Public holiday surcharges to cover penalty rates may not be going into the pockets of staff.

The typical 10 percent surcharge that is advertised throughout Melbourne cafes and across Australia is said to go straight into the pockets of the owner’s.

The hospitality union United Voice said due to the current system, it’s cheaper for employers to do the wrong thing.

Commonwealth funding to stop the declining water quality on the Great Barrier Reef has decreased by more than 11 million dollars a year.

The figures have emerged just weeks from the federal budget which critics say ignored the coral bleaching crisis that has severely damaged the reef.

Experts believe that the targets in the Government’s plan to improve the health of the Great Barrier Reef will not be met.

The leaders of Germany’s Jewish community has advised their community to stop wearing the traditional skullcaps following anti-Semitic attacks.

Yo-sef Schuster, the president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, says the Jewish population should exercise caution in big cities.

This is following the attack of two young men wearing the traditional skull caps in the city.

Seventeen unique Australian birds and mammals are set to go extinct in the next 20 years unless their protections are dramatically increased according to a new report by Australia's Threatened Species Recovery Hub.

The researchers took factors such as funding and levels of protection, as well as distribution and development in habitat areas, into consideration when calculating the probability that individual species would go extinct.

One of the world’s largest music streaming services, Spotify, has started testing a way of filtering out songs which have explicit lyrics.

The new setting does not replace explicit words with clean versions, it greys out the explicit songs and prevents them from playing.

Nicola Ford, a mother who set up an online petition calling for the filter, said the new setting does not go far enough because kids will find a way to sneak in the song.

A report by Human Rights Watch says there is a decrease in the proportion of Chinese women working as a result of discrimination in recruitment.

According to Human Rights Watch, there has been gender discrimination in job ads, and leading Chinese tech firms have now pledged to address this matter.

The report also found the ads reflected ‘traditional and deeply discriminatory views” that women are less capable than men because of their stereotypical role as family caregivers.

The Parliamentary Budget Office has found the Greens plan to legalise cannabis would add almost $2 billion a year to the Australian economy.

Under the Greens plan, cannabis would be regulated similarly to alcohol and tobacco.

The PBO warned the estimated growth may not be accurate because of limited information about cannabis consumption in Australia.

A new round-table has been convened by the Queensland government.

The group of LGBTI community members came from across the state to advise the Palaszczuk government on policy that affects the lives of LGBTI Queenslanders.

The roundtable is expected to assemble three times a year for the government to consult.