Answering the call of nature

COP15 STRIKES HISTORIC AGREEMENT

Negotiators have reached a historic deal at COP15, the United Nations biodiversity conference in Montreal, that would protect 30% of land and water considered important for biodiversity by 2030, up from the 17% of terrestrial and 10% of marine areas currently protected. According to conservationist Brian O’Donnell: “There has never been a conservation goal globally at this scale. This puts us within a chance of safeguarding biodiversity from collapse.”

For our part, federal Environment and Water Minister Tanya Plibersek said Australia “can be proud” to have led the way in the negotiations: “We didn’t get everything we wanted. Others didn’t either. But with a bit of cooperation, compromise and common sense, we have achieved a lot for the world. We secured high ambition on restoring degraded land, inland water, and coastal and marine ecosystems. We successfully advocated for placing the rights and interests of First Nations peoples at the forefront of nature conservation.”

Meanwhile, Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong is preparing to depart for the first official visit to China by an Australian government minister in four years. There is a planned meeting with her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing on Wednesday — which marks the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Australia and China. The trip is likely to be a precursor to a visit from Prime Minister Anthony Albanese next year.

Albanese writes in today’s The Australian that the two countries “are always going to be better off when we engage in dialogue. When we talk to each other calmly, directly and in a spirit of respect.” Which seems a bit pointed, considering the degree to which the Liberals’ anti-China rhetoric cost them in the last election.

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PERROTTET ISSUES ULTIMATUM

Indeed, with details of the review into the federal party’s disastrous performance at the 2022 election still dripping into the public domain, the next Liberal Party to go to the polls — Dominic Perrottet’s government in NSW — is having an ill-timed bout of public brawling.

According to The Daily Telegraph, the NSW premier has apparently told his cabinet that anyone found to be leaking will no longer be a minister after next March’s election if the Coalition is returned to government. This follows a flurry of allegations of sexism in the party, with senior Liberal staffer Tanya Raffoul allegedly told by party members to “settle down and have children” rather than seek preselection.

On top of this, senior figures such as Transport Minister David Elliott and Treasurer Matt Kean (two people who rarely find much cause to agree on anything) have publicly criticised the party over the treatment of Raffoul, as well as the failures of senior Liberal Natalie Ward and councillor Reena Jethi to secure preselection (both their spots went to men). Perrottet reputedly thinks this is nothing more than his team “talking about themselves”.

ON A LIGHTER NOTE

It’s important we remember that for all that we anthropomorphise them, animals are blissfully unaware of the knotted dramas humans are capable of clumsily weaving together. Take the defamation case brought by barrister Gina Edwards against Nine’s great muckrakers A Current Affair in the Federal Court in Sydney. Edwards argues two ACA episodes in mid-2021 defamed her by incorrectly claiming, among other things, that she is “a thief who stole Oscar the cavoodle”.

Oscar the cavoodle is a fancy little fellow who was bought by Edwards’ former friend Mark Gillespie back in 2016, and the case appears to thus far have largely revolved around Oscar’s opulent lifestyle, Instagram following and penchant for formal wear, which eventually landed him a tuxedo-wearing cameo in the opera La Bohème.

Gillespie has told the court that Edwards effectively “stole” Oscar, and the ACA episodes in question feature him ambushing her at a park, grabbing Oscar and announcing: “I’m just picking up my property, thank you.” Edwards, for her part, told the court: “I thought by filing a civil dispute that my case would be decided in a court of law, not on some horrible trashy television program that made me look like a crazy person.”

Frankly, poor old Oscar didn’t ask for any of this, and has demonstrated through his elegant sartorial choices and rich social life that he’s very much his own property, thank you. The hearing continues.

CRIKEY RECAP

Is Australia’s union movement dying?

Maeve McGregor

Dec 19, 2022

47

” ‘Unions are too weak and the barriers to industrial action are too high [for the reforms] to allow a return to anything resembling the 1970s,’ said University of Sydney industrial relations expert Chris Wright, who recently wrote an op-ed on his support for multi-employer collective bargaining.

“Far from representing a force to be reckoned with, the story of the union movement for the past 40 years is one of uninterrupted decline. Since its peak in the 1970s, when union members made up more than half the Australian workforce, the percentage of union members has plunged to 12.5% today — its lowest level in nearly 120 years.”

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A very Labor Christmas: the alleged headbutt, the plumber, and the tip-truck union

Guy Rundle

Dec 19, 2022

25

“Yes, Thursday before last, Earl Setches, head of the Plumbers’ Union, allegedly put his head down and his butt up and charged at Mem Suleyman, assistant state secretary of the Transport Workers’ Union, at the Maurice Blackburn Christmas party held at Trades Hall. Maurice Blackburn, the top union law firm and legal home to lefty HRT heartthrob Josh Bornstein among others, holds this every year, with the bruvvers, sistas, silks and MPs converging for free drinks and ’80s singalongs.

“Several sources have been willing to confirm that Setches allegedly charged at Suleyman, unprovoked, and was then escorted from the party. None of the witnesses will go on the record. They may have to though if Suleyman makes a complaint.”

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Twitter bans links to competitors as Musk hangs out in Qatar with Trump’s son-in-law

John Buckley

Dec 19, 2022

9

“The move is the latest in a series of erratic content moderation decisions made by [Elon] Musk since he bought the company for US$44 billion in October. Shortly after announcing the latest ban, Musk tweeted out a poll asking his 122 million followers whether he should step down as head of Twitter: ‘I will abide by the results of this poll.’

“Later on Monday, the policy page was abruptly removed from Twitter’s help centre, along with the tweets sent by the company announcing the new ban, which were also deleted without explanation.”

SAY WHAT?

This government is all about settling political scores. This announcement undermines the work of the tribunal in holding this Labor government to account … Mr Dreyfus’ goal with this body is clear: reconstitute the AAT and stack it from the start.

Julian Leeser

Displaying a level of cheek that even the most ambitious buccal fat surgeon would have no plan for, the opposition spokesman on legal matters accuses Labor of intending to stack whatever replaces the freshly abolished Administrative Appeals Tribunal. You can read Crikey‘s ongoing coverage of the Coalition’s years of furiously avoiding anything like that here.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

Three men charged over violent Melbourne derby pitch invasion (The Age)

Taxpayers face potential $10m payout bill as Administrative Appeals Tribunal scrapped (Guardian Australia)

Elon Musk: Twitter users vote in favour of boss resigning (BBC)

Giants of Mandurah: police treating arson crime investigation as a priority (The West Australians)

South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa reelected as African National Congress leader (ABC)

Half of Australians support Indigenous Voice plan (The Australian Financial Review)

Hillsong founder Brian Houston tells court his father was a ‘serial paedophile’ (ABC)

Mourning ‘LA’s coolest cat’ and celebrating how P-22 changed our relationship with nature (Los Angeles Times)

‘Storied history’: David Jones gets new owners just in time for Christmas (The Sydney Morning Herald)

THE COMMENTARIAT

Big challenge now will be to manage expectations — Greg Sheridan (The Australian) ($): “It’s good that Foreign [Affairs] Minister Penny Wong is going to China to meet her counterpart, Wang Yi. She must battle now, though, the danger of false and unrealistic expectations.

“Beijing has tried hard, using intimidation and coercion, to get Australia to change policy in critical areas. It imprisoned innocent Australians on trumped-up charges, it imposed $20 billion of trade boycotts on Australia, it worked hard to interfere in our internal politics, it froze all high-level contacts and ministerial meetings and kept up a constant barrage of abuse and intimidation through its official media and sometimes its wolf-warrior diplomats. And, much to Beijing’s surprise, it failed.”

Why drag young kids into the criminal justice system? — Gabrielle Bashir (The Sydney Morning Herald) ($): “The NSW Bar Association believes that raising the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14, without exception, would address some of the fundamental inequities in how we deal with children in their most formative years.

“Legal and medical experts have been arguing for this for some time, and the recently released draft report of the Age of Criminal Responsibility Working Group established by the Standing Council of Attorneys-General makes a compelling case for change.”

HOLD THE FRONT PAGE

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Nationwide

• New research from Headspace’s National Youth Mental Health Survey shows two-thirds of Australians aged 12-25 feel lonely.

Kulin Nation Country (also known as Melbourne)

• Victoria’s Parliament will open after November’s election that returned a Daniel Andrews Labor government.

• Hearing where magistrate will hand down his decision on neo-Nazi Thomas Sewell, who allegedly bashed a Nine security guard.

Eora Nation Country (also known as Sydney)

• McDonald’s and Woolworths representatives to appear at a Sydney hearing of the Senate select committee on work care.