She is known to the world as the Spirit of Ecstacy. She is also called the Silver Lady, the Flying Lady, and Eleanor, to those on a first-name basis with her.

And for more than 100 years, she has stood atop the bonnet of each Rolls Royce since before the First World War.

And she now leans into the slipstream of the first electric Rolls Royce; the Spectre.

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The luxury car maker today revealed for the first time in Australia, its first foray into the world of electric vehicles, or EV.

And today's launch is the first step in a pledge to have every Rolls Royce running on electric by 2030.

"The engineers have done two and a half million miles of testing," says Fred Whitwell, product specialist with the car maker, "and they do so, to make sure it drives like a Rolls."

The super coupe may be closing the book on the internal combustion engine, but the traditional luxuries and tailored experience remain.

"Every Rolls Royce is different," says Fred. "And the way that you commission it is then down to you; you can make it sporty, you can make it elegant, you can make it classic. Every Rolls Royce is bespoke."

And that applies to the dash trim, the coach doors, and the galaxy of pinprick lights inside, known as the Shooting Star Roofline.

"Every so often, you will see little star shoot over the roof," says Fred. "And what you can do is commission it based on a significant day or occasion; your anniversary, the day you bought your business, the day you sold it, all based on the correlation of what the stars were that night."

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And Eleanor, who has stood on the bonnet for a century or more, has had a shuzz as well.

"So she's got a little more forward intent, leaning further than before. Over 800 hours was taken to redefine her from our engineering and designing departments, never mind the entirety of the car."

But you won't be getting the Spectre straight off the lot after trading in the Commodore.

The first Spectre was delivered to its English customer just last week, and the expectation in Australia, is that you could be waiting for between one and a half to two years, before you slip behind the wheel.

And that is after parting with $770,000 dollars. Plus on-road costs.

Don't complain; after all, you wanted a Rolls.

Telecommunications giants, banks and government agencies are banding together to put a stop to scam callers.

Sydney fashion designer Melanie Gillbank was caught off-guard by a scam caller who impersonated a Commonwealth Bank fraud officer and asked for a Netbank code.

"The minute I read it out, my heart sank and I realised I'd made a mistake," Gillbank said.

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She lost $5000 to the scammer but was lucky to get her money back from the bank once she realised she had been the victim of a crime.

Now, Call Stop, a collaboration between telco provider Optus and the Australian Financial Crimes Exchange is looking to put an end to call-related scams.

The partnership intercepts phone calls to scam numbers with a warning message if the number has been reported as involved in a con.

More than 1300 scam attempts have been stopped in the first ten weeks of the program.

"That will translate to tens of millions of dollars of theft that we've already prevented," Optus spokesperson Andrew Sheridan told 9News.

"The idea is to stay one step ahead of the criminals."

Commonwealth Bank and Telstra have also recently rolled out a tool to block suspicious bank transfers while a potential scam call is in progress.

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Australian consumers have already lost $92 million to scammers since the start of the year, the ACCC has confirmed.

The volume of scam phone calls has decreased, however, spoof text messages have risen in frequency, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

A national register will be put into place this year to protect the sender IDs of big corporations, such as Australia Post, myGov and the major banks.

"Consumers will then be able to have greater confidence, that if they receive a message that says it's from their bank – it is in fact from their bank," executive general manager for the ACCC's National Anti-Scam Centre, Heidi Snell, said.

A $228 million Chinese money laundering syndicate was allegedly linked to a romance investment scam run by an organised crime network, a court has been told.

One of the accused ringleaders was released on bail on Thursday, despite fears he will flee overseas and allegations he spoke to a co-accused about getting their "stories straight" before being arrested.

Federal police said Zuo Chen, who owns a $10 million home in Melbourne's east, previously held a $100,000 line of credit with a private jet company based at Essendon Airport.

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The 37-year-old, along with three co-accused, successfully applied for bail in Melbourne Magistrates Court, after being accused of operating Changjiang Currency Exchange, with others, to launder millions over the past three years.

The company, which operates 12 retail shopfronts across Australia, is accused of being used as a front to transfer money to illegitimate customers and conceal about $228 million from regulators.

While 98 per cent of Changjiang Currency Exchange transactions were legitimate, two per cent were allegedly money laundering for criminal organisations, the court was told.

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The syndicate allegedly funnelled money into bank accounts set up in the names of relatives and associates, the court was told, with seven people arrested last week over their alleged involvement.

Police claim Chen, an Australian citizen born in China, received 30 per cent of profits made by the exchange and fabricated how much he was receiving to the Australian Taxation Office.

AFP Detective Senior Constable Thomas Martin said Chen and the syndicate allegedly disguised the source of money, property and other assets, which he said were proceeds of organised crime.

He said police intercepted thousands of hours of phone calls between members of the ring, including Chen.

On one such call, he claimed Chen told an associate about their alleged profits from a "pig butchering" romance scam, which they were contracted to by a Chinese criminal network.

"We f***ing accepted about $100 million right?" Chen said on the call, Martin told the court.

Pig butchering lures victims using online dating and other platforms, gains their trust as a romantic partner or friend and then takes their money by offering investment opportunities.

He said Chen and a co-accused discussed the AFP's investigation over a phone call, where one of the two said: "We can meet up again to get our stories straight."

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Chen is alleged to have flown to Singapore in August when he met with a co-accused, opened a bank account and spoke to an accountant and a solicitor.

Martin alleged Chen also had business operations in Vietnam, Cambodia and Malaysia, where he wanted to set up a small team as he said his business "operates in the grey area".

Police are transcribing thousands of hours of intercepted phone calls, which need to be translated from Mandarin into English, and tracing the syndicate's many accounts and assets.

Prosecutor John Saunders objected to Chen's bail due to his risk of interfering with witnesses and evidence, and feared he may try to flee overseas as he previously had access to a private jet.

But Chen's barrister Dermot Dann KC said the company, Jetpro, had since stated they would not accept Chen's business while he is on bail.

Dann said Chen would plead not guilty and it would take a long time for the case goes to trial.

Chen's mother offered her home, worth more than $1 million, as a surety against his bail and he offered to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet.

Magistrate Malcolm Thomas granted Chen bail on the condition he not leave his home, surrender his passport, and give police his bank details, mobile phone and IP address within 24 hours of his release.

Chen's family and friends in the court clapped as the hearing concluded.

Three co-accused women, Chen's wife Jie Lu, Jin Wang and Jing Zhu, were also bailed, another three remain behind bars.

The matter will return to court in March 2024.

Hospital admissions for heat-related injuries have spiked significantly over the last ten years, a report from the Australian Insitute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) has found.

Extreme heat was behind most weather-related injuries and illnesses recorded between 2012 and 2022, while bushfire-related injuries increased during El Niño, the 'Let's talk about the weather' report found.

Extreme heat caused 7104 hospitalisations and 293 deaths in the ten-year period, with about 1000 patients hospitalised for heat-related injuries and illnesses every three years.

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There were 9119 extreme-weather-related injuries across the decade, including bushfires, floods and freak weather events. 

Over the past 30 years there has been a significant increase in the frequency and severity of extreme weather events, AIHW's Dr Heather Swanston said.

The frequent and severe events included bushfires, extreme heat and cold, rain and storm-related events such as cyclones and flooding.

Queensland reported the most cases of injury from exposure to extreme heat, with 717 patients.

Victoria followed with 410 cases, while New South Wales reported 348.

South Australia had 266 over the ten-year period, while Western Australia reported a close 267.

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There were 73 instances in the Northern Territory, 23 in the Australian Capital Territory and 19 in Tasmania.

The data does not include patients who were not admitted to hospital after an emergency room visit.

"This report includes injuries that were directly attributable to weather-related events but does not include injuries that were indirectly related," the AIHW said in a statement.

"For example, it doesn't include injuries from road traffic accidents that occur due to wet weather since the primary cause of injury would be recorded as 'transport'."

An El Niño event was declared by The Bureau of Meteorology earlier this year, bringing more heat and reduced rainfall for the rest of 2023 until February 2024.

A mum of two has made the tough decision to pull her kids out of a NSW school as violent, targeted attacks by fellow students in the area are on the rise.

A video posted online shows a bus ride to school in Taree, in the state's north, turn violent with two girls appearing to pull each other's hair before someone steps in.

It was posted to a social media account dedicated to promoting school fights in Taree and it isn't the only one.

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More fights follow, some after-hours on the Manning River and another in uniform by a fence.

But the violence has become too much for one mum.

Kerrie Anne Swan said she had pulled both her kids out of Taree High School after other teens outside of school hours targeted them.

"It's not just one-on-one, there's been a couple of times I've had to come and rescue my kids from Coles on the way to school," she told NBN News.

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Swan said she felt like she had no choice.

"I thought it was just my kids, there's that many kids getting homeschooled, it's scarring them for life," she said.

"Like I send my kids to school, who's to say they're coming home."

The Department of Education told NBN News that NSW public schools have zero tolerance for violence and bullying and disciplinary action is taken when schools become aware of any incident occurring, including through social media.

Swan said police never laid any charges.

Former TV host Andrew O'Keefe has denied spitting at and attacking a woman during a domestic dispute, saying he was too sick to "karate kick" anyone.

The 52-year-old faced questioning at Sydney's Downing Centre Local Court on Thursday over the September 2021 incident, during which police allege he knocked the woman to the ground and pinned her down.

O'Keefe also allegedly pushed the woman into a door frame, causing scratches to her arm.

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He is facing charges including domestic assault, drug possession, breaching an apprehended violence order and resisting arrest.

But O'Keefe told the court the woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, inflicted the scratches on her own arm during an argument.

He was accused of saying "good riddance" to the woman and making repeated spitting gestures towards her after knocking her down.

"None of this happened," O'Keefe said.

The pair had been in COVID-19-related isolation at the time and had argued over whether O'Keefe called the woman's daughter a "c***", the court heard.

"We both know that she can be a manipulative little s***, but I did not call her a c***," O'Keefe said he told the woman at the time.

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On that night, O'Keefe said he began experiencing symptoms including dizziness and profuse sweating, which caused him to believe he was having a heart attack.

He was later transported by ambulance to hospital and was diagnosed with a respiratory tract infection before being released a short time later.

Andrew O'Keefe is facing multiple charges including domestic assault and drug possession.

O'Keefe had previous charges dismissed on mental health grounds following an incident in January 2021 during which he slapped the woman and spat in her face by his own admission.

That dispute was sparked after the woman felt what she thought was an "ice pipe" in O'Keefe's pocket.

The troubled former Seven Network presenter said the item was in fact a spoon and a lighter.

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Regarding the January incident, O'Keefe said the pair had attended a party together during which she became quite drunk, while he only consumed a moderate amount of alcohol.

He said as they went to leave the party together, the woman felt what she thought was an implement for smoking methamphetamine in his back pocket.

"She said, 'why the hell did you bring that?'," O'Keefe told the court.

"She could have been forgiven for thinking that. In the past there had been incidents."

After returning to the woman's home, the pair continued to argue and O'Keefe said he asked the woman to call him an Uber to get home as he was "flat broke".

When she refused to do so, O'Keefe said he called her "f***ing heartless" and suggested the relationship should end.

"She said, 'this relationship's never meant anything to me anyway', which I was very hurt by," he said.

O'Keefe said he then spat in the woman's face to "illustrate (that) what she said to me was a spit in the face".

"(That is) something I'll regret for a very long time," he told the court.

Later, the woman also threatened to publicly substantiate looming allegations about the then-Deal or No Deal host's drug use, including a former driver telling media he witnessed O'Keefe smoking ice in the back of his car.

O'Keefe told the court the woman threatened to tell the Seven Network and his ex-wife he was an abusive "junkie" who saw "hookers".

"Then I slapped her … once across the face," he said.

O'Keefe added when the woman continued to say she would make public allegations against him he went "slap, slap, slap" with his other hand.

Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).

Lifeline on 13 11 14.

Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636.

A Sydney mum who won a $1 million lotto prize today initially doubted her luck when she heard of the win, thinking there was a system error.

The North Sydney woman held one of two division one winning entries in draw 4335 which was drawn yesterday.

"I woke up this morning and I noticed I had an email notifying me to check my Monday and Wednesday lotto ticket," she said.

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"I immediately thought it was some sort of prank or glitch in the system. I'm glad to know it's not.

"I purchase tickets into the draw occasionally, maybe every couple of weeks because you never know what could happen."

The woman said she would use her winnings to settle her finances and treat her children to a holiday. 

"It's boring, but I'll look forward to paying off some bills like many others," she said.

"We will go on a holiday, and I'll put some money away for the kids."

Across Australia, there were two division one winning entries in Monday and Wednesday Lotto draw 4335, one each in New South Wales and Western Australia.

There are many different ways to get help and information about gambling.

Call the National Gambling Helpline on 1800 858 858; use online counselling; find information about help services in your state or territory; get information and support for family and friends; get information about how to talk with someone about their gambling; or contact Gamblers Anonymous.

All services are free, confidential and available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Police also got reports of people tampering wth equipment in the red zone in April.

More than 150,000 Australians have signed up for the new MyMedicare program, part of the federal government's plan to boost the public health system.

The voluntary program gives both patients and providers a range of benefits, including longer telehealth consultations and greater bulk billing incentives.

This is what you need to know about MyMedicare, including how you can sign up for it.

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What is MyMedicare?

MyMedicare is a new, voluntary registration that allows Australians to formally nominate their regular GP.

In exchange, both the patient and GP get access to select benefits.

The program is free and voluntary to sign up for, and changing preferred GPs or even withdrawing from the system can be done at any time.

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What are the benefits?

Patients who sign up for MyMedicare will get access to longer telehealth appointments funded by Medicare.

People in aged care homes will also be provided with more GP visits, while, from midway through next year, people who visit hospital frequently will get "connections to more appropriate care in general practice".

Practices will also benefit.

They'll get more information about patients who nominate them as their preferred practitioner, which the health department says will make it "easier to tailor services to fit the patient's needs".

They will also be given triple bulk billing incentives for longer telehealth appointments for children, pensioners and concession card holders.

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Who's eligible and how can I sign up?

Eligibility for MyMedicare is fairly broad – anyone with a Medicare or veteran card can sign up, as can anyone going through hardship like domestic violence or homelessness.

If you've had two appointments at one practice in the past 24 months – or one visit if the practice is in a remote area – you're also eligible.

Parents or guardians can register their children if one of them is eligible, and kids older than 14 can sign up themselves.

Patients can sign up online via their Medicare account or app, or they can ask their GP to begin the process.

Or, if paper registration is more your thing, you can fill out a physical registration form and return it to your GP.

Regardless of which method you choose, you won't be able to nominate your preferred practice until it has signed up for the program.

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Why is the government introducing it?

The Department of Health says the new program will lead to better healthcare for Australians who sign up.

"Evidence shows that seeing the same GP and healthcare team regularly leads to better health outcomes," it says.

"Seeing your GP regularly and formalising the relationship you have with your GP and general practice through MyMedicare may lead to better health outcomes."

The program is part of a wider boost for Medicare in this year's federal budget, including $3.5 billion in incentivising bulk billing – which came into effect on November 1 – and double-length prescriptions for 300 medicines on the PBS.

"We're delivering the biggest investment in Medicare in over 40 years, with more incentives for bulk billing and 58 new urgent care clinics across Australia," Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.

"These changes to the Medicare bulk billing incentive will make it easier, and cheaper for more than 11 million Australians to visit a doctor."

Adrian Humphreys was stabbed five times while staying at a remote Taranaki campground.