Good morning, this is Eleanor Ainge Roy bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Thursday 1 August.
Top stories
The besieged gaming empire Crown Resorts has yet to satisfy the Victorian gambling regulator it has fixed nine serious problems at its flagship Melbourne casino, including money laundering risks and the presence of alleged criminals. The recommendations from the Victorian Commission for Gambling and Liquor Regulation were to be in place by 1 July, but documents provided by its chairman, Ross Kennedy, show the gaming group has not done enough to discharge them. Yesterday Crown hit back at this week’s media revelations in newspaper ads signed by its board of directors, slamming Nine’s coverage as a “a deceitful campaign” that “unfairly attempted to damage Crown’s reputation”.
The powerful US backers of a conservative conference being held in Sydney next week say the event won’t be a one-off, and they are committed to making it a “multi-year, forever-type project” aimed at galvanising the right wing of Australian politics. “We’re all looking at having this event running many, many years down the track,” CPAC organiser Andrew Cooper told Guardian Australia, “and we have a vision for this that has thousands and thousands of attendees, not hundreds and hundreds.” The conference will feature the Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage, Tony Abbott and Mark Latham. On Tuesday night in the Senate, the event was attacked by Labor senator Kristina Keneally as a “talkfest of hate”, with particular focus on the attendance of Raheem Kassam, a former chief adviser to Farage and editor-in-chief of Breitbart.
NBN Co should focus less on recouping the $50bn taxpayer investment in the project and more on value for customers, the ACCC head, Rod Sims, has said. “We must ignore those who worry about the value of assets that are sunk, and focus on how the NBN can best contribute to Australia,” Sims plans to say in a speech to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and Australian Energy Regulator conference in Brisbane. Sims told Guardian Australia that with the NBN almost completed, it should offer more affordable basic plans rather than trying to get people to pay for higher speeds they may not need.
World
Forty people have appeared in a Hong Kong courtroom facing up to 10 years in jail on rioting charges over their role in mass protests that have convulsed the city since June.
Boris Johnson has sent his most senior EU adviser and Brexit negotiator to Brussels, to deliver in person his message that the UK will leave without a deal unless the bloc abolishes the Irish backstop.
Germany’s interior minister is calling for restraint after far-right politicians sought to exploit for political gain the death of an eight-year-old boy who was pushed in front of a train at Frankfurt station this week.
The financier Jeffrey Epstein looked physically healthy when he appeared in court in New York on Wednesday in his sex trafficking case, about a week after reportedly being found unconscious in his jail cell with neck injuries.
A prominent British art dealer who defrauded his clients out of millions by using a scheme that involved masterpieces by artists including Pablo Picasso and Marc Chagall has been sentenced to up to 12 years in prison.
Opinion and analysis
In ecological terms the royal family is a herd of elephants trashing the forest but Prince Harry’s plans to have only two children is good news, writes the Guardian’s former environment editor John Vidald. “The planet is not responding well to your jet-setting lifestyle, and two more little Sussexes adopting Dad and Mum’s ways won’t help,” Vidal writes. “Over a lifetime, the average British-born babe will emit up to 150 times more CO2 than one born in Ethiopia. You are only 34, and you have probably already emitted more CO2 and other greenhouse gases than most of the 18 million people living in Malawi will do in their lifetimes.”
Sorry, men, but we are still the slackest of the sexes, writes Greg Jericho. However you want to cut it, it is clear that women are the workers of the nation – and most of it is unpaid. “Housework and taking care of your children does not bring a wage, nor appear in the GDP figures, yet of course were you to pay someone to do those tasks it most definitely would. The latest Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey, released on Tuesday, shows that this work is overwhelmingly done by women and at levels that really should shame men in this country.”
Sport
England regained some pride in the final women’s Ashes T20 in Bristol overnight, beating Australia by 17 runs, despite another brilliant 60 not out from Ellyse Perry. But that did little to change the fact that Australia have comprehensively outplayed them throughout the series.
Tim Paine has come in from the cold to the lead the charge in the men’s Ashes, which begin at Edgbaston on Thursday. Paine is determined to make his chance count and cap a remarkable rise when he seeks to become the first Australian since 2001 to captain a side to Ashes victory on English soil.
Thinking time: Meal planning – middle-class hobby or good sense?
Kate Turner is aware that the chalkboard meal planner in her kitchen can bewilder visitors. “Friends come round and go, ‘Wow, my God!,’” says the author of My Zero-Waste Kitchen. That breakfast, lunch and dinner wallchart (Wednesday: porridge; Dad’s salad; pilaf; Thursday: cereal, tuna sandwiches; spinach pie) may look overwhelming, but Turner insists: “It’s not scary. Not having to think about what you’re cooking is liberating. It saves money, time and stress.”
Meal planning has a way to go before it becomes mainstream, but it has long been a hit with weight-loss experts and wellness gurus, and the growing desire to cut food waste has led to a new wave of interest. But whether you cook complex dishes from scratch every night or are more of a pasta-and-sauce person, to Turner, planning makes unbeatable ecological and financial sense. “If you’re wasting food, you’re wasting money,” she says. “I’m really keen this isn’t seen as a middle-class hobby. It’s a money-saver for anybody.” But where do you start? Here are 10 detailed tips from experts.
Media roundup
From Orange to Bendigo and Kalgoorlie, a new gold rush is in full swing, the Australian Financial Review reports. Advances in exploration techniques, new approaches to mining and the highest Australian-dominated gold price in history are contributing to the rush, described as a “gamechanger”. The Age reports that fewer families are sending their children to religious schools, prompting one major Melbourne Catholic boys school to consider going co-ed to ward off decline. The ABC says a Queensland council’s website promoting good news stories has been criticised as “propaganda masquerading as news”. Bundaberg council has defended the site, saying it fills a gap in the changing media landscape.
Coming up
The Melbourne international film festival opens tonight, at which the Adam Goodes movie The Australian Dream will make its world premiere.
The first Ashes Test at Edgbaston begins at 8pm AEST. Follow our live blog from 6.30pm.
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