The Informer: Politics heats up as beach town bathes in glory

In NSW, four seats headed to the polls in the Super Saturday byelections. Voters in the NSW seats of Bega, Monaro, Strathfield and Willoughby will vote in new representatives, triggered by a wave of resignations from the State Parliament.

While it won't change the party that holds government, it is Premier Dominic Perrottet's first test as the state's leader. In-person voting closes at 6pm but postal votes are due back on February 25, meaning we may not get a result today. Watch this space.

Meanwhile, in Canberra thousands of protesters have gathered to rally against vaccine mandates. The protesters are made up of a number of loosely affiliated groups, such as sovereign citizens, anti-vaccine conspiracists and evangelicals, but have been demonstrating together against vaccine mandates.

Campers from the so-called Convoy to Canberra caused the Lifeline bookfair fundraising event to be closed on Saturday as well as a regular farmers market. Police will be moving them from the campsite on Sunday so the Royal Canberra Show can set up.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison addressed the protesters from Sydney urging them to remain peaceful and respectful. He made the point that other than in the case of aged care workers, disability workers and people in high-risk situations in the health system, vaccine mandates were imposed by state governments.

The PM has also told Australian citizens in Ukraine to leave the country as soon as possible as the situation there is increasingly dangerous. His comments come after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who left Australia on Saturday, said Russia could invade Ukraine at any time and Washington and other countries urged their citizens to leave.

COVID-19 cases numbers are continuing to decline. In NSW there were 8183 new cases and 32 COVID-19 related deaths. Some 1650 people are in hospital with COVID-19 in NSW, after the number of hospitalisations fell below 2000 this week for the first time since January.

Victoria is preparing to lift its code brown pandemic alert on Monday, which means non-urgent surgeries and services will be able to resume. The state reported another 19 COVID-19 deaths and 7224 infections in the previous 24 hours.

Queensland reported 3660 new cases of COVID-19 in the last 24 hours, and 13 deaths. This was a significant drop from the previous reporting period, but the chief health officer said it could be caused by a "technical error" which is likely to be fixed in the next 24 hours.

And good news for people hanging out for Novavax. The protein-based COVID-19 vaccine is set to become available next week.

If you'd rather take a holiday from all thing COVID and politics, one of the world's most photographed spots is in our beautiful country.

*Drumroll* Mission Beach, between Townsville and Cairns in Queensland, has captured the hearts of Instagrammers and Pinterest enthusiasts. Time to plan a trip!

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