People with Disability Australia human rights adviser Ngila Bevan says restrictive practices used by families and carers to manage family members with disability represent "inhumane and degrading treatment and constitute violence" ('Former carer says she was directed to tie up disabled woman', August 8, p2).
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While I have never had to deal with the unimaginable challenges involved in such situations, I don't think it is good enough for Bevan to simply condemn the actions of some of those who are, without offering meaningful advice on alternate effective methods that should be used in such situations?
In the absence of such guidance, Bevan's comments will surely succeed only in adding to the stress of those struggling to meet their responsibilities as carers, as well as those in need of care.
John Richardson, Wallagoot, NSW
Barbarous practices
Like Jon Stanhope (Letters, August 3), I find it frightening that Australia is among the nations authorising and using torture.
It frightens me because of what it says about the capability and quality of our governance.
Let us be clear: the conditions and practices of torture in juvenile detention and immigration detention centres happen not because of a few rogue "bad apples" who work in the system, or because things within the system have "gone off the track".
These barbarous practices occur because our elected officials have decided they should, and have authorised them. Our elected officials initiated the bills, scrutinised and approved the content, and passed the laws that allow such practices to be used.
Politicians, especially ministers, who now proclaim shock at the brutal treatment of children, some as young as 10 years old, in juvenile detention centres are either lying or admitting to gross dereliction of their duties as legislators. Those who declare Australia's cruel immigration detention regime as the only effective way to treat people fleeing persecution are either knowingly deceiving the public or displaying a level of ignorance that renders them unqualified to hold office.
Equally frightening is what it says about us that we are allowing Australia to descend from being an international champion of human rights to a pathetically weak nation whose best response to those in need is their imprisonment and torture.
Eileen O'Brien, Kambah
Bully on notice
The eagles are taking flight across East Asia. The accommodators cannot claim that Australia is merely the United States' lickspittle when the entire region is putting the local bully on notice.
"Indonesia has blown up hundreds of illegal fishing boats, not just from China. Now Malaysia is getting in on the act." ('China has gone ballistic since the Hague ruling', August 7, p16)
Vietnam is rearming and Japan is reinterpreting its constitution. China is hearing the voices of the region and the world.
It "has changed its laws to arrest and jail anyone caught fishing in waters Beijing considers its own". Previously, it just shot them.
Gary J. Wilson, Macgregor
Far, far away
Jill Sutton, of Watson, bemoans the fact that suburbia is encroaching on Lanyon and other south-western areas (Letters, August 8). As an Ainslie lad in the 1960s, I undertook the journey to my holiday labouring job in the far-flung, undeveloped, new growth areas in faraway Watson and Downer.
David J. Richards, Moruya, NSW
Tangle of trams
Kevin Cox (Letters, August 5) has drawn a distinction between trams and light rail, but one wonders how it helps.
He emphasises the fact that a light-rail system has its own infrastructure so its operation is unhampered by road traffic – but that is only half the story.
The other half is that a true light-rail system does not hamper road traffic either, so as to achieve a win-win situation.
In our case, although cars using Northbourne Avenue won't trouble the tram/light rail, the reverse isn't true.
The impact of our tram, or whatever you choose to call it, will be to slow road traffic as traffic lights will often need to stop cars to achieve uninterrupted movement for the tram, and this will mean that, overall, its advantages need to be discounted. Passengers joining or alighting from the tram must cross the three lanes of traffic, which also yields a safety issue which you don't have with true light rail.
Thus, ours has some of the disadvantages of a tram without all the advantages of a true light-rail system.
J. J. Marr, Hawker
Not so bold
Malcolm Turnbull lost the confidence of his party when he was opposition leader because of his inept handling of the so-called "ute-gate affair".
As Prime Minister, he is now making a lot of U-turns of his own principled stands and losing the electorate's confidence.
History might not judge him as a very far-sighted bold leader.
Sankar Kumar Chatterjee, Evatt
Seen nothing yet
Media reports and the British Meteorological Office indicate that the earth may have already passed the 1.5-degree temperature rise target set only eight months ago in Paris.
With population growth and, in the short term, rising standards of living, emissions will rise inexorably. On the evidence, it seems humanity is incapable of curbing these emissions – lack of adequate media coverage, lack of community concern and lack of effective political leadership.
Passing the 1.5-degree target will be nothing compared to what we might see.
Rod Holesgrove, O'Connor
Religion must be held up for the ridicule and contempt it deserves
I was filled with great disappointment as I read news that religion had been afforded further legal protections under recent changes made to the ACT's Discrimination Act ("Move to outlaw vilification in the ACT on grounds of religion," August 4, p7).
A rising awareness of past and present abuses of power and privilege among an increasingly enlightened public threatens not just organised religion's profitability, but its very survival.
But what hope does any society have of freeing itself from the vestiges of these primitive, anti-intellectual, misogynistic and often violent traditions that limit our species in so many ways if religion can't be held up for the ridicule and contempt it deserves?
Some people's feelings may get hurt, but I'm sure I'm not alone in finding the current encroachment of hypocritical, morality-wielding bigots and their puerile nonsense into my daily life grossly offensive.
Voltaire wrote: "Man will never be free until the last politician is strangled with the entrails of the last priest."
James Allan, Narrabundah
Shane Rattenbury's move to outlaw vilification on grounds of religion indicates he is a hypocrite. He purportedly said religious vilification laws were needed more than ever and the "return of Pauline Hanson ... demonstrates that religious intolerance is alive and well".
Tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands of Australians voted recently for Hanson's party.
Surely Rattenbury was therefore vilifying all those voters.
One of Hanson's policies was to ban immigration of Muslims. Her reasoning seemed to be that the culture of Islam was so intolerant of other religions that it would be ridiculous to import such intolerance to Australia.
Since most of the wars today, and most of the refugees, are a consequence of Islamic (or at least Islamist) intolerance, she has a pretty good point.
Criticism of a religion, and advocating the taking of precautions for the safety of Australians, are not vilification.
Rattenbury cited vandalism attacks on the Islamic Centre in Monash and letter-boxing anti-Muslim material in Gungahlin.
Such behaviour should certainly be banned, and I'm sure Hanson would agree.
However, suggesting that Hanson's supporters are associated with such behaviour is vilification, and if Rattenbury is guilty of such association he should be punished under the very laws he promotes.
I recommend that he issue a strong apology for, and clarification of, his statements.
R. James, Melba
Spurious benchmark
Notwithstanding the class warfare undertones in the city v Charnwood comparison in the 2016-17 ACT budget statement 3, there isn't an equity issue with the current tax treatment of units and houses in Canberra.
Measured on the basis of rate paid per square metre of land, my unit complex in Barton pays more than five times as much in rates as an equivalent adjoining land area with houses on it.
That's before the change, which will increase some unit owners' rates by more than 33 per cent.
The ACT government used the measure of rate paid per square metre of land in its 2012 tax reform statement to show that small land blocks paid disproportionately more in rates compared with larger blocks, thereby justifying the increase to the valuation component of the general rate.
In going after unit owners, the government has adopted a spurious benchmark to assess equity – namely, the market value of the property – and it has devised an unprincipled hybrid mechanism to inflate the valuation component of the rate payable.
For those who think it is politically smart to pick off soft targets, they should consider the text of Pastor Martin Niemoller enshrined on the Boston Holocaust Memorial.
Mike Buckley, Barton
Building-site debacles
I've lost track: could someone please remind me of what the building-site body count for the last few years stands at in municipality-sized Canberra?
And when it evidently became acceptable for what passes as building regulatory agencies to accept subcontractor death after death as repeatedly unpreventable and unprosecutable?
And whether this would be tolerated, and OH&S so be dealt with, in any industry other than building construction?
If last month's article "Site safety warning after cranes collide" (July 22, p9) was faithful, that multiple ACT crane accidents already this year had merely "prompted Worksafe ACT to remind the local construction industry of the need for vigilance while operating cranes ... [and] ensure there are appropriate work systems and standards in place ... [including that] crane operators should also be trained so they can perform their job safely", the minister responsible should simply be impeached.
Alex Mattea, Kingston
Beware the numbers
Declaring a personal interest in the Yarralumla brickworks, I caution the Manuka Oval development opponents ("Residents rejoice with election warning for Barr", August 6, p3) on the government's community panel proposal.
Our Yarralumla panel members are committed and dedicated, however they are bound by confidentiality so it is impossible for the wider community to know what's going on.
Of interest is the drop from 1880 to 380 dwellings up to three storeys in the amended proposal. Clearly three storeys will not represent 380 free standing houses but could be 380 x 3 units or 1140 dwellings, possibly with a population of up to 2280 new residents in the suburb.
The saving grace of these development issues is they will not be decided until after the October election — unless like the tram contracts they are signed beforehand.
Greg Cornwell, Yarralumla
TO THE POINT
The Canberra Times wants to hear from you in short bursts. Email views in 50 words or fewer to letters.editor@canberratimes.com.au
OVAL CONCERN REMAINS
ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr's advice that the heritage of Manuka Oval precinct is to be protected is most welcome ("Manuka battle not over, say residents", August 8, p5). Does he understand that the whole area, inside and outside the oval, is heritage, apart from Block 1, where the Canberra Services Club burnt down? Heritage covers the land and the trees, not simply the structures. Will he accept that the land "swap deal" is dead?
R. Craig, Narrabundah
RATTENBURY CHOKER
I nearly choked over my breakfast when I read about Shane Rattenbury's efforts to outlaw vilification on the grounds of religion ("Move to outlaw vilification in the ACT on grounds of religion," August 4, p7). Is this the same man who introduced laws that made it an offence to pray peacefully anywhere within cooee of the abortion facility in Civic?
John Popplewell, Hackett
RATING GAY MARRIAGE
Here's an easy way to tell if a letter or an article on marriage equality is bigoted: for every instance of the word "homosexuals" (or its equivalent), substitute "Jews" or "Aborigines".
Fred Pilcher, Kaleen
TURNBULL'S FANTASY
Malcolm Turnbull's proposal to conscript the major banks' chief executives to meet once a year to explain the failure to pass on interest cuts is very much Alice in Wonderland ("Bank bosses hit back over rate", August 5, p34). Teddy Roosevelt advised Americans to speak softly and carry a big stick. Turnbull is advising Australians to speak loudly and carry a dandelion.
Howard Carew, Isaacs
LET'S NOT EXAGGERATE
The article "Banks act to protect profits" (August 3, p22) says the Reserve Bank "slashed" official interest rates last week. Really? We know the Reserve reduced the official cash rate by 25 basis points, or of a percentage point, which matched a similar reduction on May 6 and, combined with two equivalent reductions in the first half of 2015, represents the only reductions since August 2013. Surely the term "slashing" conveys a drastic or substantial reduction. If that's how your correspondents view last week's decision, I presume they regard the Coalition as having romped in in the election? Let's treat the adjustment for what it was: more of a shave.
Ian Duckworth, Griffith
HOT WARNINGS AHEAD
Forget blowflies. I'm awaiting the inevitable first sighting of a breathless and dire warning in the media that the bush will be a tinderbox this coming summer.
David Jenkins, Casey
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