Letters to the Editor: Fast rail a track to no one

The simple facts are that we have long distances between population centres and low populations in those centres and as such, the costs benefits are grossly unsustainable.

For example, the catchment areas for London and Paris have populations equal to the Australian population at each end.

The projected cost recovery fare for a Sydney-Melbourne trip is about the same as a business class airfare and is thus unattainable by the bulk of the population. We should not even think about fast rail in Australia as it is a waste of taxpayers' money.

Michael Lane, St. Ives, NSW

John Mason (letters, July 10) wishes to see Bimberi replaced by "small residential units, consistent with overseas practice". However, he sees the biggest impediment to such a model as being residents' associations, "which would want juvenile delinquents as badly as they want housing commission tenants and mosque-building Muslims".

We belong to a local residents' association and we can assure John that we are not aware of any anti-Muslim sentiment amongst its members. However, it does have public housing policies, based on the principle that public housing is an important social good but must always enhance or at least not detract from the area in which it is located.

The policies call for more transparency, equitable distribution, risk management to protect tenants, neighbouring residents and properties alike, the recognition of neighbouring residents as key stakeholders and more accountability for the impacts of public housing on the areas in which it is located.

Does John believe the association would have adopted such policies if the characteristics described had been present over many decades of an evolving public housing estate?

Does John agree that, if the Government can't adequately resource such policies, perhaps it should re-think some of its more grandiose current spending proposals so that it can resource such a model? More constructive engagement and less sanctimony please John.

Michael and Christine O'Loughlin, Griffith

Yes, the struggle for our equal rights is contentious (J. Reaney, "Role of unions", letters, July 10).

It is a misunderstanding to suggest that the ALP and unions are the only 'social engineers' because that implies that all the rest are part of, and defend, a pre-ordained and static natural order.

Bailing out banks with tax-payers' money and austerity cuts to public services are but two examples of how the powerful protect the grasp they have on our wealth, and values.

There are union members, yes — people like you and me, that understand that the defence of our living conditions means to contest the political and social structures and organisations that produce them.

A lack of shelter and decent homes is one current example of policy failure. The absence of a safe abode creates its own problems and exacerbates others.

Education, and schools, should be regarded as but one element of a bundle of social goods that contribute to our general wellbeing.

As a teacher, and an active union member, I argue we cannot, and should not leave it up to parliament and politicians and the 'faceless' corporate boardrooms to decide what is best for us.

Peter Curtis, Waramanga

Saturday's article ("Unions to hit Brindabella with robo-calls" July 8, p14) raises a number of concerns, even though I have been a member of various unions.

The reported planned action by Unions ACT, apparently to encourage a denial of service attack on Andrew Wall's office, is in principle an attempt to influence a member of the Assembly.

I presume Unions ACT plan to ask callers to 'press 1 so we can patch this call to Mr Wall's office and you can leave him a message' was designed to allow them to argue they are not legally in contempt of the Assembly.

The planned action also suggests Unions ACT has become overly sensitive to scrutiny.

Perhaps (this is) because they (apparently) decide the big issues for the Assembly, and don't appreciate an Opposition member asking questions.

History is replete with examples where undue influence by well-resourced extra-parliamentary bodies has had very undesirable consequences. For example the recent the US election and the rise of the Nazis in intra-war Germany.

Bruce Paine, Red Hill

Rachel Packham's article ("Demolition of flats nears end", July 8, p12-13) recounts the demolition process and what will happen to the cleared land.

On Sunday, July 2, I was there making a video of the demolition of the homes of over 1000 public housing tenants.

More evictions are to come — on both sides of Northbourne Avenue.

Remember how a former chief minister, Kate Carnell, demolished Canberra Hospital in 1997 before the Woden Hospital extension was finished. Kate Carnell's noisy chaos reigned supreme.

Chief Minister Andrew Barr is making the same mistake as Kate Carnell.

Barr has deliberately restricted information about the relocation of public housing tenants (from inner Canberra) lest NIMBY outrage is aroused.

We can only guess how many public housing tenants got new homes.

The best indicator is: The number of homeless people in Canberra is increasing because building homes is much slower than demolishing them.

My video is on YouTube at: Radio Graham — Hard Times In Canberra.

Graham Macafee, Latham

For the first time since 1942 we are under threat of an attack from another country, in this case North Korea.

The government has spent $34.6billion on defence, and what can they do to protect us? Nothing!

The car industry in South Australia was allowed to collapse, but billions are spent on submarine building, by a French company with scandals all round the world. Apart from getting Christopher Pyne re-elected, there seems to be no use for them. They will be useless in any future cyber war. If they are ever finished, they will join the Collins class subs moored at a dock.

Then there is the flawed $24billion swing-wing Joint Strike Fighter – and drones and helicopters and other toys for the boys.

Defence is a sacred cow, and neither the government nor the opposition ever attempts to discuss what all this hardware will be used for.

North Korea can't bomb Darwin, because the Chinese own the harbour — where the US forward base is.

Perhaps they will have a go at the US base at Pine Gap – it should be an easy target. No Australians are allowed there, if that's any consolation.

Richard Keys, Ainslie

It is good to have an ally when you need one to help fight off invaders. It isn't so good when the ally wants to "jump the gun" and make pre-emptive strikes against a small country employing rocket scientists to show its ability to strike and destroy cities over the horizon.

It wouldn't take a rocket scientist to know one direct hit into Seoul or any Western city will be his last and his kiddies back home will be orphans. If his whole family is living in North Korea, the risk is not worth the money. They won't be allowed to leave the country. They, with their knowledge, should be rescued. Aerospace labs could use them.

We do not know enough about how the North Koreans are suffering with all this expenditure into weaponry. Defectors to South Korea should be removed to a Western country, not Australia, where they can be protected and be free to talk about life in the north.

Now that we understand more of our neighbours, I believe Russia and China are in a better position to handle relations with Kim Jong-un. The more guns pointed at him, the more rockets he will fire.

When will heads of governments stop thinking in terms of military might and start thinking about people, especially their own military?

We don't need another US invasion to put everyone's lives at risk.

Back off and let Kim Jong-Un hang himself.

Lyn Rutherford, Palmerston

A lot about missile shields in Saturday's Canberra Times, and nothing about the landmark treaty negotiated by the United Nations outlawing nuclear weapons.

A shield sounds very nice, but military technology has been trying for decades to make one, and has so far failed. Not surprisingly, given the problem of trying to shoot down multiple ICBMs travelling at six kilometres a second at a few minutes' notice.

Apart from the fact that it cannot work, there are, as I see it, three main drawbacks to going ahead with plans for a missile shield in Australia: the contracts will swell the already-plentiful coffers of the arms manufacturers with Australian taxpayers' dollars; it does nothing to address the main security problem posed by nuclear weapons, and the "shield" will give us a false sense of security.

The only safety from weapons of mass destruction must come from political agreement, but that is not where the effort is being made.

Harry Davis, Campbell

I wonder if those calling on China to use its influence to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear capability are living in the real world?

Kim Jong-un's experience – like his father's and grandfather's – is that the West does not speak softly and carry a big stick, but rather it shouts a lot and if it carries a stick at all it hardly ever uses it.

An essential precursor to removing North Korea's nuclear threat is regime change, however unpalatable that might be to some, and the only power likely to be able to achieve that safely is China.

The only practical way to secure the removal of the Kim dynasty, while allowing North Korea to remain a vassal state of China, is for China to directly or indirectly have the current Kim removed and a pro-China puppet installed.

Any alternative that might move North Korea closer to the West will never be tolerated by China – and understandably so.

Roger Dace, Reid

In France, our Prime Minister, while speaking on the submarine project, referred to dated war history, saying the two nations fought side by side in World War One.

By 1916, when the 1st AIF first went into action in France, both of Australia's submarines, the AE1 and AE2, had been lost.

Mr Turnbull, why not mention more recent war history such as when a 2nd AIF division defeated Vichy France forces in Lebanon and Syria in about a month, or the hated French nuclear test on a nearby Pacific atoll, or the state-sponsored terrorist attack on the Greenpeace ship, Rainbow Warrior, which resulted in the murder of a photographer crewman.

Adrian Jackson, Middle Park, Vic

North Korea wasn't the only thing on which the recent G20 summit fell short ("Summit fell short on Nth Korea: PM", July10, page 4).

Unsurprisingly, it failed to sway President Trump from the decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord, leaving the US as a minority of one.

It seems that the Trump administration is determined to thumb its nose at the rest of the world and take no serious action on climate change.

It intends to not just continue to use coal for energy, it intends to increase the mining and use of coal. This is despite the now well-known fact that new wind and solar-energy plants – with energy storage – are cheaper to construct and operate than coal-fired plants, and despite the fact that their fuels are non-polluting, cost nothing and will continue to be free for as long as the sun shines and the winds blow.

Douglas Mackenzie, Deakin

Did Bill Deane (letters, July 10) spend NAIDOC week fantasising about ways to disingenuously belittle

Indigenous Australians? Has Bill met an Aboriginal person lately? My experience is the vast majority of our first Australians are brave, coherent, intelligent and welcoming souls.

Matt Ford, Crookwell, NSW

Perhaps someone could remind Senator Smith the Prime Minister has promised the Australian people a plebiscite on same sex marriage. I would think gay people would want Australia to indicate its approval, rather than just a few politicians and have the sniping continue forever.

Lyle Cook, Shearwater, Tas

Why do rates in the Weston Creek area in Canberra cost $325 per year more than the North Shore area in Sydney?

Bruce A. Peterson, Kambah

Way to go Victoria Police! You allow a maniac to mow down civilians city-wide yet your SWAT team shoots a guy and his girlfriend in a King Street bar over a toy costume gun.

Gerry Murphy, Braddon

The ABC's political editor Chris Uhlmann made an excellent assessment of Mr Trump in a short and brilliantly truthful statement. God bless him. I am waiting for his comments on Mr Turnbull and Mr Shorten.

Mokhles K Sidden, South Strathfield NSW

Most surprising that George Pell was apparently spotted in Singapore, given a top Vatican doctor (recently) said he was medically unfit to fly save for jetting about Europe (in) business class. Has there been a miracle?

Thos Puckett, Ashgrove, Qld

So we could have a high speed rail link between Canberra and Sydney in 15 years? It was first proposed in 1984. Let's just wait another 40 years until the pollies get their act together and then it's: "Beam me up, Scotty."

Tom Lindsay, Monash

Jailed Nobel peace prize winner, Liu Xiaobo in China, is arguably the biggest democracy hero on the planet. He is now suffering terminal liver cancer. His crime was to call for the end of communist single-party rule.

Rod Matthews, Melbourne

I care, Rex Williams, I really care (about what is happening in Yemen) (letters, July 6), but the rest of the world, let alone this country, does not.

Mary Murray, Braddon

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