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Fifty-six state branches want laws reviewed, while gambling, Aukus and Palestine also on agenda

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Fifty-six Labor branches have passed motions to the New South Wales state conference calling for controversial anti-protest legislation to be repealed or reviewed, with the entire left faction backing a motion for two of the laws to be scrapped.

Gambling reform, Aukus and Palestine were also among the top issues in motions submitted by branches to the conference, the last before the March election and which is key in informing policy.

Emails sent between MP Anoulak Chanthivong’s staff take cautious approach to AI giant arriving in Sydney – despite the government’s encouragement

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The NSW technology minister’s office removed a reference to being “absolutely thrilled” about OpenAI opening a Sydney office after staffers joked a dystopian Skynet could be headed for the city within five years.

Artificial intelligence giant OpenAI announced its first Australian office in August last year, before opening in December.

You can elevate a simple bit of toast to something sublime using this simple formula

Toast is a baseline meal for me. A daily friend. A daily best friend I’m always glad to see. And much like a best friend, it’s always fun to see her get gussied up a little once in a while. Think elegant; think dainty; think, as a general guideline: soft, sharp, frill.

Soft is self-explanatory. Even butter counts, if you keep it cool and thick. Avocado.

The summer’s most anticipated film will raise epic questions about culture wars, classics and the nature of film-making

In a plot twist worthy of the ancient bards themselves, the hottest movie of the summer isn’t a superhero flick, or an alien-invasion yarn, or a crinolines-and-bonnets period drama. Instead, it is an adaptation of a nearly 3,000-year-old epic poem, which film-maker Christopher Nolan is releasing as a follow-up to Oppenheimer, his grim, Oscar-winning study of the origins of nuclear war. Nolan, previously director of Memento, the Dark Knight trilogy and Dunkirk, has now turned his attention to the Odyssey, the classical Greek saga that, along with its companion epic the Iliad, is one of the foundational works of western civilisation.

Nolan’s adaptation is a big-budget affair, the largest of his career at an estimated $250m, and the director has peopled it with a cast ranging from established Hollywood stars such as Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway, newer teen-friendly faces including couple of the moment Zendaya and Spider-Man’s Tom Holland, and idiosyncratic choices such as Lupita Nyong’o, Mia Goth, Samantha Morton and fellow director Benny Safdie.

Cortisol is bad. Testosterone makes you aggressive. Melatonin helps you sleep. Experts bust common hormone myths

False The main puberty hormones are oestrogen and progesterone for girls and testosterone for boys. “They are active in the womb during foetal development and in infancy in a phase called mini-puberty,” says Sasha Howard, clinical reader and honorary consultant in paediatric endocrinology at Queen Mary, University of London and Barts Health NHS trust.

‘Hugely significant’ race for Manchester mayor will give clues on whether PM-in-waiting can turn tide against Reform UK

Andy Burnham was delivered to the steps of Downing Street after one of the most consequential parliamentary byelections in recent British history.

But it is the race to be his successor as Greater Manchester mayor that could reveal far more about the mood of the nation than the historic – and unique – contest in Makerfield.

Six matches from Cardiff to Córdoba are bound to be intriguing – but player welfare is taking a back seat

Welcome to rugby’s latest controversial ruse. The next time World Rugby spouts that thing about player welfare being their No 1 priority, just say “Nations Championship” back at them. The next time the governing body goes on about the sanctity of the World Cup, do the same.

The Nations Championship begins this weekend, a coming together of six teams from the north against six from the “south” – well, five plus Japan (it’s just not working, is it).

Family of woman who died after being hit by a bullet as she observed rioting in Derry say justice system has failed her

Three men from Derry have been found not guilty of murdering the journalist Lyra McKee in 2019.

Her family said the verdict at Belfast crown court meant the justice system had “completely failed” them and McKee.

Public health authority says 2,025 excess deaths probably an underestimate and that it expects toll to rise further

The number of deaths recorded in France surged by nearly 30% during the hottest week of the record-breaking heatwave that scorched much of Europe last month, the public health authority has said, adding that it expected the toll to rise further.

Public Health France said on Friday there had been “an increase of 29.1%, corresponding to 2,025 additional deaths compared with the previous week”. It said the figure was probably an underestimate and “mortality will rise further”.

Republican Liz Murrill was indicted for the alleged intimidation of New Orleans elected officials

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Louisiana’s highest court has granted a stay of the proceedings in a criminal indictment targeting the state’s attorney general, in the latest twist of a high-stakes political battle between Republican state leaders and Democrats who govern its most famous city, New Orleans.

Liz Murrill, a Republican who is Louisiana’s first female attorney general, was slapped with a 16-count indictment on Thursday by a New Orleans grand jury charging her with intimidation and malfeasance. The charges effectively accused her of trying to intimidate New Orleans officials who fought a law passed by Republican legislators to overhaul the city’s courts.

P21 Gallery, London
Resonant black and white photographs show Palestinian refugees and the sites today of the homes they were forced to leave during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war

These places were once filled with conversation, smells of cooking, laughter, comfort. Now I’m staring into a silent, rubble-strewn abyss. Eyewitness accounts that accompany documentary photographer Alan Gignoux’s black and white portraits of Palestinian refugees and the homes they were forced to leave refer repeatedly to the abundance that once came from these razed fields – olives, grains, figs, carob and grapes. Where there was life, now there is nothing. The vast losses seem etched into the faces of Gignoux’s subjects, even as they look back at his camera with defiance.

All Gignoux’s subjects have either been exiled by the Nakba – the mass displacement of Palestinians in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war – or are their descendants. They now live in refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, the West Bank or Gaza. Gignoux promised each of his subjects that he would to return to their homes on their behalf, and photograph them. The series gives a detailed view of what happened in different villages in 1948, the circumstances under which people left and the repercussions across generations.

Family of woman who died after being hit by a bullet as she observed rioting in Derry say justice system has failed her

Three men from Derry have been found not guilty of murdering the journalist Lyra McKee in 2019.

Her family said the verdict at Belfast crown court meant the justice system had “completely failed” them and McKee.