Our Journalists

Matt JohnstonMajor Projects Editor

Matt Johnston is major projects editor at the Herald Sun. He is a former state political editor who has covered local, state and federal politics since 2008. He is a three-time Quill award winner and a Walkley Awards finalist.

@Media_Matt

Matt Johnston

Latest

World Cup

Emerging Matildas player Nia Stamatopoulos and friend Eleni Georgopoulos.Picture by Wayne Taylor 29th August 2020.

Matildas’ new Melbourne home base ahead of World Cup

Aussie soccer team the Matildas will be gunning for glory in 2023 when the women’s World Cup is played on our soil — and now a new home base now planned to help them get there.

Coronavirus

Recently arrived overseas travellers get off their bus and wait to check in at the Crown Promenade Hotel in Melbourne, Sunday, March 29, 2020. Travellers who arrive into the country today from overseas are being sent straight to makeshift quarantine facilities across Australia. Travellers will spend 14 days of quarantine in state-funded hotel rooms, with doors guarded by state police, defence personnel or private security guards.A shutdown of non-essential services is in effect Australia wide in a bid to slow the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) disease. (AAP Image/Scott Barbour) NO ARCHIVING

VicPol wanted to ‘avoid military presence’ at hotel quarantine

Recordings, text messages and emails tabled at the inquiry into Victoria’s botched hotel quarantine program shed new light on Victoria Police’s role in deciding how security would be run.

Victoria

Amy La Verde with daughter Eloise, 18 months, at their new Essendon property. Essendon and other inner city suburbs are noted as great places to live in new stats. Picture: Mark Stewart

Home truth about Melbourne’s affordable suburbs revealed

Melbourne suburbs with the most affordable living aren’t always where you would think. Find out where families get the best bang for their buck once housing and transport costs are factored in.

HS Coronavirus News

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - JULY 14: A police car sits outside the Rydges on Swanston hotel on July 14, 2020 in Melbourne, Australia. The hotel is linked to being one of the sources of Melbourne's coronavirus outbreaks where it accomodated returning overseas travellers for a 14 day quarantine period. Victoria has recorded 270 new coronavirus cases, bringing Australia's national COVID-19 total above 10,000 cases. Metropolitan Melbourne and the Mitchell shire are currently in lockdown following the rise in COVID-19 cases through community transmissions. The new restrictions came into effect on Thursday 9 July, with residents in lockdown areas under stay at home orders until 19 August. People are only able to leave home have for exercise or work, to buy essential items including food or to access childcare and healthcare. Gatherings of groups of more than two or more than a household group are not permitted while school holidays have been extended by a week so children remain home. Retail can remain open and markets are permitted to open for food and drink only. Cafes, restaurants, pubs, clubs and bars are back to takeaway only. Eight public housing estates that have been under hard lockdown have reopened subject to stage 3 COVID-19 restrictions in line with the rest of Melbourne, while the tower at Alfred Street remains under hard lockdown while health authorities continue COVID-19 testing. (Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

State govt warned about lack of hotel quarantine PPE in April

A Labor-linked company providing doctors for the hotel quarantine program warned the state government about a lack of PPE in April, it can be revealed.

exclusiveVictoria

Plan to reboot Victoria’s economy revealed

A daring new plan to restart the state’s post-pandemic economy is in the works, including 66 projects designed to create 300,000 jobs. And it has unprecedented bipartisan support. SEE THE PLANS.

Coronavirus

MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA - NewsWire Photos AUGUST 23, 2020: A couple walking on the Tan Track in Melbourne on Sunday morning during stage 4 Covid lockdown.Picture: NCA NewsWire / David Geraghty

‘Not under my watch’: health chief’s promise as cases fall

Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton is determined Victoria’s COVID-19 numbers will be driven down and remain low, saying the state would not see days of 300-plus new cases again. It comes as 17 Victorians died of coronavirus overnight, with a further 208 new cases recorded.

ExclusiveHS Coronavirus News