Your noon Briefing

Welcome to your noon digest of what’s been making news and what to watch for.

Hello readers. Here is your noon round-up of today’s top stories so far and a long read for lunchtime.

AMP CEO Craig Mellor stands on stage with Chairman Catherine Brenner before their AGM in Sydney, Thursday, May 11, 2017. (AAP Image/David Moir) NO ARCHIVING

AMP rejects ‘criminal’ claim

Financial services major AMP has told the banking royal commission that “there is no evidence” to suggest that its board, including former chairman Catherine Brenner and former chief executive Craig Meller, acted inappropriately in relation to the preparation of a Clayton Utz legal report investigating the fee-for-no-service issue. AMP also said it “strenuously denies” allegations it may have committed a criminal offence by misleading regulators.

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Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy and Member for Port Adelaide, Mark Butler speaks to the media during a doorstop with Labor candidate for the Batman by-election Ged Kearney in Melbourne, Thursday, March 8, 2018. The pair held a a joint doorstop on Labor's strong policies to combat climate change. (AAP Image/Joe Castro) NO ARCHIVING

‘Strangled by factions’

As up to 53,000 Labor members begin voting today to elect a national president, opposition spokesman Mark Butler has again attacked the party for being strangled by faction bosses, shrinking in size, and needing bolder ideas to tackle inequality as he seeks a second term.

“Three years on, most of the meaningful changes discussed by party members back then have been blocked by factional leaders who refuse to relinquish their stranglehold on the last bastions of machine politics.”

Mark Butler

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8/3/18: Macquarie CEO Nicholas Moore speaking at a conference put on by the Wharton Global Forum in Sydney. John Feder/The Australian.

$20m man

Macquarie Group chief executive Nicholas Moore last year earned nearly $20 million, making him the best paid boss in Australia. The bank’s annual report, published today, showed Mr Moore’s remuneration in 2018 reached $19.6 million, up from $18.7 million one year earlier.

The level of pay he received was 248 times the average wage in Australia.

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Inside fortress Google's workplace hell

The long read: Inside Google’s workplace hell

At Google’s HQ in Mountain View, California, employee culture has proven to be a riot of pressure groups and causes. Kirsten Grind and Douglas MacMillan reveal how the tech giant has become a war zone for all manner of social and political beliefs.

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Comments of the day

“I live in Adelaide and don’t have any issues with power. When it’s a still day I flick the light switch and the light comes on, just like on a windy day.”

Guy

“That’s because you are probably using coal power from Victoria.”

Duncan, in response to Coal ‘no match for renewables’.