Good morning. The Queen will miss a special jubilee event as Anthony Albanese declares Australia’s relationship with Britain is now one of “equals”. Australia’s east coast gas shortage forces South Australia to turn to diesel generators. And some simple hacks to keep your power bill down.
Almost half the planet’s land surface needs extra conservation protection if the biodiversity crisis is to be halted, a major new study has found. At least 64.7m sq km needs “conservation attention” but overlaps with areas where 1.8 billion people live – about a quarter of the world’s population – raising critical human rights challenges for conservationists, communities and governments. Much of the land area is already covered by some level of protection – such as a national park – or is ecologically intact, but the research finds 12.4 million sq km needs to be added as protected areas.
The Queen will miss the national service of thanksgiving at St Paul’s Cathedral in London on Friday after experiencing “some discomfort” during Thursday’s platinum jubilee celebrations, Buckingham Palace has said. She is believed to have experienced episodic mobility issues during the day. “Taking into account the journey and activity required to participate in tomorrow’s national service of thanksgiving at St Paul’s Cathedral, Her Majesty with great reluctance has concluded that she will not attend,” the palace said in a statement. Australia’s prime minister, Anthony Albanese, used the occasion of the Queen’s platinum jubilee to declare Australia’s relationship with Britain is now one of “equals” rather than “parent and upstart”. Albanese also used the event to commit himself to advancing reconciliation with First Nations peoples.
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has described Australia’s energy markets as a “perfect storm” that is threatening to hit consumers, business and the wider economy hard. “We’ve got spiking gas prices, spiking electricity prices, and spiking prices for petrol,” he said on Thursday. “There’s no use beating around the bush: these challenges in the energy market are part of this cost of living crisis that we’ve inherited.” So how bad is this crisis, and what can the Albanese government or others do about it?
Australia
A Queensland shopper this week spotted iceberg lettuce selling at a supermarket for $11.99. The photo quickly went viral as evidence of the cost-of-living pressures Australians are facing. So what has caused the price of the humble vegetable and other fresh produce to rise so sharply, and how long will the high prices last?
Key crossbenchers are urging the attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, to immediately intervene to end the previous government’s pursuit of Bernard Collaery by withdrawing commonwealth consent to the prosecution.
Australia’s east coast gas shortage has forced South Australia to turn to diesel generators in order to meet demand, prompting calls for a faster transition away from “volatile” fossil fuels towards renewable energy and storage.
A scathing auditor general’s report has blasted Canberra’s National Capital Authority for “poor transparency and record keeping” and being unable to demonstrate value for money, with calls for new guidelines around open tenders and competitive procurement.
Local issues and candidates with strong connections to their communities shaped the unusual election results across western Sydney experts say, with major parties increasing their vote in some areas but being ejected from safe seats in others.
The future of the new Dungowan Dam near Tamworth in New South Wales is now uncertain after Infrastructure NSW called on the state government to “reconsider the timing and need for” the project.
The world
Archaeologists working near Cairo have uncovered hundreds of ancient Egyptian coffins and bronze statues of deities. The discovery at a cemetery in Saqqara contained statues of the gods Anubis, Amun, Min, Osiris, Isis, Nefertum, Bastet and Hathor along with a headless statue of the architect Imhotep, who built the Saqqara pyramid, according to Egypt’s ministry of tourism and antiquities.
A teenage boy was arrested in Berkeley, California, on Monday after police received a tip he was “recruiting other high school students to participate in a mass shooting and/or bombing” at a local high school.
Amnesty International has accused El Salvador’s government of committing “massive human rights violations” during an extraordinary security crackdown that has seen more than 36,000 people arrested in just over two months.
The US decision to supply Ukraine with high-precision multiple launch rocket systems was marked with some fanfare in Washington. However, the small print of the deal was underwhelming.
Recommended reads
Germany has been forced to admit it was a terrible mistake to become so dependent on Russian oil and gas. So why did it happen?
“After a mass trauma comes the mass forgetting. No one really wants to talk about Covid any more, even though it tore through every dimension of our lives,” writes Brigid Delaney. “But now it’s as if the disruption was so great, weird, terrible and abrupt, that we cannot incorporate it into our present and future narratives. And so we have done a remarkable and largely collective job of acting like the pandemic is over, and – even more – of trying to forget that it even happened. But why did Covid disappear from our collective consciousness so quickly?”
In Hayley Scrivenor’s debut novel Dirt Town, the barren landscape of regional Australia becomes the battleground upon which narratives of motherhood, friendship and trauma play out. Set in a remote town where a schoolgirl disappears, this debut arrives with high praise from other crime novelists – and it’s truly excellent.
Worried about rising energy prices? From home insulation solutions to avoiding the dryer, here are some simple hacks for your home that can help keep your power bill down.
Listen
After another mass shooting in the US, a debate about gun control has once again kicked off. Every time these tragedies occur, Australia’s gun laws are held up as a universal example of firearm legislation that actually works. But the truth is, not all aspects of the landmark national firearm agreement have been fully implemented. In this episode of Full Story, Gabrielle Jackson talks to Lenore Taylor and Mike Ticher about the need to stay vigilant on gun laws in Australia, and whether or not we are as immune to the influence of the gun lobby as most of us believe.
Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.
Sport
Winter is here. The Demons have finally been knocked off, the bottom few sides are abnormally bad, Buddy has kicked over a thousand goals, and Kane Cornes has found 100,000 things to object to. Starting with the top eight, here’s how your team is tracking midway through the 2022 season.
Guardian Australia’s photographer-at-large Mike Bowers takes to the slopes as an icy polar blast brings an early snow season to Mount Kosciuszko.
Media roundup
Major manufacturers warn thousands of local jobs are at risk unless gas is held back from being exported as the Albanese government calls emergency meetings with Queensland’s gas producers and state ministers to address spiking energy prices, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. A representative of the Aboriginal tent embassy, Gwenda Stanley, has criticised the Uluru Statement from the Heart on the ABC’s Q+A. While the Australian reports that NDIS minister Bill Shorten has flagged a crackdown on policing the scheme amid concerns organised criminals were falsely claiming they were providing services to people with disabilities.
Coming up
The Labor government will hand down its submission to the Fair Work Commission on the minimum wage.
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