When Traralgon 19-year-old Grace Harding was ready to enter the workforce, she knew she wanted to do something practical.

“I wanted to be more than an admin, I wanted to be hands-on,” she told reporters at a press conference in Delburn on Wednesday.

Out of high school, Harding started working as an admin for a construction company, but when a family member sent her a link to a six-week TAFE Gippsland course designed for women looking to enter the growing clean energy workforce, she saw it as an opportunity to step out of her comfort zone.

“I thought, ‘Why not do it? If I don’t like it, that’s okay’ - and I ended up loving it,” she said. 

“It’s a big opportunity with all the power stations, battery hubs and windfarms going on at the moment.”

Harding was among the first cohort of 13 women to graduate from the Women in Trades Clean Energy Taster Program and she is now employed as a trainee operational health and safety advisor at the Delburn wind farm.

Read the full story here.

Gippsland will likely play a key role in whether the surge in One Nation polling translates to the party playing any part in governing Victoria.

Redbridge polling analyst Kos Samaras told the Monitor that polling suggests tight races in the electorates of Bass and Gippsland East - won by Labor and the Nationals respectively in 2022.

A rundown: The Coalition needs 16 more seats to govern in its own right, but this is no ordinary two-way contest between Labor and the Coalition. 

The rise of a serious third player in One Nation means the way voters assign their preferences will be crucial in whether the Coalition can kick Labor to the curb and form government.

“They don’t require a large primary vote to [form government] because it's all about who is winning the three-way contests,” he said.

Read the full story here.

Take a look at a collection of video interviews with Warragul locals below. What will they be thinking about when they enter the voting booth on November 28?

How did an Australian comedy group sneak past the world’s top security?

In 2007, the Australian satirical comedy group, The Chaser, snuck past high-level security at the Sydney APEC Summit by driving a fake Canadian motorcade through police checkpoints with spoof passes.

My colleague Archie Milligan from the National Account made a video about how the blokes from The Chaser got away with it. Check it out below.