Lilley revives Summer Heights delinquent

ABC's 2014 line-up includes another Chris Lilley offering, and the return of Spicks and Specks. Source: AAP

CHRIS Lilley goes back to school and Spick And Specks returns after more than two years with a fresh look as part of ABC TV's 2014 line-up.

The network released its programming on Tuesday for the next 12 months, which included several new dramas, comedy shows and documentaries.

Lilley will revive his Summer Heights High character Jonah Takalua in a stand-alone series, following in the footsteps of his creation Ja'mie.

Killing Heidi frontwoman Ella Hooper will be a team captain in the revival of music quiz show Spick And Specks, which stopped production in 2011.

Veteran actors Bryan Brown and Sam Neill team up for the drama Old School, about a retired cop and a retired crim who solve crimes, unravel scams and make some cash on the side.

The letters and diaries of five Australian and New Zealand nurses during WWI forms the basis for the show Anzac Girls, while Carlotta tells the tale of the Australian transgender pioneer, starring Packed To The Rafters actress Jessica Marais.

The controversial Chaser team returns with We'll Have To Leave It There, while documentary and factual shows include Afghanistan: The Australian War and The Flying Miners.

There will also be a 60-minute documentary on the day The Beatles arrived in Australia in 1964.

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'Excited' tiger bit trainer: Qld zoo

A tiger has attacked its trainer, biting his neck, during a show at the Australia Zoo in Queensland. Source: AAP

A SENIOR tiger handler is in a serious but stable condition after being attacked by a tiger at a Queensland zoo.

The big cat became "overexcited" during a play session in a tiger show on Tuesday afternoon and bit its 30-year-old male trainer on the neck and shoulder.

Australia Zoo director Wes Mennon says a group of co-workers nearby saw the attack and helped drag the trainer away from the tiger.

"At the time of the incident, our emergency response team were on the scene immediately. They acted professionally and calmly. My hat goes off to them," he said in a statement.

The Department of Community Safety says the man suffered two large puncture wounds and was flown to a Brisbane hospital in a serious but stable condition.

He was conscious and breathing when he was loaded into the helicopter.

Mr Mennon said the trainer had nine years experience with big cats and raised the tiger since it arrived at the zoo as a cub.

"Our priority is the wellbeing of the handler, who is a valued member of our Australia Zoo family," he said.

"Our full support is with the handler and family."

Mr Mennon said Australia Zoo was conducting a full investigation in conjunction with workplace health and safety authorities.

The Australia Zoo keeps three Bengal and eight Sumatran tigers.

RACQ Careflight doctor Andrew Haggerty said the trainer was lucky his injuries weren't more serious.

"The neck is a very complex area and contains lots of serious structures including blood vessels, and perhaps most importantly the airway ... any bleeding in the area itself could cause significant complications," he told reporters on the Sunshine Coast.

For helicopter pilot Alan Carstens it was a very strange afternoon.

"I honestly thought someone was kidding me, they said it's a tiger attack, I said 'no', but it was," he told reporters.

"We landed just outside the African (enclosure) area, right next door to where the tigers are.

"I waited with the chopper, I was looking at a tortoise straight opposite me, I thought it was a rock initially, then it started moving."

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UNHCR slams Aust asylum seeker treatment

The United Nations Refugee Agency has slammed Australia's treatment of asylum seekers. Source: AAP

EDS: Not for use before 2100 (AEDT) Tuesday, November 26

CANBERRA, Nov 26 AAP - The United Nations Refugee Agency has slammed Australia's treatment of asylum seekers as constituting arbitrary, mandatory and indefinite detention in unsafe and inhumane conditions.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) officials inspected processing centres at Nauru and PNG's Manus Island in October, encountering harsh conditions they say failed to meet international standards.

Those conditions impacted profoundly on the men, women and children housed there, UNHCR regional representative Richard Towle says in a statement.

"In particular, they constitute mandatory detention that is not compatible with international law," he says in a statement.

"They do not provide a fair and efficient system for assessing refugee claims, do not provide safe and humane conditions of treatment in detention, and do not provide for adequate and timely solutions for recognised refugees."

Director of international protection Volker Turk said UNHCR understood Australia's determination to respond robustly to the challenges of people smuggling and dissuade people from dangerous sea voyages.

"Those responses must not neglect the compelling protection needs, safety and dignity of the individuals affected," he said in a statement.

UNHCR acknowledged some improvements, including better facilities and the start of processing on Manus.

It also noted efforts made to improve conditions on Nauru, which was hot, had little privacy for people in tents following riots, cramped conditions and mosquitoes.

Nauru was unsuitable for children who lacked access to adequate education and recreation facilities, UNHCR said.

"UNHCR is of the view that no child, whether an unaccompanied child or within a family group, should be transferred from Australia to Nauru," it said.

At Manus, the UNHCR officials observed what they termed a "pervasive" climate designed to encourage asylum seekers to choose to return home.

The report said UNHCR supported voluntary return for those fully informed and not in need of protection.

But it said it was concerned that some bone fide refugees might consider return because of the harsh conditions, long delays in processing and uncertainty about the final outcome.

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Strong Asia Pacific sales help Tiffany

TIFFANY and Co's third-quarter net income climbed 50 per cent, buoyed by strong sales in the Asia-Pacific region.

The company's results topped Wall Street's view, and the luxury retailer raised its full-year adjusted earnings forecast.

Its shares climbed 6 per cent in premarket trading.

The jewellery chain earned $US94.6 million ($A103.6 million), or 73 cents per share, for the three months ending on October 31.

That compares with $US63.2 million, or 49 cents per share, a year ago.

Revenue rose 7 per cent to $US911.5 million from $US852.7 million, with Asia-Pacific sales up 27 per cent.

Analysts polled by FactSet expected earnings of 58 cents per share on revenue of $US888.4 million.

Revenue at stores open at least a year, a key indicator of a retailer's health, increased 7 per cent.

Analysts projected a 4.5 per cent increase.

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Pyne says Gonski scheme 'bastardised'

The education minister is under pressure from the states to honour school funding agreements. Source: AAP

EDUCATION minister Christopher Pyne says the schools funding system he wholeheartedly backed in the election campaign was "entirely bastardised" and he'd be irresponsible to now try to implement it.

Mr Pyne denied he and Prime Minister Tony Abbott misled electors by declaring they were on a unity ticket with Labor on the Gonski schools funding program.

Opposition leader Bill Shorten said that now appears to have been a tactic to negate an area of the election campaign where the coalition was vulnerable.

Mr Pyne on Tuesday announced he would deliver on the Gonski school reforms in 2014, but introduce a new funding scheme for the nation's more than 9400 schools from 2015.

He said he'd been advised by Treasury of a $1.2 billion hole in Labor's funding plan, putting existing agreements with most states in jeopardy because the funding cupboard is bare.

That's prompted an outcry from states and territories which signed onto the program. Mr Pyne said the agreements weren't legally binding.

He said as education minister he now had to sort out the "Shorten shambles" he had inherited.

"Firstly we were told five jurisdiction had signed up to it plus the Catholics. Now we discover that in fact only three jurisdiction had signed up to it and the Catholics hadn't," he told ABC television.

Mr Pyne said the only place this model applied in its purest form was 900 independent schools. Every state and territory had their own scheme.

"The side deals that Kevin Rudd and Julia and Kevin Rudd did with a number of states and territories meant the system was entirely bastardised to the point where there is no national school funding model," he said.

Mr Pyne said it was also entirely incomprehensible and before the election Mr Shorten ripped $1.2 billion from the funding.

"It's not a great model to go forward with and I would be irresponsible as education minister to implement something that is incapable of being implemented," he said.

Mr Shorten said the government had broken its promise.

"With the government system there is a national agreement," he told ABC television.

"Then there are heads of agreement as well, signed between the jurisdictions. In the case of the non-government sector their funding base is outlined in the act. The act went through parliament."

Mr Shorten said during the election, the then opposition declared there was a unity ticket on education and whatever the funding envelope Labor agreed to would happen under the coalition.

"Now 10 weeks later, this is not the government that people thought they would be. They are now breaking a promise to every school parent in Australia," he said.

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Extend domestic violence leave: ACTU

THE national union peak body wants special leave for domestic violence victims to be included as a minimum workplace award entitlement from next year.

To coincide with White Ribbon Day, Australian Council of Trade Unions secretary Dave Oliver said unions will support a special resolution on the issue at an ACTU executive meeting on Tuesday.

He said 1.2 million workers already have access to domestic violence leave but it should be extended to cover more people.

"Victims of domestic violence are often vulnerable, traumatised and left with little support," he said.

"The last thing they need is to risk losing their jobs."

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Yemen court delays elopement case verdict

A YEMENI court has postponed a verdict in the case of a Saudi woman accused of eloping with her Yemeni boyfriend, as the couple's supporters demonstrated outside.

Prosecutors say they need time to see if 22-year-old Huda Abdullah Ali can be registered as a refugee with the UN, which would allow her to remain in the country and marry.

She has become a cause celebre with some youth in Yemen, a traditional society not normally associated with public demonstrations in the name of romance.

Prosecutors say her boyfriend, 25-year-old Arafat Mohammed Taher al-Qadi, told investigators Ali's father rejected his marriage proposal, and the two were forced to elope.

Ali is charged with illegally entering Yemen while al-Qadi is accused of helping her.

"My only demand is to grant Huda humanitarian refugee status so that I can marry her," al-Qadi said as police led him outside the court.

He thanked the people who have come out in his support.

The Yemen Organisation for Defending Human Rights, HOOD, said earlier they have provided the court with all necessary documents for Ali to be registered as a refugee.

HOOD's lawyer Abdul-Raqeeb al-Qadi said the Interior Ministry was still refusing to let the UN's refugee agency see Ali, who is in detention.

The couple's supporters outside the court chanted, "The sit-in continues until the pair are wed."

A group who had been bussed in from the city of Taiz to the south carried banners reading, "Taiz supporters respond to the call of love."

The court has postponed its verdict until December 1.

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Vatican puts St Peter's bones on display

THE Vatican has for the first time publicly unveiled a handful of disputed bone fragments said by some to belong to the first pope, St Peter.

The eight or so pieces of bone sat nestled like rings in a jewel box inside a big bronze display case on the side of the altar during a mass commemorating the end of the Vatican's "Year of Faith".

The "Year of Faith" is a Benedict XVI initiative which began on October 11, 2012 to mark the 50th anniversary of the start of the Vatican II Council, which approved key Catholic Church reforms.

Pope Francis prayed before the fragments, blessing them with incense, at the start of Sunday's service.

No pontiff has ever definitively declared the fragments to belong to the Apostle Peter, but Pope Paul VI in 1968 said fragments found in the necropolis under St Peter's Basilica were "identified in a way that we can consider convincing".

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ACT house shatters Christmas lights record

CANBERRA'S Richards family have turned on more than half a million Christmas lights, reclaiming a Guinness world record they first held in 2011.

Their 331,038-bulb effort was eclipsed a year later when 346,283 lights were powered up at a home in the hamlet of LaGrangeville, New York.

But on Sunday, they took back the title in style.

David Richards says he and his wife Janean and their three kids installed the 502,165 multicoloured streamers, icicles, candy canes, reindeer and other candescent decorations - some more exotic, some less - to raise funds for SIDS & Kids ACT.

"The charity is very close to our heart. We lost a child and SIDS looked after us many years ago," he said on Sunday.

Setting up the lights takes enormous effort and time but Mr Richards had a lot of help this time from family and friends, and when the power comes on and the tent-like streams of lights under a massive tree are revealed it is spectacular.

He says his six-year-old daughter Madelyn thinks everyone has a world record house with lights on it, and his other two kids, Caitlin, 10, and Aidan, 13, just enjoy it "a bit like me".

"I have always loved Christmas. Having the Christmas lights with the community coming in and sharing it is a time when you get to know people you probably should know better, I guess."

But SIDS and Kids is the main reason he does the time-consuming task, to raise money for the work they do.

"It was very important for us," he said.

"Anyone who has been through that sort of loss will probably tell you the worst thing that can happen to you is losing a young child."

People can visit the lights after dark from Nov 30 to December 26 at 3 Tennyson Crescent, Forrest. Entry is via a gold coin donation.

The Richards' last effort raised $78,000 and helped pay for two part time counsellors.

This time, though, they hope to break $100,000.

Trudy Taylor from SIDS and Kids ACT said they get 20 per cent of their funding from the ACT government and donations support the rest of the work they do with people who have lost a child aged six and under for a range of reasons.

About 150 young children die in the region, which includes parts of NSW and Victoria, each year.

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Treasurers to discuss online shopping tax

MOVES to slap GST on overseas online shopping purchases worth less than $1000 will be on the agenda when Federal Treasurer Joe Hockey meets his state and territory counterparts this week.

The treasurers will meet in Canberra on Wednesday from 8.30am (AEST) for the Standing Council on Federal Financial Relations, the first since the change of government.

A spokeswoman for Mr Hockey said the meeting will focus on economic growth and ways to increase productivity.

The $1000 threshold at which the GST is collected on goods and services purchased from abroad will be on the agenda.

The treasurers will consider potential options on collecting the GST on online transactions if the threshold was to be lowered.

Australian businesses argue that while online shopping from foreign outlets may comprise a small component of the overall retail sector, it's a fast-growing trend being supported by an effectively GST-free status on less expensive items.

The previous Labor government argued that significant reforms were needed within the tax system to handle the job otherwise the cost of collecting the tax would outstrip the revenue collected.

NSW Treasurer Mike Baird said his state had been pushing for reform on the low-value threshold on GST for online overseas purchases for a long time.

"It is about time we had a genuine discussion on the issues that matter and it's clear that under the new federal government this is what we are going to see," he told AAP.

The treasurers are also expected to discuss infrastructure partnerships and the economic and fiscal outlook.

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