Rallies of nurses are under way in 20 locations around the country.

‘It wasn’t a pretty sight.’

Bringing a child into the world should be one of the happiest moments of your life but some Aussie women are being forced to give birth without pain relief due to maternity ward closures.

Maternity wards in Geelong, Victoria, Gladstone, Queensland and Burnie, Tasmania have recently closed, forcing pregnant women and their families to travel large distances to give birth.

Gladstone mother Paige McCarthy told Today she was due to give birth in Rockhampton but when the time came she was too far along to be transferred from Gladstone Hospital.

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"I was faced with having to birth in Gladstone without any pain relief or any obstetricians, it was just my midwife who was going to be there," McCarthy said.

"Thankfully I had a really successful birth and everything went to plan, which I couldn't have been happier with.

"But I did have a complication post birth and had about a two litre haemorrhage. so I had to go to Rockhampton post birth."

READ MORE: Teenager charged with police assault after fight in Gold Coast

McCarthy said it took eight hours for the ambulance from Rockhampton to arrive and she had to stay there for four days.

It meant she was also separated from her newborn daughter.

"I wasn't able to be close to my family and close to my key supports which I needed to have during that difficult time as well."

About 400 "bypass babies" had been born in Gladstone.

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"I think we've had a change so they've allowed low risk births will begin to start with a new phase that's come in which is fantastic that we've gotten to that point.

"But it really shouldn't have taken us almost 12 months to achieve something like that for a town that has over 60,000 people."

Podcaster of Australian Birth Stories Sophie Walker said the regional maternity ward crisis was a huge problem.

"We have known that the best model of care for mothers and babies is to have a known care provider through their pregnancy, during their birth and in their post-partum… yet eight per cent of Australian women have access to that."

"Although things are really dire in Gladstone, it is almost a temperature check for what's unfolding across the country."

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Former President Donald Trump says he's not making much money from his social media network but estimates it is worth between $7 million and $37 million, according to his personal financial disclosure form filed Friday.

He owns about 90 per cent of his social media company, Trump Media & Technology Group, but said he made less than $300 from it.

He also reported he made between $150,000 and $1.5 million for a series of digital trading cards he released in December that portrayed a photoshopped Trump in a series of cartoon-like images, including an astronaut, a cowboy and a superhero.

READ MORE: The full charges against Trump

The report filed with the Federal Election Commission is the first glimpse into Trump's finances since he left the White House and launched several new business ventures.

The real estate mogul and reality TV star launched the platform Truth Social in 2022, a year after he was banned from Twitter, Facebook and YouTube following the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Although Trump has since been allowed back on those social media networks, he has relied on Truth Social as a primary method of sharing messages with his supporters, especially as he has launched his 2024 presidential campaign.

The report provides limited information since it only reports income in broad ranges.

CIC Digital LLC, the company that owned the digital trading card NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, was valued at somewhere between $750,000 and $1.5 million, according to the report.

Trump also reported he made more than $7 million in speaking fees.

All federal candidates are required to file the disclosures after announcing their candidacies. Trump, a Republican, had been granted an extension and risked a fine if he delayed further.

READ MORE: What a Trump trial will mean for America

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A teenage girl has been charged with three counts of assaulting police officers after a big fight on the Gold Coast.

Queensland Police were responding to an alleged assault at a tram stop along the Gold Coast Highway where a member of the public sustained multiple facial injuries.

"Police took a 15-year-old into custody however while placing her under arrest she became agitated and allegedly assaulted three officers," Queensland Police said.

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Police said three officers received face and body injuries and were taken to Pindara Private Hospital for treatment.

"The 15-year-old has been charged with three counts of serious assault police.

"She has been denied bail and is due to appear at Southport Children's Court."

Another five teenagers aged between 14 and 16 have been dealt with under the Youth Justice Act.

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A European spacecraft rocketed away Friday on a decade-long quest to explore Jupiter and three of its icy moons that could have buried oceans.

The journey began with a perfect morning liftoff by Europe's Ariane rocket from French Guiana on the coast of South America. But there were some tense minutes later as controllers awaited signals from the spacecraft.

When contact finally was confirmed close to an hour into the flight, Mission Control in Germany declared "The spacecraft is alive!"

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"It's a moment of pride for Europe," noted Josef Aschbacher, the space agency's director general. "I'm just relieved and just so happy."

It will take the robotic explorer, dubbed Juice, eight years to reach Jupiter, where it will scope out not only the solar system's biggest planet but also Europa, Callisto and Ganymede. The three ice-encrusted moons are believed to harbor underground oceans, where sea life could exist.

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Then in perhaps the most impressive feat of all, Juice will attempt to go into orbit around Ganymede: No spacecraft has ever orbited a moon other than our own.

With so many moons,— at last count 95 — astronomers consider Jupiter a mini solar system of its own, with missions like Juice long overdue.

"We are not going to detect life with Juice," stressed project scientist, Olivier Witasse.

But learning more about the moons and their potential seas will bring scientists closer to answering the is-there-life-elsewhere question. "That will be really the most interesting aspect of the mission," Witasse said.

Juice is taking a long, roundabout route to Jupiter, covering 6.6 billion kilometres.

It will swoop within 200 kilometres of Callisto and 400 kilometres of Europa and Ganymede, completing 35 flybys while circling Jupiter. Then it will hit the brakes to orbit Ganymede, the primary target of the €1.6 billion mission (nearly $2.6 billion).

Ganymede is not only the solar system's largest moon — it surpasses Mercury — but has its own magnetic field with dazzling auroras at the poles.

Even more enticing, it's thought to have an underground ocean holding more water than Earth. Ditto for Europa and its reported geysers, and heavily cratered Callisto, a potential destination for humans given its distance from Jupiter's debilitating radiation belts, according to Carnegie Institution's Scott Sheppard, who's not involved with the Juice mission.

"The ocean worlds in our solar system are the most likely to have possible life, so these large moons of Jupiter are prime candidates to search," said Sheppard, a moon hunter who's helped discover well over 100 in the outer solar system.

The spacecraft, about the size of a small bus, won't reach Jupiter until 2031, relying on gravity-assist flybys of Earth and our moon, as well as Venus.

"These things take time — and they change our world," said the Planetary Society's chief executive, Bill Nye. The California-based space advocacy group organised a virtual watch party for the launch.

Belgium's King Philippe and Prince Gabriel, and a pair of astronauts — France's Thomas Pesquet and Germany's Matthias Maurer — were among the spectators in French Guiana. Thursday's launch attempt was nixed by the threat of lightning.

Juice — short for Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer — will spend three years buzzing Callisto, Europa and Ganymede. The spacecraft will attempt to enter orbit around Ganymede in late 2034, circling the moon for nearly a year before flight controllers send it crashing down in 2035, later if enough fuel remains.

Europa is especially attractive to scientists hunting for signs of life beyond Earth. Juice will keep its Europa encounters to a minimum, however, because of the intense radiation there so close to Jupiter.

Juice's sensitive electronics are encased in lead to protect against radiation. The 6,350-kilogram spacecraft also is wrapped with thermal blankets — temperatures near Jupiter hover around minus 230 degrees Celsius. And its solar panels stretch 27 metres tip to tip to soak in as much sunlight that far from the sun.

Late next year, NASA will send an even more heavily shielded spacecraft to Jupiter, the long-awaited Europa Clipper, which will beat Juice to Jupiter by more than a year because it will launch on SpaceX's mightier rocket. The two spacecraft will team up to study Europa like never before.

NASA has long dominated exploration at Jupiter, beginning with flybys in the 1970s by the twin Pioneers and then Voyagers. Only one spacecraft remains humming at Jupiter: NASA's Juno, which just logged its 50th orbit since 2016.

Europe provided nine of Juice's science instruments, with NASA supplying just one.

If Juice confirms underground oceans conducive to past or present life, Witasse said the next step will be to send drills to penetrate the icy crusts and maybe even a submarine.

"We have to be creative," he said. "We can still think it's science fiction, but sometimes the science fiction can join the reality."

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An Australian man has been charged with foreign interference after allegedly compiling a number of reports for spies working for another nation.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) charged the 55-year-old man with one count of reckless foreign interference after an investigation sparked by ASIO, the nation's top spy agency.

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The AFP allege the man, who runs an overseas business, provided reports for two foreign intelligence agents after they approached him offering to pay for information about Australian defence, economy and security arrangements.

He was arrested in the Sydney suburb of Bondi on Friday to face court on Saturday. He faces a maximum jail term of 15 years.

More to come…

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Jarryd Hayne has been jailed after a bid to remain on bail before his sentencing for rape was denied.

The 35-year-old disgraced former NRL star hugged his crying wife before he was taken into custody by court sheriffs today when Crown prosecutors succeeded in having his bail revoked in the NSW Supreme Court.

Hayne had been allowed to remain on bail since he was found guilty of two counts of sexual intercourse without consent earlier in April after a judge found he could be "vulnerable" in custody ahead of sentencing on May 8.

READ MORE: Sydney mum shares entire conversation with alleged scammer

Justice Richard Button said on Friday Hayne was "remarkably" still on bail after being found guilty and it was "inevitable" the 35-year-old will be jailed.

"It is proven that Mr Hayne is a man who sexually assaulted a woman," Button said.

The question was when.

Hayne's barrister Margaret Cunneen SC argued there were "special" or "exceptional" circumstances requiring the bail he has complied with for more than four years be continued until he is sentenced.

Then he can be almost immediately be classified as a prisoner in need of protection, rather than placed on remand with other prisoners awaiting sentence.

He would be held in "oppressive" and isolated conditions while on remand.

Hayne's crime has attracted an unprecedented amount of attention, more akin to a high-profile murder, and out of proportion with the actual gravity of the two sexual offences he has been found guilty of, she said.

Many details of the case remained unknown to the general public.

"There was a closed court for evidence, as there should be," Cunneen said.

However, it meant a "baying mob" had become involved in a "toxic" social media campaign in response to his crimes, committed over 30 seconds by someone with no other criminal history, Cunneen said.

"Mr Hayne suffers from the default position he is a sex offender of the most debased and worst kind," she said.

The "terrifying" posts also reach the prison population, she said.

https://twitter.com/DamoNews/status/1646689264338599936

Crown prosecutor Brett Hatfield said some of the posts were years old.

The restricted conditions required by his need for protection were no different from others in protective custody or isolation, for various reasons, Hatfield said.

Many offenders have young families whose lives are disrupted by them entering custody.

"It is not by itself special or exceptional such that it would justify being released on bail," he said.

Hayne previously spent more than nine months in custody before an earlier guilty verdict was overturned, requiring the third trial, and the resumption of a prison term.

"To recommence it with something as oppressive as 25 days in isolation, represents something that is exceptional," Cunneen said.

The judge was not convinced.

"The fact is, all prisons are inherently places of deprivation of liberty," he said.

"If Mr Hayne should otherwise be in custody, that circumstance should hardly stand in the way of it," Button said, before revoking Hayne's bail.

9News understands he will be taken to Silverwater Prison and will remain there until he is sentenced on May 8. 

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Hayne faced a third trial and spent nine months in custody following an earlier guilty verdict that was overturned on appeal due to "profoundly wrong" legal directions given to the jury before it deliberated.

The jury in the first trial was discharged without reaching a verdict.

Hayne was found guilty of sexually assaulting a woman with his hands and mouth after attending her home on the night of the 2018 NRL grand final.

She cannot be identified.

A taxi Hayne paid $550 to drive him to Sydney following a bucks weekend waited outside the suburban Newcastle home while he played the woman songs on a laptop and watched the end of the grand final as her mother sat in the living room.

Following the assault, the pair cleaned blood off of themselves in the woman's ensuite and Hayne continued to Sydney, the trial heard.

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The case was confirmed this evening in the Nelson Marlborough region.

Outgoing CEO Jim Stabback admitted ‘with hindsight’ he would have stayed in his office.