Australia news as it happened: Liberal National Party holds on to Longman, Hume stands by foreign interference warnings
Key posts
5.43pm Terry Young holds on to Longman
5.39pm ASX ends higher, led by energy and tech stocks; Macquarie, Aristocrat shares fall
4.47pm Ley welcome to engage with PM on 'any issue'
1.41pm Cheek Media's Hannah Ferguson to run for Senate
1.30pm This afternoon's headlines at a glance
12.55pm More seats close to results in 'most complex count in history'
12.05pm Price 'chickened out' of deputy vote
11.49am Wage growth hits post-pandemic high
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yesterday 6.00pm
What we covered today
By Hannah Hammoud
Thanks for following our live news blog. That wraps up our coverage for today. Here's a quick recap of the key stories:
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The federal Liberal Party shared confidential voter data with the Exclusive Brethren, a secretive Christian group that made nearly a million pre-election calls supporting the Coalition.
Federal vice-president of the Liberal Party Fiona Scott made a joking remark suggesting Sussan Ley's leadership could be short-lived, offering a lacklustre endorsement of Ley's future leadership.
Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price surprised colleagues by declining to run for deputy leader after Angus Taylor lost the leadership vote, leaving Phillip Thompson to step in unexpectedly.
Liberal senator Jane Hume stood by her foreign interference warnings but conceded that a video referencing 'Chinese spies' may have hurt the party's campaign.
Caleb List, a 25-year-old Australian who joined Ukraine's foreign legion, is feared dead. The Prime Minister called the news 'deeply troubling.'
ASIC has accused Macquarie Group of misleading conduct for failing to report up to 1.5 billion short sales over 15 years, in a second action this week.
Hannah Ferguson, founder of Cheek Media, announced she'll run as an independent Senate candidate in NSW at the next federal election.
Joel Cauchi's psychiatrist reversed earlier claims that he was not psychotic during the Bondi Junction Westfield attack, now suggesting her evidence about his 'hatred of women' was merely 'conjecture'.
Olympian cyclist Rohan Dennis received a suspended sentence following the death of his wife, fellow Olympian Melissa Hoskins.
The Liberal National Party's Terry Young has held on to the seat of Longman, north of Brisbane, after a tight race with Labor candidate Rhiannyn Douglas.
Thanks again for joining us. We'll be back tomorrow morning.
yesterday 5.43pm
Terry Young holds on to Longman
By Matt Wade
The Liberal National Party's Terry Young has retained the seat of Longman, north of Brisbane, after a tight race with Labor candidate Rhiannyn Douglas. Young now leads by 335 votes with only about 750 still to count.
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The Liberal National Party had previously held Longman with margin of 3.1 per cent but at the next election it will be among the most marginal electorates in the nation.
Terry Young has held the seat of Longman since 2019. His victory in Longman brings the Coalition's seat total in the lower house of the new parliament to 43. Meanwhile, the Liberal Party's Zoe McKenzie is ahead in the contest for the Melbourne seat of Flinders. It is likely the winner of that race will become clear tomorrow morning.
In the ultra-close count in the northern Sydney seat of Bradfield, Liberal contender Gisele Kapterian has maintained her advantage throughout counting on Wednesday; at 5pm she led by 80 votes with about 920 votes yet to count.
yesterday 5.39pm
ASX ends higher, led by energy and tech stocks; Macquarie, Aristocrat shares fall
The Australian sharemarket swung into the green in afternoon trading, sent higher by energy and tech stocks, which more than made up for losses from big names such as Macquarie Group and Aristocrat that had kept the market in negative territory for most of the session.
The S&P/ASX 200 finished up 10.6 points, or 0.1 per cent, at 8279.6, rising for its sixth session in a row. Six of its 11 industry sectors advanced, with tech and energy stocks the big winners. Their gains were countered by falls in consumer stocks and utilities. The Australian dollar was flat at US64.71¢.
Tech stocks yet again followed their peers in the US, where chipmakers were leading a rally after AI giants Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices said they would supply semiconductors for a massive data-centre project in Saudi Arabia. The ASX tech sector rose 1 per cent, led by family member tracking app Life360, which soared a further 9.5 per cent after reporting huge sales growth this week.
The iron ore heavyweights also extended their recent gains amid hopes for easing global trade tensions since the US and China on Monday announced a 90-day truce in their trade war and agreed to temporarily reduce tariffs on each other's goods.
BHP, the world's largest miner, rose 0.6 per cent. Its CEO Mike Henry told a global mining conference overnight that the mining titan was well-positioned to navigate its way through the uncertainty created by Trump's trade wars. Rio Tinto added 0.5 per cent and Fortescue climbed 2.2 per cent.
yesterday 5.24pm
Australia records big bump in pregnancy heat-risk days
By Poppy Johnston
Climate change has already added about 10 extra days a year of extreme heat deemed harmful for pregnant women in Australia.
Darwin experienced a sharp 17-day jump in heat conditions threatening to pregnant people and newborns, the biggest increase of all Australian cities captured in the analysis by international non-profit Climate Central.
Heatwaves pose birth risks, with the World Health Organisation linking high temperatures to preterm birth and stillbirth as well as hypertension and gestational diabetes.
Climate Central vice-president for science Kristina Dahl said climate change added more than half of Australia's pregnancy heat-risk days experienced over the past five years.
'That means climate change is already making it harder to have a healthy pregnancy, especially in regions where care may be limited,' Dr Dahl said.
She said each day of extreme heat increased the chances of serious pregnancy complications.
AAP
yesterday 5.12pm
'What happened to Tanya?' Senators clash on ABC
By Hannah Hammoud
Labor senator Marielle Smith has clashed with Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie on the ABC's Afternoon Briefing after McKenzie accused the Labor Party of investing all its power in the hands of 'faceless men'.
'That's when I know the Labor Party will have actually turned the corner on gender equality, when the people that hold the power can also wear a dress,' McKenzie said.
'Tanya Plibersek should be leading your party – what happened to Tanya?'
Smith said McKenzie's comments were 'extremely offensive', and recalled being heckled and called 'quota girl' by McKenzie's colleagues when she was elected and sworn in to parliament.
'This is very rude and very offensive,' Smith said.
yesterday 4.57pm
Reports Australian killed in Ukraine 'deeply troubling': PM
By Hannah Hammoud
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Following reports that 25-year-old Queensland man Caleb List has been killed in combat while fighting in Ukraine's Kharkiv region, Anthony Albanese said the news was 'deeply troubling'.
'My heart goes out to the family and loved ones of the gentlemen concerned. DFAT are working in the way that they do to make sure the proper notifications are occurring,' Albanese said.
He said there was a travel warning in place 'for a reason' given the danger, and that Australians should not be travelling to Ukraine.
yesterday 4.47pm
Ley welcome to engage with PM on 'any issue'
By Hannah Hammoud
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has appeared for a short press conference in Perth ahead of his visit to Indonesia, telling reporters he spoke with Sussan Ley to congratulate her on her election.
'It is a great honour to lead a major political party in Australia, and I congratulate her and wish her well,' he said.
'I invited her at any time to engage with me, as Peter Dutton was always welcome to do on any issue to advance the national interest.'
yesterday 4.39pm
Labor senator welcomes Ley appointment
By Hannah Hammoud
Labor senator Marielle Smith has avoided commentating on whether Ley has been set up to fail in reference to the glass cliff phenomenon – where women are appointed to leadership positions during times of crisis.
'Sussan Ley's appointment is a matter for the Liberal Party and the Liberal Party room,' she said.
'All I would say is that more broadly speaking I think it's important that we see and continue to see greater representation of women and people from all sorts of walks of life across our institutions.
'... In that sense, I welcome it, but in terms of the nitty-gritty that's really for the Liberal party room, which I definitely do not sit in.'
yesterday 4.22pm
Does the Liberal Party need to adopt gender quotas?
By Hannah Hammoud
Ruston is asked if the Liberal Party needs to implement quotas to improve their female representation given the growing number of female voters turning away from the party.
Loading
'We need to be really analytical, but we also need to be really honest with ourselves about what went wrong so that we can make positive changes so that into the future we do provide an offering that Australians want,' Ruston said.
Caisley pressed Ruston on whether quotas were off the table, to which Ruston replied she has never been a 'great supporter' of them.
'But I do believe that you have to take affirmative action to make sure that you have got representation,' she said.
'One of my roles going forward is to make sure we are supporting women so they are joining our party. I also want to support all young people because they are future of the party and I think for people like me who've been here for some time, part of our role must be to mentor and support young people.'
yesterday 4.10pm
Ruston backs Ley to guide rebuild
By Hannah Hammoud
Liberal senator Anne Ruston has appeared on ABC's Afternoon Briefing with Olivia Caisley, where she described Ley's appointment as Opposition Leader as a 'wonderful opportunity' for the party.
'She's an extremely capable politician. She's got a lot of experience both in the parliament and in the real-world having had a series of really quite extraordinarily diverse jobs,' she said.
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The Age
2 hours ago
- The Age
‘Game On': The minute-long message that unleashed the Brethren's election machine
One Sunday in mid-April, two weeks into the federal election campaign, the global leader of the extremist Christian sect formerly known as the Exclusive Brethren recorded a brief audio message to his followers. To the Brethren, the words of 'Man of God' Bruce Hales are close to holy writ. The message was only a minute or so long and narrowcast to the flock on a Brethren-only app called the Global Media Stream, according to a church source who has requested anonymity for fear of recrimination. That message gave permission for an unprecedented electoral effort by the church. The following week, thousands of members of what's now known as the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church began appearing at pre-polling stations throughout the country, handing out election material and swamping booths in signage to try to get Peter Dutton elected. Instead, this mass movement of sect members may have helped turn voters against the then opposition leader. It has caused deep rifts within the Liberal Party and outrage in Labor, and it's sparked a push to scrutinise the Brethren's secretive support of conservative politicians, and whether disclosure requirements have been met. It has also led to one young man, who transgressed the Brethren's stringent rules, facing a church punishment that could separate him from his family forever. 'It's game on' To people not versed in the peculiar language of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, Bruce Hales's April 13 audio recording was obscure in the extreme. Government in Australia needed the Brethren's prayers, he told his members. 'Australia needs to smile again.' In the weeks leading up to this message, a large number of Brethren members had already been working quietly with the Liberal Party at the local level, phone canvassing or behind the scenes, on what they described as 'King's business' – hoping to sway marginal Labor seats for Dutton. Hales' message signalled a step-change: 16,000 Brethren members were encouraged to get involved. The government needed to change. Another church insider, who also asked to remain anonymous for fear of recriminations, said Hales' sons amped the effort. In the week before pre-polling opened, a message went out from local Brethren leaders calling members to gather at one of a number of locations near where they lived. Across the nation, inside the houses of elders, church halls or business premises, the Brethren were played a video featuring Gareth, Charles and Dean Hales. 'How awesome was it to hear that recording on [Global Media Stream]?' the Hales boys enthused. Then, in the tones of a high-pressure sales call, they exhorted their members to step up their election efforts: 'Make sure our booths are manned and volunteers fired up each day to dominate the play.' Loading 'It's game on,' one of them added, according to a summary obtained by this masthead. 'Pray and take action'; 'It's all in the extra 1 per cents'. 'Make sure we don't leave any gas in the tank!' they said. Days later, the Brethren army was unleashed on the public. Members of this church generally are exempt from voting – they claim a conscientious objection, arguing that government is of God and should not be chosen by men. They are also taught to despise the 'world' and 'worldly people' because they will defile and contaminate them. Despite this doctrine, thousands took time off from Brethren company jobs and fanned out to marginal Labor seats nationally to hand out for the Coalition. A booth roster from the seat of Gilmore, obtained by this masthead, shows them listed as 'friends'. Gareth Hales was spotted at a booth in Bennelong. 'Make Australia smile again,' they would say, parroting the words of their leader. A significant third party? A Liberal source, who asked not be named to discuss internal matters, said numbers of the Brethren had long donated to the Coalition parties and had been well known by candidates for helping on the periphery in campaigning. This year, the source said, the effort was 'turbocharged'. It was driven by the Brethren and welcomed by the party, and unprecedented numbers – 20, 30 or more at some polling booths – turned out. The Brethren insider said the whole church had been geared towards it. Businesses lost up to three weeks of work and, 'Everyone was active. Everyone was out. This campaign controlled what time the [church] meetings were. This was the priority.' It was clear, both from the word of Labor members on the ground, and from church insiders, that the Brethren were required to travel outside their areas to campaign where they would not be recognised. Labor's member for Lingiari, Marion Scrymgour, told ABC Radio after the election that Brethren members were being flown into remote areas of her huge, central Australian electorate each morning to campaign, then flown back out again to stay the night in a resort on Groote Eylandt. The spending – in cash and kind – raises crucial questions about political campaign disclosures. Outside groups that spend more than $250,000 trying to persuade people during a campaign must register as a 'significant third party', which brings clear disclosure obligations. The ACTU, Advance and Climate 200 are examples. But the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church does not have this registration, and nor do any of its businesses, charities or trusts. A spokesman for the church has denied multiple times that the church was involved in any campaigning or spending. Anything done by members was simply the work of individual people or businesses, he said. Campaign finance expert Joo-Cheong Tham, a professor at Melbourne Law School and director of the Centre for Public Integrity, said the church's behaviour deserved an inquiry. 'It's critical that there be transparency in relation to third-party expenditure,' he said. Tham said the Brethren effort appeared highly co-ordinated but was not necessarily funded by a single entity, which exposed a 'regulatory gap' that deserved scrutiny. Apart from the campaigning, the Brethren insider said church members were also told to open their wallets to make donations, but to make sure each individual amount was under the federal disclosure threshold of $16,900. That way nobody would know it was them, the source said. Ex-Brethren member Lavinia Richardson explained that to avoid public scrutiny, Brethren businessmen would gift amounts of money, or make distributions from a trust, to multiple family members or trusted staff to pass on to a candidate. Each individual donation fell under the threshold but together it could be tens of thousands of dollars. Tham said that while this was not illegal, it was another regulatory gap in the federal act, which lacks anti-avoidance provisions. In his view, all those figures should count as one and be disclosed. A senior NSW Liberal operative, who asked to remain anonymous to discuss internal issues, confirmed to this masthead that there 'were unusual spikes in fundraising activity' during this campaign. 'Some of the colleagues raised more money than ever: hundreds of thousands of dollars … more money than ever from the Brethren.' Loading The Australian Electoral Commission said it held a review of campaigner activity after every election, and it would contact any entity it determined was required to register or disclose. Failure to register incurs a penalty of up to $66,000. A court can order a penalty of three times the amount of money raised. The Labor member for Bennelong, Jerome Laxale, who won an increased majority despite a concerted, Brethren-led Liberal campaign against him, said he intended to make a submission about these issues to the joint parliamentary committee on electoral matters when it was formed. 'I'll certainly be writing a submission to it and will be encouraging locals to share their experience as well,' Laxale said. 'Not something that should happen in a democracy like ours. It was just too much.' The Brethren campaign raises fundamental questions for the Liberal Party. A party insider, speaking anonymously to discuss internal matters, said the push for large numbers of Brethren campaigners on the ground had come through local campaigns, but that they believed someone senior in the party, potentially in Dutton's office, must have signed off on it. Dutton, during the campaign, was asked about the Brethren and said the Liberal Party did not recruit people from particular religions. 'The Liberal Party has not recruited people from particular religions,' Dutton said. 'We're a volunteer-based organisation. People can volunteer and provide support to their local Liberal National Party candidate. I'd encourage them to do that.' But documents leaked to this masthead show that, as the size of the sect's input became clear, senior Liberals raised concerns. 'They'll call in favours and they don't do this for free,' senator Linda Reynolds complained at a meeting of the party's Federal Council on April 30, according to leaked notes from the meeting. 'They don't do things for democracy given they don't vote; they do it to control the candidates. They're dangerous … they hate women.' The church treats women as second class citizens – they are not permitted to be in a position of authority over a man, they sit at the back of the church and, after marriage, are confined largely to domestic and voluntary work. Another federal secretariat member, Jane Buncle, a lawyer, agreed with Reynolds in the meeting, saying the party needed Brethren campaigners because 'we don't have enough members', but that their presence would deter people – particularly women – from joining the party. 'Engaging a group like the Brethren who actively diminish women of all ages drives those people away even further,' Buncle said. 'It's a matter for the leaders of this campaign why they needed that support ... but it will impact us long term.' A senior Liberal source agreed, saying the Brethren's values were 'not necessarily aligned with the values of the Liberal Party'. 'Having them represent us in the electorate is a bigger problem than the party has been prepared to admit so far,' the source said. Federal Liberal director Andrew Hirst declined to comment, but a spokesperson said the party 'does not ask its volunteers, members, or donors what their religious beliefs are, nor do we intend to'. On the hustings, members of all major parties say the Brethren's presence may have harmed Dutton's chances. In the marginal Labor seats where volunteers said their numbers were greatest – including Bennelong, Parramatta, Macquarie and Gilmore – the swings against the Liberals were considerably larger than the statewide result. 'It's one of the strangest and most offensive experiences I've ever gone through as a candidate and volunteer in my 30 years of doing this,' said Laxale, who was re-elected to Bennelong with a large swing. 'I distinctly remember counting 36 people in Liberal shirts at pre-poll. Thirty-three were men. They were loud, obnoxious … chanting slogans … It was a lot.' Scrymgour, who also had a big swing towards her, said: 'They were aggressive and intimidating, and I think for a lot of women. We had women who were terrified to go to the booths in Katherine.' 'A traitor' While the church's campaign might have damaged the Liberal Party, it's been potentially life-changing for one young Brethren man. The man, who this masthead has agreed not to name because he fears the ramifications, has confirmed he took part in the political campaign, which he said was being run 'under guidance from the top, being Bruce Hales'. Asked about the church's line that it was simply individuals being motivated to help, the young man said: 'Absolutely NOT!!! There were teams organised in each locality who were each given T-shirts … There was absolutely no asking which party you would like to campaign for or what role in the campaigning you were comfortable doing. It was all handed to you and you were expected to get on with it.' The Brethren spokesman also insisted that different Brethren members supported different parties, but the young man said this too was wrong. Others campaigning 'for the likes of Labor were heavily ridiculed on the Zoom calls', he said. This young man had come to Australia from the UK for family reasons, but his time here was cut short by the church. Already unhappy in the church, he secretly recorded one of the election co-ordinating meetings and leaked it to former members – people the church regards as dangerous 'opposers'. He was sent home immediately to England 'because of the audio I recorded'. His 'assembly discipline' was to be kicked out of the family home. The man says he's now living in a small caravan in the backyard, his contact with his parents is limited, and he's unable to speak to his brothers and sisters. 'I have had multiple meetings with the local Brethren priests … I've been told that being a traitor is worse than anything else. They called me a traitor because I exposed private information to those who have left the Brethren. They say it has severely affected the Brethren in Australia.' After the Brethren's role in the campaign was exposed in this masthead and on social media, the church's spokesman suggested that for media to make inquiries about the religious affiliation of any individual volunteer was to encroach on their freedom of religion. Asked if he had any freedom now, including freedom of worship, the young man in the UK said there was none. 'If I decide to visit another church I would absolutely fear losing contact with my family. It would be seen as a severe crime.' Asked about the man's case, the Brethren in the UK responded that their 'pastoral care practices ... are never punitive or coercive', and that 'communicating with people outside our church community ... does not trigger any pastoral response'.
Sydney Morning Herald
2 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Shame on those who whip up hate against trans athletes for clicks and votes
'We are all just kids trying to make our way through high school. Participating in sports is the highlight of high school for some kids. No one was harmed by Soren's participation in the girls' track meet, but we are all harmed by the hateful rhetoric of bullies, like Rep. Libby, who want to take sports away from some kids just because of who they are.' Brava, brava, brava. What decency. And what a wonderful stand to take. Closer to home, last month we had our own major tabloid/talkback story about a transgender athlete at a South Australian Catholic school, who, it was breathlessly reported, had run riot at an athletics carnival. One father was quoted, saying the student 'broke a number of records competing against girls at a recent sports day ... breaking all the girls records'. It was great hate-bait, and the usual suspects on talkback and tabloid went hard. Got some hate you want to spread? Our lines are open! The former Liberal MP Gary Hardgrave certainly opened up on Sky News. Loading 'In the end,' he said, 'weak men want to compete against women and they put on the skirt and say, 'I'm a woman now, and I want to compete against you'. But even weaker men support those people in that kind of decision.' I repeat, great hate-bait! Manna from heaven. Did anyone pause, ever, to think what effect this has on the target of the hate-bait? This week, the ABC show Media Watch did, and made enquiries. And whaddya know? Most of it was nonsense. There was a school athletics meeting last year, creating precisely no controversy in the school at the time. Yes, the 13-year-old transgender athlete did indeed break a record, but it was another girl who actually swept the day breaking seven records. And the effect on the child in question from the pile-on? Devastating. 'No child or family should have to experience the trauma or fear that we have been through,' the mother of the child told the ABC. 'My child's privacy and innocence has been violated without consideration or empathy for the devastating lifelong harm this can cause. It's hard to express how horrific it is to read hateful articles about your child and have them used as clickbait for a political agenda created by adults and forced down the throats of kids who are just trying to be kids.' Read it and weep. Yes, yes, yes, occasionally the issue of an unfair advantage by transgender athletes in sport does arise – usually only at elite level – and is one to be discussed and sorted out by serious people. But that ain't this. The point is that we need to call this kind of stuff for what it is. It is not a genuine attempt to achieve fairness in sport put out by people who have a genuine track record of earnestly examining that very thing. It's just hate-bait, no more, no less, put out by people whose job in life is to stir up big trouble way above and beyond what the actual problem is. It's just hate-bait callously thrown out there to bring in swarms of bone-stupid groper fish who live off that very hate – to boost your ratings, clicks and votes – and to hell with the trauma it causes to their targets. For shame, you bastards. For shame, you bastards. What They Said Lachlan Galvin on the Wests Tigers fans: 'I understand where [Tigers fans] are coming from. I think they can have their opinion, and they can have their hatred and that against me. I understand that.' Joe Montemurro, new coach of the Matildas: 'I've followed their incredible journey closely and am energised by the passion, resilience, and identity they've built. The only promise I make is that we will play an exciting brand of football and that the integrity and the level and the respect of the Matildas will always be at the top of my thinking.' Tennis player Daria Kasatkina on her first major tournament after switching allegiances to Australia: 'To feel the support from the stands so many times. I don't know if everyone who was screaming, 'Aussie', were from Australia, but I felt this support . . . So this is the kind of support which I honestly didn't have before, it feels like it's something new to me — but it feels so nice.' Oi! Football manager Pep Guardiola doesn't think he's special: 'Do you think I feel special because I won a lot of titles? No! Forget about it! I feel that special is the doctor that saves lives. The people who invented penicillin. That is a genius. Me? Genius? Come on.' Kath McCann, the Tasmanian Devils' general manager of marketing, corporate affairs and social impact on alternative stadium options: 'This is Plan A and there is no Plan B.' Ticketek on the demand for Ashes tickets: 'We recognise that when we have high-demand events with limited inventory that some fans will miss out and will be disappointed. We encourage all customers not to use multiple browsers when trying to access tickets.' Tennis player Lois Boisson, ranked No.361 in the world, found herself in the headlines in April when an opponent, Harriet Dart, told the umpire, 'Can you tell her to put on some deodorant? She smells really bad.' This week she shocked No.3 seed Jessica Pegula to make the quarter-finals at the French Open, becoming the lowest-ranked quarter-finalist at Roland Garros in at least 40 years. 'I'm not sure what to say. Playing on this court, with this atmosphere, was amazing. I gave my all and in the end I won, which is just incredible. I hope I'm going to win it all!' Boisson was beaten by Coco Gauff in the semi-finals. Loading Aussie Formula 1 driver Oscar Piastri on winning his Spain, his fifth win of the season: 'Hard to complain, it has been a great year and this weekend has been exactly the kind of weekend I was looking for . . . The team gave me a great car once again, it's a lot of fun winning races at the moment and I've been enjoying it and I hope the team are too.' New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon on the 'run it straight' tackle challenge that has gone viral on social media after a teenager died from a serious head injury: 'All I can say to young adults who are participating is you've got some personal responsibility in this. You're hearing the advice from police, from the medical fraternity, from government, from principals saying don't do it. To the adults that are involved in more formal organisation of it and are influencing it and leading this out on social media, I think you need to stop and I can't be any clearer.' 75-year-old runner British runner Sarah Roberts, who took up running just eight years ago, and now holds the over 75 world records over every track distance from 800m to 10,000m indoors and outdoors, as well as 5km and 10km on the road: 'I'd like people to think that they should always try something. You never know what you can do until you try it. Never think you're too old. Give it a go. You will surprise yourself at what you can do if you really try to do something.' Australian 100m sprinter Lachlan Kennedy has broken the ten-second barrier: 'It's so good. I can finally say I run nine.' Here we were, thinking he was going for Best Supporting Actor. He thinks he's the star, and going for Best Actor – and he might be right! Loading Team of the Week Callan Ward. The career of this fellow, the heart and soul of GWS could be over after he tore his ACL – a badly buggered knee, to you and me. Alex Johnston. South Sydney speedster notched 200 NRL tries. Just 12 behind the all-time record held by Ken Irvine. Reds and Brumbies. Good luck to them in the Super Rugby Pacific finals. The Waratahs, meanwhile, have shown some improvement, but finished disappointingly. Australia/South Africa. Competing in next week's World Test Championship final at Lord's. Socceroos. Beat Japan for the first time in 16 years with a thrilling last-minute winner in Perth and as long as they don't lose to Saudi Arabia by five goals early Wednesday morning, they qualify directly for a sixth straight World Cup – an extraordinary turnaround from recent grim times.
The Age
2 hours ago
- The Age
Shame on those who whip up hate against trans athletes for clicks and votes
'We are all just kids trying to make our way through high school. Participating in sports is the highlight of high school for some kids. No one was harmed by Soren's participation in the girls' track meet, but we are all harmed by the hateful rhetoric of bullies, like Rep. Libby, who want to take sports away from some kids just because of who they are.' Brava, brava, brava. What decency. And what a wonderful stand to take. Closer to home, last month we had our own major tabloid/talkback story about a transgender athlete at a South Australian Catholic school, who, it was breathlessly reported, had run riot at an athletics carnival. One father was quoted, saying the student 'broke a number of records competing against girls at a recent sports day ... breaking all the girls records'. It was great hate-bait, and the usual suspects on talkback and tabloid went hard. Got some hate you want to spread? Our lines are open! The former Liberal MP Gary Hardgrave certainly opened up on Sky News. Loading 'In the end,' he said, 'weak men want to compete against women and they put on the skirt and say, 'I'm a woman now, and I want to compete against you'. But even weaker men support those people in that kind of decision.' I repeat, great hate-bait! Manna from heaven. Did anyone pause, ever, to think what effect this has on the target of the hate-bait? This week, the ABC show Media Watch did, and made enquiries. And whaddya know? Most of it was nonsense. There was a school athletics meeting last year, creating precisely no controversy in the school at the time. Yes, the 13-year-old transgender athlete did indeed break a record, but it was another girl who actually swept the day breaking seven records. And the effect on the child in question from the pile-on? Devastating. 'No child or family should have to experience the trauma or fear that we have been through,' the mother of the child told the ABC. 'My child's privacy and innocence has been violated without consideration or empathy for the devastating lifelong harm this can cause. It's hard to express how horrific it is to read hateful articles about your child and have them used as clickbait for a political agenda created by adults and forced down the throats of kids who are just trying to be kids.' Read it and weep. Yes, yes, yes, occasionally the issue of an unfair advantage by transgender athletes in sport does arise – usually only at elite level – and is one to be discussed and sorted out by serious people. But that ain't this. The point is that we need to call this kind of stuff for what it is. It is not a genuine attempt to achieve fairness in sport put out by people who have a genuine track record of earnestly examining that very thing. It's just hate-bait, no more, no less, put out by people whose job in life is to stir up big trouble way above and beyond what the actual problem is. It's just hate-bait callously thrown out there to bring in swarms of bone-stupid groper fish who live off that very hate – to boost your ratings, clicks and votes – and to hell with the trauma it causes to their targets. For shame, you bastards. For shame, you bastards. What They Said Lachlan Galvin on the Wests Tigers fans: 'I understand where [Tigers fans] are coming from. I think they can have their opinion, and they can have their hatred and that against me. I understand that.' Joe Montemurro, new coach of the Matildas: 'I've followed their incredible journey closely and am energised by the passion, resilience, and identity they've built. The only promise I make is that we will play an exciting brand of football and that the integrity and the level and the respect of the Matildas will always be at the top of my thinking.' Tennis player Daria Kasatkina on her first major tournament after switching allegiances to Australia: 'To feel the support from the stands so many times. I don't know if everyone who was screaming, 'Aussie', were from Australia, but I felt this support . . . So this is the kind of support which I honestly didn't have before, it feels like it's something new to me — but it feels so nice.' Oi! Football manager Pep Guardiola doesn't think he's special: 'Do you think I feel special because I won a lot of titles? No! Forget about it! I feel that special is the doctor that saves lives. The people who invented penicillin. That is a genius. Me? Genius? Come on.' Kath McCann, the Tasmanian Devils' general manager of marketing, corporate affairs and social impact on alternative stadium options: 'This is Plan A and there is no Plan B.' Ticketek on the demand for Ashes tickets: 'We recognise that when we have high-demand events with limited inventory that some fans will miss out and will be disappointed. We encourage all customers not to use multiple browsers when trying to access tickets.' Tennis player Lois Boisson, ranked No.361 in the world, found herself in the headlines in April when an opponent, Harriet Dart, told the umpire, 'Can you tell her to put on some deodorant? She smells really bad.' This week she shocked No.3 seed Jessica Pegula to make the quarter-finals at the French Open, becoming the lowest-ranked quarter-finalist at Roland Garros in at least 40 years. 'I'm not sure what to say. Playing on this court, with this atmosphere, was amazing. I gave my all and in the end I won, which is just incredible. I hope I'm going to win it all!' Boisson was beaten by Coco Gauff in the semi-finals. Loading Aussie Formula 1 driver Oscar Piastri on winning his Spain, his fifth win of the season: 'Hard to complain, it has been a great year and this weekend has been exactly the kind of weekend I was looking for . . . The team gave me a great car once again, it's a lot of fun winning races at the moment and I've been enjoying it and I hope the team are too.' New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon on the 'run it straight' tackle challenge that has gone viral on social media after a teenager died from a serious head injury: 'All I can say to young adults who are participating is you've got some personal responsibility in this. You're hearing the advice from police, from the medical fraternity, from government, from principals saying don't do it. To the adults that are involved in more formal organisation of it and are influencing it and leading this out on social media, I think you need to stop and I can't be any clearer.' 75-year-old runner British runner Sarah Roberts, who took up running just eight years ago, and now holds the over 75 world records over every track distance from 800m to 10,000m indoors and outdoors, as well as 5km and 10km on the road: 'I'd like people to think that they should always try something. You never know what you can do until you try it. Never think you're too old. Give it a go. You will surprise yourself at what you can do if you really try to do something.' Australian 100m sprinter Lachlan Kennedy has broken the ten-second barrier: 'It's so good. I can finally say I run nine.' Here we were, thinking he was going for Best Supporting Actor. He thinks he's the star, and going for Best Actor – and he might be right! Loading Team of the Week Callan Ward. The career of this fellow, the heart and soul of GWS could be over after he tore his ACL – a badly buggered knee, to you and me. Alex Johnston. South Sydney speedster notched 200 NRL tries. Just 12 behind the all-time record held by Ken Irvine. Reds and Brumbies. Good luck to them in the Super Rugby Pacific finals. The Waratahs, meanwhile, have shown some improvement, but finished disappointingly. Australia/South Africa. Competing in next week's World Test Championship final at Lord's. Socceroos. Beat Japan for the first time in 16 years with a thrilling last-minute winner in Perth and as long as they don't lose to Saudi Arabia by five goals early Wednesday morning, they qualify directly for a sixth straight World Cup – an extraordinary turnaround from recent grim times.
