Good morning. New laws to be introduced by Victoria’s attorney general will add two new sexual offences to the statute book and impose a responsibility for consent to be given before engaging in sexual activity. And after months of wrangling, Labor’s climate bill is finally set to pass.
Laws to require affirmative consent, criminalise “stealthing” and target “deepfake” porn will be introduced into the Victorian parliament by the state’s attorney general, Jaclyn Symes. The justice legislation amendment (sexual offences and other matters) bill 2022 will be introduced to parliament today and, if passed, will impose a responsibility for consent to be given before engaging in sexual activity from June 2023. Symes said the affirmative consent model would shift scrutiny in sexual assault matters away from the actions of the victim and on to those of the accused offender. “We want to make sure that women, in particular, are able to come forward and report crime and not feel shamed and have the spotlight put on them and what they did or didn’t do,” she told Guardian Australia.
The House of Representatives is moving towards passage of Labor’s bill enshrining emissions reductions targets for 2030 and 2050, after the Greens signalled they would support the legislation and Liberal MP Bridget Archer confirmed she would cross the floor. After weeks of negotiations, the Greens leader, Adam Bandt, confirmed on Wednesday his party would back the Albanese government’s legislation in both chambers. “After more than a decade of darkness in Australia’s parliament, today was a good day for the climate,” Guardian Australia’s political editor, Katharine Murphy, wrote yesterday.
China is to begin a series of unprecedented live-fire drills that would effectively blockade the island of Taiwan, just hours after the departure of US House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, whose controversial visit this week has sparked fears of a crisis in the Taiwan strait. Taiwan has characterised the drills – which will last until Sunday afternoon, and will include missile tests and other “military operations” as close as 15km to Taiwan’s coastline – as a violation of international law. Ahead of the drill, it said 27 Chinese warplanes had entered its air defence zone.
Australia
Tenants who have already seen their rent rise to unaffordable levels in response to interest rate hikes fear they will face further increases, after the Reserve Bank of Australia lifted the cash rate for a fourth consecutive month.
Nothing is off the table in the battle to deliver 450 gigalitres of environmental flows for the Murray-Darling, says the water minister, Tanya Plibersek, accusing the opposition of tying the Murray-Darling Basin Plan up in “brown tape”.
Marine scientists monitoring the Great Barrier Reef say they have recorded the highest levels of coral cover in 36 years in the north and central areas, but warned any recovery could be quickly overturned by global heating.
A group of unions have hit out at Victoria’s Andrews government over proposed legislation designed to criminalise environmental protests, which they said would stifle peaceful democratic action, calling for the bill to be scrapped.
The Albanese government has slashed the forecast of future gains in national productivity, saying the Coalition had relied on unrealistic predictions and hoped “no one would notice”.
The world
The UN secretary general António Guterres has described the record profits of oil and gas companies as immoral, and urged governments to introduce a windfall tax, using the money to help those in the most need.
Ukrainian refugees are likely to become victims of rising tensions and disinformation campaigns in their host countries, a report has warned. False reports have emerged exaggerating how much aid refugees receive compared with local people, and linking refugees with violent crime and political extremism.
The former German chancellor Gerhard Schröder has come under fire for a private meeting held with the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, after he travelled on holiday to Moscow to meet him last week.
Attorneys for Infowars host Alex Jones “messed up” and sent to his legal adversaries “every text message” Jones had written in the past two years – contradicting claims Jones had nothing on his phone pertaining to the deadly Sandy Hook school shooting, which he long maintained was a hoax, it was revealed at his defamation trial on Wednesday.
Researchers have created the world’s first “synthetic embryos” in a groundbreaking feat that bypassed the need for sperm, eggs and fertilisation. Scientists at the Weizmann Institute in Israel found that stem cells from mice could be made to self-assemble into early embryo-like structures.
Recommended reads
As we make progress on an Indigenous Voice to parliament, modern-day storyteller Archie Roach is a bold reminder of what speaking our stories could achieve, writes Larissa Behrendt, in a tribute to a “quintessential example of how powerful a voice can be”. “Our greatest storytellers give us words to describe how we feel. They articulate our emotions,” she adds. “They provide us with a language. Archie Roach did that. More than the legacy of his songbook – the music and lyrics that will be their own eternal life – he gave us the gift of real human truth.”
A new film called The Stranger is reigniting the seemingly unresolvable ethical dilemma of basing films on true tragedies and crimes, especially without the involvement of victims’ loved ones or survivors. Thomas M Wright’s film, which debuted at Cannes in May and premieres at the Melbourne International film festival on Friday, centres on the lengthy undercover police operation to capture the man responsible for the 2003 murder of 13-year-old Queensland schoolboy Daniel Morcombe.
As Australia enters the final month of winter, Maddie Thomas has some tips on how to save money on the best value fresh produce available this August. “Reach for hearty winter greens such as fennel, leek and celery along with starchy root vegetables and abundant oranges and avocados,” she writes, as well as telling you which to avoid right now.
Listen
With another official interest rate rise announced this week, marking the biggest increase since 1994, the government and the reserve bank are issuing a warning: Australia’s economic woes are far from over. In today’s Full Story, economics correspondent Peter Hannam explores how long these tough conditions are expected to last, and whether Labor has a plan to ease the pressure on households.
Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.
Sport
Ariarne Titmus, Sam Short and the women’s 4x100m relay medley team picked up yet more gold for Australia as the Commonwealth Games swimming competition came to a close in Birmingham. A hugely successful campaign in the pool ended with triumph for Titmus in the women’s 400m freestyle. Read our full report of Australia’s overnight results.
Adelaide chief executive Tim Silvers has publicly and privately apologised to Eddie Betts for the trauma the AFL great suffered during the Crows’ ill-fated pre-season camp in 2018. Silvers told reporters at the club’s West Lakes headquarters that he had reached out to Betts via text on Wednesday morning after bombshell claims about the controversial 2018 training camp came to light with the release of Betts’s autobiography.
Media roundup
Australia’s new army chief has said he will increase military exchanges and expand bilateral defence exercises with Indonesia, the Australian reports. And the Sydney Morning Herald has a warning of an exodus of childcare workers, as there has been in aged care, under a system that devalues the care economy dominated by women.
Coming up
Today is National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children’s Day, with events being held around the country.
And if you’ve read this far …
“We called the mums about an hour after the ceremony”: find out why more and more people are opting for a secret wedding.
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