Good morning, this is Helen Sullivan bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Tuesday 14 May.

Top stories

As the London Bridge inquest continues, the court has heard more details about the events leading to the death of Sara Zelenak, 21, an Australian. A woman believed to be Zelenak, and a man believed to be James McMullan, 32, from Brent, north-west London, were set upon immediately by the terrorists, who had already mown down pedestrians on the night of 3 June 2017, the court was told. Giving evidence at the Old Bailey on Monday, Erick Siguenza, who filmed footage of the attacks shown in court, said he had seen the three attackers step out of the Ford Transit van, brandishing knives. “As soon as the van crashed, they [the attackers] stepped out and the driver was the one that stabbed the woman who had jumped out to get out of the way of the van. She was still on the floor.” Siguenza said a man had come to the woman’s aid. “He has just grabbed her left arm and gently tried to pick her up, but by then the attackers were already in close proximity and began attacking. There was no time for him to help her.”

Irrigators in south-eastern Australia have filed a class action seeking $750m in damages from the federal government’s Murray-Darling Basin Authority. The claim accuses the MDBA of being reckless and grossly negligent in draining water from the Menindee Lakes in 2016 and discharging water from the basin knowing there would be little or none left for the southern irrigators. It states plaintiffs suffered loss of cropping income, livestock production and loss of export markets and that water released from Murray River dams caused the river to overflow at chokepoints, causing spillages estimated at 860,000 megalitres.

Modelling by BAEconomics that has been used to attack Labor’s climate policies is a “complete outlier”, according to an analysis of more than 20 other modelling exercises on the effect of higher climate targets on the economy and electricity sector. The Australia Institute has published a review comparing the work of Brian Fisher with 19 other reports and and three Treasury models that examined the potential effects of higher climate targets. The analysis found none of the reports showed greater action to address climate change was “economy wrecking” and that higher targets had, at most, “a very small impact on GDP growth compared to no action”. Bill Shorten, meanwhile, has gone on the offensive over the BAEconomics modelling, declaring Australian politics will be “broken” until it fronts up to the challenge of climate change.

World

Swedish prosecutors say they are reopening a 2010 rape investigation against Julian Assange. Photograph: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images

After Sweden’s decision to reopen the rape case against Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder faces two extradition requests. So what happens next? There is pressure in the UK to prioritise the Swedish request. Last month the Labour MP Stella Creasy, with the support of more than 70 MPs and peers, wrote to Bthe ritish home secretary, Sajid Javid, requesting that action be taken to ensure Assange is extradited to Sweden.

Felicity Huffman has pleaded guilty to taking part in the college admissions cheating scheme. The 56-year-old actor entered the plea Monday to a charge of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and honest services mail fraud.

Donald Trump again defended his China tariffs on Monday. As the clash of the world’s two biggest economies raised fears of global shockwaves, the US president denied that US consumers would pay the price.

Downing Street has said Theresa May remains opposed to any form of referendum being attached to a Brexit deal, as the government prepares to enter its seventh week of talks with Labour to find a compromise.

Opinion and analysis

A Coalition mobile billboard claiming Labor will ‘tax you to death’

A new analysis says Labor’s tax policies will have a negligible impact on the bottom 50% of households in Australia measured by income and wealth. The ANU academics behind the analysis modelled Labor’s changes to franking credits, negative gearing, trusts and capital gains tax. The overall impact of the proposed changes was highly progressive, “with virtually no impact for households in the bottom 40% of the income distribution and the largest increase for those in the top 10%”. While the Morrison government has played up the negative impact of revenue measures, particularly franking credits, on self-funded retirees with modest incomes, the analysis says that’s largely bunkum. The Guardian has also asked two experts whether any of the Coalition’s claims about new Labor’s taxes are true.

“A government with few ideas has offered a rinky-dink first-home scheme on the run,” writes Greg Jericho. “Nothing demonstrates how election campaigns are often a triumph of politics over policy than that two days after the Reserve Bank signalled the economy is set to grow slower than expected, the Liberal party announced a policy to assist some first-homebuyers with a deposit guarantee and the ALP matched it two hours later.”

Sport

Serena Williams fell behind 3-1 in the first set before opening her clay court season with a routine 6-4, 6-2 win over Swedish qualifier Rebecca Peterson on Monday in the first round of the Italian Open.

Women’s rugby in Australia was last week buoyed by the announcement of a major redevelopment of Ballymore Park in Queensland, which will include a national high-performance home base for XVs players. The proposal is an important and tangible statement of inclusion and intent, writes Jill Scanlon.

Thinking time: Doris Day has died aged 97

Doris Day, circa 1962. Photograph: Archive Photos/Getty Images

“Her face, eerily beautiful in all its buttery-blond wholesomeness, beamed over Hollywood in the 50s and early 60s like a gigantic roadside billboard advertising the American way,” writes Peter Bradshaw. “In that extraordinary period of white America’s postwar prosperity and patriotism, Doris Day was the biggest box office and recording star in the US: easily equalling the music-movie crossover success of alpha males such as Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley, although somehow without being entitled to the guys’ iconic status.

“Day’s career was a roll call of studio-era greatness. She worked with Michael Curtiz (who discovered her) and Alfred Hitchcock, and played opposite James Stewart, Clark Gable, James Cagney and Cary Grant. But her uncoolness – a vital, mysterious ingredient of her success even in her extraordinary heyday – was soon held against her. No one ever says that Doris Day is their favourite star, in the way that no one says vanilla is their favourite ice-cream flavour. Yet a heck of a lot of vanilla ice-cream gets sold.

“Day was utterly without irony and she radiated a can-do straightforwardness, optimism and good nature that resonated with millions of filmgoers. She rolled up her sleeves and got on with whatever she was contractually obliged to do: a lot of good pictures, one or two brilliant ones – of which, more in a moment – and a lot of embarrassing nonsense. But she didn’t complain. Day was in her way the presidential first lady of Hollywood’s early 60s: dignified, a good sport, lovable.”

Media roundup

The Australian Financial Review leads with a headline calling the PM’s first homebuyer plan flawed. The Sydney Morning Herald reveals Morrison bypassed cabinet with the “surprise” $500m plan. The Daily Telegraph’s headline is Bill’s big end of town, with the paper reporting that “a key plank in Labor’s policy for business will mostly hand tax breaks to big business and multinationals”. The Courier-Mail’s front page bears the headline Coal turkey, with the news that, according to a YouGov Galaxy poll, “more than one-third of voters are now less likely to vote Green because of the blow-in protesters trying to stop Queenslanders from getting much-needed jobs”.

Coming up

Students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 across Australia will sit for the Naplan tests in grammar and punctuation, spelling, reading, writing and numeracy.

The Matildas coach, Ante Milicic, will this morning name a 23-player squad, led by captain Sam Kerr, to carry Australia’s hopes to France for this year’s Women’s World Cup.

Morning mail election extra

During the federal election campaign, morning mail subscribers will receive an extra edition on Saturday mornings, rounding up all the week’s events on the campaign trail and highlighting some of the best reading from the Guardian and beyond.