Global Game Changers

Global Game Changers 2025 Episode 1: Too young to scroll? Policy, practice and the bigger picture.

Transcript Well, I think that's our cue to start.

The music's down. , hi, welcome everyone.

My name is Kumi.

It's so lovely to see you in the room.

I know how tough it is to come to events after work. , you've had a long day.

You're juggling things.

So, we really appreciate you being here tonight and engaging in the conversation.

One of the things we're really keen to do tonight is to have you involved in the conversation as much as possible.

I think there's a lot of questions, a lot of curiosity around what's happening.

So, there'll be so many opportunities for you to put questions in to us, to the panel, and also be involved in a couple of polls, which would really appreciate you participating in if you've got your phones available.

I'll explain how all that happens.

So, you're here because, well, last year the Australian government introduced new laws that set the minimum age for using social media at 16.

The idea is basically to protect young people from the risks and the harms that can come from being online too early.

So platforms like Tik Tok, Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook will soon be required to have proper age checks in place and to keep any of that information safe.

If those platforms don't do that, they will face serious penalties and these changes will come into effect by the end of the year.

They have been shaped the legislation from input from young people, parents and experts right across the country.

Before we get into that, I'd like to acknowledge of course that we are on Gaduland and I'd like to acknowledge the elders past, present and emerging.

So thank you so much for being here.

Now I just wanted to mention that we will have a number of those polls going on tonight.

So does anyone use Slido before the polling? Great.

So, we'd want you to pull up, we're going to pull up some information on the screen, but we want you to be involved in that.

We'll pull the Slido details up there and there's a login and the event.

So, hopefully that will come up soon.

But that's where you can participate and with us and participate in that poll.

So, one quick thing.

How many parents are in the room tonight? Great.

Mostly parents.

That's exactly what we hoped for and wanted to see.

So, the first poll that we will want you to participate in is do you think that the social media age should be raised to 16? As in until you're 16, you can't use social media. , has that poll come up? Yeah, that's what you do.

So, if you can scan your QR code there, that'll take you to Slido and there's the number.

You just put yes or no.

I can monitor those polls throughout the evening.

We will be asking actually a poll at the end of the conversation as well.

So there's your first question.

It basically is should the age of social media usage be raised to 16? We'd be really interested to know what you think about that.

We will be communicating those results throughout the evening.

We can even pop it up on screen.

There's some coming in already.

That's fantastic.

The other thing is that we really want your questions.

So there will be a number of questions put to the panel.

There'll be a lovely discussion taking place.

If you've got any questions that arise during the conversation, please pop them through to us.

I think you can use the same screen.

So you can pop any questions in there.

If questions arise while we're chatting, please feed them through to us live.

I can moderate those and I can feed them to the panel and we can have a really nice circular conversation.

So, thank you so much for being here and for participating.

That's time now to introduce our wonderful panel.

I'm joined by associate professor Amelia Johns from UTS.

Thank you, Amelia.

Amelia is the acting head of discipline in social, digital, and social media in the faculty of design and society.

Amelia looks at how young people tackle racism, misinformation, and digital safety across social platforms.

Also joined by associate professor Marian Andre Brazil from the UTS.

He's the head of behavioral data science lab.

Basically someone who does stuff that pretty much none of us understand, but he will explain it all to us in layman's terms. , Professor Maria Andre was the recipient of academic of the year at the 2023 Defense Industry Awards and he looks at how we are pay attention online like how we're distracted or how we're not distracted and how influence and opinion spread across the digital world which is of course such a huge issue.

Now from Project Rocket, we're joined by Rosie Thomas who's there on the big screen for us there tonight.

Hi Rosie.

It feels like you're in the room with us.

Rosie is the co-founder of Project Rocket, and that's a youth-driven social enterprise which is focused on combating cyber bullying, hate, and prejudice.

She's also an Order of Australia Medal recipient.

And we're also joined by Rana Ibrahimi.

She's the national manager at Mayan, which is the Multicultural Youth Advocacy Network.

Welcome.

She's a fierce advocate for migrant and refugee youth and an expert in social inclusion and humanitarian ethics.

All of you in the room, thank you.

We also have a number of people joining us online.

So, thank you so much for being with us both in Australia and overseas.

And like I said before, what we're really hoping tonight is to have a really practical and open discussion about what this all means.

This is happening and what the landscape looks like and what it means moving forwards for us and particularly for parents and obviously for young children.

Basically the legislation will be around who can open accounts on social media platforms.

So we're talking about Tik Tok, Instagram, Snapchat.

YouTube is different because you don't need an account to watch videos, but there will be restrictions around that age restrictions and who can actually access material.

So what I'll do is go straight to the panel.

If we do have that video at any point, we can go back to that.

Amelia, I might talk to you first.

This is a world first decision.

In your mind, what do you think led to this decision? well look what led to this decision was the concerns of parents and certainly I think that the discourse and even the current discourse is led by concerned parents and the regulator both of whom are concerned with protection of their children with online safety but not necessarily taking a balanced view whereby there might be a consideration of how young people are using social media have used social media as an important source of social connection, social support, identity formation, belonging, youth advocacy, young people having a voice on the issues that impact on them.

So I think that that side of the equation has not led to this to the implementation of this ban.

That implementation of the ban has led around has been led as I said by discourses around risks to children on social media children and young people and I think in many cases some of the risks that are being discussed are at the extreme end of the scale. , even the e safety commissioner was speaking recently in relation to the online industry codes about risks around pornography, extreme and violent content, suicide ideiation, some of these things that I'm in agreement no children and young people should have access to that content, but they are not that is not the whole picture of why of what people are connecting with on social media and what young people are connecting with on social media. , so yeah, I do have some concerns around the discourses that led to the implementation or that are going to lead to the implementation of this ban in December. , because I don't think it has necessarily been a balanced debate and and importantly, young people's voices have not necessarily been centered in some of those discussions either.

The government does say they did talk to a lot of young people and there was actually quite a lot of support for I think 74% or something support for some changes some legislation.

I just want to look at some of those stats and Rosie I might come to you.

You talked to a lot of young people.

Some of the stats are almost three and four children a 10 to 17 have seen or heard content associated with harm.

Over 50% have experienced cyber bullying.

One in four non-consentual tracking, monitoring or harassment.

I do take what you're saying that's they're the stats that have been focused on Amelia.

But Rosie, just in terms of, what you hear, if you had to do straw polls on stats, do you feel like there is a lot of concern around for young people around their safety in this in this space or do you do you feel like, there's more positives than negatives in the space for them? Yeah, thanks so much for thanks so much for having me everyone.

I'm coming to you from Wandery country, so pay my respects down here in N.

Yeah, look, without a doubt, we work with, 2,000 students each week all over the country, and we're also employed by our national youth collective at Project Rocket.

So there are 42, 12 to 20 year old roles that essentially do co-ressearch with us.

They steer the direction of our organization and wherever possible, I'll be trying to elevate their views into tonight's conversation.

As Amelia astutely said, we know the harms exist.

All of us are actually dedicating really our professional lives to tackling these harms. , I'll give you another stat.

One in five young people report being excluded, threatened or abused online.

And that's not good enough and it's completely unacceptable.

But , unfortunately, I think what we've done is we've wrapped up or I should say simplified this debate as a good versus evil and instead we've erased all of the intersectionality that exists.

And unfortunately, the way that it is all of the harms and the risks are wrapped up with so many benefits and opportunities.

And to jump off the back of what Amelia said there, we've spoken about the mental health benefits of social media and we're not here just to understand the nuance of the way that young people use social media and the internet.

We're not so much just talking about them accessing Headspace, a phenomenal youth mental health organization on social media.

Although I will let that 73% of young people reported that they do access social mental health support on social media.

But what we're really talking about here is self-exression and identity and especially for young people who are already facing marginalization.

It really is a lifeline to that community connection and that pride in ways in which they don't have that access offline.

I just want to elevate one voice at the moment.

It's Laissa.

She's a 19-year-old young Muslim all across from Western Sydney and she sits on our national youth collective and she talks about the power of social media as a lifeline.

The positive cultural representation, identity fight and community connection that she was able to tap into only via social media.

We know this is true a lot of the First Nations young people we work with, LGBTIQA youth who literally don't have physical spaces where they can show up and access support.

So, we've got a lot of unanswered questions here about how we can create these safe places for young people offline, but it's clear that yes, the harms and the risks are massive online, and we need to be addressing them, but not at the cost of young people's agency, their belonging and their connection.

Thanks, Rosie.

We've got already a lot of questions coming in, so thank you so much.

I'll be getting to those.

Yeah, I'll be getting those questions because there are already questions about what are alternative third spaces that we can provide for young people which I really want to get to at some point in this discussion.

Ran, I'll just stick to where we are now.

You are deeply invested in the migrant and refugee experience of these spaces.

What are your insights into how they're used by young people? So very similar to Rosie, we have connection to almost young people in all across the country or all the corners and our access through them ironically is through social media.

Especially those young people who near newly arrived to the country and they are in regional areas far away from accessing to physical spaces.

One thing that we are hearing is a concern that how they're going to pass that settlement process and to settle in safely and how they can navigate the process in the country.

For newly arrived consider that around 20,000 people are arriving through humanitarian entrance only and from there historically 12% of them are children in this age group and interestingly we already have lots of problems with helping them to navigate the system and getting in because their parents do not know English they become the parents they support their parents to settle in and they need this connectivity and disconnecting them.

We have heard through consultation that it's disconnection between them and the rest of the world.

But consider that their connection is through for example messenger in Facebook or Instagram because they don't have a phone number through the journey that they have to get to the country.

So it's really tricky if we consider that how they are going to help their parents, how they are going to navigate the system and also we understand that it's a protection issue for them because we hear a lot of racism and cyber bullying online.

Even us as an organization are getting trolled all the time on Facebook.

So we don't use Facebook and we literally step down from X because of the situation over there.

So we understand that we cannot consider that this is the best platform but also we need to understand that the diversity in the diversity exists is quite nuanced and the there are lots of consideration in putting a ban on social media that needs to be diverse and understand that the country is the most multicultural country in the world the most diverse country in the world and it's literally the matter of equity that when it gets to implementation, how we want to make sure that it's equitable for everyone.

Marian, Andre, there's a lot of questions coming through about the tech side of things. , I'll just run through a few of them, but I just I wanted to get a sense from you about , how much of this digital world is able to be tracked and , you do so much work like , how much control do we think we have over what we see and what we , we hear so much about algorithms.

We hear so much about endless scrolling and the dangers to our health.

But I think this is happening that this ban is happening.

It's been also talked about limiting access until you're 16.

Not so much a ban but delaying access.

So there's a few questions coming in that I think would be really helpful as in someone said is anyone comfortable loading up identity to the internet? So there's this age verification process for example.

And there's also this idea that will that allow these platforms to amass huge amounts of data.

So I there seems to be concerns about how this will happen and technically how it's going to work for these platforms to be held accountable.

Well those are multiple questions there.

Thank you so much.

Let me let me start getting to some of those elements.

So first of all we're let me start with the last one actually.

Are we comfortable letting the platforms amass that much amount of information about us? they already do.

They don't need our ids to know who we are actually.

Even from 2014 we started knowing that our online activity our public online activity is very revealing about us.

It was the beginning of where we realized that inferential privacy is a real issue.

We can predict about the users using only the only a couple of public likes that we put on online content.

We can figure out things like gender, sexual orientation, preference, political preference, psychological profiling in the big five in the big five dimensions, but even things like whether your parents have divorced before your 21st birthday.

So the fact that a lot of our personal information is out there in the hands of the social media companies, we knew that since 2014 and who else knew that also Cambridge Analytica that's how it was built on this type of inferential privacy.

Now so we can probably put a pin into the amount of information that the companies have on us.

It's a lot more than we think. , I wanted to come back to some of what we discussed and I really liked Ros's comment about how we have how the benefits and the downsides of those social media are actually blended together and I wanted to come down to some of the some of the some of the things that we know that are harmful and there's increasing amount of data and studies that start coming up that show the downsides the particularly in terms of psychological outcomes.

So we do know that for example the US surgeon general identified that children that use social media more than 3 hours daily they have double the risk of poor mental health outcomes.

So just 2 hours a day.

And then we do know that removing limiting for example limiting social media usage to just 35 minutes already increases almost doubles the almost doubles those outcomes.

But what I found particularly problematic is that there's a new very new study that comes out of the University of North Carolina which shows that when children that ch that check social media at least 15 times a day they actually show and I'm quoting increased sensitivity and reward sensors to and that leads to hyper sensitivity to peer feedback.

So where I'm getting with this, the proof is starting to be not only correlational, meaning that we know social media usage and at the same time we see these poor life poor mental outcomes, we start moving into the correl into the causal links and the fact that we see changes in the in the brains of teenagers seems to be one of the indicate seems to be one of the arguments behind maybe putting a delay until the brain reaches a particular maturity level.

And in this case it was it was deemed to be 16 years old.

You had other questions there.

Sorry I went a bit on a tangent.

No no that's fine.

So it's I think I think there's a lot of questions.

It's really interesting coming in this as if one of us is from the government and the E safety commissioner's office which we're not.

So there's it's there's so many questions I think around how it will actually work how will the platforms actually inter implement this like do you have any sense of I know the government said it's like they're building a plane and flying it at the same time like this is all happening very quickly so in order to get the technology in place in order for it to actually hold social media companies accountable is that actually possible to sort see whether you can't make an account but someone might be able to make an account fake their age for example.

There's a lot of questions coming in which we will get to around workarounds like it's it's it's obvious that there will be people trying to work around it.

That's what happens all the time in any situation. , but is it possible to restrict access in the way that it's been proposed? And can companies actually be fined up to I think it's $50 million if those rules are broken like what's the technology around that space? So that's that's a that's probably the big issue here, right? What it's the question on everybody's lips.

How are we going to be able to enforce the rules without giving the companies the companies access to our ID documents and there's so there's been a trial and yes they are building the plane as they're flying it there's been a trial but there's a couple of a couple of families of approaches to do this the first thing to know is that in the law it is explicitly forbidden for the companies to request government issued ID so Facebook won't be able to request my driving license to check my age.

Period.

That is not an option.

So, what are the options then? Well, there's a couple of families of options.

The one that is probably currently a most favored as far as I as far as I understand, but , the legislation does keep change and the implementation changes.

Also, one of the families based on tokenbased identification.

So essentially the company the social media platform does not request for identification but rather engages a third party let's say another company or another entity which specializes in identific identity and age verification and this is not new anyone that ever had to take a bank loan that the bank externalizes the identific the identity verification to a third party service that does it and then only sends the bank the information that they require.

So in this case a third party would be verifying the identity in the name of the platform and then would only transmit to the platform essentially a thumb up yes above 16 or below 16 which then only transfers the problem from the platform to the company but then the companies are domestically based or could be domestically based and that's a different story.

Then you have the families of approaches which are inferential.

So essentially predicting the age of the individuals based on a number of things.

It can be the way they speak, the way they look, the way they move, even the way they move their mouse.

All of these put together, they can predict the age.

But as with anything inferential when you make predictions, you can be wrong.

So any prediction will come with a confidence interval.

So almost like in voting percentages, like voting intentions, it's they say 3% plus minus 1%.

So it might be 15 years plus minus one year which then comes with all questions and then there's other more exotic approaches even some of them based on blockchain solutions and other but we're now we're talking about exotic.

Yeah.

What I might do is conscious this is talking about kids and a new world for them.

So I think be great to hear from a young person.

And we've got a video we'd like to play you.

The social media apps that I use are Snapchat and Tik Tok and I normally watch content on both of them and talk to my friends.

All my friends that I have added on Snapchat are people from my school and one friend that lives in the UK.

As well as watching content, I also make some like that's only for like a few people to see like people from my school.

The videos I make are just like relatable things to me, my friends, like inside jokes and stuff.

My mom had a rule where I wouldn't get Snapchat and I did break that rule, but I felt very excluded from my friends how they all haded the same app and I only was stuck with messages still.

So, there was a group on Snapchat that I was added to and there was a person who added some very inappropriate content onto that group chat and luckily I left before I could see too much.

Through my friends, I found out that someone told their parents about it and I was relieved because I feel like they should have got in trouble about what they did and learn that they can't just send stuff to people like that.

Yes.

I think kids under 16 should be able to be on social media platforms as I don't think it's up to the government to make that choice.

It should be about the parents choice cuz I feel like this isn't really going to stop cyber bullying at all.

Like this is not the approach.

I think they should make it so that parents like have more realization about things happening online.

Do I think this ban is good? no, I don't think it is.

It is coming pretty soon at the like end of the year. , I think it's important for like people my age to be on social media because I think some people feel very connected to like talking to people cuz they might not have like that real help of the outside world and might feel safer like posting stuff online or communicating online.

Am I worried of losing access? I do have like a lot of followers on some of my accounts and like a bunch of streaks on Snapchat and Tik Tok as well as a very high snap score and I don't want to lose that because that took a very long time to accomplish.

Rosie, when you hear that video, when you like is this is this something typical that you hear? Yes, absolutely.

And so great to have some youth representation.

The biggest thing we've heard from this debate if you like is that don't talk about us without us from young people.

I can say as a youth organization in the mental health sector for 20 years, young people and our sector weren't adequately consulted.

And I think like these voices just show the nuance and the dynamic of these issues.

Ultimately though, and I think this is what this little legend was telling us, that ultimately bands don't build skills.

Bands don't build empathy or resilience.

Bands don't address the root causes that are human issues around like division and hate.

Fans don't build trusted relationships between adults and young people.

And I think the biggest injustice of all of this is that parents have been left over the last 15 years to carry this huge burden of online safety with zero support and now have been lured into this false sense of security that the problem is fixed but they the problem yeah isn't fixed.

We need to be addressing these real issues.

And so I'm glad to hear that the ban is now being framed as a delay because if we simply off access until a child turns 16 years old.

We risk handing them a whole world overnight without the skills or the empathy or the resilience to navigate it.

Plus, they've lost all the benefits of, like the incredible young people we know that are musicians online because of their social media that have folders that are creating their own social change movements like Project Rocket that are tackling global issues like climate change by galvanizing literally millions of other young people using social media to call governments to account.

So the real opportunity I think for the delay is to do exactly what this little legend has said and that is really focus on education and design approaches that actually meet young people where they're at.

Amelia, given that this is happening, so it's it's tempting to have a debate here tonight about what should happen, what shouldn't have happened, what discussions should have taken place, but let's assume that this is going ahead.

Yeah.

How can that education of young people, how can young people feel one and parents that they know how to navigate this new world and also do you feel like there will be other spaces that young people will find? Let's say it is about activism or is about connection outside of the social media spaces that are now going to be restricted.

Well, I hope so, Kumi. , I guess the thing to think about here, you know, when you're hearing about young people and how important social media is to them in terms of their social connections and communities that they're building online, is that young people are not without agency.

They're not without capabilities and skills in being able to find the spaces where they can make those very vital connections.

So I guess my hope is that alternatives will be found but I don't think the resources are really there at the moment because there has been such a focus on now implementing this ban or a delay.

Let's look at the language of the delay. , you're going to have young people who are perhaps coming into year 12 or their first year of university and are, you know, accessing social media for the first time.

Whereas they may have been able to have conversations with their parents about things that were concerning online or with their friends and peers.

Maybe they had digital literacy education at school.

I think that there perhaps are less or will be fewer guard rails as they're coming into a time when perhaps they're becoming more autonomous and not relying on their parents or school, school systems quite as much for these forms of education.

So yeah, I think where are the resources going to be to create those third spaces? Look, I hope that young people will find a way to find those connections, but a ban is a really blunt tool.

And it means that even young people now who have social media accounts, if they are not of the correct age, they are going to have their accounts deactivated.

I'm pretty concerned about young people's anxiety, levels of anxiety when their accounts are deactivated.

I'm concerned about parents having these conversations with say a 17 they've got a 17-year-old child who's going to have their access to social media continue and then maybe there's going to be a 15 and 1/2year-old child who they're going to have to have a very different conversation with them.

It's like yeah all of your memories your connections with your friends community building some of these really vital sources of connections are going to be lost.

So I think that there is a lot of support that's going to be needed to be provided to parents to have some of those conversations and young people while I don't think they've been centered enough in the debate so far but certainly we need to hear them now and there needs to be a lot of research that centers their voices and experiences what their needs are and that gives them the resources to be able to create those third spaces perhaps with other stakeholders like Rana like Rosie like people who are youth researchers and who are really concerned and interested to hear what young people need.

Rana, looking ahead, have you and your colleagues been considering how to manage that shift and that change and what support you feel like might need to be implemented? Particularly I think yeah for those people for those young people who have say built a community and a life online up until this point maybe it's going to be different for kids say under eight or nine but the ones at that older end of the spectrum what discussions I guess have you been having around that yeah absolutely so u very similar to Rosie we have that moto of nothing for us without us and the conversation right now is well it is on in the question that are Beijing the child rights and beside that because we're not considering the child's agency and with that child agency what we mean and how much of the agency we want to give to the children for an organization like us we say that definitely we need children around the table to create the solution because they are innovative they are creative the Gen Z and Gen Alpha are the generation who were born in digital world And as parents the genics and millennials are not that much familiar are with the digital world that their children are they already coding and I stopped by Instagram I didn't even get to Tik Tok so I guess it's really important to bring them around the table to make sure that they can help us and children and young people that we are working at least I know that they are value based they are right based they are quite passionate about working for what is right for the society and they are eager to create something that can protect them.

So they can be a part of solution and they just need to adults they need adults to understand that and bring them to the conversation and on the other side I think we have 30% intergenerational gap we have to address it in a way and I think one of those ways of addressing is to teach the parents and to educate adults on the digital literacy as So it can be and it can be from children.

Children can train them.

So it it needs something that will bring all of them together.

It's not just the pure responsibility of a parent and it's not pure responsibility of a child or a government.

It needs to be a shared responsibility and a shared approach to address all of these in implementation.

Marriott Andre, what research do you have around or have you read around workarounds? Like when there's bans, do people tend to use VPNs? Like it's it's quite interesting anecdotally and I know don't know about parents in the room if you've had conversations with kids.

I know I've had conversations with young people saying, "Are you guys talking about how to work around stuff?" And they go, "Yeah, of course we are." do you have research around that space around what workarounds people might tend to be thinking of like is that a concern for you I guess or where do you think people will be turning to try and potentially keep access to communities that they feel like they will lose access to there will always be there will always be workarounds probably I don't want to indicate any here but I guess it would not become as a as a shock that this legislation only applies in Australia.

So any workaround that makes your access appear from outside of Australia will circumvent at least partially the problem.

So yes, workarounds ex exist and they will always exist, but that is not where that will not blunt in my opinion the effect the effectiveness of the measure because we have seen we have heard that the brunt of the brunt of enforcement up to now was the parents and any parent with a teenager at home will know the pain of trying to forbid their teenager manager to get on a particular platform, particularly if everybody else in the social group has access to that platform.

And even in our in our video here, we were the the young lady was saying that she was not allowed to have Snapchat, but she still got it because everyone got it and she felt like she was missing out.

So it is it is a form of peer pressure and the fact that everyone is on it that will that is currently making the mission of the parents suicidal almost impossible.

But with the new with the new law there's two things that will happen.

One even if the law is only partially effective we will start seeing those proportions of teenagers that will not be on social media anymore.

Therefore the pressure on the parents at home is going to be less and therefore they will have more ammunition to fight.

Up to now you we could have said no you can't because it you don't sleep at night but now you can say well no you can't because it's illegal.

But then talking strictly about workarounds the goal is not to necessarily have one effectiveness of 100% but rather to introduce what is called friction.

So all the platforms do in their in their design and I wanted to talk a bit about the design is they make they make actions easy they make the action pathway easy towards a particular goal and that is that's where the simplic that's where the interface is working when there's a gap or is a difficulty in moving from one point to another we say that we introduce a friction.

So if between the moment when I want to go online and and getting online I need to activate a VPN and re r re reroute my traffic through some third party country which then limits the speed of the connection and then introduce all undesirable properties.

You will lose a lot of users down that path because some don't know how to do it and others will just find that the new quality of the service is just not good enough and therefore they will they will abandon it therefore improving increasing yet the effectiveness and talking now this is the last point and because you mentioned earlier about design of the platforms some of these platforms they are designed to be addictive that's not by that's not by chance it's by design it there is the most the most addictive reward schedule.

It's called intermittent reward schedule which essentially mean you take an action all the time and you get reward every now and then.

And if that sounds familiar that is exactly what pokey machines do.

You pull the lever all the time and then the reward comes every now and then and you can't predict it then.

And how does Tik Tok work? You scroll up all the time infinitely and every now and then you see something you like.

It is the same design.

It is a digital poke machine.

So it is if you feel you can't get your eyes out of Tik Tok is because well it's addictive.

Rosie I want to put a question to you is protecting our children and the addictive nature of scrolling for example we know that but there's been calls for that endless scrolling to be coded differently within a lot of these platforms.

I don't know if anyone's read Johan Hari's book which is fantastic but when smoking came in when driving came in there's actually an interesting question here I lived somewhere where kids as young as 10 were allowed to drive when traffic and awareness around dangers increased the age limit was increased i.

E a ban if we are talking about trying to protect young kids and I know that you were saying in the beginning a lot of this discussion leading up to this was around the dangers is it not a good thing to protect young people from harm from dangers and per perhaps say look until you're this age we feel like this is a good thing for your health like we don't get you driving before you're 18 we ideally don't get you smoking or drinking before you're a certain age can make those decisions for yourselves.

Is this is there not some positives to this? Yeah.

So, can we first I think like I'm a parent myself and I have a responsibility to protect my child as well.

And I like that you use the example of driving because driving isn't inherently bad for you just like smoking or gambling is.

And that's similar to social media. , and so yes, like I don't think anyone is arguing that social media is a loveydovey safe place that is just wonderful for their kids.

No, it's harmful and it's problematic and social media companies do have these sticky harmful ways of operating that are unhealthy and harmful and we need to address them.

But in terms of having the most impact to actually address the root causes and this is what young people tell us and it's what I hope for with my child too is we want partnership not protection that yeah I genuinely first of all yeah absolutely having the conversations with young people on a daily basis give me a rule and I'll break it type teenage mentality yes VPNs to mask the competition around finding way to get around the ban.

But also that the recognizing that we might think we're protecting young people, but we're actually sending them into all these parts of the dark internet that is so much more harmful and it's unmodderated.

And so I just have concerns like there's no guardrails, there's no moderation, there's no supervision, and we're not even addressing the harms because we think we fixed it with a ban.

So, I think it's a poor use of it's a short-sighted and poor use of our desire as humans, as adults, as parents to protect our children that we're better off addressing, digital literacy, as I said before, like building trust, building digital citizenship and building the capabilities that way and putting a hell of a lot of pressure on social media platforms, helping governments regulate even further.

Rana, you mentioned some of the bullying and some of the situations that have occurred in your communities.

What would be the ideal situation for you? Like this is coming into place.

We need to find alternative spaces for these communities.

How do you see this working? I I guess we need to look at solutions.

I don't want say parents leaving here thinking, "Oh my god, this is just going to get worse and worse and worse." I feel like parents already feel quite stressed about how much time potentially kids are spending online.

There was an interesting comment here that came through actually, that we're focusing quite a lot on time spent online as opposed to content that we might be consuming.

So, confession, my daughter spent a lot of time on her phone playing games, doing all this stuff.

She's totally fine.

She's matured into quite a lovely young person, but I I get the sense that we we're not arguing here whether the band should be in place or not because it's coming in into place.

So what would be the ideal moving forwards? How are you going to create a space and that digital literacy for the communities you're talking about? Yeah.

So I think there are lots of evidence around what we need to do and what is harm and how harm happens and we need to look at the evidence and then in implementation and design.

It's interesting because when we do our market research for example to see how we can communicate with our community which is young people from 12 to 25 and recently from 8 to 25.

We don't get traction on Facebook.

They don't look at Facebook.

They didn't look at we don't have a Tik Tok at all ourself.

So what they got the information from is majority from Instagram for example and from our website.

So we were working with them recently.

We sat together with young people and said how can we get to you and how do you want to what channel do you like us to have a communication with you.

So we were able as a organization to create that platform on our website to communicate with our young people.

We have Mailchimps for them.

We have WhatsApp groups for them which is closed groups and they can have conversations with us.

And interestingly on Instagram for example, we don't communicate with young people under 18.

We never did.

We always communicated with their parents and said can you send a message that we want to meet or we want to have this project for them.

So and that was their suggestion because we need to have that ethic submission and consent from them.

And I think whatever we want to create it needs to have that consent from children and it needs to create a safe space for them especially from the diverse groups LGBTIQ young people the newly arrived young people they really need a safe and closed space they don't trust the open social media either and recently I had the conversation Few days before I come here, I had a conversation with an 18year-old who is doing a research with us for her school and she told me that we she's Syrian and she when they arrived she got her phone when she turned 16, but her sister who is younger got her phone and access to social media when she was 12.

And she was saying that I asked the question because you wanted me from my 12-year-old sister and she said I don't care about the Facebook or any of the things that is on Facebook.

I use the messenger to message my friends.

Even we have heard online that the most important aspect of that the whole social media is the connection.

It's not the primary idea of the Facebook which was connect.

It is actually the primary idea of Facebook that you find your friends across the globe.

So I think if we get back to the purpose and set it based on what young people want us and tell us what they're doing with social media, we can design something which is quite less harmful.

Even it was two years ago I think that the Facebook removed our newslets let's from the their platform and we had this argument between Australia and the Facebook and everybody were actually so supportive of Australian government that we want something national maybe we need an national Facebook because we don't want the kingdom of Mark Zuckerberg control us and have this power over us that is removing our newslets.

So I think it's it's not that people are against especially children and young people are against the ban but it's a factor that how we are going to implement this policy.

Okay.

And that's the sensitive part.

I want to go ask one more question.

I might ask you Amelia and then I want to move on to quite a few questions that are coming in around there's actually some really interesting stuff coming in around come on just get out to the park and play and there's other ways to there's other ways to connect and someone said use Gmail send emails send letters to connect.

It's really interesting to hear the stuff coming in.

So I'm going to get to those.

Amelia, I have a few questions coming through around digital literacy. , then maybe there needs to be more digital literacy for parents and for kids, but , can such an education actually be enforced? that seems to be a huge aspect of this. , I know that you do a lot of research around young kids, how they're feeling about their digital literacy, but should we be looking at digital literacy as a much more fundamental part of not only children's education, but parents as well? Yeah, definitely.

Because even if there are concerns around risks young people are encountering on social media, we know that the social media ban isn't a silver bullet.

We know that it is isn't a ban, it's a delay.

So, young people will be accessing social media at some point in time.

I'd like to know how well of course schools teach forms of digital literacy, but in research that I've done with young people from migrant backgrounds.

It's often young people encountering risks online like maybe ideologies around toxic masculinity or something like that or encountering forms of misinformation and disinformation online and working out with their peers online about oh okay I can't trust news on this particular platform maybe I'm I'm not going to be accessing news on this platform anymore I'm going to you know go to the source and perhaps leave this or some of the platforms they're engaging with as a place for playfulness for connection etc.

So young people are learning digital literacies and digital safety strategies through encountering forms of harm at the lower end of the scale online.

I think that needs to be facilitated even somehow working around the ban to have some of that those contents that young people are encountering online and developing their own safety strategies and literacies to work with that reality because that is the world online.

There are risks in the world that is not on social media as well and risk is an important part of young people's development.

It's how they learn agency.

It's how they learn autonomy, how they learn to think critically.

So digital literacy is very important and it multiple stakeholders again as RA mentioned are really vital here.

So schools need to be involved in this, youth organizations need to be involved in this, parents need to be involved, young people themselves like I think codeesign is really important in terms of coming up with digital literacy resources as well because some in research I've conducted young people felt that the digital literacy education they got in schools wasn't relevant to them because it didn't deal with the risks that they're negotiating on social media for example.

Often it's dealing with static websites and is this fake or is this real news you know and they felt that was really a bit beneath them like that it was a bit basic in terms of some of the complexities around disinformation and misinformation with on social media and again if that is an important part of young people's development so if there is this delay we're definitely going to need digital literacy education in schools that does focus on social media.

We can't just like pretend that doesn't exist and go out in the backyard and have a game of cricket and you'll be fine.

Those risks are still going to be there when they're able to have an account and when they're going to be able to navigate social media.

So yeah, I think it's important to have those guardrails in place.

Marriott Andre is there an ability for platforms like Instagram for example to release as an interesting question around that to have a variant of their app which doesn't allow for example infinite scrolling.

Yes.

Yes.

They control it.

They build it from scratch.

They can do whatever they want.

They could do versions for kids.

They could tweak their recommener system not to not to recommend toxic content.

But the question is what would be the incentive for that? So, for example, it is known for a while that Tik Tok recommener engine would recommend to teenagers harmful challenges, things like the blackout challenge and other really dangerous activities where young people u well they consume the content and then they film themselves performing these dangerous acts sometimes leading to death.

But they've not done anything about it because any intervention onto their platform design will reduce the engagement which then will lead to less advertisement and less funding.

Yes they can they can remove the infinite scroll.

Of course infinite scroll is a new thing.

It's a new it's a it's rather new.

We talked here about the history of social media platforms.

Depending if you consider Reddit a social media platform or not.

We had initial forums where people talked topics but then we moved into Facebook where we started searching our friends and it was all friend- centered and then Tik Tok and Instagram changed again the paradigm where we are no longer connecting with anyone.

We are just consuming infinite amounts of content which is dictated not by anyone but by a recommener engine designed to keep us there for hours.

So could they change it to make it safe? Sure they can.

They can also reduce their own income at the same time.

Okay.

I want to because I know there's so many parents in the room, I'd like to just shift the discussion briefly to some parent questions that have come up and then I'd love to look at the poll where we're at with the initial poll because we're also going to do another poll. , Rosie, there's a lot of questions around how parents communicate with their kids around what they can access and what they can't.

Do you have parents talking to you around concerns around their children or positives? like I'm glad that there's something here because we've been trying to fight this at home on our own and we actually feel like at least there's some recognition that some of the stuff that our kids might be looking at is harmful like are you hearing both sides of that from parents and then therefore how they can communicate to their kids about what's going on? Yes, absolutely.

And there is so much pressure on parents which is why this delay just seems so irresistible because it feels like it's going to fix those problems.

I think you know what we're hearing as well as is similar to what Amelia said is that we need to start having these conversations now as early as possible because there is a potentially arguably a fallout or a transition for when young people are being removed.

A lot of the A lot of younger teenagers, for example, might not be thinking in the long term about what is going to happen on December 10 when this law comes to effect.

They might start thinking about it a week earlier, for example.

So, I think like starting these conversations between parents and your kids now is really important.

It's a great excuse if you attended this thing.

And I also just want to commend every parent that is here because it's it's you parents that are really leading the way.

And I hope you have these conversations with the parent friends that aren't here.

I guess some advice around talking about this stuff because I feel the panic and fear too despite working on these issues for the last 20 years.

I think it can be really hard to suspend our fear and panic and also our opinions when it comes to talking about this stuff.

But my biggest hot tip that we hear works really well with parents and their young people is to just try and approach the conversation with curiosity and judgment.

So rather than leaping to conclusions or even rather than having a conversation a little bit like the one we're having about whether we're proban or anti-ban, let's just talk about the issues.

Don't be afraid to talk about the things that you've seen online that you didn't like and especially don't be afraid to say that you didn't know what to do about it because I actually find that as in those experiences where we show our imperfections as parents that really open up the conversation and build that trust.

So together in that scenario, you can problem solve what you could both do in the future when you see hate happen online or you can problem solve some tactics or strategies for when you might want to use social media and no longer be allowed to.

You'd be so surprised about how this approach of talking about your own experiences, really opens it up for young people to do the same.

And I think ultimately that is our goal here as parents is to be a safe, soft place to land for our kids. , one thing I wanted to add here because parents, you're not alone. , Project Rocket and so many other organizations will be here to support you.

And there are phenomenal researchers that are doing research right now to support you.

One of those organizations is , Young and Resilient Research Center from Western Sydney , University and they just released fascinating research around the impact of , social media on families and their attitudes and perspectives.

And actually the good news is they found way more in common between parents and young people than they're not in common.

So they've found that both parents and young people recognize the benefits and the risks but they prioritize them differently.

So if this helps going into your conversations with your young people, the research showed that for parents, the focus tends to be very much on the harmful content, the impact on mental health and boundaries like screen time, which is probably no surprise to anyone.

And for young people, the focus for them is , connection, identity, creative learning and for them what they say is they really want guidance in those areas.

So the study also showed that too much monitoring can actually backfire with kids feeling really spied on.

And of course they find ways around it.

But I think at the heart of it is that young people even though it's really hard to start these conversations are looking for guidance and partnership and support and skills.

They don't want to live in an unsafe world.

They don't want to see hate and division.

They recognize they're not the experts of this, but it's that in that's so hard to sometimes start the conversations between parents and young people.

Thank you.

Cuz that leads me to one of the other questions here which you've actually answered a lot of them, but to parents on the panel, what tips and tricks can you share about how to minimize harmful aspects and to build kids positive online skills? Ra, what do you think about that? what what can parents how can they help build those positive online skills? I know you're saying that a lot of the communities you work with the kids the ones who have got the online literacy and they're teaching the parents but what would you say to that? yes exactly that's the thing we hear a lot of parents who are worried because they're not familiar with the space at all and there are a lot of unknowns around what's going to happen. , one of the tricky questions I got a lot is that are we going to buy many devices for them and when they get to like buy one device when they turn 16 get another device which is a lot of costs for many families and they were worried about the cost of this process for the family as well.

So I think one of the responsibilities that actually government can pick up is that investing in digital literacy for parents and investing to clarifying how it will look like specifically for parents and one of the things that we can do we usually are the bridge between the parents and children and we navigate it together through code design.

So we bring them together and we ask questions in the way or we ask parents to ask their questions from the younger adults and from children and then we in interpret it for both generation to understand it.

So we can play the mediatory role but I think a big part of it is also coming to the government and right now e safety commissioner to provide this information as much as possible and clarify many things for the parents have town halls town hall meetings and bring parents together and answer their questions because with the fear of unknown we can continue but as much as we get information, we can solve many things.

And we like it or not, parents are not digital savvy.

So even if we spend time on giving them information, right now they are struggling with navigating chat and all of these AI tools.

So I wonder how much it takes time for a parent to just get to the speed of digital age and learn all of these things.

But they can at least as Rosie said talk about the pros and cons and what happens when you get a accepting code on your digital things.

All of these processes or what is good what is not good.

Simply is something that can create can be created through conversation and everybody actually needs to address that together.

It's not something that only parents work on it or only children or work on it or only the implementers work on it.

Amelia, there's quite a few questions coming through and I won't read them word for word, but quite a few questions coming through where I sense this divide.

There's a no wonder they're called iPad kids because parents have chucked them in front of iPads and they've just been on social media since the beginning.

Why don't you just bring in sleepovers and phones like the good old days? send your kids to the park. , parenting is about parenting and it's hard work.

So, don't complain.

I feel like there's a divide in a way happening here where we've got a generation or generations of , young people who social media is what they've grown up with. , parents who have been trying to probably monitor that and manage that.

And then this is how we grew up and there's no judgment on either end.

But how do we bridge that generational differences or differences of how we should be raising our kids? There is a lot of criticism often just anecdotally.

You see a kid in a cafe and they're on a phone or on an iPad and it's like they should just sit there and draw.

So, what research do you find around that? Do young people feel like they're understood by parents? Do parents feel exacerbated by the fact that they can't get their kids off the devices? Because there seems to be quite a lot of commentary in that space coming through.

Yeah. , I'm a youth researcher, so I center the voices, views, needs of young people.

But in a recent research report, I was interested in looking at the differences between adult stakeholders, so teachers, educators, people from youth services, policy makers, the views that they had on digital and social media as a technology.

And then the views that young people had in terms of what meaning it had, what what importance it had for them in their everyday lives like it and again you really saw these differences coming through where adult stakeholders are like there tended to be a bit of a fear around technology full stop.

You know, social media being something that they thought was harmful, but the next debate is obviously going to be around AI and AI companions. , it will be the same debate.

And I think that the reason for that is that young people think I grew up, I had sorry, I had these fantastic experiences and my kids are missing out on what I had.

But I don't think there's always a lot of attention that might be given to the forms of creativity and play and the discoveries, the excitement of young people engaging in these really, different worlds that are being created that they're co-creating in some in some ways through digital media, through social media. , it's almost a sense like they're not doing what I used to do to get enjoyment and I don't really understand it. , but I would encourage I guess to get past that generational divide.

I would encourage certainly parents to speak to young people not only about risks that they might be exposed to through social media or through digital media or through games or in interaction with Geni Gen AI, but to ask them why are you talking to a AI chatbot for this many hours a day or why is it that you're connected to social media? what it is it that you're doing, what are you getting out of it? Because I'm pretty sure that all parents in the room had similar conversations with their parents where their parents may have been disapproving of, a certain music that they were listening to.

Maybe it was television as screen time that that their parents didn't necessarily agree with.

We've we've heard a lot of these debates around every new technology that comes in. , it's bad because young people are glued to it and they're not doing what I used to do.

But I but I really do genuinely believe and I think that many of us here believe that young people are forging important connections online doing, their creativity is being encouraged.

They're engaging in forms of play that might not necessarily be the same as what their exper their parents experienced but still very important to them very important to their peers important to their social development so I think in some ways it's about a bit of give and take like maybe these really hard positions that are taken there needs to be a softening of that I think Rosie mentioned this having a really a soft understanding of what why is it that you're engaged in social media for this many hours a day? What are you doing? Like why is it important to you? some of those conversations I think can help bridge that those barriers and bridge that gap.

Rosie, questions that come up often and ones actually come up here tonight is a parent worrying about their son finding a sense of masculinity through extremism and hateful spouting of views online that don't represent the majority.

Is there a positive to there being limits to what that young person can see online and their views being formed in a more regulated majority space, not through social media platforms.

Yeah.

I think one of the most harmful outcomes that rightly so we're spending time talking about at the moment is the manosphere.

The idea that online spaces can be luring you know young men, teenagers in and through benign messages around going to the gym and getting fit and being your best self but ultimately leading to much more violent ideologies like misogyny for example. , and then of course with those addictive features that we've been speaking about tonight, it's this idea that young men in particular can get trapped in this space.

And we also know that there are additional challenges with young men and when it comes to mental health and access and support that are unique , actually to young men that are quite different to , girls and the way that they relate to one another and their social settings.

So without a doubt, this isn't a massive concern.

And there are some amazing organizations like the man cave and Movember who are addressing this work.

If you're actually parent in the room and you're concerned, I really recommend you checking out those organizations.

So absolutely, but I guess on with what we've said tonight and maybe one additional piece of research I want to layer in is that at Project Rocket we actually recently did a study with 500 young people aged 13 to 15 about the impact of social media for them.

It's called the their online realities essentially.

And we found that most teens, so 44% of teens reported both positive and negative experiences online, 41% report only positive experiences, and just 3% report only negative experiences.

And I'm absolutely not dismissing that small group and the problems they face, especially when we're talking about really extreme issues like the manosphere.

But I think it really does emphas emphasize just to calm the farm I think in the room as well.

That there's a lot of fear going on at the moment.

And hopefully these conversations or this delay is going to have a really positive effect where we start having a springboard or an entry point as parents, as governments to actually be intervening on these really insidious issues that are impacting young people.

Thanks, Rosie.

We're just going to pull up the poll and see where we are at.

There were nearly 100 votes for that initial poll and I'll just like to discuss those findings.

So, oh that was has our opinion shifted.

Can we just look at the original one as well? That would be really great. , looking at that age? Ah, thanks guys.

Thank you so much.

Basically, should we be restricting this the access? I'm not sure where the results are there.

I can pull them up here.

Basically, majority was for that age restriction.

So, I think it's really important to talk about that because on the panel here, we're looking at this is not going to be great.

We're going to restrict access for young people these communities that they're going to access.

But when you say look at the poll, it's like bring it on.

So how do we address that? the reality is there's a at least in this room there's a sense of this is actually let's limit the access at least until a bit older in life.

There was actually an interesting if we go back to that car driving analogy you it takes a while you get a license and you drive when you're older.

There was an interesting comment here about saying when young people go to access social media especially young girls should they do some test to know that they understand how to use it properly and what the harms might be.

We do a driving test when we get in a car should there be something like we do a test before we access social media.

So I'm just trying to reflect the poll there.

And people's views haven't changed that much.

So what does that tell you that there's still, there is support for these restrictions? Yeah, definitely. , I'd be interested to ask every single person in this room why the social media ban is so important to them and why they think it is, going to address these online risks and help, the their children or young people in their lives.

There's there's a lot of comments around data privacy, leaking of information.

M there seems to be a sense a valid sense that our information is not safe that the content we can maybe see is not necessarily safe.

So amongst all the very valid opinions here around young people need these spaces this is their way to communicate there does still seem to be quite a sense of this is actually maybe a good thing.

So I think that disconnect or not even disconnect but that is actually important to look at and chat about as to why we think that might be well it's related to your initial poll when you said how many parents are in here.

Yeah.

Most of the room put up their hands and then it talks to what Aidia said about the disconnect between the generations and what people fear.

So it parents want safety and parents are here.

So okay.

Rosie.

Yeah.

What would you say to that? Well, I feel so motivated.

Like I'm actually itchy on my chair now because I really want to bridge this divide.

And I think I'm really privileged to come from a space where I get to work with young people day in day out and we deliver digital literacy programs in schools, we deliver anti-bullying programs, we've externally evaluated them, we know they're effective.

And so I think when we know that there's this solution here, but it but it isn't being rolled out at scale, it isn't being funded. , as I said, digital literacy is being left up to young people as peers to fumble their way through it with scars and battle wounds at the end.

For parents who understandably have been given no education, no training, no support, but expected to hold the burden, I'm not surprised that this divide exists, but I feel really motiv motivated to close the divide.

And most importantly, I feel so motivated to be part of a conversation that brings together young people's views and their experiences their strengths and their struggles and the potential that they have to a room where parents can get to see that.

Because maybe we just get to see parts of young people and especially on social media that perhaps parents just aren't getting to see.

We've got about 10 minutes or so.

So, I'd love to spend the next 10 minutes. , we all accept this is happening.

We've all looked at the concerns.

We've all looked at the positives.

We sense that particularly in this room, there's a real sense that this is something that maybe parents feel like might be supportive for them in this social space.

Rana, if there was one thing you could say around from December when this ban comes into place to not reassure but say look this is what's happening.

This is what we're going to do to support parents and children through this.

This is the practical way in which we are going to navigate this transition.

What would you say? Well, I totally understand when we always kept it 50/50 until it got to the implementation, but I definitely think it needs huge investment on how you're going we are going to implement it and again I said it before I think definitely code design is the way going through and it's not just I really don't like to see it.

It's just a parents responsibility to go and navigate it and understand it and I don't want it to sit on the lap of the parents to have another responsibility adding to all of their responsibilities.

I think it's a shared responsibility as long as we do it in a shared way.

I think that's the best solution.

Amelia, in terms of all the research you've done around young people and how they feel when they navigate the digital world, what would what do you think young people need to be navigating that digital world, this new digital world in a way, and make them still feel connected to their peers and to their communities with these guard rails that will be in place? Yeah, I' my motivation is always to do research with young people to see how they're navigating this new landscape.

It's a completely new landscape for them.

So what questions I guess yeah if you look 6 months down the line after the ban, what questions will you be asking young people? yeah to fill your research pot.

Well, I would love to do that research and I would like to hear what their experiences are of digital exclusion.

Because we talk a lot about the inclusion of young people of their voices, how important it is for them to participate in the issues that matter to them and to have a say in them.

I just I feel like that's what I would ask them.

I would be asking how they're dealing with the ban 12 months on.

Has it been positive for them? have certain risks, diminished or have do they feel safer? these are the things that I would I would ask them.

But I would also be really saying asking them, is there a sense of something that they have lost? Are they trying to find new ways to forge those connections again that may be lost once their account is deactivated? , how are they doing that in which setting? Are they doing it in local neighborhood setting through school? Are some of those opportunities for voice and for having a say on things that matter to them being provided more so in the school environment? because often in re research I've conducted with young people social media is the space where they can advocate for themselves have a voice in a way that and I do research with young people from migrant communities as well in terms of them have advocating for themselves some sometimes it is on social media because the mainstream media may speak about them about the communities they belong to but may not touch upon their lived experience.

That the debate that happens in well debates that happen in mainstream media may not be balanced.

So in some ways how are they going to be connected with for example research that I have done have sh has shown how important it is for opinion leaders on social media or influences on social media that come from young people's communities that speak to their lived experience what they have to say about issues news and information that may be shared through those channels that they're not going to access otherwise are schools going step in and perhaps allow for this broader, more diverse debate around, young people's voice, the issues that concern them.

Is that space going to be opened up within the school environment? Because at the moment, schools also are very focused on risks and on if restricting young people from being able to from engaging with things that may that may cause harm or that may cause the school reputational damage even.

Is there going to be a little bit of risk takingaking from schools to provide that space for young people that may be lost in terms of the online environment? Rosie, do you think there could be some positives that maybe I'm not saying you haven't considered, but look, maybe if you did a poll of young people in 6 months time after the ban, do you imagine that some may say, "Oh, look, I'm actually been feeling less anxious.

I feel like I'm comparing myself less to others.

I don't feel like there's as much bullying as I was experienced." is there room for those kinds of questions to come into this space? Do you think that there might be some knock-on effects that maybe we don't know about yet? Oh yes, absolutely.

Ki in fact young people not all young people are against a ban either because young people aren't a homogeneous group of course.

They have a rich intersectionality of different experiences and identities and some are for the band for those very reasons.

Typically what we have heard from the young people that have said that they're for the ban was more yes but the other kids will get around it or they'll just go to other places.

So for me again it comes back to those practicalities but look I'm I'm hoping that there will be positives as I said before what I want to see is mandatory digital literacy education in schools.

So I hope this delay because we are bracing ourselves for the fallout with schools and young people and parents in dealing with the flow on implications the unintended negative consequences of this but my hope is that this does crack open conversations that it does hold social media platforms more to account I don't want to stifle the good things that they are doing like for example Instagram teen accounts which they looked before there was even talk about a ban that bring in into effect some of the features that the ban is hoping to bring into effect.

Anyway, so I'm really hoping though that we can start to work together because we need to move away from this division and debates and polls for and against and instead actually prioritize young people because when we treat them as empowered citizens that are capable of being agents of change in their own lives and when we give them the tools and the skills and we create school environments that allow them to be who they are and them where they're at, then young people can tackle online hate. , that they can navigate the harms and they can experience the benefits and become leaders and have positive relationships and positive mental health and loads of resilience because they've navigated the risk that they've been exposed to some level of risk.

So, I don't think that I think in six months time we'll be reassessing this thing again because I just don't think it's going to work. , but I'm hoping that what comes next is something that is a bit more applicable, practical, and actually values young people as citizens.

Finally, I think I just want to maybe balance out all the questions so I make sure I've asked everyone everything.

Mario Andre, if you look six months down the line, you talked a lot earlier in the panel about those known harms, the addictive nature of social media and such.

If you look six months down the line, do you imagine data research that comes in where perhaps there is a different level of freedom that younger people might be feeling around that space because they're not as glued? Do you feel like there's going to be some disconnection? Where do you think that data will kind of point? We already have indications via studies where they've looked into people reducing their connectivity to digital environment in general but to social media also and always unanimously these studies they show that once we reduce the connection the connectivity once we reduce the inflow of information then I actually have the I actually have it here 90% of the participants showed improvement in at least one psychological outcome.

They showed improvement in at least one psychological outcome.

Okay.

So reducing the connectivity they showed reduced connectivity leads to improved psychological outcomes and I can actually attest to that myself.

I have my own proof.

A couple of years ago I was on holiday with my family when I managed to drown my phone.

Just a long story.

But this the result was half a half a holiday without a home without a phone.

The home was also home. , and I have to tell you that was the best half holiday that I've had in such a long time.

The only thing that I missed was the ability to actually call my family when I got lost in the supermarket.

And that's why now I have this.

Does anyone know what this is? And this is my right to disconnect.

So I think I think there will be good outcomes.

All right.

Well, thank you so much for your time Rosie for joining us from Melbourne.

Thank you so much Rana Marie Andre and also to you Amelia for joining us and to you all for your questions and for your input.

I didn't get to all of your questions but I hope that I addressed some of them in the room in a bunch.

Look there are resources available online so we're looking at a few months away.

If you go to the e commissioner website there's some FAQs up there like what will it mean? how do I talk to my kids about it? , what will the what will how will the technology work? , one of the things I do want to point out which I think is one of the concerns that some parents have had is, if you and or your kids who are under 16 do platforms that you're not meant to, the onus and ban and the fines are on the social media companies, not on the parents and not on your household.

So that's there's some quite interesting questions there that you can have answered if you do have questions around that.

I understand there'll be some announcements soon in the next few months because there's obviously still some delays around putting in the technology around how it's actually going to work.

So there's a lot still in train but I really appreciate you guys having the conversation tonight and for you guys also participating.

So thank you so much.

Hello! To everyone in Australia and around the world. I welcome you to the University of Technology, Sydney. Tonight's event is the Global Game Changers, the Big Carbon Rethink. It's dedicated to tackling major world challenges. I'd like to begin... Do we still have the music on? Is that just my imagination?
Can we funk it down a little bit? It's just, you know. Let's take the funk. There you go.
I'd like to begin proceedings with an acknowledgment of the ancient land upon which we stand. It's tradition in Australia to pay respect to the land and the people who have lived here for thousands of years. At the beginning of any important gathering today in the UTS Great Hall, we have a packed auditorium. And with us online from around the world, we have about 1,000 viewers. I haven't checked that in the last 2 min, so don't quote me on that. It hasn't gone through the proper academic review process. But around that, so this welcome extends to you all.
I'd like to acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation, the traditional custodians of this land, and pay my respects to elders, both past and present.
I'm Craig Reucassel, your host, for the evening. I'm probably here because I've made a few documentaries about waste and climate change over the years.
The order of proceedings this evening will be a setting of the scene, followed by a broad discussion of challenges, and how people on this stage are overcoming them, and there will be a Q&A from the audience here today as well. So if you have your questions, put them in your pocket, keep them for the end, and we'll try and come to you.
The setting of the scene will be done by Dr. Alex Thompson, marine ecologist, Science and Technology Australia's Superstar of STEM, leading science communicator in the UTS Faculty of Science.
Following the overview, Alex will join the panel made up of Dr. Gunter Beitinger, industrial engineering and project leader at multinational technology company Siemens, striving towards net-zero with SVP Manufacturing Factory Digitisation and Decarbonisation Platform Seagreen from Germany, also the Director of Estanium.
Amy Low, the director of Brand and Marketing for iconic Australian surfwear company Piping Hot, seeking to deliver sustainable and affordable material and product production for clothing, swimwear, footwear, and accessories from Australia. Dr. Julia Reisser, co-founder of innovative climate, positive Australian company ULU, leading production of a natural material derived from oceans able to replace plastics at scale from Western Australia.
And Professor Peter Ralph, leading international researcher in the fields of algae biosystems and biotechnology, seagrasses, and the adaptation of aquatic plants to warming and acidifying oceans, and Executive Director of the UTS Climate Change Cluster in the Faculty of Science from Sydney.
As we face many challenges of climate change, this session looks at the opportunities for the future.
We imagine a world where buildings, clothes, homewares, office supplies, playgrounds, and electronic equipment—all the products we want to interact with—become carbon sinks, thereby actively reducing atmospheric carbon emissions.
Can we get to a place where products that we use, or wear are not only decarbonising the atmosphere but also ensuring that the carbon remains out of the atmosphere? Can our products go from being part of the problem to part of the solution to set the scene. We welcome Dr. Alex. Thompson.
Thank you. Beautiful. Okay, so I have a little bit of a tricky job tonight. So I'm here to provide a little bit of a glossary or a bingo sheet of terms that we're going to be using tonight. And hopefully, I'll do this justice. So please please bear with me.

So, firstly, we're going to talk a little bit about a dirty word, and that is carbon. So we know carbon has a bit of a bad rap. It is, in fact, the stuff that makes up dirt, but it's also the building block of our planet and a compound of absolute opportunity. So I want to start by taking a bit of a step back and understanding our planet's relationship with carbon. So carbon emissions are the leading cause of climate change, where the carbon comes from is as diverse as the forms that it comes in. So what we refer to as carbon emissions is a pretty lazy way of describing a whole bunch of processes and a whole bunch of compounds, 2 of which are carbon dioxide. Your little Mickey mouse character up there, and methane. I don't really know what that looks like, but it's the other thing that's up there.

So that is, these gases contribute to our planet's greenhouse effect or ability to trap heat just like a greenhouse. So carbon emitted from our planet does so in a lot of different ways. You probably heard about the industries that are most responsible for carbon emissions, but the bulk of carbon dioxide emissions come from fossil fuel sources.

So fossil fuels when extracted from our planet and used to make things like fuel, synthetic fibre, plastics, all sorts of things contribute to the way that our planet functions.

So over time these emissions have led to our planet getting a bit of a thicker blanket of gases trapped in its atmosphere, and like anyone that is trapped under a pretty thick blanket. What starts as being pretty nice and cosy soon gets pretty uncomfortable.

So we're going to leave carbon for a second, and I'm going to talk about an organism called algae.

Algae is a living thing. I'm not going to call it a plant. That's a whole other topic which a lot of people here could talk for a very long time about, but it's made up of you guessed it carbon. So algae appears on our earth in two main forms: microalgae, single-cell, tiny little organisms that a lot of people try and get out of their swimming pool, and the larger form of macroalgae or seaweeds.

Our planet has a really long history with algae.

In fact, the reason that our planet even has an atmosphere to begin with is because algae's ancestors worked out a little process called photosynthesis and gave us an atmosphere.

Which is actually the same way that it captures carbon today. So algae captures carbon dioxide via photosynthesis and holds its carbon within its body. In turn it produces oxygen—somewhere between half and two thirds of the planet's oxygen comes from algae. I'm not going to get into that debate either.

And it also produces some pretty important other compounds, as well.

Such as protein, fats or oils, and carbohydrates. So algae is kind of like a scientist's dream, being able to capture carbon and then turn it into these really awesome organic building blocks is a really cool process, and then allows us to then turn them into, well, basically anything.

So these building blocks allow us to turn it into super exciting things, whereas before that carbon would have existed in our atmosphere. We're now able to form all sorts of different things.

Such as animal feeds, plastics, fertilizers. Really, the possibility is endless. All by implementing a nature-based solution that captures carbon, transforming it into useful compounds and in the process helping us to mitigate climate change.

Now, algae is just one solution in our climate change toolbox, but it is a really really exciting one.

So I'm going to leave algae to the side for a second, and I'm going to talk a little bit about how we understand how to track where some of this carbon might come from on our planet, how much carbon is in the products that we use. What is the carbon emission history of the products that we use? And how much do we know about the products' carbon lifecycle, where it ends up. And what exactly is a lower carbon product.

This space is incredibly exciting because it allows for significant innovation when it comes to product development.

I am no expert on scope emissions.

But as a bit of a brief explainer, because these are things we're going to be talking about tonight, there are three main types of carbon emissions that most organizations will track or account for. You have scope one emissions, which is essentially the stuff that comes out of the factory, or things like company vehicles.

Scope 2 covers things like electricity, heating, and cooling.

And scope 3 is a bit of a mixed bag because it encompasses a very wide range of emissions, both upstream and downstream activities of a business. So this can include anything from business travel, employee commuting time all the way through to how products are transported and distributed both to a factory, but also once it's done in the factory, and then also how that product has an end of life.

What we can also kind of look at when we look at the different emissions of a product is what happens when a product might be shipped overseas. So what happens when people account for that carbon? And where does that carbon actually end up in an instance, say, we ship a product from Australia to Europe.

How do we understand how that carbon is counted? So in Europe, there's a scheme called CBAM, something called the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, which allows for a price of that carbon to be counted into products.

However, how scope 3 forms a part of that cost is a little bit tricky and something we're going to talk a little bit about today, too.

So ultimately, products that are derived from carbon capture, or that store carbon within them are therefore intrinsically kind of better for the environment and also better for industry.

So there it is, magic stuff called carbon. In the right place, it can work wonders. Give us a toolbox for new innovation.

And with nature-based solutions like algae, it can be transformed into a wide range of exciting products.

If we track it, we can better manage where it ends up and come up with better solutions for managing it.

And if we can do all these things, well, that's kind of what we're aiming for, right?

So I'm going to hand back to Craig now, and hopefully, some exciting discussion.

Thank you very much.

Dr. Alex Thompson. There, just while Alex comes back to his seat. Peter, let's just quickly address what's behind you. This is an algae bioreactor.

Is this how we're going to grow our algae? We can't use the oceans. I don't know what's going on there. Absolutely. This is exactly what we have back in the labs. And this is what industry has. So it's not a green lava lamp. It is actually the way that we grow the algae.

So it's a great prop for everyone. So this is what industry will look like in the future. Is algae going to grow throughout this? Like, if we keep talking longer, will we see the algae grow? No, if we go over next to it and we breathe into it, it will grow faster. So our CO2 needs to go in there, so the better your questions, the better the algae that comes out of the end. Okay, this is the pressure.

Alright. Now Alex has done a great job of explaining the science there and using algae and carbon.

But I want to start at a different level. Over the years, I've seen many great stories about scientific breakthroughs, and, you know, we've got these amazing solutions and that kind of stuff.

And then, years later, I don't necessarily see these things come into play.

And so I want to start with that question of how we get it so that we're actually making things like algae get into reality. And I think one of the reasons this hasn't happened over the years is that part of the problem is that companies don't necessarily know, firstly, the carbon footprint of their products. That's part of it. They don't know. They're like mystified by this, and the second part of it is, there's not enough incentive for companies to actually be experimenting with new things like algae.

So they have to actually be able to count what's in it. And there has to be some kind of pressure to change that.

And so, as we discussed, CBAM, the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, is a good example of this. So, for instance, if we send some steel from Australia to Europe, and we've created it using green hydrogen that's been made from, you know, renewable energy, it's going to have a lower carbon footprint. It's going to get less of a charge on it than if we've created the same bit of steel with using oil and gas to send it over.

That's the kind of theory there. But how do we actually measure this? In the first place, we want companies to be able to measure that. So I'm going to go first to Gunter here.

We want companies to be reducing the carbon footprint of their products. But how do companies actually know the actual product carbon footprint? Gunter? You're trying to answer this at a stadium, talk us through this.

No, okay, yeah, thank you, Craig. I mean, that's definitely one of the major challenges we need and be trying to tackle. Gathering accurate and comprehensive supply chain emissions data is definitely one of the biggest challenges in carbon management. And, as you said, policies like CBEM, but there are also other digital partnerships now are putting a lot of pressure on companies to implement, yeah, these solutions and scalable solutions.

What is the situation at the moment? But also, I must say there is already great progress on the situation. There's a lot of attention on the topic. The broader carbon footprint usually includes two things: the company's manufacturing emissions and the emissions from the upstream supply chain as we just saw it. So scope 1, 2, and also 3.

And the complication here is, of course, getting a baseline to get started. Companies need and have to understand why they need to create a PCF, and it's basically useful if they are embedded in a holistic strategy. But nevertheless, the companies need to go into their bill of material and into their main production process steps and start to determine this broader carbon footprint for each component and production step.

To do this, you can start to rely on average emissions. So these average emissions you get from data pools. Companies are out there. They are providing average data. And then you are using the rule of 3. So how much material is in my product. And then you go into the database and you look up. What is the emissions? The average emission on 1 kg, and then you calculate it.

What is then the impact on your product? And then the company only needs to sum up the average emissions across the components and the activities. This is quite a generic average emission data, and we call it secondary data.

But now, if you really would like to show impact, you need to go to real data, primary data. As you just explained, you would like to know, when you ship maybe products over to another place, how much emissions are really generated. So these are the true emissions. The difference between secondary and primary data can be huge, and we have seen differences up to 100%, also depends on the methodology you're using. And this is another challenge—deciding which methodology you're applying.

So it is essential, then, to maximize the share of such primary data. And, of course, you need to be able to get this primary data and to prove the declared product carbon footprint. And of course, you have two sources for the input materials: you can reach out to your suppliers and ask them, “Tell me what emissions you have generated while producing your component you're sending to me,” and the other source is your own factory. You have to go into smart metering, install measurement systems, and extract the concrete data you are generating for your product. So both are a challenge. First of all, do you have the installed technology to measure and then also to distribute it on your product? And the other one is, are your suppliers willing to give you the information you're asking for, and can you rely on this data? These are the challenges.

So, as far as I understand, a lot of the time I would look at the impact of a product using a life cycle analysis. But as you're saying, that's a kind of average thing there, and it doesn't necessarily assess if your company has gone and gone that extra 10 miles down the road and is far ahead of your competitors. You need to go into what you're doing and look at the actual data to prove you're doing it better than others. Have you got an example of any industries, perhaps in Europe, that have actually started this process and have started to actually assess their actual footprint? Who is doing this?

Excellent question. So who is doing this? First of all, the chemical industry. The chemical industry globally is working together with Together for Sustainability, which is a chemical association. They are really going into real data. The chemical industry, of course, has a huge portion of these emissions. They are going into it. Then also the automotive industry. Here we see it, of course, if you are putting products on the market, like electric vehicles, and you're promoting them and saying you are climate neutral by using these when you are judged with renewable energies, you would like to prove that the product also has a lower carbon impact, because the battery production compared to combustion engines has a much higher impact on emissions. So you need to bring them down also into the car. Then we see the steel industry, especially in Europe. There are two things: the pressure from the government and society, but also high energy prices.

Yeah, absolutely, Amy. I want to come to you and piping hot clothes, because at the moment Cbam applies to things like cement and steel and fertiliser, and, as far as I can remember, you don't make piping hot clothes out of those things. So

you're driving. What is driving your journey at piping hot to try and come up with alternatives. You know. Why. Why are you looking to make more sustainable clothing, or reduce the carbon footprint or reduce the plastic in your clothing.

It really comes from that deep connection that ocean has, or that piping hot has with the ocean. And then, seeing the degradation of the ocean and

feeling like we need to play a role in creating solutions to protect oceans in the future. So our ambitions in this area emerged from a pretty sincere purpose to

protect oceans and then to

help families save money effectively, to be able to provide sustainable software for families.

And did you then have to go on a similar journey that we've been talking about here, of going well, hang on a second. We better assess

our product lines and our suppliers and our, you know, all of these different scopes. Scope 1, 2, and 3. Did you go through all these processes? Yeah, absolutely. I mean. Gunter talked about a holistic strategy, and we've really applied a holistic strategy. We had to define

what we wanted to achieve with our products and what we meant by protecting oceans and helping families save money. We really focused on the product impact using that industry data because that's the best that was available to us at this time.

and we started with recycled polyester in 2018. That was a kind of really interesting experience for us to be able to actually go to our supply chain and say what would happen if we were to replace virgin polyester with recycled polyester? How do we make this work. And how do we deliver this to our existing customers, who are all across Australia buying our product through target

in that decision? Initially, it was about

really focusing on ocean pollution. But as we started to develop the same strategy across all of our material portfolio, we expanded that to a low impact material strategy which was looking at measurements of water, energy, and waste which are all relevant to what you know. The ocean impact of our clothes and emissions is really

key part of that mix because you can. You know, just recently there's some pretty devastating statistics about the impact of rising temperatures on

the Great Barrier Reef and many other areas. So

in learning that our decision to move to recycled polyester not only

started to take that step away from relying on fossil fuels and virgin fossil fuels, but also cut our emissions.

We were kind of ready to make that apply to all of our different products, because recycled polyesters are fascinating thing in a way, because it.

you know, from an ocean perspective, it doesn't solve one of the problems you would have had, which is microplastics like, if you know, if I wear my

board shorts made out of a fossil fuel plastic, and it has microplastics come off. If I use a recycled thing. It's going to have the same problem. But you're right by changing to recycled polyester. You're going to reduce the carbon footprint substantially, you're going to start solving part of the circular economy and those kind of things. So you realise that you was kind of

it was a difficult journey in a sense. Did you kind of did you find that? Did you kind of bump into things and go? Oh, no, this is solving half of our problems, but not the others. Yeah, absolutely. It's all fraught with danger. And then you speak to different scientists who have different views. You know, Gunter spoke about the data. There can be parts where you think you're thinking about. You know what you can impact from the design perspective.

And at the same time a lot of the end of life

impact of our clothes is out of our control in terms of how often are people wearing our clothes, and what are they doing with it? And how are they washing it? And and all of that? So we really focus on the bits that we can control? And our approach is really progress over perfection if we can. You know, we started with one fiber we've moved to, you know, more sustainable cotton

we now kind of had this ambitious step to commit to research with the University of Technology, Sydney and Peter's team to be able to develop

an alternative to polyester. So we can move away from recycled polyester altogether and solve that problem that you're so that's the kind of journey as you go. You know, virgin virgin polyester made from fossil fuels, recycled polyester, made from fossil fuels. Now the next step is going. Can we make this from algae or other bio products? That's where you are at the moment. How? How far along that journey are you? What what secrets can you tell us? It's okay. We'll keep it quiet amongst Ush. Everyone.

Look, I'd I'd love to be able to talk about this more. But I'm kind of under wraps on that. I've got nothing to say, absolutely nothing to say, Amy's the boss. But you have made some, for instance, footwear from bioplastics. And that kind of stuff. Did that utilise algae or other bioplastics at this point. Yeah, absolutely. So at all, piping hot shoes have 5% of algae in their soles.
And the 5% sounds like a very small amount. However, we've got 25% of recycled content in there and then. The remaining part is really so that we can meet the safety standards for footwear. You probably haven't thought about that as a characteristic, but for the polymer to be able to perform to the needs of, you know, going to the beach and everywhere else that you might need to go with the shoes we need to mix. 5% is kind of the amount that we can commit to at this point. The thing that was really exciting about that of adding that 5% of algae into our shoes is actually that impact because the algae is actually retrieved from polluted waters.
And so it has already cleaned water and air, and then is an alternative to the virgin plastic that we would otherwise put in that portion of the shoe. So it kind of again progress over perfection. Just put it in there, be able to tell that story, but also for us, it's that measurable impact because we're measuring less water, less energy, less waste for each of our products so overall by having every single piping hot product is made from those low impact materials. That means we've got a substantive reduction in water energy and waste compared to the conventional materials that we were making every single product out of 5 years ago.

Yeah. And again, it comes back to what you're measuring. You manage. And you get to step forward that way, Julie, I'll come to you. Can you talk us through what Ulu is, and where does it fit into this, you know? Are you part of the potential solution for these kind of companies.
Yeah, so thank you very much for inviting us to present here. So we'll do in a nutshell. What we're doing is we're cooking seaweed. And then that seaweed soup we feed into a bacteria that gets fed with our product. The name of our product is PHAs, so PHAs are natural materials. They mimic plastic very well.

But they are made with natural resources, and at the end of the life you can choose between reusing, recycling and most importantly, home compost. So it gives you the optionality at the end of its life.
Yeah, we are very excited about bringing this upstream solution into the mix and hopefully help build a bioeconomy with this progressive seaweed derived materials. Do you call Phi? Do you call? Is it a bioplastic. Would you call it that? Or do you try and distinguish it from a bioplastic? Yeah. So that again depends. Which scientist you? You ask him. I'm actually part of an oceanographer by background, and I fall in love with this material, and then decided that the best way to that to reality is through to a for profit. But I come from.
Yeah, from their research side. And one side Giga have is with this non-for-profit called Go, Pha, and what we're trying to convince the policymakers is that PHA belongs on the same class as like, let's say, silk and cardboard and natural materials, because plastics or bioplastics. They are what we call synthetics. So they are human made. We invented a new polymer that nature didn't know.

And therefore it's hard to put in a bio recycling environment. And these PHAs, they are created by bacteria. Cellulose is going to be the tree. And what's special about those natural materials is that nature produce them so nature can biodegrade more easily. So, in my opinion, answering your question, I would say, PHA is not a plastic, but it depends who you ask. But but you're actually seeking to replace plastics, aren't you? So what you're creating a kind of feedstock?
What can you make out of that?

So yeah, what's special about PHAs is that, despite it being a natural material, it mimics plastic so well that when you touch and feel that you believe it's plastic. So what is special about this natural material is that it repels water. So it's waterproof. It's windproof.
And you can melt and remelt. So you can actually recycle, just just like plastic. So in theory, we can go into any anywhere where plastic goes, we can go with PHA. Technically, of course, production cost has to go down for us to be able to to do that. I'm glad you brought up cost. That's the next question I'm going to get to just quickly, because you just said it repels water. This is one of the things that I have constantly struggled with in the kind of war and waste documentaries is because people go hey, you know, we're replacing plastic with a bioplastic. And then actually, legislation nowadays tends to ban bioplastics. The same way it bans plastics, because, for instance, you're an ocean background.

If you say, if I make a plastic that can repel water and is as strong as plastic, and I make it out of algae. If I drop it back in the ocean it still won't break down in the ocean, it will remain. It will create the same problem that a fossil fuel plastic will, won't it?

So, Phas, this class of material is going to behave a little bit like cellulose. It has a biodegradability profile very similar to wood. Let's say so. Here we have, like a little wax comb. So on this surfing team made with Phas. So if you touch it. It feels like plastic. Of course, if you lost that at sea, it's going to take a while, just like if it was made of wood.

But yeah, if it releases microplastics which have a much wider surface area for those microbes to attack the material, it's going to biodegrade eventually. So it's technically what we call marine biodegradable. You can go. There's a Tuv certification in Europe that you can actually call it marine biodegradable, just like wood is.

But that doesn't mean that you can be throwing wood or Phas in the ocean. Expect it to disappear in 2 days. It depends on the material type. It depends on the shape of your object, and it also depends the environment where the object is. So let's say, a home compost.

Much more bacteria in there to consume that, Pha. The ocean is cold and much less microbe. So it takes. It takes a while. We'll come back to the waste side of it later on, Peter, when you're talking about

Making something that looks like plastic or works like plastic. And you say, but we've changed the process we're using. We're using algae. Now.

What are the benefits from a carbon perspective, from a climate change perspective there.

That goes exactly back to what Estanium is doing. So if we can find replacement components to go into producing. You know the plastic housing on my phone. If we can take out half of the fossil carbon and replace it with a biogenic carbon. Then it's going to halve its product carbon footprint that's going to then store the carbon in our useful devices. So I think what

Estanium is doing and what I think a lot of the bioeconomy is going to be doing is looking for ways that we can find

Drop in technology that can go into making products that we, the community needs to buy every year we need to. I don't want to be throwing my phone out or throwing my plastic casing out all the time. But this is a way we can store atmospheric carbon by

Using existing supply chains and just substituting a bio

Raw material and taking out the fossil. One

Is algae, though better than some

Biomaterials, because so, for instance.

I've read life cycle assessments of a lot of bioplastics nowadays are based on corn. Right? Yep.

And if you actually look at lifecycle and you go. What we did is we cut down a forest, and we planted lots of corn, and then we dug up the corn, and then we used that to make this plastic, and you look at it, and you look at it and go

Hang on a second. This is worse than a fossil fuel. Sometimes that happens at times.

Does algae overcome some of those problems because of where it can be grown, whether it be in your lava lamp, in your office, or in the ocean, or wherever it is, does it overcome some of those problems, because not all by products are the same absolutely. And this is where the food versus fuel debate comes in. We cannot be growing algae in land that should be arable. We need to be growing food

In those lands. Algae grows in saline water. Algae grows in wastewater algae grows in brine water. Algae grows in the ocean, so places that we're not currently using. We can grow the biomass. And I think that's really important. Some of our partners are using wastewater from aquaculture

That is doing a service to making sure that the water that leaves that farm doesn't pollute the rivers. But it's also making a product that we can use. So understanding where algae doesn't compete with

Land production, that's what we want to use. So that's 1 of the benefits there, Alex, we heard Amy talking about. You know the challenge of making this new product that's also affordable

When you are dealing with companies to try and get a product here. You're trying to smash these amazing things of science that we've created here. But you've also got this criteria of.

But it has to be affordable. And you know we've got to be able to sell us in target, and that how much does that constrain the kind of

Big sky thinking of scientists. And how much is that? The exciting part of the challenge?

Yeah, it can definitely form part of the challenge. But I guess the exciting part is that

I think when I started this job, I thought, you know. Oh, my gosh, it's going to be huge multinationals coming to us. They want to change the planet. They've got all the money. They're going to do all these amazing things. It's not. It's small businesses, it's startups. It's people that are more agile that are taking this risk upon themselves and investing in research and going. Yeah, we know this is going to be expensive, potentially in the short term. But this isn't a short-term problem, and we can't come up with short-term solutions.

So it's really interesting to see that it's smaller companies and people that are entrepreneurial, that are jumping in on this.

And that's, I think, the most exciting part. And you know, as Amy said, it's that kind of incremental change. You know, it's that continually reiterating and going. Okay, we're going to get you a product that is 40% algae. And it's going to be expensive. But then we think we can get up to 50%, and we might get it cheaper. And guess what? There's a new farm down the road that has this seaweed as waste. So we think we can then go cheaper. And I think that's the thing right is, we're so used to stuff happening so quickly.

But all this research stuff takes a long time. And it's taken us a long time to have this problem on our planet. So you know, it is going to take us a little bit of time to come up with those solutions that are going to get us over that next step. But I think that's the most exciting part is it's these smaller people who are going. Yeah, I want to start tackling this. I'm going to take this risk upon myself. I'm going to put my business on the line, and I want to come up with a solution.

Can I just put an extra point to where Alex was going. It's the Smalls, the SMEs that are going to take on the risk. But we've also got to have leadership from entire industries. And I think that's where Estonian fits in, where you've got the car industry. You've got the chemical industry, you know, we would love to have the construction industry, to have entire industries thinking about these problems. That takes leadership. And it's not coming from the SMEs and the small guys. We've got to have both ends of the market, both ends of industry solving these problems. And I think that's a key part, and I'll come back to the stadium in 2 seconds. I just want to quickly to wrap up that point. There.

What's what I find fascinating about piping hot, in a way is that you know we're not talking about the Byron Bay Boutique, where you pay you know, an extra 50 bucks, because it's organic, and it's got a low carbon footprint. It's got this kind of thing you're selling on target. You don't have a green premium of this kind of thing. That's that's a much bigger challenge, in a way. But what I love about that challenge is, it's also about getting it to a much bigger audience, which is what we have to do. I kind of, I'm you know, I'm not interested in selling green products to greenies. I'm interested in selling green products to everyone. So how much harder has that made it? I'll start with you, Alex, and then come to you, Amy.

Where do I start? Okay, how? How has that made it harder? I think the whole thing is, you know. This stuff needs to be accessible. So it needs to come from a lot of different people, a lot of different businesses. And honestly, it needs to happen over and over and over and over again. You know, it's not just about one product being more accessible to people that's more climate, friendly or captures more carbon. It's like, when people start to realise this is happening with all the different products that we consume on a daily basis. Then I think it starts to become a bigger solution altogether. It's not just these incremental tiny things in one particular industry. So I think. Yeah, it's kind of interesting. And people I don't think charging a green payment on things. I mean, I have all sorts of thoughts on that.

But it can kind of also come with its own issues right? Like, if you're charging more because a product is more sustainable, you're automatically pricing out a whole bunch of people that maybe do want to make a change, but aren't able to access it in the same sorts of ways, which is kind of wrong. And yeah, yes, look, don't get me started. Every tax should be done in a way so that the most environmentally friendly option is the cheapest option. It just doesn't happen right now. Why doesn't yeah. Why doesn't that happen? We might get to that later on. So yeah, Amy, how do? How do you juggle this kind of balance of going? We have to be affordable, but we're trying to do the right thing. It's it's difficult.

Yeah, look, when we started on this journey, we transformed every aspect of our business and our operations. So you know, we directed our funds in a different way. We're buying in a different way. We're speaking to our suppliers in a different way. And it is a really beneficial relationship for us to have distribution through Target, because it does enable us to be able to deliver across the country. And we're not fighting to win over lots of small retailers like independent surf stores to say, Buy these products, you know, and then they feel like it's a risk. We've been in partnership with Target since the 1990s, and at the same time we are under no illusions that I would say more than 80% of the customers who buy our product from Target have no idea that we're actually doing anything in relation to sustainability, because when you shop in that kind of store, you have no one to tell you that because of greenwashing concerns and all those things, we have the opportunity for us to communicate what we're doing to our customers at the point of purchase is a swing tag on the side of a product.

And that the wording on that is so carefully guarded and checked because we have to have all of the background to say. How confident are we that that product contains. Algae contains recycled content that we are, you know. Recently we had to prove that actually, we are actually doing anything for clean oceans. I say all of that because the challenge remains in a difficult retail economic environment that the product still needs to look good. Fit, well, perform with quality, compete with everything else on the floor. And so it's absolutely a challenge. Huge barriers. There, Gupta, I want to come back to you and talk about a stadium, and also you work with Siemens and Sea Green. Do you notice on an international level when you're dealing with countries that have. You know, positive climate policies and CBAM, and that the companies that come from that background are coming to you and saying, How do we solve this problem? We need the data, and that whereas countries that may be well and truly behind. And I potentially throw Australia into that mix are much less likely to be approaching you, and realising that this is the next step they have to be doing.

So you're asking if if we can see a differentiation, how how companies are acting on that when we're approaching. So, yeah. Do you see that European companies that have grown up with carbon taxes and with CBAM coming in that are much more proactive in looking into their product carbon footprint than our countries from world. Perhaps you know America or Australia, for instance.

I think it's more on a company level, I mean, when you look at the top 500 companies, all of them normally have already a sustainable pledge out there, and they are, of course, depending that they are delivering on this pledge. Because they are on the international stock market. So there are different reasons. So first of all, of course, they are measured by their impact and sustainability impact. And if you have a pledge out. Of course you have to to. First of all, you have to set a target that is very important, and this target must be publicly, of course. Published, and then you have to to take actions accordingly to the target. And you need to allow that you have that you are going to be measured on these targets. And then, of course, you have to prove that you are getting the impacts by by these measurements. So yes, of course, we see this. And when we are looking into the Siemens.

We, we are have actively, of course, supplier development programs, and also our politics in place where we actively asking our suppliers what they are doing to going into direction of net zero, and how they are reducing and how they are contributing to reduce the carbon emissions. And that is a part of the supplier evaluation. And then there is a regular. Of course we check this regularly with our suppliers, and if we see, of course, then we are also supporting them by making more impact in reducing their carbon emissions. So and as also we see them, that our customers are asking us this. So yes, there is a huge tendency of the industry in this direction. It comes with the upcoming regulations, and also not only to to this, let's say. Pledge what what they have given out and the stock market. And but it's there's also pressure from from regulations. And there is, of course, from society. A lot of, let's say, awareness and and companies needs to react accordingly. And last, but not least, also, the financial market are more and more supporting sustainable companies with lower credits and financing programs. So there we see a lot of reasons and activities in this area.

And I like that answer because it shows that there are so many different pressures. It's coming from the community. It's coming from people who purchase things. It's coming from the financial community, it's coming from policy. It comes from so many different aspects. And I think whenever I get asked, what's the most important thing. It's like, well, kind of everything. Let's just look at everything. Talking about that, Alex. You worked on developing the Australian algae industry white paper.

What are the main changes in policy or incentives or financial incentives that you need to see algae become the thing?

So I guess to give a bit of context. So the global algae industry, people may be surprised to know that in Europe and America, the algae industry is actually quite big. They are probably 10 years ahead of us in terms of the number of farms, the policy that supports it, the financing that supports it, the types of products you get on shelves like if you go into any of those like super expensive supermarkets in the US. Probably seen them all on, you know, your Instagram and that sort of thing. So many of those products have algae stuff in it, and they charge through the roof for it. So it's a really big industry. When we look at Australia, the question I get asked whenever we go overseas is:

Why don't you guys have more companies? Because you have the land. You have the species. You have such a collection of researchers that occur in Australia like there is a really big cluster of these people in Australia, yet the number of businesses we can kind of count on a couple of hands, which is pretty wild. It just doesn't make a lot of sense. So when I started right?

Yeah, yeah, that's great. Well, let's ask one of those businesses. Now, I mean, Julia, what are the you know? Obviously, people are going. Why don't you have more of these companies in Australia? Do you find it hard to compete with others overseas doing this like? Is Ulu trying to compete with others overseas? Or have you got a unique product? You think? Here.

I mean, we take it a different approach with like we're competing with fossil plastic, which is a massive market. And what we see is that by getting together we're stronger, because it's very often that you go to a large brand. Be it a car manufacturer, or furniture or packaging, and maybe single use packaging? Not so much. But you're like, have you heard about Phas? Have you heard about how we grow seaweed, and that there is some seaweed for us to start in Southeast Asia, and there is a lot around educating the market, and I think that we get a great culture with the vast majority of the seaweed businesses. And we try to kind of collaborate and work on different because we're basically inventing a supply chain from scratch. And there is so much that needs to be done that's not going to be one single win. You know it's all the way from cultivating that seaweed. Getting the sugars and the protein separated in the right way. Then producing those raw materials, turning them into pellets, be it aqua feed pellets or plastic pellets, and then making them into products, is such a massive problem that

I like to be optimistic as well. When I started to work on the plastic pollution and climate change, space back in well, climate change was 2002, and then plastic. In 2009.

We were so behind, on where we're at at least the conscience is there. And people are aware of those problems. And I think we just need to accelerate that change. So I think from my perspective, I'm thankful where we're at. Of course, we need to keep going and accelerating that. But overall. I think we're in a good trajectory. And I think this audience is a good example. Yeah. And also, when you talked about Alex, you mentioned Australia being a good place for this, Peter?

What are the advantages? What are the natural advantages we have in Australia? You know what gives us a competitive advantage? Why are we in a good position for biomanufacturing here?

So I think what's going to happen is we need to be aware, as Julia mentioned, supply chains and biomanufacturing. To keep the carbon costs down, we need to grow the biomass. Whether or not it's trees, seaweeds, microalgae. We need to grow them close to the production facility. And I think that's what the change in biomanufacturing is going to be is that we're going to have supply chain production very close. And so that means we're not going to grow the algae here in Australia, ship it to China or to Europe to produce. And I think that's why we shouldn't see Australia as being behind. But we should be part of the international market, and we've just got to find out which of the markets we're going to be working in because we're not. The technology that we've got is appropriate across the globe. But you're going to grow your biomass next to where you do the production. You are not going to be shipping seaweed or algal biomass across the globe. I mean that always. It always does my head in. Actually, when you kind of look at a bioplasting, it's like what we ship this from some cornfield in America. It's like I always go. That seems insane. But anyway, I'm glad we're going to grow it here. Now let's go to the end of life of these types of products now.

And, Gunther, I want to start with you when you're assessing the actual product carbon footprint of a product.

Do you assess the end of life, the disposal of it? Or are you just looking at it up to the point of leaving the factory and going out to be sold?

At the A, for when when we are from the stanium Association point of view, we are looking from a cradle to grave so completely, of course. So it is important that we are tracking. I say, always we are tracking the carbon along the complete life, and looking forward that they are also. Then

Taking out of the atmosphere and stored when we are looking on the available solutions, what we have at the moment. And here it is at the moment most seen that the products are going from

From the let's say, from the the start of the production till the point where they are delivered to the user. So there are just a few products on the market which really are, where you're tracking over the whole life cycle of their impact by a company.

So we are from a stadium, looking from cradle to grave, and solutions are there just from till to only upstream, not downstream. Let's say, what is the problem here?

If you really would like to track and trace carbon emissions, you need to verify them. So you need to verify the data you are collecting. So when you, when somebody gives you an information, then, normally, you can trust this information, which is, let's say.

Only possible. If you have a close relation with them, or you are allowed to look into their processes to get proof of it.

But in normal business relations you are not allowed to look into the processes, because normally you get access to confidential information.

So when you are then getting information, you need the approved or verifiable credentials.

And then when it goes to multiple uses, then downstream. Then, of course, you have the problem, who is the consumer behavior? And so on. So that's still a problem, which is, it's difficult to solve. So but for industrial part, yes, we have a complete solution in place where we get the proof of each production step, and it's verified without disclosing the confidential information

And the aim. We are aiming, of course, to close this loop completely and get the track.

But there are also some examples out there which are trying to close this loop. We are working on a holistic carbon ecosystem with governments in Mexico where we are really trying to close this loop. But here you need systemic level collaboration. You need to really work together

With the governments and and with the industry. And of course, with academia.

Yeah, absolutely. And, Amy, I guess that the consumer point goes to what you were mentioning right at the beginning was like, Hey, we're trying to do all these good things and change the place. But we can't actually track every person that buys our board shorts and go. So just email us back. Did you wear it a hundred times, or did you wear it 3 times and throw it out or chuck it in the ocean? You know it's hard for you to follow that kind of whole process, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. So. I think we have the kind of 2 approaches. One is that in that period of design we think about what the end of life will be in the generalised, you know. Is it biodegradable? Will it, you know, live forever like a you know, a plastic.

Where what's the trajectory? If you, if you look at cradle to grave, however, when we measure our product impact, which is something that we do so that we can more closely assess and then communicate to our customers what we're doing in terms of our environmental steps.

We look at the cradle to store because that is, we feel much more confident about that accuracy, and we can control that part. Once it goes out there. We just want to be able to on our side, know that. Yes, we've considered what the very end of life will be, whether or not someone wears a garment several times. Yeah, yeah, it's hard to track that. The reason I ask that. And I'm interested in it. But, Peter, I'll come to you on this. Let's look at this comb I've been given that's been made of a natural product, and I'll come to you on this, Julie, obviously as well. In Australia. At the moment, a recent study showed that most bioplastics that are used end up in landfill in Australian landfills.

When a bioplastic breaks down, it breaks down anaerobically. So it breaks down without oxygen, which, like food and other organic processes, leads to methane. So do we need to be changing if we're going to be changing our system to be, you know, changing to bioproducts like this? Do we need to be changing our whole end of life process as well. Because at the moment. If I chuck that into landfill, it's going to have a negative impact, isn't it? Absolutely so? What we've got to start valuing is the carbon, the carbon that's in that comb. We need to put a value on it so that it's not disposed of. I'm going to take the example, a little bit bigger than the comb. I'm going to imagine this carpet on the floor. Or imagine wall panellings or ceiling panellings. Imagine the construction industry which is the largest emitter of Co. 2.

Imagine if the construction industry valued its carbon and it stuck carbon into these floor panels, and we sold that carbon as a carbon offset, and the building valued that carbon said, Okay, for the next 10 years I'm going to recognise the value of that. And when I do rip it up, and if I do put it in landfill, I'm going to lose my carbon credits for it. So I think there is a strategy that governments around the world can start valuing carbon in products bigger than a comb. But certainly the same concept. Yeah. But it's interesting.

But Julia, like it's an interesting balance for you, right? Because you can. Probably right now you can probably sell to the public a lot easier if you say we've created this product out of algae and unlike plastic that stays in landfill for a thousand years. This breaks down in the environment right? That'll sell a lot better. I know this, everyone always comes up to me. Oh, I love this because it doesn't. The worst thing about plastic is, it doesn't break down in landfill. And I say to them ironically, that's the best part of plastic. It doesn't break down in landfill. So it's actually a carbon store. It's a fossil fuel that's been dug up and put back in landfill, and will stay there for a thousand years ironically. The only good thing about plastic. So you have a challenge, in a sense, because to the public you can probably go. I'll make this breakdown product. But if we did kind of track it, if you said actually, I can make this comb, or whatever you're making. I could make this as long lasting as normal fossil fuel plastics. But I'll make it out of algae, and I will store that carbon for a thousand years. That's another way you can go. That's that's a kind of challenge for you at the moment, and we don't really have the. You know what needs to change for you to make those different decisions.

Yeah, it's and I think it's like, in terms of, we made 2 design decisions from Start. One is upstream related to upstream, which is using seaweed rather than fossil fuels or land crops as the input, material. And the other one was Phas, as the material that we're going to make that we're going to produce with that series. And that's really thinking about that end of life. And and I think you know people say, Oh, but if the waxcomb is not made of plastic, it's not going to last a lot, or if your textile, which this one is also made of seaweed with the same material as that one, if it's made like that, my T-shirt is not going to last, and you can ask your grandmother things used to last longer before the plastic come in.

And we had much more homecompost as well and better ways to deal with it. So I think that it, for me at least, is their realization that there is no such a thing as things lasting forever. You know it's good to get the carbon make something but the carpet or this textile of their waxcomb. At some point we need to find a solution for that. And I think for those working on the material space. It's very important to give the optionality of either going to recycling or going to compost now. Us alone. We're not going to solve the problem like, for instance, Ulu does not want to go to single-use packaging, yet people say, why not work on single use in packaging. That's where they need Phas.

The issue there is that we need 1st to scale composting. So not only home composting, but also community composting where the Phas and the food waste can go into, because otherwise you have the seaweed grabbing the Co. 2 becoming a product. And then that product ends up on the landfill, where that carbon is released as methane, and the methane is more powerful as a gas than the carbon so overall. We do not want either your food or your biological materials to end up on the landfill, so we need to make landfill something of the past. But the interesting thing about what I think Peter was talking about earlier. Where you talk about this becoming a carbon store. Is this the next step? Because if we take it in to our product. We store it for 20 years. We put it into compost. Essentially what you get. There is a biogenic process which is neutral. So it doesn't create any more carbon dioxide. It just releases it through the, you know, in a perfect composting situation. It releases it. But, Peter, you're talking about the next step which is going? No, no, no, we're not releasing, we're storing it.

Do you think that's do you think we're actually able to do that like? What? What products can we really? And how long do you have to store it for? Like, if I'm going to say my roofing panel is made out of algae. How long do I have to prove that that's stored for 100 years? A 1,000 years do I have to prove that my great grandson will have this roofing panel? No, no, so so that there's options. So there's another plastic that this one is seaweed based, and that one is permanent plastic. So if that's put into landfill, it stays there, and it doesn't break down quickly.

There's a lot of options for us to use landfills that don't make methane as vaults, so that if things don't break down we can store that carbon, and it's out of the atmosphere. It's not functional. It's not useful, but at least it's stored out of the atmosphere. I think a lot of the plastics we need to be using is ones that can be repurposed. So you take this plastic. You use it for 10 years as a chair, you chip it, and you remould it into a tabletop, and you use it for another 10 years, but if it does break down, you're going to have that as methane, as Julia said. And so this is one of the challenges is, where do you store the carbon.

And the more carbon is stored in commodities that we need every day, the better we're going to fix the planet. So this is where carbon is now seen as a good guy. If we can stick it into products, permanent products. And Alex, as I said, you've done the white paper on this.

Is this something that is government thinking about this? Is there kind of conversations happening about this stuff, or are we like, how far ahead are we looking here? Yeah. So I think there's conversations happening around particular circularity, right? I think everyone in the last couple of years has become very familiar with the term like circular economy. I feel like a few years ago, maybe Pre Covid. We didn't even know that that was a thing, but I think circularity is certainly a thing that's becoming more prevalent. And how can we start to introduce biological processes as a part of that circular process.

I think, in terms of using some of our like, what we call nature-based solutions, which is, you know, can we implement something like algae that helps us to treat wastewater, and then also turn that into a product that stores carbon. It's becoming, I think, more at the front of people's minds, and we're starting to see it more and more pop up in government policy in places like the US. This has been happening for a really long time, and they put, I'm not joking, billions of dollars behind implementing these solutions at scale.

So we have a blueprint, for how countries can take this and scale it and implement these solutions and start to make massive changes. So I think it's happening. But I think one of the things that we were talking about beforehand was, you know, we talk a lot about solutions. I think that's one of the big things that a lot of these people on the panel have in common is we talk about solutions right? But you can talk about solutions till the cows come home. If people don't know that there's a problem, then they're not going to start investing in the solution. So I think it's almost like, sometimes we have to take a step back and start talking a little bit more about the problem, and why there are certain things that are solutions, and why Australia might be perfectly positioned to innovate in these solutions. Then it starts to become more of a thing that we can start to see happen and change and make a difference.

Well, I personally find algae, and I've learned a lot about algae tonight, and I find it fascinating, and I'll be watching algae for a great deal for the rest of the future. Now let's go to the audience here, and...

My God! Like algae, it has grown while we've been having this conversation. It's massive. So put your hand up. If you have a question and we'll try and get a microphone to you, all right. So...

We've got a question over here. We'll go over this side.

Hello.

Is algae related to wastewater treatment plants in any way?

As in used in wastewater treatment plants.

Yeah, it is. There's a couple of places in Australia, where they're using algae to polish the last stage of wastewater treatment. So suck up those last bits of nutrients before it goes into rivers and is re-released as like safe water, and I think in the States it's been used for a very, very long time, and then they take that algae and turn it into things like printer ink on Patagonia swing tags. So you're saying that the saying you can't polish a turd is wrong, thanks to algae.

Yes, this is amazing. We're going to have to change sayings as well. This is what about polish? A turd, unless it's with algae. Yeah, there you go. There's a t-shirt for your scientists. Quick! Hands up!

Do you want to grab it, sir? Do you want to take it up to the second row there, so we'll go there next. No, no. Are you okay?

Yes, I'm wearing an a made of nylon flowers.

And I want to know whether I could make these out of algae rather than nylon.

You've got the ream in front of you. Yeah. Okay, well, that's that's a cellulose-based product that's come from seaweeds. So yes, we could, we could make it. Julia's got a swatch of fabric. So yes, absolutely in a heartbeat.

And this is it, the bioplastics can generally make the same things, and they can look the same way and replace it. And that's their power.

But it's also the difficulty, for you know, a system going forward. We've got to be able to distinguish between them. You know...

I got a question up here. Yes, sir.

Madam, I can't even see you, but I have no idea who you are. I'm an old fogey born in the 1940s. Everything was made to last, or it came out of nature. So it didn't cause the problems that we have these days. I've been looking at waste issues for since 1993,

And to me, it seems that we need to put a value on products when we buy them.

I would like to know what you think about it.

If we buy products, that there's a carbon price as a deposit, and it needs to be a meaningful deposit, and when the thing cannot be repaired we return it. We get our deposit back.

Just like with bottles.

But industry must take it back. Industry must be responsible for their waste. It is not our waste.

I mean, I think it's called extended producer responsibility. Yes.

Look, where are we moving? There has been an you know, kind of...

And look into extended producer responsibility in Australia. It's done at a very limited level. Is that from anyone on the panel? Is that an important part of making a step forward is bringing in this extended producer responsibility where companies have to take back their products and deal with it at the end of life.

Absolutely. There was a perfect point taken by sorry the the person I didn't remember the name.

Yes.

When we are looking and when we are thinking through the circularity approach? No. So when we are going through the air, zero so refuse completely. No, maybe in here. So also refusing is the first step. No, don't do it, don't build it, don't buy it. And then you go over, then rethink, and then you're coming to the repair, refurbish reuse, and then recycle.

When we think it through, then at the end, we must admit that it leads to new business models and the new business model is that we are not. And and this is just hypothetical, that we at the end, we are not selling products. The industry is not selling products, they are leasing them, or they are, so they stay the owner, and with the responsibility, of course, when it goes through the old R. 9 topics that the industry at the end needs to take the product back, or at least to be responsible for the materials used after at least this life of this product. And I totally agree to this. What we just said.

Yes, it certainly. It enforces. Oh, sorry going to go.

And I, I would like just to name that we are that the industry goes into this direction. And I, I would like to give you 2 examples, the automotive industry goes into this direction.

So when I look on the project, Catina X, it's it's, of course, that's a more and a European project. But here the complete cycle needs to be applied. So the circularity cycle. So the automotive industry is getting to be responsible for taking back their product, and also from the industry I just bring this. This is our product. We are laser printing on QR code on it.

And with this QR code, we have a digital twin of the product which allows us to identify our products during their lifecycle. When the customer scans them, they receive recommendations based on the product's health situation—whether it should be repaired, refurbished, or recycled, and where to do so. We are actively pursuing this direction and taking actions accordingly.

That would make it a lot easier if it was a QR code on things, so we could figure out what to do with it. That's great. Let's move on to another question from the audience. We've got one here in the blue.

I thank you very much for this evening, and I really applaud all of you working on solutions at the production end. The real issue, though, is what we do with it at the waste end. The segregation seems to be the issue. All of the products you're discussing will get mixed in with plastics and metals and end up in landfill.

I’ve spent a lot of time visiting waste transfer stations and landfills, and even staff at those places cannot recognize the different products, so everything just gets pushed into a big hole. Isn’t that where the challenge lies? Doesn’t this really affect the viability of your products if there isn’t a meaningful process at the end?

Yes, that's a very good question, and I take it personally because I'm an ocean scientist. I started by looking at wildlife and finding so much plastic. Then I looked into waste management in places like Indonesia and saw children surrounded by plastic.

You realize that addressing the problem upstream is crucial. For instance, with a container for cosmetics, if it's made of black plastic, it might be compostable or recyclable in certain ways, but not easily. If it ends up in landfill, it’s problematic. We need to change the materials and address recycling issues. Bioplastics could disrupt plastic recycling or contaminate compost, adding to the problem. Food waste is massive, with methane release contributing to the issue.

Making the feedstock easier to process—whether at home, business, or government level—is vital. Extended producer responsibility means companies need to take back products and manage their end-of-life. If everything gets mixed together, it becomes an absolute nightmare. So, addressing this issue involves improving upstream solutions and making end-of-life processes more effective.

Hi! My name is John Phipps. I have a question for Peter Ralph about the potential for algae to be used as a feedstock for biochar or hydrochar, and whether that process can be carbon negative.

Yes, absolutely. There are many opportunities with biochar using algae, specifically seaweed. However, biochar is often seen as a last step in the process. It’s a low-value product compared to high-value products made from algae. But biochar is important for carbon storage, increasing soil carbon, and is definitely a part of future solutions.

I want to hear more about how the leasing model of the economy with plastic recycling will work. Can I lease some piping hot pants?

Not at the moment, but the fashion industry is exploring leasing and renting clothes. People might be more comfortable leasing higher-cost items rather than swimwear, for instance. The leasing model tends to work better for higher-cost or occasional items.

There are also take-back schemes and new technologies for recycling textiles. For example, removing polyester from T-shirts and hoodies can help apply circular design principles. Recycling textiles to textiles is challenging due to the volume needed and sourcing issues. Technologies like Samsara Eco in Australia are recycling nylon to nylon, which is promising.

If people knew their track pants were made from fossil fuels, would they choose something without polyester? I’ve always hoped so. We once did a stunt showing people that their clothing was made from oil, and they were mystified.

They were doubly mystified by it. So no, I think most people it's like people are coming to terms with this. Now, when you talk about polyesters and this kind of stuff. People do not know the next process. I mean, people in this room probably do. But it's not the major thing. So that's part of the education process that has to go on as well. Yeah.

We'll go to the audience. We've probably got time for one to two more questions. Yes, so you've got the mic there. Yes, yeah. Hi, a question about scalability. So we're at around 50 gigatons per year of emissions in terms of carbon dioxide equivalent.

Even by mid-century, the net in net zero is perhaps 10 billion tons a year of drawdown that we need to do so. How well can these algae-based solutions scale, because it feels like an awful lot of plastic combs.

I don't think we're solely relying on the plastic combs. I mean, that's doing about 10 billion gigatons. No, I'm kidding. Well, I think there's three parts to that one. Do we have a choice? No, we have to do something.

Two, I don't think algae is the only solution to all of this. There are a lot of other solutions out there, but I think it has a really important part to play. And three, yeah, they're totally scalable. Like when we think about it's not just. And this is why it's so exciting. Right? It's not just about plastic combs. It's about new fabrics. It's about new sources of food. It's about new animal feed. It's about aviation fuel, you know. These are all industries that are huge in terms of their emissions and are going to have to find a solution really, really quickly, and it might not be about completely substituting out every single carbon-emitting product that they're using. It's that kind of step change thing. But you know, I think when we look at it, they are scalable. It's going to take a lot of other solutions packed in there as well. But we also don't have the choice. You know. There's no looking back now, the only way to go is mitigation, and when this is such a great option, particularly when it targets so many different industries, it's completely viable.

Can I ask a question on the kind of financial model? Because when you start saying we can store carbon here, some people, some environmental people, will start getting suspicious because they're like, you know. Obviously the question of storing carbon has been, hey, we're going to build a gas plant in Western Australia. We're going to store carbon through this mechanism. It hasn't worked, or whatever. But you know, sometimes it's seen as the people who are the fossil fuel polluters are using it as an excuse for continuing their business model.

How do we ensure that the storage of carbon in algae is done by subtracting something from the atmosphere that doesn't need to be done or is not linked to just continuing the business model of carbon polluters?

I'll take that bullet. I do apologise last minute bullet. So so this CCS carbon capture and storage we've got to move to carbon capture and use. And that's what we've been talking about. Today it's all about how to use the carbon as opposed to store it.

The other thing is the elephant in the room. Alex touched on it, and this comes back to the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. We've got to start thinking about fuels so sustainable aviation fuel. The US is looking at 3 billion tons of biomass they need to find by 2030. So this is a whole raft of biomass, algae and seaweed is in that puzzle.

And this is not taking the carbon out of the atmosphere. But it's replacement. So we're going to create sustainable aviation fuels, using biogenic sources, not fossil sources. That carbon is going to come out of the atmosphere, go into a sustainable aviation fuel, get used and go back in. But that's going to at least stop us taking the original fuel from the ground. So I think at scale, we can address some of these big problems and start mitigating the issue with warming the planet.

That's good. I don't know about you, but I feel more positive after this conversation. There are many more questions here. Unfortunately, we're going to have to wrap now, but our panelists, apart from Gunter, will be outside afterwards, as you can ask some questions there. I'd like to thank. Please put your hands together for our panelists, Gunter, Peter, Ralph, Amy Lowe, Julia Heisner, and Alex Thompson.

Thank you so much. There'll be drinks in the foyer if you're online, drinks in the foyer are not guaranteed. But you will, if you're in the room they are. So thanks for coming along to what was a fascinating conversation. Really appreciate it.

Thanks, Craig, and from UTS, thank you to all of you for coming tonight. We really appreciate your support, and I also wanted to thank the team that brought us together. So Jo and her team so have a great evening and thank you very much.

Well, a very good evening to you all on this glorious spring evening in Sydney. Thank you so much for coming out of your homes and your offices to be here this evening. I hope you're well fed and watered and bathroomed before this gets underway. I tried to go and get a drink, but there's too many of you queuing up.

So enjoy your drinks. Tonight.

We're here for the Global Game Changers event. It's called Faking It.

And it's really dedicated to major world challenges that we all know that the planet is facing and even our local communities.

And us as individuals around AI, gen AI, information integrity and the law, which is really quite a heady mix when you think of it.

But I think we can all feel the day-to-day real-life implications of this stuff and I suspect that's why so many of you have turned out tonight to listen to this wonderful panel of experts.

To begin with though, I'd obviously like to honour the ancient traditions and people of this land.

I'd acknowledge that we're meeting on Gadigal land, part of the Eora Nation.

And I pay my respects to the traditional custodians, elders both past and present and I hope you'll join me in that as well.

We're in the Great Hall here at UTS, a full auditorium.

So thank you very much for turning up. And online as well to those of you watching far and wide, 1,000 viewers, I'm told, around the world. So it's great to have you with us here as well.

My name's Hamish McDonald. I'm your host for this evening. I'm a journalist. I think about this stuff all the time.

In part because the business that I work in feels a little bit like it's crumbling beneath us, in part because you don't trust as much And because the business model seems to be disintegrating. So I feel it keenly.

And I also want to understand what the future might look like.

A bit about the order of proceedings this evening and I should remind you, please keep your phones off or on silent.

you'll have an opportunity for some questions at the end. We'll get some microphones out and we'd ask you to stick up your hand when the time comes.

Not yet, mate. We haven't had the panel yet.

But great to see there's some enthusiasm.

First of all, we are going to hear from the Vice-Chancellor of UTS, Andrew Parfitt.

Well then, we'll also hear from Michael Davis, who is going to, I sense, in a sense, bring us up to speed with the key issues.

This is obviously such a huge area of change. It's sometimes hard to distill it all and put it into one single picture.

But Michael's going to attempt to do that in under five minutes for us.

tonight. Good luck. Then we'll have our discussion with this wonderful panel of experts, all with different areas of knowledge and research and understanding both internationally and government, in business.

as well as industry and research. I think it's a really wonderful collection of minds that you're going to hear from tonight and I hope we'll really add insight and value to your understanding of these issues.

But first of all, I'm going to introduce Michael. He's a research fellow at the UTS Centre for Media Transition.

He was formerly a regulatory policy advisor on online information, disinformation, impartiality and commercial influence in news.

the Australian Communications and Media Authority, which I assure you is far more interesting than the title suggests.

But would you please put your hands together for Michael Davis? Thanks so much, Hamish. Yes, in fact, it's a fascinating area.

And look, first of all, I'd like to play a message from the Vice Chancellor.

who unfortunately couldn't be here tonight.

But he would like to send his welcome to you.

Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the University of Technology Sydney into the latest installment in the Global Game Changers series Faking It.

AI misinformation and the law. I apologize for not being able to join you in person for what promises to be a very engaging and lively discussion.

Today, we confront the pressing issue of generative AI and its role in manipulating information.

As deepfakes and AI-generated misinformation spread online, they disrupt elections challenge democratic processes.

and infringe on rights globally. This event is crucial as it brings together experts to address these challenges and explore potential solutions to mitigate their insidious events.

I would like to recognise the Faculty of Law and the Centre for Immediate Transition in the Work.

they are doing in this important space.

Our university is deeply committed to addressing the challenges posed by AI and misinformation We are proud to support initiatives that foster critical discussions on innovative solutions.

Thank you for joining us. I trust you will enjoy this critical discussion with our distinguished panel of speakers.

All right, so some of you might have picked up that there was something a little off about that video.

It was in fact entirely produced with AI, including the script.

And yeah, I mean, what does that tell us? I think one thing that we want to think about here is how easy it is to produce a deep fake video Like this. So what I'm going to talk about to begin with is What the threats of generative AI are to do with information integrity.

And the law, what can the law do to address some of these threats.

So let's think about what the threats might be. When ChatGPT was first released, there was a lot of hype and fuss about hallucinations, about potential existential threats.

about the forthcoming singularity and potentially the end of mankind.

humankind, I should say.

Now… In my view, these are not the real threats. And once the hype died down, we found some of this discussion really to drop away. And we started to become concerned about, I wouldn't want to call them prosaic threats but more narrow threats in kind of narrow spaces.

We've seen, of course, anyone involved in higher education has seen no doubt the use of generative AI to hallucinate sources in student essays.

But I don't think the real threat is hallucinations.

we've seen in the law some lawyers hallucinating cases in their submissions to court.

Again, embarrassing.

perhaps not the real threat.

I think the real threat and the real threat Those examples point us to that.

is in fact us and how we use generative AI. So the real threat is not really in the technology.

It's just a tool, but in how we use that tool.

Let's have a look.

at some specific areas of threats.

I think the first one is that AI is cheap.

for the user. It's not cheap.

for the planet, as we're becoming aware.

But for any individual user, it's very easy to use and costs Next to nothing.

So this is our recipe for our recipe The Vice Chancellor deep fake.

A one-minute video from YouTube.

Probably fairly low quality of the vice chancellor. One still photograph actually taken from the video.

10 seconds of voice also taken from the video And that particular video did take five days to make because The Faculty of Engineering and IT, Qing Lan, thank you for making the video for us.

They wanted to do a good job.

But he did say he could make it in a couple of hours.

He also made it with freely accessible open source models.

Right, let's think about what the relative… cheapness of AI, what the implications of that might be.

NewsGuard, which is an organisation that monitors misinformation online found that within three months of the release of ChatGPT, 49 websites were producing AI-generated news content.

And that's now over 1,100.

These churn very high volumes of material and in some cases they're created almost entirely by generative AI.

with no human oversight.

Here's an example.

County local news.

And you can see here in the article, this is the beginning of the article.

on a column called Death News.

An attempt at local news.

You can see that the prompt that's gone into the model here is producing what we take to be common responses from AI models when they come up against the filters that have been built into them in order to safeguard users.

Sorry, I cannot fulfil this prompt as it goes against ethical and moral principles.

Vaccine genocide is a conspiracy theory that is not based on scientific evidence.

And so on. As an AI language model, it's my responsibility to provide factual and trustworthy information.

Is it? This use of AI is now commonly known by such epithets as AI slop.

and pink slime in a reference to the emulsified meat product used to bulk up mincemeat.

You can see here that there's clearly no human oversight of the content.

And it's also being used to propagate misinformation.

But for what purpose? If you cast your minds back to the 2016 US election.

You might recall that there was a series of Macedonian fake news farms which were producing content targeting users in the US.

In order really to generate advertising revenue.

So they engage in the US political discourse.

They encourage… people taking part in that discourse.

to get fired up.

to get angry, to click through on articles.

And in that way generate revenue for the people in Macedonia.

Now, if you can imagine a fake news farm in Macedonia being a profitable business model.

then AI-generated fake news farms are going to be even more profitable. The cost is almost zero.

So I think there's no need to pay workers here.

These sites can essentially just sit on the internet waiting for visitors to arrive.

Like some kind of yet to be encountered parasite.

Let's turn now to a recent use of deepfake technology.

in the context of the US election.

Today is today.

And yesterday was today, yesterday.

Tomorrow will be today, tomorrow.

So live today.

So the future today will be as the past today.

as it is tomorrow.

All right, the first thing to note again is that the video is, if you look closely enough.

quite clearly fake, right? So the problem is not really about deception.

And I think that goes to the previous point as well.

Just as the previous slide is a kind of misinformation, but its success is not really founded on its ability to deceive.

And that's certainly the case here as well.

So videos like this often take off online not because they're convincing or deceptive.

but because they act as a form of political signaling.

generally to in-groups, to like-minded people.

This is an important difference between political deepfakes and, say, things like financial scams, right? Australians are losing… quite a lot of money to financial scams. In fact, a reported $43.4 million.

in losses from scams on social media this year alone.

And research by Mastercard shows that one-fifth of Australian businesses and one-third of Australians have been targeted by deep fake scams in the past 12 months.

In that case, I think.

where there is a need for deception, we might find that as the technology gets better.

that problem is exacerbated.

But in the political arena, that's not what we're seeing at all.

The second thread I want to look at is that we really just want to have fun.

Here's an Australian example.

from Queensland politics.

This is an ad posted online by the official Liberal National Party account on TikTok.

of the ex-Queensland Premier Saving meals.

All right. Funny, maybe.

Again, it's obviously fake video, right? In the sense that it's an AI-produced video that impersonates a real person.

But it's not really deceptive.

Nor is it misinformation.

Instead, rather than a deep fake, this is often what's called a shallow fake.

Where it's obviously fake.

But it still serves a political purpose.

And particularly, it generates user engagement.

online.

Here's another example, again from the US.

All right, this is clearly a form of amusement, right? In a way, a kind of political cartoon But a kind of political cartoon that's been democratized, right? Anyone now can be a political cartoonist.

by using generative AI.

to create a political image or video.

This video was in fact posted by both Musk and Trump in a kind of signalling Not to each other, but to their supporters.

Paradoxically, an inauthentic video that conveys a message of authenticity.

to their followers.

I think this points us to a key characteristic of contemporary political discourse, especially online.

The third threat is that we don't care about the truth or not nearly enough.

Another example from the US election.

Again, posted by Trump.

Again, clearly fake.

There's no deception here, right? But what's important is the political message.

Again, a kind of political cartoon signalling to the follower base.

Here's an earlier example from the beginning of last year.

Which, interestingly was created by Elliot Higgins, who was one of the founders of Bellingcat, an investigative news outlet. Now, he was just fooling around with generative AI models at home or in the office, who knows. And he created a series of images depicting Trump's arrest.

Now, Trump was arrested, of course, on fraud charges, but these images were produced before that happened.

In a way they depict something that's true, something that did happen.

But clearly, they lack authenticity.

The point I want to make here is that creating the video is one thing and sharing the video is another thing.

And here you can see the importance of people with influence, large follower networks, media figures, politicians.

in propagating these images and videos through the information ecosystem.

Again, deception is not the main issue.

Instead, the images serve to amplify polarised discourse taking over the online political sphere and reducing it to memes and hot takes.

All right.

This strange diagram is a visualization of an online echo chamber.

generated from Twitter data.

It shows how information travels mostly within partisan groups.

And less often between them.

On the right hand side you have people in the right-wing ecosystem on the left-hand side.

people in the left-wing ecosystem.

This study actually found that there's a high correlation between vulnerability to misinformation and partisanship.

But they found that this was true on both sides of the political spectrum.

Although it did find stronger partisanship on the right and you can see that.

In fact, in the diagram.

Another well-known study.

So that false statements propagated much faster and further on Twitter than true statements.

In fact, where the truth rarely reads more than 1,000 people.

The top 1% of false news routinely reached between 1,000 and 100,000 people.

And I took the truth about six times longer.

as falsehood to reach 1,500 people.

Well, what does this tell us? Well, other studies have shown that people often do not believe that misinformation is true.

They're not deceived by misinformation, but they share it anyway.

for other reasons, mostly because it serves some kind of purpose of reinforcing their political identity.

signalling like-mindedness.

That is mostly to people who already agree with them.

The fourth thread is kind of a corollary of the others.

That's that we lose interest in the good stuff.

Wikipedia is one of the most visited websites in the world.

Despite its reputation among school teachers.

He's pretty reliable on the whole and for the most part.

Indeed, it's kind of like a lone lighthouse, a beacon of the old school open internet.

where people come together to work on a common goal.

in the service of open knowledge.

This has led Australian journalist Richard Cook to call it the last best place.

on the internet.

It's also one of the biggest sources of data for training generative AI models.

It is after all freely available to anyone who wants to use it.

The biggest worry for many Wikipedians, those in the Wikipedia community, over the rise of Genida AI, is that its potential success might lead to a gradual decline in commitment to Wikipedia.

That's from the public to Wikipedia in maintaining the site So for Wikipedians to maintaining the site and from the public and using it as a knowledge source.

and donating to Wikipedia to keep it going.

Another worry is that, like a snake eating its own tail, generative AI may in fact devour itself.

As generative AI output is used to populate Wikipedia articles and other online content.

And then AI is in turn trained on that. You get what is often called model collapse.

Quite quickly where there's a danger that Well, the AI model essentially starts outputting gobbledygook very quickly.

But I think perhaps more likely and perhaps more likely Perhaps worse is that knowledge is sequestered into proprietary domains or what's known as walled gardens.

Here information might be reliable more or less.

given the propensity for hallucinations and bias.

But it certainly won't be free.

So what can we do to intervene? Can regulation play a role? Can we save what is best about the internet? Or is it doomed to meme fakery? and degraded and angry politics.

A message here from Selena Dekelman.

Chief Product and Technology Officer at the Wikimedia Foundation.

There's nothing inevitable about new technology.

we can prioritize human understanding and contribution of knowledge back to the world.

as a key goal of generative AI systems.

And with that, I'd like to open it up.

See the panel.

Thank you very much, Michael.

I'll, if I may, I'll keep the introductions fairly short. They're all very impressive and they all have massive CVs which I'm sure you can all Google. Monica Attard is the co-director of the UCS Centre for Media Transition, a journalist of some 40 years.

Of course, best known from her work on the ABC and she was a Russia correspondent for, I think, two occasions.

well acquainted with the history of disinformation. Karina Chapman is the Deputy Chair of ACMA, the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

She's also been a senior executive and strategic advisor at some of Australia's biggest media companies.

Cullen Jennings is here. He's the Chief Technology Officer For the American multinational digital comms giant Cisco Systems.

And he helps build collaboration systems used on the internet and strives to make simple, trustable communications available to everyone, which sounds like a fantastic idea.

And Sophie Farthing is also with us, head of the policy lab at the Human Technology Institute at UTS.

Previously, Sophie was the Senior Policy Advisor to the Australian Human Rights Commissioner and of course Michael joins him as well. Would you please welcome them all? I'm tempted as I am to just sit and watch shallow fakes all night. We've got some pretty… serious stuff to discuss. And I thought, Karina, I'd start with you and just some news over the past 24 hours about the misinformation bill here in Australia falling over. It's been consigned to that very deep filing cabinet somewhere underneath Parliament House.

We're all legislation that never makes it through goes.

How should we view it? Is this a sign of just how difficult it is actually for government to get ahead of the curve or even keep up with the curve on some of this stuff.

Thanks, Hamish. Yes, I… The bill had a very interesting passage and a very difficult passage.

And I think it shows that Michael here was demonstrating that when you have true AI where you can see real harms that are clearly illegal.

I'm the classic example is where the Online Safety Commissioner deals with deep fake sexualized material, which is clearly illegal. Pornography, child… child pornography, et cetera, et cetera. It's very easy for governments to deal with those issues. They are illegal.

And as we know, AI exacerbates them.

But when you come to that grey area, which I think is misinformation, which is probably a term which I think will probably now be abolished trash heap. I mean, I prefer to think of false information might be a more accurate way of describing it, but also disinformation, bots and clearly foreign interference, those types of issues.

I mean, the problem here, which is going to now be a problem going forward if the government or the next government, any other government wants to deal with this.

is that it's been so tainted by an enormous political debate which a lot of it didn't have a huge amount to do with the actual bill itself. There was a lot of, I'm not going to say the cliched line, there was a lot of false information about that bill.

that was quite inaccurate. It definitely had flaws.

But it just shows that once you get caught into a political maelstrom of freedom of speech.

it's very hard to have a reasonable debate. So you've been involved in that debate, you were giving evidence at the Senate hearings into it.

Are there clear lines in your mind between the freedom of speech argument the weaponisation of disinformation for clear strategic or political purposes or even interference. Can you delineate these things or is there now just such a mess of information? It's such a polluted information ecosystem that it does all blend and you end up with outcomes like this.

Yes, I think that's right.

I mean, you can't start from a position of freedom of speech and communication is… is absolute. Now, in a way, I have a problem saying that personally because I ran… the media company's right to know campaign for freedom of speech for about five years but Once you get into this maelstrom of the grey area, as I say, it's easy to say that the illegal material should not be there, and that is not a breach of freedom of speech to have it removed.

But once you move into material that is debatable. Where do you go? Now, from a government's point of view.

the front part of that bill, which has now been removed, now been abolished.

is with transparency. And I think that's the starting point.

That's the bit that we're missing. We don't actually know what's going on in line half the time.

The digital platforms, Meta, X, they tell us that they look at material, they tell us that they take certain action in relation to that material.

Maybe they do, maybe they don't.

The main priority of that bill was actually to try and pin the digital platforms down.

and get them to be open and transparent about what they're actually doing and what their policies are.

So if we're thinking about this in the future, Michael.

And obviously those technologies are not static. What's possible is not static. It's developing faster than probably any of us can imagine, is there something fundamental that governments need to do around placing a duty of care on whoever it is that's developing the technology or deploying it.

Thanks, Hamish. Yeah, look, I do think, and to follow on from what Karina was saying.

The key issue here is accountability, right? That we're trying to make digital platforms accountable for what they already do.

So quite clearly people are uncomfortable with the government regulating online speech and with good reason, even though our democratic traditions are strong.

That's a reason they're strong, right? But can I just pull you up on that? Don't governments already regulate free speech? Of course, of course they do, yes. As Sonia said. It's not absolute.

Say again. So what's the big difference? Why does the internet get free reign where the rest of the world doesn't really? Yeah, that's a problem. And that's a problem of accountability. So where a traditional media is already subject to accountability mechanisms through press councils, through ACMA, And so on. And also has a kind of tradition of good practice, right? You don't find that online on digital platforms have come out of nowhere to become the biggest companies in the world.

And they've achieved that by essentially also through kind of lacuna of accountability and a conscious decision to ensure that no one else has a say in what they do with online content.

And I think what we're seeing is a definite movement towards accountability there.

Because platforms always moderate content. We wouldn't go on platforms if they didn't moderate content.

They would just be like a sea of mush, like we saw this pink slime of pornography and whatnot.

We need moderation for platforms to be useful. And they understand that. That's actually their business model.

But that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be unaccountable for the way that they operate and what they do with the content that we put online.

They need to be accountable to their users.

That's the first point. And government… Government's role is to be the intervening party to ensure that they are transparent to their users about what they're using. I just want to pull you up there just to sort of insert maybe the Elon Musk-ish argument that might be made to that is, well, our users are telling us they want it because they keep logging on and subscribing and using it and we're growing.

So who are you, Government, to tell us that you know better. Well, that's right, which is why the obligations that probably should be on X and Elon Musk Tell us what you are doing.

Now, ex and Elon Musk have started a community forum where allegedly you can go on and counter information, but How do you make a complaint to X? That's where there is a role for accountability. But that duty of care thing is really interesting because this has become a very strong theme.

Which should be very interesting to lawyers.

Because they want to do one in relation to children, safety online, to accompany the under 16 ban.

I think they'll end up looking at an AI generally.

They may look at it in this context.

It's a road and it's a missed thing in gambling. I think it was one of the recommendations in the Murphy Committee.

In a legal sense. Scams as well. Scams, sorry, Scams has got one. It's a road that the government can punt it down the road to the lawyers, I think, in many ways.

Sophie, what happens to society if this all… kind of crumbles in the way that I guess maybe we're imagining based on some of the scary graphics that Michael showed us but But where we see some of this heading.

And I think we should be scared. We should be concerned. We are talking about a particular bill, but I think one thing that really has arisen out of this debate, and I'm a human rights lawyer, so I take a human rights perspective. It is really important to talk about accountability. And some work we did with the Home Affairs Democracy Task Force, they released a report a couple of months ago And they have some pretty astounding facts and figures in that report talking about Australian democratic resilience.

And the fact that democracies are in decline, like liberal democracies that we all enjoy.

there are less now than there were 15 years ago. I think something like, you know, we've got, what, 2 billion people or something voting this year.

70% of the global population lives under autocracy. So what we're all feeling, this discomfort we're feeling, the polarised debate, we've really got to unpack what that means.

Yeah, we're talking about free speech and misinformation, but what does that mean for the democracy we're all participating in? And this is why we expect governments to step in and protect that because it is freedom of expression, but it's all the things that support us putting that really important vote in the box. When we get to at election time.

You know, it's having safe spaces for active citizens to have debates. It's having trusted democratic institutions.

It's having information that we can trust.

So I think there are a lot of different factors here and I think the really positive aspect of, you know, obviously there'll be some disappointed ministers that they have had to drop a bill around accountability, but it's really what other panelists have already said.

if we don't get to these questions around accountability and how we do it, and it is hard.

We have a problem. To the point you're making though, Sophie, arguments have been made for years, they're still being made.

that actually all of this new technology does support many of those voices, creates different spaces or safer spaces.

It rebalances things in the favour of citizens or minorities against governments or corporations that do no good and all the rest of it.

Is it your view that that argument no longer necessarily holds water? What do you think? I think there's space for both. Two things could be true at once.

favorite thing I use with my children. I think that is really important. And I go back to being a human rights lawyer, a much younger human rights lawyer when the Arab Spring happened, you know, that was about, you know.

information online, but I think back to that, I was a human rights lawyer campaigning in London. When that happened, the realisation at that time of what social media, online safe spaces could do for democracy in a way that we hadn't seen before. I think that's the magic. We have gone a long way.

And we've gone off piste, obviously. But I often think back to, like I was in Libya and Egypt during that time and what I hear coming out of governments, Western democratic governments today sounds very similar to what the Mubarak regime was saying at that very time about Twitter.

So what's changed? Have we changed? Or have the platform's changed? I think maybe our expectations of the platforms have changed. I think it's the technology the platforms are using.

It's the scale and it's the ease. Going back to Michael's first slide there.

It's a technology that's now available It's democratizing technology and that kind of generation of information. But there's a real shift that we've had with generative AI when you can cheaply, easily generate images that have an impact. Some of those were funny.

I do agree. Dancing, Trump and Elon Musk, we all can have a good laugh at that. But I think of the way that some of these technologies are used Including, you know, thinking about AI that was used in a newsroom last year to make a Victorian MP look more womanly, shall we say, like putting that through the male gaze. So I think it's the way the technology is being used and lack of accountability around the use That's the change that we've got.

I think one of the things too that's important to understand is there's so many different layers of companies involved. There's the people who collect the data to build these models. There's the companies that build the models. There's companies that use these models to do the generative AI There's the platforms that distribute that. They all have different roles in being able to test it or detect it. But what's changed a little bit about going back to then is It's not the platform has dramatically changed. It's that the tools that people other than the platform can use to massively generate content The platform may be or may not be doing a good job of detecting and stopping that. But even if they're stopping 50% of it, it's so cheap, this goes back to Michael's point, it's so cheap to generate, even if they can, you know.

stop 999 out of 1,000.

Still, it's so cheap that getting that one through makes it possible to just flood the discourse.

And we have a much better idea. The platforms are really far more optimized this, and I mean this in a bad way of optimized.

of trying to get that attention economy going forward and keep people watching this content. So they sort of like it. Can you give me an example of that? I think that if you look, I think probably people bet in this room better to answer this than me, but you look back at the feeds that we had 10 years ago on whatever a popular social media platform was.

And then compare it to today, you'll see that you see less stuff across from your friends, less stuff broadly things. It's back to that graph we saw earlier with the red and the blue.

more polarized into these ecospheres.

Where people have optimized giving you content that even though you know you probably shouldn't follow that, you follow it anyway.

And you just stay there. You spend more time on. The average times people spend on platforms has gone up over time.

All of these things were sort of a little bit by design of the platforms, right? They wanted to do that. That's more time on the platforms was more advertising.

you're the product they're selling to the advertisers, right? It's not the other way around.

So they wanted to optimize that type of thing.

they weren't necessarily creating any of the content that was there. That was coming from all kinds of other places. So this fake information, disinformation.

The stuff of it that played well into their algorithms got promoted.

And the people who are creating it could spend as much time as they wanted figuring out which played well into the algorithms, which didn't play well into the algorithms, and which got blocked.

And there was no penalty for doing that, so they just keep doing that. And they found stuff that both played well into the algorithms and didn't get blocked.

So Monica, the… The Filipina journalist Maria Ressa, Nobel Prize winner.

talks about the mass pollution of the global information streams.

But she also talks about exactly the sort of stuff that Cullen's just been describing finding itself on essentially a level playing field with the information produced by newsrooms, authentic information.

Is the battle lost in your view? It's pretty close to it, I have to say. It's a bit of a depressing thought, but I think it's really, really difficult for content producers that are producing verified content, factual content that is legitimate.

to disabuse people of their belief in the content, frankly, that is being produced and that is out there, particularly when it's in relation to subjects that are in the news cycle, that are current, that have got everybody talking. There was one that appeared today which was a video of Rachel Maddow from NBC. MSNBC. MSNBC, sorry. Or as Donald Trump calls them, MSDNC. That's the one.

But it was her receiving some late-breaking news about some centre that had opened in Texas to process the children who were legitimate American citizens who who may have to be housed if their parents are turfed out of the United States. And she got a little bit choked up, but this video appeared online which had her crying for an extended period of time, like crying, not even choked up, but crying.

And it kept on, it was doing the rounds on extra day for hours and hours. And despite the fact that community notes appeared below it saying.

This is rubbish. This is not true. This is misinformation.

It just kept on appearing, often without community notes. So, I mean, I think it's very, very difficult even for mainstream media to counteract the misinformation that appears because We're not trusted ourselves and nobody's reading us and nobody's watching us and nobody's listening to us.

Thanks, Monica. Sorry. I do. I knew that you wouldn't like that, Hamish, but I think it's the truth. I mean, we are losing audience. We are losing… people who have faith in us. And I get that. I mean, I think that there is a problem in journalism as well.

that we need to address, which is another matter, not the subject for today, obviously.

But it is part of it, though, right? Because the… The door is open for a conversation about whether real journalism, if you want to call it that, is doing a good job.

And so we're a bit exposed, aren't we, if we're suddenly trying to say, well, we're the answer to this Yeah, look, I mean, I think we've had, I mean, I keep saying we, even though I'm not an active journalist anymore, but I think once you're a journalist, you're always a journalist.

But I think that we've had this problem which has crept up on us. It's been 20 years in the making where our industry has been decimated, so we've lost people and we've lost resources and we've lost lost the ability to produce the kind of journalism that we've all taken pride in, then along comes social media, which is created these tribes of politically active people.

And journalism has tried to deal with that. And what we see, particularly in Australia, is that you have some media organisations that fall in on the left and some that fall in on the right, and then you've got some that are trying to battle through the middle muddy ground of the middle.

And becoming really, really unpopular in the process. And so I think what the end result of that is that some of the kind of tried and true traditions of journalism have gone by the wayside. Impartiality, objectivity, fairness. We've got to look at those things from the inside before we can expect our audiences to really believe what we're giving them.

Okay, I want to move a bit to sort of the future and to the regulation bit, but I wonder, Cullen, if you can help me understand a little bit the business model of some of this stuff, because Michael talked about possible system model collapse, I think you called it.

We hear a bit about shitification of the internet. There's just so much crap that maybe we'll all just turn off.

Now, I want to give you an example, because I am a journalist, but sometimes I appear on Facebook selling crypto.

And… And recently I went to a chicken shop called Charcoal Charlie's.

And the guy there said to me, I watched the most incredible interview you did about crypto with Mark Boris.

who's a mortgage kind of guy.

And I was a bit confused because I didn't remember doing it.

What's the business model of that? Because it's all proliferating all over social media.

Who's making money where and how? Right. So, I mean, obviously across these platforms, there's a wide range of business models, but the predominant ones are these advertising-driven ones that we all use every day.

And they're trying to have you spend time on them. That's really what they care about. They can play more ads and those types of things.

So they are effectively paying content creators at some level to create content. And once that content is created and gets views, it has to be content that gets views.

That's great. So somebody steals your identity and moves off and starts making videos leveraging whatever brand and reputation you've developed.

They start putting those on.

that starts generating views on the platform and they get paid for those views. There's a million more complexities than that, but when it gets down to the basics, that's usually about what it comes down to.

And so one of the things that's happening right now is we're seeing all of this online content.

Not that's necessarily red, but if you just scan all of the data on the internet since 2023, A lot of it is machine generated. And this comes back to what Michael is talking about, model collapse.

When you just feed these models into themselves and let them talk to themselves, it goes crazy really quickly.

And I don't mean, it just goes bad.

So right now there's a real preference to try and use training data that you know wasn't generated by a model, so stuff that's largely came before 2023.

That's actually one of the issues of this whole space is that some of the companies that were large early companies in AI and collected tons of data before it became illegal to collect it in certain ways.

Or before some people noticed copyright violations on it.

They have access to data that probably newer companies and newer entrants won't ever get access to. Lots of people are closing off their access to data that used to be public.

For example, National Public Radio in the US, NPR, has asked none of their data be used for training. It used to be usable for training, right? So there's sort of this closing down of stuff.

And so there's a real concern about where the data is going to come from, how these companies are getting data.

But that hopefully answers a little bit of your question on where the business model of why you're seeing yourself, except not you, on the internet. So obviously there are some that argue you need to work with these companies to create whatever the regulation is. If that's the business model.

Why would you be negotiating with them to do that? Well, I think it's complicated.

All of those companies don't want the whole thing to just collapse and go away and no one to use their, everybody to leave their platform, right? I mean, there's some argument that Twitter or X, whatever you want to call it.

that is losing a lot of its viewership and stuff.

I don't think Musk cares about that.

For other platforms, they might care about losing their customers and their genuine reputation.

So there's that question of why people would want to remain trusted, why it would want to be a source that was not a harmful place, why it was a good place to go.

People would rather be YouTube than 4chan, right? One of those is much more profitable than the other.

So you see companies trying to work in some way to have some sort of regulation.

And that might be in the form of a responsible AI policy. Most companies have some, lots of the companies have some form of that.

that talks about the things you were talking about, about transparency, about being able to reveal what's happening.

But when you really get down to it, if it's just companies making up how they're going to regulate themselves.

The end thing of when they break their own rules, what will happen will be nothing.

So I don't think that that's going to be the only story in the long run. You need something more than just companies make up their own rules and follow them. That's obviously not going to work.

Karina? Yeah, I can't verify this, but I understand that on Facebook.

there's actually scam plages.

that are to warn you about scams.

So… I can validate that. Yeah, that's a very common thing. It brings trust. You bring people in. It brings viewership. It's an exciting story. You go and do it.

I mean, there was a… an airport, but that's not a new idea. There was an airport in a country I won't mention.

where there was a lot of pickpocket thieves that had a huge sign called watch out for pickpockets. And as you walked into the airport.

And everybody reached down to check their wallet. The sign had been put there by pickpockets to help you identify where your wallet was.

But regulation… It's an interesting topic that's been dealt with in so much detail around the world. And when we saw the Bretton Woods agreements But not much sense in the UK. The EU is trying to tackle it. America is to some extent.

And if you look at what Australia's doing, it's got this multi-pronged approach, which I should say no one's actually mentioned this yet but I mean… There's enormous advantages to AI and the technology that it can bring. And I think every government around the world is being very careful to balance that.

There are a number of jurisdictions who are determined to be leaders in AI and they don't want to regulate and we all know that it's globally regulated, so you can evade any legislation. I mean, here in Australia, from a news and information point of view, I think the most that the government is doing at the moment is looking into copyright issues in relation to media, but they're taking very much a high risk approach.

What are the really high risk dangers in AI.

And it's a pretty similar list at the moment than what the EU is using, biometrics.

Police and Law and Order, the things we hear the terror stories out of China.

those type of issues. And at the moment.

they're really looking at only regulating high risk. And coming down to these issues, it's all about scams.

So the scams regulation is where it's happening. But to the point you're making though, presumably governments are faced with a wall of opposition if they even talk about regulation Because the argument against is, well, you'll stifle the brilliant things that we might be able to do. Well, so you pick the problems. So that's why scams is the one that has so much traction. And I mean, if they could possibly get through all these bills this week.

that legislation might get through. But you've just been face to face with the politicians. Do they understand it enough to… Pick the problems. Well, the scams one's extremely difficult. They've picked three areas. They've picked digital platforms. They've picked banks.

And they've pitched telcos. Now, we've actually already got a code with telcos. We work with telcos on scams now to block those calls coming in.

But yes, I mean, this is always the problem. Government's always behind.

The government and regulators are always behind the game. All we can do is create frameworks. And I think what the Miss and Disinformation Bill has now shown that it's not like when I entered this game 20 years ago, we used to say, that's illegal.

You know, that's not permitted. Now you've got to come at a far more nuanced approach, which comes from everything from literacy education, working with the platforms or the banks and whoever you're working with.

and putting guardrails around it. But this government's getting quite impatient And you can see it in relation to scams.

Working with industries, running out of time, I would say.

I think you were trying to get in, Monica. Yeah, no, I was just reacting to what Karina was saying about the benefit. There are benefits to AI, big benefits.

particularly in journalism. I mean, in journalism, you know, it can save A lot of time and a lot of money, essentially, particularly in the back-end processes.

But there's this movement at the moment in big media houses to do deals with AI manufacturers.

Which, of course, is going to bring money through the door, not a lot of money, because the deals haven't been particularly lucrative.

But it does bring money through the door and it's really kind of, they're Faustian bargains. So what are the deals? What are they giving them? Well, they're giving them content.

And in return, what they're getting is the results of AI searches will provide links so they're getting audience.

And they're getting money. But it is a bit of a Faustian bargain because they're also selling whatever, I hate to say it, but whatever little trust remains in them as media organisations.

they're actually selling. And I think that is really, really problematic for an industry that needs to rebuild from the ground up.

on that front. But it struck me when I was thinking about this that whilst they're all selling their trust and they're selling their content.

There is another solution. I'm not quite sure why big media houses haven't banded together to create their own LLMs.

You know, to create the, so they're not selling their content to somebody else. They're not bargaining that away, but they're… their banking on their own they're banking on themselves.

And they're creating a system where people can, an LLM that can be used to get verified information, real information.

And in fact, we are seeing that in Europe, for example, where In some countries the news organisations which cooperate.

more than is the case in Australia, have actually banded together to do that. Yeah, in Australia the problem is, half the problem is competition between media houses.

as it is in the United States. It's really hard to see media houses here cooperating with each other, try and get them to the same meeting. It's almost impossible.

Michael or Cullen, I don't know who's best to answer this. Are there many examples, good examples.

of where AI is being used to actually resolve or tackle any of these problems.

I can leave that one to Cullen. No one wants to answer this. I mean, scans. I mean… There are millions and millions of scams getting thrown in this country, but there are millions and millions that have been stopped.

And it's by AI. And telecommunications companies for all of their work, huge amount is done by AI. And so is there any reason, Callum, why that couldn't be turned on mis and disinformation? It can. It can help. Let me talk a little bit about what I think of happening and stopping scams.

I mean, probably one of the largest things helping on the telecom scams and all of these fake calls that we get.

is a secure caller ID of understanding who they are, which is a technology called Stir Shake, which I'm an author of.

20 years ago is when we started that work, and it's getting rolled out. It could not happen without governments going and regulate it.

started from industry. It's supported and promoted by industry.

But it would never deploy unless the regulators had told telcos they had to do it.

And it forms the basis of reputation systems and trying to center in on what these fake spam calls are. And look, I mean, what you said, the number one problem of the huge financial losses, particularly around seniors, many of them are heartbreaking.

So that's one area.

AI can help look at that, and it's being used by all the companies to try and figure out which are the bad calls, which are the good ones.

some success. It's better than it was. It's not perfect.

Similarly with email scams.

We've all gotten those emails that somebody wants to help us make a lot of money or some variant of that.

And a lot of those are filtered by your email provider. So Cisco is one of the many vendors that makes the type of systems that block those and detect those.

They're particularly important for banks and other people like that trying to detect those.

And AI is used in almost every one of those systems now to try and block and reduce those.

But that doesn't mean you don't still get those. The attackers can see both sides. They can try and send a banned message.

They have a normal email. They can see whether it gets through. So it's a real cat and mouse game, but that's certainly happening there.

And certainly AI is a technique that can be used by all of the, you know.

platforms that we're talking about here to detect LLM content and then try and figure out what to do with it.

What they want to do with it, what they'll decide to do with it is a different thing. They don't want their users all leaving because they fell into some huge scam. That's not their goal, right? Their goal is to keep their users staying there.

But that said, they're obviously letting lots of that type of data through completely with sort of full knowledge of it. And it's hard to describe, or it's hard to decide at what level How much can they do that just with AI? How much do they do that with humans? I think most of the platforms have large moderation teams But obviously not large in any sense compared to the volume of data they're putting through.

That's the problem. So if I can sort of ask you to put your Human Rights Commission hat or lens on for a moment.

I guess the conversations that we are used to having are about the individual or the group against a corporation or a government something that terrible that happened or something good that should be done.

What about if we're discussing systems? How does an individual or a small group maintain its own rights against a system that's not necessarily controlled by one corporation or regulated clearly by a government.

I think, yeah, that is a really interesting question and certainly how I look at these issues.

And I think we as a human rights lawyer.

We are really looking to the regulation that's coming out because I guess I wanted to sneak back to one point before I get into this question, but I think Hamish, you talked about regulation versus innovation. So regulation will stymie innovation.

I think one thing that we are, we're moving beyond that, move fast and break things. And I think that's a really important shift that has happened.

And there have been a few moments where we have woken up to the human rights impact. I will call the human rights impact.

of the Human Technology Institute, we talk about the humans in that.

And I think we are moving beyond really having that understanding of the choices that we have. That will be a human rights perspective as well. I think it's also We often feel, I often feel, like as a layperson in the area that I'm working in, that the big companies are running the show.

I think that often feels like that. And that's where human rights is a really important framework to bring to this because we can demand of governments for our human rights to be protected.

I might just step back just a little bit because when I talk about human rights, I talk about it really practically. I am a human rights lawyer.

which of the Human Rights Commission. And when we bring this framing and when we talk to government about how we think regulation should happen.

We talk about the human rights obligations we have under international human rights law. And they're all the things that people may not think about so much, but that's what protects our democracy.

what protects our human autonomy and our dignity, protects our right to privacy. We've had a lot of chats about that.

So I think, now I can't remember your original question, Hamish, this happens to me. I was just trying to ask really whether there's a distinction in your mind In that sort of scenario between, say, companies, institutions.

governments and then systems.

that not necessarily controlled by any one business or regulated by a government.

Yeah, I mean, that is true. And I think it's a really good distinction to make that we are making decisions about how technology is used in these systems.

But I think although there is not one particular entity in what you're talking about that is in control of everything, I think we are in control of how this technology is used and how it impacts us.

And that's why, as a human rights lawyer, you would look to government to step in or to our incredible regulators.

to step in and to look at the system as a whole. I think it's a really good point you make as well to think about technology as being part of socio-technical systems.

We've had a lot of chats about existential risk, for example. The world is going to end, which is particularly unhelpful because we need to go back to how we're making decisions about technology how we're understanding our current laws, like we've spoken a lot about laws that might be coming and how we can regulate.

We have laws in Australia.

that already apply. And this is not the Wild West where there's no legislation. So I think we need to bear that in mind as well. So thinking about that future.

Do you reckon the 14-year-olds of today that are about to have their TikTok withdrawn might have a different view of this stuff and about what human rights are.

I hope so. I hope. I think we are seeing a turn. I have a tween at home, so we have been discussing this very topic and there is a… So there's quite a lot that has to be worked out with this social media ban and going back to the positives of, there are positives of social media and I think that sometimes has been lost in this debate. There are human rights that are protected. There are safe spaces for particularly marginalised teens. The eSafety commissioner has spoken about this.

So we need to think carefully about how we ban, also about the impact of what technology is used. We don't know yet what that ban is going to look like in practice.

What's that? What that's going to mean for all human rights, particularly our right to privacy.

But I think we have a new generation, we have an opportunity here. They're talking about technology a lot differently now than they were even a few years ago.

There are shifts definitely happening.

So I'm just going to let you know that we will take some questions soon. We've got two microphones.

ready to roam around the room. So if you have got a question, you can just raise your hand and we'll try and get to you.

very soon. I wonder if I can ask you for positive ideas and solutions, answers. We've talked a lot about problems.

So briefly, I'm going to go to you first, Monica, put you on the spot.

Since you're still a journalist.

A solution.

An answer. Well, in the first place, whilst newsrooms are kind of grappling with an increasingly sophisticated kind of generic AI at the same time as looking down the barrel of generative AI that they think very, very carefully about the editorial guardrails that they need to put in place.

And the positive is that I believe based on the research that Michael and I are doing at the CMT, that that is in fact happening, that they do think very, very seriously about it.

And so that's a positive. And the second positive would be, well, it's a wishful thing, but they all kind of let down the competitive barriers and start to work together to find solutions. I know you've been out of the game too long, Monica.

Karina. From a media point of view, I think the first step is to actually be telling their readers and listeners when they're using AI would be… a great enhancement to trust.

And I think we all find that we go on social media and you see something and you think, oh, it's not true, it's fake.

Is it not? the whole trust paradigm is breaking down for those reasons. And I note that one of the other bills that the government is trying to get through this week and probably will is the Electoral Reform Communications Bill, which is not the one that's been discussed about donations and it actually has in there right at the end of the bill, it's a truth in advertising bill.

But right at the end of the bill, it has actually a requirement on For political advertising in the future in the tag.

to declare whether it's been made with AI. So I think from a media point of view.

Tell us when you're using AI. Tell us how you're using AI. Is this the bill that Clarmer doesn't like? I would suspect Clive Palmer doesn't like it. In fact, I don't think any of the crossbenchers are too keen on it. Cullen, a solution. Sorry, that's not true. They don't like the political donations, Bill.

This is a separate bill. This is the truth in advertising.

Colin, truth in advertising sounds good. So I think I agree that probably some low-hanging fruit that can make progress of industry and research and government working together is figuring out how to clearly identify AI generated content.

I think that sort of watching the Digital Market Acts in Europe and how it actually forced a bunch of companies to work together and trying to do something.

It's mostly around interoperable messaging, but I think that's an interesting model where I saw something that was happening in a regulatory environment really cause companies to do something to work together that actually made things better for all of their users.

And this is actually a sort of low-hanging fruit of probably making it better for all users.

Now, in the not so low hanging fruit, I think we move into probably a lot of these problems, like we were talking about the thing here that like.

Truth spreads extremely slowly and fake news or false news spreads very quickly or as often does. It's easy to do that way.

That comes back to the algorithms people are using to decide what to put on things. And I think that regulators asking for more transparency about how those algorithms work.

demanding more choice that users could select extremely basic algorithms in some cases.

might be an area that's actually possible to regulate and is not low-hanging fruit but would have a huge impact.

And I think that comes to sort of my last point that I think is a good thing for them to work together is that It's very hard to know. It's easy to enumerate. There's been great work on the risks and all the problems and the different scams and the economic losses and the three areas you just outlined.

But what to do about them is much harder.

There's some stuff that you can regulate and make a change. And there's some stuff that probably won't change the large tech companies at all because they'll just dissipate the risk off to someone else and you'll never be able to figure out where the problem was.

So working with the researchers in policy, but also the researchers in AI, the large tech companies and the regulators trying to figure out what is regulatable, what things could make a difference. I think that's one of the other areas.

That would be very promising to see work in.

Sophie. Can I sneak in two things? One thing I would say just quickly, I'm going to struggle to spin this as a positive, but privacy reform I think is really important. This is all Our personal information is being used to send us particular information. So I would say that is legislation, that regulation again that may go through this week that has been really well consulted on for years and that I think is really important and positive where government has gone the hard yards and really spoken and consulted properly over several years, that's really good reform.

I'd also sneak in, if anyone's feeling a bit despondent, the Taiwanese digital minister, someone called Audrey Tang.

has done some pretty incredible things encountering disinformation in Taiwan. I go and read.

really interesting approaches that actually haven't involved law but have involved people and education. They have, I was reading today, really interestingly, they have a team in each government department And when there's something that's going viral that is false information.

They have a team that has to spring into gear within 60 minutes and produce that counter narrative across all types of different forums, whether that be the president speaking on a chat show on TV or going out on social media.

I think there are, we're fortunate that we can draw from overseas examples. It's that kind of thinking that I think is the positive and exciting aspect an otherwise quite grim conversation.

Michael? Yeah, that's a great point. And I'd actually raise the work of the Australian Electoral Commission hereto in Australia which has taken exactly that kind of approach with electoral misinformation and disinformation.

in the lead up to elections and the voice referendum and so on.

really engaged approach which, you know.

meets social media users where they are. And in a kind of sometimes lighthearted way as well tries to dispel some of the illusions that they have about The fragility of electoral processes or electoral fraud and so on.

And that really does work very well.

And I think that's also a sign for traditional media if we go back to the the conversation that you and Monica were having, Hamish, about trust there and what traditional media has perhaps lost and I think What it doesn't quite have on the social media environment is that engagement and that ability to be there with the users and to be part of a user group Essentially. And in a kind of slightly disturbing follow on from that.

Some studies have shown that people actually trust.

chatbots more than they trust people.

And you might think, well, that's awful, but that actually raises some potentially quite good uses. And in fact, there was a study which tried to counteract… false beliefs about vaccines, for example, by using chatbots where people would interact with the chatbot. And it would have a conversation with them in a way that a lot of us might be frustrated by if we tried to have that conversation with with a vaccine skeptic or by someone that we're politically opposed to, for example, conversation quickly break down, quickly breaks down. And in fact.

we might find that there's an actual information positive use for AI.

All right, let's try and get to some of the questions. I saw lots of hands go up.

So perhaps if we get a microphone to this gentleman at the front, and if you can tell us your name, please, and make it a fairly quick question, please.

This fellow here.

Hi, my name is Yoon Chinwa.

Very interesting. Thank you for this informative I'm just wondering why none of the panel has mentioned about this deformation law and all that because those are the ones that are ancient law that is That's there to protect the damage.

It could be.

In my opinion, generalized to handle the new AI situation because It's like, listen to this counter and attacking each other using AI is fine. It's like in the old Wild West day that… What's the question? My question is, why is our panda doesn't look at, or the government doesn't look at the deformation That's a model to generalize.

and to modernize.

So that any damage tangible or intangible to a person can be.

identify and someone can sue Okay. Another person as well as… the actor can be identified and the enabler accessory like the… Understood. All right, we'll take our next question as well and we'll get some others. There's a gentleman here with his hand up in the blue.

Light blue? Yes, thank you so much for this discussion. It's really interesting as somebody studying media and law at the moment. I wanted to ask about meta. So it's worth 1 trillion USD on the American Stock Exchange.

If there was a proposal to make it reveal its algorithm and its algorithm is its intellectual property which is underpinning its whole net worth and its market capitalization, why would it not, why would Meta not just pull out of Australia like it did with the news media bargaining code because it would be too much at stake for it to reveal.

the IP and potentially lose market share of another business comes around copying its IP.

Did you want to have a go at that, Colin? So I don't work for Meta, but let me take a quick stab at this.

No, I think you're right that they would not want to fully reveal their whole algorithm.

I think that they would be possible to allow people to put user choice in their algorithms. In fact, they were mandated to do that in some places in Europe where they got a very different feed and you had a paid for You had to pay a monthly fee for it. So they have already done this a little bit in the past.

But revealing statistics about their algorithm, I think they'd be very willing to do, not very willing to do. They could do without impacting their market cap in any way.

And allowing people to have some choice in algorithms could happen under some circumstances. They've already bridged into that space.

So I think that that's somewhat there. No, I don't think that they're going to open source their algorithm. And look, we watch the US ask TikTok to do exactly that, and they basically declined So I think that would be a similar experience for Meta Karina, were you wanting to add something to that? No, except it's the really thorny issue is jurisdictional issues and I think every part of the Australian government is looking at it.

But you're right.

If you want to operate a business in Australia, you need to comply with Australian law.

But a lot of it is about acceding to the jurisdiction. But I just want to say on defamation, I mean, it's just too clumsy.

That's partly the problem. I mean, Twiggy Forest has been trying to sue Meta for your chicken shop problems and in interviews and is failing and is trying to run his case through California.

Which goes to your jurisdictional issues again. Again, it's a bit like GDK. I think GDK is a great idea, but It's going to be slow. And defamation is slow. It's the problem. When you say this is the ongoing issue, the jurisdictional issue, I mean, is the government conceding? Obviously, there was an attempt to rein in X earlier in the year.

Is the government effectively conceiving that it can't? Because, I mean, we blinked, didn't we, ultimately in that case? I think you're talking about the Safety Commission case. I mean, I can't… I can't talk to it because I'm not across it. No, I don't think the government has… No, they're not conceding the ground, no.

To your point, the question I think you're asking, I think there are things that many of the large tech companies would walk away from the Australian market versus do.

That is a fact. I mean, end-to-end encryption is probably one of them.

And so that is true.

But if you can work with other governments and make it worldwide, that's a bigger question.

All right, let's take another question. There's a lady at the front here. We'll get the microphone to you as quickly as we can.

If you could state your name and maybe direct your question to whoever you want. Yeah, I'm Helen Voterbeck. I'm glad we've got two ABC people here, former and… But don't worry, I won't ask you any hard questions. I was very interested to hear that in Taiwan they're focusing on educating the public.

And I also feel that education will play a very key role because we can't control these corporations.

The people, what can control them, however.

is market share. So if people become sick and tired of being scammed or just don't enjoy the experience anymore.

people will turn away.

The corporations need us to be engaged and we'll be engaged when we trust what we're getting. So it can be a two-way thing. So if we can build up trust from a school age, but also for you know adults and so on. And I can really see a role for our public broadcaster to help us understand. So to expand the role of the ABC, to educate us on what we're being exposed to. I'll put this to Monica. Sounds like it's one for you, actually, Hannah. I can't comment on behalf of anyone. I mean, I've actually just been in Finland And met the education minister there where they're teaching myth and disinformation from primary school age up and they say that it's having quite a massive impact on the broader. And I think we're pretty slow.

as we are on many, many issues, but media literacy I think is a really good example of it.

We now talk about media literacy beginning at a very young age. We're talking about it for older people who tend to be on Facebook, for example, because that's not where young people live.

We're talking about it now, but we're… we're only just talking about it. It's only been the last four or five years, I think, that we've taken it quite seriously. But it is something I agree with you, it's something that has to happen.

from a very, very early age and then again at a very, very late age for people who people who are post 60 or maybe post 70, whose well-being is tied to their presence, for example, on Facebook.

And who are being scammed and who don't understand what they're reading. And of course, if Meta does end up pulling out of news in Australia, which is quite possible.

that problem is just going to worsen. So it is something that we need to look at.

We'll get to a couple more questions. There's some hands at the back. So there's a lady in the middle.

Can you get the microphone to her? Yep.

Thanks. What's your name and what's your question and who's it for? I'm Chloe. This is just kind of for whoever can answer it, but… Do you believe that AI will have an impact on surveillance capitalism and data mining on social media sites and therefore on politics and democracy in the future? How about you have a go at that, Sophie? Yes, I think that is the answer. You've really hit on… the business model that we were talking about before. I think the shift, maybe I can tie a few of those questions together actually about that interaction with individuals And speaking about young people, digital literacy and the liability question, I think There's some really, when I said before, I think we're having a shift. I think we are. So at least we understand now what the models are. So when we talk about surveillance capitalism, we all now understand that we are not getting things for free. I think that came with the Cambridge Analytica scandal where we realised that all this personal information we're feeding into these platforms is being used because it's being monetized.

So I think we are stepping towards an understanding. I think that's been really important for all of us to understand and for everyone to say.

We're not so cool with that anymore. The other thing just on earlier questions of talking about liability, I think someone had a gentleman had a question there about there's some really interesting cases I think, that are coming out of the US that are really looking to pin liability for social media harm. So I think what we are going to, very sadly, I think we're talking about In particular, a recent case I've been reading about that didn't involve a suicide of someone who got enamored with a chat bot and character AI. So I think where we are moving towards is getting A, the understanding of how we're interacting with these systems.

And B, we're getting to some harder edged questions about liability, who is responsible for producing products, because if you buy a chatbot, it becomes a product, not just a a platform dispensing information. So I think that ties into having that understanding and having some guardrails in place.

Yes, it's having a huge impact.

I think we are stepping towards making sure it doesn't have such a negative adverse impact on all of us and the protection of our human rights.

Okay, one last question. There's a gentleman right next to the microphone, so we might just… a few rows back, just there, yeah.

Either of these two guys. You take your pick. Your name, who are your questions for, and please, please.

Okay.

Greg Porter's my name. I… became the IT director at UTS in 1991.

In early 92, I got a call from the Australian Federal Police to interview a student who'd managed with a mate and managed to hack into a couple of small US government departments like US Defence and NASA.

It's a good training at UTS, obviously.

Quite clearly. What's your question? One more second about that, but a few years later I also had a visit from the politically motivated violent crime squad.

on behalf of the US Secret Service, one of the students had happened to threatened Clinton and his wife.

And blow up the World Trade Center.

Life is an IT director at a university is a lot of fun.

What I learned at that time was that our behaviour on the net.

is quite different to our behaviour in real life.

And our sense of values is quite different.

And that is the essence of the problem that we actually have.

And there's no, and people have mentioned accountability for what we do.

I think we've actually, the horse has already bolted.

But somebody mentioned the case in Melbourne, for instance, with Channel 9 down there.

It seems to… The case there… seems to fit the Australian Government definition of negligence.

So we've got a whole lot of opportunities to press home accountability but it seems to me we're not doing it.

Now, I know we are in a lot of cases but you know.

It seems to me we're doing lots of good stuff, don't get me wrong.

The behavioural problem is still there.

How can we improve that? But we need to have law actually be more active. How to improve it? That was the question.

I might jump in on this one.

Look, I think that's true.

humans are often not nice people, right? But the problem is.

which of our characteristics are promoted? online and I think you've put your finger on it, and it goes back to a point from Cullen as well is that Often we find that engagement-driven algorithms pick up on that negative behaviour rather than the positive behaviour.

If I go back to a point in the presentation from the beginning.

about the last best place on the internet.

Wikipedia is quite different.

from Twitter or Facebook.

It's a community where people come together.

you know, kind of old school internet way They have a common goal to promote knowledge and to promote open and free knowledge.

And, you know, obviously it has problems. Obviously, there are conflicts as well between users.

But on the whole, it gets along fine, just as we remember, if we do remember what the internet was like in 2003 or four or five, right? It was a better place back then in that sense.

So there is a room for accountability for social media platforms and other digital platforms.

to make them accountable for what Renee DiResta calls the infrastructure of influence, which is this the way that algorithms interact with human behavior, interact with different actors online, malicious actors.

And so on.

to certainly distribute accountability where it deserves to be distributed.

Digital platforms are not responsible for all online problems.

users are responsible for some.

But it's how the interaction occurs that is really the key here.

And I think what we're finding is that the regulatory approach is kind of treating a lot of symptoms and trying to treat them all at once in a kind of piecemeal way.

And really, we need to get to the number of the issue, which is a general accountability for digital platforms, for AI companies and so on about the risks that they present to the public and to individuals.

We are going to have to leave it there. This has been absolutely fascinating. Thank you for your wonderful questions.

Would you please thank Monica Attard, Karina Chapman, Cullen Jennings, Sophie Farthing.

And Michael Davis, please put your hats up.

Thanks for coming tonight. Have a great evening. Good night.

Hi everybody and welcome to everyone, not just here in Australia but everyone who's Zooming in from around the world. We have just shy of 2,000 people in the room with us virtually and physically for this event this evening, which is pretty great. So, we are literally touching all points of the compass, which is fantastic. We're in the centre of something significant here. This is the first event of a major international speaker series, The UTS Global Game Changers series, that is being hosted here at UTS. The whole idea of the series is to tackle the issues that matter most today, and you can imagine, across the campus, there are lots of different opinions about what matters most today, from sciences to engineering and all the rest. But tonight, we're talking about green infrastructure. I'll get to that in just a second.

The first thing I would like to do, the way I would like to start proceedings here, is with an Acknowledgement of Country and to acknowledge the ancient land upon which we are standing. I always find this is a really serious thing. I mean, as an architect or someone who's studied architecture, I think a lot about place and where we are and how important context is. So, when I do these Acknowledgements of Country, it always makes me stop just for a second to think, "Yeah, this place has been around for a while. I'm only a newcomer here, and there are people who have a lot of knowledge about where we are." So, it's a customary thing here in Australia to pay respects to the land and to the people who have lived here for thousands of years at the beginning of any important gathering, and this is most certainly an important gathering.

As I said before, we have all of us in the auditorium here in the UTS Great Hall, and we have everyone with us online. For those of us who are here in person and for the many hundreds of viewers watching internationally, the Welcome to Country or the Acknowledgement of Country extends to everybody. Welcome to everybody. So, in honour of this great land and its ancient traditions and people, I would like to acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the traditional custodians of this land, and to pay my respects to the Elders, both past and present. It's one of those things that's taken us a long time to listen to that knowledge and that wisdom, but we are listening and we are learning, which is wonderful.

Right, so we're here to talk about green cities. Green cities, and I hear you say, "What is that?" I'll get to that in just a moment. The first thing I want to do is introduce these lovely people who are up here on stage with me, and our best friend Remy, who's over there. He normally lives in Nairobi, but he's currently in Frankfurt doing important UN business. I'll get to Remy in a second. First, I want to introduce Rob Stokes, who's here on stage. Rob, welcome! Round of applause for Rob. You know the name, you know the man. He's a leading Australian spokesman on city planning and the importance of net-zero cities. Former New South Wales Minister for Planning and Public Spaces—boy, that was a job! Life after that, hey? It's good, huh? Yeah, it's a lot more comfortable now. It was a lot of fun. Passionate about beauty in people, nature, and urban spaces. I'm now thinking of Rob as our poet in politics. Welcome, Rob.

Right here on this end of the seats is Jua Cilliers. She is a global leader in urban planning and green infrastructure solutions. She is also the Professor of Urban Planning and Head of the School of the Built Environment here at UTS. She runs the school, which is why she's so busy, and she's known—this is a funny story behind this one—as a defender of the future. Just sit with that for a second. This is what a defender of the future looks like, everyone. I think we're in good hands, don't you think? Yes.

Germain Briand is here with us, also sitting in the centre. Woohoo! He's an innovative entrepreneur and he connects nature to city environments. He's the owner and director of the Urban Canopy Australia, and he's on a mission to reconnect people with nature. He's the entrepreneur bridge builder whose whole job is to give us the pathway back to nature, which I think is a great job to have. Thank you for joining us.

And zooming in with us on the big screen here is this very impressive-looking gentleman who's six foot tall, and we're only seeing him from the shoulders up, Remy Sietchiping. He is an international strategist on urban planning and geographic information systems. He's a community educator and he is also the Chief of Policy at UN-Habitat, the United Nations Human Settlements Programme in Africa. Remy, welcome to you. Thank you very much. Happy to be here.

Alright, so what is green infrastructure? I'm going to take a little second here to set the scene, and then my learned colleagues here are going to take the conversation away. My whole job is just to keep them talking, but I think they're going to do a great job of that on their own. What I want to do first is ask you to close your eyes just for a second. Close your eyes. Now, imagine the perfect city street in your mind's eye. The perfect city street. Give yourself a second to form that image. What's going on in that mind? What are you seeing now? I bet the first thing you're seeing—you can open your eyes now—I bet the first thing you're seeing are the people around you. Yeah, give me a quick show of hands if I'm right. Yeah, the people, that's the first thing you notice. Okay, a couple of people. That's the first thing I think of, and I polled everyone in my family about that, and they all said, "Yeah, the people." What's the second thing you saw? I bet there were trees on the street. Yeah, who had trees? Oh, okay, that's better. That's feeling a lot better. So, isn't that interesting that the perfect city includes—well, okay, let's put trees at the top of the pile. Trees are one of those things that are the first thing you think of when you think of a city. Now, think of downtown Sydney or downtown any city, for that matter, and think of how many trees you can count, again in that mind's eye of yours. Not as many as you'd like, right? Am I right?

So, with that thought in mind, that perfect idea in mind, urban—and now I'm reading this, so excuse me for reading—green infrastructure refers to all of the vegetation that provides environmental, economic, and social benefits such as clean air and water, climate regulation, food provision, erosion control, and places for recreation. Green infrastructure includes urban parks and reserves, wetlands and stream corridors, street trees and roadside verges, gardens, vegetable patches, bikeways, pedestrian trails, wall and rooftop gardens, orchards, farms, cemeteries, and derelict land. That's a lot, don't you think? These aren't my words; this is coming from the CSIRO. So, this is the definition that we as a research community would probably defer to as what is green infrastructure. But I think you can see from just that that it is very encompassing. It includes a lot, and as you can imagine, that idea of green cities with all of those different components requires enormous expertise across a broad wave of not just the university campus but across all of our disciplines, ranging from planning, landscape architecture, architecture, horticulture, ecology—what else have we got? Psychology, engineering, and policy, and that's just for starters. Basically, as we know, cities are big, complex animals and they're very hard to tame. They're very hard to direct. They're very hard to kind of point in a direction that we know is better because cities kind of have a mind of their own because there are a lot of people involved.

So, with that kind of situation in front of us, let me tell you a little bit about why some of the green benefits—or the benefits, sorry, of green infrastructure—are there to sort of not so much tame the city but to orient it in a better direction for our future. Some of those benefits include things like—I'm just thinking, actually, before I give you that, I'm thinking I'm about to list a few things for you but really these aren’t nice-to-have things; these are really need-to-have things in our future cities. So, this kind of list of want-to-haves is actually—no, these are the must-do things for our cities going into the future. So, with that in mind: sustainability. Green infrastructure gives us cooler streets, management of heat island effects, flood and stormwater management, cleaner waterways and air, drought tolerance, and lower building and energy needs. And that's just sustainability for a starter. Public health: better air quality, better water quality, cooler and calmer streets and neighbourhoods. Social benefits that bring us outside, that reconnect us to nature—that one's going to Germain—allow humans to use the city again. That perfect city we're all imagining? That's the one where we're all outside. We're all outside on the street, probably in some Parisian café, sitting on a street corner having a cup of coffee. But we're outside, we're with other people, and we're enjoying the ambience of being there. And biophilia—if you haven't heard that expression, it’s basically that feeling you get of wellness and goodness when you are with greenery, when you are with nature.

There's a science behind this, and I'm not going to go into it now, but basically, you know that when you look at a tree, you feel better. The other day, I heard a stat that if you spend 7 seconds, I think it was, looking at the ocean, you start to feel better. Just 7 seconds of watching the waves will actually physiologically calm you down and make you start to feel better in your whole body, physically and emotionally. So, that's biophilia—that's our connection with nature. So, that's just another one of those benefits.  

Costs—now this is the one where everyone goes, "Oh yeah, but that's going to cost a fortune. Why would we do that? Just way too expensive." Not true at all. Think about it like this: you spend a lot of money, billions of dollars, putting in freeways and what do you get for that? You get people in cars moving from A to B and back again. Now, think about putting in something like a stream that deals with stormwater, cleans the stormwater, gives people a place to walk, somewhere for my dog to go for a walk. All these benefits of health and things that I've just mentioned—these are all the add-ons that these infrastructures give you. So, you pay for one and you get ten. So, the cost-benefit analysis, the research is still really being done, but all the indicators are that you're getting such better bang for your buck in green infrastructure rather than the kinds of grey infrastructure that we're used to talking about when we talk about the city. So keep that in mind. I also heard somewhere that a treed street in a Sydney suburb will put $50,000 on the sale price of a property on that street. Something like that. Yeah, now I've got your attention, haven't I?

So, with that in mind, the last thing I want to mention too is aesthetics. Now, I'm a professor of architecture, so I dig aesthetics. I think they're important. I think how beautiful things look is an important thing for us to think about. When we talk about aesthetics in terms of green infrastructure, it's back to that vision of the city that you first started with. Yeah, the one that's in your mind. You go, "Yeah, of course it's a beautiful place. You don't want to go and hang out in an ugly place. You want to go hang out somewhere that makes you feel good and visually that entices you to some kind of ownership almost. You want to feel connected to something that has that beauty for it." Now, you define beauty in your own way, but that idea of beauty and aesthetics is a part of the green infrastructure, and that's why we think of green trees and such when we think of a beautiful city.

 

Alright, now this is an intensely local and global phenomenon. 68% of the global population are expected to live in urban areas by 2050, according to the UN. And in Australia, for those international people who are zooming in, it might surprise you to learn that here in Australia, 73% of us already live in the major cities across Australia. So this is a big issue, and it's one that will have effects whatever we end up doing. It will have effects at a very large—dare I say—planetary scale. So these moves we're making now are not insignificant. They are really big issues. So, with that, that's enough from Anthony. With that, now I want to sort of take the conversation to the esteemed panel that we're here to talk with today. And Jua, you get the first question. Given all those wonderful benefits that green infrastructure seems to obviously provide us, why is it taking us so long to implement green infrastructure in our cities?

 

A really great question, Anthony. I think that is what all of us are shouting: why are we not doing this? I think three reasons from my side. The first one is, it's really inconvenient, right? We've been used to business as usual, and we know how to plan cities and we know how to build the buildings, and now you're asking us to do it differently. Really, it's really inconvenient, yeah? So we tend to just go with business as usual, right? So there's a part of that, right? We are challenging how we think about cities and nature and how we plan everything from the start to the end. The second thing for me is, it's a lack of leadership—policies, legislation, things enforcing this but also people standing up and saying, "Hey, we should be doing this," right? It's not a nice-to-have; it's a necessity, as you said. So 0.3% of urban infrastructure budgets goes to green infrastructure or nature. Just say that again. How much? 0.3%. Remy, you can check me if I'm quoting incorrectly. 0.3% of all urban infrastructure budgets goes to greening or green or nature-based solutions, which is ridiculous. So we need collective leadership to say this should change, right? So this, for me, is the second thing. And then the third thing is really those benefits that you called out. I really think we don't understand the value of nature and what it means for us as individuals and for our cities. I think we almost take it for granted, but we've never lived in an urbanised world that it is today, and we are seeing we are losing greenery across all our cities. So we're going to lose these great benefits; we are going to lose the medicine that you explained, right? And so, in a way, it's really to realise it's not a luxury; it's a necessity. And I had to throw in there, maybe it's because we haven't had it on Grand Designs yet. That's maybe why we still aren't pushing the buttons. So, there's a teaching component here because the knowledge about the benefits is not being communicated, so that hasn't happened yet. Yeah, there's a leadership issue. Actually, that makes me think then, Rob, do you, you know, you've got a fabulous career and a deep knowledge of politics. In your mind, is this green infrastructure question a technical question or is it a cultural question?

 

It's entirely cultural. When you started with that beautiful acknowledgment of country, part of acknowledgment is acknowledging that we have imported ontologies, ways of knowing, laws, cultures from the other side of the world, and just imagined that we can somehow translate them into an entirely different context and completely ignored the people who had lived here continuously since the dreaming. And so we instinctively, at some level, are scared of nature. A more recent British visitor to Australia, Bill Bryson, the travel writer, said that about Australia—everything's trying to kill you. And there's a sort of sense that, "Oh, we've got to control our gardens or our environment because it will make it safer that way." I mean, of the top four selling plants in Australian nurseries, you've got a type of ornamental privet, you've got English box, you've got Leylandii greens, otherwise known as spiked trees because they're there to block out the neighbours, and there's one native that makes the list. It's a lilly pilly, it's called "No More Neighbours." And so our entire, you know, the way we think about nature is how to exclude others and how to make it neat and tidy and ornamental so it doesn't get in the way. Nature's messy and we want to make sense and control of our lives and, you know, that's a great thing about a lawnmower. It's your little bit of, you know, exerting control over nature. I mean the nature strip, there's nothing natural about it; it's a b lawn. So it's entirely... and I was fascinated during my time in politics. I remember once actually I got given... I went to speak at something and I got a lift and they'd given me a little tree as a gift. It was lovely and I got in the lift in Parliament and there were a bunch of parliamentarians there, probably a little bit more right-wing, and they said to me, "Hey Stoky, what do you got there?" and I said, "Oh, it's a... it's a... it's a little tree. It's a baby tree." "What are you going to do with it?" and I was kind of getting a bit intimidated at this point and I said, "I'm going to plant it." They said, "Why would you do that? And it'll... it'll get stuck in your drains and then you'll be sorry." And like, "But it's just a little baby tree." Anyway, but there's that mentality, there's something scary or that needs to be controlled, and it comes from this colonial, colonial settler mindset that's still very much there.  

 

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, what do you think then about Jua's point about leadership though? Do you agree with Jua?  

 

Entirely. There's leadership. What's that old saying in, you know, the series Yes Minister? You know, "Well, that was courageous." There's doing courageous things that are career limiting, and the clever things are the incremental change that no one... that you can get away with. COVID was an amazing time to do things that you could get away with because we trialled, for example, you know, like bike lanes. I was amazed. You try and put a motorway in Sydney and, you know, there's a little bit of resistance but most people go, "Oh yeah, we need to get where we're going faster." Try to build a bike lane, everyone goes absolutely bananas. But in COVID we were able to just put them in and say, "Oh, well, they're temporary," and then just left them there.

Can I chip in? Leadership... well, I call it leadership because there's good examples globally where we do get this right, right? And so there are some world cities that do get it right, or individuals.

So it's not like we're... everybody's lost, but it's a leadership and it's standing up for it and pushing through with it."

 

"That is a perfect segue to Remy. You with us?"

 

"Remy?"

 

"Yes, I am. I hope you can hear me."

 

"Oh, that's great. Yes, we can hear you loud and clear. I want to throw that question then to you and ask, you know, this idea of green infrastructure from your perspective, you know, as the UN. You are our UN representative here. Do you think of it as a global issue or a local issue?"

 

"Well, thanks a lot. I believe that global is also local. Everything that happens globally affects things locally and vice versa. So within the... I can hear some echoes but I hope it's okay. Within the framework under which we are operating, the social sustainable development goals, if you look through, many of them actually touch on infrastructure, on the environment, on, you know, resilience. All the topics that we're going to cover here. So it's an issue of global relevance. If you take one dimension, which is climate change, that we are all familiar with, we know that we are witnessing how it manifests itself, and this was not... this was... we still had some deniers around but 30-40 years ago that was not the issue. So sometimes push comes to shove and then you have to reckon with it. But I just want to take us a little bit back. I don't know, you might have read the great book by Jared... The Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. In that book, for those who have not read, you will understand that we are... many of the societies actually had neglected the value, the benefits of nature, and turned into consumerism rather than living with that nature in a more, you know, symbiotic manner. And that had come at a cost, and we today we are also facing similar situations. And I know that we already mentioned the importance when we culturally, I think Rob had clearly indicated, it's mainly cultural. I agree because nature-based solutions are not easily, you know, reflected. People cannot relate easily and Prof had mentioned, but the element of beauty, aesthetic, that you Anthony, you mentioned is also relative, it's subjective, but still we have some common thread that we can look at. We don't know if green is actually a good sign for everybody. In some cultures, green is not good. In some cultures, it's not good but in others it's actually a sign of aesthetic, reconnecting with your place and nature. But I just want to also add the element of heritage. Nature is heritage because that's why we talk about tangible and intangible heritage. And until we bring all these things together in terms of nature as part of our common heritage, then we continue struggling. One example, just to illustrate the point, is the during the COVID-19. It must still be fresh in our mind. Green space was or parks were the most sought-after spaces because this was one of the unique environments where we can practice more social distancing while enjoying nature. Those who were suffering from COVID were, you know, encouraged to have some... Elements of sunlight, green spaces, and clean air – all these things are important. But globally, one of the unintended consequences of COVID was that the untouched nature, the, you know, the hardly less impacted environment actually grew. It was a positive thing for nature globally. Some plants and areas recovered, just to say that nature is there, and we have to nurture it. We have to do our best to live with that and keep nature as one of our best friends. If you were to be the champions and be the city, the champion of the future, as Professor just said and who she is, so let me stop here just to say that this conversation is very important and globally very relevant. I'm not going to let you off the hook just yet because what you're saying is, yes, it's everyone's problem. It's a global problem. Global solutions. It is a common humanity, a common humanity that we're talking about here. We all fell back in love with our local parks when COVID came along, no matter where you were on the planet. But the other side to your answer there was to let us in on the idea, and this is the challenge, I suppose, that it's a different conversation in different cultures and it has to be. So the common ground we're looking for, maybe that just doesn't exist. No, it does. It does actually. Just give you an example. Who would not like to have some form of green, some, some, I don't know, plants? We, I think Rob had mentioned some energy efficiency, managing your waste differently, or managing your water differently, having a bit of a veggie garden, got something that you have grown and you could actually eat or enjoy and see that grow. So that type of habit exists everywhere, so there are some commonalities in actually taking action. Locally, of course, if you live in an ecologically unique space, it could be a desert or another environment that might be different, but it must still have native plants and a native environment. Because greening is not only about having plants, you know, you can still create the ambiance.  

I saw a business, we have Germain here, he can pick some of these ideas where they were actually trying to create, you know, we know the digital twins and try to create environments that mimic nature just to keep our mind and culture closer to nature. It might be artificial; we are quite familiar these days with artificial plants or artificial things. But just bringing that type of element of nature back into our living environment, even artificially, is a step towards that. So I believe that ecologically they might adapt, but they might still be very, very relevant. Nature exists everywhere regardless; culture varies, always, always important. I'm going to say from policy then to product Germain, this is you now because you're the innovator and the bridge builder, right? You're the one who's responsible for, in some way, landing these grandiose ideas literally in the city. So where do you see the problems and where do you see the opportunities? Yeah, thanks. I couldn't help myself so much when you were talking there. I think the problem starts here.  

There's that great quote from that American anthropologist called Gregory Bateson that says most of the problems we see in the world today come from the difference between the way people think and the way nature works. Nature works in ecosystems; we work in silos. Nature brings so many benefits to our cities, which is great, but in the way we currently work, it is also an issue because different people are responsible for different outcomes in our cities. Yet, when you're talking about a solution that is all-encompassing, you end up with a problem because who's going to look after that? Oh no, it's your thing. Well no, I thought it was your thing. No, we're not going to do that, it's too complicated because it's holistic. Because it's going to mean the landscape architect is going to talk to the architects, it's going to need to talk to the planners, it's going to need to talk to the bicycle people and everybody in between. You've got social groups or ethnic groups in Australia, you know, huge diversity in our cities. Some ethnic groups don't like nature so much. There's even people, if ever you guys have heard that word, it's called dendrophobia. Dendrophobia means fear of trees. Some people are scared of trees; they run in the other direction. That exists. Rob just told us they get in your drains, right? So we've got to be aware of moral types of fear. But the point is, nature is complex and it works in ecosystems.  

We work in silos, and for as long as we're not going to learn to do that, and that's so pertinent in the context of local and state government, where I see it in my work every day when I try to talk about bringing nature. The people who work in the sustainability department don't talk to the urban planner, don't talk to the placemakers, don't talk to the landscape architects. They're all doing their things in their own corners, and so that's not going to work. So until that happens... now to your point about being cultural, for sure. But this dates way back, you know, the colonials, the British coming. That's Newtonian science that makes the world easier to understand for us humans; we make it more simple, we put it into boxes. And even in academia, in academia you've got different faculties and a PhD is so narrowly focused on one point, where it could so much benefit from being in partnership with other parts of the university. When this type of thinking starts being applied at university... I'm so glad he's saying this because I'll have a moment to market the green infrastructure lab that's very transdisciplinary. That's right, but no, I'm talking to you because I know you understand. I know he, the Vice Chancellor, is listening, just so you know. Of course, that's right. We both know. But the risk with this as well... and I'm talking about university models in general, obviously not pointing fingers... but the risk with that as well is, the more complex the more knowledge we get, the even more focused on little things, and the more likely we are to miss the bigger picture because our knowledge is getting more and more granular. So it's a real challenge. We need to embrace complexity.

Alright, but let's get to the part where you've got all green lights and all those planners and policymakers, and everyone's green lights intended... you like that? I just worked that one in there. What is it exactly that you are putting into our cities? I mean, from a product point of view, what is this infrastructure that we're literally talking about? Yes, we're talking about trees, but you know, we're talking about businesses and we're talking about a whole kind of raft of perhaps a new industry that's emerging to do this sort of work. What exactly does that mean to you?  

 

Well, there's new challenges now with climate change. We've got a challenge of how our city is warming up. This didn't exist before. Oh, okay, so you know, when cities were designed, nature was a nice ornamental thing we just put there because it looked nice and we know that people like nature. You know, we'll touch on biophilia, but this was the sole purpose of nature. Now we're like, oh, that actually is the best air conditioner and it's natural, and it has so many other benefits. Yet, our cities were not designed to plant more trees. You know, our cities were designed with a lot of hard infrastructure and the challenge is when you're talking to engineers, we say that tree there doesn't behave like a brick wall, does it? Oh yeah, not too hard, you know, that grows and it grows this way and that way, and how do we deal with that? Too hard.

 

And so the key is to try to find solutions that bring nature into the city in a predictable way. So it's about finding the best of both worlds, yeah? Okay, right, in trying to bring nature in so it ticks most of those boxes that a tree would. Maybe not all, but it's easier to implement because it ticks the boxes of the people who design our cities. Alright, but at this point we started, I mean, I started off my bit up there at the beginning all positive. Yeah, green cities, that's a beautiful future. Who doesn't want that, right? I want to walk near a waterway with my dog, and now at this point you're all agreeing that this is too big a holistic problem for anyone to solve and it's kind of... I'm starting to get depressed. Is this, should I be feeling this way? I mean, give me some hope here.  

 

No, there's so much that has already happened. The question is, can it happen quickly enough? Right, you look for example, some people might be you know, in this audience might be old enough to remember when you could... I came when you could grow up on Sydney's Northern Beaches. I remember when you could actually smell the sewage coming out of North Head. It was just this, you know, and the water was filthy, and we solved that problem. I remember I used to surf at Queenscliff and I remember that exactly what you're saying, and with certain winds you just wouldn't go. There you'd get an ear infection, it just wasn't worth it. And although it would get you out of school, but, but, but, but, and equally, like, like petrol in our cars, you know, that, that was genuinely, I remember the, the smoke haze that was every day over Sydney. So, on some things, you know, we, we've demonstrated capacity to solve these problems if we act collectively. The problem is the things that are in everyone's interest collectively are often not in everyone's interests individually. And so, there'll always be particular stakeholders who will have a reason why, oh, that doesn't suit me. And so, it's so easy to, to, to stop change. And you do need a certain level of courage to continue. And sometimes you'll, you'll go, you know, two steps forward and one step back, but at least that's one step forward. And then you just got to keep, keep going. I mean, we, I remember when I was in government, we had an abortive attempt with a thing called the design and, and place State Environmental Planning Policy, which was basically we wanted to start the design principle. Like, our cities actually, when you look at it respectfully, aren't designed by architects. Architects come in right at the end. They're actually designed by land surveyors who have no design training whatsoever. And we just said, well, why don't we start with country? Because we'd listened to some Aboriginal planners who had told us there's incredible things, there's incredible knowledge that no one's actually bothered to ask many Aboriginal Elders about land, about song lines, about, about the country itself. And to start with an understanding of that knowledge, well, why wouldn't we? But that, that particular reform proved too difficult to get over the across the line, but there are some elements of that that, that did happen. And inevitably, it set a course that ultimately those changes will come to pass. But what one thing that we tried to do was ensure that in new subdivisions in Western Sydney, for example, where we know that a non-reflective roof will actually increase internal temperatures by about 10° in summer, like 10°. And so, in other words, it'll require really expensive mechanical ventilation to deal with that problem in households struggling with cost of living. So, if you just made the roofs a light colour, you would save a huge amount of energy. But the property developer stakeholders were, oh, no, we couldn't possibly do that because people don't want light coloured roofs. I'm like, well, that's just silly. But nevertheless, that change wasn't made.  

 

Back to the cultural question, it's a cultural thing. In Victoria, they've done it, so we can do it. Yeah, well, that's, I was going to come back to you because at this point you said leadership before, and I'm wondering in your mind then what unlocks us from this, I'm going to call it an impasse, but Rob's given me hope. So, what unlocks us from this moment where it's too big a problem, I can't do anything? What do you think? What is the research actually telling us?  

 

So, I think this, like, the, the amount of people signing up for these events tells you that people realise this is what we should be doing. We see interest from our PhD students coming in, saying, I want to do research in urban, sustainable urban development, green infrastructure, because the younger generation knows this is where it's going, this is what we should be doing. So, there's a big push coming. But I think collectively you have a stronger voice if we can all be saying the same stories, that leadership voice gets stronger. The research, I mean, you called out the benefits, I've got, I think, one of our science friends is here and he often says the research shows it's too good to be true. Like, if you know how good nature is, you would not believe it. Yeah, like, it's too good to be true. But we've, we've neglected that, so we need to be saying these stories more, piloting things, showing, and then pushing collectively for the policies and for the leadership to, to make the right decisions to do this. If we don't do it now, fast forward 10 years from here, nobody of us would want, want to live in Sydney or any city for that matter. Yeah, so there is a, a question of pace. We need to pick up the pace. We've got to find the structure to allow us to do that. That's what I'm sort of picking up from the conversation.  

 

Remy, I'm going to come to you. You're checking your emails. No, Remy, oh, you're making notes. Sorry. There you go. I, I knew you were. So, we're sort of talking about this from a, from, I guess, a culture meets politics and leadership point of view. From the UN's point of view, what is, what would you say was the biggest priority in the green infrastructure space? Just give me one that is probably top of the pile for the priorities from the UN's perspective.  

 

Well, from, from us, I think the word has been said, what we call nature-based solutions. So, whatever solutions we are bringing in cities, if they are nature-driven, nature-oriented, for instance, let's say we are, we are bringing some, because I would like to bring these elements of green, grey, and blue infrastructure, when you have this blend all the time, because when you look at the grey infrastructure, usually the, the green element is very, very sometimes insignificant. So, if you say in a tender in a city or something like that, that any infrastructure in a city should have at least 30%, at least 30%, because, you know, we use that in many of our standards and guidelines, of green, that would actually set up what we discussed earlier in terms of policy, regulations, and enforceable, because you have a threshold and that can be measured. The same way when you talk about, we mentioned the managing drainage or stormwater, because if permeable space, you know, pathways, or, you know, all these spaces had to be made more, create spaces for blending the blue and then the green, it's important. So, for us, nature-based solutions are key. And it's also one of the tools that you use for climate management. I'm saying management because we can talk about resilience, adaptation, and other measures. So, nature is really important. And as I mentioned earlier, when you look at the sustainable development goals, they have been prioritized. They are all over those 17 goals. So, it's very clear that for us there's no just one but several entry points that we use to actually bring that element of planet, people, and places together. And I have other Ps that I will be, you know, coming, you know, adding to these Ps to, to demonstrate how, what Germain was talking about, the ecosystem that we are working with. But don’t be depressed, there are many, many good examples out there.  

There are many possible solutions. There are many things we can do in our own capacity. Doesn't matter who you are, at city level, at, in our homes, you know, in our global engagement when we have a voice like this one, you can carry. So, there are so many things. I know we're going to get there, but let's not get depressed, let's get excited rather that there is a consciousness. Yeah, that is around. Applause for that. I think that's worth it. And can I just point out, Remy, that you are here wearing the SDG goals pin and Rob, which has all the colours there for the goals. So, I'm going to change the tone a little bit here for a second, because we've talked about policy, we've talked about some of the hurdles.  

I want to kind of just flip the script a bit, and one thing that you said, Rob, when we were speaking at some point earlier, you brought in the idea of beauty. Now, here's the poet-politician moment for you, okay? I'm setting you up here. I really want to understand why and how we should talk about beauty in this context. It's not something we tend to talk about. But it was only post-politics that I sort of reflected on the things that mattered to me, and I realised I care about beautiful things. I love trees. It's just something when I see a tree knocked over, I just don't like that, and I imagine that's something that many people identify with. But I think it's funny with beauty. It's very hard to measure; you know it when you see it. And I think it's harder to tell what it is than it is to say what it isn't. Beauty in architecture can be monumental, martial, magisterial, or modern. One of my favourite bits of architecture in the city is the mort. It can be quite morbid, but what they share is something that is organic. It is something that's warm, or there's fenestration, or there's something tangible or tactile. The opposite of that, inhuman or nonhuman, is very hard to be beautiful. And so I think there's something in that. Remember, it is one of those things we can measure everything except the things that matter.

There's a fellow called William Morris who was an architect and an interior designer in Britain. He was the sort of parent of the arts and craft style. He once said, "If you're looking for a golden rule, this is it: when you're acquiring anything, ask yourself, is it useful, and do you consider it beautiful?" If we're asking that question in modern Australia, the questions are probably, is it big, and is it cheap? And I'm as guilty as anyone. When my wife sends me to Aldi to get some milk, I'll come back with an air compressor, not because I need a compressor. I wouldn't know how to use it, and I don't know what I'd use it for anyway, but gosh, it was a good deal. So, we're all infected a bit by this materialism, seeing preciousness not in the beauty or the utility of things, but in the materialistic value.  

Beauty is still something that's innate to us and drives us. Interestingly, you look at environments that attract people, and they're beautiful places. The secret of placemaking seems to me to be creating something beautiful, and people will be attracted to it. That's the secret sauce. If you can find that kind of beauty that you're describing, people will love it, come to it, and feel responsible for it, which breeds sustainability and longevity. When we think about spending money at the front of a project on something which might make it more attractive, both metaphorically and literally, there's a long sort of ripple effect that includes ownership and long-term engagement. The poet John Ruskin once said that to be beautiful, something has to be true. This idea of authenticity is crucial. There's beauty in something that is not pretending to be something other than what it is. That humanity and the ideas of something organic hold beauty because it seems to be living in some sense. Let's throw to Jermaine. I know you're going to answer the organic question and tell us how gorgeous it is. In one of our previous conversations, you brought up the idea of love. I signed up for this panel thinking it's all about sustainability and infrastructure.  

Now we've got this whole sort of poetry coming out of the panel here, which I'm really enjoying. But love, what do you mean? How does that figure? Dostoyevsky said beauty will save the world. In Sydney, there's a beautiful example of that called the Sydney Opera House. It cost seven times the intended budget but has now paid for itself many times over. If you put beauty, authenticity, and natural design into something, that's what you get. Now talking about love, because it's just you and me here, go for it. I must say you look very nice tonight. Thank you, you look lovely too. Okay, so this is the essence of why I do what I do. It is my belief that we see so much destruction out there of nature, which is really destruction of ourselves, because we don't love nature enough, and arguably we don't love ourselves enough either. So, there's two big problems here. But hang on, hang on, what does the audience think about that? Do we love ourselves enough? Do we love nature enough? In your minds, you're asking the question, which is the obvious follow-on: how can I find a way to love nature more and therefore love myself more? Is this the kind of logic we're talking about? Is this where we're going? Yeah, yeah. I'm just smiling because you know the job. There's that growing conversation about the fact that we humans are too many on this planet and we're cancerous. That's bad. I mean, there's no sports team that has won any type of tournament by starting by saying, we're a bunch of losers. It doesn't work this way, right?  

So, now back to love. Why we see so much destruction of nature in the world is because we don't love it enough. We don't love it enough because we don't value it enough, because we don't understand it enough, because we don't experience it enough, and therefore we are disconnected from that web of life. Why do we do all the crazy things that we do for our families? Because all those boxes are ticked. Now, the rest of the living world is just extended family, just a few more generations ago. So that's why I bring nature into the city, because I want people to experience nature more where they are. Not everybody is attuned to going outdoors and reconnecting. That's important. Can I throw to Remy at this point? I love where this is going. Remy, with your UN and community hat on, can you think of an example of the kind of thing that Germain's talking about, where a commitment to something at a community level has led to something beautiful? Yeah, well, there are several around us.

I think this issue of experiencing and maybe appreciating what is there and doing a bit more of that in several places might be one way. But if you just look at Botanic Gardens, for instance, you have a few in some cities, but you need more, you know, in a city like Sydney. I don't know if there's a plan to create more Botanic Gardens as the city grows, or you know, at that level. So these are some of the places where we can reconnect and people who visit. And we do that in schools. We take kids to Botanic Gardens, to the zoo, to these places to get them to reconnect because they start appreciating. So the idea here is to get the younger generation, the most younger ones, to get interested because they are the future. So that would be my suggestion: how do we get the kids to start learning the importance of green in the environment where they will be living, where they live, so that it becomes part of their habit, their behavior to break out that the issue we started with, the culture, so that we don't discover we don't try to unlearn and relearn later so that it becomes part of our behavior that this is just normal, we have to be able to bring nature anytime, every time, all the time.

Perfect. I mean, I think I was going to ask all of you. I'm going to ask all of you just, we're starting to run out of time. Actually, I know we're only really getting going, but that sounds to me like a perfect, the question was what's the one thing you would ask the audience to leave the room and do today or tomorrow to bring on the green infrastructure Revolution that we're talking about. So I'm hearing from Remy that I'm pointing down here to the monitor that Greening School Playgrounds and places like that for our Juniors is the right place to start. Let education start to play that role from a very young age.

Yeah, so the conversation starts early, yes. Start schools at home, getting them involved, appreciating the plants, especially native plants, the ones that and also the ones that have benefits like the ones that absorb more CO2, for instance, these are the things that we should be aware of and be able to plant them because we know that type of benefit. The ones that bring some elements of health that have medicinal values, that have some fruits or some element, all those things we have that element of culture awareness and knowing and earlier enough the better. Getting your hands in the dirt. Rob, what's your one suggestion for people, the one thing that you would like people to do when they leave the room tonight, the literally first thing comes to my head: go for a walk or you get a Mobility Scooter, just go and just go and have a have a bit of a walk. 88% of our health budget, which is about 30% of the overall budget, is spent treating non-communicable diseases, of which the biggest single one is type two diabetes. There are more than 2 and a half million Australians with that condition, and for most people, it's preventable if we just had environments where it was easier for people to just be a bit more active.  

I'd like to bounce off what you were saying, Remy. I think everyone in this room, and I think everyone at some stage in their life – for most of us, I think it was when we were kids – we've experienced the wonder and awe of nature. It's like, "Wow!" To tie back to what you were saying, it's beautiful and transcends our rational mind, connecting directly to our hearts. To me, this is why urban greening is so important: it allows people to experience that fundamental shift we need to operate as a species and live in harmony on this planet. We often talk about needing to save the planet, but the planet doesn't need to be saved – it needs to be loved.

 

I love this question because I once made my students do this. So, here's a challenge to everybody: if you leave here, please go hug a tree. Love the tree, hug the tree, and even better, take a selfie while you hug the tree. Post it and tag us. If people ask you why, you can explain why nature is so valuable and important, why this tree is keeping us all alive, and help spread the message. Be a leader in that way.

 

We've got time for just maybe two, possibly three, questions from our beautiful audience here. We've got some roaming mics – one there and one over there. Oh my goodness, hands are shooting up all over the place. Let's go to this person here with the beautiful headscarf on. If I could just ask you to keep the question brief.

 

I loved what you said, Remy, and I agree with you. Community gardens in suburbs for children, herbs, and fruit trees are great. Also, when children see the Balmoral trees being poisoned, they should get a bit more punishment than they do.

 

Great comment. Let's go. You had your hand up very quickly there in the second row, with the dark black shirt. Here comes a microphone.  

 

Designing cities around water – twice the amount of rain falls on Sydney than we actually draw out of Warragamba. If we didn't have Warragamba and needed to drink our own rain, what would that look like? What does a city look like that's designed around water?

 

I'll start. We had to look at this question while considering the new city around the new Western Sydney airport and how to deal with water flow around South Creek, which is that big corridor. The best advice was to re-establish a chain of ponds, recognizing what was there before and seeking to recreate that. We also need to start properly recycling water rather than just generating it. We're going to have to get used to the idea that yes, we're going to drink our pee – we do it every day anyway, because ultimately, we've got the same amount of water in this biosphere as we've always had. It's all recycled. Piping sewer and wastewater from far western Sydney out to the ocean is just a silly idea now.

 

Does anyone else want to tackle that question? Jay?

 

Yes, I was going to answer from a theoretical perspective. It doesn't work ideally. A city should operate in the same way an ecosystem works, dealing with the amount of rain that falls there and not trying to do things beyond what sunlight and rain afford. A city in itself isn't a sustainable model, but there are ways to make it better. It's hard, but there are plenty of good initiatives to try to make buildings water-positive, for example. It's a tough task, but doable in bits.

 

Right, so it's a double-edged answer: it's really hard, but we can do parts of it. Let's go to the back of the room, the gentleman with his hand up and the puffy vest.

 

I have a housing question. Urban sprawl in Western Sydney isn't sustainable or desirable in combating the housing crisis, with low canopy cover, dark roofs, and car dependency. The state government is moving towards more infill development and increasing density, as we've seen with the new TODP. Greening cities isn't a new concept; we have Canberra from the Garden City movement of the 20th century. One downfall of it is its lack of density, seen as undesirable. How do we manage density in green cities?

 

First, is green infrastructure a new idea? Short answer: no.

 

Everyone shaking their heads, so no, it's not a new idea. The Garden City movement was one of the early examples. The Griffins did it in Castlecrag, wanting everyone to live in the bush. The mid-century moderns on the lower North Shore did the nuts-and-berries architecture, living with the bush without digging it up. We do have precedents, but clearly, we haven't been listening to them. The second part of the question is the density question. How do we reconcile green with density? These are both necessary.

 

I'll take a shot. Super high density is never ultimately sustainable due to too many challenges and too much energy use over time. Strata titling works well with a 1960s-style six-pack of six apartments, but once you have 500 or 1,000 apartments, it becomes a new form of governance entirely. I worry about what will happen in 50 years when some of these super-dense places need to be rebuilt. Of course, we've got a housing crisis and need a supply-side solution, but we can't ignore demand. We're not looking at the tax incentives that turn housing into a commodity. We need to stop incentivizing people who already have houses to buy more until everyone who wants a house has one. Then we can incentivize buying more houses.

 

Green infrastructure is a network, an interconnected system. Like how we plan freeways and highways, green should be throughout cities. The denser we go, the more we need green infrastructure to sustain human life. It's not just about housing; it's about rethinking the entire process from materials, construction, architecture, and planning.

 

Round of applause for that. Remy, what do you think about reconciling density with green infrastructure?

 

It's not one or the other; they can be done together. There's no fixed threshold for density; it's context-specific. For us, city or urban development should follow principles like compactness, connectivity, and integration. Cities should be compact, connected through green or blue infrastructure, and integrated. Singapore is a great example – highly dense yet highly green. So, they are not in competition; it's doable.

 

On the housing question, of course, affordability is a perennial issue in Australia. We need to make housing greener, considering elements like the roof that Rob mentioned. Greening has a cost, but the cost-benefit is in favor of nature.

 

Great, that last bit was for the accountants in the room. Cost-benefit analysis looks really good. Everyone else is saying we can do it together. Density and green don't have to fight each other. They are a companion piece. They work in harmony if we're clever about bringing those things together at the outset. That's what I'm summarizing here. From an innovation perspective, there are plenty of solutions out there that add a lot of nature to the city without impacting housing or density. There are plenty of opportunities to make it happen if we allow it to happen.

 

When I talk about sustainability to students, I often say the science was in the '60s, '70s, and '80s. The science of sustainability was in the technology and engineering of sustainability – that was in the '90s and 2000s. So that leaves us back to the very beginning with the issue about sustainability that we haven't solved yet, which is the cultural side. And that's exactly where the panel went this evening. When you all opened up to that question, we had love, poetry, and all those very human responses. Rather than a technical conversation, we've ended up with a very human conversation, and that seems to be where the problems lie, but also where the opportunities are.

 

With that, we're going to draw this evening's proceedings to a close. I hope you leave the room thinking about your next action. Hopefully, outside at the bar, you can have a conversation with like-minded people, and maybe something will spark out of that. Wouldn't that be amazing? We'll be at the bar later on, so come and tap us on the shoulder if you want to chat. Thank you very much for joining us this evening. [Applause]

 

I would like to invite you up to the podium to say some thank yous. Then you can go, I will sit down. Thank you, Anthony. I've got the wonderful task of thanking some incredible people. This event has been in the making for quite some time. A lot of hours went into it. When we started, we asked the panel members to share something about themselves. Remember those questions? Something about yourself, your perspectives, how you think about things. We said it would be confidential, but I'm going to blabber it all out now. I fed this information to ChatGPT, like any responsible academic would, and asked ChatGPT to summarize the superpowers of our panelists.

 

So, a huge thank you and appreciation to our panelists for sharing their superpowers.  

 

Firstly, Rob, our Harmony Hero, who works his magic to create amazing cities where everything and everyone fits together perfectly. That can be a new LinkedIn status. Germain, our Nature Ninja, who brings nature back to the city, making urban life fresh and exciting. Remy, our Global City Wizard, who transforms cities all over the world, making them better places for everyone. Thanks, Remy. And our host, Anthony, the Design Guru, who puts the grand into architecture, turning his passion into wonderful city-changing designs. Thank you very much. A small gift for all of you. [Applause]

 

Remy, watch out for a package coming your way soon. Everybody is curious to know what's in your bags. It's really special, designed by students from the Faculty of Design, Architecture, and Building. I believe Rob has a matching gift on. A huge thank you to Jo Bosben, Dena Fam, and the incredible UTS team running at the back, who are keeping this event live and covering it globally. It's an honor to be part of this Global Game Changer series, and a salute to UTS management for investing in these conversations and global engagements. This is wonderful.  

 

To our audience, our enablers of the visions we shared tonight, thank you for turning up and engaging with 1,700 registrations. It gives us confidence that this is an important topic, and we need to take it forward. Green infrastructure matters. A special shout-out to our UTS friends in China, who gathered a crowd to watch the live stream. Thank you.  

 

In closing, I learned something from one of my students that turned out to be my favorite quote: "You should never underestimate the power of a small change." I challenge you all tonight to be part of this change, part of the Green Revolution. Every small act by every one of us can have a huge collective impact. Never underestimate the power of a small change. To bring it back to Anthony's first question, "Why are we not already greening our cities?" This is a call to all of you as well. Let's do better, and let's do it together. Thank you, UTS, thank you to the panel and our host, and thank you to the audience. Let the Green Revolution begin. Thank you.
 

Edited full transcript

STEPHANIE BRANTZ (Host):
Well, good evening. Let’s get underway. Lovely to see everyone here in the room, and a warm welcome to everyone joining us online, wherever you are. Great to have you here for our session, Global Game Changers – Episode 3: Rewriting the playbook: women leading the future of sport. We’ve got a fantastic evening ahead.

I want to begin by acknowledging that we meet, whether online or in person, on Gadigal land. I acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the lands wherever you’re joining us from. We pay our respects to Elders past and present, and to those who hold the continuing cultural and spiritual connection to Country. I extend that respect to everyone of Aboriginal, First Nations and Torres Strait Islander descent who is joining us today, wherever you may be.

We’ve got a wonderful session ahead. I have an all-star panel to my left. My name is Steph Brantz and I’m basically the traffic conductor – guiding the conversation. All the expert intel is coming from these four fabulous women.

As I’m sure you’re all aware, women are transforming sport – from science to coaching to global event leadership. We’re seeing leading researchers, coaches, players and athletes driving extraordinary growth. Tonight, we’re going to explore how women are driving high-performance innovation, shaping major events and changing the future of sport.

We’ll look at sport science, biomechanics, coaching, delivery of global tournaments, and how we’re rewriting the sport playbook – how sport is played, led and studied. This conversation is really about celebrating those leading the charge, breaking barriers and challenging systems, and redefining what elite performance looks like. Don’t look so nervous, ladies – you are the experts in this space.

Through collaborations such as the UTS and Cricket NSW partnership, and international research in performance science, women are driving innovation and creating a smarter, more equitable future for sport – both on and off the field. That’s what we’re going to explore tonight.

Tonight’s panel brings together leaders shaping the future of sport – from high-performance coaching and research to representation and governance. I’m delighted to introduce our expert panel. I’ll chat to them for about 45 minutes or so, and then you will have the opportunity to ask your questions.

We’ll put up a QR code for Slido. Just scan that, and a question panel will pop up. Please feel free to add any questions you like. I may be able to weave some into the discussion as we go – I’ll keep an eye on them – and otherwise we have a dedicated Q&A at the end to make sure we answer as many of your burning questions as we can.

But right now, let’s hear from this stellar panel.

 
Panel introductions
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I’ll start with Leah Poulton on my left. Leah is Head of Female Elite Cricket at Cricket NSW, leading programmes that develop the next generation of players and coaches. She’s a former Australian cricketer and a respected sports leader, driving change in pathways, performance and participation across the women’s game, in partnership with UTS and national high-performance networks.

Welcome, Leah Poulton.

LEAH POULTON:
Hi, thanks for having me.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Next to Leah is Dr Katie Slattery. Katie is a senior lecturer and researcher at UTS, specialising in sport and exercise science. Her work explores athlete monitoring, performance and wellbeing, and she’s helped shape global partnerships that bring UTS research to the highest levels of international sport.

Dr Katie Slattery.

(Steph jokes about how big her face looks on the big screen.)

Now, Samantha D’Souza – and I’ve just about made you a doctor as well. Would you like to be one?

Sam is a Director at Women Sport Australia and a communications and strategy professional with more than 15 years’ experience across sport, media and culture. Her work focuses on representation, sponsorship and the power of storytelling to drive visibility, advocacy and equity in women’s sport.

Welcome, Sam.

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Thank you.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Last – but absolutely not least – Dr Libby Pickering Rodriguez. Libby is a lecturer and researcher in biomechanics here at UTS, exploring how technology, movement and injury prevention shape high-performance environments. Her work bridges science and sport, helping create a more inclusive, evidence-based approach that improves training outcomes for athletes at all levels.

Welcome, Libby.

 
Career journeys
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
All right folks, I’ve set you up – now it’s your turn to do some talking.

I’d like to start by asking each of you to give us a bit of insight into what you do from your own perspective – where it started, and what that journey was like to reach the amazing roles you hold today.

Leah, I’ll start with you. The change in women’s sport surely can’t be more evident than when you reflect on your own career. How did that bring you to where you are now, and what changes have you seen since your playing days?

 
Leah – from player to high-performance leader
LEAH POULTON:
Good evening everybody.

When I started playing cricket, we were lucky to have a crowd like this. I think I had about this many people come and watch when I played for New South Wales and Australia. For those who follow women’s cricket now, you’ll know it’s starkly different.

The biggest shift is how mainstream women’s sport is now – and how visible. It’s easy to follow. You can pick up a newspaper or turn on the TV and see it. That certainly wasn’t the case when I started.

My first role in cricket was as an athlete. I played for NSW for about 15 years and for the Australian women’s team for around eight. Like most of us then, I had a day job – I was a school teacher. All the girls in our teams held down jobs during the day and then trained at night. The commitment was the same as it is now, but the balance was very different.

When I finished as an athlete, I moved into working in cricket. I’ve held various high-performance coaching roles with WBBL, the Australian pathway and NSW teams. My current role is in administration, looking after elite female cricket across NSW – the Sydney Sixers and Sydney Thunder in the WBBL, plus our extensive NSW pathway.

That pathway is probably the most fulfilling part of my job. We run a big academy across the state where kids from about 13 upwards participate in high-performance programmes.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
And you still have a day job – a very impressive one – giving back to the sport and driving high-performance athletes even further. Thank you, Leah.

 
Katie – finding sport science and the Olympics
Katie, let’s talk about your career. You’ve worked at the pinnacle of Olympic sport. What was your pathway into high-performance work, and do you remember what sparked your interest in performance and research?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
There wasn’t one single moment that sparked it, but looking back, I was always a bit competitive as a kid and fascinated by the limits of human performance.

My heroes growing up were people like Rob de Castella and Lisa Ondieki – some of Australia’s best marathon runners. I would actually sit and watch marathons on TV as a kid. I think that’s where my love of understanding sport and optimising performance began.

The steps along the way were mostly about learning what I didn’t want to do. I initially started an environmental engineering degree – I had no idea what that really was, and I’m glad I never finished it. I then tried outdoor education, and discovered I can’t really read a map or navigate, so that wasn’t ideal either.

I looked at sports science or PE teaching, but realised I wasn’t the best student at school – so perhaps karma was coming back. At the end of my sport science degree, Aaron (who’s here tonight) asked if I’d thought about research and suggested I do an honours degree. I said, “I’ve got nothing better to do,” and it all started from there.

I did my PhD in sport science, then worked at the NSW Institute of Sport, which led to working for Cycling Australia (now AusCycling). That’s what took me to the Olympics. And now I’ve come full circle and I’m back at UTS.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
That’s a fantastic journey. I love that you say your ideas changed along the way – I think that’s really important for young women. You don’t have to pick the end game right now.

For what it’s worth, I started as a freight forwarder after studying business at uni. Then I became a naturopath, then went into media. My parents are still asking when I’ll get a proper job. So pathways can be winding!

 
Sam – curiosity, stories and global travel
Sam, you’ve had a fascinating career already. I remember when I first met you and heard the different paths you’ve taken – and of course your connection with UCLA. Once upon a time I dreamed of playing basketball there; I didn’t have a green card and I wasn’t good enough, so that ruled that one out.

You’re a fantastic storyteller – how do you tell your own story?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Great question – and I’m actually quite nervous to do so.

The main foundation of my life so far – and I like to think I’m still at the beginning of it – is that I’ve always been a deeply curious person. I credit that to my family. We’re travellers, story-finders and storytellers.

From childhood we travelled a lot. At school I was involved in everything – sport, music, art and my studies. I was a huge history nerd. That genuine curiosity about other people’s stories – where they came from and how they got to where they are – has truly shaped everywhere I’ve been and everything I’ve loved doing.

It’s taken me around the world. I studied in the US at UCLA, as Steph mentioned. One of my first childhood dreams was to be an athlete. I was a sprinter for many years, and I played hockey. That sporting community really shaped my professional discipline and my ability to work in teams – it taught me how people get through hard moments and how their bodies and minds work, and the discipline required to train.

At UCLA I worked closely with the track and field team as one of their managers, seeing the ins and outs of training while navigating my own journey in sport. Years later I ran a marathon – which is a big leap when you’ve spent years training for 26 seconds, not 42 kilometres.

Being in the heart of Hollywood and Los Angeles, you can’t help but become curious about how stories are told. For me the most interesting connection was between people telling stories for blockbuster purposes and those telling stories for impact. That link between culture, community and sport is where I’ve ended up.

I moved back home during COVID and started working with a company called ACT.3, a global agency that works closely with brands like adidas. Our focus is on cultural storytelling – it’s taken me from South Africa to Dubai, the US and Europe, where I’ve seen how different cultures connect sport to community.

Looking back at my own experience at an all-girls school – which I now recognise as a point of privilege – I can see how sport kept me connected and confident. Seeing how different cultures encourage participation now is a big part of why I’m still so curious.

So for me it’s all about curiosity, global travel and the experience of community.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Great stuff, Sam. We’ll come back to brand and culture and how important that is for women’s sport. And you did mention how important your family has been – hello to the D’Souza family, I know you’re somewhere in the room. Great to have that support here today.

 
Libby – biomechanics and women in academia
Libby, you’re part of the cohort leading the charge in a space that’s become absolutely critical to female athletes – and that connection between sport and academia seems obvious now, but probably wasn’t when you started. I’m guessing there weren’t many women in that space when you came through?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Yes, that’s correct.

I came into sport science and academia in a similar way to Katie – by following my interests more than anything else. I came to UTS straight out of high school to do Human Movement Studies, which is now Sport and Exercise Science, because I played sport growing up and wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do for a job.

I knew I didn’t want to be a PE teacher, but I enjoyed the degree. During my undergraduate study I got a tap on the shoulder about doing an honours year – I didn’t really know what that was either – but I did it, was exposed to research and realised I really enjoyed it. That led into a PhD.

Not long after finishing my PhD, I was fortunate to get an academic position here at UTS, in what’s now the School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation. At that time – about ten years ago – I was one of seven staff in the school and the only woman.

It’s changed a lot since then. The school has grown immensely and we’re now at about 37% women. So the landscape has really shifted in a decade.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Fantastic. We’ll talk more about where your research has led you in a moment.

 
Sport–academia partnerships
Libby’s story leads nicely to the link between sport and academia that Leah mentioned – particularly the UTS and Cricket NSW partnership.

Leah, what impact are you seeing from that collaboration?

LEAH POULTON:
I think it’s incredibly important in sport to have an open mind and to bring in information from as many spaces as possible. If you’re not open and exploring different possibilities, you very quickly get overtaken – other people just go straight past you.

Innovation and looking for new ways to do things is critical. Partnerships are a big part of that. We partner with other sporting organisations, businesses, and universities – and the partnership with UTS has been wonderful.

At UTS, the people are just as passionate about women’s sport as we are, but they bring different expertise. One really cool example is Project 130, which I know Libby can explain in more detail.

In women’s cricket, the fastest bowler in the world at the moment is around 125km/h – Shabnim Ismail, who’s playing for the Thunder. There’s a gap between what women bowl and what men bowl. We don’t always use men as the yardstick of where we need to get to, but we know we haven’t yet reached the limits of what’s possible for women.

So our partnership with UTS is about asking: How can women bowl faster? What training modalities do we need? Should we focus on strength, power, technique – or different things at different ages? What sort of physical profile should we look for?

I know those questions are important, but I don’t know the detailed “how”. That’s where Libby and the UTS team come in.

The partnership is really exciting. When young players come in and we say, “This is what we’re doing – do you want to be part of this project?” their eyes light up. It helps them see what’s possible.

And it’s not just for Cricket NSW. This kind of research will be a huge asset for the global sporting community. There’s not enough research on female athletes full stop, and projects like this help people imagine what’s possible.

 
(The conversation continues into UTS research, AI, biomechanics, sponsorship, participation, keeping girls in sport, global comparisons and audience Q&A. If you’d like, I can clean the next section – from Katie’s description of “training quality” and AI, through Libby’s biomechanics explanation and Sam’s sponsorship/brand discussion – in the same style as above.)
 
You said:
is this the full conversation as it doesn't end like this?
 
ChatGPT said:
 
Thought for 8s
 
Great catch – no, what I gave you before was not the full conversation. It cut off partway through.

Here’s a single, continuous, cleaned-up transcript from start to finish, including the Q&A and final thank yous. I’ve:

Kept everyone’s meaning and order.
Removed “ums”, doubles, and obvious stumbles.
Fixed names, titles and basic punctuation.
Left it in a natural spoken style you can use for captions / web.
 
Global Game Changers – Episode 3
Rewriting the playbook: women leading the future of sport
Full cleaned transcript

STEPHANIE BRANTZ (Host):
Well, good evening. Let’s get underway. Lovely to see everyone here in the room, and a warm welcome to everyone who’s joining us online, wherever you are. Great to have you here for our session, which is Global Game Changers, Episode 3: Rewriting the playbook – women leading the future of sport. We’ve got a super evening prepared.

I do want to say that we meet, whether online or in person, here on Gadigal land, and I acknowledge all the Traditional Owners of the lands wherever you’re joining us from. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and those who hold the continuing cultural and spiritual connection to Country. I extend that to everyone of Aboriginal, First Nations and Torres Strait Islander descent who is joining us today, wherever you may be.

Great to have you here. We’ve got a wonderful session ahead. I’ve got an all-star panel here to my left. My name is Steph Brantz and I’m basically the traffic conductor – I’m guiding the conversation. All the expert intel is coming from these four fabulous women.

I’m sure you’re all aware that women are transforming sport – from science to coaching to global event leadership, alongside leading researchers, coaches, players and athletes. The growth has been extraordinary. Tonight we’re going to hear and explore how women are driving high-performance innovation, shaping major events and changing the future of sport.

We’ll look at sport science, biomechanics, coaching, delivery of global tournaments, and how we’re rewriting the sport playbook – how sport is played, led and studied. This conversation is celebrating those leading the charge, breaking barriers and challenging systems, and redefining what elite performance looks like.

Don’t look so nervous, ladies – you are the experts in this space.

Through collaborations such as the UTS and Cricket NSW partnership, and international research in performance science, women are driving innovation and creating a smarter, more equitable future for sport – both on and off the field. That’s what we’re going to look at tonight.

Tonight’s panel brings together leaders shaping the future of sport – from high-performance coaching and research to representation and governance. I’m delighted to introduce our expert panel to you. I’m going to chat to them for about 45 minutes or so, but you’ll also have the opportunity to ask your questions.

We’re going to put up a QR code for our Slido questions. All you do is scan that and a question panel will come up. Please feel free to add any questions you want. Some of them I may be able to drop in during the conversation – I’ll keep an eye on them up here – and otherwise we have a dedicated session at the end to make sure we answer as many of your burning questions as we can.

But right now, let’s hear from this stellar panel.

 
Panel introductions
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I’ll start with Leah Poulton on my left. She’s Head of Female Elite Cricket at Cricket New South Wales, leading programmes that develop the next generation of players and coaches. As I’m sure you’re aware, she’s a former Australian cricketer and a respected sports leader. She’s driving change in pathways, performance and participation across the women’s game in partnership with UTS and national high-performance networks.

Welcome, Leah Poulton.

LEAH POULTON:
Hi. Thanks for having me on.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Next to Leah, Dr Katie Slattery is a senior lecturer and researcher at UTS specialising in sport and exercise science. Her work explores athlete monitoring, performance and wellbeing. She’s helped shape global partnerships that bring UTS research to the highest levels of international sport.

Dr Katie Slattery.

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
Thank you.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I’ve just realised how enormous my picture looks when we go in close-up!

Next, Samantha D’Souza – and I’ve just made you a doctor. Would you like to be one?

Samantha D’Souza is a Director at Women Sport Australia and a communications and strategy professional with more than 15 years’ experience across sport, media and culture. Sam’s work focuses on representation, sponsorship and the power of storytelling to drive visibility, advocacy and equity in women’s sport.

Welcome, Sam.

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Thank you.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Last, but 100 per cent not least, we do have another doctor – Dr Libby Pickering Rodriguez. Libby is a lecturer and researcher in biomechanics here at UTS, exploring how technology, movement and injury prevention shape high-performance environments. Her work bridges science and sport and helps create a more inclusive, evidence-based approach that improves training outcomes for athletes at all levels.

Welcome, Libby.

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Thank you.

 
“How did you get here?” – career journeys
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
All right, folks, I’ve set you up. Now it’s your turn to do some talking.

I’d like to start with each of you giving us a bit of insight into what you do – from your perspective – where it all started, and what that journey was like to get to the amazing roles you hold today.

Leah, I’ll start with you. The change in women’s sport surely can’t be more evident than when you reflect on your own career. How did that bring you to where you are now, and you must be looking at the changes since your playing days?

 
Leah – from player to administrator
LEAH POULTON:
Evening everybody.

When I started playing cricket, our crowds were about this size. I think I had about this many people come and watch us play when I represented New South Wales and Australia. For those in the crowd who follow women’s cricket now, it’s starkly different.

I think the biggest change is how mainstream women’s sport is now – and how visible. It’s easy to follow. You can pick up a newspaper or turn on the TV and see it. That’s very different to when I started.

My first role was as an athlete. I played for New South Wales for about 15 years and for the Australian women’s team for about eight. I had a day job, as most people did then – I was a school teacher. It was very common that all the women in our teams held down a job during the day and then trained at night. The commitment was the same, but the balance was very different.

When I finished as an athlete, that’s when I started working in cricket. I’ve held different high-performance coaching roles – with WBBL, the Australian pathway, and the NSW team. My current role is in administration, looking after elite female cricket in NSW: the Sydney Sixers, Sydney Thunder – who are competing in the WBBL at the moment; Sixers going pretty well, Thunder not so well – and our New South Wales pathway.

We have a big pathway across the state where kids from about 13 and up participate in our academy. That’s certainly the most fulfilling part of my role – working with those young players.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Well, you still have a day job – a very impressive one – giving back to the sport and driving high-performance athletes even further. Thank you, Leah.

 
Katie – curiosity about performance and a winding path
Katie, let’s talk about your career. You’ve been to the pinnacle with Olympic sport and your work with teams in that space. What was your pathway to high-performance work, and do you remember what sparked your interest in high performance and research?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
There was no single moment that sparked my interest, but if I think back, I’ve always been a little bit competitive as a kid and fascinated by the limits of human performance.

Growing up, my heroes were Rob de Castella and Lisa Ondieki – some of Australia’s best marathon runners. I would sit and watch the marathon as a kid. That’s where my love for understanding sport and optimising performance came from.

The steps along the way were mostly about learning what I didn’t want to do. I initially started an environmental engineering degree – I had no idea what that really meant, and I’m glad I never finished it. I tried outdoor education and realised I can’t really read a map and have no sense of direction. So that wasn’t ideal either.

Then I thought maybe sport science, maybe PE teaching. Then I remembered I wasn’t the best student myself, so maybe karma would get me if I became a teacher!

At the end of my sport science degree, Aaron – who’s here – said, “Have you thought about research? Would you like to do an honours degree?” I said, “I’ve got nothing better to do,” and it all started there.

Since then, I did my PhD in sport science, then worked at the NSW Institute of Sport, which led to working for Cycling Australia – now AusCycling – and that took me to the Olympics. Now I’m full circle back at UTS.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
That’s a super journey, Katie. I love that you say your opinion might change about what you want to do – I think that’s really important for young women. You don’t have to pick the end game right now.

I mean, I started as a freight forwarder, which was an unusual segue out of doing business at university, then became a naturopath when I qualified in health sciences, and then went into media. My parents are still asking when I’m going to get a “proper” job. So careers can move around a fair bit.

 
Sam – curiosity, stories and sport
Sam, you’ve had a fascinating career already. When I first met you, hearing the pathways you took – and your connection with UCLA – made me very jealous. I once dreamt of being a basketballer at UCLA. I didn’t have a green card and I wasn’t good enough, so that was that.

You’re such a fantastic storyteller. How do you tell your own?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Great question. I’m very nervous to do so.

The main foundation of my life so far – and I like to think I’m still at the beginning – is that I’ve always been a deeply curious person. I credit a lot of that to my family. We’re travellers, story-finders and storytellers.

From childhood, we travelled quite a lot. I was very involved in everything at school – sport, music, art and my studies. I was a huge history nerd. That genuine curiosity about other people’s stories – where they came from and what their pathway looked like – has shaped everywhere I’ve been and what I’ve loved doing.

It’s taken me around the world. I studied in the US at UCLA, as Steph mentioned. One of my first dreams in childhood was to be an athlete. I was a sprinter for many years, I played field hockey – that sporting community really shaped my professional discipline and my ability to work in teams.

It founded a lot of my love for people – understanding how they get through hard moments, how their bodies move and minds work, and the discipline needed to really train.

At UCLA, I worked closely with the track and field team as one of their managers. I saw the ins and outs of training, as well as navigating my own journey with sport. I ended up running a marathon many years later – going from training for 26 seconds to training for 42 kilometres is a bit of a leap.

Being in the heart of Hollywood and Los Angeles, you can’t help but be curious about how people tell stories. For me, the most interesting connections were between people telling stories for blockbuster purposes and those telling stories for impact.

That’s led naturally into my work now – very closely connected to sport. I moved back home during COVID and started working with a company called ACT.3, a global agency. We work closely with big brands like adidas, and our focus is to tell cultural stories. It’s taken me around the world – South Africa, Dubai, the US, Europe – seeing how culturally we connect sport to community.

Looking back at my experience at an all-girls school – which is a real point of privilege – I can see how sport kept me connected. Seeing how different cultures encourage participation today is a big part of why I still feel so curious.

So for me it’s all about curiosity, global travel, and the experience of community.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Great stuff, Sam. We look forward to hearing more about brand and culture and how important that is in the promotion of women’s sport.

You did mention how important your family has been – hello D’Souza family, I know you’re somewhere in this room. Great to have that support here today.

 
Libby – into biomechanics and changing the gender balance
Libby, you’re part of the cohort leading the charge in a space that’s become absolutely critical to female athletes. That connection between sport and academia seems obvious now, but probably not when you began. I’m guessing there weren’t many women in that space when you started?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Yes, that would be correct.

I came into sport science academia in a similar path to Katie – just following my interests more than anything. I came to UTS straight out of high school to do Human Movement Studies, which is now Sport and Exercise Science, because I played sport growing up and wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do for a job.

I knew I didn’t want to be a PE teacher, but I did the sport and exercise degree and, through that, got a tap on the shoulder to do an honours degree afterwards – which I also didn’t really know about. I did honours, got exposure to research and realised I really liked it, so I continued on to a PhD.

Not long after my PhD, I was lucky enough to get an academic position on staff here at UTS in what is now the School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation. At that time – about 10 years ago – I was one of seven staff, and I was the only female in our school.

Now it has grown, thankfully. I did the maths before – we’re at about 37% females. Our school has grown immensely overall, and the gender balance has improved significantly over that time.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Fantastic stuff. We’ll talk more about where your research has led you in a moment.

 
Partnerships – UTS and Cricket NSW
I want to come back to that sport–academia link, because it outlines perfectly the connection between UTS and Cricket NSW.

Leah, what impact are you seeing from this collaboration?

LEAH POULTON:
I think it’s so important in sport to have an open mind and get information from as many different spaces as possible. If you’re not open-minded and exploring different possibilities, you’ll be overtaken very quickly.

Innovation and exploring ways to do things differently is really important for us. Partnerships are critical. We have partnerships with other sporting organisations, with businesses, and our partnership with universities has been wonderful.

We’ve got a partnership with UTS where the people are just as passionate as we are about women’s sport, but they come at it differently. They have expertise that we don’t have.

One really cool example is Project 130. In women’s cricket, the fastest bowler is around 125km/h – that’s Shabnim Ismail, who’s playing for the Thunder at the moment. There’s a gap between what women are bowling and what men are bowling.

We don’t always use men as the yardstick – it’s not just “men do this, so we must do that”. But we know we haven’t yet reached our ceiling. There’s further growth there.

So the partnership with UTS is about looking at: How can women bowl faster? What training modalities should we implement? Should we focus on strength or power? Technique? At what ages and levels? What sort of physical profile are we looking for?

I know those things are important – I just don’t know how to do it. That’s where I need Libby’s help.

So the partnership we have is really exciting. When young kids walk through the door and you say, “Hey, this is something we’re doing – do you want to be part of this project?” you see their eyes light up – “Wow, is that possible?”

This isn’t just something that will be a huge asset to Cricket NSW. This is for the global sporting community. There’s not enough research on female athletes full stop – and projects like this help people think about what’s possible.

 
UTS research – training quality & AI
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Folks, thanks for your questions both in the room and online – keep them coming on Slido. I’ll get to as many as I can once we’ve talked through a few themes.

Katie, I want to keep that UTS theme going because your work sits at the intersection of research and real-world performance. What new developments are you seeing coming out of your work?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
One really cool thing we’re looking at now is a concept called training quality – where we’re not just asking what training you’re doing, but how well you’re doing it.

A lot of that came from not wanting to look at training from a single perspective, but zooming out and looking at the big picture. My experience as a sport physiologist was to care mainly about physical performance. Now we’re expanding to ask: What’s happening technically? Tactically? Mentally? What’s happening from a team cohesion perspective?

It sounds simple, but it’s a new step for our sport science research.

We’re also leveraging large language models and artificial intelligence – not only to capture traditional training metrics, but to draw in things like: what are coaches saying in their athlete debriefs? What are they saying to athletes during training? We’re using that to build a big-picture view of what happens in every training session.

 
Biomechanics – tech and AI making it practical
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Building on that, Libby, I want to ask you about your work in biomechanics because that gives us a glimpse into the future of sports science. When you hear Katie talk about technologies and methodologies, what are you seeing that’s redefining how we look at athletes?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
For those of you who may not know, biomechanics is essentially applying the laws of physics to the human body. We’re looking at how and why we move.

We can apply that in sport – for technique analysis, force profiles and so on. I think biomechanics is having a bit of a moment, if I may say so. That’s largely driven by recent technological advances.

Traditionally it was very process-heavy. While physiologists might take a lactate sample or a heart rate and get results straight away, we’d go and do a movement analysis and then spend hours post-processing to get accurate joint angles or velocities.

Now AI has come in and there’s been a lot of advancement that takes a lot of the grunt work out of analysis. It’s making biomechanics much more accessible across the sporting landscape, which means we can access more data and actually apply it in practical settings.

It’s one thing to say, hypothetically, “Fast bowlers should bowl with a straighter front knee.” But if they can’t address that in training – if they have to come into a lab to get that assessed – it’s much harder to implement.

New tools like AI pose estimation make this kind of analysis more accessible, so we can have real-world impact.

 
Storytelling, brands and the money question
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
It’s not just about the women working in the science; it’s also about creating the best culture and performance environment for athletes – particularly female athletes – and making sure the stories are told.

Sam, put on your brand and culture hat. What’s critical in making sure that female athletes – and the work these women are doing – is supported and publicised?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
I think the answer a lot of people skirt around here is money. It’s the thing we all need to talk about more.

I’m sitting next to three incredible academics and professionals who are working day in, day out with athletes and sporting codes, seeing the hard work and discipline that goes into this. But from a cultural perspective, I recently hosted a panel on “cultural currency” and “cultural capital” – how do we gain it? Because it holds huge value in the media and stories we consume.

The way we obtain that, as storytellers or brands or organisations like Cricket NSW, is that we need money to invest in visibility – to invest in the athletes who are front and centre, performing and working so hard for their teams and communities.

The value of women’s sport, based on the statistics and the research and investment we’re seeing, is becoming more obvious. The commercial opportunity is clearer.

I was looking at some data earlier today – I went into deep statistical nerd mode – but this year we’re going to surpass something like $2.35 billion in global revenue for women’s sports, which is around a 200% increase on what we saw a couple of years ago. That shows this is not just a DEI or CSR add-on. It’s a growing industry – a very fast-growing industry.

If you’re commercially minded and smart in business, you’ll invest your money in sport – and not just into the stories, but into the research, the codes, the programming and the infrastructure.

Because that $2.35 billion is out of a half-trillion-dollar global sports industry – there’s a lot more opportunity to grow.

 
Has the money followed the Matildas?
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I want to take one of the questions from Slido. The FIFA Women’s World Cup broke so many viewership records. Has the sponsorship money followed? What needs to change for the commercial reality to match community interest? How do you tie those two things together?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
I want to talk carefully about this, because the FIFA Women’s World Cup was one of the greatest things to happen in this local market. Did everyone go to a match? Hands raised? I went to several.

The young 16-year-old athlete inside me was so touched and emotional. I think many people – regardless of age or gender – felt that. One of my favourite memories was after the quarter-final against France. We’d beaten them, and the next morning in a café I heard an older man behind me reliving every statistic of the game. I’d never heard that kind of detailed excitement about a women’s tournament from an older man before.

The credit to the teams around that – Football Australia, everyone involved – is so well deserved and so important.

It’s now almost 2026, and the mistake we’ve made is putting too much emphasis on one tournament to carry several years of legacy. There are many other sports – we’re talking about cricket today, athletics, so many codes in Australia and globally.

The legacy plan after these events is just as important as the event itself. What we’re still seeing is:

Women’s sport makes up maybe 10–15% of the sponsorship bracket of a $113 billion sponsorship industry.
To keep growing, we need brands to invest not just in the “firework” moments – the World Cups, Euro Championships, Champions League finals – but in long-term commitments: athlete contracts, programming, research, infrastructure.
From a commercial lens, if I’m a brand deciding how to sponsor teams, I’m not just looking at short-term return – although the return can be high. It’s about the long-term effect on grassroots.

In Victoria, for example, the Office for Women and Girls in Sport did research (they’ve since been defunded in the latest budget, disappointingly) showing that in the next 15 years women’s sport could be a $49 billion industry in Australia. It’s growing rapidly on home turf, but we’re also seeing the highest rates of girls dropping out of sport in their teenage years.

Around 60% of girls after 15 consider dropping out or stop participation. Forget elite pathways – they’re not even staying in community sport. So if I’m a brand, it’s not just about big events – it’s about the girl in regional NSW, WA, Tasmania who’s thinking about never touching a football again because of body image, lack of infrastructure, or feeling like it’s not for her.

Big brands have enormous power to impact that whole pipeline – from grassroots to elite. The brands doing it well are investing in women’s sport as a long-term, strategic part of their business, not just a short-term campaign.

 
Coaching and the female Level 2
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
We need to bring that investment and legacy down to a granular level, and I think that’s starting to happen with initiatives like the all-female Level 2 coaching programme.

Leah, that’s breaking new ground. What’s driving that shift?

LEAH POULTON:
I think it’s an appetite to do things differently. The Level 2 coaching example is a really good one because, although there’s lots of great change in women’s sport, coaching is one area that hasn’t kept pace.

It breaks my heart to say that as a former school teacher and coach, but women in coaching are really lagging. There aren’t enough female coaches working in women’s sport, and very few working in men’s sport.

The Level 2 coaching course hadn’t changed much from when I did it about 15 years ago. When I did mine, I was the only woman in the course. Year after year, I’d look in and see the same demographic – men, maybe one woman.

We asked, “What’s going on here?” The feedback from women was that they didn’t think it was for them. When the course was promoted, it just sounded like a generic Level 2. It wasn’t obvious they belonged in that space.

So our coaching team said, “Let’s run one specifically for women.” Then there’s no ambiguity. And what do you know – we had about 20 women sign up within days. All they needed to know was that it was for them.

So I think it’s about being willing to do things differently and try things. One of our values at Cricket NSW is imagination. It’s a great way to approach problems: this isn’t working, we’ve tried the same thing on repeat and we’re not getting different results – how can we imagine doing it differently?

 
Australia vs overseas
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Looking across the sporting landscape, how does Australia compare with the progress overseas? Are there things we can learn from other markets?

LEAH POULTON:
Definitely. The good thing is that Australia is in a real leadership position in women’s sport. The way we’ve led investment in women’s sport is something to be proud of.

But, as we know, in sport you can’t rest on that. I look at the investment Cricket Australia has made in the women’s team for so long – we’ve been leaders in that space.

But then you look at the Women’s Premier League in India. They flicked a switch and decided to do it well, and all of a sudden they’ve gone from being the second league in the world to the first – like a rocket.

England is another example. They lagged behind in women’s cricket for a long time, and then someone in a boardroom clearly said, “We have to do this better.” With investment, things can happen very fast.

The good news for us is that we are leading in lots of spaces. Sport science is one where we’re really strong. I did a study tour to the US a few years back – we visited universities, colleges, professional sporting organisations, lots of baseball because it transfers well to cricket.

We went in saying, “What can you tell us about this and that?” and they turned around and said, “Well, what can you tell us? We should be learning from you. Australians do sport science better than anyone. How can you help us?”

So we come from a position of leadership in many spaces – but you can’t sit on that. You have to keep moving.

 
Research standards and doing it “right”
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Katie, we “do it better than anyone else” according to Leah. Talk to us about the research space – where does Australia sit in that narrative?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
I think we do a lot of things very well, and that’s been led by strong work done by the Australian Institute of Sport. Pioneers like Chris Gore and Louise Burke really started the idea of applied sport science research – looking at what’s happening in the real world and trying to answer questions systematically.

We continue to do that well. Now we’re not only thinking, “How can we look at what’s happening on the field or track?” but also “How can we apply rigorous research methods to better understand that?”

Here at UTS, for example, we have Professor Franco Impellizzeri in our school – he is intense and passionate about research quality. His attitude is: if we’re going to do something, we’re going to do it right and get the highest-quality answer to our research questions.

I think that’s what we’re doing better than anyone else at the moment – combining real-world relevance with genuine rigour.

 
Co-design and embedding students
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Libby, how do you see UTS research contributing to better outcomes, not just in the lab but for elite athletes?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Our approach is to answer questions that are driven by the real world. We try not to sit in an academic tower and invent the questions ourselves.

For the Cricket NSW–UTS partnership, for example, we have multiple studies underway from community level to high performance. One important thing is co-design with our industry partners.

So it’s not me and Katie sitting in a room deciding what Leah should do. We meet with Cricket NSW and ask, “What problems do you have? What questions are you grappling with?” Then we co-design research around that.

A really successful way to do that is to embed postgraduate students in industry. They have ownership at both UTS and within the partner organisation. They’re the eyes on the ground who can see everyday problems and opportunities that we can contribute to.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Does that help you shape how you apply the research?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Definitely. It’s one thing to find a statistically significant difference in, say, a joint angle between lower- and higher-performing athletes. But if the difference is, for example, five degrees, it might not be practically meaningful. Can we actually change that joint angle by five degrees in training?

That’s where talking to coaches and athletes is critical. Otherwise we risk going down a rabbit hole that can’t actually be addressed in the real world.

 
National bodies and co-leadership
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
How does that relate when you work with national sporting bodies? Katie, you’ve done a lot of work with them. How does UTS help bridge that divide?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
One way is through genuine co-leadership. I co-led a research project with Dr Jamie Stanley, who’s based at the South Australian Institute of Sport.

The power of co-leadership is that it’s not a “university project” or an “institute project” – it’s our project. As Leah said, we use each other’s strengths.

That also helps with implementation. The worst thing is to do a huge research project and have it sit in a journal article or a thesis that nobody uses.

We’ve done work on how interdisciplinary teams can work better together to support athletes. Because Jamie continues to work with coaches and has strong connections across the physiology network – institutes in NSW, Queensland and so on – he can say, “Hey, we’ve been working on this. Here’s something that may help you.”

Without that strong partnership and joint ownership, we wouldn’t have the research quality or the implementation pathway we have.

 
Sponsorship, brands and cultural shifts
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Sam, you like getting answers to big questions. Let’s talk about partnerships and sponsorship in women’s sport. What shifts are you seeing in investments in brands, athletes and work on and off the field?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
It’s a huge global industry, and growth has accelerated over the last few years, especially around big “firework” moments like World Cups, Euro Championships and so on.

One big shift I think is important is that brands you wouldn’t expect to be “enlightened” by women’s sport are waking up. We’re seeing financial companies investing, crypto companies, Cadbury backing women’s teams, Charlotte Tilbury sponsoring the F1 Academy.

There are great case studies of big brands sponsoring women’s teams. Another crucial change is in individual athlete contracts. Caitlin Clark’s Nike deal is one example – the biggest ever WNBA contract for a woman.

Compare that to the days when Allyson Felix left Nike because they had no maternity provision and were threatening to reduce her contract when she became pregnant. There are major shifts happening – not just in sponsoring and taking care of female athletes, but in prioritising women’s teams and competitions.

There’s still a lot of room to grow, as I mentioned before. There’s huge financial opportunity for big brands to get involved in this space, but that doesn’t discredit the work that’s been done so far.

Another under-used opportunity is local context and legacy. The global numbers are big, but in Australia the Office for Women and Girls in Sport – before being defunded – estimated women’s sport could be a $49 billion industry over the next 15 years.

At the same time we’re seeing high dropout rates among girls in their teens. When I think about this as a brand, I’m not just thinking about the return on sponsoring a national team – I’m thinking about the long-term impact on that girl in regional NSW or WA deciding whether to stay in sport.

The brands that get it right are connecting the commercial story with the participation story – they’re investing in visibility and in the research, the codes, the infrastructure and pathways.

 
Who’s doing women’s sport well globally?
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
If you cast your mind around the world, who do you think does women’s sport well, Sam?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Australia does an amazing job in many ways, though there’s still more to do.

Internationally, I’ve been really inspired by what’s happening in Europe around big tournaments like the UEFA Women’s Euro. There were lots of attendance records broken. Simple things like changing traffic lights in Switzerland to show a woman kicking a football during the tournament – it sounds small, but it signals commitment.

I was in Lisbon during the Women’s Champions League final. UEFA hosted a business case summit for women’s football at the same time – bringing top leaders together to talk about long-term strategy. A lot of the panellists were men working in the industry, which is also important – it shows shared responsibility.

In the Middle East, there’s interesting work around women’s races and providing appropriate kit for elite sportswomen to compete in a way that’s respectful of their cultures and religions. It’s complex, but it’s progress.

Everywhere has growth and cultural navigation to do, but those are a few highlights.

 
Keeping girls in sport
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I want to pick up a question from the audience and start with you, Leah. Are you working on how to keep young girls in sport? Statistically, one in five girls aged 10–16 consider dropping out due to period issues.

LEAH POULTON:
The short answer is yes. We’re absolutely conscious of the dropout rates and always looking at ways to improve them.

It’s layered – there are lots of reasons why girls fall out of love with sport, or just choose to do something else. In cricket, I think one of the biggest things is selling the social benefits, not just the physical benefits.

We’ve got this beautiful game that goes for a really long time where people sit around talking. That social side is a big selling point.

We’re doing a piece of work with UTS at the moment on our female pathway – girls aged 13 and up – looking at their experiences and hearing directly from them. I think a lot of administrators assume they have the answers, but a lot of answers sit within the community.

We’ve just done a whole lot of work listening to kids and their parents, understanding what they want and how we can improve. We’ll release the findings early next year.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
How do you define what keeps girls in the sport when you go between participation and high performance?

LEAH POULTON:
I think those pathways are quite muddled, especially in the younger age groups. We talk about “pathways to participation” and “pathways to performance”, but when you’re 12, 13, 14 you don’t really know which one you’re in.

The important thing is to make sure we have pathways with lots of entry and re-entry points. If you’re a 13-year-old who really wants to be an elite cricketer but it doesn’t pan out that way, there still need to be great offerings for you.

We also get late bloomers. Some kids take it up because their friends do and then, at 15 or 16, think, “Actually, I’m pretty good at this.” That happens – and we need ways for those kids to get into the elite pathway too.

So I’d say pathways to performance and participation weave in and out of each other.

 
Longevity and female-specific issues
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Katie and Libby, is part of your research involved in helping give longevity to female athletes’ careers?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Not always directly, but a lot of what Katie talked about – interdisciplinary work, listening to athletes’ perspectives as well as physical data – contributes to that.

I also think there have been lots of small steps on topics like the menstrual cycle, pregnancy, postpartum return to sport and so on. It’s multifaceted.

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
From my own experience working with athletes at that transition point – from high school into high performance – it’s tough. You go from being told what to do by parents and school to having to drive your own career.

With the female athletes I worked with, a big part of supporting them was building belief: yes, you can do this – this can be a career.

Ten or fifteen years ago, women had to self-fund just to race in some sports. Now they can have professional contracts. That makes the conversation easier.

There’s also good research and resources now – the AIS Female Performance & Health Initiative, for example. It has free online resources and workshops for female athletes on topics like the menstrual cycle, contraception, pregnancy, peri-menopause and so on.

Those sticking points – “I don’t want to play because of my period” – are becoming less of a barrier, because there’s more information and support.

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
I agree. There’s still a way to go, but we’ve taken lots of baby steps.

Even in our own project with fast bowlers, we’ve heard things that weren’t in the study design but came up in conversation – like a younger girl telling me she prefers one-day cricket because the uniform is coloured, not white, so she’s less worried about wearing it when she has her period. That’s such a small, practical change that can make a big difference.

Netball is another example – umpires historically had to wear white, and now they can wear black skirts, which is much more comfortable for many women.

And then there’s maternity. Netball Australia now pays maternity leave. We’re seeing more examples of women having children and returning to elite sport, which sends a powerful message.

 
Avoiding the 0.001% trap
SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Just to add – we’ve put a lot of weight on athletes like Mary Fowler, Elise Perry and others as role models. It’s amazing that they’re getting that visibility, but that’s a lot of pressure on one individual or team.

We need diversity in who we spotlight. The Matildas have carried a huge weight since 2023. The spotlight should include the less visible stories – the challenges, the practical barriers – as well as the glamorous bits.

We should be showing the full picture, not just the 0.001% at the very top.

 
Inclusive sport, disability, and everyday people
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
We have a question here on inclusive sport: does sport research transfer back to community and society by helping people with life issues or disabilities? Can sports science help people live better, more successfully?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Yes, absolutely.

Within our school, for example, we have a Clinical Exercise Physiology stream, which focuses on exercise for clinical populations. That’s one way we contribute directly to health and disability outcomes.

In terms of high-performance sport, there’s still a lower percentage of research with female participants and with athletes with disabilities, so that’s an area that needs growth. But it’s not just about research – there’s also sport science servicing.

Research relies on large sample sizes and statistical significance, which can be difficult in para-sport because each athlete is so unique. But the servicing we do – such as preparing athletes for heat or individualised performance work – still draws on sport science principles and benefits those athletes.

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
And a lot of high-performance technology eventually filters down into everyday life. How many people here have Fitbits or Garmins? Without high-performance sport, nobody would be wearing those.

Tools like GPS tracking, heart-rate monitoring, physical activity wearables – they were originally developed for high-performance environments and are now used in general health and fitness.

 
The research gap – men vs women
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Katie, there’s a question about the gap between research into female sport and male sport. How do you see that?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
Historically, we started on the back foot. Early in my research career the standard was just to research males, because – to put it bluntly – they were seen as “easier”. You didn’t have hormonal fluctuations to control for. That’s obviously a simplistic view, but it was a common one.

Thankfully, that’s changing. There’s much more research into female athletes now, and importantly we’re realising that women are not just small men. That statement from Stacey Sims has been quite revolutionary – it’s shifted mindset.

People now understand you can’t just see what happens in men and directly apply it to women. There’s still debate about the best ways to research female athletes, but we’re on a much better track.

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
There’s definitely been a historical lack of female participants in sport science research. One paper that looked at 20 years of sport science research found female participants somewhere below 20%.

It’s multi-factorial. Female physiology was seen as “too complex”, so it ended up in the too-hard basket. There’s also participation: if fewer women are in high-performance pathways or professional sport, there’s a smaller pool to recruit from.

Professional male sport has had more money for longer, so there are existing data sets – GPS, wellness scores, performance tests – that researchers can use. Women’s sport is catching up, but the legacy gap is real.

The good news is that awareness of these issues has grown, and we’re seeing concerted efforts to close the gap.

 
Behaviour standards and double standards
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Leah, we have a question about standards of behaviour: is there a double standard between women and male athletes for on- and off-field behaviour?

LEAH POULTON:
As the profile of women’s sport increases, there will be more attention on female athletes’ lives and conduct. If you have a hero – someone you look up to – you want to see them behaving well.

As more female athletes become idols, there’ll be more scrutiny. I’m not sure yet whether it’s a double standard, but I certainly think the spotlight is growing.

 
Hosting major events in countries with poor human rights
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
We’ve got a few minutes left and four or five questions a lot of people want answers to.

One is: Should countries with poor human rights records against women or minority groups be allowed to host major international sporting events?

Ten seconds or less – Sam, I’m looking at you!

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
You’re really putting me on the spot.

I don’t think there’s a simple answer. I’m not going to make a big political statement, but I do think strategies behind hosting decisions and legacy planning have to be anchored in genuine desire to see change.

If values are aligned and there’s a real plan – backed by action – to improve conditions for women and minority groups, there’s potential for sport to be a force for change.

I’ve travelled to places like Saudi Arabia multiple times to observe women’s football programmes, and there are real opportunities being opened up. So it’s complex. The key is whether the intention and investment are genuine, not just for show.

 
Getting your foot in the door – careers in sport
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Several questions relate to getting your foot in the door:

“I’ve created a proposal to promote equitable access for women in motorsport. Without industry connections, how can I effectively pitch it and be taken seriously?”
“Is it who you know?”
“How do you get into these careers?”
So from your perspective, what’s your takeaway for the group – online and in the room – about how to be who you want to see?

Who’d like to start?

 
Leah – real-world experience and volunteering
LEAH POULTON:
I can start.

The biggest one for me is: it doesn’t have to be paid industry experience. When we recruit at Cricket NSW, a real separator is real-world experience.

It doesn’t have to be that you’ve worked in sport before, or that you’ve been an elite athlete. But if you’ve volunteered somewhere, if you can show that you’re passionate through some kind of practical involvement, that’s a big plus.

So things like volunteering with local clubs, helping at events, being involved in community programmes – they show initiative and commitment.

 
Katie – don’t be put off being “the only woman in the room”
DR KATIE SLATTERY:
My biggest piece of advice is: don’t not do something just because you’re the only girl in the room.

That’s been my philosophy. I’m often the only woman, and I’ve never let it bother me. In fact, I’ve used it to my advantage throughout my career.

 
Sam – ask people their stories
SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
My favourite thing to do when I meet new people is ask them what their story is. I can tell I’m a storyteller!

My best example is actually Steph. When I came back to Australia from living overseas, I asked Steph to join a panel we were hosting during the World Cup. I chased her down afterwards while she was trying to escape and said, “Can I take you to lunch? I’d love to pick your brain about your story.”

Since that lunch, she has opened doors for me all over the sporting industry in Australia.

So the biggest thing that’s changed my career is sitting down with people I admire, asking them about their journey – with genuine curiosity, not just an ulterior motive. In sport especially, you never know who you’ll meet or what it will inspire.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Can I just say, after I heard Sam’s story I wanted to be Sam – and then I topped it off by throwing my coffee all over her, which was unintentional but clearly memorable!

 
Libby – chase your interests, not a fixed job title
DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
I think a big piece of advice for getting your foot in the door is to set your sights on your interests rather than chasing a specific job title.

That was reflected in all our opening stories. We chased our interests. I didn’t know what my job would be when I left school.

If you follow what genuinely interests you and stay curious, opportunities appear that you might not have imagined. Say yes to things. Stay open.

LEAH POULTON:
Can I add a very Australian version? Have a crack. Just have a go.

What do you lose if you don’t? I’ve had six jobs so far and I’ll get to my “real” job one day!

But seriously – you’ll find something you love, or a part of something you love. As the saying goes, if you’re doing something you love, you don’t work a day in your life.

 
Closing
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Ladies, you’ve been absolutely amazing. It’s been wonderful to share a piece of your stories, your pathways and your journeys.

Folks, can I ask you to please show your appreciation for Dr Libby Pickering Rodriguez, Samantha D’Souza, Dr Katie Slattery and Leah Poulton.

Thank you very much to everyone who’s joined us – in the room and online. Thank you to Ness for organising today, and I hope to see all of you out there pursuing your passions into the future.

Thank you for joining us on Global Game Changers.

 

STEPHANIE BRANTZ (Host):
Well, good evening. Let’s get underway. Lovely to see everyone here in the room, and a warm welcome to everyone joining us online, wherever you are. Great to have you here for our session, Global Game Changers – Episode 3: Rewriting the playbook: women leading the future of sport. We’ve got a fantastic evening ahead.

I want to begin by acknowledging that we meet, whether online or in person, on Gadigal land. I acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the lands wherever you’re joining us from. We pay our respects to Elders past and present, and to those who hold the continuing cultural and spiritual connection to Country. I extend that respect to everyone of Aboriginal, First Nations and Torres Strait Islander descent who is joining us today, wherever you may be.

We’ve got a wonderful session ahead. I have an all-star panel to my left. My name is Steph Brantz and I’m basically the traffic conductor – guiding the conversation. All the expert intel is coming from these four fabulous women.

As I’m sure you’re all aware, women are transforming sport – from science to coaching to global event leadership. We’re seeing leading researchers, coaches, players and athletes driving extraordinary growth. Tonight, we’re going to explore how women are driving high-performance innovation, shaping major events and changing the future of sport.

We’ll look at sport science, biomechanics, coaching, delivery of global tournaments, and how we’re rewriting the sport playbook – how sport is played, led and studied. This conversation is really about celebrating those leading the charge, breaking barriers and challenging systems, and redefining what elite performance looks like. Don’t look so nervous, ladies – you are the experts in this space.

Through collaborations such as the UTS and Cricket NSW partnership, and international research in performance science, women are driving innovation and creating a smarter, more equitable future for sport – both on and off the field. That’s what we’re going to explore tonight.

Tonight’s panel brings together leaders shaping the future of sport – from high-performance coaching and research to representation and governance. I’m delighted to introduce our expert panel. I’ll chat to them for about 45 minutes or so, and then you will have the opportunity to ask your questions.

We’ll put up a QR code for Slido. Just scan that, and a question panel will pop up. Please feel free to add any questions you like. I may be able to weave some into the discussion as we go – I’ll keep an eye on them – and otherwise we have a dedicated Q&A at the end to make sure we answer as many of your burning questions as we can.

But right now, let’s hear from this stellar panel.

 
Panel introductions
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I’ll start with Leah Poulton on my left. Leah is Head of Female Elite Cricket at Cricket NSW, leading programmes that develop the next generation of players and coaches. She’s a former Australian cricketer and a respected sports leader, driving change in pathways, performance and participation across the women’s game, in partnership with UTS and national high-performance networks.

Welcome, Leah Poulton.

LEAH POULTON:
Hi, thanks for having me.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Next to Leah is Dr Katie Slattery. Katie is a senior lecturer and researcher at UTS, specialising in sport and exercise science. Her work explores athlete monitoring, performance and wellbeing, and she’s helped shape global partnerships that bring UTS research to the highest levels of international sport.

Dr Katie Slattery.

(Steph jokes about how big her face looks on the big screen.)

Now, Samantha D’Souza – and I’ve just about made you a doctor as well. Would you like to be one?

Sam is a Director at Women Sport Australia and a communications and strategy professional with more than 15 years’ experience across sport, media and culture. Her work focuses on representation, sponsorship and the power of storytelling to drive visibility, advocacy and equity in women’s sport.

Welcome, Sam.

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Thank you.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Last – but absolutely not least – Dr Libby Pickering Rodriguez. Libby is a lecturer and researcher in biomechanics here at UTS, exploring how technology, movement and injury prevention shape high-performance environments. Her work bridges science and sport, helping create a more inclusive, evidence-based approach that improves training outcomes for athletes at all levels.

Welcome, Libby.

 
Career journeys
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
All right folks, I’ve set you up – now it’s your turn to do some talking.

I’d like to start by asking each of you to give us a bit of insight into what you do from your own perspective – where it started, and what that journey was like to reach the amazing roles you hold today.

Leah, I’ll start with you. The change in women’s sport surely can’t be more evident than when you reflect on your own career. How did that bring you to where you are now, and what changes have you seen since your playing days?

 
Leah – from player to high-performance leader
LEAH POULTON:
Good evening everybody.

When I started playing cricket, we were lucky to have a crowd like this. I think I had about this many people come and watch when I played for New South Wales and Australia. For those who follow women’s cricket now, you’ll know it’s starkly different.

The biggest shift is how mainstream women’s sport is now – and how visible. It’s easy to follow. You can pick up a newspaper or turn on the TV and see it. That certainly wasn’t the case when I started.

My first role in cricket was as an athlete. I played for NSW for about 15 years and for the Australian women’s team for around eight. Like most of us then, I had a day job – I was a school teacher. All the girls in our teams held down jobs during the day and then trained at night. The commitment was the same as it is now, but the balance was very different.

When I finished as an athlete, I moved into working in cricket. I’ve held various high-performance coaching roles with WBBL, the Australian pathway and NSW teams. My current role is in administration, looking after elite female cricket across NSW – the Sydney Sixers and Sydney Thunder in the WBBL, plus our extensive NSW pathway.

That pathway is probably the most fulfilling part of my job. We run a big academy across the state where kids from about 13 upwards participate in high-performance programmes.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
And you still have a day job – a very impressive one – giving back to the sport and driving high-performance athletes even further. Thank you, Leah.

 
Katie – finding sport science and the Olympics
Katie, let’s talk about your career. You’ve worked at the pinnacle of Olympic sport. What was your pathway into high-performance work, and do you remember what sparked your interest in performance and research?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
There wasn’t one single moment that sparked it, but looking back, I was always a bit competitive as a kid and fascinated by the limits of human performance.

My heroes growing up were people like Rob de Castella and Lisa Ondieki – some of Australia’s best marathon runners. I would actually sit and watch marathons on TV as a kid. I think that’s where my love of understanding sport and optimising performance began.

The steps along the way were mostly about learning what I didn’t want to do. I initially started an environmental engineering degree – I had no idea what that really was, and I’m glad I never finished it. I then tried outdoor education, and discovered I can’t really read a map or navigate, so that wasn’t ideal either.

I looked at sports science or PE teaching, but realised I wasn’t the best student at school – so perhaps karma was coming back. At the end of my sport science degree, Aaron (who’s here tonight) asked if I’d thought about research and suggested I do an honours degree. I said, “I’ve got nothing better to do,” and it all started from there.

I did my PhD in sport science, then worked at the NSW Institute of Sport, which led to working for Cycling Australia (now AusCycling). That’s what took me to the Olympics. And now I’ve come full circle and I’m back at UTS.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
That’s a fantastic journey. I love that you say your ideas changed along the way – I think that’s really important for young women. You don’t have to pick the end game right now.

For what it’s worth, I started as a freight forwarder after studying business at uni. Then I became a naturopath, then went into media. My parents are still asking when I’ll get a proper job. So pathways can be winding!

 
Sam – curiosity, stories and global travel
Sam, you’ve had a fascinating career already. I remember when I first met you and heard the different paths you’ve taken – and of course your connection with UCLA. Once upon a time I dreamed of playing basketball there; I didn’t have a green card and I wasn’t good enough, so that ruled that one out.

You’re a fantastic storyteller – how do you tell your own story?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Great question – and I’m actually quite nervous to do so.

The main foundation of my life so far – and I like to think I’m still at the beginning of it – is that I’ve always been a deeply curious person. I credit that to my family. We’re travellers, story-finders and storytellers.

From childhood we travelled a lot. At school I was involved in everything – sport, music, art and my studies. I was a huge history nerd. That genuine curiosity about other people’s stories – where they came from and how they got to where they are – has truly shaped everywhere I’ve been and everything I’ve loved doing.

It’s taken me around the world. I studied in the US at UCLA, as Steph mentioned. One of my first childhood dreams was to be an athlete. I was a sprinter for many years, and I played hockey. That sporting community really shaped my professional discipline and my ability to work in teams – it taught me how people get through hard moments and how their bodies and minds work, and the discipline required to train.

At UCLA I worked closely with the track and field team as one of their managers, seeing the ins and outs of training while navigating my own journey in sport. Years later I ran a marathon – which is a big leap when you’ve spent years training for 26 seconds, not 42 kilometres.

Being in the heart of Hollywood and Los Angeles, you can’t help but become curious about how stories are told. For me the most interesting connection was between people telling stories for blockbuster purposes and those telling stories for impact. That link between culture, community and sport is where I’ve ended up.

I moved back home during COVID and started working with a company called ACT.3, a global agency that works closely with brands like adidas. Our focus is on cultural storytelling – it’s taken me from South Africa to Dubai, the US and Europe, where I’ve seen how different cultures connect sport to community.

Looking back at my own experience at an all-girls school – which I now recognise as a point of privilege – I can see how sport kept me connected and confident. Seeing how different cultures encourage participation now is a big part of why I’m still so curious.

So for me it’s all about curiosity, global travel and the experience of community.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Great stuff, Sam. We’ll come back to brand and culture and how important that is for women’s sport. And you did mention how important your family has been – hello to the D’Souza family, I know you’re somewhere in the room. Great to have that support here today.

 
Libby – biomechanics and women in academia
Libby, you’re part of the cohort leading the charge in a space that’s become absolutely critical to female athletes – and that connection between sport and academia seems obvious now, but probably wasn’t when you started. I’m guessing there weren’t many women in that space when you came through?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Yes, that’s correct.

I came into sport science and academia in a similar way to Katie – by following my interests more than anything else. I came to UTS straight out of high school to do Human Movement Studies, which is now Sport and Exercise Science, because I played sport growing up and wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do for a job.

I knew I didn’t want to be a PE teacher, but I enjoyed the degree. During my undergraduate study I got a tap on the shoulder about doing an honours year – I didn’t really know what that was either – but I did it, was exposed to research and realised I really enjoyed it. That led into a PhD.

Not long after finishing my PhD, I was fortunate to get an academic position here at UTS, in what’s now the School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation. At that time – about ten years ago – I was one of seven staff in the school and the only woman.

It’s changed a lot since then. The school has grown immensely and we’re now at about 37% women. So the landscape has really shifted in a decade.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Fantastic. We’ll talk more about where your research has led you in a moment.

 
Sport–academia partnerships
Libby’s story leads nicely to the link between sport and academia that Leah mentioned – particularly the UTS and Cricket NSW partnership.

Leah, what impact are you seeing from that collaboration?

LEAH POULTON:
I think it’s incredibly important in sport to have an open mind and to bring in information from as many spaces as possible. If you’re not open and exploring different possibilities, you very quickly get overtaken – other people just go straight past you.

Innovation and looking for new ways to do things is critical. Partnerships are a big part of that. We partner with other sporting organisations, businesses, and universities – and the partnership with UTS has been wonderful.

At UTS, the people are just as passionate about women’s sport as we are, but they bring different expertise. One really cool example is Project 130, which I know Libby can explain in more detail.

In women’s cricket, the fastest bowler in the world at the moment is around 125km/h – Shabnim Ismail, who’s playing for the Thunder. There’s a gap between what women bowl and what men bowl. We don’t always use men as the yardstick of where we need to get to, but we know we haven’t yet reached the limits of what’s possible for women.

So our partnership with UTS is about asking: How can women bowl faster? What training modalities do we need? Should we focus on strength, power, technique – or different things at different ages? What sort of physical profile should we look for?

I know those questions are important, but I don’t know the detailed “how”. That’s where Libby and the UTS team come in.

The partnership is really exciting. When young players come in and we say, “This is what we’re doing – do you want to be part of this project?” their eyes light up. It helps them see what’s possible.

And it’s not just for Cricket NSW. This kind of research will be a huge asset for the global sporting community. There’s not enough research on female athletes full stop, and projects like this help people imagine what’s possible.

 
(The conversation continues into UTS research, AI, biomechanics, sponsorship, participation, keeping girls in sport, global comparisons and audience Q&A. If you’d like, I can clean the next section – from Katie’s description of “training quality” and AI, through Libby’s biomechanics explanation and Sam’s sponsorship/brand discussion – in the same style as above.)
 
You said:
is this the full conversation as it doesn't end like this?
 
ChatGPT said:
 
Thought for 8s
 
Great catch – no, what I gave you before was not the full conversation. It cut off partway through.

Here’s a single, continuous, cleaned-up transcript from start to finish, including the Q&A and final thank yous. I’ve:

Kept everyone’s meaning and order.
Removed “ums”, doubles, and obvious stumbles.
Fixed names, titles and basic punctuation.
Left it in a natural spoken style you can use for captions / web.
 
Global Game Changers – Episode 3
Rewriting the playbook: women leading the future of sport
Full cleaned transcript

STEPHANIE BRANTZ (Host):
Well, good evening. Let’s get underway. Lovely to see everyone here in the room, and a warm welcome to everyone who’s joining us online, wherever you are. Great to have you here for our session, which is Global Game Changers, Episode 3: Rewriting the playbook – women leading the future of sport. We’ve got a super evening prepared.

I do want to say that we meet, whether online or in person, here on Gadigal land, and I acknowledge all the Traditional Owners of the lands wherever you’re joining us from. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and those who hold the continuing cultural and spiritual connection to Country. I extend that to everyone of Aboriginal, First Nations and Torres Strait Islander descent who is joining us today, wherever you may be.

Great to have you here. We’ve got a wonderful session ahead. I’ve got an all-star panel here to my left. My name is Steph Brantz and I’m basically the traffic conductor – I’m guiding the conversation. All the expert intel is coming from these four fabulous women.

I’m sure you’re all aware that women are transforming sport – from science to coaching to global event leadership, alongside leading researchers, coaches, players and athletes. The growth has been extraordinary. Tonight we’re going to hear and explore how women are driving high-performance innovation, shaping major events and changing the future of sport.

We’ll look at sport science, biomechanics, coaching, delivery of global tournaments, and how we’re rewriting the sport playbook – how sport is played, led and studied. This conversation is celebrating those leading the charge, breaking barriers and challenging systems, and redefining what elite performance looks like.

Don’t look so nervous, ladies – you are the experts in this space.

Through collaborations such as the UTS and Cricket NSW partnership, and international research in performance science, women are driving innovation and creating a smarter, more equitable future for sport – both on and off the field. That’s what we’re going to look at tonight.

Tonight’s panel brings together leaders shaping the future of sport – from high-performance coaching and research to representation and governance. I’m delighted to introduce our expert panel to you. I’m going to chat to them for about 45 minutes or so, but you’ll also have the opportunity to ask your questions.

We’re going to put up a QR code for our Slido questions. All you do is scan that and a question panel will come up. Please feel free to add any questions you want. Some of them I may be able to drop in during the conversation – I’ll keep an eye on them up here – and otherwise we have a dedicated session at the end to make sure we answer as many of your burning questions as we can.

But right now, let’s hear from this stellar panel.

 
Panel introductions
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I’ll start with Leah Poulton on my left. She’s Head of Female Elite Cricket at Cricket New South Wales, leading programmes that develop the next generation of players and coaches. As I’m sure you’re aware, she’s a former Australian cricketer and a respected sports leader. She’s driving change in pathways, performance and participation across the women’s game in partnership with UTS and national high-performance networks.

Welcome, Leah Poulton.

LEAH POULTON:
Hi. Thanks for having me on.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Next to Leah, Dr Katie Slattery is a senior lecturer and researcher at UTS specialising in sport and exercise science. Her work explores athlete monitoring, performance and wellbeing. She’s helped shape global partnerships that bring UTS research to the highest levels of international sport.

Dr Katie Slattery.

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
Thank you.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I’ve just realised how enormous my picture looks when we go in close-up!

Next, Samantha D’Souza – and I’ve just made you a doctor. Would you like to be one?

Samantha D’Souza is a Director at Women Sport Australia and a communications and strategy professional with more than 15 years’ experience across sport, media and culture. Sam’s work focuses on representation, sponsorship and the power of storytelling to drive visibility, advocacy and equity in women’s sport.

Welcome, Sam.

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Thank you.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Last, but 100 per cent not least, we do have another doctor – Dr Libby Pickering Rodriguez. Libby is a lecturer and researcher in biomechanics here at UTS, exploring how technology, movement and injury prevention shape high-performance environments. Her work bridges science and sport and helps create a more inclusive, evidence-based approach that improves training outcomes for athletes at all levels.

Welcome, Libby.

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Thank you.

 
“How did you get here?” – career journeys
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
All right, folks, I’ve set you up. Now it’s your turn to do some talking.

I’d like to start with each of you giving us a bit of insight into what you do – from your perspective – where it all started, and what that journey was like to get to the amazing roles you hold today.

Leah, I’ll start with you. The change in women’s sport surely can’t be more evident than when you reflect on your own career. How did that bring you to where you are now, and you must be looking at the changes since your playing days?

 
Leah – from player to administrator
LEAH POULTON:
Evening everybody.

When I started playing cricket, our crowds were about this size. I think I had about this many people come and watch us play when I represented New South Wales and Australia. For those in the crowd who follow women’s cricket now, it’s starkly different.

I think the biggest change is how mainstream women’s sport is now – and how visible. It’s easy to follow. You can pick up a newspaper or turn on the TV and see it. That’s very different to when I started.

My first role was as an athlete. I played for New South Wales for about 15 years and for the Australian women’s team for about eight. I had a day job, as most people did then – I was a school teacher. It was very common that all the women in our teams held down a job during the day and then trained at night. The commitment was the same, but the balance was very different.

When I finished as an athlete, that’s when I started working in cricket. I’ve held different high-performance coaching roles – with WBBL, the Australian pathway, and the NSW team. My current role is in administration, looking after elite female cricket in NSW: the Sydney Sixers, Sydney Thunder – who are competing in the WBBL at the moment; Sixers going pretty well, Thunder not so well – and our New South Wales pathway.

We have a big pathway across the state where kids from about 13 and up participate in our academy. That’s certainly the most fulfilling part of my role – working with those young players.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Well, you still have a day job – a very impressive one – giving back to the sport and driving high-performance athletes even further. Thank you, Leah.

 
Katie – curiosity about performance and a winding path
Katie, let’s talk about your career. You’ve been to the pinnacle with Olympic sport and your work with teams in that space. What was your pathway to high-performance work, and do you remember what sparked your interest in high performance and research?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
There was no single moment that sparked my interest, but if I think back, I’ve always been a little bit competitive as a kid and fascinated by the limits of human performance.

Growing up, my heroes were Rob de Castella and Lisa Ondieki – some of Australia’s best marathon runners. I would sit and watch the marathon as a kid. That’s where my love for understanding sport and optimising performance came from.

The steps along the way were mostly about learning what I didn’t want to do. I initially started an environmental engineering degree – I had no idea what that really meant, and I’m glad I never finished it. I tried outdoor education and realised I can’t really read a map and have no sense of direction. So that wasn’t ideal either.

Then I thought maybe sport science, maybe PE teaching. Then I remembered I wasn’t the best student myself, so maybe karma would get me if I became a teacher!

At the end of my sport science degree, Aaron – who’s here – said, “Have you thought about research? Would you like to do an honours degree?” I said, “I’ve got nothing better to do,” and it all started there.

Since then, I did my PhD in sport science, then worked at the NSW Institute of Sport, which led to working for Cycling Australia – now AusCycling – and that took me to the Olympics. Now I’m full circle back at UTS.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
That’s a super journey, Katie. I love that you say your opinion might change about what you want to do – I think that’s really important for young women. You don’t have to pick the end game right now.

I mean, I started as a freight forwarder, which was an unusual segue out of doing business at university, then became a naturopath when I qualified in health sciences, and then went into media. My parents are still asking when I’m going to get a “proper” job. So careers can move around a fair bit.

 
Sam – curiosity, stories and sport
Sam, you’ve had a fascinating career already. When I first met you, hearing the pathways you took – and your connection with UCLA – made me very jealous. I once dreamt of being a basketballer at UCLA. I didn’t have a green card and I wasn’t good enough, so that was that.

You’re such a fantastic storyteller. How do you tell your own?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Great question. I’m very nervous to do so.

The main foundation of my life so far – and I like to think I’m still at the beginning – is that I’ve always been a deeply curious person. I credit a lot of that to my family. We’re travellers, story-finders and storytellers.

From childhood, we travelled quite a lot. I was very involved in everything at school – sport, music, art and my studies. I was a huge history nerd. That genuine curiosity about other people’s stories – where they came from and what their pathway looked like – has shaped everywhere I’ve been and what I’ve loved doing.

It’s taken me around the world. I studied in the US at UCLA, as Steph mentioned. One of my first dreams in childhood was to be an athlete. I was a sprinter for many years, I played field hockey – that sporting community really shaped my professional discipline and my ability to work in teams.

It founded a lot of my love for people – understanding how they get through hard moments, how their bodies move and minds work, and the discipline needed to really train.

At UCLA, I worked closely with the track and field team as one of their managers. I saw the ins and outs of training, as well as navigating my own journey with sport. I ended up running a marathon many years later – going from training for 26 seconds to training for 42 kilometres is a bit of a leap.

Being in the heart of Hollywood and Los Angeles, you can’t help but be curious about how people tell stories. For me, the most interesting connections were between people telling stories for blockbuster purposes and those telling stories for impact.

That’s led naturally into my work now – very closely connected to sport. I moved back home during COVID and started working with a company called ACT.3, a global agency. We work closely with big brands like adidas, and our focus is to tell cultural stories. It’s taken me around the world – South Africa, Dubai, the US, Europe – seeing how culturally we connect sport to community.

Looking back at my experience at an all-girls school – which is a real point of privilege – I can see how sport kept me connected. Seeing how different cultures encourage participation today is a big part of why I still feel so curious.

So for me it’s all about curiosity, global travel, and the experience of community.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Great stuff, Sam. We look forward to hearing more about brand and culture and how important that is in the promotion of women’s sport.

You did mention how important your family has been – hello D’Souza family, I know you’re somewhere in this room. Great to have that support here today.

 
Libby – into biomechanics and changing the gender balance
Libby, you’re part of the cohort leading the charge in a space that’s become absolutely critical to female athletes. That connection between sport and academia seems obvious now, but probably not when you began. I’m guessing there weren’t many women in that space when you started?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Yes, that would be correct.

I came into sport science academia in a similar path to Katie – just following my interests more than anything. I came to UTS straight out of high school to do Human Movement Studies, which is now Sport and Exercise Science, because I played sport growing up and wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do for a job.

I knew I didn’t want to be a PE teacher, but I did the sport and exercise degree and, through that, got a tap on the shoulder to do an honours degree afterwards – which I also didn’t really know about. I did honours, got exposure to research and realised I really liked it, so I continued on to a PhD.

Not long after my PhD, I was lucky enough to get an academic position on staff here at UTS in what is now the School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation. At that time – about 10 years ago – I was one of seven staff, and I was the only female in our school.

Now it has grown, thankfully. I did the maths before – we’re at about 37% females. Our school has grown immensely overall, and the gender balance has improved significantly over that time.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Fantastic stuff. We’ll talk more about where your research has led you in a moment.

 
Partnerships – UTS and Cricket NSW
I want to come back to that sport–academia link, because it outlines perfectly the connection between UTS and Cricket NSW.

Leah, what impact are you seeing from this collaboration?

LEAH POULTON:
I think it’s so important in sport to have an open mind and get information from as many different spaces as possible. If you’re not open-minded and exploring different possibilities, you’ll be overtaken very quickly.

Innovation and exploring ways to do things differently is really important for us. Partnerships are critical. We have partnerships with other sporting organisations, with businesses, and our partnership with universities has been wonderful.

We’ve got a partnership with UTS where the people are just as passionate as we are about women’s sport, but they come at it differently. They have expertise that we don’t have.

One really cool example is Project 130. In women’s cricket, the fastest bowler is around 125km/h – that’s Shabnim Ismail, who’s playing for the Thunder at the moment. There’s a gap between what women are bowling and what men are bowling.

We don’t always use men as the yardstick – it’s not just “men do this, so we must do that”. But we know we haven’t yet reached our ceiling. There’s further growth there.

So the partnership with UTS is about looking at: How can women bowl faster? What training modalities should we implement? Should we focus on strength or power? Technique? At what ages and levels? What sort of physical profile are we looking for?

I know those things are important – I just don’t know how to do it. That’s where I need Libby’s help.

So the partnership we have is really exciting. When young kids walk through the door and you say, “Hey, this is something we’re doing – do you want to be part of this project?” you see their eyes light up – “Wow, is that possible?”

This isn’t just something that will be a huge asset to Cricket NSW. This is for the global sporting community. There’s not enough research on female athletes full stop – and projects like this help people think about what’s possible.

 
UTS research – training quality & AI
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Folks, thanks for your questions both in the room and online – keep them coming on Slido. I’ll get to as many as I can once we’ve talked through a few themes.

Katie, I want to keep that UTS theme going because your work sits at the intersection of research and real-world performance. What new developments are you seeing coming out of your work?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
One really cool thing we’re looking at now is a concept called training quality – where we’re not just asking what training you’re doing, but how well you’re doing it.

A lot of that came from not wanting to look at training from a single perspective, but zooming out and looking at the big picture. My experience as a sport physiologist was to care mainly about physical performance. Now we’re expanding to ask: What’s happening technically? Tactically? Mentally? What’s happening from a team cohesion perspective?

It sounds simple, but it’s a new step for our sport science research.

We’re also leveraging large language models and artificial intelligence – not only to capture traditional training metrics, but to draw in things like: what are coaches saying in their athlete debriefs? What are they saying to athletes during training? We’re using that to build a big-picture view of what happens in every training session.

 
Biomechanics – tech and AI making it practical
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Building on that, Libby, I want to ask you about your work in biomechanics because that gives us a glimpse into the future of sports science. When you hear Katie talk about technologies and methodologies, what are you seeing that’s redefining how we look at athletes?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
For those of you who may not know, biomechanics is essentially applying the laws of physics to the human body. We’re looking at how and why we move.

We can apply that in sport – for technique analysis, force profiles and so on. I think biomechanics is having a bit of a moment, if I may say so. That’s largely driven by recent technological advances.

Traditionally it was very process-heavy. While physiologists might take a lactate sample or a heart rate and get results straight away, we’d go and do a movement analysis and then spend hours post-processing to get accurate joint angles or velocities.

Now AI has come in and there’s been a lot of advancement that takes a lot of the grunt work out of analysis. It’s making biomechanics much more accessible across the sporting landscape, which means we can access more data and actually apply it in practical settings.

It’s one thing to say, hypothetically, “Fast bowlers should bowl with a straighter front knee.” But if they can’t address that in training – if they have to come into a lab to get that assessed – it’s much harder to implement.

New tools like AI pose estimation make this kind of analysis more accessible, so we can have real-world impact.

 
Storytelling, brands and the money question
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
It’s not just about the women working in the science; it’s also about creating the best culture and performance environment for athletes – particularly female athletes – and making sure the stories are told.

Sam, put on your brand and culture hat. What’s critical in making sure that female athletes – and the work these women are doing – is supported and publicised?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
I think the answer a lot of people skirt around here is money. It’s the thing we all need to talk about more.

I’m sitting next to three incredible academics and professionals who are working day in, day out with athletes and sporting codes, seeing the hard work and discipline that goes into this. But from a cultural perspective, I recently hosted a panel on “cultural currency” and “cultural capital” – how do we gain it? Because it holds huge value in the media and stories we consume.

The way we obtain that, as storytellers or brands or organisations like Cricket NSW, is that we need money to invest in visibility – to invest in the athletes who are front and centre, performing and working so hard for their teams and communities.

The value of women’s sport, based on the statistics and the research and investment we’re seeing, is becoming more obvious. The commercial opportunity is clearer.

I was looking at some data earlier today – I went into deep statistical nerd mode – but this year we’re going to surpass something like $2.35 billion in global revenue for women’s sports, which is around a 200% increase on what we saw a couple of years ago. That shows this is not just a DEI or CSR add-on. It’s a growing industry – a very fast-growing industry.

If you’re commercially minded and smart in business, you’ll invest your money in sport – and not just into the stories, but into the research, the codes, the programming and the infrastructure.

Because that $2.35 billion is out of a half-trillion-dollar global sports industry – there’s a lot more opportunity to grow.

 
Has the money followed the Matildas?
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I want to take one of the questions from Slido. The FIFA Women’s World Cup broke so many viewership records. Has the sponsorship money followed? What needs to change for the commercial reality to match community interest? How do you tie those two things together?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
I want to talk carefully about this, because the FIFA Women’s World Cup was one of the greatest things to happen in this local market. Did everyone go to a match? Hands raised? I went to several.

The young 16-year-old athlete inside me was so touched and emotional. I think many people – regardless of age or gender – felt that. One of my favourite memories was after the quarter-final against France. We’d beaten them, and the next morning in a café I heard an older man behind me reliving every statistic of the game. I’d never heard that kind of detailed excitement about a women’s tournament from an older man before.

The credit to the teams around that – Football Australia, everyone involved – is so well deserved and so important.

It’s now almost 2026, and the mistake we’ve made is putting too much emphasis on one tournament to carry several years of legacy. There are many other sports – we’re talking about cricket today, athletics, so many codes in Australia and globally.

The legacy plan after these events is just as important as the event itself. What we’re still seeing is:

Women’s sport makes up maybe 10–15% of the sponsorship bracket of a $113 billion sponsorship industry.
To keep growing, we need brands to invest not just in the “firework” moments – the World Cups, Euro Championships, Champions League finals – but in long-term commitments: athlete contracts, programming, research, infrastructure.
From a commercial lens, if I’m a brand deciding how to sponsor teams, I’m not just looking at short-term return – although the return can be high. It’s about the long-term effect on grassroots.

In Victoria, for example, the Office for Women and Girls in Sport did research (they’ve since been defunded in the latest budget, disappointingly) showing that in the next 15 years women’s sport could be a $49 billion industry in Australia. It’s growing rapidly on home turf, but we’re also seeing the highest rates of girls dropping out of sport in their teenage years.

Around 60% of girls after 15 consider dropping out or stop participation. Forget elite pathways – they’re not even staying in community sport. So if I’m a brand, it’s not just about big events – it’s about the girl in regional NSW, WA, Tasmania who’s thinking about never touching a football again because of body image, lack of infrastructure, or feeling like it’s not for her.

Big brands have enormous power to impact that whole pipeline – from grassroots to elite. The brands doing it well are investing in women’s sport as a long-term, strategic part of their business, not just a short-term campaign.

 
Coaching and the female Level 2
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
We need to bring that investment and legacy down to a granular level, and I think that’s starting to happen with initiatives like the all-female Level 2 coaching programme.

Leah, that’s breaking new ground. What’s driving that shift?

LEAH POULTON:
I think it’s an appetite to do things differently. The Level 2 coaching example is a really good one because, although there’s lots of great change in women’s sport, coaching is one area that hasn’t kept pace.

It breaks my heart to say that as a former school teacher and coach, but women in coaching are really lagging. There aren’t enough female coaches working in women’s sport, and very few working in men’s sport.

The Level 2 coaching course hadn’t changed much from when I did it about 15 years ago. When I did mine, I was the only woman in the course. Year after year, I’d look in and see the same demographic – men, maybe one woman.

We asked, “What’s going on here?” The feedback from women was that they didn’t think it was for them. When the course was promoted, it just sounded like a generic Level 2. It wasn’t obvious they belonged in that space.

So our coaching team said, “Let’s run one specifically for women.” Then there’s no ambiguity. And what do you know – we had about 20 women sign up within days. All they needed to know was that it was for them.

So I think it’s about being willing to do things differently and try things. One of our values at Cricket NSW is imagination. It’s a great way to approach problems: this isn’t working, we’ve tried the same thing on repeat and we’re not getting different results – how can we imagine doing it differently?

 
Australia vs overseas
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Looking across the sporting landscape, how does Australia compare with the progress overseas? Are there things we can learn from other markets?

LEAH POULTON:
Definitely. The good thing is that Australia is in a real leadership position in women’s sport. The way we’ve led investment in women’s sport is something to be proud of.

But, as we know, in sport you can’t rest on that. I look at the investment Cricket Australia has made in the women’s team for so long – we’ve been leaders in that space.

But then you look at the Women’s Premier League in India. They flicked a switch and decided to do it well, and all of a sudden they’ve gone from being the second league in the world to the first – like a rocket.

England is another example. They lagged behind in women’s cricket for a long time, and then someone in a boardroom clearly said, “We have to do this better.” With investment, things can happen very fast.

The good news for us is that we are leading in lots of spaces. Sport science is one where we’re really strong. I did a study tour to the US a few years back – we visited universities, colleges, professional sporting organisations, lots of baseball because it transfers well to cricket.

We went in saying, “What can you tell us about this and that?” and they turned around and said, “Well, what can you tell us? We should be learning from you. Australians do sport science better than anyone. How can you help us?”

So we come from a position of leadership in many spaces – but you can’t sit on that. You have to keep moving.

 
Research standards and doing it “right”
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Katie, we “do it better than anyone else” according to Leah. Talk to us about the research space – where does Australia sit in that narrative?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
I think we do a lot of things very well, and that’s been led by strong work done by the Australian Institute of Sport. Pioneers like Chris Gore and Louise Burke really started the idea of applied sport science research – looking at what’s happening in the real world and trying to answer questions systematically.

We continue to do that well. Now we’re not only thinking, “How can we look at what’s happening on the field or track?” but also “How can we apply rigorous research methods to better understand that?”

Here at UTS, for example, we have Professor Franco Impellizzeri in our school – he is intense and passionate about research quality. His attitude is: if we’re going to do something, we’re going to do it right and get the highest-quality answer to our research questions.

I think that’s what we’re doing better than anyone else at the moment – combining real-world relevance with genuine rigour.

 
Co-design and embedding students
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Libby, how do you see UTS research contributing to better outcomes, not just in the lab but for elite athletes?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Our approach is to answer questions that are driven by the real world. We try not to sit in an academic tower and invent the questions ourselves.

For the Cricket NSW–UTS partnership, for example, we have multiple studies underway from community level to high performance. One important thing is co-design with our industry partners.

So it’s not me and Katie sitting in a room deciding what Leah should do. We meet with Cricket NSW and ask, “What problems do you have? What questions are you grappling with?” Then we co-design research around that.

A really successful way to do that is to embed postgraduate students in industry. They have ownership at both UTS and within the partner organisation. They’re the eyes on the ground who can see everyday problems and opportunities that we can contribute to.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Does that help you shape how you apply the research?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Definitely. It’s one thing to find a statistically significant difference in, say, a joint angle between lower- and higher-performing athletes. But if the difference is, for example, five degrees, it might not be practically meaningful. Can we actually change that joint angle by five degrees in training?

That’s where talking to coaches and athletes is critical. Otherwise we risk going down a rabbit hole that can’t actually be addressed in the real world.

 
National bodies and co-leadership
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
How does that relate when you work with national sporting bodies? Katie, you’ve done a lot of work with them. How does UTS help bridge that divide?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
One way is through genuine co-leadership. I co-led a research project with Dr Jamie Stanley, who’s based at the South Australian Institute of Sport.

The power of co-leadership is that it’s not a “university project” or an “institute project” – it’s our project. As Leah said, we use each other’s strengths.

That also helps with implementation. The worst thing is to do a huge research project and have it sit in a journal article or a thesis that nobody uses.

We’ve done work on how interdisciplinary teams can work better together to support athletes. Because Jamie continues to work with coaches and has strong connections across the physiology network – institutes in NSW, Queensland and so on – he can say, “Hey, we’ve been working on this. Here’s something that may help you.”

Without that strong partnership and joint ownership, we wouldn’t have the research quality or the implementation pathway we have.

 
Sponsorship, brands and cultural shifts
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Sam, you like getting answers to big questions. Let’s talk about partnerships and sponsorship in women’s sport. What shifts are you seeing in investments in brands, athletes and work on and off the field?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
It’s a huge global industry, and growth has accelerated over the last few years, especially around big “firework” moments like World Cups, Euro Championships and so on.

One big shift I think is important is that brands you wouldn’t expect to be “enlightened” by women’s sport are waking up. We’re seeing financial companies investing, crypto companies, Cadbury backing women’s teams, Charlotte Tilbury sponsoring the F1 Academy.

There are great case studies of big brands sponsoring women’s teams. Another crucial change is in individual athlete contracts. Caitlin Clark’s Nike deal is one example – the biggest ever WNBA contract for a woman.

Compare that to the days when Allyson Felix left Nike because they had no maternity provision and were threatening to reduce her contract when she became pregnant. There are major shifts happening – not just in sponsoring and taking care of female athletes, but in prioritising women’s teams and competitions.

There’s still a lot of room to grow, as I mentioned before. There’s huge financial opportunity for big brands to get involved in this space, but that doesn’t discredit the work that’s been done so far.

Another under-used opportunity is local context and legacy. The global numbers are big, but in Australia the Office for Women and Girls in Sport – before being defunded – estimated women’s sport could be a $49 billion industry over the next 15 years.

At the same time we’re seeing high dropout rates among girls in their teens. When I think about this as a brand, I’m not just thinking about the return on sponsoring a national team – I’m thinking about the long-term impact on that girl in regional NSW or WA deciding whether to stay in sport.

The brands that get it right are connecting the commercial story with the participation story – they’re investing in visibility and in the research, the codes, the infrastructure and pathways.

 
Who’s doing women’s sport well globally?
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
If you cast your mind around the world, who do you think does women’s sport well, Sam?

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Australia does an amazing job in many ways, though there’s still more to do.

Internationally, I’ve been really inspired by what’s happening in Europe around big tournaments like the UEFA Women’s Euro. There were lots of attendance records broken. Simple things like changing traffic lights in Switzerland to show a woman kicking a football during the tournament – it sounds small, but it signals commitment.

I was in Lisbon during the Women’s Champions League final. UEFA hosted a business case summit for women’s football at the same time – bringing top leaders together to talk about long-term strategy. A lot of the panellists were men working in the industry, which is also important – it shows shared responsibility.

In the Middle East, there’s interesting work around women’s races and providing appropriate kit for elite sportswomen to compete in a way that’s respectful of their cultures and religions. It’s complex, but it’s progress.

Everywhere has growth and cultural navigation to do, but those are a few highlights.

 
Keeping girls in sport
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
I want to pick up a question from the audience and start with you, Leah. Are you working on how to keep young girls in sport? Statistically, one in five girls aged 10–16 consider dropping out due to period issues.

LEAH POULTON:
The short answer is yes. We’re absolutely conscious of the dropout rates and always looking at ways to improve them.

It’s layered – there are lots of reasons why girls fall out of love with sport, or just choose to do something else. In cricket, I think one of the biggest things is selling the social benefits, not just the physical benefits.

We’ve got this beautiful game that goes for a really long time where people sit around talking. That social side is a big selling point.

We’re doing a piece of work with UTS at the moment on our female pathway – girls aged 13 and up – looking at their experiences and hearing directly from them. I think a lot of administrators assume they have the answers, but a lot of answers sit within the community.

We’ve just done a whole lot of work listening to kids and their parents, understanding what they want and how we can improve. We’ll release the findings early next year.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
How do you define what keeps girls in the sport when you go between participation and high performance?

LEAH POULTON:
I think those pathways are quite muddled, especially in the younger age groups. We talk about “pathways to participation” and “pathways to performance”, but when you’re 12, 13, 14 you don’t really know which one you’re in.

The important thing is to make sure we have pathways with lots of entry and re-entry points. If you’re a 13-year-old who really wants to be an elite cricketer but it doesn’t pan out that way, there still need to be great offerings for you.

We also get late bloomers. Some kids take it up because their friends do and then, at 15 or 16, think, “Actually, I’m pretty good at this.” That happens – and we need ways for those kids to get into the elite pathway too.

So I’d say pathways to performance and participation weave in and out of each other.

 
Longevity and female-specific issues
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Katie and Libby, is part of your research involved in helping give longevity to female athletes’ careers?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Not always directly, but a lot of what Katie talked about – interdisciplinary work, listening to athletes’ perspectives as well as physical data – contributes to that.

I also think there have been lots of small steps on topics like the menstrual cycle, pregnancy, postpartum return to sport and so on. It’s multifaceted.

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
From my own experience working with athletes at that transition point – from high school into high performance – it’s tough. You go from being told what to do by parents and school to having to drive your own career.

With the female athletes I worked with, a big part of supporting them was building belief: yes, you can do this – this can be a career.

Ten or fifteen years ago, women had to self-fund just to race in some sports. Now they can have professional contracts. That makes the conversation easier.

There’s also good research and resources now – the AIS Female Performance & Health Initiative, for example. It has free online resources and workshops for female athletes on topics like the menstrual cycle, contraception, pregnancy, peri-menopause and so on.

Those sticking points – “I don’t want to play because of my period” – are becoming less of a barrier, because there’s more information and support.

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
I agree. There’s still a way to go, but we’ve taken lots of baby steps.

Even in our own project with fast bowlers, we’ve heard things that weren’t in the study design but came up in conversation – like a younger girl telling me she prefers one-day cricket because the uniform is coloured, not white, so she’s less worried about wearing it when she has her period. That’s such a small, practical change that can make a big difference.

Netball is another example – umpires historically had to wear white, and now they can wear black skirts, which is much more comfortable for many women.

And then there’s maternity. Netball Australia now pays maternity leave. We’re seeing more examples of women having children and returning to elite sport, which sends a powerful message.

 
Avoiding the 0.001% trap
SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
Just to add – we’ve put a lot of weight on athletes like Mary Fowler, Elise Perry and others as role models. It’s amazing that they’re getting that visibility, but that’s a lot of pressure on one individual or team.

We need diversity in who we spotlight. The Matildas have carried a huge weight since 2023. The spotlight should include the less visible stories – the challenges, the practical barriers – as well as the glamorous bits.

We should be showing the full picture, not just the 0.001% at the very top.

 
Inclusive sport, disability, and everyday people
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
We have a question here on inclusive sport: does sport research transfer back to community and society by helping people with life issues or disabilities? Can sports science help people live better, more successfully?

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
Yes, absolutely.

Within our school, for example, we have a Clinical Exercise Physiology stream, which focuses on exercise for clinical populations. That’s one way we contribute directly to health and disability outcomes.

In terms of high-performance sport, there’s still a lower percentage of research with female participants and with athletes with disabilities, so that’s an area that needs growth. But it’s not just about research – there’s also sport science servicing.

Research relies on large sample sizes and statistical significance, which can be difficult in para-sport because each athlete is so unique. But the servicing we do – such as preparing athletes for heat or individualised performance work – still draws on sport science principles and benefits those athletes.

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
And a lot of high-performance technology eventually filters down into everyday life. How many people here have Fitbits or Garmins? Without high-performance sport, nobody would be wearing those.

Tools like GPS tracking, heart-rate monitoring, physical activity wearables – they were originally developed for high-performance environments and are now used in general health and fitness.

 
The research gap – men vs women
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Katie, there’s a question about the gap between research into female sport and male sport. How do you see that?

DR KATIE SLATTERY:
Historically, we started on the back foot. Early in my research career the standard was just to research males, because – to put it bluntly – they were seen as “easier”. You didn’t have hormonal fluctuations to control for. That’s obviously a simplistic view, but it was a common one.

Thankfully, that’s changing. There’s much more research into female athletes now, and importantly we’re realising that women are not just small men. That statement from Stacey Sims has been quite revolutionary – it’s shifted mindset.

People now understand you can’t just see what happens in men and directly apply it to women. There’s still debate about the best ways to research female athletes, but we’re on a much better track.

DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
There’s definitely been a historical lack of female participants in sport science research. One paper that looked at 20 years of sport science research found female participants somewhere below 20%.

It’s multi-factorial. Female physiology was seen as “too complex”, so it ended up in the too-hard basket. There’s also participation: if fewer women are in high-performance pathways or professional sport, there’s a smaller pool to recruit from.

Professional male sport has had more money for longer, so there are existing data sets – GPS, wellness scores, performance tests – that researchers can use. Women’s sport is catching up, but the legacy gap is real.

The good news is that awareness of these issues has grown, and we’re seeing concerted efforts to close the gap.

 
Behaviour standards and double standards
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Leah, we have a question about standards of behaviour: is there a double standard between women and male athletes for on- and off-field behaviour?

LEAH POULTON:
As the profile of women’s sport increases, there will be more attention on female athletes’ lives and conduct. If you have a hero – someone you look up to – you want to see them behaving well.

As more female athletes become idols, there’ll be more scrutiny. I’m not sure yet whether it’s a double standard, but I certainly think the spotlight is growing.

 
Hosting major events in countries with poor human rights
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
We’ve got a few minutes left and four or five questions a lot of people want answers to.

One is: Should countries with poor human rights records against women or minority groups be allowed to host major international sporting events?

Ten seconds or less – Sam, I’m looking at you!

SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
You’re really putting me on the spot.

I don’t think there’s a simple answer. I’m not going to make a big political statement, but I do think strategies behind hosting decisions and legacy planning have to be anchored in genuine desire to see change.

If values are aligned and there’s a real plan – backed by action – to improve conditions for women and minority groups, there’s potential for sport to be a force for change.

I’ve travelled to places like Saudi Arabia multiple times to observe women’s football programmes, and there are real opportunities being opened up. So it’s complex. The key is whether the intention and investment are genuine, not just for show.

 
Getting your foot in the door – careers in sport
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Several questions relate to getting your foot in the door:

“I’ve created a proposal to promote equitable access for women in motorsport. Without industry connections, how can I effectively pitch it and be taken seriously?”
“Is it who you know?”
“How do you get into these careers?”
So from your perspective, what’s your takeaway for the group – online and in the room – about how to be who you want to see?

Who’d like to start?

 
Leah – real-world experience and volunteering
LEAH POULTON:
I can start.

The biggest one for me is: it doesn’t have to be paid industry experience. When we recruit at Cricket NSW, a real separator is real-world experience.

It doesn’t have to be that you’ve worked in sport before, or that you’ve been an elite athlete. But if you’ve volunteered somewhere, if you can show that you’re passionate through some kind of practical involvement, that’s a big plus.

So things like volunteering with local clubs, helping at events, being involved in community programmes – they show initiative and commitment.

 
Katie – don’t be put off being “the only woman in the room”
DR KATIE SLATTERY:
My biggest piece of advice is: don’t not do something just because you’re the only girl in the room.

That’s been my philosophy. I’m often the only woman, and I’ve never let it bother me. In fact, I’ve used it to my advantage throughout my career.

 
Sam – ask people their stories
SAMANTHA D’SOUZA:
My favourite thing to do when I meet new people is ask them what their story is. I can tell I’m a storyteller!

My best example is actually Steph. When I came back to Australia from living overseas, I asked Steph to join a panel we were hosting during the World Cup. I chased her down afterwards while she was trying to escape and said, “Can I take you to lunch? I’d love to pick your brain about your story.”

Since that lunch, she has opened doors for me all over the sporting industry in Australia.

So the biggest thing that’s changed my career is sitting down with people I admire, asking them about their journey – with genuine curiosity, not just an ulterior motive. In sport especially, you never know who you’ll meet or what it will inspire.

STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Can I just say, after I heard Sam’s story I wanted to be Sam – and then I topped it off by throwing my coffee all over her, which was unintentional but clearly memorable!

 
Libby – chase your interests, not a fixed job title
DR LIBBY PICKERING RODRIGUEZ:
I think a big piece of advice for getting your foot in the door is to set your sights on your interests rather than chasing a specific job title.

That was reflected in all our opening stories. We chased our interests. I didn’t know what my job would be when I left school.

If you follow what genuinely interests you and stay curious, opportunities appear that you might not have imagined. Say yes to things. Stay open.

LEAH POULTON:
Can I add a very Australian version? Have a crack. Just have a go.

What do you lose if you don’t? I’ve had six jobs so far and I’ll get to my “real” job one day!

But seriously – you’ll find something you love, or a part of something you love. As the saying goes, if you’re doing something you love, you don’t work a day in your life.

 
Closing
STEPHANIE BRANTZ:
Ladies, you’ve been absolutely amazing. It’s been wonderful to share a piece of your stories, your pathways and your journeys.

Folks, can I ask you to please show your appreciation for Dr Libby Pickering Rodriguez, Samantha D’Souza, Dr Katie Slattery and Leah Poulton.

Thank you very much to everyone who’s joined us – in the room and online. Thank you to Ness for organising today, and I hope to see all of you out there pursuing your passions into the future.

Thank you for joining us on Global Game Changers.