Good morning, this is Eleanor Ainge Roy bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Monday 1 October.
Top stories
The death toll from the Indonesian tsunami continues to climb and could reach thousands, officials have warned. The confirmed death toll from Friday’s catastrophic 7.5 magnitude quake on the island of Sulawesi stood at 832 on Sunday, as more than 150 aftershocks continued to batter the island. Thousands of homes, hotels, shopping malls and several mosques collapsed, with the city of Palu worst hit. Hundreds of bodies have been found on beaches and authorities fear many may have been washed out to sea. “Many corpses are scattered on the beach and floating on the surface of the sea,” one local resident, Nining, told local media. The identified bodies are being buried in mass graves.
Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the spokesman for the BNPB disaster agency, said the area affected was much bigger than originally thought. There was no electricity in Palu and Donggala, while drinking water and fuel were running out. There was limited access to heavy equipment needed to help rescue efforts, so the search for people trapped in the rubble was mostly being carried out by hand.
Plans to dump up to 15m tonnes of salt and other waste near a Queensland creek carry a “considerable” risk of water contamination, a study has found. Approved plans to expand a dump near the town of Chinchilla allow salt waste from coal seam gas operations to be stored less than 100 metres from Stockyard Creek, in the headwaters of the Murray-Darling Basin. Local graziers, community groups and environmentalists are now pushing for the federal environment minister to assess the project under the provisions of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.
Brett Kavanaugh accuser Julie Swetnick is to be excluded from the FBI investigation, highlighting the narrow scope of the agency’s investigation into Donald Trump’s supreme court nominee. Swetnick, the third woman to accuse Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct, claimed in a sworn statement that Kavanaugh and his friend Mark Judge engaged in lewd behaviour with young women at high school parties. She alleged the two placed drugs or alcohol in punch to inebriate women so they could be “gang raped” by other partygoers. Swetnick’s attorney, Michael Avenatti, said he was still waiting for the FBI to contact his client.
Big agribusiness is being compensated for giving up access to water under the Murray Darling Basin plan, while communities, graziers, small irrigators and native title holders are having to wear its often harsh effects, a report has found. The report by the Australia Institute found wildly different treatment of stakeholders in the Lower Darling and Menindee region. The large agribusiness company Webster sold its water rights at Tandou in the Lower Darling to the federal government for $38m and was also paid $40m in compensation for the loss of future business opportunities. But other farmers who are directly affected by the changes are not being compensated.
Thousands of UK children and teenagers face a mounting sleeplessness crisis, with the number of admissions to hospital of young people with sleep disorders rising sharply. Experts have described the problem as a hidden public health disaster, putting the surge down to a combination of exploding obesity levels, excessive use of social media before bedtime and a mental health crisis engulfing young people. “We feel that the rise in sleep problems is very much based on anxiety … There is school pressure, peer pressure, social media pressure,” said Mandy Gurney from London’s Millpond Sleep Clinic.
Sport
Cooper Cronk made a miraculous return from a shoulder injury as the Sydney Roosters scored an emphatic 21-6 win over his old club Melbourne Storm in the NRL grand final. Cronk’s halfback partner Luke Keary did the damage as the Roosters stopped the Storm becoming the first club to win back-to-back premierships in 15 years, with an electric first-half display at ANZ Stadium in front of 82,688.
After a season of complaints that AFL is in crisis, Saturday’s grand final was the perfect demonstration that the game is far from broken, writes Craig Little. West Coast drew up something counterintuitive to the prevailing demand for “entertainment”, delivering something authentic that most football purists love.
Thinking time
Hundreds of Aboriginal people from across the Kimberley have recreated the historic Noonkanbah march, to mark the 40th anniversary of the protest that led to the formation of the Kimberley Land Council, in the Fitzroy valley community of Ngumpan. Forty years ago, the Western Australian premier Sir Charles Court enforced oil exploration by American company Amax on the Aboriginal-owned cattle station Noonkanbah and its sacred sites, despite strong objections from traditional owners. Forty-five non-unionised drilling rigs were stopped in their tracks when Aboriginal people from across the Kimberley marched and blocked a creek.
Throughout the 1960s and the early 70s, most progressive activists had seen “the people” as the solution to a sexist, racist oppression associated with the wealthy and the powerful. But during George W Bush’s hyper-patriotic presidency, many progressives increasingly identified the masses not as the answer but as the problem – a foolish and slightly terrifying reservoir of cultural and political backwardness. “Politically, such rhetoric was disastrous,” writes Jeff Sparrow in his new book Trigger Warnings: Political Correctness and the Rise of the Right. “By dismissing the people as fools, progressives confirmed everything the culture warriors said: they openly embraced the condescending stereotype of the liberal elitist.”
It’s time to redefine the concept of work-life balance, writes father and moral philosopher Matthew Beard. “We need to permit people to express their domestic identities in the workplace – to redefine what it means to be professional so that it’s not unrecognisable to the people who know us in our personal lives. This isn’t just important for wellbeing … The more we’re encouraged to be competitive, ambitious or whatever else in the workplace, the harder it will be to switch gears and express patience, humility or generosity at home.”
What’s he done now?
Donald Trump has posted a grumpy Twitter rant about why Democrats continue to win the support of African-Americans. “So if African-American unemployment is now at the lowest number in history, median income the highest, and you then add all of the other things I have done, how do Democrats, who have done NOTHING for African-Americans but TALK, win the Black Vote? And it will only get better!”
Media roundup
The Australian navy may be forced to make do with its ageing fleet of submarines for another 30 years, because of long delays with the navy’s new subs, the Australian reports. The ABC says stalkers are using cutting-edge technology such as drones to track their victims, and experts say the law is not keeping up. And the Age interviews top Australian investigator Michael Stefanovic, who says Australia must act to stop genocide against Rohingya muslims and demand a war crimes tribunal in Myanmar.
Supporting the Guardian
We’d like to acknowledge our generous supporters who enable us to keep reporting on the critical stories. If you value what we do and would like to help, please make a contribution or become a supporter today. Thank you.
Sign up
If you would like to receive the Guardian Australia morning mail to your email inbox every weekday, sign up here.
