Canberrans should be concerned that this city is now seen to be the new McMansion capital of Australia with the biggest houses in the nation (''City of McMansions'', April 19, p1).
Bigger houses are built for a variety of reasons in every country, but only in affluent countries do they continue to be built when the average number of persons has dropped to under three per household in Australia.
Building McMansions makes Canberra look affluent and self-indulgent because when, all is said and done, despite the argument that it creates jobs in the building industry, profit-taking and greed underpin the trend.
Perhaps some McMansions could be purchased by the ACT Government for public housing for those less fortunate.
John Bell, Lyneham The ''City of McMansions'' story stated that cost of building new homes has quadrupled over the past 20 years.
However, using the same average numbers in your article the cost per square metre has increased from $436 ($72,000/165) to $1105 ($284,000/257), ie, about 2.5 times, hardly a fourfold increase.
Where the real increase has been is the cost of land. My 1200sqm block in Fraser cost $5600 in 1975; the same size block today (if you can find one) will set you back about $400,000, a 7000 per cent increase over that time. In fact the block that I currently occupy would have increased in price by some 240 per cent in nine years.
It doesn't take rocket science to see who's making the money.
Peter Toscan, Amaroo
You report that, over 20 years, new house sizes in Canberra have grown from 165sqm to 257sqm, while households have shrunk from 3.8 to 2.7.
Can someone estimate the consequent increase in greenhouse emissions per person: (a) during construction and (b) a year to maintain comfortable temperatures?
David Hawking, Turner
Isn't it time that we imposed a heavy environmental damage tax on these ludicrous McMansions? They consume excessive resources in their structure, and guzzle enormous resources of one sort or another to support them through the ensuing decades.
S. Thomas, Deakin
Adviser alternatives
Paddy Gourley finally lists his alternatives for the ministerial advisory panel on the Defence white paper but again fails to argue why their currency, expertise or alleged independence from current government service is supposedly better than the incumbents.
With the exception of Ric Smith, none have anywhere near current experience. The Government could hardly appoint Smith given he was the immediate-previous departmental secretary and had been already commissioned to make a separate major study of national security structures and processes.
Some of those suggested were also intimately involved in previous Defence white papers. These failed to to prepare the ADF and our national strategic thinking adequately for the crises and operations Australia actually had to face during and since the 1999 East Timor intervention. Others, with the obvious exceptions of Peter Gration, Rob Walls and perhaps Chris Barrie, may have been senior ADF commanders but are not known as great strategic thinkers or as people with an active interest in national security issues a story in itself about the too frequent inadequacy of ADF higher promotion processes.
Finally, having been deputy secretary, strategy, in Defence at some time is not reason alone to assume much related expertise. Most of these in recent decades have lacked formal qualifications and experience or hands-on experience in executing strategy in military or diplomatic operations overseas. This bizarre belief that no qualifications or experience in strategy is necessary to steer development of our national defence strategies is without doubt the single greatest cause of the long-term and major failure of the 1987, 1994 and, to a lesser extent, 2000 Defence white papers. The second greatest cause is the narrow and flawed methods of their development although this is yet again really just one more result of the inadequate knowledge and experience of the officials concerned and that of others to recognise, acknowledge or fix it.
Neil James, executive director, Australia Defence Association
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