What we learned, Friday 13 March
Thanks for joining us today. Here’s a reminder of today’s top stories.
The energy minister, Chris Bowen, announced Australia will begin releasing its stockpile of fuel after the government directed fuel companies to release nearly a fifth of reserve petrol and diesel supplies amid the Middle East conflict;
NSW will get a smaller share of the GST pool next financial year, while the cost to federal taxpayers of filling up Western Australia’s coffers rose again;
The federal resources minister, Madeleine King, says the longer the war in Iran lasts, the worse the effect on “the whole global economy”;
Major flood warnings remain in place across northern Australia, with further rain forecast for an already saturated Top End;
The NSW government has extended a no-interest loan scheme for a further five years amid renewed cost-of-living concerns, including a burgeoning energy crisis caused by conflict in the Middle East;
Byron Bay Bluesfest has been cancelled, just weeks before it was set to begin;
Qantas will pay $105m to settle a class action lawsuit over its Covid credit scheme, ending a long-running dispute with some of its affected customers;
The NSW government has announced that a section of the Great Western Highway in the Blue Mountains will remain closed for at least three months after the failure of a historic bridge this month;
Victoria police have abandoned charges against three people as part of the Dezi Freeman investigation.
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Mardi Gras board stands down two directors amid escalating dispute
The internal rift at the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras deepened on Thursday night, with the board voting to stand down two directors amid an escalating dispute over trans rights advocacy and corporate sponsorship.
Board members Damien Nguyen and Luna Choo, who are also members of Pride in Protest, a left-wing trans advocacy group, have been stood down for 28 days, effective until 9 April.
The board invoked a constitutional clause to enact the “interim governance measure,” claiming the suspension was necessary to ensure the “effective functioning of the board” and to create space for mediation.
Pride in Protest’s spokesperson, Rohen Snowball, claimed the board’s move was an “emergency tactic to shut down dissent”.
Choo, the board’s only trans member, told a press conference on Friday she had been “locked out of my emails, misgendered and humiliated in front of board directors, roundly condemned and now excluded from the board room” for communicating to members on the issue of trans rights:
“At the Mardi Gras AGM last December, members passed motions to embrace trans rights, anti discrimination, reform and public funding.
In January, the board publicly announced that they are rejecting their AGM commitments to the queer and trans communities. It has been three months of no action on the three resolutions.
Nguyen also spoke at a press conference on Friday. He said members had elected him and Choo to the Mardi Gras board on a ticket of transgender rights, ending police violence and cutting ties with genocide complicity, but the board’s leadership had failed to act on members’ wishes, which were made clear at the recent AGM.
These included cutting ties with corporations associated with supporting Israel in the Gaza conflict and moving towards public and community funding instead of corporate funding.
Live Nation recently became a major partner of the Sydney Mardi Gras by securing the production and promotion rights for the festival’s official after-party, a deal that sparked intense backlash from activists, including Pride in Protest, which argued that the corporation’s global business ties conflicted with the event’s social justice values.
That partnership faced a major setback in February when the after-party was cancelled due to low ticket sales, a failure critics attributed to a community-led boycott against Live Nation’s involvement.
The Mardi Gras board said it hoped the ensuing mediation process with Choo and Nguyen would “not only … address the current concerns but also to support reconciliation and restore a positive and collaborative working environment within the board”.
Read more on the rift in Josh Taylor’s story from last month:
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