The replacement buses for Sydney's Inner West light rail service are costing taxpayers thousands of dollars a day.

The Inner West light rail has been shut down for up to 18 months after cracks were discovered in all 12 trams.

Buses are replacing the service while the fleet is fixed.

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9News can reveal the cost of the light rail shutdown for taxpayers, which includes the replacement buses, drivers and marshalls.

Documents show Transport for NSW is forking out as much as $90,000 a day.

Over the next 18 months of the predicted shutdown, it will add up to close to $50 million.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet today spoke about the transport challenges during the National Press Club in Sydney.

"Trains crack. Sometimes there are challenges with ferries. Yes, there are always going to be problems," Mr Perrottet said.

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Opposition Leader Chris Minns said NSW taxpayers "need to know their money is falling through the cracks".

"This is coming straight out of the pockets of the taxpayers of NSW," Mr Minns said.

"They're not getting value for money, the commuters aren't getting a service and the government insists nothing's gone wrong."

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It comes after other issues have been discovered in Sydney's transport services, including cracks in one of the new Manly ferries.

Several welding defects have been discovered on the Emerald-class Balmoral.

"We have safety issues with trams, safety issues with ferries and trains, all built overseas," Jo Haylen, the Shadow Transport Minister, said.

Mr Perrottet said there will be more of a focus on onshore manufacturing in the future.

"We will be having a much greater focus, even though we lead the way now, when it comes to taking NSW to the next level when it comes to onshore manufacturing," he said.

Collingwood super-fan Jeffrey "Joffa" Corfe will stand trial after pleading not guilty to two charges of sexual abuse towards a minor.

The 61-year-old fronted Melbourne Magistrates Court today, accused of abusing a 14-year-old boy in Coburg in Melbourne's north in 2005.

Mr Corfe was today committed to trial and had his bail extended.

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As part of his bail conditions, Mr Corfe will not be able to travel overseas and he will have to stay at a nominated place of residence.

He will also not be allowed to make any contact with the alleged victim or the alleged victim's legal team.

Mr Corfe will go before the County Court in Melbourne for a pre-trial hearing in January.

First home buyers are being given exclusive rights to buy 100 apartments in Melbourne's inner-north.

The offer comes as new data shows investors are muscling out younger buyers.

Melbourne resident Nick Bond, 27, has been searching for his first home all year, but auctions have become a constant losing battle.

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Investors always seem to have that a bit of extra coin to spend on properties, compared to first home buyers.

"You'd be lying if you said it wasn't a little bit deflating," he told 9News.

However, today he has been told 100 new apartments in Melbourne's inner-north are only available to first home buyers, with investors being kept away.

Three new developments across North Melbourne, Preston and Northcote will carry the offer.

"I'd be pretty excited about that," Mr Bond said.

"This is pretty much exactly where I want to live."

First home buyers are being invited to plan ahead and buy with a deposit of just 3 per cent.

General manager of property developer MAB David Allt-Graham believes there will be "really strong interest" from first home buyers.

Construction of the complexes will begin in the next six months and for the next eight weeks, first-home buyers have their exclusive pick of the apartments.

The apartments will be ready to move into by mid-2024.

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Doctors and nurse practitioners will be offered the chance to have their university debt cleared if they work in rural areas under a new Federal Government scheme.

The program, which is designed to get more health professionals into Australia's regional and remote areas, will begin in January.

It's hoped that offering the chance to have up to $100,000 in university HELP debt paid off by the government will help fill critical job shortages in the country.

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The scheme will require doctors who go to a remote area to work for half as many years as they studied to have their university debt covered.

However, nurse practitioners will only need to work in remote areas for one year to have their fees paid.

Doctors working in larger regional towns or cities will have to work in the area for the same amount of time as they spent studying.

The incentive scheme is being welcomed by existing regional doctors, who are battling current staff shortages that are forcing patients to wait for basic healthcare.

Dr Kirby White only opened her Bendigo GP clinic three months ago and she has already had to turn patients away.

"My books are now closed and I have a waitlist of over 150 long," she said.

"There are many clinics now that have a wait time up to three weeks to see a GP.

"And if you go further out into remote areas of Australia, the wait can be up to four weeks."

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Three people were sitting around a conference room table in Sydney when Canva was born.

In ten years, that's grown to 2000 staff and the Aussie company has taken out an Apple award for 2021, for helping people connect in another COVID-19-ravaged year.

The numbers are "mind-blowing" to co-founder and CEO Cameron Adams.

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"We had millions of custom Zoom backgrounds created and downloaded on Canva," Mr Adams said.

"We've seen the amount of videos created on Canva grow to 2 million every single day, which is just an incredible amount."

What started on the web now runs natively on iPhone and iPad, and next year, a dedicated Canva app is coming to Mac.

"Every second on an iPhone or an iPad we have 23 designs created," said Mr Adams, whose platform is now being used in 190 countries and in more than 100 different languages.

"It's why 65 million people now rely on Canva to communicate effectively.

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"It's just a blur of design content.

"In the time that I've been talking to you, something like 7000 designs have been created."

Having heavily invested in improving its presentation features, photo and video editing, Mr Adams says 2022 will see the company double down on education.

65,000 schools and 150,000 not-for-profits have been given access to 'pro' features for free as part of Canva's mission to "empower the world to design".

"You can't be a successful Aussie tech company if you're not thinking about the world, which is very different to places like the U.S," Mr Adams said.

"Internationalising, localising in different languages, has been so crucial to our growth which is why we make it such a big focus."

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Here's the full list of Apple's trend winners for 2021:

Among Us! from InnerSloth
Banter, bluffing and teamwork are all critical to win a match in the hit game Among Us!

Bumble, from Bumble Inc.
The dating app that puts women in the power of their conversations.

EatOkra, from Anthony Edwards Jr. and Janique Edwards
EatOkra built a robust, user-driven guide to more than 11,000 Black-owned eateries that help people find tasty ways to invest in their community.

Peanut, from Peanut App Limited
Creating space for honest conversations on every aspect of womanhood.

Here's the full list of Apple's 2021 App Award winners:

• iPhone App of the Year: Toca Life World, from Toca Boca.
• iPad App of the Year: LumaFusion, from LumaTouch.
• Mac App of the Year: Craft, from Luki Labs Limited.
• Apple TV App of the Year: DAZN, from DAZN Group.
• Apple Watch App of the Year: Carrot Weather, from Grailr.

Australia's top free iPhone apps were dominated by COVID-19:

1. Express Plus Medicare
2. Check In Qld
3. Service NSW
4. Service Victoria
5. myGovID
6. Instagram
7. TikTok
8. YouTube: Watch, Listen, Stream
9. Snapchat
10. Facebook

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Meanwhile, the country's top paid iPhone apps were:

1. WikiCamps Australia
2. The Wonder Weeks
3. Monash University FODMAP diet
4. TripView – Sydney & Melbourne
5. Forest – Your Focus Motivation
6. Procreate Pocket
7. Rain Parrot
8. TouchRetouch
9. AutoSleep Track Sleep on Watch
10. 75 Hard

A huge thunderstorm has settled over Brisbane and is continuing to build, with heavy rainfall triggering flash flooding and damaging property across the Queensland's south-east.

The Bureau of Meteorology issued a severe thunderstorm warning this afternoon with Brisbane, the Sunshine Coast, and the surrounding areas of Somerset, Redland City and the Moreton Bay region in the firing line.

The BoM warned residents damaging winds, severe storms and large hailstones are likely, and heavy rainfall may trigger flash flooding.

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https://twitter.com/BOM_Qld/status/1468461664265768964

In Brisbane, Pullenvale in the city's west was hardest hit, with 59 millimetres of rain falling in just a few hours.

On the Gold Coast, Worongary got the most rain with 46 millimetres.

A supercell storm also hit the community of Runaway Bay, and the main street of Beaudesert, just south of Brisbane, was replaced by a river.

It received 67mm of rain within an hour.

The thunderstorms are moving east, and are heading for the town of Caboolture.

At the Gold Coast's Wet and Wild waterpark, families have run for cover while their cars were lashed by rain.

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Several flood warnings remain in place across the state, including major warnings for communities along the Condamine and Balonne Rivers, the Dawson River and the Weir and the Macintyre River, which last weak peaked at record breaking highs.

Residents are warned never to drive through or enter floodwaters.

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