Good morning! As the Pacific Islands forum kicks off in Suva, Anthony Albanese is promoting Australia’s commitment to the clean energy revolution closer to home. And with flu and Covid infections rising, masks may make a return to the winter wardrobe.
The PM’s initial honeymoon with voters has moderated, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll, which found approval had dropped three points to 56% since June, and disapproval had jumped six points to 24% in a month. Albanese will today declare Australia has rejoined the ranks of “trusted global partner” on climate action at the Sydney Energy Forum. He will open the forum saying the Indo-Pacific faces “enormous” challenges but also opportunities, and commit his government to find common ground in the region to address the climate crisis and the economic opportunities of clean energy.
Mark MacGann, a career lobbyist who led Uber’s efforts to win over governments, has come forward as the whistleblower who leaked more than 124,000 company files to the Guardian. MacGann decided to speak out because he believes Uber knowingly flouted laws in dozens of countries and misled people about the benefits to drivers of the company’s gig-economy model. The leak has led to calls for a parliamentary inquiry into Emmanuel Macron’s links to lobbying and a please explain from the former European Commission vice-president Neelie Kroes after revelations that she secretly helped Uber lobby a string of politicians.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has asked military chiefs to draw up plans to gather a “million-strong” fighting force equipped with western weapons to recapture Ukraine’s southern territory from Russia. At least 24 people have died and dozens more were injured in the country’s east after a Russian missile attack hit a five-storey apartment building in Chasiv Yar. Zelenskiy has accused Moscow of targeting civilians and promised: “Punishment is inevitable for every Russian murderer.”
Mobile phone companies could face up to $250,000 in fines for failing to comply with a new code to block SMS scam messages. The regulations will require the companies to trace, identify and block SMS scam messages, and publish information for customers on how to identify and report scams. SMS scams accounted for 32% of all reported scams this year to date, accounting for $6.5m in losses, compared with $2.3m in the same period last year.
Australia
A cold and wet winter has led to a spike in cases of the flu and Covid, and 60% of Guardian Essential poll respondents believe mask wearing should return. They’re not the only ones who think so. Doctors have urged political leaders not to rule out reinstating mask mandates and social distancing to combat rising hospitalisations from the winter Omicron wave. The president of the Australian Medical Association, Dr Omar Khorshid, raised concern that governments were relying too heavily on antivirals and vaccines.
The Racism: It Stops with Me campaign was partly paid for by a disaffected former Collingwood football club sponsor. The insurance company CGU withdrew its sponsorship of Collingwood and redirected the funding to the Australian Human Rights Commission’s campaign after a report commissioned by the club found a culture of “structural racism”.
The mining giant Anglo American was allowed to more than double what it can emit without penalty from one of its Queensland mines under the former Coalition government’s safeguard mechanism. The case has prompted conservationists to call on the Albanese government to work quickly to overhaul the mechanism to try to address emissions from the mining sector.
The world
Britons will have a new PM by 5 September, with the leadership rules announced and nominations opening and closing today. Tory leadership candidates will need support from 20 fellow MPs to be included in the first round of voting. The first ballot is tomorrow, with candidates needing 30 votes from Tory MPs, and the second ballot is on Thursday.
Sri Lanka’s President Gotabaya Rajapaksa will resign, paving the way for the appointment of a successor amid reports that the beleaguered leader has fled the country.
Joe Biden has been heckled by the father of a mass shooting victim during a White House event celebrating the passage of a federal gun safety law. Manuel Oliver, whose 17-year-old son, Joaquin, was killed at a high school in Florida in 2018, objected to the event being billed as a celebration.
The mother of the man accused of assassinating Shinzo Abe is a member of the Moonies Unification church, which the suspect has cited as a motive for his fatal shooting of the former Japanese prime minister last week.
Recommended reads
A row has broken out in the world of high fashion after the French house Dior demanded compensation from its Italian rival Valentino for allegedly blocking access to a Dior boutique during a show on the Spanish Steps in Rome, according to a claim by fashion website Women’s Wear Daily.
“I wrote Naive when I was 15 or 16 – before we had the band – but I didn’t like it,” says the Kooks’s Luke Pritchard. Guitarist and songwriter Hugh Harris adds: “There are versions of Naive in the vaults of Virgin Records that would make us die of embarrassment if we heard them now. We just couldn’t get the guitars to syncopate with the dancier rhythm. We tried it as ska. We even tried it as reggae.”
Whenever Lucianne Tonti collect freshly pressed clothes from the dry cleaners, she finds a renewed sense of enjoyment in each garment. Given the immense amount of resources it takes to produce clothes, anything that joyfully extends the life of them is absolutely worth doing. But traditional methods of dry cleaning can be bad for the environment – or for you. Here, experts explain what to look for in a dry cleaner.
Listen
What do the Uber files tell us about the company’s expansion tactics? This week, a major Guardian investigation reveals what was going on inside Uber during its critical growth years. The Guardian’s head of investigations, Paul Lewis, explains in the first of three episodes how Uber broke laws, duped police, exploited violence against drivers and secretly lobbied prime ministers and presidents.
Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.
Sport
Novak Djokovic fell to seventh in the ATP rankings yesterday – his lowest position in four years – despite winning a fourth consecutive men’s Wimbledon title less than 24 hours earlier.
Queensland’s star five-eighth Cameron Munster and winger Murray Taulagi will miss the State of Origin decider after testing positive for Covid-19.
Media roundup
Queensland has recorded its first monkeypox case but health authorities have said the public health risk is “very low”, reports the Brisbane Times. The “political tug-a-war” over the Warragamba Dam continues, says the Daily Telegraph. And the Herald Sun reports on woes for Australian travellers as the major airlines remain on track to record one of their worst on-time performances on record.
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