Cybergraphic.com.au

Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson has sought to revive his ailing leadership with pledges to cut petrol excise and block a 70% tax hike on pre-mixed alcoholic drinks.

Police Chief Commissioner softens her stance on the introduction of semi-automatic firearms but said any decision on a weapons upgrade was still some time off.

Federal authorities have drawn up secret contingency plans to ensure Australia's most wanted man, Tony Mokbel, is returned to Melbourne safely.

A brawl between Attorney-General Rob Hulls and senior barristers threatens to turn a ceremonial welcome for a new judge into a public embarrassment.

The body of Saddle Club star Jessica Jacobs will reach its final resting place this afternoon when a horse-drawn carriage delivers her coffin to the St Kilda Cemetery.

An expert committee recommends that police be rearmed with new multiple-shot semi-automatic pistols - despite Chief Commissioner's public reluctance to authorise them.

Qantas devises a secret plan to smash the influence of a powerful airline union, with strike-breakers being offered $100,000 for just six months work.

Opposition threatens to block the tax hike on premixed alcoholic drinks, seizing on the Federal Government's admission that it will not reduce overall consumption.

He may have mused once more, with relief rather than resignation, that "such is life" in these 21st century times.

Concerns about the police handling of two murder cases are sharpened by the revelation that drug boss Tony Mokbel had advance knowledge of one of the crimes.

Fewer hand-outs for the wealthy, $40 billion for nation-building, and the biggest influx of skilled migrants in 60 years are cornerstones of Wayne Swan's "save now, spend later" budget.

The purge of the Victorian Liberals promised by leader Ted Baillieu has claimed its fourth victim.

Victoria's emergency departments were in crisis last year, with almost 70,000 seriously ill patients not treated within target times, a damning new Government report has shown.

A lack of ambulances forced a Ballan woman to drive her son to Melbourne with his severed finger in ice on the back seat.

Three years and $100 million after the State Government introduced a congestion tax on long-stay car parking spaces in central Melbourne it has revealed it has no idea what effect the charge has had on reducing congestion or greenhouse gas emissions.

Kaera Douglas was out of places to run. This time, she was so frightened that she could hardly walk.

Treasurer Wayne Swan brings down Labor's first budget tonight against the background of the biggest drop in four years in the number of loans for new housing.

The crisis in the Victorian Liberal Party deepened yesterday when a campaign manager at party headquarters was forced to quit for making a racist comment about a Liberal candidate at last year's federal election.

The Victorian Government architect has entered the debate about St Kilda's triangle site, arguing that the local Port Phillip Council should not have been left to oversee its $300 million development.

When Hugh Robinson spotted his father lying in the grass at the rear of his Fairfield legal practice with pedestrians crouched around him, he presumed he had had a heart attack.