☕️ The NZ bill wanting to legally define gender

We have some exciting news! TDA is going on tour in the lead-up to the federal election (less than two weeks away!)

If you ever find yourself wondering how on earth our political system works, then this event is for you! We believe politics doesn’t need to be complex. So myself and TDA co-founder Zara Seidler will be going through how the whole thing works so you can get answers to all your questions… all with a glass of wine in hand.

We’re doing events next week in Sydney, Wollongong, and Melbourne. Did I mention it’s free? Oh, and we’ll provide some nibbles!

Register here for Sydney, here for Wollongong, and here for Melbourne.

"I figured, if ever I'm not keen on anything [JK Rowling’s] said, it's only right that Warner Bros Inc keep hold of the money they owe me. This is obviously sane."
Actor Sean Biggerstaff, who played Gryffindor Quidditch captain Oliver Wood in the Harry Potter films, announcing he no longer makes money from the series due to his disagreement with author JK Rowling over trans rights.

542,143
The number of votes cast on Tuesday, the first day of early voting. At the 2022 election the AEC recorded 314,346 votes on the first day.

"If only there was an institution that produced incredible lawyers."
A comment left on our piece about Harvard University suing the Trump administration after they froze their government funding. Harvard has refused to adhere to a letter of demands from the administration.

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A minor party in New Zealand’s Coalition Government has proposed a bill seeking to legally define “woman” and “man” based on biological sex.

The move comes a week after the UK Supreme Court ruled a woman is defined by biological sex under the law.

The New Zealand First Party (NZF) said the bill will ensure “the protection, progression, and safety of women”.

NZF proposed the draft law as a “member’s bill,” which means it needs to be drawn from a random ballot before it’s debated.

New Zealand’s current Government, led by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, came to power in 2023.

It is a coalition of three parties: the National Party, the ACT Party, and New Zealand First (NZF).

NZF, led by Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters, holds eight of the 123 seats in Parliament.

Under the coalition agreement, Peters must step down as Deputy PM next month, giving the role to ACT leader David Seymour.

Under the bill, the term “woman” would be defined as “an adult human biological female”, and “man” as “an adult human biological male”.

NZF have said the bill’s proposal comes after receiving two petitions which called on “protecting the term ‘woman’ in legislation.”

NZF leader and Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters said the bill aims to provide legal “clarity and consistency” around “sex-based rights.”

“This is not about being anti-anyone or anti-anything. This is about ensuring we as a country focus on the facts of biology and protect the term ‘woman’ in law,” Peters said.

The proposal is a “member’s bill” — a type of draft legislation introduced by a member of Parliament who is not a minister.

For these kinds of bills to be debated in parliament, they first have to win a random ballot. The ballot determines which bill will be considered.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has said his party will consider the bill if it wins the ballot.

Opposition Leader Chris Hipkins told local media the Labour Party is “highly unlikely” to support the proposal.

Hipkins said the bill contradicts his party’s “long, proud tradition of empowering people to be who they are.”

In a post to social media, Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick criticised the policy, calling it the product of an “imported culture war designed to inflame and divide” the country.

Reporting by Achol Arok.

Cost of living has emerged as the top issue for voters this election.

Nearly two thirds of young people listed cost of living as their main concern at this election, according to Resolve polling conducted by TDA.

In this piece, we’re breaking down how political parties are planning to address cost of living ahead of the 3 May election.

For some context, this is what inflation (the rise in prices) has looked like over the past decade:

As you can see, the past three years has seen a period of particularly high inflation.

First, we’ll go through what the major parties agree on – this means these commitments will come into effect regardless of who wins the election.

$150 in energy bill relief will be automatically applied to energy bills until the end of the year ($75 per quarter).

A ban on supermarket price gouging will start in July. This refers to the practice of excessively and unnecessarily hiking the cost of groceries.

There is a plan to triple the number of GP visits that are currently bulk billed. This means more doctors’ visits will be fully covered by Medicare. This would be done via an incentive given out by the government, which is like a bonus given to doctors who fully bulk bill patients.

There is also a plan to cap PBS medicines at $25, down from $31.60. These are medications that are subsidised by the government. It will make them cheaper to buy at the pharmacy.

A tax cut would be introduced for the lowest tax threshold from 16c to 15c, starting July next year. This is a tax cut of $268 for the year. It would drop again in July 2027 to 14c.

There would be a new tax deduction option of $1,000 for work-related expenses. Labor says it helps workers who usually claim less than $1,000 from gathering low-cost receipts. Anyone claiming more would still claim their expenses individually.

Labor would wipe 20% off all student debt from July, which is estimated to wipe roughly $16 billion off loans.

The current tax on fuel would be halved for a year, which would wipe 25c a litre off petrol.

The number of subsidised mental health sessions would be doubled from 10 to 20. This means you could see a psychologist up to 20 times a year for a cheaper price, because Medicare would cover most of the fee.

A $1,200 one-off tax cut would be introduced in July 2026, for anyone earning between $48,000 – $104,000. A smaller tax cut will apply for those earning less than $48,000 a year, and also between $104,00 and $148,000.

Getting universal dental into Medicare has become a key Greens policy. Currently, dental services are only covered under Medicare for children under 18.

It wants to wiping all student debts, cancelling current loans being paid off by graduates. It also wants to make university free for all.

The Greens want to introduce 50c public transport around Australia, adopting the Queensland Government’s scheme which has reduced the flat fare.

Reporting by Harry Sekulich.

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🍊 Simone Biles has thrown doubt on appearing at the 2028 LA Olympics.
🍊 Lachlan Galvin will appear for the Tigers this week.
🍊 A former Test cricketer has received a suspended sentence.
🗞️ Also in today’s Sport Newsletter: swimming, AFL, and more…

Leary’s time was 59 seconds 22 milliseconds in the heats, breaking her own world record set at the Paris Paralympics last year. While she swam slightly slower in the final, she still took out the gold. Following the final, Leary said she had been “so confident” about the race, following “hard work” after the Paris Games.

Want more good news? Sign up to our weekly Good Newsletter here - we promise it’ll make your week better!

Reporting by Lucy Tassell.

Do you say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to ChatGPT?

Well, according to Sam Altman, the CEO of its founding company OpenAI, the extra words of pleasantries cost them tens of millions of dollars in electricity costs.

But Altman did say it is “dollars well spent”.

Indeed, MIT scientists have found ChatGPT demands “a staggering amount of electricity”.

Reporting by Rosa Bowden.

Last month, the body of a 19-year-old girl, Audrey Griffin, was found in a creek on NSW’s Central Coast.

She had disappeared after walking home from a night out with her friends.

Police said at the time the death was not suspicious. But this week, police charged a 53-year-old man, who was not known to her, with her murder.

On today’s podcast, we are going to explain what we know about the death of 19-year-old Audrey Griffin, and we’re also going to take a broader look at what the major parties are promising to do when it comes to domestic violence in this country.