The president of Albany's biggest surfing club says the funds spent on the Western Australian Government's new shark strategy would be better used researching shark repellents.

The Local Government Advisory Board says its decision to terminate the proposed merger of four Western Australian Wheatbelt shires was driven in part by financial concerns, a lack of common goals and the community's reaction.

The outgoing Mental Health Commissioner says the state's Indigenous population is over-represented in the suicide rate.

The Mayor of Albany has scoffed at reports the city is considering spending millions of dollars on a prime vacant site in the central business district.

How quickly do you think Australia could assemble more than 20,000 troops, 8,000 horses, and put them on to yet to-be-equipped navy ships to be sent to the battlefields of World War I?

The Auditor General has found the Water Corporation is losing billions of litres of water more than it should each year, mainly due to leaking pipes. In his report, tabled in Parliament today, Colin Murphy says about 30 billion litres of water was lost each year, ten billion more than what is considered acceptable. The agency will also have to fork out tens of millions of dollars to replace ageing pipes in the network.

A group of West Australian farmers is planning a class action in the federal court after their lenders shortened the length of their loans, in some cases, from 25 years to just 12 months.

One of the year's strongest cold fronts is bearing down on Perth and the south-west of the state today, as residents are urged to secure their homes. and prepare for gale-force winds.

A popular beach in Byron Bay has been washed away by the worst erosion in at least 30 years.

The tourist mecca's potholes are legendary, and locals are taking matters into their own hands as the mayor laments that the town's affluent profile means little to its financially-struggling council.

By the end of April there has normally been regular fire crew training, inductions, and planning, but social distancing has made that near-impossible.

A program preparing young Indigenous people for work in Dubbo is now operating a lime farm and selling the produce.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian is grilled over the behaviour of ministers Andrew Constance and John Barilaro at an awkward press conference on May 7, 2020. Mr Constance and Mr Barilaro had been engaged in a public spat amid pre-selection for the federal seat of Eden-Monaro, in which there will be a by-election.

A Chinese mining giant is being accused of underestimating the impact a proposed open cut mine will have on groundwater on the New South Wales Liverpool Plains.

A report into hazing at the University of New England finds female students were pressured into sexual acts, "slapped on the arse" by a line of men before entering a party and told to lock their doors at night.

The Coalition for the Protection of Racehorses has collated data from official stewards' documents and found 122 horses died in the past year.

For the first time in about a fortnight Tasmania has had no new positive coronavirus tests, but the Premier says that's no reason to relax while warning parents to supervise children not at school.

Coronavirus has forced some dramatic changes to how the ABC keeps the public informed, from home-based broadcasting to webcam interviews and recruiting people featured in a story to help film it on their mobile phone.

Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie says it won't "go down well" for the Coalition if she has to beg for the release of the year-old report into whether Tasmanian war hero Teddy Sheean deserves a Victoria Cross.

Country kids often hear they need to move to the city after school, but these young entrepreneurs are staying local and marketing their home town to the world.

The green vista that now stretches to the horizon is in stark contrast to the dust wall that shrouded paddocks not too long ago on this western NSW sheep station.