PM

If you're trying to have a baby, sometimes assisted fertility treatments, such as IVF, are necessary in order to conceive. But while IVF treatments are available to women aged over 40, doctors are advised not to offer them to obese women. A new paper is calling for a review of the guidelines, labelling them unjust.

For the first time in New South Wales, parents who use a surrogate to have a baby can claim paid parental leave from the State Government. Until now, couples have had to solely rely on the Federal Government's paid parental leave. But the decision could be overshadowed by a clamp down on 'double dipping' that aims to put an end to parents claiming both their employer's and the government's parental schemes.

A former Northern Territory corrections minister says he bears some responsibility for systemic failings in the youth justice system. Labor's Gerry McCarthy faced the Royal Commission into the Protection and Detention of Children in the NT in Alice Springs today. He was the corrections minister during several incidents involving former Don Dale detainee Dylan Voller, who featured in the Four Corners program which prompted the royal commission.

Irrigators reliant on the Snowy scheme, are worried the new $2 billion plan to increase power generation means they won't get access to the water when they need it. The Prime Minister's announcement to increase the Hydro scheme's power generation has had a mixed response from rural communities who are also worried about land acquisitions as a result of the project. They are questions that will now be considered through a feasibility study.

A national wood company and the Victorian Government are at odds over the future of a sawmill facing closure. Australian Sustainable Hardwoods has confirmed the Heyfield Timber Mill is closing, and it may shift some equipment to Tasmania. Workers have described the closure of the country's biggest hardwood sawmill as disgraceful and avoidable.

It's exactly one year until South Australians go to the polls. Voters are faced with the choice of returning Labor for a fifth term in power, or to usher in a Liberal government for the first time in 16 years. But the state of the state, particularly on the issue of energy, has become something of a national fascination. And today, both leaders got in the 'ring' for the first political debate, of what's likely to be, a very long 12 months.

A row is brewing among farmers over the Federal Government's push to get more gas exploration. Many have fought CSG development on their land for decades, and in Victoria and the Northern Territory, farm groups have lobbied hard for moratoriums on fracking. But the peak national lobby group, the National Farmers Federation has other ideas.

A man who once studied at an Australian university has appeared in an Islamic state propaganda video criticising fellow Muslims who have not embraced the fundamentalist group's version of jihad. The 30-year-old Bangladeshi is thought to have died in a recent suicide bombing in Iraq, but the Federal Government has been unable to verify his fate.

Science in recent years has been casting more and more doubt on the reliability of human memory. It's starting to cause ructions in the justice system, for instance by undermining witness statements.

Now neuroscientists in Sydney have cast new light on how memories form after something frightening or traumatic happens. The researchers at the University of Technology Sydney found that a memory of the fear forms quickly, but a detailed memory of what happened doesn't have time to form. The research might help explain more about disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder.

The Prime Minister says a plan to expand the Snowy Hydro scheme to include modern pumped hydro technology will continue the tradition of courage and vision of those who built the original project four decades ago. But the opposition says all that's been announced is a feasibility study that will do nothing to address warnings of a short-term energy crisis.