Eight thousand Melbournians have received emergency payments in the wake of the city’s latest lockdown. 

The recent stimulus aims to ease those who are financially stressed, considering JobKeeper wage subsidies have since receded. 

To combat two weeks of lockdown the federal government will be bringing payments of five hundred dollars to the individuals most affected.

Auckland has beaten out four Australian Capitals to claim the title of the world's most liveable city. 

Adelaide ranked third, while Perth was in sixth place and Brisbane was in 10th place.

The findings are calculated through an index rating system based on a City’s infrastructure, education, healthcare and culture and environment ratings. 

A City’s response to the Pandemic was also included and largely responsible for shaking up the global rankings.

The state government will commit two million dollars to the Sunshine Coast Hydro Plant Plan over two years.

Planned for the Mary River at Lake Borumba, the hydro plants would be Queensland's largest, and provide electricity to 1.5 million homes by the middle of this decade. 

The Queensland government plans to produce 50% of its energy from renewable energy sources by 2032.

A list of COVID-exposure sites in Queensland are expected to grow today as contact tracing gets underway for a woman who fled locked-down Melbourne before testing positive on the Sunshine Coast on Wednesday.

She and her husband left an unidentified suburb on the edge of greater Melbourne on June 1, while the Victorian capital was in lockdown.  

The current list includes locations in Kawana, Caloundra, Goondoowindi, and Moffat Beach. 

See the Queensland health Website for more details: https://www.health.qld.gov.au/

Today, Extinction rebellion protesters will lie on the road outside the offices of Origin Energy in the CBD. 

Posing as dead bodies, protestors hope to highlight a lack of initiative amongst gas corporations at a time where concerns for gas emissions grow increasingly anxious.  

A spokesperson for the extinction rebellion says the government is lying about gas being a greener alternative to coal.

Extinction Rebellion says it will continue its campaign of civil obedience until the government tells the truth about the climate emergency.

Australian of the year Grace Tame says there is still a lot of work to be done to reckon with a culture that protects perpetrators of abuse, although there’s been a major shift in attitudes towards sexual assault survivors. 

Data from ABC’s Australia Talks National Survey has revealed that 55% of Australians now agree that allegations of sexual assault are almost always true, which is a 14% rise from last years results. 

Ms Tame has described this shift in public opinion as “a huge symbol of progress”.

Law enforcement authorities in the US are investigating the disclosure of tax records cited in a media report showing some of America's richest people paid little to no taxes. 

US media outlet ProPublica said it obtained Internal Revenue Service data indicating billionaires, including Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Tesla's Elon Musk, paid no federal income taxes during some years.

The matter has been referred to the FBI and is a matter White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki says, the US government is taking very seriously

NASA’s Juno spacecraft has provided close-up shots of Jupiter’s largest moon for the first time in two decades.

Juno zoomed past icy Ganymede on Monday, passing within 1,038 kilometres, but it took time for the first images to be received on Earth.

The last time a spacecraft came that close was in 2000 when NASA's Galileo spacecraft swept past our solar system's biggest moon.

NASA has released Juno's first two pictures, highlighting Ganymede's craters and long, narrow features possibly related to tectonic faults.

A recent government survey shows only 16% Queensland businesses have recovered from COVID 19 restrictions.

A large portion of respondents display signs of optimism when dealing with the virus and unexpected lockdowns. 

Whilst the survey indicates performance is improving, businesses are now calling for the government to adopt a single approach to border declarations and hotspots to help their planning.

Queensland scientists have announced the development of a new quantum microscope capable of revealing biological structures without annihilating them.

UQ’s Quantum Optic’s lab Professor,, Warrick Bowen, says, in some cases the microscope can see down to single atoms, but it cannot be used for living specimens. 

Professor Bowen along with his team feel they have unlocked a “great utility” for scientific research.