The state Opposition Leader Mark McGowan has labelled as "out of control" fee increases for TAFE courses from next year. The Government flagged the increases months ago but the new fees were only published yesterday. Mr McGowan says the cost of a Diploma of Nursing will rise 390 per cent next year. He says the increases will result in fewer people enrolling and lead to skills shortages.

The Royal Life Saving Society says WA's latest drowning figures, which reveal a 50 per cent increase on the previous year, should serve as a warning ahead of the festive season. A new report shows 31 people drowned in the state in 2012. Children under the age of four were the highest risk group for drowning and near drowning. Older people over the age of 55 were also at risk.

The charity food provider, Foodbank, says there has been a big increase in middle class people seeking help in regional WA this holiday period.

The latest survey of the cost of living in regional WA has shown a significant drop in living costs in the state's north. The State Government assesses the cost of 500 goods and services in 27 regional centres as part of the Regional Price Index every second year.

A hoax claiming the Church of Scientology was planning a nine-storey development at an iconic Albany site in WA's South Coast has infuriated local authorities.

Travel back through time with us and take a look at 2013 in the South Coast and Great Southern.

Thieves have caused significant damage to a shopping centre while trying to steal an automatic teller machine in Albany.

A bobcat was used to ram an ATM at an Albany shopping centre.

Police in Albany suspect an attack on an automatic teller machine may be linked to a similar incident on the south coast a a few months earlier.

Authorities are warning the Great Southern and lower Wheatbelt need to be on alert over the next few days, with sweltering conditions expected to create a serious fire danger.

Police in Albany are investigating an aggravated burglary on Saturday afternoon.

Like sex and birth, death has always been hushed up. Death Cafes are a forum where there are no answers, only questions, says Sigari Luckwell of Bunbury.

A number of Western Australian south-west and Great Southern projects have received funding to clean up contaminated sites.

How many worms can you count in an hour? Albany backyard farmer Bede Harold claims that he can count one thousand red wrigglers an hour. Bede also believes it is his worms that are the key to his vegetable patch.

Clubs WA has hit out at the recommendations in a review of Western Australia's liquor laws released yesterday, claiming its interests have been ignored. The review of the Liquor Control Act released by the State Government makes 141 recommendations, including the introduction of secondary supply laws which make it an offence to supply liquor to a juvenile on an unlicensed premise without parental consent.

The Fair Work Ombudsman will be auditing retailers across Perth and regional Western Australia, in response to a spike in complaints.

Detectives have charged two people after discovering a clandestine drug laboratory in an Albany house.

Iron ore miner Grange Resources has launched an internal review of its proposed Southdown magnetite mine, near Albany, to see if the project start-up can be cheaper than the estimated multi-billion-dollar cost.

The developers of a proposed multi-million dollar shopping centre development in Denmark say they are appealing against a decision to refuse planning approval.

Analysts say it makes sense for Grange Resources to examine trying to get its Southdown project, near Albany, off the ground sooner by starting on a smaller scale.

Agricultural lobby group WA Farmers says the decision not to allow some struggling farmers access to the Government's concessional loans package is very disappointing.

The Town of Narrogin says the latest proposal to merge with the neighbouring Narrogin Shire is just weeks from being finalised.

Police are investigating a spate of bushfires in Albany over the weekend, which it is suspected may have been deliberately lit.

Albany's resident snake catcher shares her passion for chasing reptiles.

Albany's peak business lobby is calling for closer cooperation between the city's businesses, in a bid to ensure the region capitalises on November's Anzac centenary commemorations.

The Maritime Union says it has made concessions and lowered a pay claim to try to forge a new wages deal for support staff in the offshore oil and gas industry. The union is now seeking pay rises of 22 per cent over four years from marine contractor, Tidewater, down from its original claim of 24 per cent over the life of the agreement.

Leaseholders in the Western Australian south coast holiday community of Peaceful Bay have expressed concerns over a proposal to transfer their property leases to more conventional ownership titles.

"We'd rather be taken by a grey nurse than a nursing home."

A prominent businessman on Western Australia's south coast has been sentenced to eight years and six months in jail for attempting to hire a hitman to murder his estranged daughter-in-law. Brian Vincent Attwell paid $10,000 to an undercover police officer who had posed as a hitman in September last year. The court heard the 74-year-old was angry over legal action after his son's divorce and he was motivated by "sheer hatred" of Michelle Attwell. The trial was played recordings of the businessman saying his daughter-in-law had cost him hundreds of thousands of dollars, and he wanted her "strangled and buried".

Police have charged an Albany man who allegedly attempted to import hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of methylamphetamine from Mexico.

An elderly woman has been indecently assaulted while walking her dogs at an Albany school.