Things have been quietly ticking along in our repair research, notwithstanding Sydney’s winter lockdown.

On 19 July 2021, Jesse Adams Stein presented at the Right to Repair Inquiry Public Hearing, Productivity Commission, Sydney session (online). Her presentation focused on the ‘right to repair’ in relation to product design, consumer decision-making and the possibility of a repairability rating label.

On 9 July 2021 Jesse Adams Stein was an invited respondent to keynote lecture by geographer Dr Chantel Carr, ‘Repair and care: locating the work of climate crisis’. Hosted by Institute of Australian Geographers’ Conference and Dialogues for Human Geography, at Sydney University, 9 July, (online). Carr emphasised the importance of the labour of repair and care in the context of a rapidly changing climate, and called for an inclusive examination of labour futures, including a generative and open appreciation of the lives and skills of workers currently in fossil-fuel industries. Stein’s response focused on questions of retraining and repair skills.