PM

If you're in Sydney and Melbourne, the chances are a lot of the conversations you hear are about real estate. Housing prices in both cities are booming - some are calling it a bubble. It's pushed the issue of 'housing affordability' high on the political agenda with many calling for solutions to help people enter property market. PM speaks to UBS's Scott Haslem.

A Hunter Valley farmer has today been bestowed a significant global environmental award. Eighty-three-year-old Wendy Bowman has been presented the Goldman Environmental Prize in the USA, for her work spanning three decades to protect prime farmland and water supplies from open-cut coal mining. Previously won by the likes of Greens founder Bob Brown, she's the first Australian to receive the prize in almost 15 years.

When you turn on your TV news, or tune into your favourite radio show - who's presenting? Chances are they're white and middle class. However more than a quarter of Australians were born overseas and nearly half have at least one parent born overseas. But when it comes to seeing and hearing that cultural diversity in the media, it just isn't there. Now, a not-for-profit organisation's been founded to target the underrepresentation of Australia's diversity in the media.

Aid agencies are applauding the Federal Government's decision to give $10 million in assistance to the worsening situation in Yemen. The UN is warning the Middle Eastern country is on the brink of starvation, with 14 million people now without sufficient food. The aid boost comes a month before the Turnbull Government releases the Federal Budget that international agencies are hoping will increase the amount given to aid.

Lawyers fear Australian workers with disabilities could miss out on a back-pay compensation scheme that closes this month. People who were underpaid by Australian Disability Enterprises are being encouraged to urgently apply for money they are owed. The payment process was triggered by a class action settlement last year against the Commonwealth's disability discrimination laws.

Today's federal funding announcement shoring up money for community legal centres and Aboriginal legal aid services has been universally welcomed by the sector. The $55.7 million means that legal centres providing advice and representation to those in need won't be losing 30 per cent of their funding after June 30, as they feared.

Almost ten years after a landmark film deal was struck between Australia and China, movie industry figures are conceding Australian stories still aren't making it onto the big screen in China. The main benefit of the deal they say is the number of Chinese stories being filmed and produced in Australia. A group of Australian film makers is in Beijing for talks this week, as China correspondent Bill Birtles reports.

The Australian Tax Office had a big win today in a landmark tax avoidance case. The full Federal Court dismissed an appeal by the multinational resources company Chevron, leaving it with a tax bill of more than $300 million. Chevron says it's disappointed by the decision and will consider a High Court appeal. The ATO says Australians should be confident it's doing everything to ensure multinationals pay tax on the income they earn in this country. Tax experts say the decision has implication for multinationals and tax offices around the world. Peter Feros, a tax partner at Clayton Utz law firm speaks to PM.

French authorities say the gunman responsible for killing a policeman in Paris was the focus of an 'anti-terror probe'. The 39-year-old man has been identified from papers left in his car, but French officials are yet to release his name. He also wounded two police officers before he was killed by security forces on the Champs-Elysees. President Francois Hollande is to chair a security cabinet meeting, as France readies for Sunday's presidential poll.

With a complex and uncertain political climate in the lead up to the French Presidential elections, every vote counts. This includes ballot papers from French expats abroad. The number of French nationals living around the globe has doubled over the past two years, and around 100,000 French nationals call Australia home.