R. C. Warn (Letters, February 8) is right when he says he is not familiar with the recent Dickson development, though it hasn't stopped him making a blanket comment. But I think that comment was well meant and at least partially correct (though the use of the pejorative ''NIMBY'' is rarely constructive).
Infill certainly is vital - particularly for urban sustainability. But it only achieves its potential if it is done on an appropriate scale and with well-designed buildings.
While large showpiece developments, like Nishi, are often built to high standards, most urban infill happens block-by-block and suburb-by-suburb. The only realistic way to manage this smaller-scale process and achieve the desired benefits of infill is to define developmental zones and sensible rules for buildings within those zones.
The appellant residents led by Jane Goffman did not object to infill in principle or challenge either the RZ2 zone or the rules. What they did challenge - and prove at appeal - was that the proposed development had failed to meet those rules in several important ways and that ACTPLA had failed to enforce them.
It is only when sensible zones and rules are in place and residents can trust ACTPLA to uphold them that we can achieve truly beneficial infill and reduce wasteful disputation.
Felix MacNeill, Dickson
SAD BUT NOT FAIR
Community and Public Sector Union's Nadine Flood presents the picture of noble Centrelink workers trudging through the mud of NSW dispensing flood relief (''Cuts undermine PS plaudits'', February 6, p11). Sadly, not everyone's experience of dealing with Centrelink is so positive.
The last time I spoke with a Centrelink officer she was quivering with excitement at the prospect of stopping my then 89-year-old mother's pension.
My mother's crime? Dementia, which means she cannot live independently. She now lives in Canberra with me. But even though her house in Sydney is being maintained as her home (every now and then she gets quite distressed and wants to go back) Centrelink says she no longer has the right to call it her home.
Instead, it is regarded as an asset and her pension has been reduced to a fraction. She lived in that house for almost 40 years and earns no income from it. She does not receive a single dementia-related service that she would not be entitled to receive had she continued to live in Sydney. I hear the government talk about fairness, but sadly this rhetoric is not always reflected in practice.
Fintan O'Laighin, CPSU member, Narrabundah
DON'T BLAME THE DINGO
Tony Peacock, former chief executive of the Invasive Animals CRC, claims the deliberately dramatic tactic used by David Bowman (introducing elephants to control gamba grass) to highlight the environmental cost of dingo destruction by the grazing industry undermines public confidence in science (''Real elephant in the room is the loss of science's credibility'', February 6, p11).
What Peacock really is keen to avoid is a full discussion of the environmental and moral consequences of the wholesale extermination of a native animal, the dingo, as if it were introduced vermin. This is the lasting legacy of the ''smart'' grazing industry, which he unconvincingly attempts to present as a pillar of current conservation efforts. The generously funded ''science'' that has, for decades, instructed the grazing industry on how to best eradicate the dingo - a keystone species, from the landscape, with scant concern for the ecosystem damage that has resulted - is what really should concern Peacock.
This is where the credibility of science stands to suffer. Peacock sets up a straw man when he asserts that those who advocate the restoration of dingo populations think that this alone would repair the damage that has been inflicted on our natural systems. No one claims this. The issue is one of environmental remediation. We will never restore damaged ecosystems, but we have a moral obligation to ameliorate past damage where possible.
Peacock also cautions against a polarisation of the debate about dingo control. He fails to see that even the ''moderate'' approach to dingo control, which he advocates, is already at the extreme in terms of the environmental damage it has caused.
Ernest Healy, National Dingo Preservation and Recovery Program, Melbourne, Vic
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