Australian shoppers would no longer be able to save up to 50 per cent by buying clothes from overseas as a growing number of local importers reached agreements with international brands to stop selling their clothes to Australians on overseas websites or to lift their web prices, Rachel Wells reported in October. 9. Bestiality enters gay wed debate In September, Liberal Senator Cory Bernardi caused outrage when he suggested legalising same sex marriage would lead to demands for bestiality to also be sanctioned. He later resigned as Tony Abbott's parliamentary secretary. 8. Surry Hills restaurateur with notorious rules lashes Sydney's 'greedy' diners as she announces closure with online rant Surry Hills chef Yukako Ichikawa announced she would close her restaurant Wafu, after she gave a scathing review of some of Sydney's wasteful diners.

7. Climate change a hoax, Jones tells tax protesters In July, about 2000 people marched from Hyde Park to Belmore Park to hear Bronwyn Bishop speak against the government's Clean Energy Bill, while a much smaller group in Melbourne heard the broadcaster Alan Jones refer to climate change science as ''propaganda''. 6. Julia 'badass' Gillard: Slipper resignation just a sidebar The Prime Minister's 15-minute speech condemning misogyny and attacking Opposition Leader Tony Abbott's history of comments about abortion, women's roles in the home and their ability to wield authority attracted global attention - and praise - in October. 5. Hockey blasts attitude of 'entitlement'

In April, shadow treasurer Joe Hockey condemned systems of ''universal entitlement'' in Western democracies, contrasting this attitude with the concept of ''filial piety'' thriving across Asia where people get what they work for and families look after their own. 4. Nurse 'humiliated' by Qantas policy Nurse Daniel McCluskie was made to swap seats after being seated next to a child travelling alone on a Qantas flight, launching a national discussion about the policy. 3. Swap outcry moves Virgin to think again The public backlash in response to story #4 prompted Virgin Australia to announce it would review its policy barring men from sitting beside unaccompanied children on flights.

2. Alan Jones loses more advertisers High-profile companies withdrew their sponsorship of Alan Jones' radio program in October after it was revealed he had told a Sydney University Liberal Club gathering that Julia Gillard's father had ''died of shame''. 1. Alan Jones hits out at 'gutless' Mercedes exec as broadcaster points finger at bullies Both the #1 and #2 stories that attracted the most comments this year involved Alan Jones' comments about Julia Gillard's father. Jones has called a Mercedes-Benz executive a "gutless wonder" after the company asked for the return of the broadcaster's sponsored car, while also describing an online campaign against him as "cyberbullying". And now for the 10 most commented-on opinion pieces:

10. Is Abbott on thin ice? Absolutely After Tony Abbott's now-infamous interview with Leigh Sales on 7.30 in August, Michelle Grattan wrote the Opposition Leader's greatest strength may turn into his Achilles heel as the parliamentary term goes into its last year. ''If Abbott insists on simply repeating claims that he can't properly substantiate, this will feed into voters' questions about him. Yet having planted the carbon tax at the centre of his election strategy, and kept the debate black and white, he finds it hard to deal with facts that don't fit the line.'' 9. No one is laughing now

Katharine Murphy's insightful piece on the media following the tragic death of Jacintha Saldanha: ''The media needs to look unflinchingly into the heart of our most difficult year in living memory. We need to wake up. We need to start making connections again. We need to start acting like we are accountable, even if no one actually enforces the accountability. We need to engage, and to prioritise substance over notoriety.'' 8. Gillard winged but still flying ''[Julia Gillard] finishes the parliamentary year with the AWU affair having taken a fair bit of skin off her, but her opponents have not been able to prove those events have disqualified her for the office she holds,'' Michelle Grattan wrote in late November after parliament wrapped up. 7. Tipping a tipping point in Catholicism

After the announcement of the royal commission, Dick Gross wrote in his Godless Gross column: ''Questions about how the church has handled child abuse allegations will not die. The royal commission will soon start its work. Paradoxically, it might be a saving grace for Australian Catholicism.'' 6. And here's the news: My bum's got nothing to do with the story Former newsreader Tracey Spicer's open letter to her former colleagues about the sexism she endured from them during her broadcasting career was very popular with readers, who in turn shared it to Facebook more than 12,000 times.

5. Abbott suffering a Labor Party stoning

The level of personal insult from Labor to Tony Abbott has been on an industrial scale, wrote Paul Sheehan in October. ''[It] is this government's concentration on Abbott's character that sets it apart. It is the tactic on which the Gillard government has staked its survival, the politics of the personal, of targeting character, of hammering the same message about the same person, by every minister, until it seeps into the public mind.'' 4. Men and women are different, and so should be their marriage vows Peter Jensen, the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, made headlines in August after he wrote men and women should offer different vows when they marry, following the news the Sydney Anglican church proposed to change women's vows to their husband from 'obey' to 'submit': ''Where different promises are made, the man undertakes great responsibility and this is also the wording of the book, as it has always been. The biblical teaching is that the promise made voluntarily by the bride to submit to her husband is matched by the even more onerous obligation which the husband must undertake to act towards his wife as Christ has loved the church. The Bible says that this obligation is ultimately measured by the self-sacrifice of Christ in dying on the cross.''

3. The rock god philosopher Dick Gross on the appeal of the writer, philosopher and atheist Alain de Botton.

2. A modern Creation story Another Godless Gross column, on the Higgs boson, in July. 1. The atheist jamboree