1The Federation of Labour (FOL) has refused to drop a claim for an immediate $15 a week wage increase, despite urgent discussions with the Government today.

2A 22 year old man has been arrested and charged with aggravated robbery in connection with last week's armed robbery at the Mangere Bridge Post Office.

3The Government has been criticised today for banning individual South African sportsmen from New Zealand, but not businessmen, tourists or academics.

4Australian opposition parties face an uphill battle ahead of the early election called for December 1st.

5Public opinion polls in the United States have declared Democratic Presidential candidate Walter Mondale the winner of yesterday's first television debate. The poll has injected new life into the previously flagging Mondale campaign, which appears to still have a great deal of ground to make up if he is to oust President Ronald Reagan.

6Salvage tugs in the Persian Gulf have brought under control a fire aboard a Liberian-registered supertanker bombed by Iraqi jets.

7Israeli troops occupying southern Lebanon are finding life increasingly difficult as they face increasingly hostile reactions from locals.

8The biggest libel suit in American history will begin in New York tonight. The case concerns a CBS television documentary called "The Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception" about the United States' role in the Vietnam War, and it is expected that the case will make a number of previously unknown facts about the conflict public knowledge.

9Police reinforcements have been called in to Western Victoria in case there is further violence between New Zealand and Australian shearers.

10New Zealand and Australia have reaffirmed their total opposition to French nuclear testing in the Pacific at the United Nations (UN) General Assembly Committee on Atomic Radiation. An Australian expert believes that New Zealand would not escape the effects of a nuclear winter, if nuclear war were to break out in the Northern Hemisphere.

11Fish shops in Wellington have begun increasing the price of Orange Roughy from $8.00 a kilogram to almost $14.00 a kilogram as a result of the international market prices rising with increased demand.

12Wellington investment firm The Renouf Corporation is paying a record price of $7 million for a piece of central Wellington real estate.

13Enterprise New Zealand, one of New Zealand's entries in next year's Round the World Yacht Race went on show for the first time in Auckland today.