Good morning, this is Helen Sullivan bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Monday 10 February.
Top stories
Devastating storms have swept through eastern New South Wales, forcing flood evacuations and leaving more than 100,000 people without power. Residents in low-lying areas near the Narrabeen Lagoon in northern Sydney, and the south-west Sydney suburbs of Moorebank, Chipping Norton and Milperra were ordered to evacuate by the NSW State Emergency Service. Emergency services have been swamped with calls since the deluge set in on Friday, while the extreme weather has caused transport chaos across Sydney. A severe weather warning was issued on Sunday for the entire NSW coast and will remain in place on Monday.
Survivors of a Thai mall shooting have spoken of their ordeal. The gunman, a soldier identified as Jakrapanth Thomma, arrived at the mall in Nakhon Ratchasima at about 6pm on Saturday. Driving a Humvee-type military vehicle and carrying weapons and ammunition stolen from an army base, Jakrapanth fired at drivers and pedestrians in the area. Inside the mall, shoppers took cover behind counters and inside bathrooms and stockrooms. Thailand’s prime minister has denied suggestions that arms were not properly secured at the military base where the rogue soldier stole multiple weapons before killing 26 people.
Disability support pension recipients were increasingly forced to pay back alleged welfare overpayments as the Coalition government’s botched robodebt scheme progressed, despite repeated claims that the program did not target the vulnerable. As the government faces increased pressure over emails showing it received legal advice the scheme was unlawful, it can be revealed that at least 11,000 disability support pensioners have paid back robodebts in full since 2016, and the value of debts settled in full by these recipients increased by 230% between 2017-18 and 2018-19.
Australia
Warringah MP Zali Steggall will today release the climate change national framework for adaption and mitigation bill, ahead of its introduction to the parliament in March.
Labor deputy leader Richard Marles has not ruled out the party supporting new coal developments, saying it would be a decision for the markets despite previously declaring it would be a “good thing” if the thermal coal market collapsed.
A flight carrying more than 200 Australian evacuees from Wuhan landed in Darwin on Sunday, after being granted delayed clearance to fly from Chinese authorities. All passengers on the Qantas flight carrying 266 people, including 92 children, were assessed as “clinically well”.
Australian Bali Nine member, Renae Lawrence, has pleaded for clemency for the remaining five members of the group still in prison, as Joko Widodo arrives in Australia. Lawrence served 13 years in an Indonesian prison for drug smuggling.
Thousands in Western Australia have spent the night sheltering from tropical cyclone Damien, which caused significant damage when it made landfall near Karratha in Western Australia on Saturday night. Damien was downgraded to a category two storm on Sunday morning.
The world
Dr Jiang Yanyong, the Chinese surgeon who exposed the government’s Sars cover-up in 2003, has been under de facto house arrest since last year, according to his friends and family.
Leading Democratic presidential candidates have stepped up attacks against each other ahead of the New Hampshire primary, with Joe Biden saying Bernie Sanders’ democratic socialism would turn off voters in moderate states in a general election against Donald Trump.
The UK Labour leadership contest has erupted into a bitter row after frontrunner Keir Starmer’s campaign team were forced to vehemently deny claims they had hacked into party membership data.
Pressure from a new influx of refugees and migrants on Greek islands has reached a critical point. Unable to leave because of a containment policy determined by the EU, more than 42,000 men, women and children are forced to remain on the islands until their asylum requests are processed by a system both understaffed and overstretched.
Facebook and Twitter have refused Nancy Pelosi’s request to remove a video posted by Donald Trump that was misleadingly edited to show her repeatedly tearing a paper copy of his State of the Union address while he was honouring a Tuskegee Airman and other attendees.
Recommended reads
After months of fear and cancelled visits, some fire-impacted NSW regions have reopened for business – and still make a lovely holiday destination, writes Kate Hennessy. Over the Christmas and New Year’s break thousands of holidaymakers were forced to evacuate coastal regions in Victoria and on the NSW south coast. The advice from fire authorities was firm: “If you don’t need to be here, leave now.” Soon after, the message flipped. “We need you here, come back!” was the call, as towns reliant on tourism, especially from peak times such as the summer school holidays, suffered an avalanche of cancellations.
All the world has become a market, and the status of humans and citizens has declined, writes Thomas Keneally. “We can laugh when the late Gary Becker, neo-conservative of the Chicago School, defined marriage as a contract between ‘two utility maximising agents’ in which ‘love as default’ is identified as a ‘non-marketable household commodity’. We imagine lovers whispering ‘you maximise my utility like no on else can, honey’. But our laughter is cheap. When it comes to health, education and welfare, we are no longer students, patients, battlers down on our luck. We are clients of a system.”
For years, I could hear my dead father’s voice in the telephone weather service. Then it shut down, writes Matthew Ryan. “I had avoided listening to the weather service, hearing it only briefly not long after Dad died. Mum had dialled the number and played it on speaker. I heard a few words of the familiar voice as I made my way out the door. Mum denied she called it often, but when we check her phone bill, the number – 1196 – recurs sometimes six or seven times a day. Dad made most of the recordings – thousands of individual words and phrases – after the diagnosis. Diagnoses: first prostate cancer to be treated, then the resignation of metastases.”
Listen
On today’s episode of Full Story: the way Scott Morrison has reacted to the sports grants scandal is triggering alarm bells. Political editor Katharine Murphy breaks down Scott Morrison’s strategy of confusion, and what it could mean for our trust in the political system.
Sport
It has not been a great news week for the A-League, with rumours of major sponsors looking to exit and blue chip fixtures being cancelled. But amid the gloom there were great moments of joy, if fans can cleave to them, writes Jonathan Howcroft.
Welcome back, then, England cricket team. Just about. On a muggy, fun, celebratory day in Johannesburg, England beat South Africa by two wickets, limping over the line an unexpectedly nerve-shredding finish. The victory was enough to draw the three-match series 1-1. Barney Ronay reports from the Wanderers.
Media roundup
Scott Morrison tells the Australian that Indonesia will play a “pivotal role in the government’s push to diversify Australia’s economy”. The Sydney Morning Herald reveals that Sydney commuters “have been incorrectly charged more than $260,000 after tapping on to the city’s public transport network with their credit cards or smartphones”. The Australian Financial Review leads with the ASX-listed Horizon Oil firm “mired in a $15m PNG bribery scandal”.
Coming up
The Indonesian president, Joko Widodo, will address the federal parliament, becoming the second Indonesian leader to do so.
The 92nd annual Academy Awards will be held in Hollywood. Margot Robbie is the only Australian up for an Oscar.
And if you’ve read this far …
Bill Gates has ordered the world’s first hydrogen-powered superyacht, worth an estimated AU$966m and featuring an infinity pool, helipad, spa and gym.
