PROTECTING Perth’s Christmas lights and making families feel safer could cost an extra $100,000 this year. Perth council staff have asked for the extra money to try and boost attendance along the city’s Christmas light trail, saying “bored families” might be encouraged back for some Christmas shopping if they felt safer. It would also help…

PIG Stable, Beehive Town or Hamlet Where We Melt Things: The true origin of the word Meltham is lost to history. Landgate presumes Meltham is named for a West Yorkshire parish that’s been occupied since prehistory. Its name was recorded in William the Conquerer’s 1086 great survey as Melthā, with no final m, but that…

BITS of Bayswater, Bedford and a sliver of Maylands could become a new suburb dubbed Meltham. During Bayswater council’s consultation on what locals would like to see around the Meltham train station earlier this year, a panel noted it was odd not to have a suburb with the same name and recommended it be applied…

GLYPHOSATE will continue to be sprayed on Bayswater’s weeds, with instant death at the end of a 1000C flame deemed too risky. Bayswater staffers have been reviewing the city’s weed control program after council Lorna Clarke earlier this year questioned the use of glyphosate, which has been linked to cancer during a couple of high-profile…

HELEN TURNER is closing her eponymously-named art galleries in Northbridge and Claremont after 20 years. Family commitments, rather than tough economic times, were behind the decision, Ms Turner said. “[It’s] time to retire and move on gracefully to greater involvement with my growing number of grandchildren and to spend more time with my ageing mother…

MOUNT Lawley MP Simon Millman has urged Parliament’s upper house to pass a bill ending imprisonment for fine defaulters. A 2014 report found the current law sends about 1100 people to prison a year for unpaid fines. While the fine is cleared at a rate of $250 a day, it costs $345 a day to…

A BAN on wheel clamping in Stirling is a step closer. On Tuesday (November 19) councillors unanimously backed a draft local law that would outlaw wheel clamping and regulate the detention of vehicles across the city. The draft law will go out for public comment until January 31, then come back to council for the…