While parcel postage may not seem like a popular late-night activity, in the race to win e-commerce businesses in the on-demand economy, timing is everything.

"It’s all about convenience and it’s all about choice. We've been testing our drop-off locations and have seen amazing traction with the 24/7 ones at BP," Sendle founder James Chin Moody says.

The delivery challenger raised a fresh $20 million in January to "set our sights bigger" and now Sendle wants to have more parcel drop-off sites than Australia Post's post office network by 2020.

"We are all about choice in a market where there hadn't been any choice before," Chin Moody says.

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Roll out begins

The company has been targeting new business customers through the expansion of delivery sites which it has expanded in a partnership with logistics company Hubbed.

The startup says it now has 600 places across Australia where business customers can drop orders at all hours of the day and night for delivery.

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Sendle says it will have 1,000 sites active in a few months' time. It still has thousands more sites to rollout before it beats Australia Post, though: the national post carrier has 4,356 post offices, according to its 2018 annual report.

Australia Post also has more than 350 parcel lockers available 24/7 and in 2018 highlighted a $1.2 billion investment in its post office network, which helps deliver 1.3 million parcels a day.

An Australia Post spokesperson said its business customers received services like flexible returns and parcel pickups in metro areas for up to 50 parcels at a time.

"We continue to invest in new innovative ways to help our customers access their deliveries faster, including through our fulfilment start-up service Fulfilio," the spokesperson said.

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Fulfilio is another option aimed at processing parcel orders as fast as possible, allowing businesses to sign up to have their stock stored in warehouses connected to Australia Post.

While Sendle seeks to grow its drop-off network by thousands, other on-demand drop off options are also turning their minds to out-of-hours. Officeworks offers its Mailman drop-off service for business clients, while CouriersPlease says it has 750 delivery points across Australia, including 24/7 options at 7-Eleven stores.

Chin Moody says Sendle's competitive advantage is clear: while many larger businesses may use traditional parcel delivery, smaller operators want national flat postage rates and delivery points open when they want them, as close by as possible.

"Parcel delivery is becoming a key differentiator."

"Just pop down"

Vikki Guerreiro has avoided using traditional post in favour of challengers like Sendle because of the appeal of not having to wait to organise parcel delivery.

"It was something that was just simple where I could do it at my own convenience…and just having it all ready to just pop down to the local newsagency," she says.

The co-founder of Portuguese products business The Canned Company has small order volumes at the moment, with the company turning over around $20,000.

At this stage taking orders to a single drop-off point suits the business best given it's easier to drop parcels than spending money waiting for courier pickups.

"If we do bigger amounts, it’s obviously going to change a few things," Guerreiro says.

For smaller parcel volumes, challengers are providing a more affordable deal than the traditional options, she believes.

"We factor in price a lot, because it takes it away from the [margin] on actual goods."

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It is the saddest thing in sport – the one-time champion who loses his way once the carnival is over, the cheering stops, and there is no longer a clear direction by which to steer his life. (And yes, it is mostly a male phenomenon.) Without the pressing need to win the game next weekend and the premiership at the end of the season, where do you go, what do you do?

What makes the situation of Greg Inglis so troubling however – the news broke yesterday that he has been admitted to a Sydney rehab clinic – is that it has all happened so quickly. Less than a year ago he was named as Australian captain, just before being arrested on a bad drink-driving charge. By all accounts, his life was already a little off the rails at that time, and has rapidly spiralled since. There is only one upside. At least what has happened to him is at a time when the stigma of mental health is gone. At least it is at a time when we know that just as people get successful treatments for muscle tears, so, too, are there treatments for mental tears and it is fine to be equally open about both scenarios.

There are, however, a few more questions to be asked. Do the professional codes do enough to prepare all their players for life after football? Do they have a duty of care to do so, and is it sufficiently observed? Inglis is one of the most famous players in the game and will be looked after – the NRL knows we are watching – but what of all the other players, more anonymous than a wrong number, once their days are done?

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We all hear stories from time to time on how badly they struggle, including in the rugby union ranks, and perhaps there could be a cross-code compact to look at ways their athletes could learn skills beyond the football field. For every Paul Vautin and Matty Johns who move effortlessly into the media world, for every Phil Gould and Craig Bellamy who make it as coaches, there are hundreds for whom no such avenues open up. I say there is a duty of care, and it must start before they retire. Over to you, Peter Beattie, Cameron Clyne, et al.

Peak sport

The what?
Click Here: The Cricket World Cup starts on Thursday? Gee, I wish we’d been told. And they could have mentioned that the climax of the US PGA – one of golf’s majors – was held last weekend, too. But just as the PGA seemed to pass by substantially without comment these days, so, too, has much of the build-up to the World Cup. Oh yes, and they played the final of the FA Cup last Saturday night, too. And the finals of our own A-League. You didn’t know?

Twenty or thirty years ago, it seems to me, there would be a countdown to such major events, with the punters literally whittling down the days. These days, the hardcore might still be doing exactly that – you qualify as “hardcore” if you know Australia’s first game of the Cricket World Cup is on June 1 against Afghanistan in Bristol – but the more common thing is even big events just seems to creep up on you, and some right by without you even knowing. In the cricket, even with Steve Smith and David Warner making their returns after year-long suspensions for the sandpaper affair, there seems to be little hoopla, and comment around the traps.

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Why is it so? I think it is because a couple of decades ago, such events were peaks in the world of sport, and we had to travel through the valleys – usually long and empty ones – to get to them.
But right now the world of pay television, for starters, means we are spoiled for choice. What is more, thanks to YouTube and websites displaying content, we can watch them on our phones, our tablets, our wristwatches whenever we want, even while in faraway corners of the world every second of the day, and can simply skip from one peak to the next. Time and again on Twitter I notice that the top trends are overseas sporting events that no Australian team, or individual, has any involvement in, and they’re often small peaks – US basketball games and English soccer games – rather than large ones.

What a contrast with the way it was. When the Australian basketball great Andrew Gaze was growing up in Melbourne, he loved the first Wednesday of every month, because that was the day a particular basketball magazine arrived at the Gaze household, which he would devour for news of the NBA. These days, everyone interested can watch every NBA playoff game, every EPL game they’re interested in, in real time.

What does it all mean?

Beyond the fact we skip from peak to peak to peak in the international sporting world, it probably makes the specifically Australian sporting peaks feel lower, yes? And with there being only so many hours in a week that Australians can watch sport, does it not mean less eyeballs on just Australian sport than ever, less passion, less turnstiles swinging here at home in the long haul? Does that help explain the generally lower numbers for the cricket ratings, attendances at rugby league, rugby union and soccer matches?

And yes the AFL is the exception, but that is always the case, and we all know the reason why. Berko AFL followers put something in the milk of their children when babies, which makes them berko AFL followers for life, too, and the globalisation of sport has made barely a scratch on that.

Modest start worth it

And the hell with it, this US basketball yarn also caught my attention – the very attention, to reprise a theme, I might have applied to the build-up of the cricket World Cup.

See, last week the 38-year-old Utah Jazz player Kyle Korver gave a commencement speech at his Omaha alma mater, Creighton University, reflecting on his own less-than-glamorous beginnings in the professional league, way back in 2003. “The 51st pick, to the New Jersey Nets,” he mused. “I found out shortly afterwards that I had been traded to Philly. I’m not sure if traded is the right word. I was more or less sold for an undisclosed amount of money. I later found out (the Nets) used that money to pay for the entry fee for their summer league team, and with the leftover money, they bought a copy machine.”

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And he was serious. “But it’s OK,” he followed up. “Because a couple of years ago, that copy machine broke. And I’m still playing.”

Yup. Sixteen years on, he is still going and is about $80 million to the good, was an All-Star in 2015, and twice made it to the NBA Finals. He is fourth on the list of all-time shooters for three-pointers, with 2351 to his credit.

Team of the week

Cooper Cronk. Announced his retirement at the end of this season.

Brooks Koepka. Won the PGA Championship, his fourth major. Odd then, that you and I have barely heard of him. Has he risen without trace, or is it a reflection of the fact that you and I only really get into it when it is the Masters, British Open or US Open.

Tiger Woods. After winning the Masters in his last time at bat, missed the cut at the PGA Championship.

Tolu Latu. Stood down by the Waratahs on drink-driving charge. Presumably, according to one former Waratah, he will also be eventually heading for hell. (Think “drunks, adulterers, gays,” etc etc.)

Sydney FC. Champions for the fourth time. I know, it is really only we football nutters that know about it. The news seemed to barely penetrate beyond football circles.

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Kevin Muscat. Stalwart of Melbourne Victory as captain and coach leaving the team.

Geoff Stooke OAM. After more than 900 games of rugby, including 700 for Associates in Perth, the former chairman of RugbyWA and director of the ARU is hanging up his boots at the ripe old age of 71. Well played, Geoff.

What they said

Aaron Finch on having Ricky Ponting around the Australian team: “Everyone wants to impress Punter, you should see them – it’s like eight-year-old girls around Justin Bieber when Punter’s around the change room.”

Three-time world Formula One champion Niki Lauda to TFF in 1992, on his near-death experience back in 1976 when engulfed in a fiery inferno: “It was like falling into a big hole, and I just wanted to let go, to be sucked into this hole and just let go, let go. It was so nice. It was only when I realised this was what dying was that I shook it off and tried to wake up.” Lauda died this week aged 70.

Ian Darling, director of Adam Goodes doco The Final Quarter: “When you see the three years unfolding, we can now see this is what racism looks like and what it sounds like. And from the Indigenous perspective, this is what it feels like … One of our greatest footballers, who happened to be Indigenous and a proud Australian of the Year, was literally booed out of the game.” It’s being launched on June 7.

Peter Beattie on the Jack de Belin verdict, which vindicated the policy he championed to stand down players charged with serious crimes: “This is not a time for celebration, this is a time for us to move on.”

Orlando’s Seth Curry sledging his brother Steph Curry in the NBA play-offs while Curry the Elder was trying to make free throws: “I said ‘That’s 70 in a row’. I was trying to get in his head and jinx him. He looked over at me and said, ‘OK, now it’s gonna be 72’.” He should have tried the line Michael Voss of the Brisbane Lions used when his own younger brother Brett was lining up a critical goal for St Kilda: “My dad’s slept with your mum.” Brett missed.

Wayne Bennett on James Maloney and Nathan Cleary: “I’ll say what no one else wants to say, they cannot pick the halfback and five-eighth from last year.”

Victorious Sydney FC coach Steve Corica channelling Frank Sinatra: “I obviously believe in myself. I did it my way. I can only do it that way. All I can say is, I did it my way . . .” He did it his way.

Ian Botham dismisses the very idea the Aussie bowlers weren’t aware of #Sandpapergate: “As a bowler you know everything about the ball and what shape it is in. There is not a chance in the world that the bowlers in that team wouldn’t have known there had been sandpaper rubbed on that ball.”

David Pfieffer believes he has found the perfect partner for Kingsford-Smith Cup hopeful I Am Excited in Blake Shinn.

The partnership has only been together on five occasions for three wins and a second, which Shinn still finds hard to fathom two years on. For Pfieffer, it was the final part of a journey to make his I Am Invincible mare his first group 1 winner.

“Blake just suits her. I have had other jockeys on her that have her too close and don’t trust her,” Pfieffer said. “Every time Blake is on her, he gets her in  the right spot and we have seen the results.

“In the Victory Stakes last time, I so confident a long way from home, even though she was back in the field, because I could see Blake had her going sweetly. She travels better for him than anyone else. That’s what you get when you have a really top jockey.”

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I Am Excited appreciated the pressure in the Victory Stakes and charged over the top of dual Everest winner Redzel for her biggest win. Another success on Saturday at Eagle Farm would have the explosive mare in Everest considerations herself.

Shinn knows there there is only one way to ride I Am Excited: let her find her feet and have her ready to hit her top in the straight. It is the reason Pfieffer didn’t run in the Doomben 10,000.

“She needs that little bit of time to get going, and the tight track wouldn’t suit her,” Pfieffer said. “We decided before we came up here that she would only run at Eagle Farm, and this is the race we targeted.”

Shinn was impressed the first time he rode I Am Excited in trackwork and still finds it hard to work out how Jorda beat her down the Flemington straight during the 2017 Melbourne Cup carnival.

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“She has group 1 acceleration,” Shinn said. “I rode her work before that race and thought she was special. I still can’t work out how she got beaten that day.

“The most important thing with her is you can’t use her early in the race because she loses her acceleration, which is her biggest weapon, along with the ability to hold a long sprint.”

Shinn admits the capacity field in the Kingsford-Smith Cup could pose problems for I Am Excited given her racing style.

“I know where I’m going to be, so traffic is always a concern,” Shinn said. "She just need to get a run at the right time to let rip."

I Am Excited is one of three horses under double-figures quotes in the open group 1 at $9.  Godolphin sprinter Trekking is the $6.50 favourite and Doomben 10,000 winner The Bostonian is at $8.

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Saturday's Andrew Ramsden Stakes at Flemington is a strategic manoeuvre to get Anzacs back into the Melbourne Cup in place of foreign raiders, while Outback Barbie, with owners wide of Dingo in North Queensland, will take on the might of Godolphin in the Kingsford-Smith Cup at Eagle Farm.

Perhaps Surprise Baby, one of the top contenders in the Ramsden, is New Zealand bred, but has a strong local influence being by Shocking, a Melbourne Cup winner, and trained by Paul Preusker at Horsham in Victoria, but Eastender, a $22,000 yearling from Tasmania, is true blue in the Aussie, and not Godolphin, sense.

The Ramsden this year is a $400,000 weight-for-age test run over 2800m and restricted to three, four and five-year-old stayers. The winner qualifies for the Big One, which has become more of an international race with the local influence diminishing.

Yes, seven acceptors were bred in the northern hemisphere, but they are prepared here and not the fly-in-without-racing-prior category that has played a major, if negative, role in recent years.

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The upside with Surprise Baby, a four-year-old, is that from his seven starts he has notched four wins, including the 3200m Adelaide Cup on March 11.

At his first start for seven weeks recently Surprise Baby, handled by Dean Holland, was beaten under a half-length humping 60kg by Steel Prince (54kg), a rival today. However the gelding struck severe interference from a fallen horse. Holland is a flag waver regarding his potential.

“He’ll stay 3200m but he’ll quicken up at the 800 like a 1200m horse,” the jockey commented. “You don’t get stayers like that, and that’s why I think he’s something special.”

Surprise Baby has drawn 18 and the Irish-bred Steel Prince launches from three under Damian Oliver. With Eastender coming from nine with  Craig Newitt aboard, a battle of tactics in the early stages is ensured in what promises to be a gripping contest.

Newitt is tipping improvement from Eastender on his last start mainland effort.

“When I saw him in the mounting yard, he had sweated up badly, which he doesn’t normally do and it will be interesting to see how he parades this week,” Newitt explained.

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“He carried on going to the gates and raced the first half with his mouth open, which he never does, so he might not have travelled over that well last time.”

Of course Cross Counter, Godolphin’s northern hemisphere four-year-old, proved too good under only 51kg, regarded by some as a gift assessment, in the Melbourne Cup last year.

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum’s blue army has three strong chances –Trekking, Home Of The Brave and Encryption – in a very competitive Kingsford-Smith Cup in which Outback Barbie brings  a genuine home-grown flavour.

The filly is owned by Allan and Jennifer Acton of Wilpeena, a property near Dingo (population 100), 250km west of Rockhampton.

According to Jennifer, Outback Barbie honours the bygone generation of Wilpeena women who did so well in testing conditions for over a century.

“Outback Barbie’s determination is much similar to those women,” she declared on ABC News Radio’s Hoof On the Till.

The Barbie title came from seeing her granddaughter in a pink Akubra heading for a camp draft. Now they take Barbie dolls to the races for good luck.

A three-year-old filly, Outback Barbie should have ended closer when downed less than two lengths in the 1200m Doomben 10,000 last start.

Alas, she drew 16 today, but negatives don’t deter Jennifer Acton, who will make the trip by car and aircraft to Eagle Farm.

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The Stradbroke looks a better target for Barbie Doll, and I can’t get her in front of The Bostonian, Trekking and I Am Excited, but the Kingsford-Smith is a demanding sprint where positive navigation, not luck in running, will win the day.

And Jennifer figures attributes of Outback Barbie, epitomised by our country and western warbler, Lee Kernaghan, will take her a long way: “Don’t back down and don’t give up."

Theresa May has announced her resignation after failing to sell her Brexit plan to Parliament, the nation, or even her own party.

She is the second successive Conservative leader brought down by her party's deep divisions over Europe.

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In a speech outside Downing Street on Friday, the British Prime Minister said she left with "deep regret" at having failed to deliver Brexit, but "no ill will and enormous and enduring gratitude" for the honour of serving in the job.

Her voice cracking with emotion at the end of her speech, May said she had been "the second female prime minister but certainly not the last".

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And May called for a spirit of compromise in politics, warning that her successor would have to find the consensus on Brexit that had eluded her.

Her resignation will take effect on 7 June, but she will serve as acting Prime Minister until her successor is chosen.

May had been trying to hang on to give her Brexit plan one more vote in the House of Commons, where it has been defeated three times already, in early June.

But it had become increasingly clear the plan does not have the support of much of her own party or the opposition.

It is unclear if the choice of date means she will be given that last chance.

Former foreign secretary Boris Johnson is now the favourite to win his party’s leadership, in a process expected to culminate in a vote of Conservative party members in July.

However the Tories have a habit of not giving the job to the favourite, and there is a crowded field of contenders.

After the speech, colleagues praised her dignified exit.

Johnson said: "Thank you for your stoical service to our country and the Conservative Party. It is now time to follow her urgings: to come together and deliver Brexit."

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Another potential leadership candidate Michael Gove said the Prime Minister "deserves our respect and gratitude".

Her chief of staff Gavin Barwell said he had "seen at first-hand her commitment to public service and her incredible resilience as she has confronted the biggest challenge any British government has faced since the Second World War."

But May has not proven a success at the ballot box. At her first general election in 2017 the government lost its majority and had to limp on with the support of the Northern Irish DUP – which proved a major factor in the problem of delivering a compromise Brexit.

In recent council elections more than 1300 Tory councillors lost their seats.

And in the country's European Parliament elections, which took place on Thursday but whose results will not be known until Sunday, the Conservatives were expected to be deserted in droves by voters flocking to Nigel Farage's Brexit Party.

The choice of departure date means May is assured of outlasting Gordon Brown to claim the title of only the fourth shortest-serving post-war prime minister.

May's successor has until October 31 – the current Brexit deadline – to come up with a new plan.

The European Union has indicated its refusal to reopen the divorce deal that was signed late last year with May, governing the terms of the UK's departure from the EU and including the controversial Irish "backstop".

However it has said it would consider reopening the "political declaration" accompanying the deal, which sets out the aims and parameters of the UK's future trade and customs relationship with Europe.

The Labour opposition is likely to push for a general election, challenging any new leader's legitimacy and mandate.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said: "“The Prime Minister is right to have resigned. She has now accepted what the country has known for months: she cannot govern, and nor can her divided and disintegrating party."

And the DUP will have a strong voice in the government's future, as they would renegotiate their deal with the next Conservative leader to deliver a majority in Parliament.

The chief executive of multibillion-dollar Silicon Valley startup Twilio has his eye on growing the number of Australian businesses using his technology so they can talk to customers no matter which app they use.

"We are in the middle of a great communications renaissance… there’s certain people you Facetime with, with other people you call. You name it, there are so many ways we communicate with each other now," Jeff Lawson says.

The $US17 billion ($24.71 billion) cloud communications business lets developers build tools for sending SMS, voice messages and emails to company clients. It recorded $US650 million ($944 million) in revenue globally last year and after opening Sydney and Melbourne offices in 2018, the Nasdaq-listed company says Australia is a key growth market.

"We saw so many that were building amazing companies here. We see innovative companies, [in] the startup sense and the incumbents."

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Twilio says it now has thousands of Australian businesses on board, including working with tech darling Atlassian and pizza operation Domino's. The traction has seen it grow from "a handful" of local staff to dozens in the last year, Lawson says.

Trust and blocking 'bad actors'

Twilio's pitch to local businesses is the ability to build personalised messages to customers so they hit the right platform, whether that's a well-timed email about a deal or a text message or automatic voice call to resolve a dispute.

The company promises to make it as easy as possible for developers to build functions so businesses can send widespread communications quickly. The challenge is stopping malicious actors from using the technology to send spam or scamming messages.

"One of our goals has always been to remove friction. With that also comes the risk that bad actors are attracted," Lawson says.

The cloud has well and truly taken hold among Australian businesses, with an expected $16 billion set to be spent on enterprise software and products this year, Gartner predicts.

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At the same time, cyber crime costs are jumping and the prevalence of businesses being hit by scam emails is on the rise.

The first 12 months of Australia's notifiable data breaches scheme, which requires businesses to tell customers when they are hacked, revealed phishing attacks were "the most common and highly effective" method of compromising a company's security.

Twilio says it is doubling down on cybersecurity and a top priority is developing methods to "make sure our technology is using it for good", including tracking use of the platform to stop it being used for spam.

"[It's] preventing bots, and preventing account takeovers. Also measuring the effectiveness of communications and preventing people from using communications for things that are bad," Lawson says.

In 2018, Twilio bought email platform Sendgrid for $US2 billion ($2.9 billion). The platform processes around 50 billion emails a month and in a blog post in April it explained how it had used machine learning to block abusive email and phishing content.

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The security question is a top priority in the quest to expand Twilio's user base, given business customers only use products where they can be guaranteed of secure communications, Lawson says.

"Information security is a very big area of investment. If you think about it, communications is at the centre of building trust."

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A state funeral for Australia's 23rd prime minister, Bob Hawke, will be held at the Sydney Opera House on Friday June 14.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said it was fitting that a "national icon and political giant" will have his life celebrated at an "iconic and beloved Australian venue".

"Bob was a man who understood Australia and the people who call our country home," Mr Morrison said.

Members of the public who wish to farewell Mr Hawke will be able to secure free tickets to the funeral from midday on Wednesday, May 29, from the Opera House's website.

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The funeral will be screened outside on the steps of the Opera House and will be televised on the ABC.

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Mr Hawke was 89 when he died last Thursday, just two days before the federal election.

An outpouring of grief from the public and both sides of politics dampened hostilities in the two days prior to polling day.

In an interview on the ABC's 7.30 program on Thursday, Mr Hawke's wife, Blanche d'Alpuget said her husband was at ease in his final days.

"He said to me, 'I can't make any further contribution. I've got no contribution to make now,'" Ms d'Alpuget said.

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Israel Folau is now certainly unemployed, most certainly not by choice. So what exactly should he do next?

The answer to that question must be framed by considering whether it’s actually unlawful for Rugby Australia to terminate Folau’s four year, multi-million dollar contract.

But before proposing what Folau should do next let me start by stating, unreservedly and not for the first time, that his method of evangelising via Instagram is abhorrent. It’s devoid of any sensitivity and emotional intelligence; and it’s incredibly dangerous and unbelievably reckless. Yet, I will nevertheless defend Folau’s right to express his religious beliefs.

Pulpitry via social media plainly isn’t and shouldn’t be a sackable offence. That isn’t a criticism of RA’s code of conduct tribunal because it was asked to determine if Folau had breached RA’s code of behaviour. The tribunal didn’t actually terminate Folau’s contract although it recommended it; RA did.

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Indeed, if one is to take seriously RA’s statement of its vision for an inclusive culture, set out in the preamble to its Inclusion Policy, it’s difficult to understand how Folau could end up persona non grata.

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On this "vision", RA’s policy states: Our vision can only be achieved if our game is one where every individual participant, whether players, officials, volunteers, supporters or administrators feel safe, welcome and included.

However loathsome and offensive some people consider the manifestation of Folau’s religious beliefs to be: isn’t it the case, that he too is one of those people RA promised to make feel safe, welcome and included?

Moreover, although the Bible can be interpreted to say that unrepenting drunks, homosexuals, adulterers, liars, fornicators, atheists and idolaters (and revilers, swindlers and the greedy) are destined for Hell, this isn’t exactly the message taught at your neighbourhood Catholic primary school circa 2019.

Without doubt, Folau’s espoused religious beliefs are wildly and permanently dislocated from the values held and cherished by most Australians. Yet it doesn’t follow that Folau, in resolutely maintaining his religious beliefs, should be subjected to the termination of his employment. Equally, it doesn’t neatly follow, that Folau and his actions are "homophobic".

Has anybody bothered to consider the possibility that Folau himself might be hopelessly conflicted and agonised between his own personal relationships with people who are LGBTIQ, and the tenets of his Pentecostal religion? Shouldn’t we pause to consider that whatever the dogmas of Folau’s faith might be, maybe he bears no hatred, fear or loathing of homosexuals or any of the other of the classes of people to which he refers? As heads is tails …

But back to this question: now RA has terminated Folau’s employment, exactly what can he do next? That’s a pertinent question, considering Folau is 30 years old; where he’s just lost his seven-figure income, in the only career he’s ever known; and where it appears he’s got a limited array of transferable skills.

Although classified as a termination of employment due to a high-level breach of RA’s code of conduct, it’s difficult and arguably artificial to distinguish between that high-level code of conduct breach being the reason; and Folau’s religion, religious beliefs and his expression of those religious beliefs.

And if you accept it’s arguable that Folau’s employment was terminated for the reason of his religion, religious beliefs and his genuine expression of those beliefs, then surely you can’t lose your job in Australia for that? RIGHT???

See, this is where it gets tricky. For the purpose of what I’ll say next, accept that both Folau and RA are "residents" of NSW; he was a RA employee; and that Folau’s Instagramming happened here too.
The Fair Work Act — itself a piece of Commonwealth, and not NSW legislation — applies to RA’s employment of Folau. Section 351(1) of the Act says an employer such as RA can’t take adverse action against an employee because of the person’s religion, EXCEPT WHERE the action is not unlawful under the anti-discrimination laws in force in the place where the action was taken.
Section 342 says that "adverse action" includes dismissing the employee.

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Now every state and territory in Australia, except NSW and South Australia, has enacted some form of laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of religion, beliefs and the like. Although the federal government — because Australia has ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – has the legislative power to prohibit discrimination on the basis of religion and religious beliefs, it hasn’t done so. If Folau had’ve been living in St Kilda and playing for the Melbourne Rebels, things may have been different.

So section 351 of the Act isn’t of any apparent use to Folau — the applicability of that provision is directly dependent on the existence of other laws, preventing religious discrimination in NSW. There are none. But, all isn’t lost … another section of the Fair Work Act might well assist.

One of the stated objectives of Part 6-4, Division 2 of the Fair Work Act is to give effect to International Labour Organisation Conventions 111 and 158, which were adopted in 1958 and 1982 respectively, then and ratified by Australia in 1973 and 1993.

The ILO is an agency of the United Nations. Under these two instruments of international law, Australia agreed that it would enact laws eliminating religious and other discrimination in employment AND that it would legislate so that employment can’t be terminated on invalid grounds, including because of an employee’s religion.

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According to the ILO, such religious discrimination includes discrimination based on a person’s expression of their religious beliefs.

Accordingly, section 772(1) of the Fair Work Act makes it unlawful (subject to some irrelevant exceptions) for an employer to terminate an employee’s employment because of, or for reasons including an employee’s religion. And if an employee’s religion includes a person’s expression of their religious beliefs — "believers" hardly worship in a vacuum — then was Folau terminated for reasons including his religion, or not?

If an employee’s employment is nonetheless terminated because of reasons including those which are statutorily unlawful under section 772(1), the employee has 21 days after the termination, to apply to the Fair Work Commission, asking it to deal with the matter.

Usually, the FWC deals with such matters by way of mediation or conciliation. Those methods of touchy-feely dispute resolution won’t cut the mustard though, in resolving the dispute to the satisfaction of either RA and Folau. So once the FWC agrees, the Act requires it to issue a certificate to that effect. Thereafter, Folau is free to take his unlawful termination case to the Federal Court of Australia.

Remember, we’re dealing with "unlawful" termination, not a guillotining which is merely unfair or harsh. Once unlawful termination is alleged, it’s up to RA to prove the termination wasn’t anything to do with any unlawful reason, or for reasons INCLUDING that unlawful reason.

And if RA can’t prove the termination had nothing at all to do with religion, then the Federal Court has the full jurisdiction to order that RA reinstate Folau; pay him full compensation; pay his (no doubt significant) legal bills; and pay a civil penalty of $50,000 or more.

It’s fair to say that an immense amount hinges on RA being able to absolutely delineate between it having terminated Folau’s employment because he breached RA’s applicable code of conduct by reason of expressing his religious beliefs; but NOT because of his religion, religious beliefs or the expression of those beliefs.

Moreover it’s a dangerous division to say that a professional athlete’s right to genuinely express their religious beliefs is mutually exclusive with his or her right to work.

The Labor leadership contest appears over, but the policy struggle has only just begun.

Anthony Albanese is emerging as the consensus option to take the party to the next election, given his standing as a former deputy leader and the man who almost gained the leadership in 2013.

There are enormous policy challenges ahead of the party after the election result last Saturday, which puts the Coalition on 51.4 per cent of the national vote and Labor on 48.6 per cent in two-party terms in the latest count.

Labor is yet to decide how much of this defeat was due to poor tactics and how much the result of bad policy, but Albanese and others are putting everything up for review.

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On climate, the intervention of environment spokesman Tony Burke suggests the party could step back from advocating any form of market-based mechanism to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

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Recent political history suggests that voters like renewable energy but are easily startled by economy-wide schemes that put a price on carbon.

The Coalition attacked Labor on the cost of its climate policies, while Labor relied on the help of activist group GetUp and others to mobilise on the ground to win marginal seats.

The result shows the help was not enough to neutralise the attacks. A policy rethink is inevitable.

Albanese is cautious on this issue. In an interview, he did not prejudge the outcome and said Labor would act on the science. He was not prescriptive about the policy mechanism used to do this.

The need to keep the peace within the Labor caucus means the elevation of Albanese without a leadership ballot can help the party recover.

Even so, the decision not to hold a leadership contest three years ago may have been a mistake. Former opposition leader Bill Shorten lost the election against Malcolm Turnbull so narrowly that Labor ended up doing a "victory lap" and Albanese chose not to put his hand up.

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Perhaps he should have. It is now clear that Labor needed a much bigger rethink of its policies and tactics after the 2016 election.

It may not have a leadership ballot this time, but will certainly need a long and thorough review of its policies and the way it conducted the campaign.

AMERICAN PSYCHO
Hayes Theatre, May 16
★★★★

Were the dog-eat-dog world of Wall Street a mathematical series, its logical conclusion would be American Psycho. Bret​ Easton Ellis's 1991 novel – among the most misunderstood in history – prophetically suggested that if greed, sexism, hedonism and narcissism go unchecked, they will spawn mutants incapable of empathy.

Ellis just chose to house his satirical social commentary in the darkest room in our imaginations.

Following Mary Harron's​ memorable 2000 film of the novel, this innovative stage musical emerged in 2013, penned by Roberto Aguirre-Sarcasa (book) and Duncan Sheik (music and lyrics).

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At a stroke it makes most musicals seem blunt-edged, aided by this startling production from director Alexander Berlage​, starring Benjamin Gerrard as the psychopathic Patrick Bateman.

The novel's straight-faced tone and graphic violence and sex was massaged into more obviously amusing satire in the film, and the musical follows this lead, dealing in implied gore rather than rivers of red. Sweeney Todd seems civilised compared with Bateman, in that his victims are cleanly killed and then cooked before being devoured.

Bateman likes to torture and terrify before the kill – and then gnaw them raw. It brings him a little peace, you see, in the brutal world of mergers and acquisitions.

In Gerrard's dazzling performance we see the stylish charismatic whom Bateman's friends enjoy, and the psychopath constantly lurking in his shadow. The problem with this version of the character is not performance-related: it is having no answer to the novel's extraordinary unravelling of the first-person narration.

The final song, This Is Not an Exit attempts to do that, with Bateman entering the audience to watch the closing scene from the outside. But it is framed as self-justification, and doesn't catch the disquieting shift in tone that Ellis achieves in his non-resolution.

Gerrard's performance shares star status with the design, choreography, direction and lighting. The production's visual brilliance will have your eyes out on stalks more than any chain-sawed bodies could do. Isabel Hudson uses a revolve to recreate the hustling lives of Manhattan's young, rich and predatory in 1987, while mirrored walls (like modern social media) reflect the pandemic narcissism.

The writers could have made more of the humour potential of Bateman's self-concept as a music connoisseur, given his mostly dire taste. Nonetheless the incorporation of songs by the likes of Phil Collins and Huey​ Lewis and the News are necessary evils that are made to work well.

Sheik's original music, tweaked for this production by Andrew Worboys​, is mostly doofy​ electronica played so loudly as to rearrange your entrails; so loudly, more pertinently, as to make many of the lyrics unintelligible – which is hardly smart.

Indeed this would be an unreserved five-star review were it not for that fact, for the lame scene with Tom Cruise as a character, and for one truly appalling Sheik song sung by Jean (Loren​ Hunter), Bateman's secretary. Called A Girl Before, this overwrought ballad is as out of place as chocolate on a barbecue.

Amid an exceptional cast of 11, Amy Hack offers an entertaining turn as Bateman's troubled, Anna Wintour-like mother. The dancing is machete-sharp, with Yvette​ Lee's choreography exploiting the revolve to the full, amplified at every turn by Berlage's​ own lighting.

The effect is often reminiscent of music videos, including during a vivid series of beachside tableaux set in the Hamptons. Mason Browne's costumes evoke a world in which clothes – like cocaine, champagne and restaurants – are signifiers of success. They're just not enough for Bateman.

Until June 9.

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