More buses more often

On top of that is the revelation that we don't have enough buses, at a time the government is saying more of us should use public transport.

The biggest problem with the bus system in this city is a lack of frequency. In London, a city superbly suited to rail-based solutions, you can get a train on the tube every seven minutes off peak and every two minutes in peak hour. You don't need a timetable; you just turn up and there will be a train soon. The same is true of the Docklands Light Rail system, which, as a life-long rail fan, I rode when in London recently, just out of interest.

It is one of the world's really successful light-rail systems, so I was interested to see the environment where it operates – a densely settled city with towers of residential units on either side of the track for miles – unlike our route to Gungahlin.

If the government were serious about improving public transport in Canberra, it would address the frequency problem.

I would suggest a fleet of light buses, perhaps 10-seaters, which could provide services on feeder routes in the suburbs perhaps every 10 minutes at a minute fraction of the cost of trams. That way, we probably would get a substantial increase in the number of people using public transport.

Trams, which are bigger than buses and which will be even less frequent, won't help anyone.

Stan Marks, Hawker

The BBC series Yes, Prime Minister shows how polling can be manipulated to produce any response desired. In Season 1 Episode 2, Sir Humphrey leads Bernard to reach opposite conclusions about compulsory national service.

It is worth a look on YouTube, because clearly this technique has been used by Minister Simon Corbell in his polling that shows we Canberrans, against all the other evidence, really do favour light rail after all.

Allow me to suggest alternative survey questions that allow a different position of Canberrans to be revealed:

Are you worried about the cost of living in Canberra?

Are you concerned about the rates rises we have experienced lately?

Do you believe that further rises in rates are justifiable?

Are you concerned about waiting times for hospitals, and the general quality of healthcare in Canberra?

Do you believe it is the responsibility of governments to ensure we have the best-quality, properly funded schools?

Do you believe all Canberrans, no matter which part of our city they live in, should be able to access first-rate public transport?

Do you believe it is important for our government to spend our money wisely, so there is the most benefit for all Canberrans?

Would you support the ACT government spending $1billion on a light-rail project that has not been rigorously researched, and that will produce a questionable benefit for a very small proportion of the people of Canberra, and that forces us to abandon improvements to our hospitals, schools and public transport Canberra-wide?

Yes, Minister? I believe the answer would be No, Minister.

Terry Werner, Wright

Toni Hassan's opinion piece questioning the role of the Australian War Memorial ("The war memorial: what's it good for?" November 6, 2015) reflects a surprising lack of knowledge of the purpose of this great national institution. More importantly, it is deeply offensive to the millions of Australians whose family members and forebears were killed or injured in the defence of this country.

Ms Hassan's freedom to express her opinion was hard won by the brave and unselfish efforts of our servicemen and women, of all races and creeds, who left our shores to fight foreign aggressors. The prime purpose of the memorial is to commemorate their sacrifice. That is what the memorial is "good for".

War is a dreadful and terrible thing – few of us would argue with that.

And Australia's Indigenous people were treated appallingly in the progressive settlement and occupation of the continent by Europeans.

Indeed, as a keen student of Victorian history, I have had my eyes opened by James Boyce's revelations of the illegal and hugely tragic dispossession of the original inhabitants of Port Phillip by white man, in his must-read The Founding of Melbourne and the Conquest of Australia (2011).

There are differing views about whether the so-called "frontier wars" should be commemorated at the memorial.

But arguments supporting that cause, which many do consider worthy, do not need to simultaneously demean the memorial's role over 70 years in providing comfort and inspiration to a nation whose finest will never return.

Gary Kent, Griffith

In her article concerning recognition of the frontier wars, Toni Hassan unwittingly gives a possible reason why the Australian War Memorial does not include those wars in the memorial: before federation, the colonies raised contingents to fight overseas and only after federation were Australian forces involved in wars.

Further, the first belligerents in the frontier wars most likely were not born in Australia, but probably still regarded themselves as English.

Ken McPhan, Spence

As people moved forward to receive Holy Communion at Gungahlin Uniting Church last Sunday, I was struck how many of them had been born and lived for a significant period in a country other than Australia – Singapore, Vanuatu, Britain, South Africa, China, Germany, Sri Lanka, Ghana, Indonesia, Solomon Islands, Iraq, Jamaica, South Korea, Zimbabwe, Fiji, US, Brazil, Vietnam.

I asked myself, "What other organisation, apart from the Christian Church, can attract and provide an environment where such people can relate with each other and share a common experience?" I know the Church has its faults and of some things, is deeply ashamed. But in its best expression, the Church breaks down barriers and brings people together. That is good news in a world often divided.

PS: We shared sausage and onion sandwiches, muffins and drinks for lunch around the barbecue after the service.

Ron Reeson, Nicholls

In light of the recent revelations regarding Jane Halton's intervention and the subsequent dumping of Elbit Systems by the Australian Federal Police as provider of crime-specific command and control software, it's concerning to learn that not only has the Capability and Sustainment Group (Defence Materiel Organisation's new name) continued to engage Elbit Systems, but it has awarded it a sole-source contract without tender worth nearly $1billion.

Not only was Elbit Systems unable to deliver functional software in a timely manner to the AFP at the agreed cost, but its only other previous contract with the Australian government, which was to provide a battle-management system to the Australian Army (to facilitate interoperability with the RAAF and RAN, which had previously undertaken the digitisation process) was a complete disaster.

The system delivered couldn't communicate with the US or other allied forces that we regularly deploy alongside, but of more concern was the fact that it couldn't even communicate with existing navy or air force systems. Once the basic faults had been rectified, the initial contract, which was worth approximately $200million, ended up costing three times as much and being two years late.

It is so deficient that any vehicles we've deployed in Iraq or Afghanistan, from helicopters to APCs, have had their Elbit Systems hardware removed and replaced with the US Army's FBCB2 system, at further cost.

Somehow, somebody at the Capability Acquisition and Sustainment Group decided Elbit Systems was so much better than its competition that there was no need to release a request for tender for the nearly $1billion Land 75 Phase 4 contract.

Given the history of Elbit Systems, I'd be interested in seeing an explanation as to how this somewhat secretive decision was arrived at, because, to the casual observer, value for money doesn't seem to have been a consideration.

James Allan, Narrabundah

Sharks are not the villains the media are making them. How ridiculous that people go into the water knowing there could be sharks where they are supposed to be. This is typical of the arrogance of man. If you do not want to encounter sharks, stay out of the areas where they are.

Julie Gray, Burra, NSW

Oh dear! Kathleen Lee-Joe's lament regarding excessively priced cosmetics ("Why is expensive make-up so expensive", canberratimes.com, au, November 9) will cut no ice with detached males who desperately cling to the hope of taking females, coquettish or not, seriously.

In the first week of a respectable Year 11 economics curriculum, what the market is prepared to pay is dealt with comprehensively, and the class then moves on. There's rock-solid consensus here among economists otherwise thoroughly notorious for their variety of opinions.

Ladies, by all means pamper yourselves and, of course, tell your man you "do it for him".

Maintain the illusion, too, that he falls for it, and is sympathetic. Anything to keep the peace!

Patrick Jones, Griffith

I recently received a sale catalogue from a prominent bookseller in my letter box. I was looking through the books offered for sale – books on politicians, prime ministers, ex-prime ministers, singers and sports people. The usual range of celebrities or would-be celebrities were listed as worthy of my interest.

The last book was on Graham Thorne, a young child, kidnapped and murdered years ago, when I was young and impressionable. I can still remember the awful feeling I got when I read about it in the newspaper.

I most certainly wouldn't buy a book on any of the so-called celebrities offered for my consideration. But the book on Graham Thorne grabbed my attention and my heart strings. But I couldn't buy it either, too sad. I was faced with the choice between the unimportant, the uninspirational and the tragic. It is a superficial and cruel world we live in.

Patrick O'Hara, Isaacs

Paul Krugman's article "Austerity's grim legacy worse than we critics feared" (Times2, November, p5) is the first time I have read of the concept of hysteresis being used in a public article on the economy. As a student in the 1960s, my agricultural economics texts presented demand-supply curves as a single line following the same path for increasing and declining demand.

Yet, in soil physics, we were presented with curves for the movement of water in soil as separate lines (hysteresis) depending on whether the soil was filling or draining. Why has it taken so long for the reality – that increasing demand on supply will take a different path to that of declining demand – to filter through, even though it was apparently first suggested in 1986?

James Walcott, Mawson

My exasperated 31-year-old daughter often says to me: "Dad, you are B-class doofus!" It's mostly entirely deserved – 57 years of age tends to see "the doofus gene" being expressed!

I have always liked words and etymological issues, so, the latest reprimand notwithstanding, it did get me wondering about the plural or, indeed, a collective noun? I much prefer to ponder than to google, so the plural should be doofi, as in "there were plenty of doofi that afternoon at the Canberra West Bowling Club (with sincere apologies to those fine sporty folk).

But a collective? A doofi of local government curmudgeons, perhaps, or a doofi of Northbourne tram hipsters?

Ralph Snowdon, Chapman

This week, I took my partner to an ENT specialist. For the first consultation, my partner was charged $200, but to remove some wax from his ear was an additional $200.

This is a great example of medical practitioners ripping off patients and Medicare.

This practitioner's fee structure should be forensically examined be the Commonwealth Department of Health and by the relevant professional body.

Jane Timbrell, Reid

Today (any day) would be a great day for the deans, principals and directors of all Australian tertiary music schools to reiterate their enthusiasm for radically good performance standards in the sector, to express their concern that Australian National Academy of Music's success could be denigrated by the "elitist" tag, and rashly perhaps to proclaim that they don't mind where ANAM is, so long as it is.

What a good family of institutions that would be!

David Pereira, Murrumbateman, NSW

REIN IN SPENDING

With so much speculation about tax measures, particularly the GST, what about some consideration and debate about the other side of the equation – where to rein in government spending and spending growth? Otherwise, our taxes will continue to increase.

J. Grant, Gowrie

STRUGGLE TO SURVIVE

A friend of mine struggles to stay alive on her $25,000 pa government super pension even though, having turned 60, she no longer has to pay direct income tax. If Turnbull is telling us the poor will not be disadvantaged by any increase or extension of the GST, I would really like to know how she will be compensated.

Nancy Tidfy, Chisholm

THE ART OF SATIRE

Tony Abbott as The Laughing Cavalier is fine ("Ex-PM's cavalier side captured", Gang-gang, November 9, p8 ), but to demonstrate this fine paper's political impartiality, why not Bill Shorten in Edvard Munch's The Scream as Bill contemplates his political future?

Roger Dace, Reid

HONOUR GOUGH

Surely the new Molonglo Valley stage-three suburb should be called Gough ("New ACT suburb to honour former PM", November 9, p3).

Paul Kringas, Giralang

DEBATE THE TPP

Many, including myself, suspect Australians will be "done over" unless our "independent press" exposes all the issues and angles on the Trans-Pacific Partnership simply and clearly to its readership. Let's begin an open and serious conversation and pursue it in a vigorous manner.

Martin Ryan, Duffy

AUDIT RAISES CONCERNS

Given the ACT Auditor-General's conclusions in her report on the government's handling of it's transport portfolio ("Auditor raises transport concerns", November 7, p1) the public must question all the government's planks for the Gunghalin light rail and its competence to manage the program.

Ed Dobson, Hughes

HYPOCRISY ON SHOW

In response to criticism within the United Nations Human Rights Council of Australia's treatment of asylum seekers on Christmas Island and elsewhere by many countries, including our "best friend", the United States, perhaps we should inquire as to the possibility of rendering our irregular arrivals to their Guantanamo Bay facilities, where they could be interrogated in the same humane fashion for which that establishment is renowned.

John Murray, Fadden

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