A sinkhole roughly 8–10 m wide and several metres deep has opened on the AJ Burkitt Reserve sporting oval in Heidelberg, directly adjacent to the North East Link tunnel alignment in Melbourne’s northeast. Victorian Infrastructure Delivery Authority has confirmed the “surface hole” is in the vicinity of active tunnelling operations, leading to a work pause while engineers and emergency crews carry out geotechnical investigations and monitoring. No injuries or structural damage have been reported, but the area remains fully cordoned off pending cause determination and stability assessment.

MPs have pressed the environment minister on whether large-scale river dredging will be adopted to reduce rural flooding during extreme rainfall, amid pressure from farming communities hit by repeated winter overflows. The debate centres on whether increasing channel capacity by removing bed sediment and vegetation in rivers such as the Severn and Wye offers better value than upstream storage, washlands and natural flood management. Engineers will need to weigh short-term conveyance gains against impacts on bank stability, habitat loss, maintenance cycles and downstream flood peaks.

Government plans to promote supermarket-sold plug‑in solar panels, with Lidl preparing low-cost balcony units, are drawing strong safety warnings from Hollis energy director Stuart Patience and trade bodies ECA and NFRC. Concerns centre on non-competent DIY installation into unknown domestic circuits, lack of UK-specific product testing, fire risk from PV and potential add‑on battery storage (thermal runaway, unextinguishable high‑rise fires), and extra loading and combustibles on balconies. Critics argue current grid connection rules, building safety regimes and accreditation frameworks for rooftop and façade systems are not configured for mass plug‑in deployment.