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Catherine Liddle is the CEO of SNAICC, the national body that represents Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and their families.

Every year, Catherine and her team document how First Nations children are faring, and how they’re treated. And yet again, the picture is devastating.

Catherine’s report shows that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are more likely to be reported to authorities, they’re more likely to be taken away from their families and they spend more time institutionalised.

For every dollar the government spends on this, only 16 cents goes to helping families – the rest is on taking children away, causing enormous harm.

Today, SNAICC CEO Catherine Liddle on the damage the child protection system is doing to First Nations children – and what needs to be done to break the cycle.

This week, devastating figures were released that show the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in out-of-home care.

It’s damning evidence that not enough has changed since the Stolen Generations. 

Last year, we published a story about the long shadow cast by a policy of child removal, centred on the notorious Kinchela Boys Home in NSW.

It’s a place that holds painful memories for the many survivors of the Stolen Generations who went through its doors. Hundreds of of Indigenous boys were sent there, and subjected to torture, abuse and reprogramming, in order to assimilate them into white society.

Now, the survivors and their families want to take ownership of the site, to make it a place of healing for future generations.

Today, Gunaikurnai and Wotjobaluk writer and contributor to The Saturday Paper Ben Abbatangelo, on the enduring legacy of the Kinchela Boys Home. 

This episode was originally published in October 2024.

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This week, Labor rolled out its flagship social media ban for under-16s. The reform was expected to be one last win for the government after a year of political victories.

But while the spotlight was on the minister leading the charge, it was for all the wrong reasons. Instead of having runway to promote the ban, Anika Wells spent the week defending her use of taxpayer-funded expense entitlements.

Today, former political advisor to two prime ministers, Sean Kelly, on how even a tightly planned policy launch can be knocked off course, and the unquenchable thirst to apply the pub test to some and not others. 

Condoms and other contraceptives are set to become more expensive in China, as the Communist Party tries to boost population growth. 

With the economy slowing, birth rates declining and the population ageing, the government is now trying all kinds of ways to make women have more babies – from taxing contraception, to new laws on marriages, to cash bonuses and propaganda campaigns.

Reproduction is now seen as a national security issue, and the success or failure of the new policies will have far-reaching consequences – for China’s economic and military strength, and for countries like Australia, who rely on China continuing to grow.

Today, senior analyst at the Mercator Institute for China Studies, Daria Impiombato – on the threat to women’s autonomy in China’s new phase of population control.

Over the past week, Labor Minister Anika Wells has become the face of a new debate over politicians' perks.

Revelations about a near-$100,000 trip to New York to talk up Australia’s teen social media ban at the UN, followed by reports of taxpayer-funded family travel to grand finals, ski fields and overseas sporting events, have seen her refer three-and-a-half years of expenses to the parliamentary watchdog.

The prime minister insists her claims are “within the rules”, but the backlash – and even more questions over the spending of MPs from all parties – has opened up a bigger argument about whether the rules are fair, and whether they match public expectations in a cost-of-living crisis.

Today, press gallery journalist Karen Middleton, on parliamentary entitlements – and whether this scandal will force change.