Sydney - The scientists who each year accompany Japanese whaling boats to the Southern Ocean say minke whales are getting lighter because competition for krill is getting more intense.

Their study, published in the journal Polar Biology, relied on the examination of 6,779 specimens of the smallest whales. It stated that over the past 18 years minkes have lost 9 per cent of their blubber because of more intense competition among whales and the effect on krill numbers of climate change.

The quality of the research was criticised by Australian Antarctic scientist Nick Gales.

Sydney - The Australian Labor Party's monopoly on government ended Sunday when its branch in Western Australia conceded defeat to a coalition of conservative parties.

A week after a state election resulted in a hung parliament, the National Party threw its support behind Liberal leader Colin Barnett, allowing him to claim victory and become premier of the resource-rich state.

Sydney - Carmakers need a government subsidy to roll out the vehicles that Australians want to buy, an industry lobby group said Sunday.

The three local carmakers - Toyota Motor Corp, GM Holden Ltd and the Ford Motor Co - only make big, petrol-thirsty cars that have lost their appeal because of higher petrol prices and environmental concerns. Smaller cars, all of them imports, are what the customer wants.

Sydney  - An Australian civil libertarian who has spent over a year in jail for refusing to register her car Friday lost a Supreme Court appeal against a sentence she argues runs contrary to "Bible-codified common law."

Losalina Rainima will be released on Sunday but the likelihood is that she will again offend and be back behind bars because of her view that "all living things are given graces - the birds fly, the fish swim, the kangaroo hops - and I've been given the graces to drive."

Rainima is one of 3,000 members of the United People Movement Against Road Taxes (UPMART), which claims to protect human rights through "Bible-codified common law."

Sydney - Australian officials Thursday defended its purchase of a 910-square-kilometre cotton farm so the 20 billion litres of water it uses can be returned to the draught-stricken Murray-Darling basin that the nation relies on for its food and fibre production.

Toorale Station, only slightly smaller than Hong Kong, was bought at auction for 24 million Australian dollars (19 million US dollars) from its British owners.

"Returning this water to the Darling will begin to turn around the long-term decline of this once great river," Climate Change Minister Penny Wong said.

But she warned that the gains - water equivalent to 20,000 Olympic swimming pools - would not reach the Murray-Darling estuary near Adelaide.

Sydney, Sept. 11 : New South Wales Police Minister who lied about dancing around his office in his underwear and allegedly simulating a sex act with another MP, has resigned.

Matt Brown quit on Wednesday night after reports emerged about the party. There were also reports that he had simulated a sex act on a female MP, but the MP denied that had happened.

"I''m a human being and I made a mistake and I''m going to cop the consequences of that mistake,'''' news. com. au quoted him, as saying.