Good morning. Today we speak to a member of a “meme factory” in Indonesia who is busy trading outrage about Australian politics online as Facebook’s owner, Meta, pays for her efforts.
Another exclusive story reveals that Chinese officials have raised serious questions about whether a Chinese citizen was properly monitored before she died in a Melbourne detention centre run by a US prison giant.
With house auctions on shaky ground across Australia, we ask whether we still need this weekend ritual. And Benjamin Netanyahu has cast further doubt over Middle East peace efforts by rejecting Donald Trump’s Gaza plan.
Australia
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Exclusive | Chinese officials have expressed “grave concern” as documents reveal a suicide warning before a woman’s death in a Melbourne immigration detention centre run by a US private firm.
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Cash for clicks | Workers in Indonesia’s “buzzer” economy are propagating outrage on social media – including about Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party – not for any political motive, but because Meta pays for engagement.
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Clearing out | Recent falls in auction clearance rates are resulting in dramatic headlines featuring words like “horror”, “failure” and “wipe out”. Is Australia’s love affair with auctions coming to an end?
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The Agenda | As the spring parliamentary session begins, Labor’s gambling reforms face pressure from all sides. Will they hold ’em, fold ’em or walk away?
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Body discovered | The body of a woman was found in a suitcase by the side of a road at Oallen, south of Goulburn, in regional New South Wales.
World
Full Story
Why hasn’t Labor had another female leader?
Tanya Plibersek has got the profile and a long list of credentials. But in the conversation of who is in line to be Labor’s next leader after Anthony Albanese, she barely registers, and nor do any other women. And that’s despite the party achieving gender parity in its caucus. Krishani Dhanji speaks with Rafqa Touma about why it’s been a long time since a woman led the Labor party.
Full Story
Why hasn’t Labor had another female leader?
In-depth
Australia has often sought to reassure itself that at least the nation is untainted, unlike Britain and the US, by a heinous history of slavery. But a new book traces how Sydney’s sugar rush profited from the capture and sale of “blackbirded” Pacific Islanders. The work highlights how the evidence of blackbirding is hiding in plain sight, with its legacies only now being grappled with.
Not the news
Photograph: Blake Sharp-Wiggins/The Guardian
Within the first 10 minutes of My Brilliant Career, Netflix’s new take on the classic Australian novel by Miles Franklin, there’s smutty performance poetry and a Divinyls needle drop that suggests it’s not going to be your standard turn-of-the-century period drama. “It’s bonkers,” admits Philippa Northeast, who plays our wild, passionate and indomitable teen heroine Sybylla Melvin.
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Sport
There are warnings that more than 15.5 million Australians will have no say in who inherits their superannuation, ABC News reports. To combat the threat of AI, a radical overhaul of the HSC would bar year 12 students in NSW from completing unsupervised take-home assignments, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. A 3D-printed medical device is offering new hope to Australian women suffering complications from silicone breast implants, the Age reports.
What’s happening today
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NSW | A hearing is being held in Sydney today in the independent “public inquiry” into the Aukus security partnership.
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NSW | Public hearings in the royal commission on antisemitism and social cohesion are due to continue today in Sydney.
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Brain teaser
And finally, here are the Guardian’s crosswords to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow.
