The Algorithm Age

Parental leave in the UK is confusing for both families and businesses, the Business Secretary has said, as a major review into the system is announced. The review will look at maternity, paternity and shared parental leave to investigate how improvements might be made. Currently, most new dads and second partners are able to take up to two weeks of paid leave from work after a baby is born. Most mums and birthing parents, meanwhile, can take up to 52 paid weeks off work – though lower pay kicks in after 39 weeks. Alongside the familiar paternity leave and maternity leave, the UK also has adoption leave, parental leave, parental bereavement leave, shared parental leave and neonatal care leave. Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said the current situation is ‘confusing, even for businesses’. Sign up to 's politics newsletter, Alright Gov? Craig Munro breaks down Westminster chaos into easy to follow insight, walking you through what the...

Parental leave in the UK is confusing for both families and businesses, the Business Secretary has said, as a major review into the system is announced. The review will look at maternity, paternity and shared parental leave to investigate how improvements might be made. Currently, most new dads and second partners are able to take up to two weeks of paid leave from work after a baby is born. Most mums and birthing parents, meanwhile, can take up to 52 paid weeks off work – though lower pay kicks in after 39 weeks. Alongside the familiar paternity leave and maternity leave, the UK also has adoption leave, parental leave, parental bereavement leave, shared parental leave and neonatal care leave. Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said the current situation is ‘confusing, even for businesses’. Sign up to 's politics newsletter, Alright Gov? Craig Munro breaks down Westminster chaos into easy to follow insight, walking you through what the...

The West Australian government has defended its hardline liquor restrictions after an independent review found the scheme had "mixed" results in reducing alcohol-related harm. The report's release comes as state parliament debates a new bill looking to lock in the Banned Drinkers Register (BDR) and other measures across a large swathe of regional WA. In Broome on Tuesday Racing and Gaming Minister Paul Papalia said the restrictions had slashed crime in the Kimberley town. "We've had an overall drop in overall crime of 33 per cent over the two years since they were introduced," he said. "In Derby the drop was over 19 per cent for family and domestic violence-related crime. "It's a positive impact and we want to see it continue into the future." The BDR, which prohibits individuals from purchasing takeaway alcohol, has been trialled in the Kimberley, Pilbara, and Goldfields regions since 2...

On Tuesday, some Australian university students got access to a new payment. The Commonwealth Prac Payment is available to eligible teaching, nursing, midwifery and social work students. It will provide A$331.65 a week during compulsory professional placements, to help with living and study expenses. This could include travel, accommodation, uniforms and lost income from other employment. But while the payment is a much-needed step in the right direction, many students are still missing out. Who’s not covered? The prac payment was a recommendation from the federal government’s 2024 Universities Accord review . It is designed to help students complete essential professional placements, so they can graduate and enter the workforce. But numerous other health degrees with time-consuming work placements are excluded from the payment. This includes medicine, physiotherapy, dietetics, psychology, radiography and other allied health professions. Veterinary medicine s...

New South Wales' early childhood sector will be a subject to a number of "nation-leading" reforms, the state government has announced, following the findings of an independent review into the sector regarding a rise in safety breaches. As announced by the Minns government on Thursday, these reforms will be centred around transparency and improving child safety. These planned changes include childcare providers being required to notify families if they are being investigated for serious breaches, a mandate for service quality and safety performance information to be appropriately published, as well as legislative changes to increase penalties over breaches to national regulations. But the government's plan is to also establish a state-based early childhood regulator, independent from the federal Department of Education, that will report directly to the NSW minister of education and have "stronger powers and accountability". ...

Buried among the 1,116 pages of the " One Big Beautiful Bill " President Donald Trump wants the Republican-controlled Congress to approve in order to advance his agenda is that rarest of policy proposals pushed by Trump: an idea high-profile South Carolina GOP officials oppose. It's a credit to them that they did their research and are pushing back on part of Trump's signature initiative. There is more to criticize in the bill, including the way it would increase the federal deficit by $2.8 trillion over the next decade, but that's a discussion for another day. Today, let's focus on whether states should be able to regulate artificial intelligence. Spoiler alert: They should. Don't just take it from me. Take it from South Carolina's attorney general and Senate president, who have been at the forefront of growing bipartisan opposition to what would be a massive change, a national embrace with few protections of a field evolving too fa...