Although some limited hearings of trials are now occurring in the Supreme Court in person, The Honourable Justice Bell, President of the Court of the Appeal, has indicated that, absent exceptional circumstances, appeals in the Court of Appeal will continue to be heard remotely for the time being. Practitioners engaged in appeals listed for the rest of this year should proceed on that basis. All information on current restrictions on NSW courts and tribunals is available here.

NSW recorded 12 new cases in the past 24 hours. Victoria has recorded 113 new cases and another six deaths. Confirmed COVID-19 cases are associated with the following NSW locations and have been classified by NSW Health for action:

• Areas and suburbs with increased testing
• Self-isolate and get tested immediately if you've been to these locations
• Monitor for symptoms if you've been to these locations
• Public transport routes

Legislation has passed Federal Parliament allowing the extension of JobKeeper by six months to 28 March 2021. The JobKeeper payment has provided cash flow support to more than 900,000 businesses and income support to around 3.5 million workers to date. The extension will provide further support to significantly impacted businesses and will also see an extension to the vital workplace flexibility that has been available for businesses receiving JobKeeper payments. More here.

Restrictions on the NSW-Victorian border will be eased from this Friday midnight. A new single border region that extends to around 50 kilometres on either side of the NSW-Victorian border and new border permits will come into effect at 12:01am on Friday, 4 September 2020. The key changes will help residents and local businesses operate as Victoria continues to battle COVID-19. More here.

Southern border small business support grants for $5,000 and $10,000 will soon be available for small businesses in 13 Local Government Areas that have been impacted by the closure of the NSW and Victorian border. The grants are designed to provide immediate, short-term cashflow assistance to help businesses survive or adapt to the changed circumstances and will be available through Service NSW from Tuesday 8 September. More here.

Crime across most of NSW has remained stable or fallen in the two years to June 2020 according to the latest quarterly update from the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOCSAR). The only major exception to this is sexual assault which rose 9.4 per cent year-on-year to June 2020. A similar upward trend was reported in the previous quarterly report. As previously reported, crime patterns were significantly interrupted in April 2020 by the pandemic response. More here.

Australian Gross Domestic Product (GDP) fell 7.0 per cent in the June quarter, the largest quarterly fall on record, according to figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). This follows a fall of 0.3 per cent in the March quarter 2020. According to the ABS, the combined effect of the pandemic and the community and government responses to it led to movements of unprecedented size, not only in GDP but also in many of the other economic aggregates in the June quarter National Accounts. More here.