🔵 I love this big old ugly building

HEARD THIS WEEK👂

🌆 Do you think this building is ugly?

Have you ever walked past this long-vacant St Leonards building and wondered — who built that?

We found out.

Watch the full video below.

🚌 Ryde Liberals vote to exclude bus drivers, cleaners from affordable housing

Ryde councillors have rejected staff advice on affordable housing and removed a selection of job types from the “key worker” eligibility list, including bus drivers, cleaners and retail workers.

What happened: A recommendation from Ryde Council staff said councillors should endorse a policy that made affordable housing available to “key workers” in jobs such as law enforcement, nursing, teaching, cleaning, bus and delivery driving and retail.

This was a continuation of the previous policy.

The debate: Some councillors, however, were not happy with the breadth of the list and wanted certain jobs — drivers, retail workers and cleaners — to be removed from the “key worker” policy.

Under the bus: Those in support of the decision to remove certain jobs — seven Liberal councillors and one independent — argued the policy should prioritise what they saw as more important occupations, given the small number of available dwellings.

“When everybody is a key worker, nobody is a key worker,” said Councillor Cameron Last.

Read the full story below.

🍕 Chatswood pizzeria to face court over dough dispute

A director of Chatswood’s Cedar Dough bakery and pizzeria has denied she knowingly underpaid a young worker, claiming the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) had taken the matter “out of proportion”.

The business and company director Jalila Assaf face total fines of nearly $220,000, after the ombudsman revealed on Monday it had commenced legal action.

The FWO said that in a period of around eight weeks in 2025, the pizzeria underpaid a casual employee $1,288. The FWO said this was a combination of unpaid weekend rates, public holiday rates and casual loading.

Facing court are PE Jayz Pty Ltd, which operates Chatswood’s Cedar Dough bakery and pizza bar, and director Assaf.

Read the full story below.

LOOKING NATIONALLY 👀

🪵 Time to log off? The case to end the destruction of our native forests

“A dog of an industry.”

This is how Ecology and Conservation Biology Professor David Lindenmayer from ANU describes native logging, adding that it costs taxpayers a fortune.

In Australia, there are two types of logging: plantation and native.

Plantation logging grows mostly radiata pine and blue gum eucalyptus on designated estates across the country, primarily for construction timber and woodchip exports.

Native forest logging, meanwhile, targets eucalypts like mountain ash and alpine ash in Victoria and river red gum and ironbark in NSW.

Archie from the National Account breaks down the native logging industry below.