And as ever, sport provided the highlights with tennis ace Ash Barty becoming world number one, Australia winning the Ashes on English soil, Dave Warner ending his horror run with a stunning 335 not out to start the Australian test summer and even the Blues winning Origin for the second year in a row.

There were some big arrivals – baby Archie for Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle – and some happy departures, good riddance backpacker killer Ivan Milat dying from painful oesophageal cancer.

END OF EVIL

Milat’s final insult, an attempt to get the state to foot the bill for his funeral, was thwarted by Corrections Minister Anthony Roberts who took the money from his prison account.

“His corpse has now been unceremoniously incinerated and he will pay for it,” Mr Roberts said.

Mother nature played a big role in NSW this year – with a crippling drought leaving a large part of NSW in its third year of drought and parts of the north going into the eight year of the big dry.

Sydney has gone onto Level 2 water restrictions, a luxury level for the farmers looking at dusty, brown bone dry paddocks and mounting bills.

But people do care. With spending drying up in bush communities the Buy From The Bush campaign has encouraged city customers to buy from rural retailers and become a nationwide movement.

The dry conditions have also led to an unprecedented number of bushfires across the state with a state of emergency declared twice as the extreme heat and strong winds stoked giant fires across the state.

More than 5000 firefighters were drafted in to battle the blazes that ringed Sydney and shrouded the Harbour City in smoke. On Thursday four giant fires around Sydney were at emergency level with houses lost and firefighters injured.

Rural Fire Service commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said the losses of homes left fire fighters shattered. “They’re devastated by loss no matter what, but it just goes that little further when it’s your own home, or the colleague you’ve got sitting on the fire truck next to you, having lost their home, while they’re out saving others.”

Emergency responders were also kept busy in 2019 with gun and knife wielding attackers. Bodybuilder Daniel King opened fire on Penrith police station, leaving one officer with wounds to his head, before embarking on a one hour shooting rampage that ended with him being shot dead.

EVERYDAY HEROES

And bystanders in the Sydney CBD were the first to respond and stop knife wielding stabbing suspect Mert Ney using chairs and a milk crate after he allegedly killed escort Michaela Dunn and stabbed another woman in the back.

In the political arena Gladys Berejiklian overcame a robust Labor campaign to become the first woman to be elected as the premier of NSW. She did it on the back of a giant infrastructure spend that promised the delivery of the long-awaited the northwest rail link and the $2.9 billion light rail.

However that did not go so well. The trams started running in December and immediately became a “trambles” with breakdowns, emergency stops, passengers stuck on stationary trams medical episodes and an incident of projectile vomiting.

QUIET AUSTRALIANS SPEAK UP

Prime Minister Scott Morrison also won the Federal election. He credited “the quiet Australians” for returning him to office in a victory that saw shell-shocked Bill Shorten step down as Labor leader.

It was an election of people power where with former Prime Minister Tony Abbott losing his seat to independent Zali Steggall after a ferocious local campaign.

Mr Morrison said the victory was for “those Australians who have worked hard every day, they have their dreams, they have their aspirations: to get a job, to get an apprenticeship, to start a business, to meet someone amazing. To start a family, to buy a home, to work hard and provide the best you can for your kids. To save for your retirement and to ensure that when you’re in your retirement, that you can enjoy it because you’ve worked hard for it. These are the quiet Australians who have won a great victory tonight.”

He celebrated with a beer as he cheered on his beloved Cronulla Sharks the next day and vowed to govern quietly with less noise from the “Canberra bubble” on the front pages.

But just how that has translated has been less impressive. The Australian Federal Police raided the home of News Corp Australia’s Annika Smethurst and the ABC Sydney headquarters in June. The raids were intimidating and aimed at reporting that was in the public interest and relied on whistle blowers.

It prompted a rare show of unity with media executives from News Corp Australia, Nine newspapers and the ABC travelling to Canberra. They called on the Morrison government to act on a six point plan to protect the public’s right to know about the serious issues that go to the heart of Australian democracy.

And the Morrison government and Veterans Affairs Minister Darren Chester have also been silent on The Daily Telegraph’s Save Our Heroes campaign which is calling for a Royal Commission into veteran suicide.

The newspaper is backing Julie-Ann Finney, who has collected 250,000 signatures calling for a Royal Commission since her Navy poster-boy son Dave took his own life in February. Both the Labor Party and the NSW Government have called for a Royal Commission as has Australia’s most decorated war hero Ben Roberts-Smith who said: “One veteran suicide is too many”.

But Mr Morrison has merely said he “has not ruled out a Royal Commission” and will think about it over the Christmas holidays.

ISRAEL’S HOLY WAR

Freedom of speech also became a big issue in sport this year with Rugby Australia terminating Israel Folau’s contract for posting a meme on social media quoting Corinthians that homosexuals would go to hell.

Folau, a fundamentalist Christian, launched legal proceedings in the Fair Work Commission in a legal battle that dragged on for eight months before he claimed “vindication” after receiving an apology and multimillion-dollar payout from Rugby Australia.

It seems unlikely Folau will land a sporting contract in Australia, or possibly even overseas given his refusal to keep his strong beliefs off social media, and may join his father Eni as a full-time preacher at their Truth Of Jesus Christ Church in Sydney.

There were plenty of other sporting highs and lows. The Daily Telegraph’s Phil Rothfield revealed the secret document showing hundreds of thousands of dollars of payments that plunged the Cronulla Sharks into a crippling salary cap crisis.

The Wallabies crashed out of the Rugby World Cup in Japan in the quarterfinals with a 40-16 loss to England. Coach Michael Cheika received a fusillade of criticism for his stubborn refusal to alter his one dimensional game plan to tackle the poms.

When he quit even his own players had no sympathy with Quade Cooper tweeting: “If he actually cared about Aus rugby he would have done it a while ago.”

The world of swimming was rocked by the out-of-touch governing body FINA’s decision to punish Australian Mack Horton’s for his refusal to join Chinese cheat Sun Yang on the podium at the World Championships in South Korea.

Drug cheat Yang had been let off on a technicality despite a FINA doping panel report finding he had deliberately used a hammer to smash vials of blood collected from him for drug testing.

Meanwhile Australian swimming star Shayna Jack faces a four year suspension after testing positive to an anabolic steroid that she insists may have come from cross-contamination.

But there was good news too. On the track the Chris Waller trained Yes, Yes, Yes won The Everest, the world’s richest race on turf, and jockey Glen Boss rode Kolding to victory in the first Golden Eagle at Rosehill.

In tennis, down-to-earth French Open champion Ash Barty became the world number one after beating Julia Gorges in Birmingham.

CELEBRITY BIRTHS, DEATHS AND MARRIAGES

The world of showbiz saw the departure of celebrity agent John Fordham, who died aged 75 after a long battle with throat cancer, and the arrival of model Jennifer Hawkins and Jake Wall’s baby daughter Frankie.

Jesinta Franklin also revealed she is pregnant with her husband Lance ‘Buddy’ Franklin’s first child after trying to conceive for years.

Liam Hemsworth and Miley Cyrus announced their unexpected split after less than a year of marriage with Cyrus launching straight into a fling with Kaitlynn Carter. She is now linked to Cody Simpson while Hemsworth’s sister-in-law Elsa Pataky rallied to his support and said Hemsworth “deserves much better.”

Golden couple Sam and Phoebe Burgess also split while Bindi Irwin got engaged to American wakeboarder Chandler Powell.

And Aussie pop duo The Veronicas were booted off a Qantas flight from Sydney to Brisbane after Qantas staff called the Australian Federal Police because they had become disruptive. Singers Jessica and Lisa Origliasso denied that and said they have received no explanation from the airline for their “embarrassing” exit.

Next year is already off to a flying start with the revolving doors in the worlds of television and radio seeing the return of Karl Stefanovic to Nine’s Today show and ousted Chris Smith to 2GB.