Good morning, this is Eleanor Ainge Roy bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Friday 10 November.
Top stories
Lawyers at the firm at the centre of the Paradise Papers hatched a secret plan to set up an office in Australia but avoid paying tax in the country, leaked documents reveal. Appleby staff named their 2009 Australian expansion plan “Project Painkiller”, a reference to the signature cocktail of the British Virgin Islands, a Caribbean tax haven. The firm would create a “stealth” office in Sydney or Melbourne and a “special purpose” company in the British Virgin Islands which would invoice Appleby for all of the work conducted by its Australian business. The plan sought to capitalise on the region’s increasing interest in the tax havens of Mauritius and Seychelles, which would grow “in tandem with the epochal rise of India, China and other emerging markets”.
The firm, which specialises in offshore corporate law, has been at the heart of the Paradise Papers, one of the biggest leaks in history. It has previously denied any wrongdoing by itself or its clients. In a general response provided to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, Appleby said: “We take any allegation of wrongdoing, implicit or otherwise, extremely seriously. Appleby operates in highly regulated jurisdictions and like all professional organisations in our regions, we are subject to frequent regulatory checks and we are committed to achieving the high standards set by our regulators.”
Almost half of people believe service providers should have the right to refuse same-sex weddings on the basis of their religious views, a poll has found. Those most likely to support such a protection were people who oppose marriage equality (76%) and people over 65 (65%) but 39% of marriage equality supporters also agreed with the proposition, the Lonergan Research poll of 971 people found. It also found 9% of people surveyed said they had lied to or misled others about how they voted. The finding suggests there might be more “shy progressives” than “shy conservatives” because supporters of marriage equality emerged as more likely to to have misled others.
Donald Trump has lavished praise on the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, and blamed his own predecessors for the “huge” trade deficit between the world’s two largest economies. Trump’s apparent enthusiasm for China is in stark contrast to his rhetoric on the campaign, when he repeatedly criticised China, accusing it of “raping” the US economy and being the country’s “enemy”. To audible gasps from the audience, the US president went on to suggest that China was not to blame for the trade deficit, but past US administrations. Trump also urged Xi to “act faster and more effectively” to extinguish North Korea’s nuclear “menace”. Xi’s praise of the visiting president was cooler and China experts have noted the trip has been such a success because China has courted and flattered Trump’s ego.
Three people have been fined for exporting more than 16o greyhounds to China, including to a Shanghai zoo notorious for racing the animals against cheetahs and holding boxing matches between clowns and kangaroos. The scheme relied on buying unwanted dogs for a few hundred dollars from New South Wales racetracks and selling them on to cruel conditions in China for thousands. The Australian owners shipped 96 dogs to the Macau Canidrome racetrack, despite Greyhounds Australasia having banned exports to Macau in 2013, due to high death rates and poor conditions.
LA police are investigating an alleged Hollywood paedophile ring after claims by former child actor Corey Feldman, who said he was a victim of the alleged ring at the age of 13. LAPD detective Ross Nemeroff told the Hollywood Reporter: “When a report is filed on something as severe as this, an investigation is opened by the robbery/homicide division, which also handles sex crimes,”. Feldman has long alleged that a systemic culture of underage abuse exists in Hollywood, and claimed that both he and late actor Corey Haim were molested as children, and blamed Haim’s abuse for his death in 2010 at the age of 38. “Right off the bat, I can name six names, one of them who is still very powerful today,” he said.
Meanwhile actor Portia De Rossi has accused actor and producer Steven Seagal of sexually harassing her during an audition for one of his films. “My final audition for a Steven Segal [sic] movie took place in his office,” De Rossi wrote on Twitter. “He told me how important it was to have chemistry off-screen as he sat me down and unzipped his leather pants.” The Guardian has contacted Seagal’s representatives for comment on De Rossi’s claims.
Sport
England ended day one on 235 for seven, after wickets tumbled under lights in the day/night Ashes series, forcing Australia to fight back following half-centuries from Beaumont and Knight. The half-centuries marked the first time that two England players in the top three had made it to 50 in the same Test innings against Australia since 1968.
In San Pedro Sula on Saturday morning, the Socceroos will be tested in their crucial World Cup qualifier by harsh conditions, fanatical supporters and a youthful, hard-running Honduras team. But the Central Americans have a flaw – a habit of conceding late goals.
Thinking time
Taylor Swift’s new album Reputation drops today, and the Guardian’s Laura Snapes looks back at Swift’s meteoric rise from country bumpkin to privileged pop Queen – and the gradual souring of her popularity in recent years. Her failure to speak out about Trump and her now-routine slaying of ex-boyfriends and enemies with vindictive song lyrics have seen her charged with being an anti-feminist, unable to break out from her cocoon of elite white privilege. So, can the new album resuscitate her reputation, or can we expect more of the same?
At least 3,500 Australian soldiers died in the two battles of Bullecourt in northern France in 1917. Now, French authorities want to erect a windfarm nearby, outraging many that Australian graves will be disturbed. But few Australians would realise there are thousands of unidentified Indigenous human remains held in cardboard boxes in institutions (close to 5,000 at the South Australian Museum alone) because modern infrastructure disturbed their traditional burial sites. Paul Daley asks where is the anger or the government protest at the plight of these bones?
Vroom, vroom! Being off the roads for a decade has made Brigid Delaney nervous behind the wheel. “I have been practicing driving in the smallest country towns I can find – towns without traffic lights, or even traffic,” she writes in this week’s diary. “With other scared, elderly learner drivers I’ve been comparing the best places to sit for our driver’s license test – the place with one roundabout, or at 2pm on a Tuesday in the town with a population of 900.”.
Media roundup
The Australian splashes with the increasing chaos of the citizenship saga, with Malcolm Turnbull set to clash with Bill Shorten over the citizenship of four Labour MPs. Crikey asks if senator Sam Dastyari, who was heckled and racially abused by a group of a alt-right men in a Melbourne pub, would have been justified in punching his tormentors. And the ABC has a long-read on the Victorian disability commissioner stepping in to remove a severely intellectually disabled man from prison. The man had been in prison since September because disability providers has refused to care for him due to his complex needs, the ABC reports.
Coming up
The Apec leaders summit begins today in Da Nang,Vietnam. Malcolm Turnbull will be joined by leaders including Donald Trump, Shinzo Abe and Jacinda Ardern.
Public hearings are being held into the Victorian government’s plans to sell public housing estate land for private development.
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