Sydney news

A mother from country New South Wales, who struggled to find the right help when her son was diagnosed with autism, launches an app to help other parents.

Concerns the community will be "held to ransom" and forced to fund a clean up of contamination from a toxic firefighting foam at the airport prompts Tamworth Regional Council to ask the Federal Government what it plans to do to remediate the site.

A West Australian stuttering expert hopes a new study identifies stuttering genes.

Some farmers are left frustrated and concerned for their crop while others rejoice over mid-summer rain.

A small Darwin mango producer finds an elusive market 1,500 kilometres south in Alice Springs, driving hundreds of boxes down every couple of weekends to avoid oversupply in the Top End.

Elderly residents at a Perth retirement village are forced to shower in a carpark after a gas leak leaves more than 100 of them without hot water.

Sydneysiders tossed and turned through sweltering temperatures last night, with a Bureau of Meteorology forecaster saying it may have been the city's hottest ever December night.

Former Australia vice-captain Brad Haddin says Mickey Arthur's Pakistan face a test of character in their Test series this summer.

Whitehaven Coal is trying to stop the release of annual pollution reports from its north-west NSW coal mines, despite the state's Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) deciding the information is in the public interest.

Authorities searching for a family of three on board a boat missing off the coast off Cape Jaffa on South Australia's south-east coast have found a bucket and plastic tub from the vessel overnight.

ABARES is forecasting a 6.1 per cent increase in Australia's agricultural production for 2016-17, driven by unexpectedly high grain yields.

Youth advocates say a report into Queensland's youth detention centres being handed to the State Government today needs to spark a major overhaul of the system.

The Queensland Supreme Court is facing an increased workload while coping with outdated technology and substandard facilities at a major regional courthouse, Chief Justice Catherine Holmes says.

A child protection advocate wants the Governor-General to strip high-profile Queensland criminologist Paul Wilson of his Order of Australia medal following his conviction on child sex offences.

Nineteen years of stories shared by rural youth, through the ABC's Heywire competition, paint a picture of pain and progress that continues to evolve.

A humble floristry course in western Sydney is helping migrant and refugee women overcome language barriers and flourish in their local community.

A common strain of the fungal disease known as dieback has killed off an alarming number of mango trees in the Kimberley town of Derby.

Radiology services were in disarray after a medical software failure in South Australia's major hospital's this week, a health union says.

On his 68th birthday, a South Australian man who was given a wrong chemotherapy dose is told his cancer is back.

Seven people on a Royal Flying Doctors plane experience a close call when the wheels collapse and the plane skids 500 metres along a runway in Melbourne's north-west.

The all-important democracy sausage is declared Australia's Word of the Year by the National Dictionary Centre, with favourites smashed avo and shoey missing out on the title.

The ACT's newest politicians detail stories of tragedy and abuse, as well as visions of hope in their inaugural speeches at the Legislative Assembly.

The ACT Supreme Court is to get a new justice with the appointment of David Mossop to replace Justice Richard Refshauge who is retiring.

The closure of Victoria's Hazelwood coal-fired power station is expected to drive up South Australian power bills by 7.2 per cent next financial year, adding about $115 to the annual bills of an average household.

Several people are injured in a bus crash on Great Eastern Highway in the eastern Perth suburb of Ascot.

The only person who was looking after a five-month-old baby the day he died in Alice Springs says he is not aware of how the infant came to be covered in bruises.

The latest NAPLAN results show literacy and numeracy levels in Australian schools have stalled and in some cases gone backwards.

An emergency warning for Cessnock, New South Wales, is downgraded to advice after houses were earlier under threat from two bushfires.

The state will pay the legal costs of a confidential defamation settlement involving WA Corrective Services Minister Joe Francis.

Emergency services are at a popular swimming spot near Alice Springs, searching for a teacher who is feared drowned after he did not resurface from the water while on a school excursion.

Australian music legends Olivia Newton-John and John Farnham talk to Leigh Sales about their careers, the fans and singing together again.

In New South Wales there have been nothing but green lights for Crown's Barangaroo casino project. But now James Packer's vision is facing trouble. Crown staff in China marketing to wealthy gamblers have been arrested, a move which could threaten the entire business model the project was sold on.

Police in Townsville are warning residents against lashing out at teenagers suspected of crime, after a spike in juvenile offences in the north Queensland city, now dubbed the state's crime capital.

Some of the teenagers detained inside Victoria's maximum-security prison were warned any violent behaviour would be met with the use of teargas, firearms and dogs, a court hears.

A court orders Queensland Nickel to hand over a stash of documents to liquidators investigating the collapse of the former Clive Palmer operation, but a lawyer argues the company's former chief financial officer Daren Wolfe is the only person who can access the files.

A child health expert says Aboriginal youth in Kalgoorlie are the solution, not the problem, and leaders need to listen to them.

Residents of Townsville are warned to leave policing to the police amid a spike in youth crime, with children as young as nine involved in car stealing and burglary and some teens live-streaming their exploits on Facebook.

Nationals leader Brendon Grylls is under attack on two fronts as he fights the mining lobby's opposition to his planned new tax while campaigning to hold onto his seat of Pilbara.

The Australian Taxation Office manages to restore its website after two days of mass-IT outages which took a number of its systems offline.

Two candidates from this year's Melbourne City Council election are charged with false declaration and unlawful nomination following an investigation into allegations of electoral fraud.

Sydney is only behind Paris, London, New York and Los Angeles in terms of Airbnb user numbers, even as the company manoeuvers through government regulation that bans homeowners from leasing their property on the site in several areas.

Police are investigating an apparent barbed wire "booby trap" that injured a teenage jogger in the eastern Perth suburb of High Wycombe.

An Adelaide doctor forgot to write notes about a nine-year-old girl she examined, who later died from internal injuries, because she could not find the child's patient file and became distracted, a coroner hears.

Police hold serious concerns for a couple and their adult son who have gone missing while boating off South Australia's south-east coast.

Cronulla star Andrew Fifita is slapped with a breach notice by the NRL over his support for convicted killer Kieran Loveridge.

Advertisements featuring fresh West Australian produce will begin airing on television in Singapore as part of an $8 million campaign to boost demand for WA's high end produce.

A Perth start-up develops technology it is likening to a "Bloomberg terminal" for lawyers, where they can access real-time data including court cases and government documents.

The biggest annual jump in the number of domestic violence protection order applications across the state is hailed as good news by a Central Queensland University academic.

The Australian Tax Office braces for a third day of mass-IT outages which have taken the group's website and a number of its other systems offline.

The Queensland Government suddenly finds itself with money to spend as a tough election approaches, with a budget windfall of more than $1 billion.