1. Media icon and 2013 Australian of the Year Ita Buttrose is set to join a new morning show with Network Ten, which will air this year. Former Sunrise executive producer Adam Boland has been hired to organise Ten’s morning programming, including the new panel-based show with Buttrose. In a statement Buttrose said, ‘‘I am looking forward to working with Adam Boland and the Ten team to give Australian audiences a morning show with edge, energy and above all, enjoyment”.
2. The Victorian Labor party is planning to introduce a private member’s bill in State Parliament this week, which will aim to give children conceived through sperm donations the right to know about their biological parent. Fairfax has reported that the state Coalition government is planning to introduce similar legislation later this year.
3. Yet another vessel carrying asylum seekers is suspected to have capsized en route to Australia, and up to 13 people are dead and 55 missing. The death toll has continued to rise. You can read Mamamia’s coverage here.
4. Nelson Mandela is back in hospital with a lung infection. President Jacob Zuma’s office said that the Nobel peace prize winner was in a “serious but stable condition”. Mandela spent 10 days in hospital in March, after he developed pneumonia.
5. The Australian Sex Workers’ Association is pushing for the Federal Government to extend the scope of 457 visas to foreign sex workers. The Australian Sex Workers’ Association – also known as the Scarlet Alliance – program manager Jules Kim told News Ltd that, “The [Immigration Department] considers that sex work is not a skilled occupation and so they’ve been excluded … That’s discriminatory and we want equal rights.”
6. Fairfax has reported that genetic testing clinics in NSW have seen more referrals from people looking for the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes – the mutations that increase a woman’s risk of developing breast or ovarian cancer – since Angelina Jolie’s announcement that she had undergone a preventative double mastectomy.
7. Virtus Health, the largest infertility treatment provider in Australia, has started offering a new discounted model of IVF – which is significantly cheaper, but has a lower chance of the treatment being successful. Fairfax has reported that a standard ‘cycle’ will cost between $1500 and $2000, compared to $3500 for the usual services.
Top Comments
Love Ita Buttrose. Her program should be interesting and informative viewing , hopefully free of the usual butt kissing that is the staple feature of the Channel Ten panel shows of the past and present.
Looking forward to hearing a variety of topics discussed and a variety of opinions presented.
Oh ! Those 457 visas ! No names mentioned............
Looking forward to Ita on Ten.
I am one of the few people who actually really liked the axed Breakfast show with Paul Henry, Kath Robinson and Magdalena Roze. Once he calmed down a bit and stopped talking over everyone I thought Paul did a good job. He was well across the topic when he interviewed and he asked the hard questions. Magdalena gave the best weather reports. They actually were about the weather!
At least it was interesting. Once they were axed and I had to go back to the other two breakfast shows I have pretty much given up morning TV. They are so boring and predictable and plain uninteresting.
Let's hope Ita can give us an alternative.