SUNAK RATHER THAN LATER
The UK will head to a general election on July 4, The Guardian reports, after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak called a surprise vote despite trailing Keir Starmer’s Labour Party by 20 points in the polls. Sunak says he is confident, but senior Tories are reportedly alarmed at the prospect of an “electoral wipeout”, with some MPs considering a vote of no confidence. It’s been 14 years of conservative government for Britain. The result? “The sewage in our rivers, people waiting on trollies in A&E, crime virtually unpunished, mortgages [and] food prices through the roof” — all a “direct result of the Tory chaos in Westminster”, according to Starmer.
Back home now and Peter Dutton is preparing to name the proposed sites of “six or seven” nuclear power stations within weeks, according to the Nine papers. The possible sites include the Latrobe Valley and Anglesea in Victoria, the Hunter Valley in NSW, Collie in Western Australia, Port Augusta in South Australia, and Maranoa in south-west Queensland. Speaking to Sky News, Labor Minister Anthony Chisholm said “No-one wants one in their backyard, and the fact that the Coalition has taken so long to actually announce any detail shows you how challenging this can be.” Dutton dismissed a CSIRO report detailing the extensive costs and time constraints of his nuclear rollout, saying it didn’t consider the cost of switching to renewables.
END OF THE OCCUPATION
Students at Melbourne University’s pro-Palestine protest have agreed to end their occupation of the uni’s Arts West building in exchange for a guarantee that the university will disclose all its ties with weapons manufacturers, The Australian reports. The protest’s student organisers are calling it a “major win”, according to the ABC. Students have been demanding that the university cut all affiliation with Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and BAE systems — which they say allow the university to profit from genocide. Despite uni administration earlier threatening to clear out the protest, The Age reports Victoria Police received no formal complaint of trespass.
Meanwhile, The Daily Telegraph is reporting that a NSW Health executive sent a staff-wide email calling a man who killed himself and his two-year-old son a “wonderful colleague and beloved friend”, and a “proud dad”. NSW Health Minister Ryan Park said the email was “completely unacceptable” and caused “significant distress to staff”, while family violence campaigner Rosie Batty said it’s “critically important for people in leadership roles to acknowledge that this was a deliberate act of murder … with the intent to hurt his ex-partner in ways that are unfathomable”. It comes as The Canberra Times reports that social workers on the frontline of the family violence crisis could leave the industry in droves, with two-thirds allegedly being paid less than their qualifications and experience entitles them under the award.
For anyone seeking help, LifeLine is on 13 11 14 and Beyond Blue is on 1300 22 4636.
SAY WHAT?
Peter Dutton lowered the bar and Angus Taylor has tripped over it.
Jim Chalmers
The treasurer called Angus Taylor’s post-budget address the “most shambolic appearance by a senior politician at the National Press Club in memory” after he appeared to directly contradict Peter Dutton’s plans for migration.
CRIKEY RECAP
“But while the CSIRO report is bad news for Dutton, note what it says about carbon capture and storage, to which the Albanese government has committed as part of its surrender to the fossil fuel industry. Carbon capture and storage for gas — what the Albanese government is now spending a billion dollars on to encourage — is right now more expensive than large-scale nuclear power. And at least nuclear power works, unlike carbon capture. In 2023 terms, Peter Dutton’s proposal is cheaper for consumers than Labor’s carbon capture obsession and would actually function.
In 2030, the CSIRO estimates, carbon capture with gas will be cheaper than large-scale nuclear, but will still be more expensive for consumers than both solar thermal and solar and wind with firming. That is, the Albanese government, with its surrender to its fossil fuel donors and climate denialist unions, wants to impose a significantly more expensive energy source on Australians than the one that is available now — and it doesn’t even work. Carbon capture is a fantasy — and you’re paying for it.”
“Missing from much of the media coverage has been any substantive engagement with the demands of the university protesters, or even much in the way of attempting to explain why they are protesting. Many casual news media consumers might be surprised to learn the various Australian student protest camps have relatively specific and articulated demands around the divestment or boycott of university activities associated with military industries and the Israeli Defence Force.
This illustrates a central conundrum for protesters, where their key demands are not covered by media outlets until events escalate, with those demands then overshadowed by media preoccupation with objectionable protest behaviour or the remarks of fringe individuals.”
“Before taking this step, [Karim] Khan had enlisted a group of six eminent international lawyers, led by Lord Justice Fulford (a former UK appeal judge and ICC judge) and including Amal Clooney and Baroness Helena Kennedy, director of the International Bar Association Human Rights Institute. Their task was to advise Khan whether there was sufficient evidence to lay charges, which they unanimously concluded there was. Their published statement is worth reading: ‘Why we support ICC prosecutions for crimes in Israel and Gaza’.
As both the experts and Khan have emphasised, this is just step one: the laying of allegations. Nothing has been proven. The outraged reactions from literally everyone who usually trumpets their devotion to the rule of law — Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal editorialised that the ICC has ‘disgraced itself over Israel’, republished in The Australian, while Peter Dutton is frantically demanding Australia condemns the ICC — are bordering on the unhinged, given the ICC is an actual court whose jurisdiction is guaranteed by a treaty to which 124 countries have signed up (including Australia).”
READ ALL ABOUT IT
America’s monster: How the US backed kidnapping, torture and murder in Afghanistan (The New York Times) ($)
Chinese blogger who filmed Wuhan lockdown is free (BBC)
Spain, Ireland and Norway announce they will recognise the state of Palestine (euronews)
As Brazil copes with floods, officials face another scourge: Disinformation (Al Jazeera)
NZ looks set for another winter COVID-19 wave: How big will it be? (The New Zealand Herald)
THE COMMENTARIAT
An open letter to Gina Rinehart, from Queen Victoria (who loved her beer) — Julia Baird (The Sydney Morning Herald): “Oh, I was slender at times, especially after I stopped being eternally, infernally pregnant, but plumpness runs back centuries in my family tree. I am under five feet tall. I long stopped worrying about what I privately called ‘my ugly old face’.
I mean, have a look at some of the hundreds of my statues, dotted about the place. They didn’t capture me looking happy and winsome, did they? Nor do they hearken back to the days I was fit and limber, horse-riding all day then dancing all night. No, I stand stern and stout, on plinths all around the world, on dusty mounds, street corners, overlooking palaces and parks, like I’m perennially displeased with what I see. Which, in truth, I often am. But then, isn’t the point of being a lady of (considerable) influence and privilege that: we don’t have to care? I refused to wear corsets, horrible things. My doctor was shocked at my unseemliness, but how they scratched and dug into me. I’m a monarch, not a model.”
Dutton’s migration policy announcement was far from smooth. With nuclear, the detail will be even more important — David Speers (ABC): “The Coalition won’t only have to convince voters on cost. It will need to explain where the nuclear plants would go, how it would convince the Senate to lift the moratorium on nuclear power, how it would convince reluctant state governments, and what would fill the gap over the next decade or two as coal-fired plants shut down.
The nuclear policy will require serious answers that go into these details. It will need endorsement from credible experts and a coherent explanation from shadow ministers who are all on the same page. If the migration policy announcement is any guide, the opposition will need to lift its game.”
