VicForests, timber industry leaders and local MPs have lashed a Bunnings management decision to discontinue sourcing timber from VicForests, a decision that will have significant impact on local timber towns and hundreds of jobs. The Federal Court in May found VicForests failed to comply with a regional forest agreement, which breached national environment laws, prompting Bunnings’ decision....

Lou and Sandi Beltrame, along with their daughter, Pirra, have been running the Omeo Caravan Park for more than 12 years. They’ve put their physical and emotional energy into making the caravan park a place where people feel not only welcome but a friend of the family. Ms Beltrame says it’s not a job, but a lifestyle. They lease the caravan park from the East Gippsland Shire with the agreement...

In Buchan, frustration over the delays in bushfire-affected residents having their homes rebuilt is growing. Six months on from the devastating bushfires, which destroyed lives, those who lost their homes in the inferno say bureaucratic red tape is hampering their efforts to re-establish their lives. Jeff and Margie McCole’s timber house on farmland, just outside the Buchan township, was...

East Gippsland has recorded its second positive coronavirus test –the first since March 26. The positive test was announced among last Friday’s updates and amid what is becoming a dangerous spike in cases across Victoria – yesterday the state recorded 191 new cases following two deaths on Monday. The positive case was not tested at the Bairnsdale Respiratory Clinic, indicating the East...

As winter sets in at Wairewa, residents of the small valley, which bore the brunt of the summer bushfires, have become resigned to the slow grind in getting their lives back to normal. Yet, for Robert ‘Red’ Geddes, the past six months since the fires wreaked havoc has gone quickly. “I don’t know where time has gone, it’s just disappeared,” he said. “It’s soon going to be Christmas.” It was only...