Lately, General Man, welcome the Late Bays.
Well, good evening.
I'm James Macpherson with Liz Storer and Caleb Bond coming up. A woman banned from a council forum after she said that dogs can't be gender fluid.
We'll tell you all about that a little later.
Plus when we look at the papers, the twenty twenty six Commonwealth Games will go ahead in Scotland, Victorians will be picking up the bill, and the federal government to consider free childcare for low income families.
All of that soon.
But first, it's no secret there's a housing crisis nationally, with last month national vacancy rates being just one point three percent. So if you're looking for a rental, good luck. But we want to show you just how difficult it is to find somewhere to live here in Sydney. Today we found an ad online for a three bedroom, one bathroom apartment in Bondi Junction. Sounds pretty good, a little expensive, listed at nine hundred fifty dollars a week, but there's
just one caution you'll see on the ad there. It says that the unit is located above a kindergarten. Well, when you read on in the advertisement you find out that there are a few problems.
With this listing.
It says the unit is located above childcare center and only access is through the kindergarten to get to your nine hundred and fifty dollars a week unit. Occupants are required not to come and go during kindergarten hours and no guests are permitted during kindergarten hours. Now the kindergarten hours seven forty five am to five forty five pm, which means you can't get in or out of your nine hundred and fifty dollars a week apartment before six.
Pm each evening.
But there's one more detail you need to know before you sign up for this amazing opportunity. The property is being offered at a lower rent figure as it takes into account the following. Occupation of this unit means, as part of the agreement, the tenant will be required to do the following for the preschool situated below the unit. Remove leaves, sticks and gum nuts from playground in children's area before eight thirty am on Mondays and Thursdays.
Blow up vacuum provided.
Liz, would you take up this amazing opportunity or would you prefer a tent somewhere in Chrisman's.
Electric made or live in gardener.
Plus you don't get access to the place that you're living in, or if you work from home, you're just shut.
Up in there all day because you can't leave.
The funny thing is this has been taken down, which may well suggest so much taking them up from the offer, because when you consider we're doing in three hundred and fifteen dollars each to live in Bondai, which is actually not a bad deal at the moment.
As per the photos. It is a large apartment, as they say in the listing.
I can just imagine three young bloats being like, you know what, we can make this work because Bondi, of course is a very much sought after location.
It is a lifestyle. It's like manly.
It's one of those suburbs that people are like, you choose a lifestyle when you choose this suburbs.
So I can just see three.
Young blokes being like, look, that's my work hours. Anyway, I've got to leave by seven forty five to get to work. I won't be back before five forty five.
Suits me just fine.
Another one probably works from home and they've decided you know what for a bit of yard duty once a week, were down.
But normally, if you have like a living gardener or a living cleaner, or a house attendant or something, you give them accommodation and you pay them to be there.
They did you say that that was why they'd reduced the rental rates.
You get out You've.
Got to pay to be the living bloody cleaner, right and look, you know we're Sidney having a laugh at it, but it's not really a laugh because it is indicative of where we are at with the availability of this country that you would actually genuinely consider as perhaps one of your only options to get a house in the area that you can't come and go from your horse for about nine hours a day.
Or actually what was it from seven.
Through to you know ten six pm?
You know ten odd hours or actually, yeah, what's that. I'm trying to do the numbers here. That's yeah, it's about ten hours a day. Look, I didn't do the all that well at maths at school. That's why I became a journalist. Ideal in words, different, it's about ten odd hours a day that you don't have access to your own house if you want to come and go.
There's a solution to this, do a Cert three in childcare, get a job in the child care center.
Perfect, you can come and go as your please.
Yeah, but if you do your SERT three in childcare, you're probably not earning enough money to pay nine hundred and fifty dollars a week to live in the place. But that's where we're at that people would consider something like that because it could be their only option to get a roof over the And how bad is that? I mean, you know, the federal government parrots on it all the time, but we're going to build a million houses in this country, so we've got somewhere for everyone
to live. There is such a simple solution turning off the immigration tap. Because they keep importing so many people and there are out enough places for them to live in.
You have situations like this. By the way, it's nine hundred.
And fifty dollars a week, which is you know, that's not cheap, and that could be someone's only option to have a roof over their head. It's funny, but I think it's actually a disgrace. And that's no knock on the landlord or the agent. I mean, look, they're just dealing in the market that currently exists, and why wouldn't you go for every bit of profit and an advantage that you can gain. But it's the tenants, the people looking for houses at the moment, who were struggling.
Through stuff like well, as Liz said, not long after, I think it was you that found this ad online. It was taken down, so presumably someone snapped it up. The ABC had a story today saying that there's tents as you drive into Grafton. Now there's a tense city set up at the entrance to that town because there's just no accommodation. And of course in Stephen Miles Electric in Queensland Brisbane there's a tense city as well. It's happening all around the country so it's a major problem.
But it's not just paying your rent that's an issue. Now you're having to pay in order to pay your rent with the advent of real estate agencies using apps for renters to pay their rental fees headline in the newspaper today, So Australian tenants are being charged to pay their rent these apps. One is called a low You pay the rent through this app rather than just having money deducted from your bank account. But just as when you use your card, you charge a service fee, this
app charges a service fee. One gentleman being charged five dollars ten a month. Now five bucks a month probably doesn't sound much, but when you're swimping for every dollar just to afford rent, electricity and food, it all adds up, and it's insult to injury when you're being stung for rent and then you have to pay the real estate agency in order to forward your rental fees. Tim Renter tim the rent rather for a second, that was his surname.
He told the paper.
I was annoyed at having to pay money for basically nothing, but I was afraid to say anything to the property manager. You don't want to risk being on one of their bucket lists for being a blacklists, for being a difficult.
Tenant, not doing well with the reading.
This is the problem with a shortage in housing that if you've got a rent all you feel fortunate to have one in the first place. You dare not kick up a stink about the condition of the property or about the terms the real estate agent is applying to you, even charging you to pay your rent, for fear that they'll come up with a reason to kick you out and you won't find a place.
Well.
I would say to your landlord James, and James often talks about how much he likes his landlord.
He's a good guy.
But I would recommend to him that he puts another zero on the end of James's weekly rent because given his reading abilities, tonight, he won't even know you've done it. I'd be taking to the collect But you know, it's five dollars extra to pay rent whatever. But every time you go to the cafe or the supermarket or whatever and you're getting charged to surcharge on your credit card, these surcharges very quickly add up.
You know, it's five dollars here, twenty cents there, fifty cents there. Across a month.
You could be paying million, one hundred dollars into these damned search charges, right, And it made me think today, what would happen now if you tried to go to the shop front of your property manager and try to pay your rent in cash.
Something tells me that.
A lot of places now would either look at your sideways and say, what the hell are you doing that for? Or they would simply refuse to take your money because everyone is expected to pay for everything online now, and it's all good and will to expect people to pay online. And I suspect a lot of landlords and property managers would expect you to pay online instead of via cash.
But if that then comes with a surcharge, given that cash is still legal tender in this country, and we see this in shops where they now refuse to take cash, you should not be able to refuse that legal tender. As far as I'm concerned, why should I have to pay extra to use my own money. It's because the person you're giving the money who doesn't want to pay the surcharge themselves.
But why should I have to pay that?
If there's a way I can avoid it, and that's cash, But I'm continually being told that I cannot use cash.
I don't see how that is fear in any way.
Well, a method by which to pay your rent without a fee is law in many states, and this particular app that Tim Rent is talking about does have an option whereby you're not paying the fee, but it requires you to go on to the app once a month to pay, and thereby have to put in all your banking details all over again, which I would argue is a small inconvenience if you want to spare yourself the
five dollars ten cents every month. I found it very amusing though, that this Alow app was invented by the great grandson.
Of Ray White.
He's cash and then on the family business. But you're quite right, why would a real estate agent who has chosen to pro assess.
Their rental payments through such an app, through such a platform, Why shouldn't they be the ones bearing the brunt of any costing curve because they're doing it for their own convenience, not the convenience of the renter. But like you say, Mac, in today's market, the renters just have to keep sucking it up because you don't want to be difficult, you don't want to get in.
Trouble to our free speech.
Absolute crisis going in our country right now. Today, Communications Minister Michelle Rowland stared down the barrel and told us with a straight face that the Misinformation Disinformation Bill that she's introduced, which would give AKMA, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, more powers, is now backed by report by AKMA itself which agrees that yes, They're more than happy to be the Ministry of Truth here in Australia should the bill get up.
In the most recent parliamentary sitting, I introduced legislation to ensure the regulator, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, has the powers it needs to hold digital platforms to account for their systems and processes in relation to combating seriously harmful miss and disinformation on their platforms. And just today the Australian Communications and Media Authority released its latest report into the voluntary industry Code of Practice dealing with miss
and disinformation in Australia. What this does is underscore the need for the government's legislation to combat harmful, seriously harmful miss and disinformation online. We know from the acma's report that around eighty percent of Australians are concerned about this and they want something done about it.
Stalin Chairman Mao and Hitler approve this message, baby, Can you believe this? Can we get a fact check on that a percent of Australians want this? We're supposed to believe twenty million of US Australians want this misinformation disinformation combated and we want AKMA to have weapons grade powers to censor me, to censor you, to censor us every night.
On the Late Debate, even more than they already do.
There's already codes that we all must abide by, which we agree, for the most part, are fair.
But what we're talking about.
In this misinformation disinformation bill is out and out censorship.
This is unbelievable. And be reminded, we.
Can't even bash labor about this. This isn't even an election war that we can play off because this bill is the brainchild of a liberal government. So if you think they're going to come to your rescue, think again. Whether your vote blue or red, you're getting this. It's utterly terrifying just to note that these two parties, which are completely controlled, in my personal opinion, no matter which way you vote, you're going to get the same end result.
With regards to this.
We've seen it play out in the UK, it's progressively playing out in the US, in Canada, all these Western countries biting down hard on the most basic principle of any free Western democracy, which is freedom of speak.
I just loved Michelle Rowland's press conference. I mean it was so dramatic.
Today. Akma agreed that Akma should have more power. Wow, thanks so much for that. That's driving matters. Who would have guessed that'd come to that conclusion.
And then that eighty percent of Australians want misinformation and misinformation cracked down very concersed, I would say, is a wonderful example of misinformation. If they're in a crackdown on misinformation, like you know, gender identity, I might be in support of this good, But the idea of misinformation and this, I mean, these are terms that didn't exist. What six literally is, they've made them up. There's things that are true and there are things that are not true, but
there's no such thing as misinformation and disinformation. They are government terms used to confuse us so they can make us say what they want and not say what they don't want. And then she talks about things like, you know, we've got to crack down on harmful and seriously harmful.
Did you see?
Yeah?
So seriously not just.
Things that are harmful. Then there are other things that are seriously harmful. I don't know what they are.
She can't show rowlands.
She knows what they.
Are, and she will let us know if we say anything that's harmful or God forbid seriously harmful in her view.
Yes, yes, I have a plan, but I don't know what the plan is yet, but I'll tell you about it later.
And the ridiculous thing about all of this, of course, is that if you think back.
To the presidential campaign in the US in twenty sixteen, Trump started talking about fake news all the time, right right, and he was derided by the left for using fake news as cover for news that he didn't like, reporting on Trump that he didn't appreciate. And it we said, well, you know, every time he says fake news, it simply because he doesn't want you to know that about you.
It's simply the free press interrogating Donald Trump. So you fast forward from twenty sixteen to twenty twenty four, eight years later, and you now have the left essentially using the term fake news, except that they've got different words for it now, which is misinformation and disinformation.
And saying no, no, no, no, no, we don't like all.
This information that's been published that's critical of us and could be damaging towards us. That's fake news. It's misinformation disinformation. The same people who criticize Trump for going after the press for fake news now claim that everything that is published by the press and you and me on social media is misinformation slash disinformation. How can she and AKMA possibly come up with the number that eighty percent of
Australians want this now? Sure, eighty percent of Australians may agree that there is false information online and that they would appreciate that not being there, But do they realize that under this Misinformation Disinformation Bill it would give AKMA, the Communications and Media Authority, the ability to haul you in just as much as it has the ability to haul mean and explain what I am talking about and what I am posting online.
You post something on X.
Or Facebook or whatever, and AKMA is suddenly the arbiter of truth, decides that they.
Know what is the truth and you don't know what's the truth.
They can force you to explain yourself, and if you refuse to explain yourself, they'll fine you for doing so. I don't think eighty percent of Australians would actually be in support of essentially a ministry of truth that can fine you for not cooperating with.
You exactly, And we are adults, We have common sense. If you say something hair brained, I'm gonna think it's hair brained. We all get to pile on you and tell you you're an idiot, and vice versa. If we disagree with each other. We are all capable of our own thinking processes. If you say something that I know nothing about, I'll do my own research. If I'm interested, I'll come up with my own opinion. I don't need Daddy government, who seems to be so scared of his
rebellious children. I don't need Daddy government to protect me from anything. Give me a most hair brained ideas.
At the very least, all we entertain.
They're not trying to protect you, Liz, They're trying to protect themselves.
They are the ones that come up with the brained ideas.
Is how they sell it though, that we're trying to protect you trying to protect themselves.
What I find.
Unbelievable about these arguments, though, is people's unwillingness to concede that these people mean you very real harm. What do you think they mean by cracking down censorship, individuals can't speak their minds anymore? And yet, despite the evidence, especially after the last four years, nobody wants to concede this
central point. And we can come back to this point where whether we're talking about digital idea, whether we're talking about surveillance, whether we're talking about them hauling these massive public public square platforms like X and others before they're jumped up court, people don't want to concede that maybe, just maybe the people in power genuinely mean you harm and are actively pursuing it, because how else, how else can you explain that?
The other thing is that people in power have glass jaws. Do you remember Anthony Lbnezi lamenting a couple of months ago that there's got to be a way to stop people making memes of me because he didn't like them.
So did you read today?
Gavin Newsom in California has passed legislation effectively to ban political memes. Anything that is, you know, satire or ridiculing politicians that's not legitimately true because it's satire is now banned. So all these politicians have got massive glass jaws, and it's okay to disagree with them, but if you laugh at them or mock them, they hate that, and so now they're outlawing.
Yeah, we've lost the plot. We have just lost the plot.
By the way, I don't want the word daddy anywhere near elbow.
Again, this is a little note to you, Liz.
But of course all of this stuff is being swept up into one.
Now.
You got misinformation, disinformation, Billy, got the hate speech bill that was also put up last week. You've got the proposal now from the federal government that they would restrict teenagers and children from being able to use social media. And as we've said many times, that is a noble goal. It is one that is highly popular because most people recognize the danger of children using social media, but they add that on to things like misinformation and disinformation as a.
Way to ram it through.
Here are a few things on the sidelines that mightn't be so popular, but here's a really popular policy, like restricting age on social media. Let's bring it all into one and try to sell it as one product. And as we've said here many times, why don't parents who ultimately have control of their children, or ought to ultimately have control of their children, simply tell kids you cannot go on social media, or even better, you cannot have
a device. Well, the big tech companies are fighting back against the proposal from the federal government to implement age restrictions, including the CEO of Snapchat. Now, Snapchat, some of our viewers may not be aware of. It's a social media platform that is primarily used by young people, including kids. It's basically where you can send photos and messages that self destruct. So I might send a photo to you, you open it, you know, it lasts for ten seconds
and then it disappears. If you screenshot that photo, it tells me that you have done so. Evidently that is also used by people for nefarious purposes. But the CEO of Snapchat, Evan Spiegel, says that parents have already got these tools today. This is the sort of thing that the government is trying to implement. We use the iOS level controls and screen time to limit what our team, we've got an almost fourteen year old at.
Home, what he's able to use.
We have Family Center as well inside of Snapchat that allows parents to monitor their teen's activity on Snaphat and put in place more stringent content controls and things like that. We've really done a lot to empower parents to make the right choices for their teenagers. And again, all those tools already exist for parents who would rather restrict the
use of certain apps for their teams. Well, Lo and behold, Snapchat speaks out against it, but Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has thought, well, maybe if we do a little bit now, then it might just get the government to move back a little bit, because they announced overnight that they will implement their own restrictions for children on Instagram. Michelle Roland, who we showed you before, I'm sorry to subject you to her again, but she brought this up at her press conference today.
The announcement we've seen today applies to one platform, that is Instagram. The government is seeking to introduce legislation, have that passed by the Parliament, will introduce that this year that relates to access to social media by children. We're looking at an age range here of between thirteen and sixteen.
And again we're looking at an age range between thirteen and sixteen.
Because they don't actually have a plan yet.
This is literally policy on the run. But this response is not surprising whatsoever. You had the Prime Minister the other day trust to say, oh, we're going to stand up against those big tech bullies who don't want to conform with the law in Australia. Well, the tech companies are simply trying to say and not unfairly so that we have created tools that parents can use if they so wish, but the parents.
Haven't done so.
So why is it always the responsibility of the government to step in and be the parent when the parents could do something about it?
Now, I love this, whether Snapchap CEO putting the onus back on the parents, your kids, your responsibility, revelatory, Oh my gosh, you're a genius, buddy.
This is what I think all of.
These guys, whether it's meta, whether.
It's elons, should be saying back.
To these governments, this is not necessarily our responsibility.
They already take great extremes to.
Abide by the laws of the countries in which they operate.
If there is a law being.
Broken, they're the first to say, yep, our bad, We've got to get this material off our platforms. They are very conscious of that. Otherwise they'd be in big trouble and they'd constantly be before the courts. But what the government is trying to do here is essentially take the place of parents.
And I know that a lot of parents I would call them.
Lazy, are like, oh thank god, the government's taking this on instead of me having to do my job. If you, as a parent, are aware of the mountain.
It's more like a mountain range.
At this point of studies and research done on the detrimental impacts on youths on social.
Media, do you even let them have access?
And if they do have access, why aren't you using the measures available to you to monitor it. It's not rocket science. It is your job to protect your kids.
I just find this utterly exhausted.
Let me speak on behalf of these lazy parents, because I agree with what churl.
You're one of them? Is that what you'rer.
Because I'm the parent on the desk that would be true. So the point is correct that there are opportunities on your phone to limit. And when my boys got social media and phones, I think they were thirteen years old, which was late compared to all of their friends. And for about two years they nag non stop and complained that their human rights were being breached because they were the only kids in the whole of the state who did not have an iPhone. And eventually I relented and
they got them at age thirteen. Interestingly, my kids now say, Dad, when we've got kids, were never letting them get a phone. There so you can go on the phone, and I remember when they were thirteen, would limit what apps they could have access to, We could limit how long they were able to use their phone before it would shut down, et cetera, et cetera.
But a couple of things.
You've got to basically be a tech expert to work out how I have enough trouble changing ring tones, as you well know, on my phone without trying to work out how do I select which apps they can and when they can use it, et cetera, et cetera. And then they'll come to you and you say, Dad, I want to access this because I want to get sports information or something, So can I just get you to change the setting for half an hour? And then you've forgotten the password and you've got to get back in.
And so it's not as simple as well, you're just lazy.
It's incredibly complicated for some tech retarded people like myself. And on top of that, parents are doing a million things now, so to sit down for half an hour and try and work out there's a lot going on.
So it's a parent's responsibility.
But I think most parents are saying, if we could have some help from these big tech companies, it wouldn't go astray, and we wouldn't begrudge them doing a little bit to make it.
That is a situation in which the government can assist in tech literacy.
Right, you don't have to go so well.
So I'll go to a seminar so the government.
Did you literally walk into an Apple store with your son's iPhone and say I want these settings the guys there.
When we are going to walk into an iPhone store like in my spare time and wait for it, you got to make an appointment three days later.
What you're talking about now is the lazy parenting I'm referring to.
About lazy parenting, I'm talking about it.
Wasn't worth one visit to an iPhone store.
Do me a favor.
They literally have tech gurus sitting there twiddling their thumbs or they're absolutely smashed if it's a busy day. But I'm talking about one visit and they can implement whatever.
You want on the device that you've bought in.
I'm just saying I think it's a bit rich to sit there and say, all these lazy parents, it's not as c.
Very important.
So I'm not saying it's not important you make.
Time for the things that are important, and if you don't have the skills, then you go to someone who does, like one trip to an iPhone store and say this is my son's phone.
Can you do this?
So what do people in Grafton do who don't have an iPhone store anywhere near them?
What do they do?
That's why I find someone, That's why I know there.
Is a place for government to educate on tech literacy.
And there's a place for the tech companies to say, you know what, we want to play our part two which which have now said, you know what, we could actually do better?
And is that not an admission they.
Haven't done They could do a hell of a lot more in terms of removed.
And they're doing it and they're doing it without government help.
Well, they're doing it because this will have been pressured and I do so.
So the question then is whether the government should now pursue these laws.
Yes, with the.
Tech companies taking the initiative of themselves.
This is the vex When this is the vexed part of the question, isn't it Because a lot of people, on the face of it, would support something like a government instituted ban on the ages you can use social media, and part of me thinks, sure, that's a great idea, but the problem is all the other things that come along with Of course, it's not as simple as Okay, we're just going to ban kids from using social media.
It becomes a vehicle for the misinformation, disinformation, It becomes a vehical for AI and digital ID, et cetera, and so on the face of it, if that's all, it was great idea, but there's so many other things that it gets swept up in that makes it so much more complicated and ultimately dangerous compared to what it could be.
Yeah, it's no coincidence that it's all happening at the same time, it's no coincidence that this suddenly became a pressing issue after years of being a very pressing issue, just weeks after our government passed its digital ID bill.
I would bet any amount of money and you can remember this and quote me on it, that no matter what measures are put in place, whether it's buy these tech platforms themselves, or whether it's by legislation by the government protecting the youth, give it a matter of months before the government returns.
To us and says it's not working. It's not. It's just not effective enough.
How else can you put these measures on applying only to youth a digital ID?
It's a digital ID. How else are you going.
To prove your age and who you really are on any online platform.
It's not just the kids though, who are complaining about a lack of access to digital devices. Would you believe that the prisoners now are up in arms that they don't have smartphones and iPads and whatever in the prisons with them? Petition today that has been put up by the Greens. They've collected a thousand signatures from inmates in New South Wales complaining that they want free phone calls and they want access to devices for wait for.
It, educational purposes.
Yes, I'm sure nothing could go wrong giving prisoners phones and iPads and stuff. Good Greens in p su Higginson carried on about this today. She said, right now, inmates in this state, that's New South Wales are suffering from.
Quote unque, disconnection disorder.
I look in jail.
The murderers and the rapists of New South Wales have disconnection disorder.
Oh, I'm also sorry for them, she continues.
So disconnection is kind of the point of jail, is right.
She continues, they can't connect to the people they love because punitive policies in this state won't let them. Criters, connection and education are two of the most effective factors in reducing recidivism. By denying basic access to technology and educational programs, the men's Labor government is ripping away the paths to rehabilitation inmates in this state.
Have yes, you heard it here first.
Because the prisoners don't have iPads, they are going to go back out and commit more crimes when they finally get released. Now, look, if you are in prison, you've got a roof over your head, which is more than can be said for a lot of people in this country.
Look in a housing crisis. Don't think they haven't considered.
And they're not worrying about paying nine hundred and fifty dollars a week to clean up the leaves.
At a kindergarten. Are they? They've got a roof over their.
Head, they've got three square meals a day, they've got health care. Bloody hell, send me to prison at this point, because I could do with saving some money right now. So they've got all of the other free stuff and it costs about one hundred grand to keep a prisoner in prison per annum per prisoner, for heaven's sake. Now they want free phone calls and free iPads and phones on top of it.
Give me a spell.
And if this proposal gets up, there are rumors that the Greens will next campaign for prisoners to get access to Netflix and free massages.
So you know, it just keeps going.
But you know, she says that these things like connectivity and education are effective factors in reducing recidivism. Well, I would have thought an effective factor is that prison is so horrible and so uncomfortable and so bad you don't want to commit a crime unless you go back there. That would be a fairly effective thing. And education, and
fair enough, is very important. Well, there used to be this thing called book books, you know, and you used to read them, and then used to get a pen and paper and you used to write things.
Want to introduce that into prison?
We already have those. They have the books, they read the books.
Well, like prison libraries, you've got those. If, as you.
Claim, you want this for educational.
Purposes, there's plenty plenty in books.
If you can read, you're fine to HSC exams.
Now, the biggest shake up in fifty seven years is occurring, Ladies and gentlemen, history and the making which the masters of HSC have decided that we will no longer be writing English exams. Yes, it's been done for decades, but for some reason this has to be thrown out the window now and kids can complete their exams online whenever they come up with something new like this.
All I really hear is kids aren't coping.
The schools are tired of looking like failures due to poor results, so we've decided to mix things up a little. South Wales's Education Standards Authority had Paul Martin said, we want to be clear that handwriting is still a vital skill while continuing to modernize the HSC exam experience for students.
He goes on to say, there is some accuracy.
And reasonableness about interrogating the text outside of the time that the person wrote it, but it can go to a point where your own reaction and response becomes more important.
Than the intent of the author and what the text is trying to convey.
It's my strong view that students should know the plot and the themes, and the characters and the quotes and the symbolism.
Also in using.
Computers, how can you be sure that they're not cheating. You've got hundreds and hundreds of students sitting these exams before, when it was just you sat at a desk with a pen or a pencil and a pile of blank paper with a few questions on it.
He had just had what was up here.
But for as long as there's technology involved, as there is at Unis, I've sat exams via this method that they're talking about at you said there is so much room for cheating.
It's basically an open book exam.
Really, So that last quote you read relates to they're getting rid of postmodern literary theory, which is a good idea absolutely. But I also like the idea of using computers to write your English essay or exam. I mean, you can write faster on a computer than with pen and paper. Second, it's well plus you can edit as you go, which is much better than trying to cross out or just don't make a mistake. The only issues you've got are cheating, which they could surely mitigate against.
But if you've got an it failure, but we already use it for naplan So I don't see this as a cynical exercise in disguising poor educational outcomes.
It just makes sense that they.
Would use computers because most kids these days are not writing. They're typing their messaging. That's how they communicate. Why shouldn't they do their English exam that way?
But that's the problem, is that we have done the kids down so that they don't know how to write properly. Any handwriting is a skill that's gone out the window. And I can say, but my handwriting has gone downhill immeasurably in the last ten years because I use computers and phones so much more than I did the teen years.
But it's a literacy test, it's not a handwriting test. If you want to test their their penmanship, then give them a pen and paper test to test.
Their ability to communicate if they give them a laptop.
So if the quality of their penmanship isn't a problem, then what's the problem with letting them write in a scrawling And they have for decades part damp paper like everyone always.
Why are we constantly trying to make it easier for this generation?
Weird enough? For do?
I think it's the way their brains work.
For instance, for myself, I think while I type, and I find it easier to think while I'm typing, But if you give me a pen and paper, it's a whole different process in my brain. But then a lot of and our kids are the same because they've been raised on that.
Sure, But a lot of people also process information better when it's received orally they're listening to it. Some people are able to commit information to their brain better when they talk about it, they dictate it, right. So does that then mean that we have to have a different version of the exam for every different kid who learns in.
A different way.
No, You've got to have one simple product that is available to all. And I think handwriting is actually a really good skill, and it's one that is being lost. And this is just another marker of the fact that we.
Are losing it. You know, we have these sort of.
Impersonal methods of communication now, whether it be email or text message or whatever.
I mean.
You think of your grandparents, right, who used to send love letters to each other. Think back to the war, writing telegrams and all this stuff, and people hold onto this.
Next should be wanting kids to put perfume on their exam papers.
Conicuous love is held on to forever.
People still have reams of letters that their grandparents and great grandparents wrote to each other, and we go, oh, isn't that romantic?
Well, what in.
Fifty years time, my potential future offspring aren't going to be going, oh, can you messages.
With online?
The ship going the way it is, we're going to have to return to handwritten notes in order to communicate anything to each other that the grubby government doesn't get to read verse and sentence paragraph by.
It's even past notes in class anymore.
They don't know how to write. We're going to go to a commercial breakball. We come back.
We'll look at what's making news tomorrow, including the Commonwealth games to go to Scotland, Victorian taxpayers picking up the bill. Okay, let's take a look at what's making news tomorrow. We'll start with the Northern Territory News, where the headline says energy clash, Anti fracking protesters given marching orders in Lea's gas lashing Chief Minister Leah fin kay, sorry, you are helping me with history and the ad breaking that I
mucked it up. Lea Finocchiaro has told anti gas protesters at a major resources convention to go back to Victoria, also hitting out the Commonwealth's decision to review whether the water trigger should have fly to fracking projects.
I like this. They had one hundred people.
Protesting outside the convention and she's gotten up and told all the protesters and go back to where we.
Know you came from.
Victoria, of course, is the state that all protesters originate from. But the Greens MP Kate McNamara, the first ever Green to be in the Northern Territory Parliament, she said, no, no, no, these are all local protesters. They didn't come from Victoria. Well who knows where they came from.
That would be, but they normally do bust them in for these sorts.
Of It's not a bad burden.
Really glad to see a chief minister of political leader in this country who is willing to stand up just say it how it is.
Bugger off back to Victoria.
I think she missed a trick in not telling them to frack off back to Victoria. But good honor, she's saying, this is what we need for my territory.
The rest of you. Bugger off.
She's saying it in plain, simple language. This is what people have been demanding from leaders for so long, and finally we're actually seeing it well.
She added that the Northern Territory has been one of the worst performing economies in the country for eons. She's determined to turn that around, and she's not going to let one hundred people standing out the front of a convention center protesting progress to keep the Northern Territory in last place economically.
Liz, Yeah, good, honor.
Let's see more of this, honestly, and also just take the mick out of these people. We're talking about the power of satire just last night.
Mock them.
Be like, if it weren't for fossil fuels, I don't think there'd be a tree left standing. Do you want us to go cutting down all of them? Shall we go back to using.
A whale oil?
I'm sure there's a lot of people who would protest that. Smart people understand that what this is really about is control of our energy resources.
Because when you're switching energy.
Resources like we are now, some of us want to some of us don't. You are talking about a massive transfer of of power. No one's paying attention to that. These are just the useful idiots who genuinely believe this is going to save the world. Of course it's not going to It is going to pad the pockets of the right people who planned out this agenda eons in advance. But there they are, and to hear someone like her, who obviously isn't going to get into the minutia of it,
just to tell them to rack off. I'm doing what's best for my state. That's my job as chief minister.
It's so refreshing, which is kind of sad in today's day and age.
Just a premiere, which is essentially what she is, standing up for what's best for her pat.
There's one more really interesting line in this article.
This project has been referred to an independent scientific committee
by Tenure Plibask. The Environmental Minister and Federal Resources Minister Madeline King has told the Northern Territory News that of course this project has been looked over many many times, but as part of their social license, we need to do this one more check, which shows you why productivity is so down in this nation where the government are effectively It sounds like she's admitting there's really no need for this, but we just want to be seen to be doing the right theme.
How frustrating is that for investors?
Of course, of course that's why investors will walk out of this country. But you mentioned whale oil is they could probably extract whale oil from some of these protesters because if it weren't for these protests they never get off their lazy, jobless asses.
Let's go to the Herald Sun tomorrow where it says you've got to be joking. Well done to the subs.
Two hundred and five million dollars of Victorian cash handed to Scotland to host twenty twenty six Colm Games. After we ditch them, every one dollar spent building two stages of SRL will return only sixty to seventy cents. New analysis reveals there's a lot of money being spent. It's
a good result. Victorian tactpays have been dealt a double blow with the Glasgows sorry confirmed to host the twenty twenty six Comonwealth Games at our expense, as a new independent analysis of the Bourbon Rail loup reveals its benefits come nowhere near matching the dollars spent on the huge project.
Let's not forget Daniel Andrews should not be allowed to get away with this, and I know that he's got a few other problems at the moment with the car in a car accident where he not him, allegedly his wife hit a young man, Ryan Yilman, nearly ten years
ago now, and that's all going through the course. But he should never be allowed to get away with this because he bid for and agreed to host the Commonwealth Games in Victoria with this mad model that it was going to go around all these regional talents purely to shore up regional votes for the twenty twenty two state election. And as soon as he had the opportunity, he said, oh my goodness, this thing is too expensive to possibly hold.
It was so see through. Like almost everything he does, he just gets away with it.
So Victoria spent what almost six hundred million dollars getting out of the Commonwealth Games. Of that six hundred million, about three hundred and eighty million was compensation payments that'll be used to stage the Scottish Games. Interestingly, Liz, they're only going to have ten sports at the next Commonwealth Games because well, the Victorians only gave them six.
Hundred men to make the list. I don't think.
Raygun will be part of the Comonwealth Games, which it is a tragedy for the entire world.
I think we can all agree.
So it'd be interesting to see which ten sports are represented. But what sort of Commonwealth Games is I mean, your local school sports carnival has more than ten different.
I remember them well.
I don't think anyone really cares all that much about the Commonwealth Games.
No, I don't think they do. This is the end of the Commonwealth Games now it is.
And let's not forget either that.
Jacinta Allen, now, the premier who replaced Daniel Andrews, was the minister in charge of the delivery of the Commonwealth Games. Now the story on the front of the Herald sounds
tomorrow free childcare push. Children from low income households should get free childcare three days a week and subages should be increased for other families, and major in inquiry has urged the federal government will consider a five point four billion dollar ann You'll increase in childcare spending to meet the Productivity Commission's recommendations.
Well, whoop do you do? So?
Just like every other time we've increased childcare subsidies because childcare is becoming so expensive. What will then happen is that the childcare centers will Jack there fees up again so that the government has to fork out even more money.
How can the Productivity Commission not see that it is childcare subsidies that have been a large driver in childcare costs going through the roof to the point where we're now saying, well, some people need it completely free because they simply cannot afford to go to work and have children.
It's as simple as if said that's exactly what will happen.
Why, as we always say when this comes up, why don't you scrap your universal daycare so the stake can raise the kids and you force women back to work to earn more of your tax payer dollars. Government, We see you, We know exactly what you're doing. How about
you empower women to stay home. How about you give them the option instead of free daycare, give them the money so that they can be recognized for one of the hardest and definitely the most important job on the face of the planet, and that is raising their own children. To the front page of the Career Mail Now. Olympics boss questions Premier's stadium right size games call Brisbane, twenty
thirty two. Olympics boss Andrew Levers has pointedly questioned the value of the Miles government's plans to spend one point six billion on a temporary athletics arena at the old QEII Stadium.
Well, this has gone from bad to worse, Like there is literally not been.
One smooth part of preparing for Brisbane twenty thirty two.
To my knowledge.
Even the people in charge are like, yet, it's not really happening, But we're trying and nothing's working and nobody agrees with any recommendations except for us because we're covering our butts.
Yeah, I think it's safe to say Scotland will be hosting the Commonwealth Games in twenty twenty six and probably the Olympic Games in twenty thirty two will be paying for it.
We're going to go to a break when we come back.
A woman penalized for saying that dogs can't be gender fluid.
That's coming up in just a second.
Well, pretty much every night on the Late Debate we bring you a story of council stupidity, and each night we think it'll never get worse than that, but every night it does get worse.
And this is the worst one so far. It'll be outdone tomorrow night.
No doubt, but Cambridge County Council in the UK decided to put on a forum for their LGBTQ plus employees so they could discuss inclusion. But how many of you know you can have a little too much inclusion. One of the participants in this LGBTQ plus forum decided to bring along his dashhound, a gender fluid dog dressed in a dress. Well, one of the LGBTQ plus members of this forum took exception, saying that she didn't believe in gender fluid and certainly not in dashhounds.
Will.
Those participating in the forum complain that these comments were nasty, transphobic, and non inclusive. What's more, these comments were detrimental to their mental health. Now remember these comments that dogs can't be gender fluid. Their mental health was greatly affected. So the council how did they react? They banned this woman from further participation in the LGBTQ plus forum. Will She sued the council at a tribunal and was awarded fifty five thousand pounds because she suffered.
For her quote gender critical beliefs.
A council spokesperson, reflecting on the outcome of the case said, we strive to create a safe, inclusive and compassionate environment for people to work in, and recognize this needs to be balanced with everyone being entitled to express their own views and beliefs, such as dogs are not gender fluid. We will reflect carefully on this final outcome, as well as undertaking a review of our policies and peges accordingly.
So I guess it's a win for common sense. But dear Lord, you get kicked out of a forum for saying a dog can't be gender fluid.
If I knew all I had to do to get fifty five thousand quid would say dogs can't be gender fluid, I would have done.
It a long time ago.
But actually, what a great thing that we have seen here, a decision by a tribunal that has upheld common sense.
And part of me thinks if a case like.
This was run in Australia, you would expect the tribunal to come back and actually side with the counsel and say, I know dogs can be gender fluid. For heaven, say, I'm actually flawed that the tribunals come back and said no, this is wrong.
So I love this quote from the lesbian social worker Elizabeth Pitt, who was awarded the fifty five thousand pounds. She said, let's hope that other employers will start to learn that it's a bad idea to try to stop lesbians asserting their boundaries and silent staff who know that sex is real and sometimes matters. It does matter in the case of transgender.
Do on that that's it from us. Stick around Coming up in just a moment, it's the reader Penney show h