POLITICS & POLICY

The Australian Senate recommended on late Monday amendments to the country's Marriage Act that will pave the way for the legalisation of gay marriages, which both the Government and the Coalition have been opposing vehemently.

Some 35 jobs have been saved from the latest sale of two businesses, along with a number of assets, which belonged to collapsed Australian engineering firm Hastie Group.

Liberal senior member Ian Macfarlane is a firm believer of Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, who has come under fire this week for apparently playing deaf and blind over the plight of boat people seeking refuge in Australia.

Bell FX Currency Outlook: The Australian Dollar dipped below Parity last night (a "reverse" Parity party) as headlines started to emerge ahead of this week's EU summit as clear signs are yet to emerge the global industrial cycle has bottomed and a lack of policy clarity from the euro area being evident.

Majority of submissions to a Senate committee that investigated marriage equality are in favour of a legislation that would permit gay couples to marry. Almost 60 per cent or 46,000 submissions that the committee received backed the legalisation of same-sex union.

Jewellery investors in India are turning their focus on diamonds, shying away from gold as prices of the safe haven yellow metal continue to outrule the rupee.

The woman behind a recent controversial photo shoot depicting a pair of female Air Force enlisted personnel breastfeeding their infants in uniform has been fired from her civilian job as an X-ray technician, though the company - naturally - says the divisive shoot had nothing to do with it.

Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan denied on Monday that free bottled waters and fruits will be withheld soon from school children visiting the Parliament as part of his office's cost-cutting measures in running the federal institution.

Amid the decline of incoming international passengers, the influx of Chinese tourists at the Auckland International Airport has grown 44.4 per cent in May to 12,443 individuals.

Australia's production of the safe haven yellow metal gold continued to decelerate in the third quarter, spurred largely by the wet weather conditions.

Receding profits by mining giants would lead to lower revenues for the controversial mining tax, which takes effect July 1 and has been projected by Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan to rake in for the federal government more than $13 billion over the next four years.

The sudden resignation of Liberal Senator Mary-Jo Fisher on Thursday over her second implication in shoplifting would not leave a void in the Senate. The party's State Council is scheduled to meet on Tuesday, July 27, to discuss a possible replacement for the legislator diagnosed with mental ailment.

Australia has stepped up its efforts to pressure the Syrian government into initiating an end on the 15-month conflict that has been ravaging the Middle Eastern nation, which international observers said already killed thousands of innocent civilians.

Australia is set to ride on a massive natural gas boom that will surely propel the nation to a new level of economic heights, but it ought to drumbeat its labor supply as early as now to aid this development.

Reality bites. With commodity prices taking a continued beating owing to the massive slowing global economic growth, investment bank UBS AG said it is impossible for Australia to generate the forecast earnings from its planned Mineral Resources Rent Tax (MRRT) in the next two years.

The Australian share market lost ground on Friday, with the All Ordinaries Index (XAO) falling 1% or 40 points.

Bell FX Currency Outlook: After all the volatility of the last week or so the Australian Dollar starts the week over parity after fairly benign announcements on Friday.

A rebound by banks and health-care shares helped push blue chips higher, although not enough to help them avoid a losing week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 67.21 points, or 0.5%, to 12640.78, Friday.

The Australian sharemarket lost ground today for the third time this week, with the All Ordinaries Index (XAO) falling 1 pct or 39.9 pts to 4093.8. Despite today's slump, the Aussie market has actually only eased by 0.32 pct over the past five days thanks to a strong performance on Monday.

Julian Assange has been holed up in Ecuador's London embassy for close to three days and there is no telling him what awaits him in case his high-profile application for asylum was rejected by the country he cherry-picked because it apparently opposes bullying from the United States.

The Fukushima nuclear disaster of 2011 may have spooked the nuclear power industry as well as the uranium sector, but judging from the global activity wherein Chinese companies combined forces to bid for a UK nuclear power project, Britain poised to switch back to nuclear power after 20 years and the Lithuania parliament approving the construction of a new nuclear plant, nuclear power has regained its former stronghold - alive and kicking and most definitely back on the radar.

Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan was hardly surprised that Fortescue Metals Group (FMG) launched a legal challenge on Friday that questions the constitutionality of the Gillard Government-initiated minerals resource rent tax (MRRT) set to take effect in July.

More and more non-Chinese rare earths miners are turning aggressive with their respective exploration programs, wanting to get a slice of the rare earths pie in anticipation of the sector's potential supply glut in the wake of China's planned stricter monitoring on its rare earths industry.

Global-growth worries slammed stocks Thursday, triggering a bearish recommendation from Goldman Sachs that accelerated declines and helped drive major benchmarks to their second-biggest one-day drop of the year.

A global economy that supports healthier environment will be the wave of the future, Prime Minister Julia Gillard said on Friday, which in turn would eradicate poverty and generate more employment opportunities at the same time.

The Australian government needs to level the playing field of the domestic aviation industry that would allow Qantas Airways to legally accept foreign investments and survive what the national carrier calls as serious threats to its existence.

Bell FX Currency Outlook: The Australian Dollar has taken a nose dive as global markets suffer heavy falls after disappointing economic data from China and Europe weighs on the market.

Embattled MP Craig Thomson has had two hits in his favour over Health Services Union (HSU) fund misuse charges he is facing. First, the former prostitute who initially claimed that Mr Thomson was her client recanted her statement two weeks ago. On Thursday, a court sacked HSU whistleblower Kathy Jackson who was instrumental in filing of charges against the MP.

Scandals continue to plague Australian legislators. The Craig Thomson and Peter Slipper controversies have yet to subside, but on Thursday the spotlight was again on Senator Mary-Jo Fisher who quit her post effective Aug 10, 2012.