Tag: SB001

Unity is a common theme every year on Malaysia Day, the holiday celebrated last week that marks the day Malaysia became a federation in 1963.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s announcement that he’ll prioritise reducing unemployment ahead of reducing government debt is welcome news.

These are very challenging times for U.S. fossil fuel-producing states, such as Wyoming, Alaska and North Dakota. The COVID-19 economic downturn has reduced energy demand, with uncertain prospects for the extent of its recovery.

Boris Johnson wrote that “one man can make all the difference”. This biographer still had faith in the “great man” theory of history. In his admiration for a charismatic and controversial figure, Johnson seemed to be hinting, or perhaps thinking, that another latter-day controversialist might also make a pretty good ...

For years now, the bank has chronically undershot its inflation target of 2% to 3% per year. This has to stop.

Police are undoubtedly one component of the state’s health response, needed to enforce measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 such as restrictions on group gatherings and curfews.

The first low emissions technology statement, released on Tuesday by federal energy minister Angus Taylor, flags public investment in five areas: hydrogen, energy storage, low-carbon steel and aluminium, carbon capture and storage, and soil carbon storage.

The federal government has announced a A$3.5 billion upgrade to the National Broadband Network (NBN) that will grant two million households on-demand access to faster fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) internet by 2023.

More businesses are in financial distress, and the one-size-fits-all arrangement doesn’t take account of the varying complexities of businesses.

Although the UK has already left, the dilemma of deal or no deal has reappeared. The UK government’s negotiations with the EU about what should follow are fraught. Equally, though, its Brexit policy has made London’s relations with Cardiff and Edinburgh worse than they have ever been.

Iceland and New Zealand have some of the lowest COVID-19 deaths per capita among OECD countries (2.83 and 0.51 per 100,000 population, respectively, compared with an OECD average of 24.01 per 100,000).

More than 250 pilot whales were reported to have stranded, with one-third presumed dead. And this morning, rescuers found another 200 pilot whales stranded up to ten kilometres away from the first group — most are likely dead.

Research from the pressure groups Transport and Environment and Greenpeace has claimed that CO₂ emissions from plug-in hybrid cars are “two and a half times” higher than tests by manufacturers suggest.

The UN general assembly is the prime venue for diplomatic speed dating – seeing as many fellow leaders as possible in as short a time – and for hammering out difficult decisions in private conversations.

US computer tech firm Oracle and retailer Walmart proposed a joint venture called TikTok Global, which would see customer data move to US-controlled infrastructure.

Prime Minister and Labour leader Jacinda Ardern and National Party leader Judith Collins have met for the first televised debate of the 2020 election campaign.

Universities spent A$12.2 billion on research in 2018. Discretionary income used to fund Australian university research that year amounted to $6 billion, of which $3.1 billion of this came from international student fees.

A Victorian SMS Morgan poll, conducted September 15-17 from a sample of 1,150, gave Labor a 51.5-48.5 lead over the Coalition, a six-point gain for the Coalition since the November 2018 state election.

The government has accepted journalism is a public good, deserving of public support. All sides acknowledge the future of the news media is under threat from the collapse of the advertising-based business model that has traditionally paid for most journalism.

With about 1.6 million people on JobSeeker but only 130,000 job vacancies in May 2020, it matters little if some job seekers are more selective about the job offers they accept.

For more than 80 years, the 7:45am bulletin was a uniquely Australian fixture on local radio. It provided a soundtrack to the major events of our nation, bringing to our ears the sounds of wars, invasions, sporting triumphs, political scandals and disasters.

Global gross public debt was already high before the crisis, at about 80% of one year’s world GDP. It has since ballooned to more than 100% and exceeds the previous peak recorded after post World War II.

Along with social distancing measures and effective vaccines, a healthy immune system is our best defense against coronavirus infection. To keep it that way, proper nutrition is an absolute must.

This week’s announcement of mandatory disclosures of climate-related risks for companies and financial institutions is arguably the New Zealand government’s most significant climate policy.

The IPL’s cancellation in March meant all India’s states lost a stage for city-branding and the income raised by taxing state cricket associations.

Facebook has announced the latest version of its successful standalone virtual reality (VR) headset, the Oculus Quest 2.

A preliminary study, posted online this week by researchers at the Australian National University and elsewhere, estimates 71,000 Australians had COVID-19 by mid-July.

Humanity originated on the African continent at least 300,000 years ago. We know from fossil evidence in southern Greece and the Levant (modern-day Israel) that some early members of our species expanded beyond Africa around 200,000 years ago, and again between 120,000 to 90,000 years ago.

Here’s how active this year’s Atlantic hurricane season has been: When Tropical Storm Wilfred formed on Sept. 18, the National Hurricane Center exhausted its list of storm names for only the second time since naming began in 1950.

Decades before she joined the court, Ginsburg’s work as an attorney in the 1970s fundamentally changed the Supreme Court’s approach to women’s rights, and the modern skepticism about sex-based policies stems in no small way from her lawyering.

While atmospheric heat is the dominant reason for melting in the summer, it has little influence during the cold dark polar winter. However, the ocean warms the ice from below year-round.

The firm designs software and semiconductors that are used in a multitude of consumer favourites, including Apple and Samsung smartphones, Nintendo consoles and many more.

The equivalent of a garbage truck of plastic waste enters the sea every minute, and this increases every day.

Chinese tourists prefer to spend large sums on luxury items, such as designer clothes and accessories, when they travel overseas.

Japan accounts for less than 2% of British imports and exports.

The U.S. economy is far from healthy and inflation has been relatively subdued in recent years, which can hurt growth.

Alexander Lukashenko should be resting easily in Minsk, looking forward to his sixth term as the president of Belarus.

The new funding will enable the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) to support technologies such as green steel production, industrial processes to reduce energy consumption and somewhat controversially, carbon-capture and storage and soil-carbon sequestration.

An Australian study found low income workers were three times as likely as high earners to face a high risk of losing their jobs.

The selling of experiences was the fourth great stage in our consumer development after commodities, goods and services.

Authoritarian countries such as Russia, China and Iran erect walls around their cyberspace, and democracies like the U.S., India and the European Union cite national security when blocking specific foreign companies like ByteDance’s TikTok and Tencent’s WeChat.

More than 25,000 people are presently registered as having expressed a wish to return, and there have been numerous hardship cases in the media and in representations to MPs offices.

Unlike many other countries, where the president or prime minister is chosen by direct popular vote, in the U.S., a candidate may win the popular vote and still not be elected to the nation’s highest office.

The Fire Shield project aims to use emerging technologies to rapidly find and extinguish bushfires.

For the first time, iOS 14 is to require apps to get permission from users before collecting their data – giving users an opt-in to this compromise to their privacy.

Under municipal control, or through public-private partnerships, platforms could transform service delivery to citizens.

With the exception of the reforms that accompanied the introduction of the GST in 2000, state tax systems haven’t changed much since the 1970s, which began with the transfer of payroll tax from the Commonwealth to the states, and ended with the abolition of death duties.

The federal government today announced it will build a new gas power plant in the Hunter Valley, NSW, if electricity generators don’t fill the energy gap left by the Liddell coal-fired station when it retires in 2023.

Yoshihide Suga is set to be Japan’s new prime minister after he was easily elected leader of Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) on Monday.

Coronavirus has hit the healthcare systems and societies of the global south even harder than the rest of the world due to their already weak economies and high debt levels.