You know, most people couldn't care less about trams and cycle paths. Given the almost threefold increase of our rates, most ordinary folk would prefer to see basic services return to a decent level. Is it too much to ask for roads to be resurfaced properly instead of stones being left to be driven into by cars, potholes to be filled in correctly and in a timely fashion, rubbish strewn on the sides of roads to be collected and debris removed from major thoroughfares such as the Tuggeranong Parkway and Monaro Highway?

Basics, people, basics!

Fiona Hume, Banks

I wonder if those responsible for running the National Museum are aware of one of the museum's greatest treasures?

The school holiday program, which is run by a group of talented staff (and their helpers), shows teaching and learning not only at its best but also what is appropriate for the 21st century in which today's students live and will work.

Each holiday, the museum program is linked to the current exhibition, medieval life this time. The children are taught a bit about the exhibition and then go on to create their own crowns and shields to take home, with the final step helping to build a medieval village which will continue to grow until the end of the holidays.

The program is teaching at its best, with the children automatically wanting to produce creative objects because they are interested and all ideas are acceptable and encouraged. What makes it outstanding is that the staff involved in organising the program are given freedom to come up with appropriate ideas. They own the program and therefore enjoy doing it, which in turn enthuses the kids.

It seems a far cry from the formality and competitiveness we force upon our schools, particularly national testing, which dates back to the 20th century when those advocating it would themselves have been educated.

Well done, museum staff.

Audrey Guy, Ngunnawal

Northbourne Avenue is a mess and getting worse.

In a desperate bid to get votes, the Liberal Party proposes giving yet more of the green space to motor vehicle traffic. Desperate stuff and ill considered. The Greens et al want to build a tram.

The concept of an avenue of trees dividing two single-direction sets of roads renders the park-like centre strip all but useless. Nice to look at but difficult to get to.

Griffin seemed to propose a single road flanked by lesser roads to service local traffic, not an avenue of trees dividing two roads.

Perhaps the planners need some creative rethinking. What would be wrong with, say, a six-lane road to one side of the space with the two pairs of lanes on the outer edges permanently single-direction and the two centre lanes variable so that the road would respond to the traffic load. Add to this fewer crossroads (read traffic lights) and some pedestrian bridges to make crossing safer (and less disruptive to vehicles).

This may help to reduce the logjam at peak hour, but more importantly, it would give us back a large swath of accessible parkland that could accommodate the "train set", a wide, useful multi-use path and some recreational spaces.

Peter Gamble, Queanbeyan

Gee! So many great letters in the paper today (September 29), my heart rate remained wonderfully steady for a change.

Given that I recently gave him a serve on a different issue, I need to say how much I agreed with James Allen that the international causes for Islamophobia are patently real; and H.Ronald's related letter on political correctness was totally on the money. Rod Olsen on the lies we are being told about free trade; and Janet Rickwood on the militarisation of our police were also standouts.

Wow! Could this presage more balance and less PC fiction in the Comment section?

Here's hoping!

Greg Ellis, Murrumbateman

Malcolm Turnbull's race to prominently eulogise Shimon Peres' death this week stood in contrast to his total silence on the death of another former president just last week – Italy's highly regarded Carlo Ciampi.

It mirrors Kevin Rudd's well-documented race to pay respects at the deathbed of magnate Richard Pratt in 2009, whose private company, Visy, had recently been fined $36million for price-fixing.

I don't recall any prime minister ever rushing to the deathbed of any other noted businessman – even the major philanthropist Franco Belgiorno-Nettis in 2006.

By racking my brain, I hope to find a pattern to this complex puzzle.

Alex Mattea, Kingston

Apparently, for casual employees, employers can submit supercontributions to the funds quarterly.

If you worked in July, you might not see your super contribution in your fund account until October.

This means employees lose three months' worth of interest on their super contributions, while employers have the benefit of those funds for an extra three months.

Such long delays increase the risk that casual employees will lose track of their contributions.

In these days of automation, such delays should be deemed unacceptable.

Wendy Hutton, Florey

It makes me sick to see Australia's politicians ignoring decades of warnings by climate scientists about fossil fuels, global warming and climate change.

When Tony Abbott became prime minister in 2013, his first act on taking office was to sack the Climate Change Commission for telling us the truth.

As PM, Malcolm Turnbull is equally wary of the truth – lest donations to the Liberal party from fossil fuel (and big business) companies dry up.

What is the truth? Climate scientists say billions of people burning fossil fuels (like there's no tomorrow) will make extreme weather even more extreme. How many monster storms and state-wide power outages will it take before we stop dithering and act (with might and main) to reduce carbon emissions?

Sadly for the planet, we will probably do nothing. Why?

God or evolution forgot to give us a self-restraint gene. We're fossil-fuel addicts with no brakes and no hope.

Thank God I'm 78 and won't see Carbogeddon.

Graham Macafee, Latham

Thank you James Allan (Letters, September 29) for his letter. Radical Islam, any radicalism, is among the many real and extremely complex issues we face and we certainly should not shy away from an open assessment of these problems in their correct context and with the nuanced approach they deserve.

To paint all Muslims as radicals, particularly in Australia, is an argument fuelled by misinformation and irrational fears. It exacerbates divisions and intolerance, aligning perfectly with the agenda of the preachers.

Isn't this paradoxical? Open multiculturalism is not a one-sided experience but a mutual exchange: it may not hit the headlines with the same banners, but in the West mainstream Islam has long started the process of transition into a moderate, 21st century version of itself. The terrorist attacks and very public atrocities against moderate currents inthe countries listed by MrAllan in his letter are a further case in point.

If we want to stop and reverse this process of integration, isolate all Muslims and trigger a perpetuating cycle of radicalism and terror, there's certainly no better strategy than the social segregation proposed by those who manipulate the argument to endorse their politics of territoriality.

That approach draws very blurred and arbitrary lines, and our history has many similar precedents to offer (McCarthyism, the segregation of Japanese Americans, just to pick a few).

Those lines, however, tend to shift very quickly, never solved any problem nor did they survive the test of time. I hope we have come that far.

Luca Biason, Latham

I agree with Greg Ellis (Letters, September 29) that it is difficult to conduct a reasoned and rational debate on subjects as vexed as religious and cultural intolerance. When ignorant people are passionate, any beliefs and prejudices that are rooted in mythology are very likely to overrule humanitarian ideals that are rooted in fact.

In reflecting upon the French Revolution, Edmund Burke observed that "superstition is the religion of feeble minds". He might equally have said "religion is the superstition of even feebler minds".

Of course both Islam and Christianity are rooted in mythology. But this does not mean their adherents are not deserving of compassion, respect, comfort and acceptance, especially when in need.

When "real" Australians reject Muslims because they possess a different set of beliefs, these "real" Australians reject their own humanity. They are moral empty vessels, vacuums, devoid of understanding and incapable of reason and rationality. The vitriol oozing from Mr Ellis' correspondence underscores my point perfectly.

Rob Westcott, Reid

That a jurisdiction in a first-world country could fail to ensure energy security is evidence of the ideological trap that awaits leaders who surround themselves with climate change zealots and commercial rent seekers.

South Australia has been let down badly by their political elites and Victoria is rushing headlong down the same path.

Most galling is the fact that the mix of power-generating hardware is a relatively straightforward engineering problem if it is guided by sound policy, properly funded and left to the technical experts.

Sadly I have no confidence that we will correct this policy madness any time soon.

H. Ronald. Jerrabomberra

The contentious same-sex marriage plebiscite debate muddies the issues.

The changes asked for are these:

1. Remove the necessity of celebrants to establish whether a party is legally a man or a woman which can prohibit transgender, intersex or people with indeterminate sex from marrying.

2. To get all state and territory law changed to accept adoption, surrogacy, IVF in line with married heterosexual couples.

3. Legalise all same-sex marriages conducted overseas.

4. Affirm that marriage is a personal choice expressing a person's commitment to another person. The ability to produce children from the relationship becomes irrelevant.

Those who prefer no change fall into three groups; those who do so on religious or moral grounds; those who do not believe the Marriage Act discriminates and wish to retain the traditional definition of marriage; and those who want to see same-sex relationships receive full recognition under a different name.

Sylvia Miners, Isabella Plains

Jonathan Bradley describes Donald Trump as dangerous, ignorant and unpleasant ("Petulant Trump no business being president", September 28, p17). Still, there is just a few weeks left for the world to find out if the American people do not mind having such a person as their next president.

Frankly, I don't expect either the US' allies or the rest of the world to be celebrating, should Trump end up at the White House.

Sam Nona, Burradoo, NSW

ENTHUSIASM LACKING

Such is their complacency and indifference that neither Andrew Barr nor Shane Rattenbury chose to attend a meet the candidates forum held by the Inner South Canberra Community Council this week. If they cannot find the time to talk to their local constituents, why should we bother voting for them?

S. Begg, Barton

RECORD ACT

Tony Eastaway has just bowed out as treasurer of the Australia-Indonesia Association (ACT), having served for 44 years as a committee member of the association. There must surely be a place for Tony in Guinness World Records.

John Milne, Chapman

DEATH WITH DIGNITY

Three in five suicides nationally are aged over 54, "with the highest rates being in men over 85 years" ("Suicides on the rise in Canberra", September 29, p9). I would imagine that most of those reflect the increasing social acceptability of death with dignity.

Gary J. Wilson, Macgregor

BILLBOARDS ON OUTER

It seems that some election billboards – those that show the faces of Barr and Rattenbury and the succinct threat that under Labor our rates will keep rising and billions spent on a light rail – are getting under the thin skins of Labor and/or Green voters in Woden.

Several posters were destroyed or pulled down in the last couple of days on Butters Drive.

Someone feeling nervous ?

Christina Faulk, Swinger Hill

NO ALTERNATIVE

I do not want to vote Liberal but I feel I have no choice.

The ALP/Greens' refusal to have a referendum on a hugely expensive project with known opposition means that I will have to put up with a right-wing, Catholic, morally po-faced mob for three years in order to get rid of Barr's sheep.

George Beaton, Greenway

TESTING TIMES

Bill Gemmel (Letters, September 28) once again uses sarcasm (the lowest form of intellect) against those ACT ratepayers who are opposed to the tram/light rail. Contrary to Bill's assertion, no sensible government would have entered into such a fundamentally dangerous contract without giving its intention the ultimate test – taking it to an election.

Michael Doyle, Fraser

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