Midday News Bulletin 25 May 2025

SBS Australia

25-05-2025

TRANSCRIPT
Interstate teams deployed to help flood-hit communities in New South Wales
Advocates for Stolen Generations survivors call for support ahead of National Sorry Day
Matildas players help Arsenal win the Women's Champions League final Almost 200 additional emergency service teams from interstate have been deployed to help flood-hit communities in New South Wales. Recovery crews face a mammoth task to assess damage to at least 10,000 properties, as waters recede from deadly and record-breaking floods. State Emergency Service Commissioner Mike Wassing says the extra resources will be needed. "The focus is very much in terms of the assessment of the damage. We are talking in the order of 10,000 impacted properties. That is ranging from commercial right through to residential impacts, so it is significant. We do have interstate and Commonwealth support in place, but we have more coming. That will be coming from Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania, Australian Capital Territory, Victoria, New Zealand. This will supplement, particularly our cleanup operations." Gabrielle Woodhouse, from the Bureau of Meteorology, says windy conditions could complicate recovery efforts when a cold front moves through this week. "We're expecting wind speeds of generally around 30 to 50 kilometres an hour. And wind gusts up around that 60 to 80 or even 90 kilometres an hour. Now those stronger winds are going to be more likely for parts of the Blue Mountains, the Illawarra, and south along the New South Wales ranges on Tuesday. As well as part of the Northern Tablelands. Now for those flood-affected areas across the mid-north coast and Hunter. It is still going to be very windy." Stolen Generations survivors and their descendants are preparing to mark National Sorry Day tomorrow. This year is the 28th anniversary of the event, which acknowledges the mistreatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who were forcibly removed from their families and communities, which we now know as The Stolen Generations. Their experiences were detailed in the 'Bringing Them Home' report in 1997. Of the 54 recommendations in the report, only six per cent have been clearly implemented. Professor Steve Larkin is the chairperson of the Healing Foundation, which advocates for Stolen Generations survivors and families. He says the national day is an important focus to increase understanding of the ongoing effects of what happened, but also a reminder of the need to ensure adequate funding for Stolen Generations organisations to support the needs of families. Dr Jackie Huggins is a member of the Bidjara and Birri Gubba Juru peoples and a former co-chair of Reconciliation Australia. She says Sorry Day and Reconciliation Week draws attention to the need for more progress on improving life and health outcomes for First Nations Australians. "There hasn't been a let up in children going into care - foster homes or other care. It is also - particularly around criminal justice systems; and with our young folk in jail. So there is a continuum of what needs to be done. Housing, education, employment. The usual things that plague Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Peoples lifestyle." Only four of the 19 Closing the Gap targets are on track, with critical areas such as suicide prevention, incarceration rates and child removal worsening. The indicators show the gap in outcomes on education, health and well-being between First Nations Australians and the wider population; including dying more than eight years earlier. National Sorry Day is on Monday, the 26th of May. National Reconciliation Week runs from Tuesday, the 27th of May to Tuesday, the 3rd of June. The film 'It Was Just An Accident' by Iranian director Jafar Panahi has won the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or top prize. Mr Panahi, who has been arrested several times for his filmmaking, was last at the festival in person in 2003. 'It Was Just An Accident' follows Vahid, played by Vahid Mobasseri, who kidnaps a man with a false leg who looks just like the one who tortured him in prison and ruined his life. Mr Panahi says his time in jail influenced the film, but he himself did not experience all the stories recounted in it. "What is shown in the film is not all my own experience. It reflects the experiences of 40 years of prisoners, of those who have been imprisoned for nearly half a century in Iran." The 64-year-old was banned from making films or travelling abroad for 20 years in 2010, after he was convicted of "propaganda against the system". That sentence was recently revoked, allowing him to travel again for the first time in 15 years. In football, Matildas players Caitlin Foord, Kyra Cooney-Cross and Stephanie Catley have helped Arsenal to win the team's first women's Champions League title in 18 years. The win comes against a mighty Barcelona team considered on paper to be the best in the world. The Arsenal players stood arm-in-arm in front of their red-clad fans after the final whistle singing along to Queen's "We are the Champions". Former professional player for the US team, Becky Sauerbrunn told The Women's Game podcast, says it is an impressive achievement.
"Most peoples' expectations was that Barça was going to win. I was thinking that can always work in Arsenal's favour. I think it is a different feeling when you have everything to lose and nothing to win. And those kind of expectations I think can weigh very heavily on different players - and affect them in different ways."