Federal Education Department officials have apologised to Australian taxpayers after spending thousands of dollars on work trips and meetings at five-star restaurants. Department Secretary Tony Cook conceded his team “let taxpayers down” after it was revealed that education officials racked up a $290,000 hospitality and travel bill last year. ThisContinue Reading
Australia’s persistent teacher shortages in schools have reached “crisis” levels, according to Education Minister Jason Clare. Millions of students across the country are due to head back into classrooms over the next week, but schools are facing crippling staffing issues. Amid continued reports of high teacher vacancies and a recordedContinue Reading
Aussie parents are expecting to spend $2.5 billion as their kids head back to school in the coming weeks. The new data reveals about 5 million Australians (24 per cent) will spend an average of $512 each on back to school related merchandise before the school gates reopen. Queensland studentsContinue Reading
Hardware giant Bunnings has been dragged into the furore over Australia Day celebrations, as Woolworths faces boycott calls over the supermarket giant’s decision to scrap merchandise ahead of the national day. Peter Dutton slammed the supermarket’s decision as an “outrage” and urged chief executive Bradford Banducci to reverse the callContinue Reading
A senior Liberal politician has been caught threatening an elderly constituent who emailed her in support of the proposed Voice to Parliament. Senator Sarah Henderson sent an email two weeks ago to a list of people she claimed registered to attend the launch of the official No campaign in VictoriaContinue Reading
Coalition senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has fallen short of distancing herself from controversial No campaigner Gary Johns, weeks after he drew ire over comments he made. At last month’s CPAC conference, Mr Johns, the president of anti-Voice group Recognise a Better Way – claimed some Indigenous communities were living inContinue Reading
Defence Minister Richard Marles has slammed criticism of his $3.6 million in taxpayer-funded VIP flights revealing he “stands by” every flight he has taken. Speaking on Channel 9‘s Today show, host Karl Stefanovic, Mr Marles fired up over the flights accusing the Coalition of a “smear” over the taxpayer-funded spending.Continue Reading
One in three of the country’s 1.3 million school students who sat the 2023 NAPLAN tests failed to meet literacy and numeracy expectations in the latest sign that Australia’s educational standards are continuing to slide. Aggregated results from the 2023 National Assessment Program, Literacy and Numeracy testing, released on Wednesday,Continue Reading
Finance Minister Katy Gallagher has said she never declared a conflict of interest in relation to a multimillion-dollar compensation payout to Brittany Higgins because it “never crossed her desk.” Senator Gallagher has been grilled for a second day over a tip off she received from Ms Higgins boyfriend David SharazContinue Reading
A change to how student debt is calculated is being considered after the balances of millions of Australians soared overnight. The debt, known as HECS-HELP, is indexed in line with the inflation rate each year, meaning loans rose by 7.1 per cent on Thursday morning. It’s the largest increase experiencedContinue Reading