Economics of Labour's plan to nationalise broadband – £20 billion cost is unrealistic

Nov 19, 2019 02:35 am UTC| Insights & Views Economy

Labour has promised to give every home and business access to free full-fibre internet by 2030 if elected in the 2019 UK election. To do this, it plans to nationalise several parts of BT and create a free-of-charge,...

The problem with child protection isn't the money, it's the system itself

Nov 19, 2019 02:33 am UTC| Insights & Views

In Victoria, 35 young people aged 12-17 years ended their lives by suicide between 2007 and 2019 all were entangled in the child protection system. This was the focus of a new report, Lost, not forgotten, released last...

Please, no more projections. What we need are predictions, and they're harder

Nov 19, 2019 02:32 am UTC| Insights & Views Science

It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future. (attributed to Danish physicist Niels Bohr) The difficulty of making predictions has long been known, but the rise of the internet means that it is...

Green cement a step closer to being a game-changer for construction emissions

Nov 19, 2019 02:29 am UTC| Insights & Views Business

Concrete is the most widely used man-made material, commonly used in buildings, roads, bridges and industrial plants. But producing the Portland cement needed to make concrete accounts for 5-8% of all global greenhouse...

Nitrogen fertilisers are incredibly efficient, but they make climate change a lot worse

Nov 19, 2019 02:29 am UTC| Insights & Views Science

Nitrous oxide (N₂O) (more commonly known as laughing gas) is a powerful contributor to global warming. It is 265 times more effective at trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide and depletes our ozone...

Loneliness is a social cancer, every bit as alarming as cancer itself

Nov 19, 2019 02:28 am UTC| Insights & Views Health

The ABCs Australia Talks project aims to stimulate a conversation on a broad sweep of topics from job security and sexual habits to national pride and personal finances. The project is based on the results of a...

Prince Andrew claims he 'didn't sweat' – here's the science

Nov 19, 2019 02:28 am UTC| Insights & Views Health

Sweating is a controversial topic at the moment. In his extraordinary recent BBC interview, Prince Andrew dismissed some of the allegations made against him by Virginia Giuffre (known previously as Virginia Roberts) on the...