NZ and US Pass Laws to Reduce Smoking Harms, While Australia Makes it Harder to Quit
The NZ government launched its Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan on 9 December. A decade in the making, the policy proposes to see less than 5 percent of the population smoking in four years’ time, within a country that sees a...
The Impact of Family Court Decisions on the Christmas Holidays
Christmas is a time when families are meant to be together, sharing each others’ company and reflecting on the things in life that really matter. And despite travel restrictions, most families will be able to spend time with one another...
Have Yourself a Very Perrottet Christmas
As Dominic Perrottet took over the reins of the NSW Liberal Nationals government on 5 October, it was understood that the new premier was going to shift the decade-long conservative governance in this state a trifle further to the right…...
Demerge Mega-Councils: An Interview With Residents for Deamalgamation’s Andrew Chuter
The 4 December elections for Inner West Council were different to the votes held at all other 127 local government areas in NSW, as the constituents in Sydney’s inner west had an extra optional question to deliberate upon, and that was whether...
Road Fatalities on the Rise Despite COVID Lockdowns
Despite Covid lockdowns right across the country for large chunks of last year and the year before, road fatalities are on the rise. The pressure is now on governments at both the state and federal level to reassess road safety...
The Queen Is “Completely Anathema” to Australia: CLA’s Bill Rowlings on a Republic
A first-time visitor on arrival to Australia, might question why Queen Elizabeth II is on the back of all the coins. Truth be told, however, a lot of locals, when catching a glimpse of her head on the back, wonder...
Calls to Legalise eScooters and to Increase Power and Speed Caps for eBikes in NSW
The New South Wales Productivity Commission has long urged a review of laws regulating eBikes and eScooters, citing economic, environmental, and public health benefits. Now, in 2025, these calls are being answered – with the NSW Government moving closer to...
US Votes Against UN Adopted Anti-Nazi Resolution, While Australia Abstains
The 76th session of the UN General Assembly last week adopted a resolution on “combating glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fuelling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance”. Initiated by the Russian...
Imagining Prison Abolition Is Not Difficult, Says Sisters Inside’s Debbie Kilroy
When the British arrived by boat to colonise this continent in 1788, it was all about incarceration. The First Fleet brought with it large numbers of inmates, military officers and a foreign law system with carceral punishment as an integral...
NSW Set to Criminalise Coercive Control
The New South Wales Government will soon begin drafting legislation aimed at criminalising coercive control. The new laws will create a standalone criminal offence for coercive control, in an attempt to deter such conduct and make it clear that such...
