Your morning Briefing

Welcome to your morning roundup of what’s making news and the must-reads for today.

Hello readers. Here is your two-minute digest of what’s making news today and a long read for later.

Smoke is seen emitted from chimneys of the cooling towers of a coal-fired power plant in Dadong, Shanxi province, China, 03/12/2009. The United Nation's (UN) environment chief said he is optimistic that the climate change talks beginning in Copenhagen will reach a deal setting firm targets to cut carbon emissions.

Carbon dated

Alarmist projections of how sensitive Earth’s climate is to rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have been proved wrong by new research published today in Nature. Climate sensitivity is still higher than the most optimistic forecasts, however; left unchecked, greenhouse gas emissions will result in significant warming by the end of the ­century. The paper said there was a less than one-in-40 chance of climate sensitivity being greater than 4C, renewing hope it would be possible to avoid global warming exceeding the Paris target of 2C.

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Nina Jackson from the Gap in New Farm Park. Pic Annette Dew

Amnesia day

Most Australians don’t mind which date Australia Day is celebrated, but fewer than half could name the First Fleet when asked why January 26 is the current date, according to a recent poll. The poll of 1417 people conducted by the left-leaning Australia Institute found 56 per cent of Australians do not mind when Australia Day is held. When asked to choose which date Australia Day should be marked, fewer than a quarter chose the current date from a range of options. Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs Minister Alan Tudge said the lack of knowledge about the historic reasons for January 26 showed a need for better education.

“I think that shows that we should be doing everything possible to teach more Australians about the importance of our heritage: our indigenous heritage, our British heritage and indeed the multiculturalism which has been part of Australia particularly in the last few decades.”

Alan Tudge

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high contrast image of casino roulette in motion

Blackout roulette

Welcome to Australia’s deadly game of Melbourne and Sydney blackout roulette. Robert Gottliebsen writes that the stakes involve hundreds of millions of dollars of refrigerated food and the operations of thousands of factories and offices who don’t have emergency power contingencies in place. The blackout roulette game has been engineered by Victorian State Premier Daniel Andrews and NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian and her predecessor Mike Baird whose governments vandalised the power system by “plonking” wind and solar farms in various areas without providing back up for high demand days when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine.

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Savage Garden

Spotify spat

Australian Conservatives leader Cory Bernardi says calls from artists such as Savage Garden frontman Darren Hayes and Adelaide hip-hop group the Hilltop Hoods for him to remove their music from his party’s Australia Day playlist are “outrageous” and “absurd”. Senator Bernardi created an “Australian Conservatives 100” Australian music playlist on streaming service Spotify, as a response to ABC youth station Triple J’s decision to shift its annual Hottest 100 from January 26. The move prompted Hayes to demand Senator Bernardi remove his group’s song To The Moon and Back from the list, and the Hilltop Hoods to tweet: “Go f*** yourself @corybernardi”.

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SUNTAS NEWS: Kingston mum Nicole Cowles and daughter Alice, talking on medicinal cannabis debate.

The long read: Cannabis conundrum

Nicole Cowles has been dosing her daughter with cannabis for years. Before she began, Alice, now nearly 12, often had dozens of seizures a day. The so-called “hippie drug” has made all the difference for one little girl. “She’s really healthy and well now,” Nicole says. “She still has seizures if she has a temperature, but they are nothing in comparison to those she used to have.” From Kingston in Tasmania, Cowles, 45, blames some of Alice’s ongoing disability on the “horse doses” of anti-convulsants she was fed as a child by panicking doctors. Alice has a rare genetic condition, CDKL5, and cannabis, or marijuana, is the only medication that seems to work for her. But it’s illegal.

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Comment of the day

“Savage Smack Down? Really? More like a thrashing with a wet lettuce leaf.”

Allen, in response to ‘Bernardi: music protest absurd’.

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Kudelka’s view

Jon Kudelka Letters page cartoon for 18-01-2018Version: (650x366)COPYRIGHT: The Australian's artists each have different copyright agreements in place regarding re-use of their work in other publications.Please seek advice from the artists themselves or the Managing Editor of The Australian regarding re-use.