Rosanne Maloney

New rules will cap second and third-year working holiday visas and introduce a ballot system for backpackers wanting to stay longer.

The tourism, hospitality and agriculture sectors in regional Queensland say changes to Australia's migration system, including introducing a ballot system for working holiday makers, will have devastating impacts.

Katrina Beavan, Hannah Moon and Rosanne Maloney Around a normally lively Far North Queensland backpackers' hostel, an unusually sombre mood lingers in the air.

After almost three decades working with at-risk young people through government departments, Rob Hodge found there were limits when working to change things.

Exhausted and fed-up crime victims fill a small hall in the regional Queensland town of Mareeba, determined to have their say on proposed tougher bail laws.

In Far North Queensland the school holiday tourist season is booming but businesses fear they will not be able to keep up with demand in future.

After six months working as a chef in a Far North Queensland kitchen, Rocco Raseri should from today be eligible for his third year working holiday visa.

A teenager who raped a 14-year-old girl in her bedroom in Far North Queensland has been jailed for five and a half years under Queensland's "adult crime, adult time" laws.

A remote Far North Queensland community fears it is being left without police support while authorities try to fill vacancies at its empty police station.

A judge has retired to consider whether a teenager who held a man at knifepoint during a Cairns home invasion is also guilty of raping the man's partner.