Who’ll watch out for kids in Qld watch houses?

YOUTH INJUSTICE

Captive male pigs now have more welfare protection than Queensland kids behind bars, Queensland Human Rights Commission boss Scott McDougall says, adding Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has refused to meet with him for nearly five years. It comes after state Labor rammed through laws that mean kids can be held in adult police watch houses indefinitely, The Courier-Mail ($) explains, and a watch house or adult prison can also be declared a youth detention centre. McDougall says youth justice laws are “the most serious human rights issue in Queensland”. First Nations children make up 62% of Queensland’s youth detention population, Guardian Australia reminds us, and account for 84% of youth detainees put in solitary confinement. Wait ’til the makers of documentary 13th hear about this.

Meanwhile the Catholic Church has been successful in permanently blocking abuse claims by two Indigenous men, Guardian Australia reports, because the alleged paedophile priests have died. The church has known about convicted child abuser David Joseph Perrett’s crimes since 1995, but said his death meant it couldn’t gather the material to prepare a defence, even though he admitted he was an abuser in 2016. Finally, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton says the Yes camp gets an unfair advantage on the ballot of the Voice to Parliament referendum because a tick will be counted as a Yes, but a cross will not be counted as a No, as The Australian ($) reports. We’re actually supposed to write the words Yes or No — but Dutton reckons only the tick counting is in violation of federal Parliament’s referendum machinery legislation which says the AEC must count a ballot paper if the voter’s meaning is clear. Under AEC guidelines, a vote is informal if a cross is used on a referendum ballot paper which has only one question “since a cross on its own may mean either yes or no”.

DIRTY BUSINESS

Australians pay $65 billion a year, about 2.5% of GDP, to subsidise fossil-fuel polluters. So says an International Monetary Fund report, which also finds Australia’s coal subsidies are worth 1.2% of GDP — way more generous than Germany, the US, Canada and the UK, The Age ($) notes. Why? About $55.6 billion of it is us paying for our own premature deaths and crap health caused by air pollution — about 11,000 people die a year (!) from traffic-related air pollution in Australia. (The remaining $10 billion is for things like household electricity bill relief or tax breaks for big coal and gas.) But the safeguard mechanism, our crown jewel pollution levy, one can almost hear Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen piping up. The IMF was like, no chance. Prices don’t cover the cost of environmental damages, the report found — they don’t even cover supply costs sometimes.

Meanwhile Alinta reportedly wants to buy NSW’s largest coal-fired power station, due to close in 2025, to “capitalise on concern about the state’s energy needs”, The Australian ($) reports. Origin’s $600 million large-scale battery at Eraring would be “thrown into doubt” by a sale to Alinta, the paper says. Alinta was tight-lipped when asked for confirmation. To finish on something positive, Australia’s EV selection is set to get bigger and cheaper — we’re finally getting a fuel efficiency standard for cars, Guardian Australia reports, due before the end of the year. The standard forces car makers to keep below an emissions cap, which forces them to make more EVs (and hybrids). We’ve been a global laggard — only Russia joins us as nations in the OECD without the standard — and it’s made Australia a dumping ground for the world’s petrol-guzzling cars. Not any more, Bowen says — the public “overwhelmingly supports” the introduction of a standard following a consultation period.

WAR AND NO PEACE

Disgraced soldier Ben Roberts-Smith’s appeal in February will have strict and extraordinary security measures, the SMH ($) reports. Each judge will get a safe for national security information, and a separate computer to write parts of the judgment based on closed-court submissions. Roberts-Smith kicked perhaps one of the greatest own goals in Australian history after a defamation case he brought against Nine newspapers found the Victoria Cross recipient was, to a civil standard anyway, a war criminal who was involved in the murder of four unarmed men in Afghanistan. Now the papers are asking his lawyers to cough up a bond of sorts to pay for their legal costs if he loses the appeal too.

Speaking of probable war criminals… Russian President Vladimir Putin has described Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin as “a talented person, a talented businessman” who worked for Russia “with results”, after the guy was killed probably on Putin’s orders. That’s according to UK defence sources, who told the BBC that Russia’s FSB domestic intelligence agency (the new KGB) was the most likely culprit, while US officials say his plane was likely to have been loaded with a bomb, as The WSJ ($) reports, not shot down as initially speculated. From big to petty conflict, and woke culture is stopping men from peeing in front of each other, according to critics of WA’s home of cricket. Plans for the $154.7 million WACA Ground renovation reveal there are no urinals, and incensed WA Cricket Association board member Paul Collins told The West ($) he was told it was “required to address ‘inclusivity’ “.

ON A LIGHTER NOTE

It’s the year 565, and Irish monk Saint Columba was getting a little R&R from his pious life of observance in the land of the Picts when he came upon what can only be described as a bit of a bummer. Some locals were burying their friend by the river. They claimed he had been dragged to the murky depths by a hideous monster. Columba — perhaps not the bravest of men — told a little brown-nosing follower by the name of Luigne moccu Min to get in the water to find out more. The monster approached him, but he made the mighty sign of the cross! and the monster backed off. So goes the lore of the first interaction with Nessie, the Loch Ness monster who clearly has the secrets to anti-ageing as her spottings would continue well into the modern day.

This weekend, however, we’re getting to the bottom of the age-old legend. Drones will produce thermal images of the lake to “search the waters in a way that has never been done before” as enthusiasts flock to the Scottish Highlands to look for the mythical beast. It’s the largest search in half a century, the Loch Ness Centre reckons, but not everyone has a drone. Some people are going to just keep “an eye out for breaks in the water and any inexplicable movements”, the centre added seriously. Sounds precise. There’ll also be hydrophones detecting sound but who’s to say whether it will prove anything. Some have speculated that the monster is simply a a plesiosaur, a prehistoric marine reptile, giant eels (how giant?!) or even swimming circus elephants, the ABC says. Eyebrows were raised in 2016 when a sonar image captured a Loch Ness monster-shaped thing resting on the bottom of the loch. It turned out to be a prop for the 1969 Sherlock Holmes movie.

Hoping your imagination runs wild today, and you have a restful weekend.

Folks, I don’t play favourites but my favourite colleague Anton Nilsson will be bringing you your Worm for the next fortnight while I soak up the last days of summer here in Vancouver before the big chill arrives. Drop me a line if you feel chatty — eelsworthy@crikey.com.au. Be well. 

SAY WHAT?

We didn’t get it right, and we needed to fix it. And the important thing is, we did fix it. Because since March 2020, we’ve had $3 billion of refunds being given. We’ve only got $370 million of credits left.

Alan Joyce

Tell that to the class action lodged in the Federal Court which alleges Qantas took advantage of customers for years during the pandemic, treating them “as providers of over $1 billion in interest-free loans” as they tried to get their money back for cancelled flights.

CRIKEY RECAP

If you ‘don’t know’ about the Voice, how about you actually listen?

CELESTE LIDDLE

“We have potentially less than two months to the referendum, and the misinformation campaigns are yet to reach a crescendo. If people were actually interested in knowing what the referendum is about, the information is readily available. The question is a basic Yes/No answer, and the constitutional reforms that will happen if it does get voted up are easy to google.

“Yet time and time again, I hear claims from the regressive No camp that there is not enough information, that changing the constitution will divide the nation by race and give Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people special rights, that it is a Trojan horse for all of our other agendas such as land rights and treaties. Rubbish.”

READ ALL ABOUT IT

FIFA opens case against Spanish football official Luis Rubiales [over World Cup kiss] (Al Jazeera)

Early intelligence suggests Prigozhin was assassinated, US officials say (The Wall Street Journal) ($)

Russia’s Vladimir Putin sends condolences to family of Wagner boss Prigozhin (Reuters)

Emperor penguins: thousands of chicks in Antarctica likely died due to record-low sea ice levels (Guardian Australia)

Takeaways from the first Republican presidential primary debate (CNN)

Fukushima: China retaliates as Japan releases treated nuclear water (BBC)

THE COMMENTARIAT

Ignore nuclear hype, renewables are our future — Chris Bowen (The Australian) ($): “The joyfully pessimistic tones that fill this opinion page are often accompanied by an attack on Gencost, the independent analysis of the costs of Australia’s potential energy sources. The shadow minister for energy has even referred to it as ‘Labor’s Gencost’. A regrettable and unbecoming slur against the independence of AEMO and the CSIRO. But the criticism is misplaced. As AEMO has said in response: ‘Recent media commentary that AEMO’s Integrated System Plan does not include transmission and storage, as well as generation costs associated with providing electricity to Australian customers, is wrong.’

“Small modular reactors are small in one sense only: output. Even supporters of SMRs concede they can produce just 300 megawatts each. They are conservatively priced at at least $5 billion each. That is a lot of dollars for not many megawatts. To listen to the hype, you’d think there are SMRs all around the world and Australia is missing out. In fact there are only two demonstration SMRs in the world: one on a barge in Russia and one in China. There’s not a commercial SMR in operation anywhere in the world. And we are meant to think this is a viable solution for our energy needs in 2030? Peter Dutton can bet his energy plan on this unicorn if he wishes. We won’t be distracted by such nonsense.”

The Liberal Party’s presidential race opens up old wounds and bitter rivalries — Annika Smethurst (The Age) ($): “This assumption caused amusement in other Liberal circles given most MPs elected in the past decade have had little to do with him. Many of those who do remember him were quick to remind me of his history of perceived disloyalty to the party’s leaders, particularly Ted Baillieu. One of those MPs who sat alongside [Philip] Davis in the upper house is the senior frontbencher and strong Baillieu ally, David Davis (no relation). Back in 2006, Phil D infamously described David D as unreliable in a blistering attack against his factional rival, and said he would be unable to work with DD (as he is sometime referred) despite his colleagues voting to elevate him to the leadership team.

“Baillieu, a leading moderate figure in the party, is also understood to be less than thrilled about his candidacy … While his nomination has angered moderates, a brouhaha between Davis and another Liberal member from Gippsland is also fuelling a group within the conservative faction, unhappy with his decision to run. Despite all of this, Davis goes into the contest the clear favourite. His time away from politics appears to have cooled tensions and his ability to alienate figures from both factions has some Liberals hoping he can smooth tensions. Baillieu’s close ally, Opposition Leader John Pesutto, had hoped to stay out of the fight. While tensions in the parliamentary Liberal team seem to have settled, Pesutto can’t afford to back a loser.”

HOLD THE FRONT PAGE

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Online

• Harvard University’s Edward Glaeser will talk about the role of cities and regions in diversifying their activities, the 15-minute city, and housing supply in a webinar held by CEDA.

• A state funeral for former Queensland premier and treasurer Michael (Mike) John Ahern AO. You can watch online.

Yuggera and Turrbal Country (also known as Brisbane)

• Author Laura Jean McKay will talk at the Food Lovers’ Cook Book Chat at Avid Reader bookshop.

Eora Nation Country (also known as Sydney)

• Sydney University’s Penny O’Donnell, singer Jeanie Lewis, and poet Jenny Pollak will speak at the launch of Journeys, Australian Women in Mexico at Better Read Than Dead bookshop.