Morning Mail: ‘outrageous’ use of Covid tracking data, Peter Reith dies, Sri Lanka cricket inquiry

Good morning. The long-term impact of the Covid-19 pandemic is felt in many ways, from the economy to working from home. But our medical editor Melissa Davey has an exclusive story raising concerns about how personal data was treated during the crisis. She reports that the Victorian government – faced with spiralling cases in July 2020 – passed contact tracing information to the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission for use on the controversial data mining platform Palantir, in a move described by experts as “dubious” and “outrageous”. We also look at how the vaccine rollout numbers stack up ahead of a possible new wave of infections.

Peter Dutton has led tributes to former Liberal deputy leader Peter Reith, dubbed “warrior of the waterfront”, who has died aged 72. And Sri Lanka cricket has opened an investigation into player behaviour in Australia during the T20 World Cup.

Australia Peter Reith, the former Liberal MP and deputy party leader, has died aged 72 after suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Photograph: National Archives. World US voters head to the polls in the midterm elections. Photograph: Cristóbal Herrera/EPA Full Story Cop27 is being held in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt. Photograph: Mohammed Salem/Reuters

Cop27: greenwashing and lies – a chance for change?

Guardian Australia’s climate and environment editor, Adam Morton, explains what’s happened since Cop26, our current path to catastrophic heating, and what’s likely to be on the agenda over the next two weeks.

Full Story Cop27

Sorry your browser does not support audio – but you can download here and listen https://audio.guim.co.uk/2020/05/05-61553-gnl.fw.200505.jf.ch7DW.mp3

In-depth Total Covid booster doses by country. Photograph: The Guardian

With Australia consistently reporting more than 30,000 Covid cases a week, our data journalists have taken a look at the vaccine rollout. They find that Australia trails Chile, Japan, South Korea and Belgium per 100 population, but is ahead of the US and UK.

Not the news The unusual intensity of the koel’s calls this spring may be linked to climatic factors. Photograph: Hal Beral/Getty Images

There’s enough going on in the world to keep people awake at night at the moment without east coast Australians being driven “insane” at night by what they call a “devil bird”. But the unusual intensity of the koel’s calls this spring may be linked to climatic factors, experts believe.

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Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. The world of sport Garang Kuol of the Mariners. Photograph: Jeremy Ng/AAP

Many papers carry stories about the death of Peter Reith, the Howard-era Liberal minister. The Australian says he was Howard’s “waterfront warrior” for his 1998 fight against dockers’ union, while the Canberra Times leads on Peter Dutton’s description of Reith as a “great Australian”. The Age claims an exclusive with a claim that the Coles and Woolworths plastic bag recycling scheme has collapsed after the emergence of warehouse stockpiles. The West Australian reports that “hundreds of British bobbies” are rushing to sign up for the state’s police force as part of a recruitment drive. NT News rejoices in figures showing that the territory’s population of young people is booming.

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