With tax reform back on the agenda thanks to the productivity roundtable, Henry’s 2010 review has a lot of answers to the biggest challenges facing the Albanese government
Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast
Ken Henry, the former Treasury boss, slipped up during his address to the National Press Club this week.
Speaking in his capacity as chair of the Australian Climate and Biodiversity Foundation, Henry was asked about his landmark review of the nation’s tax system, handed to the Rudd government back in 2010.
Continue reading...
Breaking Waves: Ocean News
07/18/2025 - 10:00
07/18/2025 - 07:22
Watchdog has faced intense criticism over sewage spills, shareholder payouts and ballooning debts
Serious pollution incidents by English water firms rose 60% last year
England and Wales’ embattled water regulator will be abolished under recommendations from a government-commissioned review due out on Monday, the Guardian understands.
Ministers will announce next week a consultation into creating a new regulator, to coincide with the results of a review into the water industry directed by former Bank of England deputy governor Sir Jon Cunliffe.
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 06:00
Use of wastewater treatment plant effluent containing Pfas threatens wildlife, food and drinking water, advocates say
Many of the nation’s wetlands are being filled with toxic Pfas “forever chemicals” as wastewater treatment plant effluent tainted with the compounds is increasingly used to restore swampland and other waters. The practice threatens wildlife, food and drinking water sources, environmental advocates warn.
Effluent is the liquid discharged by wastewater treatment plants after it “disinfects” sewage in the nation’s sewer system. The treatment process largely kills pathogens and the water is high in nutrients that help plants grow, so on one level it is beneficial to struggling ecosystems.
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 05:52
Exclusive: Letter signed by 59 MPs criticises party’s deputy leader after his warning to energy firms over new contracts
UK politics live – latest updates
A group of nearly 60 Labour MPs has written to Richard Tice challenging the Reform UK deputy leader’s pledge to rip up green energy contracts if his party wins power and questioning if he appreciated the impact this could have on the economy.
Led by Polly Billington, the East Thanet MP, and signed by 58 others who have sustainable energy projects in their constituencies, the letter said Tice appeared to have “under-appreciated the growth potential of the green transition” when he wrote to eight leading energy firms warning that to bid for new contracts carried “significant” risk.
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 04:07
Current list of 24 invitees to next month’s economic reform summit includes only one environmental representative
Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast
Environmentalists fear they are being shut out of the economic debate after peak nature groups were overlooked for invites to Jim Chalmers’ reform roundtable.
The current list of 24 invitees to next month’s summit features only one representative from the environment movement: former Treasury secretary Ken Henry, in his capacity as chair of the Australian Climate and Biodiversity Foundation.
Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 03:27
Environment Agency records 75 serious incidents among total of 2,800, with Thames Water being worst offender
Serious pollution incidents by water companies were up 60% last year compared with the year before, data has revealed.
These incidents are the most environmentally damaging and indicate that the sewage spill or other pollution incident has a serious, extensive or persistent impact on the environment, people or property. They could, for example, result in mass fish deaths in rivers.
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 03:23
Rules to prevent ‘enormous waste’ of fuel are seen as weak and poorly enforced and firms have little incentive to stop
The fossil fuel industry pumped an extra 389m tonnes of carbon pollution into the atmosphere last year by needlessly flaring gas, a World Bank report has found, in an “enormous waste” of fuel that heats the planet by about as much as the country of France.
Flaring is a way to get rid of gases such as methane that arise when pumping oil out of the ground. While it can sometimes keep workers safe by relieving buildups of pressure, the practice is routine in many countries because it is often cheaper to burn gas than to capture, transport, process and sell it.
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 01:00
The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world
Continue reading...
07/18/2025 - 00:00
The bulk of global greenhouse gas emissions come from countries that are not democratic, and many big oil and gas exporters are also authoritarian
The big emitters: which countries are holding back climate action and why?
When it comes to the climate crisis, how do you negotiate with an autocracy?
It is the case today, and it is almost certain to remain so for the dwindling number of years in which we can hope to stave off the worst of climate breakdown, that the bulk of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions come from countries that are not democratic. Add to that, many of the major suppliers of oil and gas – the Gulf petrostates for instance, plus Russia, Venezuela and a few others – are likewise authoritarian.
Continue reading...
07/17/2025 - 19:00
The Kangaroo Island assassin spider’s only known home is in the north-west of the island off the coast of South Australia, where it hides out in moist clumps of leaf litter. As parts of Kangaroo Island – still recovering from the black summer bushfires – suffer through near-record drought, scientists say an invasive plant root disease is drying out the Jurassic-era spider's habitat even further
Continue reading...
