Celebrating World Rat Day

Happy World Rat Day! Today in Parliament, Abigail passed a motion celebrating our clever, empathetic, and often misunderstood rodent friends, giving rats the recognition they deserve!

Abigail said:

I move:

(1) That this House notes that:

Friday 4 April 2025 is World Rat Day, which was created in 2002 by Ratlist, a group of rat lovers spanning across several universities in the United States including the University of Washington who wanted to set a date to honour rats and educate the public about their amazing capacity as a companion animal,
World Rat Day is all about tackling rats' bad rap, to change negative perceptions of rats held by many people today,
rats are highly intelligent and social sentient beings. They feel empathy, have extraordinary problem-solving skills, can dream and process their day time experiences and thoughts, and form close bonds with other rats as well as human companions,
rats giggle when they are tickled; it activates the neurons in a specific brain region in rats’ somatosensory cortex, producing high-frequency squeaks which are beyond the range of human hearing,
when rats are stressed they release corticosterone, a stress hormone similar to cortisol in humans which triggers a fight-or-flight response. This often results in visible symptoms similar to that observed in humans such as their body hair standing on end, social avoidance, increased inactivity, sleep disturbances and suppressed exploratory activities,
globally, at least 120 million mice and rats are used in medical research each year, with rodents constituting the vast majority of lab animals, and
medical research has progressed significantly in recent decades, with scientists increasingly turning to more humane and ethical alternatives to animal experimentation such as studying human cell and tissue cultures, computational models, AI and machine learning, voluntary clinical trials with human participants and post-mortem studies from donated human tissue.

(2) That this House celebrates World Rat Day and encourages all Members to educate themselves about the amazingly complex affective and cognitive capacities of rats.

Motion agreed to.

Read the transcript in Hansard here.

6 May 2025

A UNIVERSAL WELLBEING PAYMENT FOR NSW

No matter who you are or what you do, everyone has the right to share in the wellbeing of our country.

But at the moment the essentials so many of us need – a place to call home, food on the table, and everyday essentials like electricity, internet, medicine and water – are simply out of reach.

Instead of supporting us, our government is choosing to prop up huge corporations with massive subsidies, and to give away our collective wealth through record tax cuts for the wealthy. Meanwhile, the rest of us are left to live paycheck to paycheck or trapped in the dehumanising bureaucracy of our existing welfare system.

Now, in the midst of a pandemic, and following quickly on the heels of the bushfire crisis, more of us than ever before are experiencing what it’s like to lose our jobs, be without a home, or worry about where the food for our next meal will come from.

It’s time for us to choose to prioritise the wellbeing of everyone.

And that’s exactly what the Universal Wellbeing Payment will do.

It’s a regular payment made to each of us to ensure our minimum standard of wellbeing. No means testing, no bureaucracy, no strings attached.

It’s the amount you’re owed simply for being a participant in our society.

It means you are free to live your life and contribute to society as you see fit, whether you’re a carer, an artist, a student, a parent, an entrepreneur – you can get on with what you need to do, knowing that you will always be supported regardless of your income.

It means that we’re choosing to structure our economy for the benefit of all of us, not using our collective wealth to prop up the interests of big business and the wealthy few.

It means you will always have what you need to live a good life, no matter what.

The Universal Wellbeing Payment is for everyone. Help us make it happen.

For more information, head to universalwellbeingpayment.com.au

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Celebrating World Rat Day

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