Tag: SB001

Before the pandemic, aviation was on course to be the UK’s most polluting sector and produce as much as 22% of global emissions by 2050.

Despite varying degrees of lockdown restrictions due to the pandemic, many people in the UK are still going in to their workplaces. Factories, warehouses, schools, farms and some shops and hotels are all still open, and all have been sites of workplace clusters of transmission of COVID-19.

The most important of the five measures the Reserve Bank announced on Tuesday is the one that won’t whirr into place for a very long time.

An overwhelming majority of Australians want action on climate change. And the federal government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic shows governments can act decisively and effectively on imminent threats. But on climate action, there is a lack of political will.

A call to abolish New Zealand’s Human Rights Commission and dismiss it as a “hard left” body forgets the role both sides of politics played in establishing the organisation.

The campaigns have spent more than US$1 billion to reach voters in battleground states. Analysis of the “poll of polls” shows Democratic candidate Joe Biden with more than a 8-point lead over Republican president, Donald Trump.

As many of us get closer to our first COVID-19 winter, we have many things to feel optimistic about: vaccine results are on the horizon, mortality rates for those infected have fallen and established therapeutic strategies, such as treatment with the antiviral drug remdesivir, seem to be reducing illness.

The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons received its 50th ratification on October 24, and will therefore come into force in January 2021. A historic development, this new international law will ban the possession, development, testing, use and threat of use of nuclear weapons.

Biden’s lead in Pennsylvania is almost four points below his national lead, and that gives Trump hope of pulling off an Electoral College/popular vote split, as occurred at the 2016 election.

Tourism normally provides one in four jobs in Vanuatu and one in three jobs in Cook Islands. It contributes between 20% and 70% of the GDP of countries spanning from Samoa and Vanuatu to Fiji and Cook Islands.

Lockdowns, changing work practices and the need for social distancing have left some of Australia’s largest city centres at times resembling ghost towns.

Productivity Commission calculations suggest the number of private renters in housing stress has doubled over the past two decades, largely because rent assistance has failed to increase in line with rents.

Europe is not alone in its suffering - much of the northern hemisphere is dealing with spiralling infection rates as the autumn turns to a long winter. In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced a month-long lockdown as cases pass the 1 million mark.

GHG inventories are national accounts of emissions that cause global warming, from transport, construction, agriculture and so on, and underpin any country’s national and international reporting requirements for greenhouse gases.

Several international polls link the decline in confidence in American leadership to Trump’s mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic, both nationally and internationally.

Poverty and inequality were already high and rising in the UK before the coronavirus hit. Now, the pandemic is creating an even greater gulf between those whose debts are increasing and those whose savings are growing.

Labor had been behind in Queensland polls until early October, when a YouGov poll gave them a 52-48 lead. The swing back to Labor was likely attributable to the state’s handling of coronavirus, with Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk recording strong personal ratings.

Perhaps the most persistent myth about Connery, who was 90, is that he was an “unknown” actor who was plucked from obscurity by Bond producers Albert “Cubby” Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, who reportedly cast him against the wishes of author Ian Fleming and distributor United Artists.

The U.S. government sets limits on hazardous air pollutants to try to protect public health, but it can be difficult to determine where to draw the line for what is considered “acceptable risk.”

Queenslanders head to the polls tomorrow to decide the state election. Throughout the campaign, the Palaszczuk Labor government has vocally backed expansion of the resources industry.

On Monday October 26, five days ahead of Queensland’s election, many voters received an unsolicited text message from Clive Palmer’s mining company Mineralogy, accusing Labor of planning to introduce a “death tax” and providing a link to an online how-to-vote card for Palmer’s United Australia Party.

Despite all the challenges to this year’s election – long lines, calls for voter intimidation, baseless claims of fraud – voting is a fundamental civil right.

Whisky is big business in Scotland. In 2019, the golden liquid accounted for 75% of the nation’s food and drink exports, with a value of almost £5 billion to the Scottish economy.

Government computer systems in Hall County, Georgia, including a voter signature database, were hit by a ransomware attack earlier this fall in the first known ransomware attack on election infrastructure during the 2020 presidential election.

Restoring native habitats to at least 20% of the world’s land currently being used by humans for farming, ranching and forestry is necessary to protect biodiversity and slow species loss, according to a newly published study conducted by a team of environmental scientists including us.

The bushfire royal commission today handed down its long-awaited final report. At almost 1,000 pages, it will take us all some time to digest.

In Australia, CBD-based retailing has been on life support for most of 2020. At times Australian CBDs, especially Melbourne, and some shopping centres have resembled ghost towns.

Ant Group is likely to pull off the largest initial public offering (IPO) in history when it goes public on the Hong Kong and Shanghai exchanges on November 5.

COVID-19 is an unprecedented doom loop between a severe health crisis and grave economic repercussions. Government interventions to handle the outbreak and its aftermath first stopped public life in its tracks and then entirely reshaped it.

Earlier this year, the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) estimated that to reduce the spread of COVID-19, at least 80% of all infected individuals’ close contacts would need to self-isolate within 48 hours of exposure.

Americans who seek political insight and information on Twitter should know how much of what they are seeing is the result of automated propaganda campaigns.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine, the largest scientific organization that studies sleep, now wants to replace daylight saving time with a move to a year-round fixed time.

The current governance/management crisis at the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, ASIC has seen a deputy chairman resign and the chairman step aside under a cloud.

White House advisers have made the case recently for a “natural” approach to herd immunity as a way to reduce the need for public health measures to control the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic while still keeping people safe.

The news Justices Jacqueline Gleeson and Simon Steward will be Australia’s next High Court judges follows months of speculation.

This year’s prestigious Prime Minister’s Prize for Science has been awarded to a team of Australian physicists for their contribution to a stellar, reality-bending discovery.

As early voting continues ahead of the US elections on November 3, many Americans are waiting in long lines to cast their ballots across the US. But for those Americans living abroad who want to vote, there will be no queuing up outside US embassies around the world.

Leaders, Australia-wide, are enjoying high approval ratings during the pandemic. During the tumult of the first wave, a Liberal National Brisbane City Council was returned with not a single ward changing hands.

Ideally, the UK wants single-market access and special agreements for financial services and security and the Northern Ireland border. It wants no free movement of people, which is a big ask given the amount of access it expects.

Countries usually write new constitutions only when wars end or when transitioning to democracy. And constitutional conventions composed solely of citizens are practically unheard of. Chile shows what frustrated people in democracies can achieve when they rise up.

Water is more abundant on the Moon than we might have suspected, according to two papers published today in Nature Astronomy that confirm the presence of ice on and near the lunar surface.

A momentum effect could benefit the candidate either leading or gaining in the polls. It can motivate their supporters to vote (the bandwagon effect) and demotivate the supporters of the other candidate (the discouragement effect).

Australia doesn’t yet export renewable energy. But the writing is on the wall: demand for Australia’s fossil fuel exports is likely to dwindle soon, and we must replace it at massive scale.

As COVID-19 spreads through rural America, new infection numbers are rising to peaks not seen during this pandemic and pushing hospitals to their limits. Many towns are experiencing their first major outbreaks, but that doesn’t mean rural communities had previously been spared the devastating impacts of the pandemic.

Independent MP Helen Haines has just introduced a bill into parliament that seeks to establish a robust new federal integrity commission.

If the past few months have been like a long-haul flight, Victorians are now standing in the aisles waiting for the cabin door to open, a little groggy and disoriented but relieved.

The UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons will finally come into force after the 50th country (Honduras) ratified it over the weekend. The treaty will make the development, testing, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons illegal for those countries that have signed it.

Challenged by the Economic Society of Australia and The Conversation to rate it on a scale of A to F when judged by its stated aims of rebuilding the economy and creating jobs, none of the 43 economists who responded gave it the lowest grades of E or F.

The Morrison government and business have reacted angrily to Daniel Andrews’ “cautious pause” on announcing the easing of COVID restrictions in Melbourne, saying it showed the state government lacked faith in its contact tracing.

In many western countries, COVID-19 infection rates are rising again. For some like the UK, France and Spain, it appears that the second wave of the pandemic is already here.