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Federal Labor has been accused of using an ad that ran this weekend in Queensland as a xenophobic pitch to One Nation voters. The ad shows Bill Shorten talking about employing Australians first while standing next to a group of workers almost exclusively Anglo-Saxon. The Coalition calls it offensive, but Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese has also criticised it, calling it a shocker that should never have been made or shown.

Hundreds of new forensics, surveillance and intelligence officers will be sworn into the federal police following today's pre-budget announcement from the Government. The Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull says it's the biggest funding boost in a decade, but Labor calls that a con and reckons the new positions won't make up for those heading out the door. Others, meanwhile, worry the extra money will come from yet another cut to the foreign aid budget.

Westpac CEO Brian Hartzer has addressed his feud with Resources Minister Matt Canavan over the bank's decision to refuse finance to any coal mines in Queensland's untapped Galilee basin. Westpac last month updated its Climate Change Policy to say it'll only support miners in existing coal basins and only in projects where the coal is of high energy content. It's angered Senator Canavan who labelled Westpac 'wimps' and advised Queenslanders to bank elsewhere referring to the company by its old name 'The Bank of New South Wales'.

Terrorism experts believe the children of terrorists exposed to horrific violence can be successfully rehabilitated back into society. It comes as another photograph emerges showing Islamic State fighter Khaled Sharrouf's son posing next to a dead body. The Sharrouf children's grandmother is pushing to get them back to Australia. But what are the prospects of these children readjusting to life in Australia after Islamic State?

The Federal court has fined three online e-cigarette retailers for making false and misleading claims. Australia's consumer watchdog the ACCC took the action after the businesses suggested their products did not contain harmful carcinogens and toxins. It's put the industry on notice - as sellers promote the vaporisers are both a stop smoking aid and a fun recreational product.

A review of Australia's quarantine procedures has been carried out after irreplaceable plant specimens from France were destroyed by biosecurity officers. The department in charge says the documents that came with the material didn't comply with import requirements. But it concedes the historic plants were incinerated before they should have been. A representative of the country's herbaria says it's the second such incident in recent weeks with another parcel from New Zealand also destroyed.

The price of Australia's prime export, iron ore, is tumbling amid fears of a global slump in key commodities. Anxiety is rising about the Chinese economy which gobbles up a massive share of Australian product. The price of oil is also tanking. Our Business Editor Ian Verrender explains why it's falling.

Doctors will be required to go underground into a coal mine to better their knowledge of black lung disease. It's part of a new training regime being brought in by the Queensland Government as they attempt to deal with a growing number of cases. The coal miners' union says the decision is an admission that health checks up until now have not been adequate.

There are leaked reports that the World Trade Organisation has upheld Australia's right to impose plain-package label restrictions on the sale of tobacco products. This would be a massive blow to the cigarette industry, who've mounted a series of legal battles opposing the policy implemented almost five years ago. And as Antoinette Lattouf reports, despite the lack of official confirmation, its already being hailed as a huge win for Australia.

A US jury has ordered health care giant Johnson and Johnson to pay a woman $110 million in compensation, after it found her ovarian cancer had been caused by 40 years of using talcum powder for feminine hygiene. The advice from Ovarian Cancer Australia is that women should avoid using talc-based products.