The decision, announced as part of Budget 2023, will cost the Government $619m.

It’s hoped the accolade will translate into an uptick in wine tourism to the region.

The $2 million house had just failed a building inspection.

The bill went through its first reading in the House under urgency last week.

Police tracked a stolen vehicle for more than 30km along Auckland’s Northern Motorway.

An engineering firm is awaiting sentence after it failed to supervise a worker who was killed dismantling a Victoriancheese factory.

Glen Parsons died when he was crushed by a 770kg condenser at the old Murray Goulburn cheese factory in Leitchville in northern Victoria, in December 2017.

A1 Engineering, which employed Parsons, faces a $1.4 million fine after a jury found it failed to properly supervise Parsons and his coworker, who suffered non-fatal crush injuries.

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The old cheese factory had been bought by a New Zealand company in 2017 and A1 Engineering was one of several companies hired to remove equipment to be repurposed and shipped overseas.

Andrew Buchanan should have been on site to supervise the work, between May and December 2017.

But he was in New Zealand in December 2017 when Parsons, a boilermaker, was arranging the condenser to be shipped.

There were attempts to load the heavy condenser into a closed-top shipping container, but they struggled because of its size and shape.

Parsons and another worker came up with a plan to move the condenser on a hydraulic jack, which was made larger with a plank of wood.

Parsons asked his colleague for a hammer so he could remove the skates from under the condenser, to move it off the jack into the container.

But the condenser fell and crushed the two men.

Parsons was killed, while the other man was a pinned by his legs and arms.

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Defence barrister Ffyona Livingstone Clarke said Parsons was an experienced tradesman and could have been the supervisor.

County Court Judge Damian Murphy said the company had tried to blame everyone else for  its failings at trial and rejected that Parsons could have supervised himself.

"(The company) should have ensured there was a supervisor actively supervising their work," he said.

Parsons' wife Jan said she didn't blame anyone for his death and hopes the finalisation of court processes will allow her to live her life wholly again.

"It really is your worst nightmare when the man you adore and love does not come home from work," she said.

Andrew Buchanan Engineering, the company owned by Buchanan, was fined $300,000 after pleading guilty over its role in Parsons' death.

Judge Murphy will hand down his sentence at a later date.

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A good Samaritan has reportedly died in front of his children after he was struck by a car while helping a family of ducks cross the road.

Twelve-year-old William Wimsatt told US news outlet KCRA3 the man started shooing the ducks at an intersection in California and "everyone was clapping because he was being really nice".

The boy captured a photo of the act of kindness on his phone, as he praised the man for his actions.

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"My mum rolled down the window and said 'good job, good job' and I said 'good job' to him too," he said.

The man, who local media has identified as married father-of-two Casey Rivara, was struck by a car immediately afterwards.

Local media reported paramedics tried to save the man but he was pronounced dead at the scene.

"I didn't see the car actually hit him," Wimsatt said.

"All I remember is the sound and then him flying across the intersection.

"His shoes and one of his socks were right in front of our car."

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Another 12-year-old boy, who also witnessed the tragedy, set up a memorial with flowers and rubber ducks at the scene to remember the man.

"He was being really nice and you should honour him because he was being really kind and then something horrible happened to him," he said.

"He was an amazing person."

Police said the driver of the car was a 17-year-old girl and the crash remains under investigation.

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Australia is a sought after country in the global property market, with millions of people travelling across the continent every year. Now, new data has revealed exactly where non-Australian homeowners are who have property down under.

A 23-year-old American man has lost his arm after he was attacked by an alligator near a pond behind a bar in southwest Florida early on Sunday morning, officials say.

"The responding crew treated a male patient who had an above the elbow amputation of his upper right extremity. Bystanders applied a tourniquet to the patient before we arrived," Charlotte County Fire & EMS spokesperson Todd Dunn said in a statement.

An alligator trapper was later sent to the scene of the attack near Banditos, a bar in Port Charlotte, Florida, authorities said.

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An alligator that was 3.18 metres long was removed from the pond and "humanely killed", according to a release from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Serious injuries caused by alligators are rare in the state, the wildlife agency said.

The agency said it "places the highest priority on public safety" and cautioned people to avoid conflict with alligators by keeping a safe distance and swimming only in designated areas during daylight hours.

People should also never feed alligators, it said.

"When fed, alligators can lose their natural wariness and instead learn to associate people with the availability of food. This can lead to dangerous circumstances for yourself and other people who could encounter the alligator in the future," the agency said.

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Additionally, the agency advises residents to keep their pets on a leash and away from the water's edge because the animals may appear as prey to alligators.

Through its Statewide Nuisance Alligator Program, the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission contracts alligator trappers throughout the state to remove alligators that may pose a threat. Residents may call a hotline to report concerns about the animals.

"Generally, an alligator may be considered a nuisance if it's at least four feet in length and believed to pose a threat to people, pets or property," the agency's website states.

The program aims to "proactively address alligator threats in developed areas, while conserving alligators in areas where they naturally occur," according to the site.

The community of Port Charlotte is about 45 kilometres north of Fort Myers.

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A group of anti-Putin Russian nationals – who are aligned with the Ukrainian army – has claimed responsibility for an attack in Russian's southwestern region of Belgorod, as Moscow said it was fighting a group of saboteurs there.

Shelling damaged an administrative building, several residential buildings, and a kindergarten in the area, according to regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov, who said there were no fatalities.

In a Telegram post, groups calling themselves the "Freedom of Russia Legion" and "Russian Volunteer Corps" said they had "liberated" a settlement in the Belgorod region, which borders Ukraine.

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A Ukrainian official acknowledged that the units had carried out an operation in the area but insisted they were acting independently.

"We can confirm that this operation was carried out by Russian citizens," Andriy Yusov, a representative of Ukraine's defence intelligence agency, told CNN.

He said the units were "part of defence and security forces" when they were in Ukraine, but were independent from Kyiv when they were not: "In Russia they are acting as independent entities."

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russian forces were working to push out a "sabotage and reconnaissance group," according to state media TASS.

The situation in Belgorod marks "the first time" that Ukrainian-aligned forces have launched "a cross-border land operation against Russian targets," according to CNN's Sam Kiley.

"This is on a significant scale, and clearly intended to cause considerable consternation among the local authorities at the very least, if not at the level of the Kremlin," Kiley told CNN.

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'The situation remains extremely tense'

At least eight people had been injured in the attacks, but there were no deaths among civilians in Belgorod, according to Gladkov, the regional governor.

"The situation remains extremely tense. A sabotage and reconnaissance group, the Ministry of Defence and all law enforcement agencies have entered the territory to carry out combat missions to protect our country," Gladkov said in a live-streamed address on Monday.

Gladkov said that the Belgorod government is "completing a house tour of the border villages" and in the town of Graivoron to ensure the safety of the local population.

He added that "most of the population left the territory" with personal transport and the local government is providing help for those who do not have the opportunity to leave on their own.

He also noted that the head of the district Gennady Ivanovich Bondarev, is working with the Ministry of Emergency Situations and the police to evacuate people.

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He said earlier that Russian troops, the border service, the National Guard and the FSB "are taking the necessary measures to eliminate the enemy."

Air defences struck down an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) in the region, Gladkov said, adding that there were no victims and Russian authorities are looking into any potential damage on the ground.

Aleksey Baranovsky, a representative of the Kyiv-based Russian Armed Opposition Political Centre – the political wing of the Freedom of Russia Legion – told CNN that the operation had started on Sunday night and fighting was "ongoing."

He would not specify the number of fighters who had crossed the border into Russia.

Baranovsky said the group wanted to "liberate our motherland from the tyranny of Putin."

In a Telegram post, the groups said they had "fully liberated the settlement of Kozinka of Belgorod region. [The] first groups have entered Grayvoron."

What is the Freedom for Russia Legion?

The Freedom for Russia Legion numbers a few hundred of diehard, battle-hardened Russian volunteers fighting their own people as part of the Ukrainian armed forces.

Caesar is a member of the group. He is a former teacher, a father and has a wife living in Kyiv. He told CNN last year that he had dedicated his life to toppling Russian President Vladimir Putin and marching into Red Square and the Kremlin itself.

He is a devoted member of the Orthodox Church and is nostalgic for the Tsarist era that predated the Soviet Union. His unit is well-equipped with modern armoured vehicles, gunsights and the latest automatic weapons.

The legionnaires themselves have admitted that they're often treated with suspicion by Ukrainian soldiers but hope to win them over with gallantry on the battlefield.

Their apparent incursion along a border that is frequently used by Russian mortar teams and artillery as a firebase for attacks inside Ukraine will help further cement their reputation.

It also serves as part of ongoing psychological operations intended to undermine support for the war in Russia and the fighting spirit of Russian soldiers themselves – signalling that they could be attacked at any time and even by their own countrymen.

Peskov, the Kremlin's spokesperson, said: "Russian forces are working to push out the Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group from the territory of the Russian Federation and destroy it. There are enough forces and means," he told reporters.

He made reference to Bakhmut, which has garnered an outsized importance in the conflict as Russian forces battle to capture the eastern Ukrainian city while failing to make gains elsewhere.