Water extractors and locals in Northern NSW are divided over bids to increase the production of bottled water.

Locals are worried extra water extractions will affect their reliant supply from the Bilambil Valley, however a hydrology report commissioned in 2016 by one of the local extractors found the water extraction from his aquifer is ‘not likely’ to affect the town supply.

$60 million worth of illegal tobacco has been destroyed at properties in Pine Creek and North Isis, both south of Bundaberg following raids by Queensland Police, the Australian Border Force, and the Australian Taxation Office.

The operation began via a series of tip-offs on CrimeStoppers and destroyed 30 tonnes of plants and 45,000 seedlings, according to Detective Sergeant Andrew Self.

QUT Kelvin Grove Students took to George Street yesterday to protest Federal Government cuts to tertiary education.

The National Union of Students were protesting against new government plans which include lowering the HECS repayment threshold to $45,000, loss of less popular courses and a reduction in student support services.

The remains of a mysterious creature have been discovered on a beach in the Wolf Island National Wildlife Refuge in American state of Georgia.

Debate has been raging online and in the biological world over whether or not the rotting carcass, which resembles a small plesiosaurus, is a hoax.

Chantal Audra from the Tybee Island Marine Science Centre hypothesized that, if real, the decomposing body may belong to a type of deep sea shark, distorted to it’s dinosaur-like appearance by the decomposition process.

Girls in Tonga will be banned from playing rugby in schools after Education Minister Penisimani Fifita issued a statement saying it was against Tongan traditions and culture for girls to play rugby.

There has been strong backlash against the government over the decision; Australian international player of Tongan descent Caroline Fairs says the ban is ludicrous.

Services manager for Oceania Bruce Cook said “when girls play rugby they transcend the gender limits set on females."

An outspoken critic of the Chinese Communist Party’s influence on Australian politics says he was turned back from Shanghai when trying to return his father’s ashes to his homeland with his mother.

Former Parramatta city councillor John Hugh said he asked the officials who met him at the airport their reasoning, to which they allegedly responded, “You should know.”

The NSW education minister Rob Stokes has labelled the emphasis on STEM subjects in the education system “intellectual snobbery” and calling the acronym a “buzzword.”

STEM refers to Science, Technology, Engineering, and Maths, and has been a government focus since 2015, when all national education ministers agreed on a 10-year plan to boost results.

Mr Stokes, delivering the Balmoral Lecture at Sydney’s Queenwood School, bemoaned “people of influence… piling in to denounce the value of philosophy, the arts, and the social sciences.

Investigations are underway after two people died and three others were injured after their helicopter crashed at Hardy Reef on Queensland’s Whitsunday Coast on yesterday afternoon.

A statement released by The Whitsundays Air Services said the Helicopter crashed on its final approach to Hardy Reef Heliport, with a man and women, both international tourists, pronounced dead at the scene.

The Whitsundays Air Service offered their “deepest condolences” and have suspended all operations while the review process is underway.

The Palaszczuk Government will provide $1.4 million in funding over five years for a new domestic and family violence counselling and case management support service based at Chermside, with outreach services across Brisbane.

The service, which will be provided by UnitingCare Queensland, is a part of a Brisbane Domestic and Family Violence High Risk Team developed in response to the ‘Not Now, Not Ever’ report delivered by the Special Taskforce on Domestic and Family Violence in Queensland in 2015.