Australia’s government finally took up the central bank’s call for economic stimulus in its annual budget, with a A$75bn (€51bn) infrastructure plan as its centrepiece.

Wildfires destroyed eight houses and cut electricity lines in southern Australia, plunging much of Victoria state into chaos as hundreds of thousands were left without power, a fire official said today.

SOARING temperatures and high winds fuelled bushfires raging across Australia last night, razing at least six homes in rural Victoria and forcing the evacuation of villages in the Snowy Mountains near the capital, Canberra.