As the day unfolded:Man charged over abduction of Cleo Smith;Victoria records 1247 new local COVID-19 cases,nine deaths;NSW records 308 local cases,four deaths

Good evening and thank you for reading our live coverage of the day’s events. If you are just joining us now,here’s what you need to know.

Man charged over abduction of Cleo Smith

NSW and Victoria open their borders to each other for fully vaxxed

Regional NSW of concern to health authorities

NSW,Victoria hopeful of swift vaccine rollout to 5 to 11-year olds

Queensland records three new COVID-19 cases

More COVID-19 cases in Canberra as vaccine rates soar

Man dies in New Zealand while self-isolating

This isMichaela Whitbourn signing off on the blog for tonight. My colleagueBroede Carmody will be back with you early tomorrow.

The NSW and Victorian premiers said the border announcement was thanks to the hard work of people in both states who rolled up their sleeves and got vaccinated against COVID-19.

In NSW,89.1 per cent of people over the age of 16 are double-dosed,and in Victoria,82.5 per cent of people in the same cohort are fully vaccinated.

“NSW is set to pass 90 per cent double dose vaccination in the near future,with Victoria not far behind,allowing family and friends to be reunited in the lead up to Christmas after many months of being separated,” NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet said.

“The milestone has only been made possible because people across NSW and Victoria have rolled up their sleeves and led the nation on the road back to normality thanks to our vaccination rates.”

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews thanked Victorians and people in NSW for getting vaccinated,and said “we’re delighted to be able to have free travel between the two states once again”.

“Victoria and NSW have been through so much over the last few months,and we’re pleased that more families will now be able to reunite just in time for Christmas and the holiday season.”

NSW and Victoria will open their borders to one another from 11.59pm tonight,the states’ premiers have announced.

A joint media release from Dominic Perrottet and Daniel Andrews said on Thursday the move would come as both states normalised “living with the virus”.

Victoria’s Acting Chief Health Officer Professor Ben Cowie declared that from 11.59pm,the ACT and all remaining “orange zones” in NSW would become “green zones” under the state’s traffic light travel permit system.

“This means,for the first time in more than six months in Victoria,all local government areas in all states and territories across Australia will be green zones for the purposes of entering Victoria,” the premiers said.

Travellers entering Victoria from green zones face no quarantine or testing requirements,but still have to obtain a permit before they arrive,the media release said.

“There are no requirements for fully vaccinated Victorians entering New South Wales,unless they have been to a place of high concern in Victoria.

“A Victorian who is over 16 years and not fully vaccinated is not allowed to enter NSW for recreation or a holiday.”

The man accused of abducting four-year-old Cleo Smith from her family tent in the coastal town of Carnarvon in Western Australia and holding her captive for 18 days had a doll room inside his house.

Terence Darrell Kelly,36,was picked up by WA Police after detectives raided his locked Tonkin Crescent home at 12.46am on Wednesday local time and found the little girl alone inside a bedroom.

On Thursday,Mr Kelly was charged with forcibly or fraudulently taking or enticing a child and appeared before Carnarvon Magistrates Court.

WA Police Detective Senior Sergeant Cameron Blaine said Cleo was found in physically good health in a bedroom inside Mr Kelly’s house.

“The lights were on and she was playing with toys,I think that’s about all I want to say. This is still a matter that needs to go before the courts. There’s certain aspects about what we saw that is going to be evidence,” he said.

Detectives declined to comment on whether dolls were found inside the house,with the head of Taskforce Rodia,Superintendent Rod Wilde,telling journalists he “didn’t want to go into that”.

Since his arrest,video has emerged of Mr Kelly recording himself inside a room filled with dozens of dolls,some still in their packaging.

The man also uploaded photos to Facebook in April 2020 taking a doll for a drive in the car,captioning the post,“I love taking my dolls for drive arounds and doing their hair and taking selfies in public”.

Read the full story here.

WA Police have charged a 36-year-old man over the abduction of four-year-old Cleo Smith,who was rescued by police on Wednesday morning after an 18-day search.

Terence Darrell Kelly is facing a charge of forcibly or fraudulently taking or enticing a child. He appeared in Carnarvon Magistrates Court today and was remanded in custody. The case returns to court on December 6.

Mr Kelly was picked up by WA Police after detectives raided his locked Tonkin Crescent home at 12.46am on Wednesday local time and found the little girl alone in the house.

WA Police Detective Senior Sergeant Cameron Blaine said Cleo was found in physically good health in a bedroom inside Mr Kelly’s house.

“The lights were on and she was playing with toys,I think that’s about all I want to say. This is still a matter that needs to go before the courts. There’s certain aspects about what we saw that is going to be evidence,” he said.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has announced Moree will be declared a restricted border zone area from 12.01am tomorrow after an outbreak of COVID-19 in the northern NSW town.

“Residents in Moree will no longer have access across the Queensland border,except in exceptional circumstances including essential healthcare.”

NSW recorded 308 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19,an increase of 118 on yesterday’s total of 190.

The Hunter New England Local Health Districtaccounted for 103 of today’s new cases and is an emerging area of concern after “super-spreader” events,including a funeral in the town of Moree.

Foreign Minister Marise Payne has defended the federal government’s decision to sign a document underlining the importance of the French submarine program just weeks before it cancelled the contract.

Senator Payne and Defence Minister Peter Dutton held avirtual meeting with their French counterparts on August 30,just 17 days before Australia announced a new defence alliance with the United States and United Kingdom that involved tearing up the French contract.

Australia and France signed a joint communiqué at the time agreeing to “underline the importance” of the submarine agreement.

France’s ambassador to Australia,Jean-Pierre Thebault,pointed to the communiqué on Wednesday as a key piece of evidence supporting the country’s claim that it had been deceived by Canberra.

Senator Payne said the meeting was “needed to discuss the full range of the relationship,which is,after all,a very broad one,and broader than the future submarine program itself”.

“There had been no decisions made at that time,and Australia is very focused… on our national security,” she told Sky News.

“And I don’t think removing oneself from a meeting of that nature while no decisions had been made was an appropriate thing to do.”

Senator Payne also said the AUKUS agreement with Britain and the United States was about much more nuclear-powered submarines.

“I think,perhaps,we would miss the point completely if we ignored the fact that the premise of the decision that Australia made was our agreement to participate in an extremely important trilateral partnership with the United Kingdom and the United States,” she said.

As reported earlier in the blog,WA Premier Mark McGowan paid a visit to four-year-old Cleo Smith and her family today after police recovered her early on Wednesday from a house in Carnarvon and reunited her with her parents and younger sister. She had been missing since October 16.

Mr McGowan,who came bearing gifts of two teddy bears,said Cleo was a “delightful little girl”.

In case you missed tuning into Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews’ press conference earlier,he said he hoped the federal government would make an announcement “quite soon” about vaccinating five to 11-year-olds,preferably before the end of the school year.

“We don’t have a paediatric vaccine at this point. We will do,though,” he said.

“It’s really pleasing that the[US Food and Drug Administration] and the Biden administration have not only got approval,but have ordered literally tens of millions of these doses.

“It would be great to think that we could make a dent into[vaccinating children under 12] before the school year ended,rather than having them out and about all over summer,hopefully doing what kids over summer - having fun - but without the protection of being at least first-dosed.”

Mr Andrews said the issue of getting children under 12 vaccinated would be among those on the agenda at Friday’s national cabinet meeting.

As we reported earlier,to date,81 per cent of Victorians aged 12 and above have been fully vaccinated and 92.2 per cent have received their first dose of the vaccine.

Victoria surpassed more than 10 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines administered across the state on Wednesday.

The lead detective investigating the abduction of Cleo Smith has implored the community to refrain from circulating “wild theories” on social media,as the four-year-old and a suspect in custody are interviewed by police.

A 36-year-old man from Carnarvon,about 900 kilometres north of Perth,was taken into custody by WA Police on Wednesday morning after he was apprehended by officers in a separate location to where Cleo was found,18 days after her disappearance.

Charges have not yet been laid against the man.

WA Police Deputy Commissioner Col Blanch said earlier today that the man was taken to hospital on two occasions as a precautionary measure before being brought back to Carnarvon police station where the interview process was expected to continue on Thursday afternoon.

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“We’ve had to take him off to hospital a couple of times to check on his medical status,” he told radio station 6PR.

“It’s really a precautionary matter,I don’t believe it’s a serious issue.”

Detective Superintendent Rod Wilde said Cleo was a young and vulnerable witness,so specialist interviewers would speak with her. Her interview was expected to start today.

“Physically,we believe she’s good,” he said.

“We really need to establish exactly what’s taken place over all of those days[she was missing].

“We believe it was a spontaneous event that she was removed from the tent taken by this person.

“Cleo’s welfare is paramount and the first and most important thing here … we take a very careful approach when we speak to children of such a young age and being through such a traumatic event.”