Canberra Times Letters to the Editor: Airport may find life a little on the nose

The prevailing winds in this part of the world are from the west.

Just across the way and downwind from this silly initiative are Pialligo and the Canberra airport.

When the influential and powerful airport mandarins come to realise that regardless of measures intended to deal with the release of particulate matter, dioxins and so on nothing will stop the inevitable and appalling stench that will pervade their expensive turf, shoulders will be tapped on and the proposal quietly shelved.

It's a shame though that the residents of Tarago, who are also downwind from a much larger but similar "initiative" and who have for many years now, had to endure the "South West Stench", have never been shown one iota of support from those who continue to see ACT rural surrounds as "out there".

William Gray, Bungendore, NSW

The Commonwealth intends to borrow the UK lottery idea to make up the shortfall in Olympic sports funding.

Australia is unlike the UK with our state system.

The states, as could be expected, are not in favour of the idea because it encroaches on their lotteries and gaming activities and revenues.

It also seems contradictory to introduce yet another option for gambling when it is generally considered a scourge across society. The Commonwealth's capacity to effectively implement a lottery policy like this is also open to question.

So why not use the Treasurer's bank tax as a revenue-raising model and impose a tax or levy on all gambling to raise the necessary revenue and at the same time discourage gambling by raising its cost.

Economically the policy is a hypothecation of revenue disliked by the purists, but that egg has well and truly been broken with Petrol Taxes, Medicare levies and so on.

Imposing the tax or levy on all gambling forms would reduce the opportunity for gambling companies to game the system.

Commonwealth/state issues are avoided and the only gaming of the policy would be by bureaucrats building the program's administration and sports seeking funds from the rivers of cash.

Increased sports participation and improved sports infrastructure would also lead to long term reductions in the health budget.

David Butt, Narrabundah

I read with interest letters on the issue of same-sex couples teaching in Christian, especially Catholic, schools ("Archbishop does not speak for all Catholics with his 'no' vote views", Letters, August 22).

I can see both sides to this issue. In our secular society common justice seems to require that a teacher in a same-sex marriage be accepted in a Christian school purely on the grounds of professional skills and qualifications. A legal same-sex marriage should be irrelevant.

Yet the great difficulty is that a Christian school is founded on certain Christian doctrines. One of these is that the sacrament of marriage is reserved for one man and one woman. No parent is forced to send their child to such a school but those who choose to do so are entitled to expect that the staff will uphold Christian teaching and values. The same applies to Jewish or Muslim schools with their own teaching and values. Government schools, being secular, have no such requirements.

With tact and understanding all members of our society should be able to find the school for their children that best suits their own convictions. Would a teacher in a legal same-sex marriage really want to teach in a school upholding a clear Christian tradition about the sacrament of marriage as being between one man and one woman?

Fr Robert Wilson, Deakin

Auriel Barlow (Letters, August 24) raises an interesting point about the purpose of the Letters page, saying she is unhappy about people "proselytising".

Is she equally unhappy about every person who expresses a viewpoint and hopes to sow a seed to encourage people to look at the world differently, or only those whose views are contrary to her own?

Mike O'Shaughnessy was calling out cruelty and hypocrisy. This is a good thing. This is what considered and passionate people do. His letter informed us of practices in the egg industry of which many are not aware.

With the dispelling of ignorance, maybe someone, somewhere will stop to think and question if they can support such an industry.

Most won't, but I know I did. Surely it is the duty of people with moral conviction to speak up for those who have no voice, to stand up for what is right and decent, and denounce what is wrong.

Exposure to alternative ideas is the catalyst for thought and discussion and ultimately progress, evolution and the effecting of change.

Even if some people are unhappy about it. I suggest we should salute animal warriors like Mike rather than criticising them for possibly pricking our collective conscience.

Jan Darby, Isabella Plains

"Proselytising in the Letters columns"? Standard practice, I'd have thought.

Mike O'Shaughnessy, Spence

The Coalition has a reputation for criticising activist judges, wishing they would just enforce the law rather than interpreting it. Recently a couple of senior ministers caused a stir by publicly pasting "hard left" activist judges.

Now they want an activist result from the High Court. Funny how you see things differently when the boot is on the other foot.

S. W. Davey, Torrens

Thank you, D. Perry, for your concern (Letters, August 24) about what might our Queen be saved from?

The first thing I can think of is sparing Her Britannic Majesty Queen Elizabeth II from the indignity of hosting a state visit to the United Kingdom by Donald Trump, President of the United States of America.

Ronald Elliott, Sandringham, Victoria

There were many risible elements in Mathias Cormann's recent hysterical rant about the threat of a Shorten government.

Far from forgetting about the perils of Big Bad Socialism, Cormann is banking on Australians ignoring the manifest failure of neo-liberal economics over the last 30 or so years, with its privatisation, de-regulation and trickle-down economics agenda rightly now held in widespread disrepute.

Investment guru Warren Buffett at least agrees with him that there is a class war going on, except for the part that it's a war waged by the wealthy on the rest of the populace, hence the noisy resistance to ceding any political and economic power to the hoi polloi.

If successful (i.e. wealthy) Australians were to ultimately decide to flee because they don't want to pay their fair share and give up their subsidies and rorts as part of a rebalancing to a fairer and more equitable society, then "bon voyage", I say.

They will be replaced by 'hungrier', more ambitious and motivated people and organisations on the way up who aren't in it just for the money but want to build something for Australia.

Senator Cormann is welcome to join them by re-emigrating to that neo-liberal paradise, Belgium.

Meanwhile we have housing affordability, and energy affordability and availability crises because of government policy failure, a continuing domestic violence scourge which kills far more Australians than terrorists and an underemployment epidemic.

Which part of the socialist bogey was responsible for those?

David Jenkins, Casey

Mathias Cormann has said "You don't get a strong and successful economy by taxing the life out of it, or by putting limits on people's ambition".

In the US from the 1930s until 1981 the top tax rate averaged more than 80 per cent.

No one says the US was trapped in 'socialist revisionism' or was weak and unsuccessful in those years. Subsequent to the 1980s data revealed an ever increasing gap in income between the rich and poor, aided by huge unjustified payouts to CEOs etc, unlinked to either performance or productivity.

As evidenced most clearly by the super rich such as Bill Gates, above a certain level, fortune and wealth grow explosively independently of any work their owners do, or of any particular merit or talent they possess.

"The rich get richer, full stop ... we'll end up with major divergences" of wealth and economic power. (Picketty).

So I say, more power to Mr Shorten, Leader of the Opposition, for trying to fight inequality. And a big thumbs down or something ruder, to those unashamedly promoting the cynical, ugly and divisive politics of greed.

Jane Holesgrove, O'Connor

Oh, for Pete's sake, how many of these miserable "peace" groups do we need?

They appear to be metastasising. Who finances these mobs? We now know that Russia provided start-up capital for GetUp, so it's either them or George Soros again.

The latest group call themselves the "Independent and Peaceful Australia Network" (Letters, August 24).

It's shades of Monty Python's 'Popular Front for the Liberation of Judea' – (punch line; "that's him over there").

Why do the free, democratic countries have to suffer this burden alone? Why don't these groups pester just some of the police states for a change?

God knows, there's plenty to pick from. Most of the police states (China, Vietnam, Cuba and all the Arab Muslim states) have embassies here just like legitimate governments, so why not organise some demos out side? Or send a firm letter?

If it wasn't for America, every country in the world would look like North Korea or South Australia.

Christopher Smith, Braddon

Tuesday's announcement by the ACT government that it expected the Civic-Woden light rail would have a comparable cost to the Gungahlin-Civic link which would be around $936 million reveals it is totally devoid of financial clothing.

We all remember Katy Gallagher saying that if the present light rail cost was to exceed $600 million it would not go ahead.

Instead we have the present light rail section under construction doomed to exceed the $1 billion mark.

It follows that the Civic-Woden light rail will exceed the $1 billion mark also. Forget the talk about going via Parkes.

No one travelling from Civic to Woden will take a service that takes twice the time to get to Woden that the bus service does.

Forget going down Adelaide Avenue. The difficulty involved in would-be passengers crossing anywhere along that route at peak hours makes it impracticable.

I imagine an ever increasing number of people think Andrew Barr will leave a reputation of being the most impracticable Chief Minister we have ever endured.

Howard Carew, Isaacs

Over 50 years ago I boarded a Qantas 707 in Saigon taking me home.

I chose to bottle up my anger and frustration at man's inhumanity to his fellow man.

Something inside me cracked on Wednesday night as I watched yet another limp body of a child being carried into a bombed out hospital somewhere in the Middle East as though this limp body was nothing out of the ordinary.

It would never have occurred that this limp child was someone's daughter or son.

This was someone who had the same aspirations as those watching the nightly carnage.

After all it was time to move onto more important news such as sport or hedonistic pursuits.

After all most of the viewing audience don't want their conscience pricked at the nightly carnage.

After all they hide behind the same old cop out saying what can they do anyhow?

No should shut their eyes and regard as nonexistent the suffering of which they have chosen to spare themselves the sight.

D. J. Fraser, Currumbin, Qld

LIGHTS ON, NOBODY HOME

A letter in The Canberra Times of August 24 about non-functioning street lights prompted me to try this method of exacting some action from the ACT government about the street lights in Munro Street and McCormack Street in Curtin.

I have now reported this failure by both telephone to Canberra Connect and by email. The lights have been on day and night for about five weeks now – another example of both negligence and waste.

Elizabeth Teasey, Curtin

VOTERS COUNT, MR BARR

Felix MacNeill (Letters, August 24) argues the Chief Minister has the right to spend our money promoting one side of the same-sex marriage debate because he was democratically elected.

That is not the case. Same-sex marriage was not an election issue. Second, at the final result Labor received only 38.4per cent of the votes from ACT citizens, which means more than 61 per cent of ACT voters did not vote for Mr Barr's party and his policies.

Tony Falla, Ngunnawal

CAT OUT OF THE BAG

The article "No guarantee against theft" (canberratimes.com.au, August 18) quoted Deputy Statistician Jonathan Palmer as saying "if the form's legitimate recipient contacted the ABS to say they had not received their survey, it would be cancelled and a new form dispatched". Does this mean that my vote would not be anonymous?

Ruth McLucas, Weetangera

POLICING REQUIRED

Police may have to consider imposing some limit on the number of people whose position as a member of Parliament is dependent on the say-so of the High Court.

M. F. Horton, Adelaide, SA