10 things you need to know in Australia this morning

It's that most wonderful day of the week, folks. TGIF.

1. Scott Morrison delivered a major foreign policy speech in which he slammed the "unaccountable internationalist bureaucracy" – not naming names – which he says should not be calling the shots on migration and climate change. It probably sounds more than a little Trumpian, but he also sought to argue Australia should not embrace isolationism and protectionism; instead aiming for what he called "positive and practical globalism". You'd be forgiven for thinking that the UN's jabs on climate change and migration are getting under his skin.

2. I guess if you've been caught, you may as well run all the way with it until they take you down – that's the mantra Trump is operating under right now. In a deeply weird White House lawn presser, the president urged China to join Ukraine in investigating the Biden family. The guy must be feeling extra confident.

https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1179770264982302720

3. Shockingly, the EU has "grave concerns" about Boris Johnson's supposedly final Brexit offer. As I mentioned in yesterday's briefing, the Irish have significant problems with the PM's proposal for how to deal with the Irish border problem, with the country's deputy prime minister today saying he "cannot possibly" agree to its terms.

4. Another day, another Aussie hospitality empire stung for not paying staff properly. On the chopping block today is Chris Lucas' restaurant fiefdom – which includes popular joints like Chin Chin in Melbourne and Sydney – reportedly underpaid staff by up to $340,000 in a single year. Once you're done reading that, here's our list of celebrity-chef restaurants in Australia which have been accused of the same thing.

5. The Reserve Bank has signalled it could very well slash interest rates down to zero in order to bring Australia to full employment. For a country, which until recently never dipped below 1%, that's uncharted territory. Read our explainer of what a 0% interest rate would mean – and why it's basically meaningless in the absence of government stimulus.

6. The number of ultra-wealthy Australians is set to surge, as it becomes clear the recent bounce in property values is concentrated at the top end. According to CoreLogic, it's the "prestige" end of the market which is sustaining this apparent rise in house values. What does 'prestige' mean, exactly? It means you, the person reading this, can't afford it. Sorry.

7. WeWork looks set to axe thousands of employees – up to 25% of its entire workforce – in order to focus on its "core business" and reduce costs. Massive job cuts have been rumoured since the company booted its CEO Adam Neumann last week. Whether or not the core business is actually valuable in any way is a question I'll leave to the eggheads.

8. The new Tesla feature 'Smart Summon' is supposed to gracefully bring your vehicle to you from upwards of 100 feet away. It sounds like the future, but the reality is somewhat messier. Tesla owners are posting videos of the new feature wreaking havoc, and then photos of the ensuing damage. Quite frankly, I would not trust *any* autopilot system in the average carpark.

https://twitter.com/eiddor/status/1177749574976462848?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1177749574976462848&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.businessinsider.com%2Fteslas-smart-summon-feature-is-wreaking-havoc-2019-10

9. There's more juicy stuff leaking from internal Facebook Q&As. In this one, Mark Zuckerberg explains in unusual detail the company's policy on hate speech, specifically in response to an employee question regarding why a comment like "men are trash" is considered inappropriate for the platform. In it, Zuck basically admits that Facebook has way too much content to apply any nuance to these kind of discussions.

10. Cryptocurrency might still have a bit of buzz around it in the tech world, but not as far as Apple is concerned. In remarks published Thursday, Tim Cook said that his company has absolutely no intention of following Facebook by setting up a currency. His reasoning is pretty interesting. "I really think that a currency should stay in the hands of countries," Cook said. "I'm not comfortable with the idea of a private group setting up a competing currency."

BONUS ITEM
On the above WeWork stuff, NYU professor Scott Galloway – who went viral a few weeks ago basically predicting the company's collapse ahead of the IPO – has another chat out about where he sees it going from here. Worth a read.