The Briefing

There are many ways in Australia to have children if you can’t physically procreate. You can foster or look into adoption - or you can find a surrogate.     In Australia, it’s illegal to pay someone to carry a child for you – but nothing is stopping you from paying someone overseas. However, surrogacy isn't without contention or is an easy road.    ...

You might be celebrating Brat Summer, or singing along to the light-sounding-but-heavy-meaning words of Chappell Roan – or maybe you’re just sipping that Espresso with Sabrina Carpenter.  Either way, the charts don’t lie - a new intense and complex female-made and focused pop sound is having a renaissance.   So what’s the key ingredient for being a female pop...

Headlines: Christmas is on hold for Victorian firefighters ready to protect the state, Joe Biden pardons death row prisoners, NRMA issues Christmas road safety warning, and Australia's most famous crocodile has passed away at 90 years old. Best of Deep Dive:  Is it possible that there’s a serial killer wreaking havoc along the NSW coast? That’s the question raised by Jeremy B...

Headlines: Christmas tree light warnings, Victorian bushfire update, airfare charter of rights proposed, and Aussie researchers create injection to reverse blindness. Deep dive best of: Amid a cost of living crisis, who can resist the invitation to “shop like a billionaire” at bargain-basement prices? Online juggernaut Temu is Australia’s most popular free app, offering a vast vo...

Richard Baker is one of Australia’s best investigative journalists, who has spent decades chasing stories. The Walkley award winning journo is the host of LiSTNR's Secrets We Keep: Pray Harder, which explores a secretive religious group in Geelong where every aspect of members’ lives are tightly controlled by their hardline pastor. In this chat with Antoinette Lattouf, Richard explains...

We’ve been captivated by the US election, horrified at wars overseas and have marvelled at the Olympics. There’s no doubt 2024 has been another massive year in news. In today’s deep dive, Sacha Barbour Gatt and Bension Siebert talk through the biggest stories of the year and what they’ve meant to us, before looking ahead to what we can expect in 2025. Follow The Briefing: T...

Headlines: Man in French mass rape case that shocked the world handed 20-year conviction, Albanese government condemned for approving four coalmine expansions, first-ever estimates of LGBTI+ Aussies released and Raygun The Musical will be going ahead! Deep Dive: 'The Briefing recaps 2024' in your feeds right now as a separate episode. Follow The Briefing: TikTok: @listnrnewsroom Instagram: @listnr...

Headlines: Penny Wong announces Australian embassy will re-open in Ukraine, Australian crews en route to Vanuatu, NSW Government approves pill testing trial and NASA's stranded astronauts to remain on the ISS until March. Deep Dive: Have you cut meat out of your diet for ethical reasons, only to eventually return to that late-night cheeseburger or pub chicken parma? There are plenty of good reason...

Headlines: Australia stands ready to help Vanuatu after powerful earthquake, Qantas and Meta to pay massive fines, reactions to Victoria’s new protest laws and Bluey is heading to the big screen. Deep Dive: As 2025 looms, are we watching major Western governments across the world collapse? A possible resignation of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. A vote of no confidence for German Ch...

Headlines: Bashar al-Assad releases first statement since fleeing Syria, new poll shows Albanese’s disapproval at 50%, Australian teenager and mother hospitalised in Fiji return home and Prince Andrew disinvited from royal Christmas as spy saga deepens Deep Dive: NRL club Melbourne Storm are scaling back Welcome to Country ceremonies and focusing on “action” rather than “wo...

Headlines: Remaining Bali Nine return home, four Australians hospitalised after suspected alcohol poisoning in Fiji, heat wave warnings issued across Australia and Adelaide Zoo welcomes its newest giant pandas. Panda diplomacy deep dive: https://play.listnr.com/podcast/the-briefing/episode/panda-propaganda-why-china-is-sending-us-diplomacy ? Today's Deep Dive: For the first time in a long time, Sa...

Narelda Jacobs is a trailblazer. She’s a Whadjuk Noongar woman, journalist and presenter who’s changing the face of Australian media. Over the past two decades Narelda has worked as a trusted news presenter and is a powerful advocate for First Nations rights, LGBTQIA+ inclusion and social justice. In this chat with Antoinette Lattouf, Narelda opens up about some recent experiences that...

Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) is blowing up in Australia. The fantasy table-top roleplay game is nothing new – it was first published in in 1974 – but Google Search trends in Australia show searches for DnD have been steadily climbing since about 2016. What’s behind the hype? Should you be picking up DnD in 2025? And if you aren’t keen on the kind of effort involved in playing...

Headlines: Coalition to unveil cost of bold nuclear plan, ‘Adult time’ youth justice laws pass Queensland parliament and Donald Trump named Time’s Person of the Year ... again Deep Dive: It has been ten years since the Lindt Cafe siege, which took place on December 15, 2014. Man Haron Monis took 18 hostages and held them for 16 hours in Sydney’s Martin Place. The 16-hour si...

Apple Intelligence has officially come to Australia. Apple’s AI was first announced back in June, and as of today can be used by hundreds of thousands of iPhone-owning Aussies. But what can it do, and how will it change us? Will it encourage Android loyalists to make the jump, and is it really a gamechanger?   In this episode of The Briefing, Chris Spyrou is joined by tech expert and ed...

Headlines: Women launch class action against BHP and Rio Tinto over alleged decades of sexual harassment, Anthony Albanese supports exclusion zones near houses of worship, Saudi Arabia chosen to host FIFA world cup, and HECS balances will be slashed from today. Deep Dive: A viral on the street interview turned Hailey Welch from a normal girl to an internet celebrity overnight. Becoming Hawk Tuah G...

Are public figures fair game when it comes to parody and satire? Personally, your answer might shift depending on who that public figure is, while legally, the answers are a little more clean cut. It’s a question being asked following reports the legal team of Rachael Gunn, Australian academic and competitive breakdancer also known as Raygun, had a parody musical on her journey to the 2024 P...

The fire attack against a Jewish synagogue in Melbourne has intensified a battle between our politicians over the meaning of anti-Semitism, and who is responsible for encouraging it in Australia.  Meanwhile, many people are struggling to know how to talk about anti-Semitism, Israel or Gaza without fear of saying the wrong thing.  In part two of The Briefing’s two-part special episo...

Headlines: PM’s pitch to families ahead of election announcement, Syria’s new PM meets old government officials to aid transition, Telstra fined $3 million for 000 network outage, and two new sounds have been added to Australia’s sound archive. Deep Dive: The fire attack against a Jewish synagogue in Melbourne has intensified a battle between our politicians over the meaning of a...

A group of sexy Queensland concreters have created a the "Sexy Concreters" calendar, featuring 12 Gold Coast tradies posing shirtless in wheelbarrows, pouring iced coffee over themselves and eating meat pies. The calendar was created to raise money and awareness for men’s mental health, with the first print of the calendar selling out in just two hours. In this episode of The Briefing, Bensi...

Headlines: Antisemitism taskforce announced as travel warning issued for Jews heading to Australia, Australia fires new Tomahawk missiles for the first time, person of interest interviewed in CEO shooting case and Starbucks Australia posts $5.8 million loss. Deep Dive: A major health insurance company CEO was shot dead on the street in New York City last week, and many are celebrating.  A Facebook...

Rebel forces in Syria captured the capital over the weekend in a move that saw the nation’s president, Bashar al-Assad, flee the country. It comes after a 13-year civil war and over five decades of his family’s brutal autocratic rule. The news has been widely welcomed by those living in the country, who are celebrating liberation – a similar sentiment echoed on the streets back here in Australia....

Headlines: Syrian rebels bring down Assad regime, new poll spells more bad news for Albo and Donald Trump attends the reopening of Notre Dame. Deep dive: The price of a cup of coffee has always been debated, and now, global coffee prices have reached their highest in over 50 years.     It boils down to many factors across the industry, including bad weather in Brazil and Vietnam where most of the...

Noni Hazlehurst has been a beloved fixture in Australian homes for decades, from Play School to Better Homes and Gardens. In her new memoir Dropping the Mask Noni opens up about her journey to self-discovery and concealing her true self to fit the roles others expected of her. In this chat with Antoinette Lattouf, Noni shares her MeToo moment for the first time when a senior entertainment executiv...

Settling in to watch a Christmas movie is one of the hallmarks of the festive season for a lot of us, with titles like Elf, Die Hard and Love Actually usually at the top of the most-streamed list. But does it feel like it’s been a while since we’ve seen a great Christmas movie? Time Out’s list of the ten best ever doesn’t feature a single title from after 2005, which has us asking – have we seen t...