SBS Our House

Today is International Women's Day, with the theme of 'Balancing the Scales' which calls for accelerated progress toward gender equity. SBS World News Chief Political Correspondent Anna Henderson has spoken with Irish Ambassador Fiona Flood, German Ambassador Beate Grzeski, and Croatian Ambassador Betty Pavelich on their experiences as senior diplomats. The conversation covers a range of important issues, including gender equality in world diplomacy, the conflict with Iran, and the struggles women have in getting ahead in a traditionally man's world of diplomacy.

A federal parliamentary inquiry has opened into racism in Australia, with advocates calling for the probe to be not 'another exercise in diagnosis'. The Australian Human Rights Commission says the government already knows what needs to change, and the inquiry must turn that knowledge into action, with timelines and accountability. Meanwhile the federal Minister for Indigenous Australians Malandirri McCarthy is encouraging big social media platforms to make submissions to the inquiry. She's told NITV some Indigenous people are feeling scared after a string of reports of racist attacks in public. She's talking here to NITV's John Paul Janke

The emergency evacuation of the Prime Minister from his Canberra home due to a targeted bomb threat has prompted warnings of a heightened security environment, where online hostility is increasingly manifesting as high-harm physical threats. It follows comments by the Federal Police Commissioner late last year, noting a trend of escalating violence against public officials.

The Federal Government has moved to the next stage of Australia's inaugural high-speed rail project, launching a two-year development phase for the Sydney-to-Newcastle link. Construction is slated to begin in 2028. While the project faces a nearly $90 billion price tag and public scepticism over its long history of delays, proponents argue the 180-kilometre network will eventually transform regional housing and productivity across the entire East Coast.

A Senate inquiry into housing affordability has heard urgent calls for tax reform, with advocates warning that current capital gains concessions favour wealthy investors while locking the younger generation out of the property market. The Australian Council of Trade Unions argues that reducing these tax breaks could boost home ownership by four per cent. The Grattan Institute maintains the primary benefit would be a $6.5 billion budget windfall to fund public housing and support struggling renters.