More than 80,000 people sign petition for Dr Charlie Teo to operate in public hospitals, & more in News in 5.

-With AAP.

1. More than 80,000 people sign petition for Dr Charlie Teo to operate in public hospitals.

More than 80,000 people have signed an online petition for controversial neurosurgeon Dr Charlie Teo to be allowed to operate in public hospitals.

Sydney University Professor Henry Woo sparked a debate last month after tweeting about the ethics of crowdfunding campaigns raising money for Dr Teo’s surgeries.

Last week Dr Teo hit back, saying that he wasn’t allowed to operate in public hospitals and so patients had to pay to be operated on in the private system.

A change.org petition is now lobbying for Dr Teo to be allowed to operate in the public system.

“Dr Charlie Teo is a medical genius, yet he is vilified by his peers in Australia,” the petition says.

“At present he has not been invited to operate in any public hospitals in Australia, so those that need his expertise have to pay to go into a private hospital.”

The petition is addressed to Minister for Health Greg Hunt, WA Minister for Health Roger Cook, and Prime Minister Scott Morrison, and has a goal of 150,000 signatures.

“Many people don’t know a lot about brain tumours until it affects someone they love,” it reads. “But brain cancer kills more children than any other disease, approximately every seven hours an Australian dies of brain cancer. We need to give them every opportunity, which means having the best access to the best medical treatment.”

Dr Teo told the Today show he is willing to operate on interstate patients in public hospitals, but has never been taken up on this offer.

Currently, patients outside NSW can only access his surgery through the private health system, so patients from interstate, or who don’t have private health insurance, have “two options”.

“They come to the private system in NSW and get done privately where they have to pay.

“Or I say to them, ‘Listen, if you can get your neurosurgeon from your state to invite me to your hospital, I will operate free of charge in the public system with benefits not only to you but will benefit hopefully the whole neurosurgical community where they can learn my techniques’. Have I ever been taken up on that offer? Never.

“All they need to do is swallow their ego.”

Dr Teo is known for performing surgery on patients other surgeons have deemed inoperable.

2. A WA man has pleaded guilty in the first revenge porn case since the state introduced new laws.

A Perth man has pleaded guilty to distributing intimate images of his former girlfriend by posting them on Instagram, marking the first successful prosecution under WA’s new revenge porn laws.https://t.co/YyiWH48sjt via @ABCNews

— Sabrina Balfour (@SpottyBalfour) June 11, 2019

The first person charged under Western Australia’s revenge porn laws has admitted creating social media pages in his ex-girlfriend’s name and posting intimate photographs of her.

Mitchell Joseph Brindley, 24, had taken intimate photos of the 24-year-old woman with her consent while they were in a relationship, police said.

He posted several images on Instagram after they broke up, then when the profile was taken down he created four more pages.

Brindley faced Fremantle Magistrates Court on Tuesday and pleaded guilty to distributing an intimate image of another person without consent in April.

A pre-sentence and psychological report have been ordered ahead of sentencing on July 22.

Brindley had his bail renewed and was warned not to approach the victim.

He declined to comment as he left court.

The WA government introduced the law earlier this year, with a punishment of up to three years in prison and/or a fine of up to $18,000.

4. Anthony Albanese moves to expel union leader John Setka over comments made about Rosie Batty.

Labor Leader Anthony Albanese will move to expel high-profile union official John Setka from the party over his comments about anti-domestic violence campaigner Rosie Battyhttps://t.co/che94upZZj

— SBS News (@SBSNews) June 11, 2019

Defiant union leader John Setka claims “dirty politics” is behind a push by Anthony Albanese to expel him from the Labor Party over comments he reportedly made about anti-domestic violence campaigner Rosie Batty.

The federal opposition leader said Mr Setka had undermined the labour movement and his comments were “completely unacceptable”.

“I don’t want him in the party I lead. It’s that simple,” Mr Albanese told reporters in Perth on Tuesday.

The Victorian secretary of the CFMMEU has been suspended by the party, but Mr Albanese said he will have a chance to “press his case”.

Mr Setka claims he was taken out of context after reportedly telling a union meeting that Ms Batty’s advocacy had led to men having fewer rights.

“People are making up lies about what I said. Every time I see Rosie Batty I want to give her a hug,” Mr Setka told the New Daily.

“I would rather be called corrupt. It’s not even an exaggeration of what I said. It’s an outright lie.

“I’ve got people portraying me as a neanderthal. This is dirty politics and this is wrong.”

Ms Batty says Mr Setka’s comments open an opportunity to “continue conversations that we need to have”.

“What rights does he feel he has lost as a man, or men are losing?” she told ABC Radio National.

“The right to behave in a violent and abusive, degrading way? Because if that’s the rights that men have lost, or feel that they are losing, well then I am pleased that we are finally moving forward and making people who choose to be violent accountable.”

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Mr Setka should have resigned a long time ago.

“They can root out one Labor thug in the union movement, but there’s plenty more where John Setka came from,” Mr Morrison told reporters in Sydney.

“The CFMMEU is one of the most litigated against and charged unions in the country – their charge sheet is longer than your arm – and John Setka is just one of many.”

After remaining silent on the issue for several days, Victorian Labor premier Daniel Andrews on Tuesday said he supported Mr Albanese’s move.

“The comments made about her (Ms Batty) by Mr Setka are disgraceful and his refusal to apologise for them is appalling,” Mr Andrews said in a statement.

“They cannot be defended in any context.”

Mr Andrews, who has rallied alongside Mr Setka, ignored Liberal Party calls to take action against him last month when the union leader indicated he would plead guilty to two criminal charges following an incident at a Melbourne home.

He faces a charge of breaching a court order, along with another charge, details of which cannot be revealed for legal reasons.

Mr Albanese stressed his decision to seek Mr Setka’s expulsion is not linked to his court case which is due to resume on June 26.

The Liberals also condemned him last year for likening the federal government to the Hitler regime and for tweeting a picture of his young children holding a sign telling the building commission to ‘Go get f*#*ed’.

ACTU secretary Sally McManus has cut short an overseas trip to return home and deal with the crisis.

Ms McManus said in a statement Mr Setka’s reported comments were “appalling and totally unacceptable” and he should withdraw them and apologise.

4. Samoa has banned Elton John biopic Rocketman because of its gay content.

Samoa's film censor has banned Elton John rock biopic Rocketman because of its gay content.

The deeply conservative Pacific nation's censorship office last week banned the film, which is based on the life of of the iconic British musician, with principal censor Leiataua Niuapu Faaui telling the Samoa Observer some scenes were "not good for public viewing".

He said its depiction of sex between men "violates laws against same sex marriage" and clashed with the nation's Christians beliefs, according to the Observer.

More than 95 per cent of Samoa's population is estimated to identify with some form of Christianity and the country still has laws against sex between men.

Apollo Cinemas Samoa over the weekend announced it would not be screening the film due to "censoring issues".

The country's censors in 2009 also objected to the film Milk, which is based on the life of gay rights activist Harvey Milk.

The decision comes after Rocketman's local distributor in Russia was criticised for reportedly cutting gay scenes from the film to accommodate local laws.

Sir Elton and the film's makers condemned the Russian move and said it was a "sad reflection of the divided world we still live in and how it can still be so cruelly unaccepting of the love between two people".

5. A new victim of 9/11 has been identified 18 years on.

Authorities have newly-identified the remains of a 9/11 victim found at the World Trade Center.

The New York City medical examiners' office on Monday said the man is the 1,643rd person to be identified nearly 18 years after hijackers crashed planes into the trade centre's twin towers in 2001.

The victim's name, which is being withheld, was confirmed through DNA testing of remains recovered in 2013.

It's the first new identification of a World Trade Center victim since that of Scott Johnson, a securities analyst at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, in July 2018.

The medical examiner says about 40 per cent of the 2,753 people reported missing or about 1,100 sets of remains are still unidentified.

The remains were recovered near the Deutsche Bank building and experts identified him by analysing a bone fragment, said spokeswoman Aja Worthy-Davis.

Johnson's bone fragment was tested a number of times but advances in technology and new techniques discovered by the medical examiner's lab helped make the identification possible.

with DPA.