National

The navy lurk: blonde model gets sailors fighting fit

''IF YOU ladies leave my island,'' screams Gunnery Sergeant Hartman to his fresh recruits in Full Metal Jacket, ''if you survive recruit training, you will

Go figure: maths no longer in its prime

MATHS education is in crisis, with the number of students enrolled in a mathematics major at Australian universities declining by 15 per cent since 2001 ...

Big ideas to boost the state

SWEEPING local government mergers to create 10 super councils, and a trial of staggered starting times for schools as a means of easing peak-hour traffic ...

Phones to offer X-ray vision

LOST in a big city? It is a familiar experience. So imagine if you could use X-ray vision to see what was on the other ...

Art or child porn? Now censors must decide

ARTISTS who create images of nude children would have to pay $500 an image to get Commonwealth classification to make absolutely sure they would not ...

Rabbit out of the hat leaves everybody staring at goats

FOR those privileged to see it, Julie Bishop's overly long loathing look at an audience interruption on ABC TV's Q&A on Monday night was a ...

Flood of insulation installers seek pay relief or retraining

AT LEAST 1500 people have lost their jobs and are applying for government retraining programs because of the sudden suspension of the $2.45 billion insulation ...

A nappy change designed to wedge Labor and woo women

TONY ABBOTT'S parental leave policy is bad even when judged against the kind of bad policy we get in election years. ...

Questions the Department of Defence declined to answer

Why was $10,000 spent for a "strategic planning conference" at Lake Crackenback Resort in early 2008? Also, who attended and what was discussed? ...

Abbott betrays a core Liberal philosophy

THE Liberal Party has spent 66 years developing its brand as the party of enterprise and low taxes. It took Tony Abbott just 98 days ...

Demotion for Events NSW as Macdonald is handed the reins

IAN MACDONALD, the minister dubbed ''Sir Lunchalot'', is to take control of Events NSW from the Premier, Kristina Keneally, indicating the organisation's importance within the ...

Breast jobs, tummy tucks in the deal

TAXPAYERS are funding hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of cosmetic surgery and fertility treatments for Defence Force personnel. ...

Midwives want to meet Roxon to avoid home-birth ban

ABI WHITEHAIR is only nine days old but she's already saved taxpayers thousands of dollars. ...

Coalition colleagues livid with Abbott over lack of consultation

THE federal government will be pressed by the Senate to enhance its paid parental leave scheme after the Greens and independents said they would use ...

War on waste: 'Defence extravagance must end'

THE Defence Minister, John Faulkner, has demanded action on millions of dollars Defence has spent on luxury items, saying ''financial control is critical''. ...

11yo drove mum's car 80km, court told

A boy faces court accused of taking his mother's car on a 80-kilometre joy ride, then crashing. ...

College collapse expected to lower Indian student intake

The Foreign Minister, Stephen Smith, says he expects the collapse of some private colleges will contribute to a drop in the number of Indian students ...