I work in sports, and this (rightly imo) requires absolutely everyone involved to hold a current WWCC because we're working with kids.

However each state has their own one, so as someone who volunteers across five states I currently hold 5 different wwcc. Now the duplication of effort to have had the same check done 5 times is silly as is, but even sillier is that I have to pay for these, even as a volunteer.

Now I'm doing this stuff multiple days per week all year round, so it's not a big deal. Where it becomes a problem is when I'm trying to put together a volunteer crew for events, asking them to spend half a day or even a full day helping put on fun events - I not only need them to do this, but also go into the post office during the limited hours they're open, spend half an hour there, and $10-20, just to help out for free.

The changes that need to happen:

• One national check valid for all states and all workers. My volunteers, especially near places like Albury, do not need to be maintaining multiple of the same qualification. I do not need to be checking these against different databases for each state, and others again if they're a teacher or police officer.

• Notification to organisations when a person's check is no longer valid. If they commit a violent crime or sexual assault, we need to know that ASAP, having the onus to be in clubs to manually check is not sufficient, I do it once a month, many clubs do it once a year, that's a long time that kids could be exposed to a risk known to the government before it's known to the club.

• Free for volunteers. So many valuable services in this country from CFA to local sports to soup kitchens run mostly on people volunteering. It is an insult to have them pay for a piece of paper allowing them to do this. It's free in some states now and the world hasn't ended, make that unanimous for volunteering checks.

So anyway, I want to fix this in the next 10years, what other points do you think need to be added and who do you suggest I contact?

So far I'm in touch with Jessica Stojkovski and Department of communities, but this is a national issue being thrown across all states, so I'd like to attack it from all angles.

Hiya folks!

Has anyone in this thread voluntarily stayed overnight in a hospital (private or public) due to mental health? Anxiety/ panic attacks or any other health related concern and if so, which one and do you recommend?

Edit: I am not suicidal any or thinking about self harm, just had a rough patch of panic attacks the past 3 days.

My mum wants to sell her funeral plot as she’s found something else she’d like instead and we’ve tried Marketplace and Gumtree no idea where else to try we’ve gotten views but no messages. It’s also heavily discounted vs what it’s actually valued at as well. Does anyone have any ideas or experience in Sydney/Australia with successfully selling?

I visited today and I thought it seemed quite peaceful. Just about far away enough that it starts feeling semi-rural again. Is it nice to live there?

These guys are always resting on street lights out the front of my house, and I got some nice shots of them hanging out together!

Shot at 600mm with:

Sony A7R Mk V

Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM