Good morning, it's Friday, March 18. Here's what you need to get going today.
One thing you’ll be hearing about today: The federal government's DV support plan
A funding package has just been announced:
- The government says $104 million in domestic violence funding will focus on technology programs over the next five years
- Nearly $55m of that will go towards technology checks for domestic violence victims
- That includes checking a victim's phone and computer for any GPS tracking programs or bugs installed by the perpetrator
- It'll also cover a sweep of victim's homes, searching for cameras hidden in toys, vents or lights in homes planted by their abuser
Here are the latest updates from Ukraine
- It's still unclear how many causalities there were in the bombing of the Mariupol theatre where citizens were sheltering
- British military intelligence says Russian forces have "largely stalled on all fronts" across Ukraine
- Peace talks have yet to come to much — Ukraine is standing firm on its claim to sovereignty over areas occupied by Russia and pro-Russian forces
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appeared before Germany's parliament and accused Berlin of putting its economic interests ahead of Ukraine's humanitarian crisis
News while you snoozed
Let's get you up to speed.
- NT Police have arrested a 36-year-old man over the death of a man who was shot in Katherine yesterday. Police found the man's body after being called out to a home over reports of an intruder.
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Four additional council areas in the NSW northern rivers region now have access to flood disaster payments from the federal government. People in the Ballina, Byron, Kyogle and Tweed areas are now eligible for payments, a week after the same support was announced for Lismore, Richmond Valley and Clarence Valley.
The news Australia is searching for
- Bono: You remember Bono! He's the lead singer of U2 — the guy who wears the sunglasses. He wrote a poem about the situation in Ukraine, where he compared Volodymyr Zelenskyy to St Patrick and Russian invaders to the snakes. He sent it to US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who read it out at a St Patrick's Day event in Washington DC. You can hear it in the first minute of this C-Span footage:
One more thing: We might have the perfect wake-up alarm tune for you
RMIT University's Stuart McFarlane and Adrian Dyer researched which alarms tunes were best at waking people up and which alarms made sure they woke up on the right side of the bed, so to speak.
Apparently, people who wake up to songs they can hum along to experience less grogginess than if they had a run-of-the-mill "beeping" alarm.
So Associate Professor Dyer and Mr McFarlane helpfully came up with an alarm tune they say leads to "significantly better performance upon and after waking":
That's it for now
We'll be back later on with more.
ABC/wires
