‘We have learned lessons. And we are listening,’ mayor says.

The son of a "gentle, funny, caring" Gold Coast mother has been charged with her murder after the 61-year-old's body was found in the boot of a car.

Wendy Sleeman's body was found inside her blue Honda Jazz on January 26 after she went missing two days earlier.

Police were called to the 61-year-old's Elanora home on January 24 but Sleeman was missing when police arrived 30 minutes later.

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A crime scene was declared after police allege a large amount of blood was found at the property.

Her son Slade Murdok was arrested a day later and charged with various domestic violence-related charges and criminal counts of kidnapping, assault, stalking and attempted arson.

The 30-year-old was denied bail when he faced court on January 26.

After a two-day search for the missing woman, electronic data led police to a garage in Wilston where they found Sleeman's body.

Queensland Police today charged Murdok with one count of murder (domestic violence).

Murdok did not face Brisbane Magistrates Court today and was instead represented by his solicitor Rodney Keyte.

Police prosecutor Eddie Fraser told Magistrate Belinda Merrin on Tuesday that Murdok was not required to appear in person or via video-link for the murder charge to be heard.

Keyte told the court his client had an "unusual request" to pass on to the magistrate.

"He has an injury to his hand … he asks for an order that fingerprints not be taken until it has healed," Keyte said.

Merrin said she did not understand the request and did not know which power would be used to grant it if she could.

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Murdok was ordered to reappear at Southport Magistrates Court on February 14, where he is also due for a further hearing on the domestic violence-related charges related to Sleeman's alleged abduction.

Meanwhile, Detective Inspector Brendan Smith fronted the media this afternoon to ask for help identifying the movements of Murdok's white Ford laser sedan with the registration 483ZPG before and after the alleged kidnapping on January 24.

"We believe this was the vehicle used by [Murdok] to travel to the Gold Coast," Smith alleged.

"We believe he was in Surfers Paradise earlier in the day when he attended [Sleeman's] workplace.

"We also believe he used that to get to Elanora."

Police seized the car from nearby the Elanora property and it has undergone forensic examination.

"It will come out that he's returned to try and collect recover that vehicle but we've already got it," Smith alleged.

Smith alleged Murdok may have picked up fuel somewhere for the attempted arson attack at the Elanora home and asked for any details from the public in finding out where this was.

Smith alleged Murdok planned the alleged abduction and murder.

"There is certainly evidence in the part in the investigation there was a lot of planning involved, a clear example of that is the hiring of the storage unit in Brisbane where the car was located," Smith alleged.

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"There have been other things located which suggest he had other plans moving forward but because of the interjection of us and his arrest, that failed to materialise.

"I think he certainly had a plan to get away with it."

Brisbane Magistrates Court on Friday held a brief hearing on separate charges filed against Murdok last year.

Murdok had been released on bail at the time of Ms Sleeman's alleged murder last week.

He was charged with the serious assault of a police officer, physically obstructing a police officer and contravening a police order to supply his full name and address on April 14 at a house in Ferny Grove in Brisbane's outer northwest.

The 2022 matter was adjourned until May 19.

Sleeman's brother and sister said today they are "profoundly saddened" by the Gold Coast woman's death.

"We can now lay our beloved sister to rest," Mike and Meg Sleeman said in a statement released by police.

"She was gentle, funny, caring, clever, loved her labradors and always thought of other people before herself.

"We will miss our beloved sister forever and ask for you to respect our privacy at this terrible time."

If you or someone you know is impacted by sexual assault, domestic or family violence, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit 1800RESPECT.org.au. In an emergency, call 000.

Help is available from the Men's Referral Service on 1300 766 491.

The first flight from new airline Bonza has taken off, marking a new chapter in Australian aviation history.

Bonza has pitched itself as a low-cost, ultra-Aussie airline. 

The airline is doing things a bit differently.

READ MORE: Why cheaper airfares could on the horizon

Rather than buying tickets from a website, Bonza directs customers to download their app and do so there.

If you don't want to download the app, the only other option is to go to the travel agent.

Where will Bonza Airlines fly?

Bonza has been set up to serve less common routes, usually involving regional airports.

That means, for now, there are no flights going to Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide or Perth.

All flights to Melbourne land at Avalon.

The current routes are:

• Cairns to Rockhampton
• Cairns to Mackay
• Sunshine Coast to Avalon
• Sunshine Coast to Mildura
• Sunshine Coast to Cairns
• Sunshine Coast to Mackay
• Sunshine Coast to Townsville
• Sunshine Coast to Whitsunday Coast
• Sunshine Coast to Coffs Harbour
• Sunshine Coast to Newcastle
• Sunshine Coast to Port Macquarie
• Sunshine Coast to Albury
• Sunshine Coast to Rockhampton
• Townsville to Rockhampton
• Newcastle to Whitsunday Coast

Bonza said flights from its second base at Melbourne Airport will go on sale "in a matter of weeks".

Flights to and from Tamworth, Toowoomba Wellcamp, Gladstone and Bundaberg are listed as "coming soon".

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Who owns Bonza?

Bonza was founded by Tim Jordan, Lidia Valenzuela and Peter McNally, and Jordan is the CEO.

But the majority stake in the airline is owned by 777 Partners, an investment firm based in Miami, in the US.

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What are Bonza Airlines' prices?

Tickets begin at $49 one-way for shorter flights.

The longer flights cost up to $79.

"We are about travel for the many, not the few," Jordan told Today.

"We are about visiting friends and relatives and that's our focus."

What is Bonza Airlines' food like?

Bonza says it has an all-Australian menu of food and drinks, which you order and pay for on board.

Like many other low-budget airlines, there are no complimentary in-flight meals.

Bonza does not allow you to view the menu until you are on board.

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Fraudster Melissa Caddick's luxury home in Sydney's affluent eastern suburbs has finally settled for nearly $10 million.

The Dover Heights property was purchased last October by a mystery buyer, and three months on the price tag has been revealed.

"The sale price of the property was $9.8 million, which we consider a good outcome given the current market conditions," Bruce Gleeson, Principal at Jones Partners, the receivers of Melissa Caddick and Liquidators of Maliver Pty Ltd, said.

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The five-bedroom, four-bathroom home features a double garage, pool and expansive views of Sydney's harbour.

It was hoped the sprawling mansion would sell for about $10 million, with the profits going to the victims of Caddick's fraud.

Last December Caddick's jewellery, artworks and other luxury items were sold off to repay her investors.

READ MORE: Caddick's husband makes claim for watches, jewellery, paintings

The collection of extensive high-end designer goods came to a total of $884,618 at the auction.

Gleeson said today liquidators had received the proceeds from this auction, plus funds and documents from Christian Dior Australia.

In December, the fashion house was ordered to relinquish more than $262,000 linked to Caddick.

Caddick disappeared in November 2020, hours after the Australian Federal Police and Australian Securities and Investments Commission raided her Dover Heights home in Sydney's eastern suburbs.

Three months later the 49-year-old's decomposing foot, encased in a running shoe, was found on Bournda Beach on the state's South Coast. She is presumed dead.

It is believed about 74 victims lost at least $23 million through Caddick's Ponzi scheme, over which she was set to face a string of charges. 

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For the first time in a year monthly retail turnover in Australia has dropped – an indication the rising cost of living is starting to change the way Aussies spend their money.

Data released on Tuesday by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed retail sales dropped 3.9 per cent in December, the first fall in monthly since the same time in 2021.

"The large fall in December suggests that retail spending is slowing due to high cost-of-living pressures," ABS head of retail statistics Ben Dorber said.

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While some might expect retail figures to be much higher in December due to Christmas spending, Dorber said more and more Aussies were doing their holiday shopping earlier in the year, taking advantage of sales to alleviate the impact of the rising cost of living.

"Retail businesses reported that many consumers had responded to these pressures by doing more Christmas shopping in November to take advantage of heavy promotional activity and discounting as part of the Black Friday sales event," he said.

"Seasonal spending patterns continue to change and evolve around Black Friday and the holiday period."

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Food was the only retail industry whose turnover increased, up by 0.3 per cent, while the likes of department stores (-14.3 per cent), clothing, footwear and accessories (-13.1 per cent) and household goods (-7.8 per cent) all fell.

Cafes, restaurants and takeaway food services were largely unchanged from the month before.

Despite the falls in December, overall retail spending still increased over the course of year, up by 7.5 per cent since the start of 2022. 

It is the second time in as many years that Australian retail spending has dropped in December.

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In 2021, turnover dropped 3.7 per cent in the last month of the year – although that came after a number of significant rises which followed the lifting of lockdowns in NSW and Victoria.

The retail figures come a week after the ABS revealed annual inflation had risen to 7.8 per cent, a higher-than-expected number and the highest increase over the course of year since 1990.

The Reserve Bank is expected to raise interest rates once again next Tuesday.

Beneath the surface of the ocean is a world of colour, creativity and childhood nostalgia waiting to be discovered.

The planet could cross critical global warming thresholds sooner than previous models have predicted, even with concerted global climate action, according to a new study that used machine learning.

The study estimates that the planet could reach 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming above pre-industrial levels in a decade, and found a "substantial possibility" of global temperature rises crossing the 2 degrees threshold by mid-century, even with significant global efforts to bring down planet-warming pollution.

Data shows average global temperature has already climbed risen around 1.1 degrees to 1.2 degrees since industrialisation.

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"Our results provide further evidence for high-impact climate change, over the next three decades," noted the report, published on Monday in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Under the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, countries have pledged to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees — and preferably to 1.5 degrees — compared to pre-industrial levels.

Scientists have identified 1.5 degrees of warming as a key tipping point beyond which the chances of extreme flooding, drought, wildfires and food shortages will increase dramatically.

Temperature rises over 2 degrees could bring catastrophic and potentially irreversible impacts, including pushing three billion people into "chronic water scarcity".

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The study used artificial neural networks — a type of machine learning or artificial intelligence — which scientists trained on climate models and then used historical observations of temperature around the world "as independent input from which the AI makes a prediction," said Noah Diffenbaugh, a professor at Stanford University and a co-author on the study.

Diffenbaugh and his co-author Elizabeth Barnes, a professor at Colorado State University, assessed three different scenarios: low, medium and high "forcing" climate pathways, which refer to the intensity of the heating caused by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

In all three scenarios, the scientists estimated that the world would hit 1.5 degrees of warming between 2033 and 2035, even if planet-warming pollution is substantially reduced.

Diffenbaugh said that while "individual years are likely to reach 1.5 degrees sooner," their predictions "are focused on how long until the global mean temperature was warmed 1.5 degrees".

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The study's prediction is in line with previous models. In a major report published in 2022, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimated that the world could cross the 1.5 degrees threshold "in the early 2030s".

Where the study departs from many current projections is in its estimates of when the world will cross the 2 degrees threshold.

While the IPCC projects that in a low emissions scenario, global temperature rises are unlikely to hit 2 degrees by the end of the century, the study returned more concerning results.

The AI predicted a probability of around 80 per cent that 2 degrees warming will be reached before 2065, even if, over the next half century, the world reaches net-zero — where it removes at least as much planet-warming pollution from the atmosphere as it emits.

If emissions stay high, Diffenbaugh said, the AI predicted a 50 per cent probability that 2 degrees will be reached before 2050.

There is "clear evidence that a half degree of global warming poses substantial risks for people and ecosystems. Hence, the greater the global warming, the greater the challenges for adaptation," Diffenbaugh said.

While many net zero decarbonisation pledges and targets have been framed around holding global warming to 1.5 degrees, he added: "The AI predictions in our study suggest that those may be necessary to avoid two degrees".

The use of machine learning to make predictions is increasing in climate science, Diffenbaugh said.

"The AI is able to learn the most reliable indicators of how long is left until a given global warming level is reached in a large number of sometimes contradictory climate model predictions," he said.

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New Zealand's biggest city hit with landslips as it braces for more flooding to come.

A nurse has opened up about the disturbing levels of trauma and neglect frontline workers are confronted with on a daily basis in remote communities in the Northern Territory.

Warning: This story contains content that some readers may find disturbing.

Rachel Hale has spoken out about confronting incidents of child abuse she witnessed first-hand while working in the public health system in Alice Springs as the territory and federal government grapple with how to handle a crime wave plaguing the town.

READ MORE: What is happening in Alice Springs?

"In my career, I've seen a child aged four come in with anal warts. I've seen a girl as young as six with vaginal sores," the nurse of 14 years told 9News.

"Last year, there was a two-year-old who was raped."

Hale moved to the NT seven years ago and flies into Alice Springs for work every eight weeks.

She claimed the abuse is just a snippet of the disturbing stories that are often not heard about in the media, but are happening daily in Central Australia.

https://omny.fm/shows/ben-fordham-full-show/kids-are-being-raped-at-home-harrowing-call-from-a/embed?style=cover

Crime is on the rise in Alice Springs, with residents reporting a surge of break-ins, vandalism and alcohol-related assaults.

The latest data released by NT Police showed alcohol-related assault jumped 55 per cent in the last year to November, while domestic and common assault both increased by 43 per cent and 54 per cent, respectively.

Commercial break-ins were up 56 per cent and reports of property damage climbed by almost 60 per cent.

Hale said crime and anti-social behaviour are out-of-control, with vision she posted on social media of what she could see from her hotel balcony on the weekend just an example of what locals witness on any given night.

Children run rampant through the streets, hitting and kicking stunned pub patrons and spitting on publicans.

"I have never felt so terrified in my life, I feared for my life that night," she said. 

This comes after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's six-hour visit to Alice Springs last week.

He announced new alcohol restrictions, some starting on Monday, which aim to reduce the availability of takeaway grog.

But Hale said politicians are missing the key issues.

"The home life of these children is horrific," she said.

"It's much safer for these kids to be on the street than at home."

A report from the newly appointed Central Australia regional controller will be handed to the Commonwealth this week, mapping out a plan forward on alcohol restrictions.

But for locals on the ground, there is a much bigger issue at play.

Mayor Matt Paterson earlier said "senseless and destructive behaviour" was a continual problem in Alice Springs as he called for intervention and better police resources.

"It needs to get better. We need help. As I said, people are leaving Alice Springs in droves," Paterson said.

"If we don't address it, there will be no Alice Springs left."

If you or someone you know is impacted by sexual assault, domestic or family violence, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit 1800RESPECT.org.au.

In an emergency, call Triple Zero (000).