Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke announced the government’s long-awaited migration policy yesterday. It’s been a week dominated by the topic, with One Nation unveiling its policy on Monday, too.

The government’s proposed settings appear to be knee-jerk reactions to reducing net overseas migration (often referred to as NOM), rather than being based on careful modelling of labour demand and migration impacts on infrastructure.

Falling short of expectations

There was a strong expectation Burke would set out a concerted approach to lowering the 400,000-odd people on bridging visas, especially those awaiting the outcome of an appeal to the Administrative Review Tribunal following rejection of an application for a student or asylum visa.

Their chances of success on appeal to the tribunal are minimal but, because of the huge numbers, it takes a long time for cases to be heard. During that wait time, the person is issued a bridging visa, which enables them to work.

It was also expected the government would propose restricting the capacity of these people to work, and to examine ways to limit their capacity to appeal, thus encouraging them to leave.

This wouldn’t have been controversial because it has been an issue for a decade. All political parties are in favour of doing this.

But apparently this did not happen because Burke had not reached agreement with the Coalition on migration policy changes.

Instead, he’s proposed a return to 2015, when people whose options had run out went into detention centres and dutifully left the country in a few weeks.

Today, however, the numbers involved are vastly greater, far exceeding any capacity for detention centres to house them or the department’s capacity to find them.

Withdrawing work rights is the obvious policy direction. But this would have to be matched by severe penalties on Australian employers if they hire a person without work rights illegally.

The 2015 approach will do little. This is important because the data show that the low number of departures, not a high number of arrivals, is why the net overseas migration rate hasn’t fallen more quickly.

Punishing partners

The failure of people who don’t leave the country when they should also undermines the integrity of the migration system. But instead of addressing the pressing issue of departures, Burke focused on even more measures to reduce arrivals.

The unseemliest of these measures is to prevent partners and children of Australian citizens from coming to Australia on a visitor visa and then applying for permanent residence. Instead, partners will only be allowed to have short visits with their spouses before leaving again.

The net outcome of this arrangement is that the Australian citizen will eventually leave Australia so they can live in a full-time relationship with the person they love from another country – not one of occasional visits.

By contrast, for new permanent skilled migrants coming to Australia from overseas, their spouses can join them immediately.

It is also not clear what will happen if a relationship is formed in Australia. Will the partner be required to leave?

Changes, but with how much impact?

A second measure geared towards limiting arrivals is to not allow students to bring “secondary applicants” with them, that is, their spouses and children.

According to Department of Home Affairs statistics in 2025–26, 39,400 grants were made to secondary applicants on student visas (excluding those studying for a PhD). About a quarter of those were for children aged under 15 and most of the rest were partners.

Interestingly, 58% of secondary applicants were men. The primary student visa holder was a woman in the majority of cases. Nearly half (46%) were from South Asian countries, while just 4% of grantees were Chinese.

At the 2021 census, 57% of adults in the secondary student category had a university degree and 78% were employed

The impact of this restriction on net overseas migration will be limited in the short term as, in 2025–26, 54% of the grantees were already in Australia. In 2025, net overseas migration for people in this category was only 12,400.

It seems the restriction on secondary applicants will also apply to those on graduate visas. This will probably reduce applications for this type of visa, as grantees would be facing many years of being without their partners.

The government has also proposed a ballot for second- and third-year grants of working holiday visas.

This could have a powerful effect because a backpacker facing three months of farm or mining work in a regional area just to qualify for the ballot may decide the risk is too great. Farmers are already concerned about the loss of backpackers from work in the horticultural industry. This may add to their anxiety.

Still no plan

It seems the government has prioritised shrinking net overseas migration at the expense of the comprehensive planning that experts, including myself, have long been calling for.

Many of the people in the affected categories are now working in jobs that are important to the economy and society.

For example, as the demand for aged care has expanded sharply since COVID, many migrants have become carers. They were available and willing to do this work.

The demand for aged care workers is about to explode as the baby boomer generation turns 80. Withdrawing workers from the sector will be problematic.

Certain skilled trades in the construction industry could also be affected. The government’s proposed juggling of permanent skilled visa grants will only touch the surface of this demand.

It also misses the central issue for Australian migration policy: the management of the temporary population.

Other countries face similar challenges. Canada has recently accepted that temporary migrants will make up 5% of the total population of the country. In other words, it has accepted the inevitability of an ongoing, mainly growing, temporary population, and is planning accordingly.

Planning for temporary migrants (numbers, labour force involvement, infrastructure implications, rights and responsibilities) did not feature in Burke’s speech at all. This doesn’t bode well for managing migration in the future.

Peter McDonald, Honorary Professor of Demography, Centre for Health Policy, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The Australian government has announced visa changes making it harder for international students to bring their families with them while they study. There are also new rules designed to stop students from cycling through courses just to prolong their stay in Australia.

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has framed these changes as part of a broader, “orderly” and “fair” approach to lowering net overseas migration. But they also continue a years-long push by the federal government to lower international student numbers.

What has been announced? And what is happening with international student numbers more broadly?

What did Tony Burke say?

On Thursday, Burke told the National Press Club most international students will have to come alone to Australia. There will be some exceptions, including for people from Pacific and ASEAN countries and PhD students.

Last year, more than 45,000 visas were granted to family members of an international student.

Burke also flagged the government would clamp down on “visa hopping” by international students. Students will need to prove they are progressing to a course at a higher level to prolong their student visa.

As Burke explained:

One of the classic areas of visa hopping is people finish a course, hop to the next course, hop to the next.

These changes are part of the federal government’s wider bid to bring down net overseas migration from about 290,000 to 225,000 in 2027-28.

The peak body, Universities Australia, described the latest move by the government as “worrying”. Chief executive Luke Sheehy explained students often bring family members to Australia if they are doing research degrees “because they can be here for up to three or four years while they do that”.

What has been happening?

Over the past three years, the government has been trying to lower the number of international students in Australia.

Legislation to give the government greater powers to do this was blocked before the last election, so the government has had to use a series of “workarounds”. These include increases to student visa application fees and slower visa processing times.

After the pandemic, international students returned to Australia more quickly than expected. In 2022, the Australian government suggested it might take four years to reach pre-pandemic levels of students. It took one year.

This surge created an increase that continues to work its way through the system. After completing a course, many international students can apply for a graduate visa. This means they can extend their stay for a further 18 months or more.

The number of students on graduate visas has more than doubled from 70,000 in June 2019 to 199,000 in June 2026 as students who finish their courses transition to these visas.

Further increasing the total number of current and former students are “secondary” visaholders. These are normally immediate family members, such as partners and children who come with students to Australia. The total number of student and graduate secondary visaholders has increased from about 92,000 in June 2019 to about 142,000 in the most recent available data.

Other moves to reduce international students

To reduce net overseas migration, the number of residents leaving the country must be higher than the number of residents entering the country.

Many of the measures announced on Thursday give the government more ways to ensure student visaholders leave. In the meantime, there has been a reduction in the intake of new international students.

Our analysis of immigration data (shown in the chart below) shows the visa refusal rate for international students has increased significantly over the past six months. Student visa refusal rates are currently the highest they have ever been.

The government has said this is because it is more strictly applying a financial capacity test. These are the funds an international student must demonstrate when applying for a visa – to prove they can support themselves while in Australia.

How does Labor’s plan compare to other proposals?

The complicated nature of migration means it can be difficult to make direct comparisons between different proposals.

However, this week, One Nation announced a much harsher plan. Its target of 350,000 international students would come close to halving the number in Australia, as part of its proposal to reduce the overall number of temporary migrants by 750,000.

Such a cut would have a huge impact on the university sector and beyond. The Australia Bureau of Statistics says international education is worth A$54.7 billion per year, of which $24.3 billion is from student fees.

International students also take a huge range of courses at different types of institutions, such as vocational colleges, private providers or English-language schools.

Universities can be the face of international students, but they only account for about half of the international student enrolments in Australia.

An international student could be your baker or your carer

Our analysis of tax data (shown in the chart below) shows international students play a significant role in certain occupations. These include jobs as hospitality workers and food trades workers (such as bakers and cooks).

About 10% of carer and aides jobs, such as child carers and aged care workers, were held by current and graduate international students.

Other countries are doing similar things, but …

Australia is following a global trend to tighten settings for international students.

Canada has also wound back its international student program. Rather than having an open-ended number of visas, there are planned ceilings. The United Kingdom also announced a restriction on family members applying for student visas in 2024.

What is missing from these announcements is a clearer picture of how international education fits within the wider migration program.

The debate has focused on reducing numbers, but the bigger question is what Australia wants international education to achieve. That means deciding which skills to prioritise and how education, migration and workforce planning can work together.

Peter Hurley, Professor and Director, Mitchell Institute, Victoria University and Melinda Hildebrandt, Policy Fellow, Mitchell Institute, Victoria University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Life just got tougher for international students under new visa rules. Why is this group being targeted? first appeared on The Australia Today.

You’re standing in the skincare aisle and pimple patches are everywhere – clear ones, flesh-coloured ones, stars, hearts. They promise to flatten a pimple overnight.

Then there are those satisfying social media videos where someone peels off a pimple patch to reveal a much calmer-looking pimple underneath.

But do pimple patches actually work? And what are they really doing to your skin?

What’s a pimple?

A pimple forms when a hair follicle gets clogged with oil, dead skin cells and bacteria, causing inflammation, redness and sometimes a pus-filled head. You might also hear a pimple called a “spot” or a “zit” – these are just names for the same thing.

“Acne” is the name for the broader skin condition of getting pimples recurrently (along with blackheads and whiteheads), rather than a word for a single pimple.

In this article we’ll mostly stick to “pimple” for an individual lesion, and use “acne” only when we’re talking about the overall condition.

Pimples affect an estimated 20.5% of people worldwide at any one time, and up to 80–85% of adolescents. This makes it one of the most common skin conditions.

What are pimple patches?

Pimple patches look like a TikTok-era invention, but the underlying technology isn’t. They’re based on hydrocolloid dressings, which were developed decades ago for wound care. Then dermatologists began adapting them for skin conditions, such as acne.

Hydrocolloid patches caught on as a beauty product in South Korea almost 20 years ago before crossing into Western markets around 2012.

Today’s pimple patches are made from a hydrocolloid material – a gel-forming substance – which is often a blend of ingredients such as pectin, gelatin and carboxymethylcellulose. This bonds to a thin, flexible, waterproof outer layer.

The hydrocolloid absorbs moisture, so it can soak up fluid from a wound and hold it in place while the skin underneath heals.

On a pimple, the same process kicks in. Press the patch over a pimple with a visible head, and the hydrocolloid layer starts drawing fluid – pus, oil and dead skin cells – out of the pore and locking it into its gel matrix.

As the patch fills up, it turns white or cloudy, which is exactly what people are peeling off in those satisfying videos. The outer layer holds everything in place and keeps the area covered while this happens.

Pimple patches also act as a physical barrier. They cover the pimple, making it harder to pick, squeeze or touch it, which can otherwise introduce more bacteria and worsen the inflammation.

Some pimple patches are medicated, most commonly with salicylic acid. Others contain tea tree oil, niacinamide or benzoyl peroxide. Rather than simply drying out the pimple, these ingredients are meant to help exfoliate the skin, calm inflammation or target acne-causing bacteria.

You can buy pimple patches at supermarkets or pharmacies, typically for about A$6–20 a pack, depending on the brand and whether they’re medicated (medicated patches typically cost more than unmedicated ones).

Do they actually work?

A 2025 review found most evidence for hydrocolloid patches comes from wound care, not for pimples specifically.

Of the handful of studies on pimples, many are small and industry-funded that test the brands’ own patches. Often these studies are not “blinded”. This means either the researchers, participants or both knew if they were using pimple patches, which risks skewing the results.

So while the early results are promising, the evidence for pimple patches is still limited.

One manufacturer-funded trial of 41 people found applying a patch to a pimple that had already come to a head and been popped improved its appearance in a day.

Another small industry-funded study followed 37 people over ten days. In two days, pimples covered with the patches were 35% smaller and looked 44% less less inflamed, based on a combined visual assessment of size and redness. Untreated pimples showed little change. By day ten, the treated pimples were also less likely to develop post-inflammatory pigmentation (dark marks on your skin after a pimple heals).

Patches seem to work best on pimples that already have a visible white or yellow head. That’s because the pus sitting inside has already risen close to the skin’s surface, putting it within reach of the patch’s absorbent gel.

For the best results, apply to clean, dry skin and leave on for six to eight hours or overnight, swapping it once it turns cloudy and swollen. Afterwards, place your pimple patch in the bin.

Are they for me?

Pimple patches can be handy for the odd pimple. But they can only do so much, and they’re not for every pimple.

They don’t work well for deep, painful cystic pimples because the patch can’t reach inflammation that sits deeper in the skin.

People with darker skin tones may also need to be careful, as irritation can increase the risk of dark marks after a pimple heals. This can happen with any skin tone, but skin with more melanin tends to produce more pigment in response to inflammation or irritation, so the resulting dark marks are often more noticeable and slower to fade.

If you have sensitive skin or an allergy to adhesives, patches can cause redness, itching or a rash. Medicated patches containing ingredients such as salicylic acid can also be irritating.

My pimples aren’t getting better

If you’ve tried patches, cleansers and treatments for a few weeks and your pimples aren’t budging, it’s probably time to get some help. Likewise, if your pimples are deep, painful or starting to leave scars, don’t wait.

A GP can discuss your options, and if needed, refer you to a dermatologist to work out what’s driving your pimples and find a treatment.

Lisa Byrom, Associate Professor, Dermatology, School of Medicine, The University of Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Do pimple patches actually work? Here’s what the science says first appeared on The Australia Today.

Fiji’s Minister for Employment, Productivity and Workplace Relations, Agni Deo Singh, passed away in Brisbane yesterday (12 September 2026).

Prime Minister and Chair of the Coalition Cabinet Sitiveni Rabuka announced the death on the official Facebook page of the Fiji Government.

Prime Minister Rabuka extended his deepest condolences to Singh’s family, loved ones, colleagues and friends during this difficult time. He also acknowledged Singh’s dedicated service to the workers and people of Fiji and his invaluable contribution to the Government and the nation.

Under the Fiji-Australia Vuvale Partnership, Agni Deo Singh, together with representatives from Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) and Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR), had been visiting Fijian workers participating in the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme and engaging with their employers in Australia.

The delegation met Fijian PALM workers employed at Australian Country Choice (ACC) in Brisbane and held discussions with company and labour-hire representatives. Singh acknowledged ACC for providing employment opportunities to Fijian workers and welcomed feedback from the workers.

Singh also commended JBS Australia for its commitment to worker welfare and wellbeing under the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) Scheme during a site visit and engagement in Brisbane.

The minister also welcomed JBS Australia’s strong commitment to transparency in wages and deductions.

Minister for Fisheries and Forestry Alitia Bainivalu also posted a tribute to Singh on her Facebook page.

“I was deeply saddened to learn of the passing of my colleague, the late Agni Deo Singh. As a fellow member of the Coalition Government, I extend my deepest condolences to his family, loved ones, colleagues, friends, and to the many workers across Fiji who knew and respected him,” she said.

Bainivalu added that Singh served Fiji as Minister for Employment, Productivity and Workplace Relations from 2023 to 2026, at a time when important decisions were being made for the welfare and dignity of workers.

“His legacy will not only be remembered in Parliament or in Government records. It will be remembered in the lives of ordinary working people.”

In 2024, Fiji’s national minimum wage increased from $4 to $4.50 an hour, followed by a further increase to $5 an hour in 2025.

In 2024, the full 18% FNPF contribution was restored, strengthening workers’ retirement savings and providing greater protection for their future.

In 2024, the long-running dispute involving 368 Vatukoula mine workers finally reached a historic settlement. The $9.2 million settlement provided $25,000 to each worker, bringing an end to a matter that had remained unresolved for more than three decades, Bainivalu said.

She added that during Singh’s time in the Employment Ministry, workers’ rights were also strengthened, including the restoration of freedom of association, greater engagement between the Government, employers and unions, and stronger attention to workplace grievances, wages and employment conditions.

Bainivalu said that while politicians’ time in office is temporary, the policies they help put in place and the lives they touch can leave a lasting legacy.

“Today, we mourn a colleague and a fellow servant of the people. To his family, may you find strength and comfort during this difficult time.

“And to the workers of Fiji, may you continue to remember the contribution that Agni Deo Singh made to improving the lives and rights of working people. Vinaka vakalevu, Agni Deo Singh, for your service to Fiji and to our workers.”

The Fiji Government’s Facebook post said further details regarding funeral arrangements and other official matters would be communicated in due course.

The Government has respectfully asked members of the public and the media to respect the privacy of Singh’s family during this time of mourning.

Contributing Author: Shymal Kumar is a final-year journalism student at the University of the South Pacific, undertaking his journalism internship with The Australia Today.

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The post Fiji Employment Minister Agni Deo Singh dies in Brisbane during Australia visit first appeared on The Australia Today.

Labor is no doubt dreading the likelihood of further interest rate rises, despite Treasurer Jim Chalmers talking up the economy.

When One Nation outpolled Labor’s primary vote for the first time back in June, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese responded: “It’s the economy, stupid”.

He argued voters were struggling economically despite working hard. Consequently, “many people feel that the system isn’t working for them”.

Albanese’s over-reliance on an economic explanation risks underestimating other factors such as race, ethnicity and gender.

Nonetheless, election studies and opinion polls have indeed shown economic concerns are a major factor driving the increased vote for One Nation.

Two in three One Nation voters say their household finances have worsened over the past few years, while 77% believe a Hanson government would successfully manage the cost-of-living crisis.

With voters in a world of economic pain, what might it mean politically?

The economic pain is real

The economic pain voters are feeling is real. Successive interest rate increases have seen many voters paying tens of thousands of dollars extra in mortgage repayments since Labor was first elected in 2022.

The economy might be growing slowly, but living standards are not. Profits are rising but real wages are dropping due to inflation.

The government is being punished as a result. The Coalition is blaming Labor for Australia’s economic woes. One Nation is blaming both major parties.

However, the economy is also being impacted by forces outside any Australian government’s control. For example, Albanese argues “every country is facing” economic problems and inflation as a result of the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. It should be noted, though, that Australia’s inflation and interest rates are particularly high.

The relatively small growth in the Australian economy that may result in the Reserve Bank increasing interest rates yet again has been driven significantly by private consumers purchasing electric cars in response to the petrol crisis caused by the Middle East war. It has also been driven by private business purchasing equipment for data centres as AI reshapes the international economy.

Any Reserve Bank decision to raise interest rates further to contain inflation based on current economic growth figures is therefore contentious. Ordinary Australians are already constraining their normal spending due to the cost-of-living crisis and lower real wages. Higher interest rates will simply hurt them even more.

Perceptions matter too

Voters therefore have very real economic concerns. Nonetheless, perceptions also play a role. It’s not just that voters who are hurting can blame governments for some economic factors beyond their control. Voter perceptions of whether the government is listening and trying to address their economic difficulties are important too.

Albanese argues the government is hearing voters’ pain. He cites multiple efforts the government has made to address the cost-of-living crisis. These include wage rises, tax cuts and greater subsidies for health and childcare costs. There are also the controversial tax measures designed to address the housing affordability crisis.

However, such efforts are continually being undercut by inflation and interest rate rises. Furthermore, the government is constrained by the fear the Reserve Bank will raise interest rates even more if funding additional cost-of-living measures increases government debt.

Chalmers has ruled out abandoning the decades-long convention of Reserve Bank independence and using a residual government power to override its interest rate decisions.

Meanwhile, both the Liberals and One Nation have criticised current government debt levels, arguing they have fuelled inflation and therefore high interest rates.

One Nation has also constructed the domestic issue of immigration as an economic one that is contributing to the housing affordability crisis and depressing wages. Similarly, the government’s energy policies, designed to address climate change, are being criticised for increasing power bills.

However, the housing crisis long predates Labor, and climate change critics overlook that increasing power bills are partly driven by fossil fuel industries as well as by the war in Ukraine.

Yet there is also little comfort in all this for the Coalition. Their declining primary vote and electoral losses to One Nation indicate many voters don’t see them as offering a solution either. The anger in sections of the electorate who feel abandoned by the major parties is palpable, along with a transgressive joy in punishing the establishment.

To some extent, the Coalition may be suffering from a problem of their own making. After decades of flirting with a neoliberal populism that criticised Labor by arguing big government was the problem, not the solution, and that politically correct elites were abandoning mainstream Australians, they have now come to be seen as just another self-serving “uniparty” elite themselves.

However, Labor faces a particular perception problem that can undermine its efforts to tackle cost-of-living issues.

One Nation is depicting itself as the champion of the workers and Labor’s attempts at discounting that claim are not cutting through. A key reason is that populist arguments by both the Coalition and One Nation have long mimicked class politics.

They have suggested “woke” elites are exploiting workers by ripping off taxpayer funds to support minority groups and issues such as climate change, rather than workers’ exploitation occurring in the labour market.

It is cleverly designed to appeal to workers, reframing debates away from workers versus bosses to workers versus so-called elites. This is also why older-style class-based Labor arguments emphasising wage issues or associating Hanson with wealthy supporters such as Gina Rinehart may not be sufficient.

If Labor is to win back less socially conservative working-class voters it has lost to One Nation, it needs to be more successful at arguing that its equality agendas for groups from women to Indigenous people are not supporting woke elites but disadvantaged Australians who are often members of the diverse working class themselves.

Labor needs to emphasise that its policies are based on equal opportunity and a fair go, given One Nation suggests they discriminate against mainstream groups such as white men.

Similarly, Labor needs to become better at convincing voters that climate change is not a woke elite issue either. After all, workers’ homes in at-risk areas won’t be miraculously immune from increased bushfires. Blue-collar workers and tradies are at risk from work-related heat stroke due to rising temperatures.

The framing of voter perceptions on economic-related issues is therefore crucial. The economy may not be the only explanation for the growth of right-wing populism, but it is an essential part of the perceptual glue that holds various populist narratives together.

For all the above reasons, economic perceptions matter alongside real economic issues. However, so far neither Labor nor the Coalition is cutting through sufficiently to win back the swathes of voters who have abandoned them on economic grounds.

Carol Johnson, Emerita Professor of Politics, Adelaide University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Results from the latest international test of 15-year-olds have prompted another round of headlines suggesting there are serious problems with Australia’s academic results.

Some outlets reported Australian reading and maths results in the PISA tests have taken a “plunge” and sunk to an “all-time low”.

At the same time, headlines have lamented “Australia’s classroom disruption [is] among worst in world”.

As someone who has researched PISA for 25 years from three different countries (Norway, England and Australia), what do the results tell us, beyond the punchy headlines?

What is PISA?

PISA stands for the Programme for International Student Assessment. It’s an international survey comparing the skills and knowledge of 15-year-old students across 91 OECD countries.

It also involves a survey of students about their classroom experiences.

PISA is conducted every three years and aims to assess how effectively students can transfer the lessons learnt in school into the real world. The tasks in PISA are less about memory and more focused on students’ ability to analyse and problem-solve.

PISA tests students in three main domains: mathematics, science and reading literacy. In 2025 it also added a new area: learning in the digital world, which tested digital skills.

In the latest round, conducted in 2025, 91 countries and 760,000 students participated. This makes PISA the largest education survey in the world.

In Australia, 766 schools from all states and territories and 14,658 students participated.

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Australian students perform above average

Despite the alarmist headlines, in 2025 Australian students maintained above OECD-average scores in reading, science and mathematics.

The report ranked Australia in 11th place for reading and science, and 17th in maths.

In reading, Australian 15-year-olds scored an average of 491 points, compared with the OECD average of 461. In maths, Australian students recorded an average score of 478, compared with the OECD average of 463.

Australian students’ science scores were strong. Their mean score of 509 remained stable and was considerably higher than the OECD average of 482.

It would be helpful to know more about what Australian teachers are doing well – and how can we make sure this knowledge is shared across the country.

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For the first time, the 2025 survey also tested students’ ability to problem-solve using technology. Australian students performed strongly in this area, scoring 532 – well above the OECD average of 500.

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Lower scores in reading and maths

While the average science score has remained consistent over the past ten years, the mean scores for Australian students in reading and maths were lower in 2025 than 2022.

These declines in reading and maths follow a long-term trend – Australia’s scores have been dropping since 2003.

It’s important to note maths, reading and science scores have been declining globally, especially across OECD countries. Here, 20% of all 15-year-olds are now considered low performers in these three learning domains.

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Why are we seeing a drop?

The PISA survey doesn’t report on the reasons for these trends.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare says too much screen time in schools is behind a decline in academic results.

The OECD has also suggested digital devices could have made an impact on global reading skills, but this is only a suggestion at this point, and more research is needed.

We simply do not yet know enough about the quality of students’ technology use, the impact on learning, when to use digital devices and when not to.

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Are Australian classrooms too noisy?

As part of the survey, students were asked to report on how disruptive their science lessons were.

In Australia, 41% of students reported science classes as being disrupted by noise and disorder compared with the OECD average of 31%.

About 34% of Australian students said their peers didn’t listen to the teacher during science lessons.

The results about Australian classrooms being particularly disruptive are similar to previous rounds of PISA reporting, in 2019 and 2022.

These perspectives are based on self-reports, which research has shown are often biased. They can also simply depend on personal preferences. What some students report as disturbances might be productive discussions for other students.

To better understand these results, we need further evidence-based research of how classes are run. This includes reports from teachers and other observations of classrooms.

This is a complex report, with many stories

There was also positive news in the latest PISA data about school cultures.

The results show the majority of Australian students find their teachers caring and supportive.

About 79% reported their teacher showed an interest in all students’ learning in most science lessons, compared with the OECD average of 69%. The report also found 80% of students believe their teacher offers extra help to students when they need it.

What now?

Australia’s PISA results are worth reflecting on as we support the next generation to succeed in an increasingly complex world.

But the numbers are a starting point only, not the full story. We also need time for further research and analysis.

That includes discussing the results with students and teachers to agree on what is going well, and working with them on what is needed to improve their learning and teaching.

Therese N. Hopfenbeck, Professor in Educational Assessment, Faculty of Education, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Some people seem naturally tidy. Their keys are always in the same place, clothes make it into the wardrobe, and their kitchen bench remains mysteriously visible.

Others can clean the house on Sunday and wonder by Wednesday how everything became messy again.

It’s tempting to explain this as personality: “I’m just a messy person.” And there is some truth to that. But personality isn’t destiny. Our surroundings and the small things we repeatedly do within them matter too.

In fact, changing those patterns may eventually change something about the kind of person we are.

Are some people just naturally tidier?

Psychologists describe personality in terms of relatively enduring patterns in how people tend to think, feel and behave.

One of the “Big Five” personality traits is conscientiousness. It includes tendencies towards being industrious, self-controlled and orderly. So, someone higher in conscientiousness – particularly its orderliness aspects – may find keeping things organised easier.

But “relatively enduring” doesn’t mean personality is fixed.

Large studies following people over time show personality is both stable and changeable. For example, people tend to become more conscientious during different stages of adulthood, such as when they have children or new responsibilities.

So, saying “I’m a messy person” may describe a tendency. It doesn’t condemn you to a lifetime of losing your keys.

Messiness is something you repeatedly do

A messy room isn’t usually created by one great act of mess-making. It results from hundreds of tiny behaviours: leaving the cup on the desk, putting clothes on the chair, dropping the keys wherever is convenient, or deciding you’ll deal with the mail later.

Repeat those actions and they begin to look like a characteristic of the person doing them.

They can also become habits.

Habits develop when we repeatedly perform a behaviour in a recurring context. With repetition, features of that context can begin to prompt the behaviour automatically.

This helps explain why simply deciding to “be tidier” can fail. You return home with the same intentions, but also to the same environment that prompts the same old behaviours.

Change the environment, not just your intentions

Suppose you routinely arrive home and drop your keys on the nearest surface. You could keep reminding yourself to be more organised.

Or you could put a small bowl beside the door.

The bowl doesn’t just store your keys. It can prompt the behaviour you want. Repeatedly putting the keys there when you arrive home helps strengthen the association between the situation and that response.

The same principle applies elsewhere. Put the laundry basket where clothes actually come off. Give frequently used objects an obvious home. Put things you want to remember where you’ll encounter them at the moment you need to act.

In other words, don’t rely solely on motivation or memory. Arrange the environment to prompt the behaviour you want and make it easy to perform.

So if you act like a tidy person, do you become one?

This raises a more interesting question. What do we actually mean when we say someone is a tidy or messy person?

We usually imagine personality causes behaviour: a conscientious person behaves conscientiously.

But the relationship may also run in the other direction. Researchers have proposed that changing the behaviours through which a personality trait is expressed may, over time, contribute to changing the trait itself.

This doesn’t mean you can decide on Monday to have a different personality by Friday. Personality change is generally gradual. But it challenges the idea that we must first become an organised person before we can behave like one.

Perhaps consistently behaving in a more organised way is part of how we become more organised.

So, how do you become tidier?

Start by observing rather than judging. “I’m messy” doesn’t tell you what to change. Notice a recurring problem and the behaviour that produces it.

Then decide what you want to do instead. Make it specific: “When I take off my clothes, I’ll put them in the basket.”

Next, arrange your surroundings to prompt the new behaviour and make it easy. Put the basket where you actually get changed, or the key bowl beside the door.

It can also help to link the new behaviour to an existing routine: “When I make my morning coffee, I’ll deal with yesterday’s mail” or “When I turn on the television after dinner, I’ll spend five minutes putting things away before I sit down”.

Try the new routine, then review it. If it isn’t working, don’t conclude “I’m just a messy person”. Ask what got in the way and adjust the plan.

With repetition, the new behaviour may require less conscious effort and become part of your routine.

But do you actually need to become tidier?

Tidiness isn’t a measure of character, and perfection doesn’t need to be the goal. The more useful question is whether your environment is helping or hindering the life you want to lead.

If you routinely can’t find important things, miss bills, argue with people you live with, can’t use parts of your home, or find the clutter stressful, changing some habits may make life easier.

And if difficulties with organisation are causing significant distress or interfering with everyday life, it may be worth seeking professional help.

If clutter becomes so severe that rooms can’t be used for their intended purpose, or getting rid of possessions causes intense distress, that’s different from ordinary messiness. Hoarding disorder is a recognised mental health condition, and professional help is available.

Otherwise, you don’t need a personality transplant.

You may always be less naturally orderly than someone else. But arrange your environment to prompt the behaviours you want, establish routines that support them, and repeat them often enough, and those behaviours can become habits.

Trevor Mazzucchelli, Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology, Curtin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Last year, Australia took world-leading action by banning children under the age of 16 from having social media accounts.

It was one of the biggest social and cultural changes our country has ever faced, and it
was led by Australian parents protecting children.

When we proposed and introduced the ban, there were sceptics, there still are.

We didn’t lead the world for the sake of it.

We took action because the community said enough was enough and we would no longer let Australian kids be treated as commodities instead of children.

Our action is working. More than five million accounts have been removed or deactivated in Australia, and we have started a global movement, with more than 20 countries taking similar action to get kids off social media.

Despite our success, we know there is more to do. Our government will not back down.

This week in Canberra, we will seek to pass new legislation to double down on our efforts to protect Australian children from the harms of social media.

This legislation will give the eSafety Commissioner new powers to crack down on platforms that refuse to follow Australian laws to ensure the ban is effective.

The legislation does two things. It gives the government regulator the powers it needs to collect critical evidence, and it doubles the penalty that big tech faces for breaking Australian law.

When we passed our world-leading laws, we had bipartisan support. We said at the time we knew these laws wouldn’t be perfect and that it would take time to see the full impact.

Now, the parliament has the opportunity to come together again to strengthen bipartisan laws and to hold some of the richest organisations in the world to account for choosing company profits over child safety.

While we are strengthening the ban, we are taking the next steps to make interactions with the internet safer for all Australians – through our Digital Duty of Care.

This landmark reform will put the onus on services providers to take reasonable steps to create a safe online environment for all Australians.

We are also looking at what action we can take on harmful algorithms.

The evidence is overwhelming.

Algorithms are pushing people further and further to the extremes.

They are driving users – often young people – down rabbit holes of harmful content.

We also know harmful algorithms can be devastating for young people and body-image issues.

For young men, those paths far too often lead to misogynistic voices detached from the values and expectations of our societies.

The government is under no illusions. The connection between what is being fed to people on feeds and the terrible consequences of sexual violence that we see far too often in our communities is clear.

Every woman and every girl have the right to feel safe and must be safe at all times – in our workplaces, in our schools, in our sporting clubs, in our homes and online.

This is not about giving government control. It’s about giving people control.

People should have control of what they consume, and tech companies have a responsibility for what they platform on their services.

Advocates such as Chanel Contos and Teach Us Consent have highlighted the dangers of systems that push content on to users they may not be looking for – and which may harm them.

The Digital Duty of Care will place the responsibility on platforms to provide a safe online environment for all Australians.

We want to give users more choice of their digital platforms, rather than platforms having control over people.

Contributing Author: PM Anthony Albanese

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. The Australia Today is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, suitability, or validity of any information in this article. All information is provided on an as-is basis. The information, facts, or opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of The Australia Today, and The Australia Today News does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same. This Op-ed has been provided by PM&C.

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High school teacher and former refugee Netra Ghimire is running for a New Zealand parliamentary seat from Palmerston North. The Opportunity Party candidate was born and raised in a refugee camp in Nepal. He resettled in New Zealand when he was 11 years old.

“That gives me a perspective shaped by both migration and community, and I understand how important it is to feel a sense of belonging. Palmerston North is also one of New Zealand’s major refugee resettlement centres,” Ghimire said.

He added that he plans to break the establishment gridlock to enter the Beehive by doing politics differently. He intends to achieve this by listening to people, connecting with communities, and putting evidence and practical solutions ahead of political point-scoring. Adding on, he particularly wants to give young people a stronger voice in decisions that will shape their future.

Ghimire said that he reminds himself that serving in Parliament would be a privilege, not a personal entitlement.

“There will always be pressure, criticism and disagreement, but if you stay grounded in why you are there and who you are serving, you can handle it. I think pressure can also be healthy when it keeps you accountable,” Ghimire said.

When asked about how many qualified Asian migrants work in low-skilled jobs to make a living and what his strategy is to overcome this, Ghimire said we need an economy where people’s skills are properly valued and where hard work leads to a decent standard of living, and more broadly, his goal is to build a New Zealand where someone working full-time can afford the essentials, have a secure home and have the opportunity to build a meaningful life.

Ghimire addressed the legislative policies needed to create a level playing field for upcoming migrants: “This is an area where we are still developing our policy position, so I don’t want to pretend we have a fully formed answer when we don’t.

“But the principle is straightforward: if someone has valuable skills and qualifications, we should have systems that allow them to use those skills rather than leaving them underemployed.”

Regarding concerns that many migrants use New Zealand as a backdoor to permanently move to Australia, causing potential local workforce shortages: “Again, we are still developing our detailed position on this,” Ghimire said. “But I think the bigger question is why people choose to leave. If New Zealand offers good jobs, affordable housing, quality public services and a genuinely good quality of life, we are far more likely to retain the people we need.”

“I would say judge me on what I do, not what boxes I tick. My background is part of who I am, but I am standing because I want to contribute to the future of Palmerston North and New Zealand. Ultimately, I’m here to serve,” Ghimire stated when asked how he responds to the idea that his candidacy might be viewed as ticking multiple boxes.

The Opportunity Party is led by Fiji-born Quilae “Q” Wong. The party was formed in 2016 and has yet to win a seat in the New Zealand’s Parliamentary elections. As per their website, The Opportunity Party claims that they come from all walks of life but none of us is a career politician.

The current incumbent Member of Parliament (MP) for Palmerston North and Ghimire’s opponent is Tangi Utikere of the Labour Party. Utikere will re-contest this seat during the elections in November.

While it may be a long shot, if elected, Netra Ghimire would make history as the first Nepali-origin Member of the New Zealand Parliament.

Contributing Author: Shymal Kumar is a final-year journalism student at the University of the South Pacific, undertaking his journalism internship with The Australia Today as part of his academic and career development. His journalism focuses on data-driven investigative reporting and challenging conventional media narratives to promote independent and balanced journalism.

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The post From refugee camp in Nepal to New Zealand Parliament: Netra Ghimire aims for historic first first appeared on The Australia Today.

Australia has passed a grim milestone. Gross government debt has surged past $1 trillion for the first time in our history.

For many in the Indian Australian diaspora who came to this country to build a better future — through small businesses, trades, healthcare, IT and professional work — this isn’t an abstract number. 

It’s a bill that lands on every taxpayer, including the thousands of Indian Australian- families running small businesses, working double shifts, and trying to get ahead in one of the most expensive cost-of-living environments in a generation. 

Interest repayments on this debt are now the fastest-growing single item in the federal budget. This financial year they will around $30 billion — roughly the entire annual bill for Medicare.  

That works out to about $2,300 a year in interest for every taxpayer. Money that isn’t going to hospitals, roads, schools or small business support. It’s going straight to servicing debt. And it’s only getting worse. Government debt is projected to keep growing under this government, reaching $1.25 trillion within three years. Worse still, interest rates on this debt are far higher than they used to be — around 5% today, compared to less than 2% a few years ago.

Recently in Parliament, I asked what the government’s strategy was to get this debt under control. The answer? There isn’t one.

This government talks constantly about “intergenerational fairness.” But there is nothing fair about saddling our children — many of whom are the next generation growing up in migrant families across this country — with a mountain of debt and a crushing interest burden they had no say in creating.

For the Indian Australian community who have built their lives on the values of hard work, saving, and building something for future generations, this should matter deeply.

Labor is steering Australia toward a high debt, low-growth economy. An economy restricted by heavy government spending, high taxes, excessive regulation, and a small business sector under real pressure.

Many of our community’s small business owners — in retail, hospitality, transport, IT services and beyond — are already telling me how hard it has become to stay afloat. 

That is why the next election matters so much. It will be our chance to change course before this economic mismanagement becomes irreversible, and before the bill gets handed to a generation that never agreed to it.

Contributing Author: Dave Sharma is Shadow Assistant Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, Shadow Assistant Minister for International Development and the Indo-Pacific, and Senator for New South Wales

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The post $1 trillion in debt and counting: Who will pay the bill? first appeared on The Australia Today.

The annual Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) Leaders Meeting is underway in Palau, and already there has been controversy.

First, it’s a leaders meeting with a distinct lack of leaders. Second, China is reportedly furious that Taiwan is represented at the meeting in its own right.

The fact that the leaders of five of the forum’s 18 members are absent – Kiribati, Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa and Solomon Islands – has raised questions about China’s role in their withdrawal. New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters said the collective absence was “highly suspicious” but did not make any direct accusation.

It has come at a time when there are many pressing issues facing Pacific Islands nations, which the forum is ideally placed to tackle.

The forum’s importance

The leaders meeting is central to Pacific diplomatic architecture. It’s the preeminent regional diplomatic institution providing a platform to voice a Pacific agenda.

On occasion, Australian prime ministers have been criticised for non-attendance, and the excuse has usually been domestic politics. This is clearly the case for several Pacific Island countries this year. For example, Solomon Islands Prime Minister Matthew Wale returned home to respond to a no confidence motion. It is a reminder that all foreign policy is driven by domestic considerations. Nonetheless, non-attendance is regionally significant.

It has been suggested some of the missing leaders may have been influenced by China. Beijing has threatened “consequences” over the Taiwanese delegation’s participation in Palau.

All this means this year’s meeting theme, “Building Economies: Life. Action. Unity”, is looking shaky.

The Pacific prides itself on unity. The “Pacific way” of diplomacy focuses on consensus. It is distinctive and effective in managing diverse interests in a culturally sound way. But the Pacific way is being challenged by outside forces and from within.

Geopolitics causing ructions in the region

Geopolitics is the prime reason, and its influence can be seen at all levels in this crisis. Core issues are China’s increasing assertiveness in the Pacific and the unintended consequences of Australia’s successful bilateral approach.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese would have been looking forward to this year’s meeting, but Canberra’s recent geopolitical successes may be a double-edged sword.

China competes with Australia by attempting to gain influence through persuasion. Aid is used to benefit Pacific Island countries. China challenged Australia in the 2010s, but Canberra responded and never lost its position as the top donor. The Lowy Aid map has clearly tracked the rise and decline in Chinese aid.

Within aid budgets a key battleground was infrastructure, which Australia largely avoided to focus on capacity-building in governance, education and health. China’s approach directly benefited elites. It was also electorally useful as benefits trickled down to ordinary Pacific islanders through their leaders. Canberra met China’s infrastructure challenge, albeit with rigorous engineering and anti-corruption standards. https://www.youtube.com/embed/TULlGsphAu8?wmode=transparent&start=0

Another issue is the threat of China establishing a military “base” in the Pacific. Rumours led to panic by some elements in the Australian media and a firm diplomatic response from Canberra. Australia ensured this diplomatic “red line” was never crossed through rigorous military and policing diplomacy.

China signed a security arrangement with the Solomons in 2022. Australia then secured security treaties with Tuvalu (2023), Naoero (formerly Nauru) (2024), Papua New Guinea (2025), Vanuatu (2026) and Fiji (2026).

Many Pacific Island leaders have embraced Australia’s bilateral entreaties that elevate Canberra’s geopolitical concerns. This is in contrast to the forum’s multilateral approach and could be viewed as contrary to the Pacific way.

Meanwhile, China was planning an intercontinental ballistic missile test that splashed into Pacific waters while the Ocean of Peace treaty was being signed in Suva. Needless to say, Pacific Islands leaders were not impressed, but taking sides in a geopolitical contest has consequences.

Why unity is key

Much of China’s assertiveness is focused on combating the diplomatic recognition of Taiwan. The Pacific is a central battleground in this contest. Palau is one of the few countries that recognises Taiwan. So it is difficult to separate China’s geopolitical motives with respect to competing with Australia or countering Taiwan.

Without unity, a Pacific agenda cannot be furthered. Sustainable economics is certainly a worthy focus for leaders. The Pacific has been disproportionately affected by the disruption of global supply chains caused by the US-Iran War. Belts have been tightened, and the transition to renewable energy accelerated.

But the reality is the wellbeing of Pacific islanders has been adversely impacted. Pacific governments have had fewer resources to respond. The long shadow of COVID still hangs over the region, so coordinated regional action is needed.

The forum secretariat in Suva handles routine diplomacy between Pacific Islands countries. Without the unity of Pacific leaders, it loses the authority to further core agendas on vital issues such as climate change, the Blue Pacific strategy and the Ocean of Peace Alliance between Australia and Fiji.

Pacific Island leaders can benefit from engaging in the geopolitical contest between China and Australia. But ultimately, this is distraction from the pressing issues facing the Pacific.

Author: Michael O’Keefe, Director, Master of International Relations, Department of Politics, Media and Philosophy, La Trobe University

Disclaimer: This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Leaders missing and China ‘furious’: the Pacific Islands forum off to a decidedly shaky start first appeared on The Australia Today.

A flash flood can transform a river within minutes. This is what communities near the Nepal-Tibet border witnessed on Wednesday.

A massive flash flood ripped through villages along the Bhote Koshi–Trishuli river system carrying mud, debris and fast-flowing water. It has claimed the lives of at least 469 people and left hundreds more missing, including 39 Australians. Preliminary investigations suggest the flood was caused by a major collapse of ice and rock high in the Himalayas.

During such disasters, every extra minute is valuable time to reach higher ground. So how can we ensure communities are prepared in the face of such rapidly developing hazards?

Our research suggests early warning systems may help.

How do early warning systems work?

Early warning systems use various tools, data and communication channels to detect natural disasters before they strike.

These systems do much more than send a text message after a flood or fire has started. They are designed to identify a potential hazard early, track it as it develops, and forecast where it may go. The most effective early warning systems communicate this information quickly, enabling the public and emergency responders to act.

These systems have saved lives. In the Swiss village of Blatten, monitoring enabled authorities to evacuate residents before a massive rock-ice avalanche swept through the region in 2025. In Iceland, monitoring and established emergency procedures allowed more than 800 people to escape sudden glacial floods during the 2010 Eyjafjallajökull eruption.

Tracking where a disaster travels and how it develops is crucial. In the case of floods, river-monitoring stations at strategic intervals can measure water level and discharge. Cameras and other sensors can provide information about flow velocity and debris. Combined with real-time flood modelling, these observations can indicate when a flood may reach downstream communities, how severe it could be, and which areas may be inundated.

This information also helps emergency responders. If authorities know one settlement may have 20 minutes before a flood arrives while another has 50 minutes, they can prioritise evacuations, position rescue teams, and identify roads and bridges that may soon become inaccessible.

When warnings aren’t enough

In Nepal, emergency warnings were sent out but were not enough to save local villages.

The cascading disaster was triggered by the collapse of a massive glacier in Nepal’s Langtang national park at about 8:40am. Nepal’s Flood Forecasting Division soon received information that a major flood had entered the Bhote Koshi river system from Tibet.

Within minutes, more than 600,000 mobile warning messages were sent to the public. By then, the Syabrubesi monitoring station in northern Nepal had already stopped transmitting. As the flood moved downstream, authorities continued to track it and issue warnings.

Nepalese authorities have known about the risk of such a disaster occurring for years. A 2020 assessment by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development and the United Nations Development Programme identified 47 potentially dangerous glacial lakes across the region’s main river basins. This was based on data from satellite images and other remote-sensing technologies used to monitor glacier activity. High-risk areas can then be monitored using cameras, lake-level gauges, weather stations, and sensors measuring ground or ice movement.

The Nepali government has rolled out similar technology at Imja Lake, a fast-growing glacial lake in the Himalayas. Authorities installed sensors and automated sirens in 2016, but these have since fallen into disrepair.

Not foolproof

The catastrophic Nepal flood reveals the limitations of early warning systems.

For communities close to the source, flood warnings simply came too late. This is why warning systems should be automated wherever possible. When sensors detect dangerous conditions, information should immediately reach forecasting and emergency authorities. Location-based mobile alerts must then be sent to people in threatened areas.

But mobile networks and electricity can fail, so phones cannot be the only solution. Sirens, radio and trained local task forces provide essential backup and ensure people know where to go and which evacuation routes to follow.

The monitoring network itself must be resilient. In Nepal, several weather stations stopped transmitting or were swept away during the recent floods. Monitoring infrastructure must be designed to keep functioning even if some instruments fail. This may involve establishing more strategically spaced weather stations, communication pathways, and backup power systems.

More work needed

Early warning systems cannot prevent natural disasters or fully protect vulnerable communities. They must be used alongside hazard mapping, which identifies areas that are more vulnerable to a particular disaster. Resilient infrastructure and established evacuation routes are also vital to prepare for natural disasters.

Research must focus on what interventions are most effective and in what regions. In the wake of the recent Nepal floods, several important questions remain, including how closely river-monitoring stations should be spaced, and how much warning time different communities need to evacuate safely.

Communities may have only minutes before a disaster strikes. An effective early warning system is about making every one of those minutes count.

You can support the Nepal Flood Disaster Appeal through the Emergency Action Alliance website or by calling 1300 939 000.

Prashidha Khatiwada, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, School of Engineering, Swinburne University of Technology

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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More than 150 people are dead and hundreds more missing after an enormous wave of water, ice, mud and rock cascaded more than 170 kilometres down the Bhote Koshi River valley in Nepal. The valley is the main link between Kathmandu in Nepal and Lhasa in Tibet. At least 34 Australians are missing. There was little warning.

Footage of the debris-laden flash flood is shocking. It is, unfortunately, not surprising.

As an expert in glaciers, I have tracked their accelerating retreat around the world as they melt – and the disasters that can follow. Early analysis suggests the abrupt collapse of a glacier triggered the disaster.

As climate change intensifies, glaciers worldwide are melting – even in high regions such as the Himalayas. The Himalayas are especially vulnerable, because the steep slopes of many of these very tall mountains are made of permafrost – rock and soil frozen for centuries. As temperatures rise, these slopes are beginning to melt or destabilise. If an earthquake or slope failure occurs, it can trigger a sudden and devastating debris flow.

It’s too early to say this was the exact cause. But we know that the great ice stores of the Himalayas – known as the world’s “third pole” because it contains the largest amount of snow and ice after the Arctic and Antarctic – are no longer safe.

What do we know about this disaster?

What happened in Nepal is likely due to an enormous ice-and-rock landslide sweeping down a mountain pass and gathering up ice, water, rock, trees and dirt.

The landslide was so large it was originally thought to be an earthquake, as the seismic energy registered as a 4.4 magnitude quake on seismographs.

By the time it reached Gyirong Port – a China-Nepal border crossing – the wall of debris resembled a tsunami of dirt. Early estimates suggest the wave may have been 30 metres high.

What are the likely causes?

Sometimes, disasters like these can be caused when glacial meltwater trapped in a lake by a landslide breaks free. One of these events – known as a glacial lake outburst flood – hit Nepal in 2024.

But early analysis suggests this isn’t the case here. Satellite imagery suggests the landslide may have carved away large parts of a glacier, triggering its collapse.

We don’t know yet what caused the glacier to collapse. But glaciers worldwide are broadly in retreat – and flood and debris flow disasters can follow.

A smaller flood hit the same district in Nepal last year, killing nine people. Also last year, a melting glacier in Switzerland triggered a huge debris flow that destroyed the village of Blatten. In 2023, a landslide and subsequent flood in my home country of Georgia killed 33 people at a mountain resort.

But this disaster is one of the largest so far.

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/lsjYC

Permafrost is vulnerable

The high-elevation glaciers of the Himalayas can respond differently to climate change than glaciers at lower elevations or in relatively warmer regions. Thawing and degrading permafrost can also contribute by making steep Himalayan slopes less stable.

Permafrost is ground containing rock, soil and ice that has remained at or below 0°C for many years. As the climate warms, the ground can thaw, weakening the ice that helps bind rock and soil together.

On steep mountain slopes, this loss of frozen ground can make slopes less stable and make rockfalls, landslides and other forms of ground movement more likely. An earthquake, rockfall or other disturbance can then trigger a rapid downslope movement of rock, soil and debris.

Can these disasters be prevented?

No one died when the Swiss glacier collapsed. That’s because early warning systems were in place. Authorities evacuated residents before it fell.

As temperatures rise and climate-related disasters become more frequent or severe in some regions, early warning systems will become increasingly important for villages and towns located near glaciers or thawing permafrost.

These systems can monitor rapidly rising river levels, intense rainfall and seismic waves to alert authorities before disaster strikes.

However, installing and maintaining effective early warning systems can require significant investment. That’s a challenge for lower-income and developing countries. In good news, the Green Climate Fund last year announced funding for better monitoring systems in Nepal.

There’s another problem, too. Meltwater from Himalayan glaciers feeds rivers that are vital to billions of people across Nepal, Pakistan, India and China.

As the climate warms, increased glacier melt can temporarily increase river flows and, in some places, contribute to flood risk. But as glaciers continue to shrink, their contribution may eventually decline and lead to less water availability – particularly during the dry season.

Rapidly reducing greenhouse gas emissions, investment in early warning systems and better monitoring of vulnerable mountain regions can help communities prepare. These measures cannot prevent every disaster, but they can save lives and give people a better chance to adapt to a changing climate.

Levan Tielidze, Research Fellow in Glacial Geomorphology, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Tsunami of dirt: what caused Nepal’s deadly glacial flood? first appeared on The Australia Today.

As per ABC News, the July directive from Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke prioritises skilled workers already in Australia, while most offshore applicants have been pushed to the back of the queue.

Defence and law enforcement workers receive the highest priority, followed by construction, healthcare and teaching workers who are already in Australia.

Most skilled workers applying from overseas fall into the lowest priority category unless they work in defence or law enforcement.

The change has triggered warnings from business groups already struggling to fill critical vacancies.

Australian Industry Group chief executive Innes Willox told ABC that some visa decisions had stretched from weeks to almost a year, describing the system as an “emergency stopping lane” after the post-COVID processing “fast lane”.

Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive Andrew McKellar sadded that the Government risked slowing access to workers needed by Australian businesses.

The changes come as Burke prepares a broader migration overhaul aimed at reducing Net Overseas Migration from about 300,000 to 225,000 by 2028.

The new processing order does not change eligibility requirements for skilled visas, but it determines which applications are considered first.

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It’s a cold winter afternoon and you’ve just brought the washing in. Suddenly, you pause. Are these clothes a bit damp?

In the laundry basket, your hand can clearly distinguish the textures of silky shirts, woollen jumpers, cotton bed sheets. So why is it so hard to tell whether the washing is cold and damp, or just cold?

A sensible guess might be that our hands are numb from the cold, making it harder to detect wetness. The less intuitive reality is that we humans completely lack any specialised sensors that respond to “wetness” in the first place.

That’s right – your skin alone can’t actually detect if something is damp.

How do we tell if something is wet?

Our ability to sense information about our external environment starts at nerve cell endings in our skin.

There are specialised molecules on the surface of these nerve cells called sensory receptors. They convert environmental information into a biological signal, which is amplified into an electrical impulse and transmitted along nerve cells to the brain.

There are numerous different sensory receptors in nerve cells that are activated by cold, warmth or damaging heat. There are also sensory receptors that respond to very precise tactile information such as vibration, friction or stretch.

When you put your hand in that laundry basket, all the information about temperature and texture comes from the relevant sensory receptors in your hand.

The electrical signals triggered by these multiple inputs can also be integrated together in the central nervous system, or the brain. In this way, we can infer an extraordinarily nuanced sense of our environment.

Our experience of wetness arises in this way. It comes from the combined input of cold and friction receptors, refined by association with previous experience.

This means our brain can detect wetness without needing a specific sensory receptor activated by moisture. All we need is a set of related sensory inputs that, taken together, are consistent with our concept of wetness.

This integration of information even extends to include our other senses (the look, smell and sound of the material), and draws on related context (such as “is it currently raining?”) to inform our subconscious assessment of whether something is wet.

It’s not a perfect system

Sensory integration is only as good as the quality of input it receives. It can be hard to feel if clothes are damp in wintry conditions, because both cold and wet things activate our cold receptors.

Likewise, in hot weather it’s much easier to tell when our skin or clothes are damp, as evaporation leads to both local cooling and a slight change in pressure on the skin.

However, we can experience similar challenges in sensing wetness in a warm environment: try closing your eyes in a warm bath and lying still. Without evaporation or cooling from the contact of water against your submerged skin, it can become difficult to consciously perceive that those parts are wet – at least until you lift your arm out of the water and the skin cools as water evaporates.

Our lack of specific wet receptors doesn’t mean our perception of wetness is an illusion generated by our brain. Sensory integration allows us to sense a consistent and tangible quality of objects.

While this sense may sometimes be unreliable, our perception of wetness is not totally untrustworthy. On the contrary, the precision with which we navigate our environment by combining information from different sensory receptors is, frankly, awe-inspiring.

There’s a way to help your brain

Next time you’re trying to figure out whether your washing is damp or just cold, you can try and use some of these insights.

Help your brain out by adding additional context to the signals you’re receiving from the nerve endings in your hand. Squeezing or rubbing the clothes to generate more friction can enhance the mechanical information that influences our ability to detect wetness.

You can also try using visual information, such as variations in colour across the fabric when lightly stretched, to add fresh sensory context.

Or, shifting from cold and damp to warm and damp by heating a small part of material with a hairdryer (or your own breath) will make it much easier to tell if the clothes are dry, or … if you need to hang them all out again.

Kate Poole, Associate Professor in Physiology, UNSW and Felix Aplin, Lecturer, Department of Physiology and Translational Neuroscience Facility, School of Biomedical Sciences, UNSW

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Is the laundry still damp, or just cold? Why your skin can’t tell the difference first appeared on The Australia Today.

This speech was delivered at the launch of the Australian Council for International Development’s (ACFID) State of the Sector Report 2026 on 6 August 2026.

I acknowledge the Ngunnawal people, the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we meet, and pay my respects to Elders past and present. I extend that respect to all First Nations people here today.

On the cover of this report are Kilu and Oneidah from Boboe Island in Solomon Islands, harvesting sea grapes.

Sea grapes are a traditional food and an important source of livelihood. In Western Province, four communities have launched a women-led enterprise producing body lotion and soap from sustainably harvested sea grapes. The work draws on traditional practices and helps conserve a food source under pressure from a changing climate. It also creates new sources of income.

The project is supported through Climate Resilient by Nature, an Australian Government initiative delivered in partnership with WWF-Australia.

That cover image captures much of what good development looks like. Local knowledge shapes the work. A trusted partnership supplies support. Environmental care and economic opportunity advance together.

The photograph shows people at work. The pages that follow give us the evidence behind that work.

Good sector data helps organisations see changes and lets funders test assumptions. It also gives the public a clearer view of how the sector uses trust and expertise. This report performs each of those functions.

I am delighted to launch the ACFID State of the Sector Report 2026.

Thank you to ACFID and Monash University, and to Karinda Flavell, Raewyn Lans, Aditri Saikia, Emily Moreton, Samanthi Gunawardana and Sara Niner, with support from Terence Wood. Thank you also to the organisations that contributed data and case studies. A report of this scale depends on a sector willing to examine itself closely and share what it finds.

This is the second State of the Sector report, following the first in 2018. Across 36 indicators and 10 characteristics, it provides the most comprehensive comparable picture of Australian development non-government organisations in nearly a decade.

The pressures are plain. Inflation has increased costs. Real public donations are around 20% lower than in 2015. The share of Australian adults donating to ACFID members fell from 8.3% in 2016 to 5.7% in 2023. Across a comparable group of organisations, staffing fell by around one-third between 2017 and 2022.

These figures affect organisational resilience and the capacity to plan for the long term. They also shape how many communities organisations can reach.

Alongside that strain, the report records strong performance across many areas.

ACFID members continue to set a high standard for transparency and accountability. Audited financial reporting is universal. Compliance with ethical standards for emergency appeals is consistently high. Participation in learning remains strong, with 25 active communities of practice and more than three-quarters of members involved in at least one.

The sector is also becoming more representative in important respects. Around 70% of staff are women, and women’s representation among chief executives and board directors has risen since 2016. The report identifies scope for stronger data on broader forms of diversity. Better measurement will help organisations understand who holds influence and where fresh perspectives can be brought in.

There is encouraging progress on climate integration. In 2023, 458 projects included an element of climate action, with most focused on building resilience.

This October, that work will have a global platform in the Pacific. In partnership with Australia, Fiji and Tuvalu will host the official Pacific Pre-COP events from 5 to 8 October 2026. Fiji will host the preparatory meeting, while Tuvalu will host a leaders’ event. The gatherings will bring global leaders to the Pacific to see climate impacts and Pacific-led solutions first-hand. They will also help shape priorities ahead of COP31.

The report’s new baseline for locally led development is another important contribution.

Forty-three per cent of responding members had an internal commitment or policy on locally led action or partnerships. Almost all organisations reported dedicating staff time to partner-led capacity building and institutional strengthening. Among organisations undertaking advocacy, local partners usually had some influence over that work.

These measures give the sector a basis for tracking change over time.

Locally led development means listening early and sharing decisions. It means backing local institutions and recognising where knowledge sits. That approach builds capability close to the people affected and supports solutions grounded in local priorities.

This approach sits at the heart of the Australian Government’s development program. We support solutions shaped by communities themselves across climate adaptation and health, as well as education and governance. Local organisations bring knowledge and legitimacy. Australian organisations contribute expertise and long-term relationships.

Australian non-government organisations are invaluable partners to government. You can mobilise quickly and work in fragile or hard-to-reach places. You reach people who can be overlooked by large systems, and you sustain relationships across political and funding cycles.

Your experience also improves policy. You help government understand regional challenges and shape responses. Through deep people-to-people links, you connect Australians with our region and give local partners a stronger voice in Canberra.

In 2026-27, the Albanese Government will invest $5.2 billion in official development assistance, an increase of $112 million on the previous year. More than three-quarters of that investment will benefit our region, including $2.2 billion for the Pacific and $1.4 billion for Southeast Asia.

At a time when aid budgets are shrinking elsewhere, Australia remains a reliable and responsive partner. Our development program helps shape a region that is more peaceful and prosperous. It strengthens relationships founded on mutual respect for sovereignty.

It supports human rights and social inclusion. That includes gender equality and disability equity, along with LGBTIQ+ rights.

It is also an investment in Australia’s future. Helping a community withstand a cyclone or contain an infectious disease contributes to a safer region. Supporting children to learn and protecting humanitarian workers strengthens the resilience on which shared prosperity depends.

Government works with a range of partners because different organisations bring different strengths. We choose delivery partners according to capability and context. The proportion of funding delivered through contractors varies from year to year.

Funding delivered through non-government organisations has remained broadly stable at around 10 to 11% of official development assistance over the past decade. Non-government organisations can also compete for departmental procurements.

The distinctive contribution of this sector deserves clear recognition within that mix. Non-government organisations bring public trust and specialist expertise. They also bring local partnerships and the patience required for work whose results unfold over years.

The report’s findings on public engagement deserve close attention. In 2023-24, ACFID members raised $750 million from more than 793,000 Australians. That is a formidable constituency for international development. The decline in donor participation also shows the work ahead.

The strongest case for aid often begins with a truthful account of what cooperation achieves.

It is harvesting sea grapes from a better-managed reef. It is a health worker reaching a remote community. It is a local organisation leading through the next emergency. It is an Australian donor seeing how a modest contribution becomes a larger act of solidarity.

The sector has an opportunity to tell more of these stories while keeping the rigour that this report exemplifies. Evidence gives stories weight. Stories give evidence reach. Together, they can build durable public support.

The operating environment will remain demanding. Humanitarian need is rising and climate pressure is intensifying. Civic space is narrowing in many places, while resources remain tight.

This report shows a sector learning how to work in that changed world.

Its strengths are substantial: professional standards and deep partnerships, alongside a culture of reflection and a broad community of Australian supporters. Its challenges are stated with candour, which gives the sector a solid base for action.

The task now is to use this evidence. Strengthen organisations before strain becomes fragility. Widen the circle of Australians who see themselves as participants in development. Move from local consultation towards local authority. Keep testing which partnerships produce lasting benefit.

The cover returns us to the heart of the work. Kilu and Oneidah are drawing on knowledge rooted in their community and place. Their hands are harvesting food and supporting livelihoods. Their work also cares for an ecosystem that will sustain future generations.

Good development gives people greater power to shape their own future, supported by partners who respect their knowledge and back their ambition.

Congratulations to ACFID, Monash University and everyone who contributed.

This article appeared first on Devpolicy Blog (devpolicy.org), from the Development Policy Centre at The Australian National University.

Contributing Author: Dr Andrew Leigh is Assistant Minister for Productivity, Competition, Charities and Treasury, and Federal Member for Fenner (ACT). He was formerly an economics professor at the Australian National University. He holds a PhD in Public Policy from Harvard and is the author of numerous books on economics and public policy.

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Universities are increasingly turning to oral exams to stop students using artificial intelligence (AI) to cheat.

Some unis say it allows teachers to more accurately test students’ knowledge.

Meanwhile, some NSW schools are also using oral exams to prevent cheating.

Oral exams – or “viva voces” – are one of the oldest assessment methods. But they are not a foolproof solution as universities and schools struggle to ensure academic integrity. Here’s why.

A brief history

Oral exams date back to ancient Greece. Teachers would ask students questions, which needed to be responded to on the spot to show their knowledge of a subject.

They became less common over time as written exams were easier to administer across growing numbers of students. But oral assessment never disappeared and has remained in many schools and unis.

Aside from testing a student’s knowledge, oral exams allow examiners to ask a student immediate questions and prompt them to clarify points further. An oral exam can also help students develop their public speaking and communication skills.

Not fair for all students

Despite these benefits, oral exams can create barriers for some students.

Research suggests they can increase students’ social anxiety. A German study found uni students experienced more anxiety in oral exams than written ones. If students are overly anxious, they may not be able to show examiners what they actually know.

Oral exams may also unfairly disadvantage students when they are required to speak in their non-native language. These students might have a strong understanding of the subject but might need more time to express that understanding.

Consistency can be a problem

Research suggests it is also difficult to ensure oral exams are consistent.

For example, a study of oral exams in Norwegian secondary schools found initial student presentations ranged from five to 16 minutes. At the same time, follow-up discussions ranged from seven to 23 minutes. This gave students unequal opportunities to demonstrate their knowledge. A follow-up study found with the same examiners, some students received fewer than ten questions while others received nearly 50.

These variations may not always be intentional, but they can have real impacts for students.

Can they really stop cheating?

As a measure against cheating, oral assessments are not perfect.

A student could use AI to rehearse and remember convincing answers. Another student who wrote every word may freeze under pressure.

If we are just using oral exams as an “AI lie detector”, it can turn assessment into a test of confidence, rather than learning or effort.

Making assessments fairer

My research shows effective forms of school assessment must:

• produce trusted and reliable results
• treat all students fairly
• allow appropriate flexibility for students’ different needs
• measure the intended learning. For example, a science oral should assess scientific reasoning, not speaking confidence, while an English oral would be a more appropriate place to assess speaking skills.

For oral exams, this might involve assessors telling students ahead of time the purpose of the assessment, its marking criteria and the types of questions they may be asked by examiners.

Students should also have regular opportunities to practise speaking, enough thinking time to answer questions and any appropriate adjustments made to help them feel more comfortable, for example, choosing the time of their exam, and whether they’d prefer sitting down or standing up to speak.

Examiners should use agreed, consistent prompts for follow-up questions so students have comparable opportunities to demonstrate their learning.

Along with a shared marking template, other teachers checking a sample of marks can also provide oversight without creating an unmanageable workload.

Assessments in the age of AI

Research suggests oral exams are most useful when used alongside written or practical assessments, rather than replacing them.

For example, rather than replacing a history essay with an oral exam, students could submit an annotated essay draft and reference list, followed by a five-minute conversation with the teacher. In this discussion, the student might explain their decision to include a specific reference, one notable revision they made and how any AI assistance shaped their thinking.

A well-designed oral exam can show how students have engaged with a topic, and support a meaningful conversation between teacher and student. This can strengthen assessment and trust.

Used as a form of interrogation, it may simply replace an integrity problem with a fairness problem – as well as a lot more work for examiners.

Nicole Brownlie, Lecturer in Education, University of Southern Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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By James C. Murphy, Emily Foley, Phoebe Hayman, and Tenzin Liddy-Corlett

A new poll of Victorians shows almost half of respondents who voted Labor in the 2022 state election intend to vote differently this November, with more than 13% moving their vote to One Nation and a further 11% intending to vote for the Coalition.

The survey, conducted by Accent Research as part of an in-depth study of the Victorian state election funded by the University of Melbourne, also found the cost of living was easily the most pressing issue for voters, with more than 68% listing it in their top three concerns.

Worryingly for the Carroll Labor government, just 18.8% of voters thought Labor was the party best able to deal with cost-of-living issues, behind the Coalition (23.9%) and just ahead of One Nation (15.7%).

While much of the campaigning efforts against the Labor government have been directed at issues of corruption, voters say household financial pressures will be the key issue in November.

The key issues

Our poll, made up of a representative sample of 1,002 Victorians, asked voters to nominate their biggest issues this election.

Two thirds of our sample — 68% — nominated cost of living as one of their “top three” issues when presented with a list of a dozen policy areas to choose from. 56% put crime in their top three, and 38% did so for health. Other issues — corruption, public debt, schools, the environment — were lower down in voter priorities.

Cost of living is not a surprise issue: it has rated high across Australia for some time, with inflation a persistent pressure and a series of interest rate rises biting, though perhaps slightly less in Victoria than other states.

Crime has also been a significant political issue in Victoria for several years. Both the media and the state opposition have claimed Victoria is in a “crime crisis”, though the latest statistics suggest crime rates are declining.

The appearance of health in the top three is more surprising. It is of course a perennial issue, but hospitals have not been a major feature of the political debate in Victoria — certainly not in the way they were at the last election. However, recent strikes by healthcare workers might be a sign the issue will grow in salience.

When asked which parties they trusted most to handle those issues, more respondents (24%) said the Coalition was the best party to address cost of living than said Labor (19%) or One Nation (16%).

This is somewhat surprising, in that federally the Labor Party was normally rated as better at addressing cost-of-living pressures in national polls.

The Coalition won on crime, too: a quarter of our sample said Liberals or Nationals were best at dealing with this, though One Nation was close behind, with 22% preferring them. Only 16% of respondents rated Labor as best on crime.

On health, Labor remains the preferred party, as it often is in such polls, at state and federal level. But its lead could be stronger: 26% said Labor was best to deal with health, with 21% opting for the Coalition and 13% nominating One Nation.

Labor ‘defectors’ and ‘remainers’

About 35% of respondents said they voted for Labor in the 2022 state election — the post-COVID “Danslide” that saw Labor take 56 seats in the 88-seat Legislative Assembly.

Labor appears to be losing a big chunk of those voters. Just 57% of people who voted Labor at the last state election say they will stick with them this year. 11% of this group said they intended to vote instead for the Coalition in November, while even more — 13.4% — intended to shift to One Nation. 8.5% were moving to Greens and 6.8% were undecided.

This much tracks to the broad picture in other polls: Labor is recording much less support than four years ago. But what do these Labor “defectors” care about?

Our poll found the top issues for this group were the same as the full sample: cost of living, crime and health. 77% of this group ranked cost of living in their top three issues and nearly half (47%) ranked this as their number one — easily the biggest issue, and something Labor has spent big to try to ease — but perhaps not enough.

Crime was in the top three for about half of Labor defectors. This might suggest Coalition attacks against Labor, accompanied by high-profile campaign promises on recruiting more police and restricting bail, have cut through.

Labor has matched the Coalition on some of these policies, including controversial “adult time for adult crime” laws, but this appears not to be enough to convince voters of its tough-on-crime bonafides.

Health was top three for 43% of Labor defectors — an interesting finding, suggesting Labor’s ownership of the issue is relatively soft, and opinions divided.

Also interesting is what is not in this list. Missing are two big issues the Coalition and media critics are focused on: “corruption”, ranked in the top three of issues for just 15% of Labor defectors; and government debt, which was in the top three for 12%.

Complicating this picture is the fact that Labor “remainers” had the same set of top three issues as “defectors”: cost of living, healthcare and hospitals, and crime and public safety. This is perhaps an indication voters are thinking about the same set of issues — they are not siloed off in echo-chambers, thinking about radically different issues — but are divided over how well Labor is addressing them.

One Nation wins converts

The most unusual aspect of this state election is the rapid rise of One Nation in the polls. Our poll found only 16% of respondents planning to support One Nation this November supported them in the 2025 federal election and the 2022 Victorian election. The vast majority of our sample intending to support the party – 70% – did not vote for them in 2022.

These One Nation “converts” were strongly united in their concern about crime (79% put it in their top three) and cost of living (62%), with government finances and debt (29%) and corruption (28%) trailing further back.

This sky-high concern about crime with One Nation converts is interesting: more rated it in their top three issues than did Coalition converts (only 54% of this cohort put crime in their top three).

And of the respondents saying they were Coalition-to-One-Nation converts — not a large group, only 8% of our sample — a whopping 86% rated crime in their top three.

This complicates our understanding of how crime concern is playing politically. It might be that all the Coalition’s crime campaigning is sending some voters over to One Nation instead of themselves — indeed, even sending away some who were previously in their camp.

Cost of living, crime and health will be a focus in November

This is just one poll, one snapshot in time. The intent is not to try to project the election outcome with any precision. Rather, the goal is to gain insights into which issues voters really care about, and from there, to see how parties go about responding to that, and with what success.

In particular, this poll helps us better understand the degree to which ‘issue salience’ and ‘issue ownership’ moves or is fixed. The academic literature is divided on this.

These early results suggest Labor ownership of health and cost of living has slipped, and Coalition ownership of crime is being contested by One Nation. This could have government-changing implications in November.

James C. Murphy, Lecturer & Tutor (Teaching Intensive) in Politics and Public Policy, The University of Melbourne; Emily Foley, Postdoctoral research fellow, Flinders University; University of Canberra; Phoebe Hayman, PhD Candidate and Casual Academic in Politics, La Trobe University, and Tenzin Liddy-Corlett, PhD candidate in Politics, La Trobe University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Exclusive poll shows nearly half of respondents defecting from Victorian Labor. What do these voters care about? first appeared on The Australia Today.

Delegates attending the Pacific HIV Symposium in Fiji next week will be confronting one of the region’s most urgent health challenges: the fastest growing HIV outbreak in the world.

HIV prevalence among adults in Fiji is now 1.6%. This means about one in 60 adults lives with the virus.

This is likely the tip of the iceberg: just one-third of people living with HIV in Fiji know their status, and only a quarter are receiving treatment.

Experts project yearly infections will triple by 2030. Sadly, the equivalent of one child every week is born with HIV in Fiji, while one dies of AIDS-related complications every month.

This is a public health emergency whose causes and consequences extend well beyond Fiji’s islands. In a region connected by travel, work, study and family ties, the challenge demands attention, support and informed engagement from its neighbours.

An outbreak with many causes

The crisis is already gaining international attention, with Fiji in the spotlight at the AIDS2026 conference in Rio de Janeiro in July. The head of Fiji’s national HIV outbreak cluster response task force, Jason Mitchell, told delegates:

It’s important to talk about what’s happening in Fiji, as it can happen anywhere in the world.

No single factor explains the outbreak.

Health authorities and experts point to a combination of rising methamphetamine use and needle sharing, disruptions to funding for prevention and treatment services, health system pressures and a culture of silence and stigma surrounding HIV.

Since declaring the outbreak in January 2025, Fiji has established a dedicated HIV response task force and expanded testing and treatment. There is increasing emphasis on prevention tools.

PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis), a highly effective medicine taken to prevent HIV, is now available. Fiji is now also in the queue for the long-acting HIV prevention drug Lenacapavir, as the Global Fund – a worldwide partnership to defeat AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria – expands access.

Fiji is also working with international partners to strengthen its response. Australia recently announced a contribution of more than US$10 million to support Fiji’s HIV response. UNAIDS, the World Health Organization and many other international agencies are providing financial, technical and on-the-ground support.

Why this matters beyond Fiji

Despite this progress, Fiji’s outbreak represents a significant health security risk to the region. Many New Zealanders and Australians have close connections to Fiji through tourism, seasonal employment, education and family networks.

Fiji is also a major regional hub, connecting communities across the wider Pacific. This does not mean travellers should be alarmed. HIV is not transmitted through casual contact or everyday social interactions.

Just as importantly, it is no longer the death sentence it was once perceived to be. With early diagnosis and effective treatment, it is managed as a chronic health condition, and people living with HIV can expect to live long, healthy lives.

Understanding the situation in Fiji is not about avoiding travel. It is about encouraging informed and responsible behaviour (including condom use), access to HIV prevention tools and regular testing for those who may have been exposed to risk.

Such precautions are relevant whether someone is travelling to Fiji, Auckland, Sydney or anywhere else. HIV is a global health issue, not a uniquely Fijian one.

But one of the greatest challenges facing the response is social stigma, which research shows discourages people from testing, delays treatment and undermines public health efforts.

A regional response is vital

Concerns about confidentiality, shame and discrimination can make it difficult for people to seek support, particularly in smaller and more closely connected communities.

Similar barriers can affect Fijian health professionals diagnosed with HIV, as well as Pacific peoples living in New Zealand and Australia.

This is why culturally safe services that recognise the realities of Pacific communities and reflect Pacific values are so important for supporting confidentiality and trust.

Similarly, health authorities in New Zealand and Australia prioritise their own domestic preparedness and security in an outbreak so close to home. But these measures also need to avoid creating further stigma.

Public health challenges in the Pacific – be they caused by HIV, other infectious diseases or climate change – are increasingly regional in nature. Fiji cannot do this alone and is still calling for support, funding and technical and capacity-building assistance.

It is hoped this week’s Pacific HIV Symposium can build on what has already been offered and help the country’s health workers, community leaders and people living with HIV to confront this urgent challenge.

Sharon McLennan, Senior Research and Teaching Fellow, School of Health, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made a fresh plea for Australia to be given relief from US President Donald Trump’s tariffs during a phone call between the two leaders overnight Thursday.

Trump agreed to “consider” the request.

Albanese described the wide-ranging conversation as productive, constructive and “very warm”.

He told a Friday news conference he asked Trump to “consider a full exemption” from the recently imposed 12.5% tariff, “or at the very least no increase” from the earlier 10% tariff. Australia makes repeated representations against Trump’s tariffs.

The 12.5% has been imposed on a range of countries, including Australia, on the pretext they haven’t dealt with forced labour issues adequately.

In the discussion, Albanese pointed to Australia’s record on issues such as modern slavery, as well as reminding Trump of the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement.

Australia and the president had different positions on tariffs, Albanese said. “But I did ask that Australia’s position as a friend of the United States be considered and the president agreed that he would give consideration to my request.”

Albanese said he and Trump would engage further when the prime minister visits the US at least twice in coming months. He will be at the United Nations in New York in September and then the G20 in Florida in December.

The discussion also covered the Middle East, regional issues, AUKUS, critical minerals and artificial intelligence. Albanese said they also canvassed “a few personal issues” that he didn’t detail, and said the president had asked for “his best wishes [to be passed on] to the people of Australia”.

Heavy vehicle reforms to boost productivity

A Friday meeting of federal, state and territory treasurers endorsed heavy vehicle reforms designed to boost productivity.

It is estimated the changes will increase GDP by up to $4.4 billion a year, making for a better road freight service that will benefit suppliers and consumers.

The federal government’s Heavy Vehicle Productivity Reform package will provide $400 million to the states and territories to implement the reforms.

They include harmonising access for truck drivers crossing state borders; getting more zero-emissions trucks onto the roads by removing regulatory barriers and improving the availability of charging infrastructure, and strengthening drivers’ skills.

The funding will come from the $900 million National Productivity Fund.

Government signals disagreement with Productivity Commnission’s GST report

Treasurers were briefed at their meeting by the head of the Productivity Commission, Danielle Wood, on the commission’s interim report on the distribution of the GST.

This report recommends unwinding the generous deal that current arrangements give Western Australia. The deal was put in place by the Morrison government.

But Treasurer Jim Chalmers said “without pre-empting [the commission’s final report later this year] the Albanese government has been clear that Western Australia must always get its fair share”.

The commission’s review was required under legislation rather than being ordered by the government.

The eastern states attack WA’s special treatment under the present arrangements.

But Labor holds the bulk of federal seats in that state, which influences its position on calls for change.

Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Mid-August is a season of independence for millions of Australians with roots across South Asia, who now call Australia home. This year, Aware Super is marking the occasion with a shared message: the leap continues beyond arrival.

For many migrant Australians, independence began well before retirement. It began with the courageous decision to leave behind the familiar and build a new life in Australia. Financial independence is the next chapter of that journey – the freedom and security that comes from knowing years of hard work have created a strong foundation for the future.

For Aware Super, that journey is seen and valued. As one of Australia’s leading profit-to-member superannuation funds, we serve members from a wide range of cultural backgrounds and lived experiences, recognising that every member’s pathway to financial security and retirement planning is different. We support members throughout their retirement journey – a commitment that reflects our broader approach to social impact and inclusion.

In practice, that means helping people and communities build deeper engagement with super by ensuring it is relevant to their lives, long-term goals and financial priorities. Super is part of a broader journey of building financial security — for members themselves, their families and future generations. For Aware Super, that means helping members understand, access and safeguard their super at the moments and life stages that matter — from a first job and family milestones to supporting loved ones overseas, buying a first home and planning well before retirement.

“For many people and communities across Australia, building financial security is part of a much bigger journey — one that spans work, family, community and future generations,” said Aware Super CEO Deanne Stewart.

“Many have made sacrifices, created opportunities for current and future generations, and contributed enormously to our communities and economy. They deserve to feel just as confident about their financial future, and to know that their journey is recognised and valued.

Financial independence is another leap – one that is built gradually, pay by pay, over many years. We want every member to be supported across their journey.”

Financial independence is about choice, confidence and the ability to plan for what comes next. For some, it is the confidence to plan ahead. For others, it is the ability to support loved ones, create new opportunities and feel more secure about the future. Aware Super is proud to celebrate the journeys, contributions and aspirations of the communities it serves.

About Aware Super

Aware Super is one of Australia’s largest profit-to-member superannuation funds, managing more than $200 billion in retirement savings on behalf of around 1.3 million members. With a strong commitment to creating positive social impact, Aware Super works to improve financial wellbeing while engaging with diverse communities across Australia to better serve members’ experiences and long-term financial priorities.

To learn more about Aware Super’s commitment to creating positive social impact and helping all Australians build a more secure financial future, visit https://aware.com.au/member/about-us/corporate-sustainability

Disclaimer: This release contains general information only. It does not take into account any person’s objectives, financial situation or needs. Before acting on this information, readers should consider its appropriateness to their circumstances and seek independent financial advice. Aware Super financial planning services are provided by Aware Financial Services Australia Limited (ABN 86 003 742 756, AFSL 238430), wholly owned by Aware Super. Issued by Aware Super Pty Ltd (ABN 11 118 202 672, AFSL 293340), trustee of Aware Super (ABN 53 226 460 365).

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The post The Second Independence first appeared on The Australia Today.

By Caroline Fisher and Sora Park

The government has finally tabled its News Bargaining Incentive legislation to make big tech companies pay for the Australian journalism they use on their platforms.

The government developed these laws to fix a problem with the original News Media Bargaining Code introduced under the Morrison government.

While the code generated between $200 million and $250 million a year through deals struck with Meta and Google, it allowed them to stop making deals with news companies by not carrying news on their platform.

The new laws aim to close this loophole by making social media and search companies strike deals with eligible news publishers, or pay a charge based on their Australian digital advertising revenue, which would be distributed to news organisations through the News Journalism Payment Scheme.

While setting up new revenue streams for struggling newsrooms is a welcome move, the laws themselves are far from perfect.

How would the laws work?

The News Bargaining Incentive is made up of a couple of parts.

First, the government wants large social media and search companies with an annual digital advertising revenue of more than $250 million in Australia – likely to include digital giants such as Google, Meta and TikTok – to enter deals with at least eight eligible Australian news businesses.

If they fail to strike enough deals, they will be forced to pay a charge: 2.5% of their Australian digital advertising revenue.

To encourage deals, the charge is offset by 150%, and this increases to 200% if the deal is with small or medium-sized businesses.

Revenue collected from the charge will be administered through the News Journalism Payment Scheme. These funds will support the production of core news content in Australia. That means, according to the Australian Communications and Media Authority’s definition:

[…] content that reports, investigates or explains issues or events that are relevant in engaging Australians in public debate and in informing democratic decision making; or current issues or events of public significance for Australians at a local, regional or national level.

The scheme is primarily designed to sustain the employment of journalists and help build capacity of news organisations.

Funding to news publishers will be decided by a weighting formula based on the number of full-time equivalent journalists in each organisation.

In a welcome move, the definition of journalist has been broadened to include a range of essential news roles, such as:

• journalists
• photojournalists
• videographers
• data or visual journalists
• editors or producers who are involved in the production of news content
• and freelancers and volunteers (low-revenue organisations) who produce core news content.

Of the charge funds, 10% will be set aside for grants, including 5% to fund AAP (Australian Associated Press) in recognition of its public-interest role, and a further 5% for small organisations that are not eligible for funding from deals under this scheme.

Exactly how the collected funds are to be administered is not clear.

What will it mean for media companies?

On the positive side, the new laws will guarantee a steady flow of revenue for the Australian news industry, either through deals or charges.

This stops the digital platforms opting out of giving financial support to the news industry, which is welcome.

There has, however, been criticism from the news industry in four key areas.

1. A smaller funding pool

The pool of funding from which the charge is drawn is smaller than the original proposal. It was initially based on the annual revenue of the platform in Australia. Now it will be drawn from its digital advertising revenue.

While there has been a small increase in the charge, from 2.25% to 2.5%, it might not make up the shortfall.

More importantly, for this to work we need a more accurate definition and estimate of advertising revenues earned by digital platforms in Australia.

2. Uneven expenditure rules

The minimum number of deals that need to be struck to avoid the charge was doubled from four to eight.

But the maximum share of expenditure per news business is 25%, which means a platform can give four companies 99% of the money and split just 1% among four additional companies.

This could continue the problem of propping up the larger mainstream news outlets at the cost of smaller publishers, which are playing an increasing role in the way audiences access news and information.

3. Favouring larger organisations

The charge distribution mechanism also favours larger organisations. To be included on the Australian Communications and Media Authority’s register of eligible news businesses you must generate more than $150,000 in annual revenue.

This excludes many small and independent outlets. For example, among roughly 200 Local and Independent News Association (LINA) members, 35% earn less than the threshold. The 5% grant built into the scheme is promising, but not sufficient to support the diverse range of publishers operating in Australia, particularly in regional areas.

4. No AI companies included

The government chose not to include AI companies in the scheme.

Excluding AI services creates a significant regulatory gap. AI platforms have become an increasingly dominant source of news and information for the Australian public.

With the advent of generative AI-enabled platforms, news organisations are now facing a “zero-click” era as artificial intelligence (AI) summaries reduce referral traffic to news websites.

This is clearly a missed opportunity at the precise moment when their market power and impact on journalism are accelerating.

Are the laws likely to be effective?

Overall, the new laws will channel badly needed funds into the struggling news industry.

However, while the government has made small changes to the News Bargaining Incentive legislation, they don’t go far enough to reflect the industry’s feedback and support the diversity and sustainability of public interest journalism.

Caroline Fisher, Adjunct Associate Professor of Communication, University of Canberra and Sora Park, Director, News & Media Research Centre, University of Canberra

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post New laws to make tech companies pay for news will help, but there are 4 key problems first appeared on The Australia Today.

Growing competition in outer space provides India with a unique opportunity to shape a narrative in which collaboration, rather than confrontation, drives space exploration. Recognised as a trustworthy and cost-effective spacefaring nation, India is now well placed to transform its technological advances into enduring international partnerships that contribute to scientific progress, economic growth, and sustainable development.

India’s journey into space has been distinctive. Unlike many space programmes that emerged from Cold War rivalries, India’s programme was conceived as an instrument of national development. Dr Vikram Sarabhai anchored India’s space vision in practical applications that would improve the lives of ordinary people. Under his leadership, satellites were developed to strengthen communications, weather forecasting, disaster management, healthcare, agriculture and education. This development-oriented philosophy remains central to India’s space programme and resonates strongly with the needs of countries in the Global South, which seek practical applications of space technology rather than prestige alone.

Today, India’s achievements extend  beyond developmental applications. The Chandrayaan missions, the Mars Orbiter Mission, the Aditya-L1 solar observatory, and the forthcoming Gaganyaan human spaceflight programme have established India as a nation capable of executing sophisticated and reliable space missions. Chandrayaan-3’s successful soft landing near the Moon’s south pole placed India among an exclusive group of space powers while demonstrating that world-class innovation can be achieved at comparatively modest cost.

India’s growing credibility comes at a time when the global space economy is expanding rapidly. Valued at over US$600 billion today and projected to approach US$1.8 trillion by 2035, the sector is increasingly driven by commercial activity in satellite communications, Earth observation, navigation, climate services, broadband connectivity, and emerging fields such as in-orbit servicing and lunar exploration. Many countries aspire to participate but lack indigenous capabilities. They seek dependable long-term partners rather than merely launch providers.

India possesses the capabilities to meet these requirements. The liberalisation of the space sector in 2020 transformed the ecosystem by opening it to private participation. The establishment of the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe), the expanding commercial role of NewSpace India Limited, and the growth of private enterprises have created one of the world’s most dynamic emerging space ecosystems. Indian startups are developing launch vehicles, satellite platforms, geospatial applications and propulsion technologies that are attracting global investment and customers. Companies such as Skyroot Aerospace, Pixxel and Agnikul Cosmos have demonstrated that Indian private enterprise can compete internationally in advanced space technologies.

The next step is to internationalise this ecosystem.

Rather than positioning itself only as a low-cost launch destination, India will offer comprehensive partnerships encompassing satellite design, launch services, mission operations, ground stations, astronaut training, capacity building and downstream applications in agriculture, disaster management and maritime security. Such integrated partnerships would be valuable for countries across the Global South and the Indo-Pacific seeking affordable, customised and reliable technologies to meet their development priorities.

India has demonstrated the diplomatic value of such cooperation. Through the South Asia Satellite, it provided communication and developmental benefits to neighbouring countries. Indian launch vehicles have successfully placed hundreds of foreign satellites into orbit for governments, universities and commercial operators around the world. India’s decision to join the Artemis Accords reflects its willingness to participate in the peaceful exploration of the Moon through international collaboration. Cooperation with  NASA, the European Space Agency and JAXA has strengthened India’s scientific and technological capabilities.

These partnerships reinforce India’s standing as a leading voice of the Global South. India offers development partnerships based on affordability, reliability and mutual respect rather than creating technological dependence. Space cooperation has therefore become an increasingly important instrument of Indian diplomacy, strengthening bilateral relationships while delivering tangible developmental benefits.

To realise its full potential, India will aim to sustain the momentum of reform. Faster regulatory approvals, greater access to venture capital, stronger intellectual property protection, and closer collaboration among research institutions, industry and academia will be essential. Public procurement policies would continue supporting Indian startups, enabling them to scale up, innovate and integrate into global supply chains.

India is positioned to play a larger role in shaping the governance of outer space. Orbital congestion, space debris, responsible resource utilisation and equitable access to emerging space opportunities are becoming pressing international concerns. As space activities expand, there will be an increasing need for countries capable of building consensus on responsible norms and practices. India’s long-standing commitment to the peaceful uses of outer space, combined with its growing technological capabilities, equips it to contribute meaningfully to the development of rules that promote transparency, sustainability and equitable access.

The coming decade will determine not only which countries lead in space but also how space is governed. With its scientific capabilities, entrepreneurial ecosystem and international credibility, India is uniquely placed to bridge the gap between established and emerging space nations. By building collaborative partnerships founded on inclusivity, mutual benefit and innovation, India can transform its space programme into a major pillar of its global engagement.

In an increasingly divided world, India’s space sector offers a powerful reminder that the greatest achievements in space are those that bring nations together. That may well become India’s most enduring contribution to humanity’s next frontier.

Contributing Author: Gurjit Singh is a former Ambassador of India to Germany, Indonesia, Ethiopia, ASEAN and the African Union. He also served concurrently as Ambassador to Djibouti, IGAD and Timor-Leste. He has chaired the CII Business Task Force on Trilateral Cooperation in Africa, including the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor with Japan. He regularly comments on international affairs in the media and has written extensively on India-Africa and trilateral cooperation, with a particular focus on private-sector engagement.

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The post India looks beyond the launchpad to lead global space cooperation first appeared on The Australia Today.

From February 2 2027, passengers on Jetstar will only be able to bring one small bag that fits under the seat for free. Anyone wanting to store a bag in the overhead locker will need to pay an additional fee, with prices varying by route.

The airline says the change will provide “more choice” while helping keep base fares low. It also reduces the need to weigh as many carry-on bags at the gate and improve boarding efficiency. Passengers who pay for the overhead baggage option will receive priority boarding.

While the policy is presented as offering greater flexibility, it also raises a less obvious question: does giving travellers more choices necessarily improve the travel experience?

More choice isn’t always better

Jetstar’s CEO, Stephanie Tully, said the new carry-on baggage model means passengers will “only pay for what you need”, presenting the paid option as giving consumers more choice.

But psychology research suggests that more decisions can also create more mental effort.

Booking a flight now involves deciding whether to pay for checked baggage, seat selection, overhead cabin space, and other optional extras, each carrying a financial cost. As these choices accumulate, passengers may experience what psychologists describe as “choice overload” – when having more options makes decisions harder rather than easier.

The travel experience begins during the planning and booking process, not when passengers board the aircraft. Additional purchasing decisions can therefore shape perceptions of the journey even before the trip begins.

If increased choice adds new burdens, those trade-offs may be easier to justify if the policy delivers real operational improvements. Whether it will do so, however, remains to be seen.

Will the policy achieve what it promises?

Jetstar says the new policy should reduce the need to weigh bags at the gate, and will improve boarding efficiency.

Priority boarding, however, works when only a proportion of passengers receive it. If large numbers choose to pay for overhead baggage, priority boarding risks becoming less meaningful – while competition for locker space remains.

Passengers may still spend time searching for available locker space, rearranging luggage and competing for overhead storage. This could offset any operational efficiencies the airline hopes to achieve.

From the passenger’s perspective, the burden has not disappeared. It has changed form, but now comes with an additional financial cost.

A strict size limit for the underseat bag has also been introduced. However, this may require travellers to buy smaller bags that comply with the dimensions, adding another expense to the trip.

It also raises practical questions about value for money. While passengers will get an increased weight allowance of up to 10 kilograms per item, the reduced cabin bag size means many bags may simply not have enough capacity to hold that weight. In practice, travellers could pay for a higher weight allowance without being able to fully use it.

Jetstar claims the change will help keep fares “low”. However, the airline has not indicated base fares will fall as a result of this new policy.

A spokesperson for Transport Minister Catherine King said Jetstar would need to demonstrate the change will in fact keep fares affordable, adding:

it will be up to them to demonstrate that to passengers.

What does this mean for passengers?

Charging separately for overhead cabin baggage is not new.

It is standard practice among many low-cost airlines in Europe and North America, but the Australian market differs in two important respects.

First, consumers have fewer low-cost airlines to choose from. Second, European passengers benefit from stronger passenger rights, with rules governing airline obligations, delays, cancellations and pricing transparency.

In Australia, the federal government has proposed an independent Aviation Consumer Ombuds Scheme to resolve passenger complaints. It was expected to begin operations in 2026, but the legislation is still before Parliament and the scheme is not yet operational. https://www.youtube.com/embed/iuV4_0AeNDs?wmode=transparent&start=0

Consumer rights stuck in a holding pattern

For now, an interim ombudsperson has been appointed within the Department of Infrastructure and Transport. However, the role has limited functions and cannot formally investigate or resolve complaints between consumers and airlines.

In practice, little has changed for passengers. As the first step, consumers must still complain directly to the airline.

If the matter remains unresolved, passengers can escalate their complaint to the Airline Customer Advocate. However, the advocate is funded by the airline industry and cannot issue legally binding decisions.

Alternatively, passengers can pursue broader consumer issues through state consumer protection agencies or the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Whether travellers continue to choose the low-cost model or decide full-service airlines offer better value may depend not only on price, but also on how many trade-offs they are willing to accept before they fly.

Cindy Lee, Senior Lecturer in Tourism and Hospitality, Torrens University Australia and Anita Manfreda, Associate Professor, Blue Mountains International Hotel Management School, Torrens University Australia

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Now Jetstar wants to charge extra for overhead bags. What are your options? first appeared on The Australia Today.

There are now many more people walking the streets in Australia wearing glasses that can subtly film and record the world around them. That’s in large part thanks to Kmart, which recently introduced – and then rapidly sold out of – cheap “camera glasses”.

These glasses are from Kmart’s in-house brand, Anko. They sell for only A$89 – quite the discount from similar products offered by Meta and Ray-Ban, which start at $337.

The push to make camera glasses a major consumer trend comes at a cost to the privacy of the wearer, and everyone around them. We know little about what happens with data from the devices, or who will see the images. Indeed, on Friday, federal Attorney-General Michelle Rowland asked Australia’s privacy commissioner to urgently review the technology.

So are current privacy laws strong enough to handle this new wave of wearable tech?

More than a decade of development

Smart glasses themselves are not new. Google launched Google Glass in 2013 to much media fanfare and celebrity endorsement.

Yet that basic variant failed to break into the market because the technology was underwhelming, the clunky and obvious appearance left much to be desired, and users were widely derided as “glassholes”.

Modern iterations are far more aesthetically pleasing. And they are less obtrusive: it is less obvious to you and everyone else that you are wearing a high-tech computer on your face.

Kmart’s budget camera glasses perform similar functions to the higher-end models (albeit perhaps in a slower, more limited way).

Running on HeyCyan software, they have embedded cameras to analyse and record photos and videos of what the wearer sees, microphones to record sound, and speakers to enable the wearer to take phone calls and listen to podcasts or music.

Images, video and sound are recorded onto memory in the device, but can be downloaded into a connected app on the wearer’s phone, enabling recorded content to be edited, shared and uploaded to websites.

From covert filming to falling over

The risk receiving the most attention is the capability of these glasses to covertly film bystanders and unsuspecting women in public for social media content, potentially leading to a rise in harassment, voyeurism and stalking in public for social media content.

Uploaded videos compound the abuse. And there’s the potential harm from distraction if the wearable tech “augments” the wearer’s view with digital information in their line of sight, creating a very real potential for physical risks such as falls, trips and car accidents.

Companies and employers should also consider the risks, for example, that smart glasses will record confidential information, trade secrets or bank account details.

It’s also worth noting Meta is reportedly developing “super-sensor” glasses that could record even when you aren’t interacting with them. This would provide companies with unprecedented access to the most private parts of your life, whereabouts and preferences.

Such data could be sent to data-labelling firms and, depending on the product and terms, used to train AI models.

So, what of the law?

It isn’t clear how Australia’s highly fragmented, partial and out-of-date privacy laws apply to advances in privacy-intrusive and ambient technologies such as camera glasses.

Most of the federal Privacy Act, including the parts about collection, storage and use of personal data, apply only to public and private-sector organisations (the latter only above a certain size). The activities of individuals who wear camera glasses and record and share video or photos are not covered – although a company that collects and uses personal data, including photos, through the apps would need to obey privacy law.

But wearers might face other legal risks.

The Privacy Act does include a a right to sue in cases where a person seriously invades your privacy by intruding on your seclusion or misusing information relating to you – if you have a reasonable expectation of privacy.

It can also be illegal to record conversations without consent under surveillance laws. These laws vary from state to state.

In New South Wales, for example, it’s illegal to record or publish private conversations without consent (with some exceptions).

Online publication of personal information about a person (or members of some groups) “in a way that reasonable persons would regard as being, in all the circumstances, menacing or harassing” is an offence under the new federal anti-doxxing provision.

The eSafety Commissioner has also powers to seek to take material offline where it is bad enough to be considered cyberbullying or cyberharrassment.

In other words, we have laws, even if they are a bit all over the place. And victims of the worst kinds of abuse of camera glasses’ capabilities could have some way to get recourse.

It’s time for privacy by design

But do we really want to live in a world full of constant low-grade recording?

As we are surrounded by technologies that degrade the privacy of people who never even got the chance to click through a privacy policy, do we want to be constantly second-guessing our conversations, or confronting strangers about their recording? Are there better options? Should the technology be banned?

In our view, a more nuanced conversation would be better. After all, these technologies can be a life-changer for people with disabilities, opening up spaces and opportunities otherwise closed to them.

There are ways to more actively balance different rights and interests as this new wave of technology hits us.

Major employers and social institutions (such as schools or universities) could consider policies that protect their shared spaces.

And perhaps, rather than putting all the responsibility on individuals to negotiate this new world, what Australia also needs is a more serious discussion about making sure our privacy (and other consumer) laws really push for better privacy by design in consumer and commercial products.

After all, the form technology takes is not inevitable, it is a choice: one where we should have some say over the terms.

Kimberlee Weatherall, Professor of Law, University of Sydney and Milica Stilinovic, Post-Doctoral Research Associate, Governing Immersive Tech Project, University of Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post Smart glasses are going mainstream. Do current privacy laws protect us from the risks? first appeared on The Australia Today.