The December 7 Edition

Jo Taylor is a grieving mother. She’s also an angry mother. She’s right to suspect that, in different circumstances, six people going missing from the same sparsely populated area, in less than half that number of years, would be big national news. As she points out, the hunt for four-year-old white girl Cleo Smith in another part of Western Australia occupied police for 18 days in 2021, and became a national talking point. Was it the colour of the skin of Taylor’s missing son, Wes Lockyer, that saw the initial search for him called off after only four days? Did rumours that his disappearance could be linked to drug-running and bikie gangs play a part? And what of the five other West Australian Indigenous men who’ve also gone missing in recent years? Are they linked to Wes’s case and, if so, how? Beyond exasperated, Taylor and her family hired private investigators to try to get to the bottom of it all. She wants her son – or his body – found. She wants the police, the politicians and the wider populace to care about where he might be. If foul play was involved, she wants those responsible charged. Underneath all this, she wants an end to the unknowing. Editor, Katrina Strickland.

13 stories

For subscribers

Drugs, bikies, a serial killer: How did six men vanish from the outback without a trace?

Wes Lockyer is one of six Aboriginal men from WA’s remote north to have disappeared in recent years. His family want the police and pollies to do more to find them. And the public to care.

December 7, 2024
by Tim Elliott

For subscribers

Is it still goodwill if you’re filming? Kindness in the era of social media

Worthy deeds are performed for a vast digital audience. Philanthropy, or charity porn?

December 5, 2024
by Katie Cunningham

For subscribers

When trust goes bust: how we bind during a crisis and break in the aftermath

Australians back their governments at times of national peril, then dump them when it’s over. Who will they blame in 2025?

December 6, 2024
by George Megalogenis

Two of Us

For subscribers

‘I was a mess’: How Margaret Pomeranz helped her son through the death of his twins

Film critic Margaret Pomeranz and her eldest son, Josh Pomeranz, on enduring the worst of times – and welcoming two blockbuster creations.

December 5, 2024
by Fenella Souter

“Singing with other people is a very powerful human experience … It does something to the soul.”

Dicey Topics

‘It does something to the soul’: Meg Washington on the power of singing en masse

The singer-songwriter discusses why she makes music, not being smart with money – and her hatred of leaf blowers.

December 6, 2024
by Benjamin Law

Modern Guru

For subscribers

Every year, my close friends forget my birthday. Do I just accept it?

Either be proactive or become a birthday non-acknowledger (like our Modern Guru).

December 12, 2024
by Danny Katz

The haircut

Vic’s decision to get a haircut while on holiday backfired when he was charged $80. “I thought it was going to be $30!” he later raged to his wife, Deb. “If you’d remembered your glasses…,” she began, but he cut her off: “Either way, it’s highway robbery!” Determined to recoup the “stolen” money, Vic invested in hair clippers. “After five haircuts I break even,” he explained. As he emerged from the bathroom five haircuts later, still looking the way he did these days, it was clear to Deb that his idea of breaking even and her idea of breaking even were entirely different things. Words by Paul Connolly. Illustration by Jim Pavlidis.