Month: July 2022

The Prime Minister insists he’s willing to take a risk on a referendum, to ‘uplift our whole nation’

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on The Prime Minister insists he’s willing to take a risk on a referendum, to ‘uplift our whole nation’

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants Australians to consider a draft question — released by the government this weekend — asking whether the constitution should be changed to create an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.

He told ABC’s Insiders program that a referendum could be as powerful as the national apology for the Stolen Generations and the Mabo decision.

“This is an opportunity for us to demonstrate our maturity as a nation, to uplift our whole nation. And I’m very hopeful that we can do so,” he said.

“I recognize that it’s a risk, but if you don’t try then you have already not succeeded.”

A Voice to Parliament, created via a referendum, was the key recommendation of hundreds of Aboriginal people at Uluṟu in 2017.

There is now a push from the Opposition and the Greens for more detail on what role and function the body would have.

The Voice has been described as an advisory body that would permanently give frank and fearless advice to the federal parliament.

But the Prime Minister has suggested there will be limitations to the power a Voice would have, stamping out the claims from the previous government that it would become a “third chamber” of parliament.

“We’re a democratic nation, and parliaments, in the end, they’re the accountable body,” he said.

‘Use your voice and be heard’

The Prime Minister made his pledge at Garma, a cultural festival hosted by the Yothu Yindi Foundation in north-east Arnhem Land.

This year, there’s been a reunion of sorts, as clans come together for the celebration, for the first time since the pandemic began.

It has been 17 years since Gumatj and Rirratjingu woman Yirrmala Mununggurritj was last at the Garma Festival.

Ms Mununggurritj says honoring the legacy of her late elders and amplifying the voices of women was her main priority.

Yirrmala Mununggurritj says Anthony Albanese is putting Indigenous issues “on the map”.(ABC: Jeddah Coast)

“Now that my grandmother’s not with me anymore I’m just here living her legacy, continuing her work which means so much to me … I feel so close to her here,” she said.

She has been busy encouraging young women at the festival to have their say in policy-heavy discussions about topics that affect them.

“Shame is a big thing for Indigenous women and girls in my community, but I’m trying to teach them that it’s a good thing to speak up, use your voice and be heard,” she said.

She has also returned in time for a significant step forward on the path to constitutional recognition for Indigenous people, the announcement of a question that could be asked at a referendum on a Voice to Parliament.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume.

PM Anthony Albanese to announce draft referendum question

After hearing snippets of the Prime Minister’s speech on Thursday, Ms Mununggurritj said she would like to see the government make an effort to make the language used throughout the referendum campaign more accessible for young people.

“I’ve got a little bit of an understanding of it [the referendum] but I’m still learning about my other culture in the English world, just like many others,” she said.

“They should make it more interesting, so that we can be more excited about it and want to actually learn about it.

“I think I heard him [Mr Albanese] talk about racism which is pretty important … because me as a young kid I grew up being racially discriminated against … I’m just glad that he came here [to Garma] to put us [Indigenous people] and these things on the map.”

Voice legislation will not come before a referendum, PM says

For some, the announcement of a draft question for a referendum has brought a sense of relief that after years of delays, action is finally being taken on the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

But for others, it’s what the government hasn’t announced that is causing doubts.

Garma is held on Yolngu land, where people are connected through ancestry, story and ritual.(ABC News: Michael Franchi)

The Prime Minister wants the question and proposed changes to the constitution to be clear and simple — but that comes at the cost of leaving it to the parliament to determine the composition, powers and function of the Voice.

“The legislation of the structure of the Voice won’t happen before the referendum,” Mr Albanese said.

Tags anthony albanese, federal government, garma-festival, greens, Indigenous, mabo decision, opposition, prime minister, voice of parliament, work

Nancy Pelosi confirms Asia trip but does not mention Taiwan | US foreign policy

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on Nancy Pelosi confirms Asia trip but does not mention Taiwan | US foreign policy

The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, has confirmed a visit to Asia this week but questions remain over whether it will include a stop in Taiwan.

In a press release on Sunday, Pelosi said a delegation would travel to the Indo-Pacific “to reaffirm America’s strong and unshakeable commitment to our allies and friends in the region”.

The delegation left Hawaii on Sunday and there will be stops in Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan. Pelosi said they would hold “high-level meetings” in those countries to discuss the advancement of “shared interests and values” including peace and security. The press release did not mention Taiwan.

Pelosi was supposed to visit Taiwan in April but the trip was postponed after she contracted Covid-19. Recent reports suggesting Pelosi intended to visit in August have angered Beijing and prompted threats of military countermeasures. Some analysts have said it is one of the most dangerous moments in cross-strait relations in decades.

China considers Taiwan to be a breakaway province destined for reunification, and strongly objects to all acts that appear to support Taiwan as an independent sovereign state. In a phone call lasting more than two hours, China’s president, Xi Jinping, warned Joe Biden about what he considers China’s “territorial integrity”. “Those who play with fire will perish by it,” Xi said.

The US does not have official ties with Taiwan but maintains friendly relations and is legally obliged to provide weapons for self-defence.

Taiwan’s government will not comment on a Pelosi visit as it balances its wish to maintain the safety of the status quo while also growing its relations with the US.

Taiwan’s population has lived under the threat of China for decades, and while recent events such as the Ukraine war have heightened concerns and prompted increased military and civilian preparations, there has been little sign of major concerns specifically surrounding Pelosi’s visit.

Among Taiwanese analysts and officials there is some belief that Pelosi must visit now to avoid appearing cowed by Beijing’s strong language.

Amanda Hsiao, a senior China analyst with the Crisis Group, a thinktank, said on Friday that China was unlikely to directly target US military assets or risk a military confrontation. However, she noted that China had greatly increased military activity in recent years, including frequently sending squadrons of warplanes into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ).

“Beijing will have to select a response that visibly rises above the already high baseline of activity,” Hsiao said.

On Saturday China conducted previously unannounced live-fire exercises in the Taiwan Strait, at the narrowest point between China and Taiwan’s main island.

Numerous US political delegations have made unofficial visits to Taiwan in recent years, showing support for the democratic island amid increasing pressure from China. Pelosi would be the highest-ranked US official to go there since 1997 when the then speaker, Newt Gingrich, visited.

Biden, who does not control the actions of the speaker as Congress is a co-equal branch of government, told media that the military did not think it was a good idea.

Drew Thompson, a former US defense department official, said the lack of a Taiwan mention in the press release did not necessarily mean the delegation would not stop by in an unofficial capacity. On Twitter, Thompson said he believed China would be satisfied with the exclusion of Taiwan on the formal itinerary, even if the delegation visited.

“This is an accommodation to Beijing’s concern but far from a capitulation. China’s interest in keeping Taiwan off the formal agenda and listed with sovereign states is respected,” he said.

Thompson speculated that the most likely outcome would be increased sorties into the ADIZ or reconnaissance flights around the island, but the firing of missiles or crossings of the median line between China and Taiwan were now unlikely.

Business

Elon Musk’s Antics Turn Owners and Would-Be Buyers Against Tesla

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on Elon Musk’s Antics Turn Owners and Would-Be Buyers Against Tesla

For much of the past decade, Tesla lacked competitors that matched its models’ battery range and other measures of performance.

The trends have shown up in one consumer survey and market research report after another: Tesla commands high brand awareness, consideration and loyalty, and customers are mostly delighted by its cars. Musk’s antics, on the other hand? They could do without.

Creative Strategies, a California-based customer-experience measurer, mentioned owner frustration with Musk in a study it published in April. A year earlier, research firm Escalent found Musk was the most negative aspect of the Tesla brand among electric-vehicle owners surveyed.

“We hear from Tesla owners who will say, ‘Look, I love my vehicle, but I really wish I didn’t have to respond to my friends and family about his latest tweet,’” says Mike Dovorany, who spoke with thousands of EV owners and potential buyers during his two years working in Eswarm’s automotive and mobility group.

Tesla has so far had no trouble growing its way through Musk’s many controversies. The dip in vehicle deliveries the company reported last quarter was its first sequential decline since early 2020 and largely had to do with COVID-19 lockdowns in Shanghai forcing its most productive factory to shut for weeks. Competitors that have been chasing the company for a decade may still be years away from catching up in the EV sales ranks.

Musk’s star power, built in no small part by his activity on Twitter – the same forum where he’s become such a lightning rod – has contributed immensely to Tesla, especially since it’s shunned traditional advertising. His steady stream of online banter, punctuated with the occasional grandiose announcement or stunt (see: shooting a Roadster into space) keeps Tesla in the headlines. During the company’s earlier days, the trolling and glib comments were a feature, not a bug. They allowed Musk to shape media coverage and made him the ringleader for Tesla’s legion of very-online fans.

But after making Tesla and himself so synonymous with one another, Musk has waded into political conflicts, attempted to buy one of the world’s most influential social media platforms and struggled to bat back unflattering coverage of his personal life, putting the company’s increasingly valuable brand at risk.

Jerry James Stone, a 48-year-old chef in Sacramento, California, who teaches his 219,000 YouTube channel subscribers how to make vegan and vegetarian meals, drives a Volkswagen Beetle convertible and plans to go electric with his next car. He is not sure yet which model, but he is certain it wo n’t be a Tesla.

“Elon has just soiled that brand for me so much that I don’t even think I would take one if I won one,” Stone says. “You have this guy who’s the richest dude in the world, who has this huge megaphone, and he uses it to call somebody a paedophile who’s not, or to fat-shame people, all these things that are just kind of gross.”

Teslas off the table

According to Strategic Vision, a US research firm that consults auto companies, some 39 per cent of car buyers say they wouldn’t consider Tesla. That’s not necessarily out of the ordinary – almost half of respondents say they won’t consider German luxury brands. But Tesla does lag more mass-market brands: Toyota, for example, is only off the shopping list for 23 per cent of drivers.

Emma Sirr, a 28-year-old worker in cloud computing who lives in Bozeman, Montana, gets around with her partner and their two dogs in a 2004 Nissan Frontier. They’ve been researching EVs for about three years and until recently considered Teslas the only viable option, given their range and the charging infrastructure the company has built in their area. But they refused to buy one because of Musk, their main concerns being his politics, staff turnover at the company and its cavalier approach to autonomous-driving technology.

“We took Tesla off the table from the get-go,” Sirr says. She and her partner de ella have their eyes on the Kia Niro and Chevrolet Bolt as possible alternatives. “As consumers, our power is what we buy. I think younger generations in particular vote with their wallets, and I feel like that might come back to bite.”

For much of the past decade, Tesla lacked competitors that matched its models’ battery range and other measures of performance. Consumers put off by Musk’s mischief had few EVs to turn to. As legacy vehicle makers introduce more capable electric models, Tesla won’t have as much leeway.

“We’ve seen among the early adopters more of a willingness to take risks or to put up with things that are out of the ordinary,” says Dovorany, who left Escalent for an automotive tech start-up earlier this year. “We’re not seeing that as much with incoming buyers.” To win this cohort, automakers need to check every box, and for some, that includes employing a chief executive who doesn’t share Hitler memes on social media.

Levitt, the self-described former Musk fanboy, took a test ride last month in a Lucid. He was n’t sold on it, partly he says because it did n’t have enough cargo space for his golf gear. He’s still waiting for another automaker to steal him away from Tesla and considering models from Audi, Mercedes and BMW.

“If you take Mr. Musk and his antics out of the equation, I’m about 98 per cent certain that my next car would be a Tesla,” Levitt says. “His antics of him put me in play.”

Bloomberg

Entertainment

The Queen needs Kate Middleton needs to take less holidays

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on The Queen needs Kate Middleton needs to take less holidays

There is a strange schism when it comes to the royal family and holidays: The royals love taking lengthy stretches off from the business of the monarchy… but their holiday homes are pretty grim.

Sandringham, the Queen’s Norfolk estate where Christmas is spent, looks like the setting of a gothic horror story while Balmoral, Her Majesty’s Scottish home, was partially modeled after a Bavarian schloss. All that forbidding gray stone and all those mock medieval turrets are enough to give even the bravest of young HRHs lifelong nightmares.

And yet when it comes to holidaying, the House of Windsor are nonpareils. Princess Margaret used to jet off to Mustique and crisp herself in the Caribbean sun with egregious regularity (you could probably still catch a whiff of coconut oil long after she was back demanding whiskey in the some London drawing room) while the Queen Mother promptly bought herself a holiday castle – the Castle of Mey – and would decamp there for generous stints, far away from anything so bourgeois as work.

And unfortunately this royal tradition of holidaying like it was a competitive sport is one that William and Kate, Duke and Duchess of Cambrdige, are eagerly carrying on. In the last 18 months they have taken nearly four months off and are currently in the middle of their roughly two month-long annual summer holiday.

While the duke and duchess are set to roll up to the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham this week to wave the Union Jack and prove how good they are at cheering, in a normal year, once the final Wimbledon trophy is handed over in July, it’s time to get out the Ambre Solaire, with the duo not returning to their posts until early autumn.

This year, sure June was a busy month for the Cambridges given all that Platinum Jubilee waving they had to do, but as is usually normal, in July we have only seen Kate at a charity polo match and in the Royal Box at Wimbledon, hardly a demonstration of regal elbow grease. (Any sort of ‘work’ that can be done while holding a chilled glass of Pimms hardly counts as hard graft now does it?)

August, as unusual, will see Kate disappear off the radar completely, usually only popping back up around mid-September.

Likewise, in 2021, the only official engagements that Kate undertook in July involved watching tennis and soccer, after which she proceeded to take nearly nine weeks off, meaning that from the end of June until mid-September her out-of-office was essentially on.

The same schedule also held for William, apart from two meetings about the Earthshot Prize he managed to squeeze in and one church service. Gosh, however does he manage to get so much done?

The couple have, in roughly the last year, been to France twice (for Kate’s brother’s wedding and for a skiing holiday) and to Jordan, not to mention spending time in Scotland and Norfolk.

There’s no way around it: William and Kate have a holiday problem.

And, as we all know, the first step is admitting it.

At issue here is that just because they can take months of the year off and that traditionally members of the royal family have, does not mean they should.

For years now, the couple and their team have been focused on building Brand Cambridge, that of them as a hardworking and oh-so-normal couple. Look at them, out there boldly taking the most pressing issues of the day, including mental health and climate change, and then getting home for bath time!

This is the formula that has been cooked up to try and ensure that the monarchy survives yet. The idea seems to be to let Prince Charles be, well, Prince Charles, rabbiting on about hedgerow preservation and delivering the occasional barnstorming speech about the environment and his Aston Martin that runs on white wine (really) and Britons will grudgingly tolerate him.

Meanwhile, alongside all that we have William and Kate pioneering a much pluckier, more engaged and more proactive version of royalty that also features quite the cult of personality.

Central to the nascence of Cambridge Inc. is the couple’s relatability and willingness to be vulnerable. We’ve heard Kate talk about the loneliness of new motherhood and appear on a parenting podcast while William has regularly opened up about the emotional toll that his years of him as an air ambulance pilot took on him and his grief over the loss of his mother.

These touchy-feely outings are not one-offs but a core part of their public personae, all about transforming them into the first senior members of the royal family who are viewed as genuinely human and who are in touch with the real world; who have done more than just spy the hoi polloi when peering out at the world through the window of a golden carriage. (They have one of those of course, but it’s terribly unwieldy for the school run.)

But for all the H&M dresses Kate wears, they are not a normal middle-class family, no matter how many Audi station wagons they add to their fleet and how many times young Prince George is taught how to use the self-checkout at Waitrose.

The duke and duchess can take vast swathes of time off whenever they fancy because they have complete control over their schedules, aside from key events like Trooping the Color and Remembrance Day, meaning they can spend a week on the beach, even if it is in the Cornish Isles of Scilly, rather than at their 19th century mahogany desks whenever the mood strikes.

Nor do they have, as the vast majority of the world does, have a very finite amount of leave to be carefully husbanded and can instead beetle off for some more quality time in famille, Harrods buckets and spades in tow, whenever they fancy.

But, it’s time for the Cambridges to give up this royal perk. They can’t have their nearly one hundred days of holiday per year and still go about trying to sell themselves as the Duke and Duchess of Relatability.

Every time William and Kate accidentally remind the world just how fundamentally not normal their lives are it jeopardises all the work they do the rest of the year to sell themselves as the approachable faces of the modern royal family.

There is also the fact that this pesky bad habit also serves to revive the Lazy Kate narrative that haunted her for years. Prior to their wedding, in 2008, the Daily Mail reported that the Queen thought Kate needed to get a job.

“The Queen has admitted she has no idea what Kate actually does,” a senior aide said at the time and that Her Majesty is “of the opinion that Kate should be working. She believes in a modern Monarchy and feels very strongly that the Royals should be leading by example.”

A source close to Kate said back then, “Mostly she just waits for William to come home so that they can go on another holiday.” (Ouch.)

Then there is the fact that the duo only began full-time royal duties in 2017. Diana, Princess of Wales, by contrast, was chucked in the deep end and shunted off to charm the masses in regional town centers before she had even gotten all the wedding confetti out of her hair.

What anyone worth their Walter Bagehot knows is that the British monarchy, in the coming years, is in for its greatest test since Oliver Cromwell started getting ideas. The next king is a man who garners tepid, at best, support, at a time when the royal house has suffered a series of body blows in recent years it has yet to recover from, thanks to Prince Andrew’s horrifying behavior and the seismic eruptions of Harry and Meghan, Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

Things for the Crown are not exactly looking tickety-boo, hence why so much is resting on William and Kate.

And yet, they seem willing to gamble all the gains they have made to take time off from their duties with the sort of enthusiasm that Margraret probably reserved for the arrival of every new 20-something barman at her favorite Mustique watering hole.

Of course the duke and duchess should get a holiday and of course they should not have to apply for leave from their manager (though the image of the 96-year-old Queen spending part of her day green lighting holiday requests from HRHs is fun) . But those crazy kids have to find some sort of middle ground between the extreme privilege of royalty and the image of them as hardworking, ordinary parents who just happen to have the keys to the Tower of London. (Yes, I know, they don’t actually have them but they could certainly get their hands on them they couldn’t they?)

It’s time for William and Kate to channel less Princess Margaret and more Princess Anne. And when it comes to the Princess Royal, the swimsuit industry’s loss has only been the monarchy’s gain …

Daniela Elser is a royal expert and a writer with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.

Tags America, Anne, annual summer holiday, Asia, Australia, Australia and New Zealand, body blows, Cambridge Group PLC, century mahogany desks, charity polo, Charles, church services, City of Birmingham, climate change, Daily Mail, Diana, Duchess of Cambridge, Duke of York, Europe, extreme privilege, forbidding gray stone, France, george, gothic horror story, harry and meghan, hedgerow preservation, holiday castle, holiday homes, holiday problem, House of Windsor, infinite amount, involved watching tennis, Jordan, katherine, leading media titles, luxury perk, margaret, middle-class family, modern royal family, month-long annual summer, mood strike, norfolk, normal parents, North America, Northern America, Northern Europe, occasional barnstorming speech, Oceania, official engagements, Oliver Cromwell, parenting podcast, pressing issues, Prince Andrew, Prince of Wales, Princess of Wales, PrincessRoyal, quality time, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, real world, regal elbow grease, regional town centers, Royal Box, royal family, royal house, royal perk, royal tradition, Scotland, senior members, ski holiday, station wagon, swimwear industry, times young, Union Jack, United Kingdom, United States of America, vast swathes, Virginia, water hole, wedding confetti, Western Asia, Western Europe, William and Kate

Sports

‘Hold Hasim Rahman Jr. liable’: Jake Paul blasts rival as grudge match canceled

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on ‘Hold Hasim Rahman Jr. liable’: Jake Paul blasts rival as grudge match canceled

Jake Paul’s has savaged Hasim Rahman Jr. after the fight was called off at the last minute.

The YouTube star was due to fight at Madison Square Garden next weekend but a statement released on Saturday night slammed Rahman for apparently moving the goalposts, The Sun reported.

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A statement from Most Valuable Promotions said Rahman’s team tried to change the fight weight from 200lbs to 215lbs.

And it read: “The boxing community must hold Hasim Rahman Jr liable for his lack of professionalism.”

Rahman and his team are said to have offered assurances that he was on track to make 200lbs at the weigh-in on Friday.

Paul claimed Rahman’s team went “as far as to provide a letter signed by a recognized nutritionist that his weight cut was progressing without issue”.

But in the last 48 hours, Rahman had lost less than one pound and the New York State Athletic Commission said it wouldn’t sanction the fight for less than 205 pounds.

Paul’s team claim they were prepared to raise the weight to 200 pounds, but say Rahman indicated he would come in at 215 pounds.

“Upon receiving this new contract Saturday morning, Rahman’s camp indicated for the very first time that he planned to weigh 215lbs. at the official weigh-in and would not agree to

weigh-in at 205 pounds and reporting Most Valuable Promotions that they are pulling out of the fight unless the fight was agreed to at 215 pounds,” the statement read.

“MVP and Jake Paul will not reward someone that has conducted themselves in such a deceiving and calculated manner.

“Therefore, MVP is left with no choice but to cancel the August 6th event. This forced outcome impacts Jake Paul, Amanda Serrano and every other fighter on this card who have trained tirelessly over the past few months for this event.

“The boxing community must hold Hasim Rahman Jr. liable for his lack of professionalism.”

And drastic action was taken with the fight axed and refunds offered to ticket holders and PPV buyers.

Paul was due to fight British reality star and boxer Tommy Fury.

But Fury ran into visa issues and couldn’t fight the YouTuber at Madison Square Garden.

Paul had been sparring with former world champ Chad Dawson in build up to the fight.

He was set for one of the toughest fights of his young boxing career.

This was due to be the sixth professional fight for the younger Paul brother and he is undefeated so far.

This story first appeared in The Sun and was republished with permission.

Australia

Queensland gardening guru Tom Wyatt hangs up his headphones after 40 years on air

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on Queensland gardening guru Tom Wyatt hangs up his headphones after 40 years on air

From “give it a cup of urine” to “how to sex up your pumpkins”, Tom Wyatt’s practical and sometimes cheeky advice has won him legions of fans across regional Queensland.

But after 40 years of gardening talkback on ABC Local Radio, the 75-year-old gardening guru has hung up his headphones due to health issues.

Mr Wyatt puts his success down to being curious, having a retentive memory and having “a specialized interest in what happens to gardeners when they get frustrated.”

Tom Wyatt, with headphones half on, talks into a microphone in a radio studio — People from across Queensland called in to let Mr Wyatt know the impact he’d had over 40 years.(ABC Capricorn: Rachel McGhee)

“I’m so happy this has brought so much pleasure to people and solved so many problems,” he added.

Mr Wyatt’s familiar advice has often boiled down to Condy’s Crystals, a good dressing of gypsum, blood and bone delivered by one clenched handful to the square metre, lux flakes and “don’t forget the wetting agent”.

His encyclopedic gardening knowledge and unique on-air style had loyal listeners tuning in from across the state every Friday morning at 10am.

in the beginning

The program began in 1982 after ABC staff in Rockhampton bounced around the idea of a 10-minute gardening program.

Tom Wyatt’s name was tossed around as he was a horticulturalist working for the Rockhampton Council as director of parks and gardens and curator of the Rockhampton Botanical Gardens.

“He seemed the right choice,” said David Anderson, a radio presenter for the station for more than 30 years.

And they were right.

“It just blew up,” Mr Anderson said.

A group of people with Tom Wyatt in the center holding an award. — Tom’s last broadcast was an emotional one, but his family and colleagues celebrated afterwards.(ABC Capricorn: Rachel McGhee)

The program was lengthened to half an hour, and it wasn’t long before it was extended again to the full hour at the request of listeners.

The program was soon networked to Mackay, Bundaberg, Longreach and Mount Isa – more than half the state.

“Tom has such a wealth of knowledge and he’s such an interesting person to talk with – he doesn’t talk at people, but he has a conversational style,” Mr Anderson said.

“There were so many times when people would simply ring up and say, ‘Oh, I wanted to congratulate Tom on such and such an idea that he gave me because it worked,'” he said.

Mr Wyatt credits Mr Anderson with the program’s success.

“David coaxed me all the way, so I owe my debt to David Anderson for developing the program,” Mr Wyatt said.

having a laugh

It would be difficult to name all the presenters Mr Wyatt has worked with over the years, but one who stands out is Craig Zonca.

Mr Zonca, who now presents Breakfast on ABC Brisbane, took on the role as a fresh-faced 21-year-old with no clue about gardening.

But the two struck up a special rapport.

“We changed the tempo of it a bit and made people laugh,” Mr Wyatt said.

Sometimes it was the other way around.

Tom Wyatt stands at the top of stairs at ABC Capricornia, a sandstone building — Tom has walked up these stairs at ABC Capricornia almost every Friday for 40 years to host his talkback program.(Supplied: Donna Thurecht)

Pat from Mount Isa recalls phoning in about her husband’s problem pumpkins.

“Tom asked, ‘Did John propagate them with a cotton bud?’

“I forgot I was on the radio all over north Queensland and said, ‘Yes. He’s sexing the pumpkins every morning’.

“Tom and Craig Zonca couldn’t stop laughing,” Pat said.

Traveling far and wide

Family sits together in radio studio — Tom Wyatt’s family came to his last broadcast and say they are so proud of what he’s achieved. (ABC Capricorn: Rachel McGhee)

Mr Wyatt’s popularity has seen him invited to gardening clubs, expos and agricultural shows all over Queensland – and he has never said no.

Long-time listener Margaret Pegler from Trinidad Station near Quilpie opened her gardens to the public and invited Mr Wyatt four times.

“He was always very popular and if he couldn’t answer a question at the time, he would find out and get back to you,” Mrs Pegler said.

“I have helped a terrific number of people with their gardens, and I know they have helped me a lot.”

Beautifying the Beef Capital and beyond

People who have worked with Mr Wyatt describe him as a visionary.

“You can see Tom’s touches wherever you look,” said Rockhampton councillor Cherie Rutherford, who was given her first job in council by Mr Wyatt.

The chimpanzee enclosure, a jewel in the Rockhampton Zoo’s crown, is one of those.

Cassius the chimp goes to kiss Tom Wyatt's hand through the glass — Tom Wyatt and Jim Webber saved Cassius the chimpanzee from death row. (ABC Capricorn: Inga Stunzner)

Mr Wyatt and Rockhampton’s eldest at the time, Jim Webber, drove through the night to save two chimpanzees from death row, breaking a few rules along the way.

“We did a lot of things we weren’t supposed to, but it worked well,” Mr Webber said.

And in this case, it did. Cassius, who turns 51 later this year, is now the oldest chimpanzee in Australasia.

Mr Wyatt also transformed Rockhampton from a dust bowl to a green city, converting an old rubbish dump into Kershaw Gardens — 50 hectares of parkland.

“The city wouldn’t be the green area that it is today if it wasn’t for Tom,” Mr Webber said.

A man sits in a paved area with trees. — Tom Wyatt designed the Stuart Fragrant Garden, a sensory experience for people with disabilities.(ABC Capricorn: Inga Stunzner)

It wasn’t just Rockhampton that benefited from Mr Wyatt, but towns around the state, I added.

“He would go anywhere anybody wanted him to go and he was always advising people on the talkback radio.”

Although the contribution Mr Wyatt has made to regional Queensland is immeasurable, ABC Capricornia presented him with an award for his 40 years of service.

Tags bugs, Craig Zonca, gardening talkback, gardening tips, greenlife, horticulture, insect, nature, nursery, plantlife, plants, rockhampton, Tom Wyatt

Nancy Pelosi confirms Asia trip but does not mention Taiwan | US foreign policy

Post author By mangakiko
Post date July 31, 2022
No Comments on Nancy Pelosi confirms Asia trip but does not mention Taiwan | US foreign policy