Sovereign Kabi people removed by police from a sacred site will take to Gympie’s Department of Transport and Main Roads in protest tomorrow morning.
 

Kabi protesters had been staging a continuous occupation of Djaki Kundu to prevent a Bruce Highway upgrade they say would destroy and desecrate the Gympie sacred site. 

They were forcibly removed by police last week, but will continue protesting in Gympie, with protests scheduled for 9am tomorrow at the TMR Department, and 10am this Saturday at Gympie’s Memorial Park.

With excitement growing among interstate Year 12 students for the annual schoolies celebrations, the Commissioner for Fair Trading, Victoria Thomson has warned school leavers of the need to carefully review their accommodation booking terms and conditions.

This warning has come following last year when the pandemic was new and unprecedented, some interstate people were not provided refunds under the accommodation provider’s T &Cs.

Australia’s Auditor General has discovered that more than a quarter of regional grants awarded by the Commonwealth government have actually been awarded to recipients from major cities.

A report released by the Australian National Audit Office on Tuesday has found that more than 27%  of regional development grants awarded since 2018 were to recipients with postcodes in major cities. 

It can be recorded these grants awarded to major cities were worth $624 million.

A mass kidnapping of US missionaries in Haiti is the latest indication of the country’s rising instability.

The Caribbean nation is struggling in the wake of the president’s assassination in July this year, a subsequent catastrophic earthquake and a worsening fuel crisis, bringing the Haitian economy to the brink of collapse.

Rising insecurity and gang violence has seen Haitian workers strike indefinitely. 

At least 328 kidnappings were reported in Haiti over first eight months of 2021, up from last year’s overall total of 234 kidnappings.

Research published by Flinders University adds further to Traditional Owners concerns that the Adani Carmichael coal project is likely to permanently damage the culturally and environmentally significant Doongmabulla Springs in Central Queensland. 

The research paper published concludes there is a serious threat of decline to the springs if the source aquifer is partially dewatered by mining operations 

This has reinforced the Traditional Owners' calls for independent scrutiny of Adani’s water plans. 

Australian charity, Rural Aid, is helping fill the agricultural worker shortage created by border closures and travel restrictions. 

Rural Aid’s ‘ farm army’ website is providing a platform where volunteers and workers can apply for jobs that are listed by farmers needing a hand. 

South East Queensland farmers have found this particularly helpful as most of them have felt more isolated ahead of the state opening its borders to the declared hotspots on December 17.

Despite being a priority group, COVID-19 vaccinations in Indigenous Australians continue to cause concern for politicians desperate to reopen borders, however one community near Alice Springs have turned that on its head with 94% of the eligible population having received at least one dose. 

Around 200 people living in the community nestled in sandstone valley said the vaccination rate can be accredited to the Indigenous-controlled central Australian congress, and not the North Territory government. 

New Forecasts from the International Monetary Fund place Australia in the fastest growing region in the world. 

The IMF has cut its economic outlook for the Asia Pacific by 1 point 1 per cent, but the area is nonetheless predicted to experience an overall growth of 6 point 5 per cent this year. 

Australia itself is experiencing a commodities boom, driving a 3 point 5 per cent growth for the nation this year.

Facebook will pay up to $19 million to settle civil claims brought by the US government that the social media company discriminated against workers and violated other federal recruitment rules. 

The lawsuit announced last December accused Facebook of giving hiring preferences to temporary workers, including those who hold H-1B visas that let companies temporarily employ foreign workers in certain specialty occupations.