Morning mail: $15bn jobkeeper overhaul, mine threatens Aboriginal site, Beirut anger

Good morning, this is Richard Parkin bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Friday 7 August.

Top stories

The Morrison government has overhauled eligibility requirements for the jobkeeper wage subsidy only three weeks after cutting the payment in an attempt to save businesses and jobs at risk because of the deteriorating outlook in Victoria. Daniel Andrews has again pledged accountability but refused to answer questions about the hotel quarantine program that sparked the second Covid-19 wave in Victoria, which has claimed eight more lives, with a further 471 new cases recorded. Across the state more than 30 residential disability services have been linked to active outbreaks, state government figures have revealed. And several major airlines have been accused of “unethical” behaviour, with Australians returning from overseas reporting the cancellation of economy tickets on flights ito boost business and first-class sales. One couple from Queensland have found a silver lining to the coronavirus, however, using the government’s homebuilder initiative in conjunction with the early superannuation drawdown and a state program offering cheaper land to complete their dream house by year’s end.

A 60,000-year-old Aboriginal sacred site in the Pilbara is under threat from a proposed Fortescue mining expansion, a Senate inquiry has heard. Two rock shelters containing evidence of use and occupation for at least 47,800 years have been described as “highly significant sites”, with Eastern Guruma traditional owners documenting widespread engraved rock art at a third site as “sacred text” bound with major dreaming narratives of the region. The sites are not far from those destroyed by Rio Tinto’s blasts at Juukan Gorge in May that prompted the inquiry. A spokesperson for Fortescue said an acceptable boundary was previously negotiated with traditional owners but WA’s Aboriginal Heritage Act permits further expansions nevertheless.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron has toured the devastated site of the Beirut explosion, with angry crowds urging him to help bring about political change in the beleaguered nation. At least 157 people have died and more than 5,000 have been injured, with the explosion causing at least $15bn worth of damage to the Lebanese capital – prompting calls for an independent inquiry into the disaster. Speaking with grieving locals, Macron promised that aid “will not go to corrupt hands”, warning Lebanon’s political class that “if reforms are not made, Lebanon will continue to sink”. A grim timeline is emerging as to how a Moldovan-flagged vessel bound for Mozambique came to leave 2,750 tonnes of deadly ammonia nitrate stranded for six years in a port district warehouse.

Australia

Residents in northern NSW have petitioned the federal environment minister to save 52 hectares of koala habitat that faces demolition for a quarry expansion. A state body approved the works just weeks after a parliamentary inquiry found the animals would become extinct in NSW by 2050 without urgent changes.

The former ACT Liberal leader Kate Carnell faces conflict of interest allegations after a party-affiliated communications firm received nearly $200,000 from the now small business ombudsman’s office without a tender process. A spokeswoman for Carnell has denied there was any conflict of interest.

Australian company bosses commanded pay packets as high as $37.7m last year, with a 7.4% fall in the average remuneration for executives not preventing at least three company leaders from taking home in excess of $20m.

The world

New York’s attorney general has sued to have the National Rifle Association dissolved, accusing the powerful gun lobby’s leadership of using the non-profit organisation as a “personal piggy bank” and creating “a breeding ground for greed, abuse, and brazen illegality”.

Pope Francis has shaken up the senior leadership of the Catholic church’s finance committee, naming six women to the 15-member Council of Economy, responsible for the Vatican’s coffers. They are the most senior positions given to women within the Catholic church.

One of the world’s poorest countries, Niger, wasted more than $100m in potentially corrupt international arms deals, leaked official documents have alleged. An audit of eight years worth of defence department purchases, predominantly from Russia and China, showed hugely inflated prices, with some equipment not being delivered.

A South Korean MP has sparked a heated debate about sexism after her decision to wear a colourful red dress in parliament triggered a flood of misogynistic comments online. The 28-year-old, Ryu Ho-jeong, says she wanted to “shatter” conservative traditions that associate power with wearing a suit.

Recommended reads

“I will always remember 2020 as the year without spring.” For Barcelona resident, Meritxell Mir, a 12-week hard lockdown as the coronavirus ravaged Spain’s second largest city was tough. “By the third week, time started to feel heavy. Days seemed to have 72 hours as minutes wouldn’t pass.” But as the bleak outer world, and news of 28,000 dead filtered in, the simple pleasures – going through old boxes of travel photos, and that first hug with loved ones after isolation, unlocked a new, more profound sense of resilience.

“The animals are dying. Soon we will be alone here.” As opening lines to novels go, the first foray from theAustralian author Charlotte McConaghy’s debut novel, The Last Migration, sure packs a punch. Following a protagonist with a deep affinity for arctic terns, the “dreamy, elegiac” work often moves into “the register of fairytales or myth”, writes Fiona Wright.

“My grandfather had never been a tall man, and now he looked absurdly small, no bigger than a child.” As Pestonjee Pader was laid to rest, under the watchful gaze of white-clad priests intoning in Avestan, the long-dead language of the Zoroastrian scriptures, one of the world’s great disappearing religions lost another of its cohort. Shaun Walker tells the moving story of a funeral, a family and a rapidly shrinking faith.

Listen

As if there wasn’t enough tension during the final year of school, for the crop of 2020, turning 18, getting your licence and making tentative fumbling steps in the world of romance has all been largely left in the shadows. On this episode of Full Story, we hear about how an already turbulent year has unfolded under the shadow of the global pandemic.

Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.

Sport

It was a thought so obvious it almost got overlooked. So when Sarah Dwyer-Shick donated a handful of sports bras to aspirational athletes in rural Namibia, a project was born. “It began as a grassroots project to meet a need and also to provide a way for individuals and teams to take action and directly support other athletes,” she tells Samantha Lewis. And while the symbolism was immediately clear, the impact for breaking down barriers to female participation in sport is only beginning.

England’s top-order collapse has the home nation in trouble in the first Test against Pakistan, after a superb Shan Masood century helped the visitors to 326. Burns, Sibley, Root and Stokes all fell cheaply before Ollie Pope and Jos Buttler steadied the side to 4-92 at stumps.

And, it wouldn’t be Friday without David Squires … on a Central Coast dreams factory up for sale.

Media roundup

The federal government has added $15bn to the coronavirus recovery scheme, easing eligibility for jobkeeper for thousands of businesses, reports the ABC. Scott Morrison has said the revised guidelines constitute “doing whatever it takes”. The NSW treasurer, Dominic Perrottet, is facing heavy scrutiny after the resignation of his chief of staff amid revelations that two of the minister’s personal staff were paid by icare – a workers’ insurer that is meant to be independent from politics, the Sydney Morning Herald has reported. And, a fleet of 16 snow-clearing vehicles has been deployed across Tasmania after heavier than usual falls, the Mercury says.

Coming up

Scott Morrison will join state and territory leaders and health and economic advisers over videolink for a national cabinet meeting.

The Reserve Bank will release its economic forecasts after Treasury flagged that the unemployment rate will head towards 10%.

And if you’ve read this far …

He’s never had formal swimming or lifeguard training – but one nine-year-old Florida boy is being hailed a hero. Asaih Williams has a vivid imagination and sometimes that involves him being caught up in rescue situations. So when his father, Josh, back his neck in a diving accident, towing him safely back to shore was the natural response.

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