By Sam Bennett, Disability Program Director, Grattan Institute
Reilly Polaschek, Associate, Grattan Institute
Disabled people employed in specialist disability workplaces – what used to be called sheltered workshops but today are more often called Australian disability enterprises – can be paid sub-minimum wages as low as $8.32 under the relevant award, the Supported Employment Services Award.
Disabled people’s wages can be further reduced to a fraction of the award wage – as low as $3.31 per hour– by a mechanism called…
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By Milad Haghani, Associate Professor and Principal Fellow in Urban Risk and Resilience, The University of Melbourne
In less than six months, China will start phasing in a world-first ban on hidden car door handles. A US ban may be next. So what’s happening in Australia?
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By Terry Goldsworthy, Associate Professor in Criminal Justice and Criminology, Bond University
It’s hard to know exactly how big an issue this is today, whether this is becoming more common or how much it costs taxpayers. But here’s what we know so far.
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By Rebecca Strating, Director, La Trobe Centre for Global Security, and Professor of International Relations, La Trobe University
Arzan Tarapore, Research Scholar, Indo-Pacific Security, Stanford University
Our war game simulations showed how vital it is to protect shipping routes across the entire ocean, not just in waters close to Australia.
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By Steve Turton, Adjunct Professor of Environmental Geography, CQUniversity Australia
California is once again confronting a rapidly escalating wildfire season fuelled by extreme heat, drying vegetation, drought and strong winds.
As of 24 July, the state has recorded more than 3,800 wildfires so far this year, burning approximately 79,000 hectares. The largest active blaze, in Lassen County, had grown to more than 28,000 hectares.
The immediate images are familiar to Australians: towering smoke columns and orange skies. But these wildfires are not simply the result of hot summer weather. They…
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By Aaron Walton, PhD candidate, Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, The University of Melbourne
In his 2023 bestseller, Determined, neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky argued that the interaction of biology and environment leaves no room for free choice. Philosopher and neuroscientist Sam Harris puts the case more bluntly: “free will is an illusion”.
However, prominent voices in psychology and the media…
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By Simon Francis Thrush, Professor of Marine Science, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
The government’s controversial Fisheries Amendment Bill has reignited debate over New Zealand’s most common – and most controversial – commercial fishing method.
Bottom trawling involves commercial fishing boats dragging large, heavy nets across the seafloor. It is the most widespread source of human disturbance to the global…
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By Judy Ingham, Newsletter Producer, The Conversation
Every day, we publish a selection of your emails in our newsletter. We’d love to hear from you, you can email us at yoursay@theconversation.edu.au.
Monday July 27
“Like any geopolitical fix, this one [to fix ocean chemistry] is ‘naturally’ fraught. There are positives and negatives – which constitute political chemistry. But can we perhaps dissolve these opposites to precipitate a clear solution? I think we can. Use less…
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By Guillaume Lhermie, Professeur, économie et politiques publiques de santé animale, University of Calgary
The cyclosporiasis outbreak linked to fresh produce in the United States is raising concerns in Canada about the safety of imported food. While Canada has seen some recent cases of cyclosporiasis, officials say there is no link with the U.S. outbreak.
The outbreak has drawn attention to public health advice encouraging Canadians…
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By Farid Saberi, Phd Candidate, Western University
There’s a widening divide between two Canadas: one marked by working-class misery and homelessness; the other by the unprecedented prosperity of the uber-wealthy. This wealth gap is unsustainable.
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