A man and his therapy dog have been forcibly dragged off a Perth train by transit officers.

The officers have been criticised for forcing the elderly man and his small dog off the train, despite the man showing proof of his medical condition.

The officers stated a therapy animal “is not grounds for having a dog on a train”.

The public transport authority reported the officers acted appropriately.

A report revealing Queensland state school staff made 574 reports of suspected sexual abuse in 2015 has been released 16 months after being handed to the Queensland Government.

The report revealed across the state, schools are one of the places where youth sexual violence is most likely to occur.

The report explained in some of Queensland’s most disadvantaged locations, violence has become almost normalised.

Queensland’s Multicultural Month has officially launched today with over 100 events scheduled during August.

The events will showcase and celebrate Queensland’s unique cultural diversity and ‘community champions’ will be honored at the Queensland Multicultural Awards.  

Multicultural Affairs Minister, Stirling Hinchliffe is urging Queenslanders to celebrate ‘our story and future’ during multicultural month.

There is a rising number of koalas starving to death on Victoria’s Raymond Island due to food shortages and overpopulation.

Increasing numbers of people moving to the island and clearing trees for bushfire protection has lead to emaciated koalas being handed over to wildlife carers daily.

Federation University professor Wendy Wright said because the koalas are stuck on an island they are unable to “move away and disperse" as they would in a normal environment.

NASA images have revealed smoke from wildfires in Northern California has spread as far as Utah, 1300 kilometres away.

Wildfires have been threatening more than 10,000 homes in Northern California for several days, burning over 24,000 acres of land and claiming the lives of six people including a firefighter and two young children.

Mass evacuations are occurring, with 37,000 people reported to have fled their homes.

Schoolchildren in France will have to leave their smartphones switched off or at home after lawmakers voted for a ban on Monday.

The ban which includes smartphones, tablets and other connected devices will apply to pupils up to the age of 15, but schools can decide individually whether to impose a partial or total ban on connected devices.  

Brisbane’s Lady Cilento Children’s Hospital could be renamed as The Queensland Children’s Hospital in order to clear up confusion over whether the hospital is public or private.

A quarter of parents surveyed were under the belief that the public hospital was private and therefore assumed they would be unable to afford their child’s care at Lady Cilento.

Health Minister Steven Miles says “I don’t want even the slightest risk that parents think they can’t have their child treated at this hospital if they need it.”

Local Government Minister Stirling Hinchliffe is examining claims Brisbane City Council employees were told to withhold information from local councillors.

Opposition leader Peter Cumming asked a question of the lord mayor on Tuesday, and said there had been several recent examples where the chairman of council committees were directed to conceal information from councillors about their wards.

A stray dog has won over the hearts of a Western Australian community after it completed a half-marathon alongside human competitors.

1-year-old Stormy pawed his way through the 21 kilometre Goldfields Pipeline Marathon and was awarded a participants medal after passing through each checkpoint along the course.

Some runners have lodged an expression of interest to adopt the dog, which is expected to be freed this week unless its owner comes forward.

Cambodian Prime Minister, Hun Sen, says his country is ‘preparing’ to receive more refugees from Australia in a controversial deal that has cost the Federal Government $50 million.

In 2014, Australia signed a four-year deal with Cambodia, committing an extra $40 million in aid in exchange for resettling refugees from offshore detention centres in Nauru.

The deal has been labelled an expensive failure with just three of seven resettled refugees from Nauru remaining in Cambodia.