Ballarat’s top cop is calling for major changes at the Rainbow Serpent Music and Arts Festival after a string of illegal activity including drug trafficking, assaults and two reported rapes as well as a fatality. Read more.

An Avoca man who was caught driving 12 times with either a suspended or disqualified licence has been jailed. Read more.

All emergency services were called to a crash involving a single vehicle and a tree at Scarsdale this evening. Read more.

After receiving care at the Ballarat Base Hospital for a burst appendix, eight-year-old Rebecca Harrison wanted to pay it forward. Read more.

Mt Rowan and Woodmans Hill school campuses have opened. Read more.

Today is going to be pretty much perfect - sunny and a top of 23 degrees.

Need a national news snapshot first thing – well, we have you covered. 

► NEWCASTLE: Scripture in NSW public schools is “an echo from a bygone era and now needs to be reconsidered”, said a prominent Newcastle Anglican Diocese priest after calls on Monday for scripture’s immediate suspension. Find out more.

►WINDANG: Their beach might have been closed due to rough conditions, but that didn’t stop Windang surf lifesavers from springing into action on Boxing Day.

A mass rescue at the entrance to Lake Illawarra, which saw six people plucked out of the ocean, has earned the lifesavers the title of Surf Life Saving NSW’s Rescue of the Month for December. Full story.

► LITHGO: NSW Police have fined a 51-year-old woman for a crash involving two 40-seater buses earlier in January.

The driver was fined for following another vehicle too closely in order to stop safely.

At 4pm on Thursday, January 5, two buses were involved in a rear-end collision at the intersection of State Mine Gully Road and Old Bells Line of Road at Newnes. Full story.

► ILLAWARRA: A Warrigal Care minibus driver charged over a fatal crash on the M1 Princes Motorway at Yallah last Wednesday has been identified in court as 63-year-old Michael Ryan.

Ryan fronted Wollongong Local Court for the first time on Tuesday, where he entered a plea of not guilty to a charge of dangerous driving occasioning death. Full story.

► WAGA: THE ALLEGED perpetrator of Monday’s siege drank alcohol and packed a tomahawk before travelling to Mount Austin to bash his ex-partner, police claim.

Northcott Parade was sent into lockdown when a 52-year-old man barricaded himself inside a flat before lighting a mattress on fire and hurling it from the balcony. Full story.

► MAITLAND: 

► BEGA: A Bega Valley child’s dream came true recently when she received a hand written letter from her hero Sir David Attenborough. Read all about it.

► CANBERRA: Former One Nation senator Rod Culleton had a minor victory in the High Court, when it was declared he was to be referred to as "Senator Culleton" for the duration of the day's proceedings.It was his only one. Full story.

►SYDNEY: It was 6.25pm on Thursday when a relative ran up the side path of Kimberley McGurk's Cremorne home screaming "there was a pop and there's blood" and that her husband Michael was hurt. Full story.

DUBBO: Mark Stocco​ pulled a stolen pump-action shotgun out from under his bed, handed it to his father and said: "Shoot him".

So Gino Stocco​ took the gun, walked outside, and shot farm caretaker Rosario Cimone​ twice in the stomach. Full story.

► JAKARTA: Indonesia's highest Islamic clerical body is poised to issue a fatwa against hoax news amid fears that fake reports on social media are fuelling  ethnic and political conflict. Full story.

► WASHINGTON: Funny people, these Americans - there was no mistaking during the election campaign that given his druthers, Donald Trump would go after Muslim refugees and migrants, and yet just a little more than half of eligible voters could be bothered going to the polls. Full story.

► PHILIPPINES: Philippine authorities suspect accused Australian child sex predator Peter Scully is still masterminding a "dark web" pornography and child torture operation from his jail cell in the southern Philippines. Full story.

1979 - Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini was welcomed in Tehran as he ended nearly 15 years of exile. 

1987 - Terry Williams won the largest slot machine payoff, at the time, when won $4.9 million after getting four lucky 7s on a machine in Reno, NV. 

1991 - A USAir jetliner crashed atop a commuter plane at Los Angeles International Airport. 35 people were killed. 

1996 - Visa and Mastercard announced security measures that would make it safe to shop on the Internet. 

1999 - Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky gave a deposition that was videotaped for senators weighing impeachment charges against U.S. President Clinton. 

2003 - NASA's space shuttle Columbia exploded while re-entering the Earth's atmosphere. All seven astronauts on board were killed.

CADEN Chapman fit a lot of life into five years with his beloved family.

Bec and Beau Chapman’s late son was imaginative, cheeky, charismatic and adored zooming his toy cars around the floor with friends.

“I miss his personality, his cuddles – he was such a friendly little boy,” said Mrs Chapman, of Clarence Town.

“Spending a lot of time in hospital he had to know how to have a bit of fun.”

The Chapmans have used their son’s positive attitude as inspiration for The Bloody Long Walk, a 35 kilometre trek from Palm Beach to Manly Beach on Sunday to raise awareness about and fund research into mitochondrial disease. Read more.