Category Archives: New South Wales

‘One in a million’: teen surfer found on remote island 14km off Australian coast

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A search involving Marine Rescue NSW, police, PolAir and locals on and around Wooli beach led to Darcy Deefholts, 19, being rescued

A 19-year-old surfer is stable in hospital after being found safe on a remote island off the northern New South Wales coast of Australia in an outcome his dad described as “one in a million”.

Darcy Deefholts’ family were “fearing for the worst”, his father, Terry, said in an urgent post to Facebook calling for rescue help on Wednesday night.

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Court rejects developer’s bid to turn Sydney boarding house into luxury apartments

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Lord mayor Clover Moore says city ‘should not simply be an enclave for the rich’ and hopes case sets precedent

A court has rejected a developer’s bid to turn a boarding house into luxury apartments in a case the lord mayor of Sydney hopes will set a precedent to stop the ongoing loss of affordable housing.

In the wake of the court’s decision the mayor, Clover Moore, has also called on the Minns government to allow significant loss of individual homes as a ground for rejecting development applications.

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Tiny fungus farming beetle from WA could wreak havoc on Sydney’s heritage trees

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Invasive shot-hole borer only found in Perth in Australia, but as WA moves from eradication to management of pest, risk of spread is ‘heightened’

The chief scientist of the Botanic Gardens of Sydney is warning of an imminent and deadly risk to the city’s trees posed by an invasive beetle that has led to the removal of thousands of trees in Perth.

The tiny polyphagous shot-hole borer, which is native to south-east Asia, is a “fungus farmer” that burrows into trees and can spread a fungus that kills the host tree.

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Celebrity chef Peter Russell-Clarke dies aged 89 – as it happened

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Here’s how Melbourne’s Metro Tunnel will transform the city and commuting

For nearly a decade, deep beneath Melbourne, tunnel boring machines and construction crews have been quietly reshaping the city with the creation of the Metro Tunnel.

I think every Liberal seat in the country is a marginal seat, right now. But my feelings around quotas and the talk in the media oversimplifies the issue, which is around the culture in the Liberal Party and how women are treated in the Liberal Party …

I had two attempts to take me out as a sitting member of parliament by blokes, very aggressively. So, until the culture is addressed, we could have all the quotas in the world, but it will be a revolving door of women.”

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Bodies of two men in dilapidated Sydney house could have been undiscovered by housemate for weeks

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Landlord made welfare concern call about one tenant – but when police arrived they found two bodies

The decomposing bodies of two men found inside a dilapidated terrace on a busy inner Sydney street could have gone undiscovered by their roommate for several weeks, police have said.

On Thursday afternoon, Eleanor Barker, 63, made a welfare concern call to police about one of her tenants. She has owned and lived at the Cleveland Street property in Surry Hills since the 1980s, and rented it out to the two men for at least a decade.

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Royal Prince Alfred hospital management pauses cuts across women and babies unit after protests

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Exclusive: One midwife said staff were ‘so relieved that the cuts had been paused’ and that they hoped a fair roster could be negotiated

Management at Royal Prince Alfred hospital (RPA) in Sydney will pause its cuts to staffing levels across its women and babies unit, just days after staff protested against the changes.

Dozens of midwives and other clinical staff held a snap rally on Tuesday outside RPA, one of the city’s major tertiary hospitals, claiming that management’s decision to reduce the number of midwives rostered on to the birthing unit risked the lives of mothers and babies.

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Flood threat ongoing for parts of NSW and Victoria as east coast weather system subsides

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Heavy conditions expected to continue along parts of the east coast on Thursday

Authorities remain on alert to flood risk across New South Wales and eastern Victoria after a complex low-pressure system swept the nation’s east coast this week, drenchingcatchments.

Severe weather warnings for damaging winds and hazardous surf also remained in place on Thursday morning, with the system still “lurking over the Tasman Sea”, said Helen Reid, meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology.

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NSW weather: storm brings 13-metre high waves and wild winds as BoM warns of ‘second surge’

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Vigorous coastal low forecast to keep sending severe weather across eastern New South Wales for much of Wednesday, before gradually easing on Thursday

Thousands remain without power across New South Wales after severe winds and heavy rain battered the state, with wind gusts up to 130km/h, 13-metre high waves, and several places receiving more than 200mm rain.

The Bureau of Meteorology expected a “second surge” on Wednesday night would bring a further burst of rain and wind to the south coast of NSW and eastern parts of Victoria, with peak gusts of around 90km/h possible along exposed parts of the coast.

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Man in critical condition with lyssavirus after bat bite – as it happened

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NSW wild weather: ‘Conditions can become dangerous quickly’

Wild weather has brought down trees, damaged properties and flooded roads on the NSW coast, NSW SES says.

These incidents are a timely reminder that roads are slippery, and conditions can become dangerous quickly.

Please, never drive, walk or play in flood waters. If you do come across a flooded road, turn around and find an alternative route.

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Australia news live: some Central Coast residents told ‘evacuate now’ amid coastal erosion threat; children’s commissioner says child safety ‘not a priority in this country’

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NSW braces for damaging winds and heavy rain from coastal low. Follow the latest updates live

Gas market review will ‘drive efficiencies in the system’, King says

The resources minister, Madeleine King, says a review into gas market regulations will drive efficiencies into the system.

Our existing policy has made sure that that gas is available. So that’s that combination of existing policies brings in that extra 600 petajoules. So indeed, that work is already happening.

What we’re trying to do and will endeavour to do, and the industry is very supportive of, is to make that more coherent, and how we can make sure we learn from the whole system, reduce duplication in some of the regulation, some of the reporting factors, simply how we can make it work better for consumers, for industrial users, and for the Gas industry itself. And that drives efficiencies in the system, which we expect will help with pricing.

We were honest with the public from day one: the toll situation would get worse before it got better. That’s the reality of the infrastructure pipeline locked in by our predecessors.

And now, the most recent NSW Budget reflects that – with toll revenue projected to rise from $180m to $283m in the 2028–29 financial year.

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Women and babies could die due to midwife cuts at Sydney’s RPA hospital, staff warn

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Midwives’ union president warns women giving birth at one of the city’s largest hospitals will not receive a level of care considered safe

Midwives at one of Sydney’s largest hospitals have warned women and babies could die in light of cuts to the number of midwives staff deployed across the birth and delivery unit.

Hospital staff say 20 full-time equivalent roles have been removed from across the women and babies service at Royal Prince Alfred (RPA) hospital in Camperdown, including five from the midwifery group practice (MGP), effective from Tuesday.

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‘Shock to creative ecology’: NSW regional art galleries face funding crisis after state pulls financial support

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Peak arts bodies urge review of decision that jeopardises institutions which are the ‘lifeblood’ of regional Australian cultural life

Three out of four regional public art galleries in New South Wales are facing a funding crisis after the state government pulled its financial support as a result of a massive restructure of its cultural funding arm, Create NSW.

Wagga Wagga, Orange, Armidale, Broken Hill and Tamworth are among 18 regional centres in NSW with major public art galleries that will no longer receive four-year funding from the state government, worth between about $70,000 and $200,000 a year.

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Federal court orders Sydney Muslim cleric to remove ‘racist and antisemitic’ lectures from social media

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Wissam Haddad was sued by two members of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry over lectures in 2023 recorded in Bankstown

A Sydney Muslim cleric has been ordered by the federal court to take down a series of “fundamentally racist and antisemitic” speeches posted online, and instructed by a judge not to make similar addresses again.

But Justice Angus Stewart ruled other criticisms of the state of Israel and its military did not breach the Racial Discrimination Act, finding it is not inherently antisemitic to criticise Israel.

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NSW weather: Sydney and south coast residents warned to ‘stay indoors’ as vigorous coastal low batters state

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Emergency services minister says ‘it may seem pretty bad [now] but the situation is going to worsen’ overnight with damaging rain and winds

Destructive winds and heavy rain are hitting large swathes of the New South Wales coast with authorities warning the situation will deteriorate over the next 24 hours.

Some areas received a month’s worth of rain in one day while others recorded winds above 100km/h as a vigorous coastal low continued to intensify on Tuesday afternoon.

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Lawyers investigate whether Hannah Thomas could sue police over alleged excessive use of force at Sydney protest

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Critical incident investigation declared into arrest of former Greens candidate who says she could lose sight in right eye

Lawyers are investigating whether protesters could sue New South Wales police over alleged excessive use of force during a pro-Palestine protest in Sydney, after which the former Greens candidate Hannah Thomas said she could lose sight in her right eye.

Thomas, 35, who ran against the prime minister at the federal election, was arrested at the Belmore protest which was attended by about 60 people on Friday. She was subsequently taken to hospital and underwent surgery.

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Greens call for investigation into NSW police arrest that injured former candidate

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Sue Higginson demands critical incident be declared after Hannah Thomas taken for surgery, but acting police minister says matter does not ‘meet the threshold’

A Greens MP has called for an independent investigation into New South Wales police arrests at a protest that resulted in a former Greens candidate being taken to hospital with serious facial injuries.

Sue Higginson says a critical incident should be declared after Hannah Thomas, who ran against Anthony Albanese in the Sydney electorate of Grayndler, sustained facial injuries during arrest at a protest on Friday. The protest was outside a business in Belmore accused of “supplying electroplating and surface coating services for a variety of applications including aerospace and defence technology” to Israel.

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Australia news live: Minns’ team asked why premier focused on possibility of ‘terrorism’ in NSW caravan plot announcement

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Follow the latest updates live

The foreign minister, Penny Wong, is expected to join a meeting of her Quad counterparts in Washington DC next week.

The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said on Friday he would host foreign ministers from Australia, India and Japan on 1 July, with the meeting set to discuss geopolitical issues and China’s treatment of Indo-Pacific nations.

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Student allegedly hacked Western Sydney University to get discounted parking and alter academic results

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Police allege the woman’s hacking escalated to allegedly threatening to sell confidential student data on the dark web

A former Western Sydney University student allegedly waged a four-year hacking campaign on the institution which began as an attempt to secure discounted parking on campus and culminated in her threatening the sale of student information on the dark web.

The 27-year-old was arrested on Wednesday and charged with 20 offences including accessing or modifying restricted data on a computer, dishonestly obtaining financial advantage by deception, and unauthorised modification of data with intent to cause impairment.

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NSW MP Gareth Ward likened to ‘vampire running a blood bank’ by alleged sexual assault victim, court hears

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State MP’s alleged victim spurred to action after learning politician had been appointed as families minister, court hears

A court has heard a New South Wales state MP’s alleged sexual abuse victim was spurred to action after learning the politician had been appointed as families minister, which he likened to a vampire running a blood bank.

The Kiama MP, Gareth Ward, 44, is on trial in the NSW district court after pleading not guilty to sexual intercourse without consent and indecent assault charges.

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NSW upper house president seeks advice from Bret Walker over possible political staffer arrests

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High-profile barrister consulted over arrest warrants for five government staffers who did not attend inquiry into Dural ‘fake terrorism plot’

The president of the New South Wales upper house has sought advice from high-profile barrister Bret Walker SC over whether he can seek arrest warrants for government staffers who failed to give evidence to an inquiry examining the Sydney caravan “fake terrorism plot”, Guardian Australia understands.

Ben Franklin is expected to reveal on Tuesday whether he intends to seek arrest warrants from the NSW supreme court for five staffers who were summoned to appear before the inquiry on Friday, but did not attend. Three are from the office of the premier, Chris Minns, and two work for the police minister, Yasmin Catley.

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