Goulburn Murray schools share in budget spend

Goulburn Murray region schools were the biggest winners in yesterday’s Victorian budget.

The Victorian Government announced $230 million for school buildings and equipment in the budget.

It includes $1.5 million to rebuild the Toolamba Primary School which was badly damaged by fire in February.

There is funding to keep the Tawonga Primary School open and improvements to those at Euroa, Mansfield, Mount Beauty, Myrtleford and Tallygaroopna.

Visitor facilities at the Mount Buffalo chalet will also be improved and an Indigenous dance academy will be established in Mooroopna.

A total of $2 million will be spent planning the future needs of courts including those at Shepparton and Wangaratta.

The Government will also commit $136 million for fire and emergency services.

But Dr Harry Hemley from the Australian Medical Association says there is no mention of funding in the state budget for the Albury-Wodonga Health Service.

He says the Victorian Government is required to contribute its share of money to running the health service.

Dr Hemley says the Government also needs to better plan for growing demand on health services into the future.

“We’re growing at 100,000 people a year, we need to have a plan and how we’re going to address that growth,” he said.

“In the plan you would have things like the Albury-Wodonga cross border arrangement and all of the small hospitals and how they’re going to fit into it.

“That’s what I mean when I say we need a vision for the future – we need a plan for the future.”

Meanwhile, regional police stations have been granted $10 million for improvements, including money to buy land for a new police station in Echuca.

Campaspe Mayor Peter Williams says it has been a long time coming.

“It is very much a run-down facility and it’s undersized and it certainly doesn’t deliver what the police need to deliver – best quality service,” he said.

“It’s exciting that they’ve identified they’re going to purchase land to build the new station and we hope that that will now roll on to a new police station in the next few years.”

The Liberal Member for Benambra, Bill Tilley, says he is disappointed no money has been allocated to expand the Wodonga police station, which is overcrowded.

“We’ve heard the former chief commissioner of police talking about how she’s been working with this Government about the extensions for the Wodonga police station,” he said.

“[But] no certainty and no time line has been given or any money has been committed to Wodonga police station.”

Meet the 72-year-old ex-sprinter who chased a teenage handbag thief

London, Feb 13 (ANI): A teenage girl thief was taken by surprise when her victim, a 72-year-old ex-sprinter, chased her after she ran off with her bag.

When Jean Hirst, a former championship sprinter, started chasing the girl, she had to throw down the bag in her desperation to escape.

Hirst, a retired teacher, had allowed three teenage girls into her car to help her with directions after getting lost on the way to a theatre.

However, she was back to her sprinting days when one of the girls tried to make off with her bag.

“Suddenly I felt 18 again. The adrenaline just kicked in and I seemed to turn back the years,” the Telegraph quoted Hirst as saying.

She added: “She had a head start but I covered 70 yards in about 15 seconds and was within two strides of her when she looked over her shoulder and saw me. She probably thought I was an easy target but she shouldn’t have judged a book by its cover. The look on her face was one of sheer amazement and she just threw my bag aside.”

Hirst, a widow, from Mansfield, Notts, then stopped and picked up the bag, which she described as containing her “whole life”, including her purse, keys and address book.

At the age of 17, she was the Nottinghamshire County Schools 100 yards champion and qualified for the final of All England Schools Championship in Ashington, Northumberland. (ANI)

Victoria police launch manhunt for ‘serial arsonist’

Melbourne, Feb.12 (ANI): Police in the Australian state of Victoria have launched a manhunt for a “serial arsonist” after clearing the two men they had arrested earlier of any wrongdoing in connection with bush fires ravaging the region.

Officers confirmed to the Daily Telegraph that a serial arsonist was being investigated in connection with the Gippsland blaze that has so far claimed 21 lives.

According to the paper, over 150 detectives are working on separate investigations related to the fires across the state. The official death toll remains at 181, but it is expected to rise.

Earlier, police in the state’s northeast arrested two men this morning near Taggerty after reports of “suspicious behaviour between Seymour and Yea in relation to the fires”.

A police spokeswoman told Sky News that they were later released without charge.

Police are close to releasing a photo of the Gippland suspect, Deputy Commissioner Simon Overland said, but he would not comment on a rumor that the suspect is a teenager.

“There has been a serial arsonist in this area for some period time and we have been working on that,” Overland said.

“It’s too early to say whether it was that person that was responsible for the fire that happened on Saturday, but that’s obviously something we will follow through,” he added.

The fire in Marsyville is also being investigated for possible arson because of its ferocity. So far eight deaths have been confirmed in the town but it is feared up to 100 of the town’s 519 people might have died.

Victorian Premier John Brumby today confirmed a 15-hectare grass fire at Mansfield, started on Wednesday, was deliberately lit.

Water bombing aircraft were used to quell the fire, which broke out in a pine plantation southeast of the town.

Fires in East Kilmore, between Yea and Seymour, started on Saturday and merged with the Yea-Murrindindi fire creating the massive Kinglake Complex fire. This fire, which was not started by arsonists, has burnt almost 230,000 hectares of land, destroyed 550 homes and killed at least 147 people in a wide area from Wandong, north of Melbourne to Marysville and Taggerty.

Experts have traced the starting point of the deadly Kinglake fire to a paddock on a hill in Kilmore East. (ANI)