Afternoons with Michael McLaren - Monday, 9th June

seven three the open line number. If you want to have your say on anything, of course, you can send me a text right throughout the afternoon until three o'clock. Just go to the text line for that zero four six zero eight seven three eight seven three and the email remains the same even on a public holiday. Twogb dot com click on the feedback icon. Lot's coming up on the program between now and three o'clock. Later this hour,

I'll speak to a dairy farmer, Phil Ryan. He's down on the south coast there and they've had reasonable conditions. It's pretty greener bigger at the moment, I'm told. But the state of the dairy industry is back in the news and this sort of ebbs and flows comes and goes, this story how the dairy farmers are going. The herd is down in number, the number of farmers is down to the fears it could continue to drop as they are squeezed by the providers and the big behemoths in

the industry. Phil I'm led to believes doing okay. I think he's dealing with biager if I'm not mistaken. But a lot of other farmers in Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, in a litter of his drought stricken areas are really struggling to make a profit. And the minimum pricing is being negotiated as we speak. So it'd be groups like Fonterra, I'd imagine it'd be coming in and doing the minimum pricing negotiations and some of them are just saying, look,

we can't, we can't operate on these levels. Now. You know, we go to the supermarket and okay, we're not getting a dollar or a liter of milk anymore. But there is an argument maybe we should be paying more. If that then filtered back to the source. The dairying no guarantee, it always does. So these things come and go, these debates, but the problems seem to just perpetuate in the dairy industry. I know very little about it, but I want to speak to someone at the coal face, so I'll speak

to philm after one o'clock Meryll Kine. Now Merrill is the new South Wales Justices Association Vice President, and I was saying to Mark just before, there are a bunch of challenges for Justices of the Peace in Victoria. They simply don't have enough of them. In regional Victoria particularly,

there's a very significant earth of jps. And you know you're going to need a JP on a number of occasions throughout your life to witness documents, to do all sorts of things, and if there just isn't one available, or you've got to drive miles and miles to find one, it is a real impediment. So why are we down on jps? Why is there a shortage? Why aren't people taking it up? What did jps do? What are the qualifications you need?

The average JP seems to be getting older, and you know that's something we're going to have to look at. Drive is back with us, even if it is a public holiday. A lot of people are on the roads. James Ward, the director of content at drive dot com DOTU will be here to take your questions about different cars and all the rest of it. Actually, speaking of cars, I saw what was it, a Genesis? A Genesis on the road the other year. They're good looking cars. They're

very good looking cars. Don't see too many of them around, but damn fine looking vehicles. I might ask James about the whole Genesis story. And after two o'clock with the King's Birthday public holiday, comes the awards that we associate with the day. And I think this is a wonderful opportunity. It seems to have been well exercised this year, anyway to recognize and elevate those that have done extraordinary things but may not have Shall we say that the platform

or the pulpit that celebrities have to elevate their cause. Now, yes, we also give gongs to people that are sporting champions and former high profile politicians, and of course they've got their pulpit already and they can communicate from there. But what we get today are a range of Australians, a bunch of people that have really overachieved compared to the average, and yet up until this point haven't really had the ability, haven't been given the platform to educate us about what

they do and the areas in which they've achieved. I'll be speaking to one of those people today, Roger Franzen. Roger's the former chair of the Space Industry Association of Australia. He's done incredible work in engineering all sorts of things, and he's a wonderful gentleman. And he's now Roger friends in AO and I look forward to speaking to him in the final hour. We've got track of the day. As Mark reminded me. We'll catch up with a great

Mark Levy. He'll be at that big football match this afternoon. The continuous call team on instead of Sydney now because of the big game. So all of that and more stay with us one three, one eight seven three. It is quarter past twelve. Well, look, it might be a public holiday out here, but it's very quiet streets all that sort of stuff. But over in Los Angeles it's

a very different story. Turn on the television and chances are you'll see scenes from LA with thousands of protesters and law enforcement facing off over the removal of illegal immigrants from across the city. But depending on who you watch or what you listen to, chances are you won't hear the full story about what's going on. All too often, the anti Trump default position just automatically kicks in and the reason why, for example, the National Guard has been

deployed is not explained. So what is going on over there? Well, in short, on Friday and Saturday, so called Ice agents arrested some one hundred immigrants from around Los Angeles City as the agents swept through different neighborhoods, some of them heavily Latino. In composition, tensions escalated and protest has congregated, and there were reports of federal agents being pelted with rocks and chunks of cement. All of that started to

filter through. Something had to be done. Now, Trump's decision to send in the Guard is somewhat historic. It is the first time in some sixty or so years that a president has activated the Guard minus a request from

the state's governor. But in the case of Los Angeles, the governor is the Democrat Gavin Newsom, and there was no way Newsom would ask for help rounding up illegal immigrants, even those that might have criminal records, because his party has been running a legislative protection racket for such people for a long long time. Now, they call this sanctuary cities, right and in America, a stack of big cities like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, and along with some two

hundred odd towns are declared sanctuary cities. And in the case of Los Angeles, part of this designation means laws have been passed to specifically deny any cooperation between the local authorities and the federal government on matters to do with immigration enforcement. Now, for an Australian audience, trying to work out how this happens. It'd be a bit like the state parliament or some local council withholding resources and denying Canberra access to any council facility in the enforcement

of an immigration matter. Now, people here that how does that happen. Indeed, in the words of Nitha Raman, who's an LA councilor from the fourth District, quote, LA's new Sanctuary City Ordinance permanently enshrines sanctuary policies into municipal law and prohibits the use of city resources, including property and personnel, from being utilized for immigration enforcement or to cooperate with

federal immigration agents engaged in immigration enforcement. Now, she went on to write to constituents recently, quote the ordinance prohibits the direct and indirect sharing of data with federal immigration authorities and important gap, she said, to close in our

city's protection for immigrants. So there you have it. The law makers of Los Angeles City have no interest in helping the federal government identify and deport people who shouldn't be in the country or suspected shouldn't be in the country. In fact, they're doing everything they can to protect such people.

Despite the direction of the Congress and the presidency. That's a completely unacceptable state of affairs that's been allowed to FESTI for far too long, and at all it took really was a president who was prepared to actually follow through on his order to bring it.

intentionally escalating the tensions. You see, since nineteen seventy nine, with the passing of the so called Special Order forty, the LAPD have apparently maintained a policy where they don't arrest people on the basis of immigration status or take any actions to determine a person's immigration status. These don't

want to know. The latest sanctuary city legislation, the one I mentioned earlier, is merely the icing on the cake, the cherry on the top, But it speaks to a mindset that's determined to undermine and stymy federal directives in a policy area that should be wholly managed by federal law. Now, I think with the deployment of the National Guard, Trump's making a point not just to Los Angeles in California, but all the devotees of sanctuary cities across the United States,

and that is shape up or ship out. In his first term, he tried to deny these jurisdictions federal funding if they didn't follow federal directives. That failed, but emboldened by winning a second term, he's clearly trying again, and so far the legal barriers are again being put up, the latest coming on April twenty four, when a federal judge in California, of all places, barred the administration from

denying federal funds two sanctuary jurisdictions. But if it goes all the way to the Supreme Court, well Trump may have the last laugh. Watch this space. In the meantime, some of Los Angeles streets remain off limits, with smoldering cars, riot police, the National Guard, at a mix of protesters and just plain rioters facing and fighting for the rights of what the Americans tend to call illegal aliens. Now many will remember that song by the clash from nineteen

seventy seven. You know, I fought the law and the law won. Well, it's going to be fascinating to see which interpretation of the law prevails in this case, the local laws of the city of Los Angeles or the might of the federal law and the presidency. But either way, as the messy scenes play out on our televisions, one thing is certain, the reputation of the United States eight winning. Appreciate all the feedback, keep it coming. Zero four six

zero eight seven three eight seven three. On this public holiday Monday, a lot of calls about the JP situation. Let's get to some of those. Jack, Good, afternoon, kisch.

to sit back and do another test? Be coauld have already done all this, Nothing's changed, We're still doing the same Servant.

I'll see what others have to make about that. Jack Sean, good afternoon.

through that and studied it. And the questions, Michael, were so close to know how you have multiple choice questions where the answers are very similar that you know, I got sort of you know, eighty percent incorrect correct, and you know I had to get ninety percent to become reapplied past the test. I didn't even get an option, but it was was basically, you know, you're failed and

you're not being to register. And I was really disappointed with that whole prochi because you know, as Jack has done and other people have done, you know, you give this as a community service, yes, and then you service and we'll see you later. And now that the short of people that's ridiculous.

some having to sign statutue decorations. And in my days when I first joined, you had to apply to your local member of public and then they also did a criminal record tech so you had to be a good character and have references, but you didn't need any other qualifications to become a JP.

start to towel week. But it's easy this time around. So I guess they may have listened the peoples concerns when sid or finder in your process.

said no thanks to all of this. Last year, Sue on the tech said, I was a JP for thirty seven years. I retired last year with the renewal of status application forms. They're now online, but I don't have a computer. It was a privilege to serve the community. These are usually available at libraries, post offices, banks and real estate agents that I know of. That's from Sue,

who is now retired JP. A lot of people I think go to the post office for that, some doctors JP's as well as being GPS obviously real estate agents. That's interesting. I hadn't thought of that, all right, Good to be with you. One three one eight seven three. The open line number two got the text lines going nuts for a public holiday. Every JP under the I think every JP in the southern hemisphere sent me a note already, Dave saying what many have said, it's a

theme here. He said, when I reapplied from a JP license that was five years ago. The questions were so close in answers. I complained and was told some of the answers were correct, but one was basically more correct. Sort of animal farm esk, isn't it. We're all equal, except some animals are more equal than others. Anyway, I said, frustrating six times to get three questions right. It's a he's a paint of the dairy. That's from Dave, So

I think Dave's stuck with it. But a lot of people saying, when you do the test, and again I've got no knowledge of any of this, but some of the answers are so similar that they are basically almost the same. But you've got to pick exactly the right one, and it's confusing. And now look others are saying, well, look, you know JP or not. You want to make sure that the people that are will do have this title,

know what they're doing and get it right. So if they're favling the test, maybe they shouldn't be a JP. Others who are JP, so, well, look, you know, we know what we're doing. It's just that the tests are so difficult to discern the exact right answer, because some of them are so close in rationale that it's almost deceptively difficult. Now again, I'm just referencing what others are telling me. I have no knowledge of this. We'll discuss it in greater detail with an expert after the news,

but I said text after text. This one from no Leano says I am also a JP for many years. The test is many answers that are very ambiguous, and a one hundred percent pass is required. Whilst I'm happy at my age early eighties to still provide the service, I think the whole thing is just too hard to provide a service. That's from Noline. Thank you, Noline. Nice to hear from you. This is from Gay, who says

I've been a JP since nineteen eighty nine. Like the last caller, I too had an online course assessment to maintain my status. It's typical of the government simply adding a layer of red tape to keep some bureaucrat in the job. Also note no other occupations can sign documents and do not need to do this course like a JP. All right, Gay, thank you for your feedback. I appreciate it. Paul suggests that JP should be paid a small fee. My understanding is it it's a completely voluntary service. Again,

I might be wrong, but that's my understanding. Geraldine's just called in, Hi, Geraldine.

the end. Well good because and the on that site that you go into the manual is actually a soft copy in front of you, so you can just pull it down as you need it, and even when you get a question wrong, it will tell you which section in the manual you need to go to to get the answer.

They often churn out some doozies the UK Telegraph, and this is top of the pile. According to some academics. Don't roll your eyes yet, the Michel and Restaurant Guide is racist, eurocentric and elitist. Don't these people have anything better to do? So, it says here. The famous guide, first published by the French tire Come copy back in nineteen hundred, now covers more than thirty countries. It's racked

up sales of more than thirty million copies. The rating system of stars is often seen as the sort of the krem de la creme for the restaurant industry. But in the most recent version of the Great Britain and Island Guide, and that's got eleven hundred and forty seven restaurants, two hundred and twenty a starred, and there's a Greek one in there. There's an Anglo Thai etery, a Korean restaurant, a couple of West African restaurants in Fitzrovia in London

that have been awarded stars. So it's not just all French things, but as it says here. Despite some variety within the guides, critics argue that Michelin's approach is generally parochial and that it ignores huge swathes of the world. Now the average person who might be over in say Europe or something that look, we're going to splash out, We're going to gave a really top notch feed here. Let's have a look at the Michelin Guide. And you know, do you think they give it. They ain't care, it cares,

you know. But some academicsio existence. So as it says here, these emissions may be down to racism, also suggests a professor of anthropology, religion, and transnational Studies at Emerson College

in Boston. The person is saying, quote, there is no Michelin Guide in India, one of the world's greatest and oldest cuisines, or in Africa, with its multiplicity of cultural flavors, perhaps a side of racism with the berf bourgagnor Nice tribe, but instead of promoting restaurants in other parts of the world. The critics say that the inherently elitist guide for celebrating obscure European gastronomic processes such as fire cooking and Stockholm

and molecular gastronomy in Spain. In fact, the academic said, and I quote, despite a movement to decolonize food, did you know about? That? Movement? Hasn't registered in my part of town. Too busy, just trying to pay the bills. Anyway, despite a movement to decolonize food by rethinking colonial legacies of power and the extractive ways of eating, Michelin has delivered its stellar reputation primarily from reviving, reviewing rather metropolitan

European cuisine. Anyway, you get these GISTs. Some people reckon the Michelin Guide is racist and eurocentric. Look, it might be eurocentric, but is that a problem? Does that matter? I mean the mischel entire company's French, you know, I mean, cut them some slack. They happen to be European. I'm sure there's a bunch of critics and guides in Africa and Asia and India that do their own thing that probably don't rate too many European restaurants, or restaurants in

Australia for that matter. Do we care?

this reality is something that I think they forget. Some of that note out linked to all sorts of different policies which in turn put farmers under pressure control things like methane production from the animals and sort the whole story gets lost, right, But there is also the issue of cost in farming, because there are often occasions when the local produce is more expensive than what we could

purchase from overseas. But at the end of the day, we need local farmers to keep the economy running and our sovereignty guaranteed. Now the backbone of all of them, of of course, the dairy farmers, but they're under a lot of pressure at the moment, with dairy companies across the country reportedly announcing their latest farm gate milk prices.

Now generally speaking, across the board, these companies have announced slight increases to the price this is the minimum price, but they pale in comparison to the increased cost of production at the farm gate. Now the story doesn't apply to all farmers. Some farmers have got a pretty good deal and they're not in the middle of drought, and there's good production and everything on their patch. But you go fifty or sixty kilometers in another direction, and it's

a different story. I wanted to speak to a dairy farmer who understands all of this. Phil Ryan is his name. He runs Hillgrove Dairy. It's in the Bega Valley. He's on the line with me. Now, Phil, thanks for your time this afternoon.

where it needs to be. Fonterra are paying their dairy farmers in New Zealand the price of ten dollars a kilo New Zealand, which equates to about nine dollars twenty five after exchange, and I suggest that's the minimum our dairy farmers want to see as a price signal for them being appropriately valued, and even a little bit more than that would be good.

number of farmers supplying that milk. There are elements of competition that I think are very very good for the economy and society generally, but we struggle in Australia with a heavily dominated domestic supermarket industry, and we saw Coles, Wilworth and now the reduce the price of freshmen last year when there's no way that price should have been going down, and if they were serious in responding to the needs of farmers, they would be increasing that price

and passing it on immediately and it should never be going backwards. Farmers are, particularly dairy farmers, who operate relatively high volume, low margin businesses. We are arguably more exposed to inflationary pressures and input costs than the most businesses, and we have very little control over the price we sell our product for, and that is an issue as well as the extreme climatic pressures that we're seeing in parts of the country.

a year, twenty four to seven operation. The herd has to be milked twice a day. The average farmer is getting older. A lot of these metrics are pointing in the wrong direction for a healthy future.

So what's the message to the city folk, who has the spending power that in many respects decides a lot of this. What can we do?

complicated one. But again, if it's Australian made, it's supporting Australian farmers. Australian owned becomes a bit more complicated because several of our large processes in the country are foreign owned, but they're still using milk from Australian farmers, So sort of it is a challenge to pick the right brands, but one of the easiest ones would be Narco which is a farmer own cooperative on the North Coast and Queensland and their farmers have been in particular hit very

hard by the floods and wet conditions up there. So if you've got access to that one. Obviously I'm a bigger supplier and bias towards bigger and dairy farmers, but generally any Australian made dairy product is supporting Australian farmers.

the JPS than others? And what is it with this retesting that a number of view of raised has been a bit of an issue. Well, Merril Kane's the person to speak with. She's the vice president of the New South Wales Justices Association and she's with me on the line. Merrill, you're a good person doing this on a public holiday. Thank you for your time.

a little bit more formal. You do have to register well, put in an application to become a JP, which you can do online, as so many things he's done, And there is, as you said, that you do have to sort of prove you're a person of good character and that you're not likely to be corrupted. So you have a police check and you can't be an unm what's the word. You can't have had bankruptcy issues or something like that. But there is also now a knowledge test,

which is what you also raised about. I think it was probably about six years ago now a knowledge test came in for jps. And because you know it, it's a sort of thing when you it's not just a

matter of you know, witnessing a signature. There are proper ways to do things, and for example, if you were witnessing a statutory deck cloration or a Afford David, there are in fact thirteen steps to be followed, so you need to do that properly, and you need to know that the client we call them clients, they're not customers, needs to be reassured that you know what you're doing. And therefore the Department of Communities and Justice brought in

this knowledge test. Yes, put a few people off, but let's face it, from the public point of view, we want these people to know what they're doing and to be assured that they do know what they're doing.

but a good twenty five thirty years ago. The now, I can't remember exactly, but what was then the Department of Justice, I think reissued appointment and they just think that they had a lot of people on their books who no longer wanted to be act as jps, or they might have even died or moved away, or they couldn't find them, so they decided to re issue the appointments of JP's and the appointment now lasts for five years.

keep the peace in local areas. It goes back that far and they you know, then you know legal Over time, the legal process became much more formalized and training was much better, and the appointment of judges and magistrates was much more not constricted but controlled, and Justice of the

peace the term is still used. In fact, our first Justice of the Peace in Australia was Governor Phillips, so we go that far and then he appointed people to assist with legal matters and that's really what we still do. We're not lawyers. We can't give legal advice. But if you need someone who is proven to be of good repute and to witness a document or certify that a document is a true copy of the original, for example

booth steps and marriages certificates. It's often needed these days for people who are applying for jobs and they need certified copy to submit to the people that they're applying to. And you don't want to give original documents and they don't want to have to deal with it.

of the JP is increasing demographically. I guess something's going to have to be done to rectify that, because the JP's will be run off their feet.

be paid. So this is purely a voluntary job. And it is a job that, as you said, your father having been a school teacher, when he retired he became a JP. In fact, I was a pharmacist and when I retired I became a JP. So it's often a position that people take on in semi in retirement or semi retirement, and therefore your your life to continue to do that, your work is your you know the third age of working it is, you know, we can't keep going forever. It needs to continuing turnover of people.

to support your application, but that's pretty much automatic. They will ask for permission to check out that you don't have the department that is that you don't have any criminal history, and you do this online test and that's an open book exam, so it's not really that challenging because if you don't know the answer, you can look it up.

So if you've got a question about your motor vehicle one three, one eight seven three, particularly about one you might be considering buying, a lot of people do use the drive segment to sussep whether they should get the Iondai or the Mazda or whatever. It is, or maybe the thinking, well, I want to get a car for the young one, but not sure what the best one in this price bracket is. These are the sort of questions the drive boys are particularly well versed in answering.

So if you've got a question down those paths or any other path really to do with motoring one three, one, eight, seven, three, and we'll be able to get that answered for you. I hope the team will look before we get to the news, though, what about this? I let me just have to die. I appreciate the NDIS is a very very important vehicle in the broader scheme of things, very important. The principle of it is right. The practice of it, though,

I think, is sorely missing. I just struggle to believe, as the headlines say today that one in ten young children in Australia are using the NDIS. One in ten. Really, let me just think about that one in ten young

children in Australia are now on the NDIS. Now, that statistic is in in some ways misleading because when you look at young boys and I'm just trying to find the exact figure here, it is well under fifteen's now make up seventy percent of the scheme's new participants, So seventy percent of the new participants filing into the ends fifteen years and younger. Fifteen percent of Australian six year old boys are on the ndis fifteen percent of boys

six years old. How's that possible? And the reason I ask that is, I mean, well, you know what's going on a lot of the cases being put into it lately have been children with autism or diagnosed with I think as at stage two autism. I think that's the threshold you have to meet from memory. And there's some serious questions about whether some of these diagnoses are genuine or not. Not all, of course, but some, and that's

worthy of discussion. But it does seem that one of the issues here is that a lot of people have been put into or onto the NDIS because there are not equivalent state based interventions that can be accessed. It's sort of NDS or bust, that seems to be the situation. So a lot of parents are saying, well, look, the child has to get on the NDS because if they don't, there's no support for whatever the condition happens to be. At any other level. Whatever support is there is just

so mediocre you don't bother. That seems to be part of the issue. So look what's going on. I don't know, you know, the sort of people patting themselves on the back saying, oh, we've got the growth rate down. Yeah, well it's down to I think ten point six percent. Now, any government program growing it over three or four percent perandom is unsustainable. Ten point six percent, that's down from

about thirteen. So, I mean they are there's a slight step in the right direction, but everywhere you look, I just I just don't understand how we've got to this point now. Surely, when the NDS was first in visged and sold to the public, I think it was Jenny Macklin and Julia Gillard and others, that Nicola Roxon might have been involved. I'm not anyway all of that.

the exact number here. It is seven hundred and seventeen thousand people according to the last quarter's numbers on the NDIS and growing seven hundred and seventeen thousand when the initial reports and Productivity Commission reviews and all of those forecasts that had thing like that. So we've just blown all of the initial estimates out of the water, and it's continuing to grow at a very unsustainable rate, although a tad slower than what I guess moment says the

worst case scenario. No, I'm not saying people shouldn't be getting access, that they don't qualify, that they should be denied, none of that. But we seriously have to consider this. I mean, it is going to be unfundable going forward if we keep going at this rate. And I worry about so many young people, young boys, particularly being associated

with the NDIS. I mean, are we sure, Are we certain that in the vast majority of cases they really should qualify, And if not, are we doing them a service or a disservice by gaining for their parents anyway access to some of the services available. I mean, these are questions, hard questions, but they do have to be discussed and debated in this country. I think one three, one eight seven three. All right, let's go to the

news room. I think we've got all the tech. Kremlin sworded which helps Aeron Margot.

to be cut free. Israeli forces have boarded and stopped at gas Abound AID boat carrying Greta Tumberg and other activists. They say those on board will be provided with sandwiches and water, then return to their home countries. And a runaway pet zebra, which has been on the loose for more than a week in the US, has been found and captured. Ed had to be airlifted to safety in Sport. The bulldogs are looking to return to the top of the inner A ladder when they take on the Eels

in front of seventy thousand fans this afternoon. Young Gunlucky Galvin could make his deboo after a messy exit from the Tigers. He's been named on the interchange bench. And there'll be more news at two o'clock on afternoons.

Terry Hills just a top of thirteen today it's pretty could Bondai fifteen, Campbelltown, Paramatta fourteen, Richmond fifteen Tomorrow sunny in eighteen. That's a bit of a change, isn't it, and then mostly sunny for Wednesday. A top of eighteen for the city Candra today, good to have you with two double c shower or two top of eleven Tugnong's the same morning frost and a partly cloudy fourteen on Tuesday.

Wednesday somewhere between minus one and positive thirteen depending on the sundial morning frost and then partly cloudy Lithgo well a max of just six Today. Showers or snow at times, and you don't see the snow symbol too often, but there is orange. Will see some snow on a top of just five mudgie more likely I think rain or that it's very hard to do. That could be little snowflakes top of nine bathist eight, So I said, Lythgo six, Katombus seven, Springwood thirteen cloudy and top of nine on

Tuesday for Lyfthgo very similar story. On Wednesday. You might be listening in some areas that get a little dusting of the white stuff. You can give us a call and let us know how beautiful. I think really have said this before, but it's true. There are lots of places around the world to get snow. Yeah, the Alps in these sort of areas in Europe, and they've got the pine trees and it all looks very pretty and nice. But when the white stuff falls on the Australian native bush,

I think it's particularly beautiful. There's just something about the eucalypse and those native shrubs and the rocky outcrops and whatever that's sort of endemic to Australia. And then having a dusting of snow that maybe because it's so rare and unexpected, I don't know, but particularly I think appealing and aesthetic about that. Anyway, enough of my musings will take a break when we come back. Let's get in the motor vehicle and we'll talk Drive.

to raise with you. I saw a Genesis on the road the other day, four wheel drive as sorts, very very sixy looking rear, if I can put it that way.

the state of the world. So manual will start to be enthusiast. Only we know Porsche or persisting with it. We know some parts of BMW they're trying to but for the most part it will be phased out.

just not going to get it in anything else. The most old school new car you can buy these days is either a seventy series Toyota land Cruiser or the Innios Grenadier, and one of them is basically a look it's a nineteen eighties relic that's kind of.

and all that kind of stuff. But the modern ones, yeah, launched as the three point fifty was the first modern Z car improved in the three seventy, but now it is a four hundred, but it's just called the this and Z.

a specific level. But being a land cruiser, there will be someone, So maybe check out some online whether their Facebook groups are online clubs, to see if any land cruise or owners have been down this path before.

is the energizer Bunny. He'll be out at the Olympic Stadium, big football match this afternoon, and there will be a bit of traffic chaos, i'd imagine come six or seven o'clock there as people leave because others will be coming in for this Katie Perry concert, so it'll be be a nice place to avoid if you don't have to be there, I suppose later in the day I will also catch up with one of our latest recipients of the Order of Australia, Roger Franz and extraordinary human being.

You probably haven't heard the name. But that's why these awards, the King's Birthday honors are important because, as said at the top of the show, you can elevate people that don't have the platform but have done incredible work in whatever field is their chosen field of expertise, and where we can learn about them, we can learn about why what they do is important for the economy, for the country. And the work that Roger has done in space and in engineering is vital and it's not just sort of

esoterical theoretical. We are using all of these things that he has worked on in applications in our everyday life. They're tangible. We may not appreciate it or understand it, but Roger will explain some of that for us. Look for to speaking with him. I'm told he's a real gentleman later in the hour, So stay with us. Track of the day. Everything else coming up as well. One three, one, eight,

seven three. As I said, we've got a few more updates about Greta and friends on this boat heading to Israel. They've been intercepted them in given sandwiches or something like that. They'll be sent on their way. They won't make it, but the Swedish climate campaigner and a bunch of others on this vessel have also before they are turned around, I believe will also be shown a forty five minute video of the October seven massacre. Once they arrive at

the port of ash Dodd. The Australian will, via the AFP reporting of the Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has told the military which is towing the vessel they're on the mad Leen to Israel, to screen this so I'll get a bit of a different perspective, perhaps about the whole situation from October seven, twenty twenty three. Now, I

don't pretend that that is an isolated incident. This is an ongoing geopolitical situation in that part of the world that goes right back to the foundation of the state of Israel. But there are some people, because perhaps they want to ignorantly be blind to the whole story, are just looking at tiny little slithers of that narrative, of that historical narrative, and selecting which ones they want to

read and learn about and which ones they want to ignore. Now, I mean Greta's sort of pivoted here from Darling of the Climate Cause to the darling of the gars Are cause, as it were. But you know, whether anybody on the ground in Gaza knows that she's coming is anybody's guess. And of course she won't make it, nor will the supplies that were on the boat. I think they left Sicily on Friday from memory and the you know, they were heading eastern. They've been intercepted and the rest of it.

So that'll be the end of that story for now. But you know, there's a part of me that the cynical part that says, you know, how much of this is actually about the activists as opposed to the cause. You know, is there not more than just a whiff of narcissism about the way they do these things? Okay, they drum up attention, and that's what they want. They want the state of Israel to look horrible. You know, they're denying these people food and medicine and oh here

we are riding in to help people. And okay, but the way you deal with these complicated situations, if you have some clout, and Greta for good or for bad, has clout at the United Nations and the diplomatic level, the way you deal with these things isn't to hop on a boat and sail east and sort of wave your arms around as the cameras come within shot. The way to do it is behind the scenes, diplomatically. You do it quietly and you work to get the end

result that you apparently desire. So obviously that's not worked, and Grea will be heading back to Sweden at some point now just on the climate issue, not trying to pivot deliberately here, but as way of a segue, there's a fascinating piece by Nick Toscano and The Herald. Now many people probably haven't seen it, but it is a bit of a wake up call in the realism that is required with this transition as we verbert to renewable energy. Now, Australia, as I keep saying, is trying to do what no

other continent is attempting to do. Power the entire joint on solar and wind with some bactory backup and hydro, but we have limited hydro capacity because of our topography. Gas will be in the mix as the savior. But of course you've got a lot of state jurisdictions that are trying to stop gas extraction, and so whether it's going to be available and the volumes required is anybody's guess. I mean, at the moment, I doubt SOUL is producing

too much across part of Greater Sydney. For example, the wind turbines with the snowy conditions, I'm not sure what they're doing. So you've got to have a reliable backup now. As Nick Toscano reports, this isn't used to some of the big energy users. We're used to talk about aluminium smelters near Tomicgo in these sort of places, blue Scope Steel. They remain big users. But for the economy that is coming, it will be the data centers that are the hungry

beasts on the energy Pie and microstoft, Google, Amazon. They understand this because they are the users. Now, as He's writes, these three big players are urging the Albanezy government to beat up the delivery of energy storage projects that can guarantee around the clock power for the data centers. Now they've had to do this because the coalition were trounced and so nuclear isn't going to be part of the mix,

at least for the next three years, if ever. So a boom in the number of these data centers right around the world but it's happening here. Certainly a lot out at mcquarie Park, and there's a few starting to pop up I think around Gore Hill. These loom as one of the next tests for Australia's shift from coal to renewables, because renewables aren't reliable, and that is the data centers require huge amounts of power to run and to keep cool, meaning there's extra strain on the grid.

You know, forget all these electric vehicles are going to have to be charged. These things, as I said, are

going to be very thirsty for juice. Twenty four seven. Now, Microsoft, Google and Amazon are among a group of industrial power users and clean energy developers stepping up their calls to the federal government for not just an ambitious renew wall target, you know, eighty two percent of the grid and they support all that sort of stuff, but one that simultaneously fast tracks projects with the capacity to store surplus power from the growing number of solar panels of wind turbines

to cover the gaps when it's not sunny or windy. Now, if they can achieve that, it'll be in everyone's best interests because the same deficits that threaten the data centers threaten us in the broader economy when we go to turn on the lights. Now they've apparently written a letter

to the Energy Minister, Chris Bowen. I hope it was all very simple English and the international group known as the Long Duration Energy Storage Council, it is warning that a renewable grid is quite only as strong as its ability to deliver power when and where it's needed. That's a convoluted way of saying reliability is key. Now Microsoft and other technology companies in the United States, and you've probably heard about this, are increasingly turning to nuclear power.

And they're doing that so that they can meet their dual objectives simultaneously. One to have net zero electricity, but two to make sure that twenty four to seven electricity is available. Now nuclear can do that, renewables can't on their own. They need secondary technologies and Facebook and Instagram's parent company, that's Meta. Last week, it says here assigned a twenty year deal to secure a nuclear power to help meet surging demand for AI and to United Nations

report out. Just in fact, last Thursday, set electricity consumption by data centers increased twelve percent and has done each year twelve percent from twenty seventy to twenty twenty three,

four times faster than the generic global electricity growth. So now I guess you'd say, dear, I say, using the pun, they're at the coal face, these people minus the coal, and they are saying, you know, it's all well good to have these renewable targets, folks, but you've got to be able to back it up with a reliability capacity. I keep saying nuclear could have done it, but the Australian public have decided that's not going to be part

of the mix, certainly for the next three years. I suspect it's gone and done and dusted for a while.

I wouldn't rule it out long term, but I think for quite a while nuclears finished, and we're going to have to invest heavily in battery storage and other forms of storage to ensure that the unreliables can be more reliable, not just for the status quo for energy use, but the increasing demand on the grid when the data centers proliferate and the electric vehicles proliferate and greater demand is realized.

I just hope all of those well paid bureaucrats are across the brief because if they ate, we're in some strife. We'll catch up with Mark Levy shortly out at the Olympic Stadium big footy match coming up. When we wrap up here one three, one eight seven three, A lot of text message is still coming through about all the different issues we've discussed so far. Greg makes the point that why do we have to invest in order that Microsoft and Meta have a reliable power supplied. They've got

revenues rivaling the GDP of most countries. Let them research and buy their own batteries and if they can't do it, well, then they can, as Greek says bugger Off. Okay, well, look I have some sympathy with that, but I guess the point they're making is if Australia doesn't have nuclear power as part of its legal energy mix, then we're going to have to come up with alternatives, not just indeed for the demands of the economy of the future, which they have a significant stake in, granted, but for

everybody's sake. And so I guess Gregor, I appreciate the point you raised, and I understand and I sympathize with that sentiment, but really they are sounding a warning here that I think we will all benefit from if we can come to some sort of resolution. Back to the JPS, Michael says, everyone's using the plural JPS, but surely it should be j's P as Injustices of the Peace singular. I think that's right, but j's P sort of you might get the wrong impression and people say, who's Jay

and what's wrong with him? You know? So anyway, I take your point, Thank you, Michael. Back to the NDS. Note here from someone says, my ten year old son has dyslexia. He's struggling really badly, but the school recognizes this and we're spending six thousand dollars a year to get out of school education help. We've been advised to find a doctor who'll diagnose him with autism, which he doesn't have, because without that he'll never get even basic

help at school. This is the problem, and this is why the NDS is growing like topsy, because there is this going on to get in and get you get the income from the NDIS, you get the autism stage two diagnosis, and you're in without it, you struggle and you've got to find the money yourself, and a lot of people can't, Simon. I appreciate that. I thank you very much. One three one eight seven three.

Road as well. So we're going to have a great atmosphere for a clash between two Western Sydney rivals, Paramatta and Canterbury. I'm just looking at the Bulldogs down out there. They've just arrived, they've wandered out onto the field. Lucky Galvin's had a couple of photos and he's gonna make his club debut.

of football. There is an issue, though, Michael. I've shouted some coffees for the boys, just to give us a little pickup for today, and I thought I saw some maltesers sitting on the shelf. So I've bought a box of Maltesers for the team. How much, Let's just say, in excess of nine dollars. It says king Share on the box. But it's a sixty grand box of Maltesers. There's about twenty Malteesers in it. So I'm outraged to.

were certainly in the contest. So I think the Eels are going to be competitive, but I think Canna reill win.

and I hope it works out for him. Now before we get the news, of course, Coco Goff had a reasonable French open, didn't she. But it was a bit of an awkward first round for miss Goff. She forgot I think what some would say is a kind of critical piece of kit if you're going to go and be playing a professional tennis match, that is, her rackets turned up to the match without tennis rackets. Now, of course, you know, being a superstar in the world of tennis,

they found replacements in a way they go. But I thought i'd ask you this afternoon one three, one eight seven three, where have you gone and forgot something kind of crucial? You gone to a birthday party and left the present behind? Have you I don't know, maybe a photographer or something, and you had the duties to do a wedding and you turned up to someone's very special day and you left the camera at home, or I mean,

what was it. You might have been at a piano recital and you know, you're not like one of those superstars that you know, can do it all off the top of their head. You kind of need the music, the sheet music, and you left it, I don't know, on the kitchen table or whatever it was. I'd imagine I'm speaking on behalf of a few people here. If I suggested you might have been one of the gentlemen who was nominated as the best man and left the

rings at home. I think there was a few movies where certain things were exchange for weddings at a funeral comes to mind. I think they had a situation like that, didn't they. One three one eight seven three. So you've sort of you know, I don't know. I went to the shops and forgot the list, and don't worry about that. But yes, it's something that is kind of key, something kind of important, and you had a big role. You had, you know, one job to do, as they say, and

you're stuffed. If you've got a story, I wouldn't mind hearing it. One three one eight seven three. I will confess because my wife will remind me if she happens to be listening. And I don't mention this that when we first went to Europe together, meet the in laws and something future in laws as it were. Part of the itinery was we were going to have a bit of a trip through Italy. So okay, got there. My wife's the organized one, being dramatic. I sort of yeah, Australian,

it'll all be okay. So we turn up to the airport in Germany, and we're flying down to Naples I think it was, and we get there early in the morning, it's one of those early flights, and we hop out of the taxi who managed to do about one hundred and ninety three thousand kilometers down the auto barn got us in four minutes or something and said, okay, we've got everything, got bags, you've got that, and she said you got your passport and then no, you packed that,

didn't you. No, okay, so we got on the flight, but it was thanks to a very enterprising taxi driver who did incredible things to and from the house so she could go back pick up my passport. And you need your passport on airport and I forgot that one. So my logic was, oh, well it's an inter European flight, it's domestic sengen right. No, that was a bit of the Australian mindset that went awry. Anyway, So you might have a suggestion or you might remember something nobe wasn't

you. You might have been your husband or your wife they kind of or mate forgot something kind of important. One three, one, eight seven three will fight out those embarrassing stories after this person who has never forgotten anything is the wonderful erin ma Erin Good.

banking staff. The state government is allocating more than thirty million dollars in the next budget to provide better support for those sleeping rough and Network ten has acted ACXD its long running current affairs show. The project to be replaced with a new news and current affairs program. In Sport, Australia has been knocked off the top of the Sale Grand Prix championship standings. The Flying Rus crossing the line at the New York event in fifth, slipping at a

second on the ladder behind Spain. And there'll be more news at three o'clock on afternoons.

And a lot comes buying our pay later after pay and Zip and all those guys, and they said, well, we're not credit because we're not charging you interest. Now the rest of us No, that's obviously not the case, but legally they were one hundred percent right. And what that meant was the rules that apply to credit cards, personal loans, payday lenders, all that sort of stuff. So they didn't apply to buy now, pay later. Governments and

regulators might have taken way too long. This has been an issue for thirty four or five years, I think, and they've dragged their heels as parliamentary inquiries and regulator looked at it. The government FI I only got around to passing some new laws not that long ago. And as you say, they start at start this week. Effectively, now buy now, pay later companies are going to have to treat you as the credit card company would. Effectively,

it's not exactly the same. They're calling it regulation light, not exactly the same. But for example, enough to pay again, just as an example, not do anything wrong. But they didn't have to find out whether I had other debts, how likely I was to be able to pay that debt back, or I had to do with say I applied for it, but they reckon I should get it. Yeah, okay, that'll do. They can give me the they can give

me the credit I'm off. I can go and put as much as I want on buying now, pay later, programs. I have multiple ones. I got credit cards, I got a personal loans. They didn't know there was no requirement for them to assess my ability to repay. Now some did voluntarily to different degrees, but that wasn't in place.

So from tomorrow, essentially what's going to have to happen is if you want a buy and now pay Ladder account, you have to submit your usual information you would if you were taking out any other type of loan, and the company's obliged to make sure you can actually repay that debt. Doesn't sound like an hing reasonable thing. You feel they should have been doing it anyway, But that's going to be the change. What it probably means is fewer people will qualify, and that's I think where the

biggest issue had been in the past. Okay, if you got to get a credit card, you take one. If you were going to get a credit card, you might go buy our pay later, and if I didn't check, you might just get access to that credit. So hopefully more responsible lending, Hopefully fewer people get in the souls in trouble using credit products.

with all this special deal. No, we had to drive back home to Orange, drive back again and pay three times the amount.

Order of Australia. Now those selected are recognized for their contributions to all kinds of industries within our society, medicine, the arts, the military, emergency services, education and so on. But I wanted to catch up with someone who's contributed a great deal to an industry that I think may not seem every day to the average Australian right now, but it is an industry making waves in the realm of science. His name is Roger Franzen and he's being

recognized today for his outstanding contributions to the space sector. Now, more specifically, he's dedicated his career as Roger to engineering complex systems, aerospace and satellite communications, most of which of course goes straight over my head, but it is critical in the emerging economy. And Roger's been working in the space engineering space for more than thirty years, and in recognition of his outstanding contribution, he's been made an Officer

of the Order of Australia. That's why these awards are so good because people we may not know too much about. They're not celebrities, they're not household names and not Hollywood A listers, but we recognize them for the bedrock contribution that they have made to our way of life in our nation's economy. Roger's with me on the line, Roger Frans and thank you for joining us. Thanks Michael, congratulations AO, Roger, Friends and IO. That'll take a little while to sink.

defense and space. Scott Morrison was saying to me just the other week that this is really going to be the new frontier of the third pillar of orcuses that were no doubt you agree with that assessment.

dependency on other people. Whenever you have a dependency, you have a vulnerability, and we haven't addressed that vulnerability for forty years. We need to really step up to become professional at delivering enough capability. We're never going to replace everything that other countries have built up because they've been doing it for the last seventy years. So we would have a cliff face to climb of enormous height to

replicate that. Don't do that. Select the areas where we must have some resilience, both from an economic point of view and from a civilian the military point of view. So that's what we need to do.

for the nation. The grid would collapse. So yeah, it is important, and that's something that is not very well understood.

So we sleep beforehand and then go out and watch the stuff. And you know, that brings a perspective that says, wow, there is so much more out there that we don't understand. And needless to say, I'd done a techniqely oriented high school course and then went into engineering. I wasn't a great scholar, but I had a deep passion for it and that just kept driving me on.

training and such like. Those pyramids produce output, but they also produce jobs. The more pyramids you have in different areas pharmaceuticals and space and ships and airplanes and all of the complex engineering technologies, the more of those you have, the more jobs you have, but the more easily you can then realize new innovation, because it's like having a massive lego box that's able to let you build all sorts of different things. The more lego pieces you have,

the more things you can build. And that's really what we're lacking. Why aren't there more people going into STEM because where are the jobs? Where are the jobs in STEM?

eight seven three, here's your question. It was on this day, speaking of all sort of French things in twenty nineteen. On this day twenty nineteen, the great Ash Barty won the French Open tennis final. But who was the last Australian player to win the women's title before? Who was the previous Australian lady that won the French Open before Ash Barty did it on this day in twenty nineteen, Nita clue, here's a bit of a musical hint.