and economically, and bring about Putin’s overthrow.
Zelensky did precisely what was demanded of him. When he appeared to waver early on, and considered signing a peace deal with Moscow, Britain’s prime minister of the time, Boris Johnson, was dispatched with a message from Washington: keep fighting.
That is the same Boris Johnson who now breezily admits that the West is fighting a “proxy war” against Russia.
Hmm, maybe someone can help me.
How was Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine entirely ‘unprovoked’, when the British leader in charge at the time, Boris Johnson, now admits Nato viewed Ukraine as the battlefield for a ‘proxy war’ against Russia? 🤯 pic.twitter.com/VS6jRE03gH
His comments have generated precisely no controversy. That is particularly strange, given that critics who pointed this very obvious fact out three years ago were instantly denounced for spreading “Putin disinformation” and Kremlin “talking points”.
For his obedience, Zelensky was feted a hero, the defender of Europe against Russian imperialism. His every “demand” — demands that originated in Washington — was met.
Ukraine has received at least $250 billion worth of guns, tanks, fighter jets, training for his troops, Western intelligence on Russia, and other forms of aid.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian and Russian men have paid with their lives — as have the families they leave behind.
Mafia etiquette Now the old Don in Washington is gone. The new Don has decided Zelensky has been an expensive failure. Russia isn’t lethally wounded. It’s stronger than ever. Time for a new strategy.
Zelensky, still imagining he was Washington’s favourite henchman, arrived at the Oval Office only to be taught a harsh lesson in mafia etiquette.
Trump is spinning his stab in the back as a “peace agreement”. And in some sense, it is. Rightly, Trump has concluded that Russia has won — unless the West is ready to fight World War III and risk a potential nuclear war.
Trump has faced up to the reality of the situation, even if Zelensky and Europe are still struggling to.
Trump’s overt ‘genocidal’ warning over Gaza. Video: TRT World News
But his plan for Ukraine is actually just a variation of his other peace plan — the one for Gaza. There he wants to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian population and, on the bodies of the enclave’s many thousands of dead children, build the “Riviera of the Middle East” — or “Trump Gaza” as it is being called in a surreal video he shared on social media.
In telling the “people of Gaza”, they will be “DEAD” if the hostages aren’t released – something they can’t decide – Trump is expressing clear genocidal intent. He’a also sending the arms to make that genocide possible.
Similarly, Trump now sees Ukraine not as a military battlefield but as an economic one where, through clever deal-making, he can leverage riches for himself and his billionaire pals.
He has put a gun to Zelensky and Europe’s head. Make a deal with Russia to end the war, or you are on your own against a far superior military power. See if the Europeans can help you without a supply of Washington’s weapons.
Not surprisingly, Zelensky, Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron huddled together at the weekend to find a deal that would appease Trump. All Starmer has revealed so far is that the plan will “stop the fighting”.
That is a good thing. But the fighting could have been stopped, and should have been stopped, three years ago.
Money, not peace It is deeply unwise to be lulled into tribalism by all this — the very tribalism Western elites seek to cultivate among their publics to keep us treating international affairs no differently from a high-stakes football match.
No one here has behaved, or is behaving, honourably.
A ceasefire in Ukraine is not about peace. It’s about money, just as the earlier war was. As all wars are, ultimately.
An acceptable ceasefire for Trump, as well as for Putin, will involve a carve-up of Ukraine’s goodies. Rare earth minerals, land, agricultural production will be the real currency driving the agreement.
Zelensky now understands this. He knows that he, and the people of Ukraine, have been scammed. That is what tends to happen when you cosy up to the mafia.
If anyone doubts Washington’s insincerity over Ukraine, look to Palestine for clarity.
In his earlier presidency, Trump tried to bring about what he termed the peace “deal of the century” whose centrepiece was the annexation of much of the Occupied West Bank.
The hope was that the Gulf states would ultimately fund an incentivisation programme — the carrot to Israel’s stick — to encourage Palestinians to make a new life in a giant, purpose-built industrial zone in Sinai, next to Gaza.
That plan is still simmering away in the background. At the weekend, Israel received a green light from Washington to revive its genocidal starvation of Gaza’s population, after Israel refused to negotiate the second phase of the original ceasefire agreement.
The Trump administration and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are now spinning their own bad faith as Hamas “rejectionism”.
They and the echo chamber that is the Western media are blaming the Palestinian group for refusing to be gulled into an “extension” of what was never more than a phoney ceasefire — Israel’s fire never ceased. Israel wants all the hostages back, without having to leave Gaza, so that Hamas has no leverage to stop Israel reviving the full genocide.
The people of Gaza are still being fed into the Washington mafia’s meatgrinder, just as the Ukrainian people have been.
Trump wants them out of the way so he can develop a Mediterranean playground for the rich, paid for with Gulf oil money and the so-far untapped natural gas reserves just off Gaza’s coast.
Unlike his predecessors, Trump doesn’t pretend that Ukraine and Gaza are anything more than geostrategic real estate for Washington.
The big shakedown Zelensky’s shakedown did not come out of the blue. Trump and his officials had been flagging it well in advance.
Two weeks ago, the industrial correspondent for Britain’s Daily Telegraphwrote an article headlined “Here’s why Trump wants to make Ukraine a US economic colony”.
Trump’s team believes that Ukraine may have rare-earth minerals under the ground worth some $15 trillion — a treasure trove that will be critical to the development of the next generation of technology.
In their view, controlling the exploration and extraction of those minerals will be as important as control over the Middle East’s oil reserves was more than a century ago.
And most important of all, the US wants China, its chief economic — if not military — rival excluded from the plunder. China currently has an effective monopoly on many of these critical minerals.
Or as the Telegraph puts it, Ukraine’s “minerals offer a tantalising promise: the ability for the US to break its dependence on Chinese supplies of critical minerals that go into everything from wind turbines to iPhones and stealth fighter jets”.
A draft of the plan seen by the Telegraph would, in its words, “amount to the US economic colonisation of Ukraine, in legal perpetuity”.
Washington wants first refusal on all deposits within the country.
At their Oval Office confrontation, Trump reiterated this goal: “So we’re going to be using that [Ukraine’s rare earth minerals], taking it, using it for all of the things we do, including AI, and including weapons, and the military. And it’s really going to very much satisfy our needs.”
All of this means that Trump has a keen incentive to get the war finished as quickly as possible, and Russia’s territorial advance halted. The more territory Moscow seizes, the less territory is left for the US to plunder.
Self-sabotage The battle against China over rare-earth minerals isn’t a Trump innovation either — and adds an additional layer of context for why Washington and Nato have been so keen over the past two decades to prise Ukraine away from Russia.
Last summer, a Congressional select committee on competition with China announced the formation of a working group to counter Beijing’s “dominance of critical minerals”.
The chairman of the committee, John Moolenaar, noted that the current US dependence on China for these minerals “would quickly become an existential vulnerability in the event of a conflict”.
Another committee member, Rob Wittman, observed: “Dominance over global supply chains for critical mineral and rare earth elements is the next stage of great power competition.”
What Trump appears to appreciate is that Nato’s proxy war against Russia in Ukraine has, by default, driven Moscow deeper into Beijing’s embrace. It has been self-sabotage on a grand scale.
Together, China and Russia are a formidable opponent, and one at the centre of the ever-growing Brics group — comprised of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. They have been seeking to expand their alliance by adding emerging powers to become a counterweight to Washington and Nato’s bullying global agenda.
But a deal with Putin over Ukraine would provide an opportunity for Washington to build a new security architecture in Europe — one more useful to the US — that places Russia inside the tent rather than outside it.
That would leave China isolated — a long-time Pentagon goal.
And it would also leave Europe less central to the projection of US power, which is why European leaders — led by Keir Starmer — have been looking and sounding so unnerved over the past few weeks.
The danger is that Trump’s “peacemaking” in Ukraine simply becomes a prelude to the fomenting of a war against China, using Taiwan as the pretext in the same way Ukraine was used against Russia.
As Moolenaar implied, US control over critical minerals — in Ukraine and elsewhere — would ensure the US was no longer vulnerable in the event of a war with China to losing access to the minerals it would need to continue the war. It would free Washington’s hand.
Trump may be behaving in a vulgar manner. But the gangster empire he now heads is conducting the same global shakedown as ever.
Jonathan Cook is an award-winning British journalist. He was based in Nazareth, Israel, for 20 years and returned to the UK in 2021. He is the author of three books on the Israel-Palestine conflict, including Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s Experiments in Human Despair (2008). In 2011, Cook was awarded the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism for his work on Palestine and Israel. This article was first published in Middle East Eye and is republished with the author’s permission.
Some 50 years ago, on March 1 1975, Australian television stations officially moved to colour.
Networks celebrated the day, known as “C-Day”, with unique slogans such as “come to colour” (ABC TV), “Seven colours your world” (Seven Network), “living colour” (Nine Network) and “first in colour” (0-10 Network, which later became Network Ten). The ABC, Seven and Nine networks also updated their logos to incorporate colour.
For most viewers, however, nothing looked much different. The majority owned a black and white TV, while a coloured broadcast required a colour TV set.
Advertisers were initially reluctant to accept the change, which required them to re-shoot black and white commercials with colour stock at a significantly higher cost.
Many reasoned viewers were still watching the ads in black and white. And initially this assumption was correct. But by nine months later, 17% of Australian homes had a colour receiver. This rose to 31% by July 1976.
By 1978, 64% of Melbourne and 70% of Sydney households owned colour TV sets, making Australia one of the world’s fastest adopters of colour TV.
According to the Federation of Australian Commercial Television Stations (FACTS) annual report for 1975–76, colour TV increased overall viewership by 5%, with people watching for longer periods.
The 1976 Montreal Olympics also led to an increase in TV sales, with the colour broadcast shared between the ABC, Seven and Nine.
Highlights from the Montreal 1976 Olympic Games marathon event.
A late start
With the United States introducing colour TV from 1954, it’s peculiar that Australia took so long to make the transition – especially since conversations about this had been underway since the 1960s.
In 1965, a report outlining the process and economic considerations of transitioning to colour was tabled in parliament.
Feedback from the US highlighted problems around broader acceptance in the marketplace. Colour TV sets were expensive and most programs were still being shot in black and white, despite the availability of colour.
Networks were the most hesitant (even though they’d go on to become one of the most major benefactors). In 1969, it was estimated transitioning to colour would cost the ABC A$46 million (the equivalent of $265,709,944 today) over six years.
The federal government, led by then prime minister Robert Menzies, decided to take a cautious approach to the transition – allowing manufacturers, broadcasters and the public time to prepare.
The first colour “test” broadcast took place on June 15 1967, with live coverage of a Pakenham country horse racing event in Victoria (although few people would have had coloured TV sets at this point).
Other TV shows also tested broadcasting in colour between 1972 and 1974, with limited colour telecasts aired from mid-1974. It wasn’t until March 1975 that colour TV was being transmitted permanently.
‘Aunty Jack Introduces Colour’ was a one-off television special of The Aunty Jack Show, broadcast on the ABC on February 28 1975.
The cinema industry panics
Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War created further urgency to televise in colour. With the war ending in April 1975, Australians watched the last moments in colour.
Other significant events broadcast in colour that year included the December federal election, in which Malcolm Fraser defeated Gough Whitlam after the latter was dramatically dismissed as prime minister on November 11.
With the public’s growing interest in colour TV, local manufacturers began lobbying for higher tariffs on imports to encourage domestic colour TV production.
In the mid 1970s, a new colour set in Australia cost between $1,000 and $1,300, while the average full-time annual income was around $8,000. Still in the throes of a financial recession, customers began seeking out illegally-imported colour TV sets – which were appearing at car boot markets across the country.
British childrens show The Wombles came to Australian screens shortly after colour TV was introduced.
The government also created an advertising campaign warning the public of scammers who would offer to convert black-and-white TVs to colour. These door-to-door “salesmen” claimed to have a special screen which, when placed over a TV, would magically turn it colourful.
By 1972, the estimated cost of upgrading broadcasting technology to colour had reached $116 million. The cinema industry, in a panic, even questioned whether colour TV could damage a viewer’s eyesight.
The industry had previously suffered huge losses in cinema attendance with the introduction of black-and-white TV from 1956. Cinemas had a monopoly on colour and were petrified over what the introduction of colour to television could do to their attendances.
Such fears were founded. In 1974 Australia had 68 million admissions to the cinema. By 1976, there were just 28.9 million admissions. Never again would yearly cinema admissions reach above 40 million.
But despite the complaints – from the cinema industry, advertisers, broadcasters and manufacturers – audiences were ready for colour. And any network that dared to program in black and white would subject itself to a barrage of annoyed viewers.
Colour TV was here to stay.
Stephen Gaunson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The opposition wants to call time on letting public servants work from home. In a speech to the Menzies Research Institute this week, shadow public service minister Jane Hume said, if elected, a Coalition government would require public servants in the office five days a week:
While work from home arrangements can work, in the case of the [Australian Public Service], it has become a right that is creating inefficiency.
Hume said Labor had given public servants a “blank cheque” to work from home, creating an “unsustainable” system that was no longer working.
She stressed that exceptions “can and will be made”, but only “where they work for everyone rather than be enforced on teams by an individual”.
Few workplace issues have drawn such heated debate as whether people should be allowed to work from home. The Coalition’s latest election promise, with parallels to a similar move by Donald Trump in the United States, has brought these questions back into the spotlight.
What impact do work from home arrangements have, not only on performance and productivity but also employee wellbeing? Is it really wise to reverse course?
Our research has examined these questions in detail – and we’ve found a changing picture.
We have examined the impacts of working from home on staff performance and productivity in Australian workplaces as part of the Australian Workplace Index, surveying 2,932 Australian employees across 2022 and 2024.
This is a research collaboration project between Australian National University and University of Newcastle.
An Australian Workplace Index 2022 working paper (which has not been peer-reviewed) actually suggested working from home was linked with a number of negative impacts.
In 2022, we saw that compared to those who didn’t, employees who worked from home three to four days a week experienced lower wellbeing, higher depression and anxiety, and higher loneliness.
They also experienced more administrative hassles, higher pressure to meet targets and increased levels of conflict with supervisors and colleagues.
We found working from home was also associated with a reduction in staff productivity, job-target performance and an increase in staff turnover intentions.
A changing picture
We have recently completed analysis for a similar study based on data from 2024, to be published in an upcoming working paper. And it paints a very different picture.
We found the negative impacts of working from home, originally found in 2022, had reversed in 2024.
In the most recent 2024 Australian Workplace Index employment data, we see no significant difference in productivity between employees who work from home and those in the office.
In fact, the latest data suggest numerous benefits.
For example, staff who worked from home one or more days a week had 9.9% more autonomy in how they carried out their work. Those with higher job autonomy were up to 16.8% more productive in their work when compared to those with low job autonomy.
We found staff who work from home also save on average 100 minutes in commuting time each day.
But on top of this, staff who worked from home one or more days a week were 10.6% less burnt out from work compared to those who never did, and had reported lower intention to quit their jobs.
This positive trend likely reflects investment by employers in improving support for staff who work from home.
In 2024, we found a majority of organisations (69%) now had a work-from-home policy in place.
There was also an increase in the physical, technological and psychological infrastructure support available to staff who work from home. For example:
Physical: 82% of staff have a dedicated workspace, 93% have their own desk, and 93% have air conditioning.
Technological: 85% of staff have access to IT support, 94% have access to collaborative technology and 95% have internet access.
Psychological: 80% of staff have access to psychological support from their supervisor and 72% have access to counselling services.
Importantly, employees still value the opportunity highly. Our 2024 data show 38% of Australian employees chose to work from home for 50% or more of their work hours.
32% of Australian employees would prefer to exclusively work from home, 41% prefer a hybrid option, while 27% prefer to work exclusively from the office.
Christina Boedker has received research grant funding from the University of Newcastle’s RSP Stimulus Funding Scheme and from The Australian National University for this research project.
Kieron Meagher received research grant funding from the University of Newcastle’s RSP Stimulus Funding Scheme and from The Australian National University for this research project.
Aeson Luiz Dela Cruz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
It’s been three years since floods pummelled the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales. Now, Cyclone Alfred is heading for the region, threatening devastation once more.
On Thursday night and Friday morning, the NSW State Emergency Service asked residents in parts of the Northern Rivers to evacuate. Rain associated with Cyclone Alfred was expected to cause rapid river rises and extensive flooding.
As you’d expect, many Northern Rivers residents feel very apprehensive right now. No-one wants to go through this again.
I know of a woman who, just last week, had painters doing final repairs to her home after it flooded in 2022. Other people can’t afford to repair their homes at all.
Damage from the last floods extends beyond the material. Many people in the Northern Rivers are still dealing with mental health problems such as anxiety, depression and PTSD after the last disaster.
Still, people are preparing for Cyclone Alfred’s arrival – and drawing lessons from the 2022 floods in the hope of a better outcome this time.
Memories of Lismore floods
I have 20 years’ experience working on climate change adaptation and disaster risk management. My research focus includes the Northern Rivers, where I live. Last year, a study I led examined community collaboration across the region in response to disasters.
The Northern Rivers is located in the NSW northeast and is drained by three major rivers: the Richmond, Tweed and Clarence. The city of Lismore is one of the most flood-prone urban centres in Australia.
As my colleagues and I have previously written, the 2022 flood in Lismore and surrounds surprised even the most prepared residents.
Floodwaters in Lismore reached more than two metres higher than the previous record. Shocked residents were left clinging to their roofs. Businesses moved their stock to higher ground, but it was still destroyed. Houses above the so-called “flood line” were inundated.
Warning systems proved inadequate, and emergency agencies were overwhelmed. More than 10,800 homes were damaged.
Landslides and boulders fell on homes and roads, leaving people trapped and isolated for up to six weeks. Others could not access cash, petrol, communications, food, schools, carer services and medical assistance for long periods.
The 2022 floods were by no means the first disaster to befall the Northern Rivers. The region also flooded in 2017. In 2019 the region, like much of Australia, was deep in drought. The Black Summer bushfires hit in 2019-20, and Covid-19 struck in 2020. Parts of the region suffered bushfires in 2023.
Now, we are facing Cyclone Alfred.
The scale of the 2022 floods forced many residents to confront a harsh reality: in a disaster, emergency services cannot always help. Sometimes, people must fend for themselves.
That realisation prompted a growing community-led resilience movement. As Cyclone Alfred approaches, that network has swung into action.
Since 2022, community-resilience groups have emerged in each local government area across the region. The groups comprise, and are led by, community volunteers.
We work with local organisations, government agencies and emergency services to help the community before, during and after a disaster. The local council convenes regular meetings between all these organisations.
My research shows strong information flows are crucial in disaster preparedness and recovery.
Since the Cyclone Alfred threat began, my community group has received regular updates from the SES on matters such as locations of sandbags and sand, the latest weather information advice, and when evacuation centres will open.
We also have an established a network of contacts who live on streets vulnerable to flooding. We pass on relevant information to other residents via Facebook and a WhatsApp group. In the past day we have been exchanging information such as whether flood pumps are working and the extent of beach erosion.
The flow of information is two-way. Byron Shire’s community resilience network is chaired by the local council, and has links to emergency management – the “lights and sirens” people. In this way, community knowledge and contributions are recognised and valued by decision-makers and other officials.
In recent days our group has fed advice up the chain to emergency services, such as the location of elderly and vulnerable people who may need help to evacuate.
A man holding a portable emergency satellite provided to a community resilience group in the Northern Rivers. Facebook
Byron Shire Council has also loaned portable Starlink satellite dishes to some community-resilience groups. These devices provide essential and communication if phone and internet services fail in a disaster.
On a broader level, the Bureau of Meteorology is producing regular video updates about Cyclone Alfred in clear, plain language. This is helping to communicate the risks widely and give people the information they need.
Community resilience groups also seek to adopt a proactive, rather than reactive, approach to disasters – such as helping residents prepare for the next flood event.
This can be challenging. Many people and organisations in the region have understandably been focused on recovery after the 2022 floods. It can be hard to do this while also preparing for the next disaster.
And sometimes, people don’t want constant reminders of the potential for flooding. Some people just want to move on and think about something other than disaster.
If Cyclone Alfred brings destruction to the Northern Rivers, community resilience groups will play a big role in supporting health and wellbeing. Not everyone accesses formal mental health support after disasters. Communities and neighbours looking out for each other is crucial.
Tough times ahead
As I write, the Northern Rivers is starting to lose power and internet access. Winds are wild and rain lashed the region all night.
As climate change worsens, all communities must consider how they will cope with more intense disasters. The model of community-led resilience in the Northern Rivers shows a way forward.
There is still much work to do in the region. However, our experience of compounding disasters means we are well along the path to finding new ways to support each other through extreme events.
Rebecca McNaught is a Research Fellow at the University Centre for Rural Health (University of Sydney) in Lismore. She has received scholarship funding from the Australian Government’s Research Training Program Stipend. She is affiliated with the South Golden Beach, New Brighton and Ocean Shores Community Resilience Team. She has also conducted paid and voluntary work for the Northern Rivers not-for-profit registered charity Plan C.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne
The Western Australian state election will be held on Saturday, with polls closing at 9pm AEDT. A Newspoll, conducted February 27 to March 5 from a sample of 1,061, gave Labor a 57.5–42.5 lead, a 1.5-point gain for Labor since an early February WA Newspoll.
Primary votes were 44% Labor (up two), 29% Liberals (down three), 5% Nationals (up two), 10% Greens (down two), 3% One Nation (down one) and 9% for all Others (up two).
Labor Premier Roger Cook’s net approval was down one point to +17, with 55% satisfied and 38% dissatisfied. Liberal leader Libby Mettam’s net approval was up three to +1. Cook led as better premier by 53–34 (54–34 previously).
The Poll Bludger reported Friday that a DemosAU poll for The West Australian, conducted March 4–5 from a sample of 1,126, gave Labor a 57–43 lead. Primary votes were 43% Labor, 30% Liberals, 5% Nationals, 11% Greens and 11% for all Others. Cook led as preferred premier over Mettam by 47–32. By 49–31, voters thought WA was headed in the right direction.
At the March 2021 WA election, Labor won 53 of the 59 lower house seats on a two-party vote of 69.7–30.3, a record high for either major party at any state or federal election. Labor won 59.9% of the primary vote.
Labor was never going to match the 2021 result at this election, but if the results on Saturday reflect the Newspoll and DemosAU polls, they will exceed their 2017 result, when Labor won 41 of the 59 seats on a two-party vote of 55.5–44.5.
Upper house reforms
Prior to this election, WA had six upper house regions that each returned six members. From the ABC’s 2021 WA election pages, there were three Perth regions and three non-metro regions. Perth had 75% of WA’s enrolled voters, but only 50% of upper house seats.
Furthermore, the Mining & Pastoral region and Agricultural region had far fewer enrolled voters than the South West region. Combined, these two regions had just 10.1% of WA’s enrolled voters, but 33.3% of upper house seats.
Labor’s huge 2021 win gave them a majority in the upper house for the first time in WA history, with 22 of the 36 seats. Labor used this opportunity to convert the upper house into a single statewide electorate that will return 37 members by proportional representation with optional voter-directed preferences.
Under these reforms, a quota for election will be 1/38 of the vote or 2.63%. Parties that win about half the quota have a reasonable chance of winning a seat, so 1.3% could be enough to win. Labor also abolished group ticket voting (GTV), leaving Victoria as the only Australian jurisdiction that still uses this discredited system.
ABC election analyst Antony Green said there will be 13 groups on the upper house ballot paper and a total of 146 candidates. To get a group box above the line, at least five candidates for that group were required. The number of candidates has been more than halved from 2021, when there were 325 upper house candidates. Group ticket voting encouraged a proliferation of micro parties and candidates.
In the lower house, there will be a total of 398 candidates for the 59 seats, down from 463 in 2021. Labor, the Liberals and Greens will contest all seats, the Nationals will contest 20, the Australian Christians 54 and One Nation 41.
Labor has huge lead in a SA state poll
The next South Australian state election will be held in March 2026. A DemosAU poll, conducted February 18–23 from a sample of 1,004, gave Labor a 59–41 lead (54.6–45.4 to Labor at the March 2022 election). Primary votes were 43% Labor, 30% Liberals, 10% Greens and 17% for all Others.
Labor incumbent Peter Malinauskas led the Liberals’ Vincent Tarzia as preferred premier by 51–23. By 53–33, voters thought SA was headed in the right direction.
The Poll Bludger reported Monday electoral reforms have passed parliament that will allow postal and pre-poll votes to be counted on election night. At previous SA elections, only votes cast at ordinary election day booths were counted on election night, with other types of votes taking at least a few days to count.
In the federal part of this poll, Labor led by 53–47 in SA (54.0–46.0 to Labor in SA at the 2022 federal election). Primary votes were 35% Coalition, 34% Labor, 11% Greens, 6% One Nation and 14% for all Others. Anthony Albanese led Peter Dutton as preferred prime minister by 39–33, and by 46–39 voters did not think Australia was headed in the right direction.
Adrian Beaumont does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
