8:24 AM AEDT | More than 20 students were told there was no room for them at Maitland TAFE because of “budget cuts”. But Hunter TAFE has “unequivocally” denied there were any cuts to funding in the hospitality courses.

8:23 AM AEDT | Haylea Best’s career in hospitality is in tatters because she was turned away from a place at Maitland TAFE yesterday. The 17-year-old dreams of working in a restaurant and becoming a qualified chef and she wanted to complete a Certificate IV to give her some experience and help her find a job.

8:25 AM AEDT | The heat is on to complete the Rural Fire Service Hunter Zone control centre in time for the next fire season. Maitland will become the centre of operations for the new Hunter zone, a conglomerate of Maitland, Cessnock, Port Stephens and Dungog local government areas, with a multi-million dollar headquarters to be built on Mount Vincent Road.

8:31 AM AEDT | Danielle Redding and Kally Lewis stand at opposite ends of the sporting field. Redding guards the goals with her gloves as the custodian of her team, while Lewis goes full steam ahead as a striker trying to dazzle defenders and put the ball into the back of the net.

8:34 AM AEDT | The one and only time Australia hoisted the World Cup aloft was in 1986. It was the same year Simon Orchard was born.