His reference of Magistrate Bernadette Boss to the Attorney-General for giving a young man with an acquired brain injury $50 out of her own pocket so he could afford overnight accommodation once admitted to bail is an indictment of him, not the magistrate.

Dr Boss later recused herself from further involvement in the young man’s case, no doubt because she recognised she might be perceived as lacking impartiality in finalising his matter.

Her conduct, in both instances, was, in my opinion, proper, appropriate and praiseworthy.

As Roy and HG might say, the director should take himself into the room of mirrors and have a long hard look at what he sees. A swift self-delivered uppercut might be in order.

We need more magistrates like Dr Boss. She is a good lawyer, a sensible human being and obviously someone with a heart and a capacity for compassion.

Her ilk should not be discouraged nor bullied by unworthy complaints to the head of the judicial arm of government.

It is noteworthy that, almost without exception, complaints to the director about the conduct of prosecutors on his staff go unanswered and unaddressed.

The majority of those prosecutors are not members of the ACT Bar Association and, for that reason, not subject to the disciplinary process of that body.

There appears to be a double standard at play here.

If Dr Boss’ act of kindness is what Jon White SC regards as a serious absence of probity then heaven help us all.

Jack Pappas, Barrister-at-Law, Empire Chambers, Canberra

So much for the separation of powers.

The Federal Industrial Relations Minister has applied to intervene in a case against a labour hire firm by ‘‘casual labour’’ claiming annual leave (‘‘Class action firm to intervene in casuals test case’’, November 8, p10).

Apart from an implied threat of retrospective legislation to close a loophole which has already allowed a worker to ‘‘double dip’’ by claiming leave on top of casual loadings, as the minister expressed it, there is a flipside here.

That is the issue of employers outsourcing full-time staff and declaring them casual to avoid compliance with the law. A whole lot of matters such as sick leave, compassionate leave, zone allowance, travel allowance, overtime and compensation are affected.

G. Wilson, Macgregor

I am still confused by the ACT Cash for Cans scheme.

I can see that most of the (Coke) cans we use attract an upfront charge of 10 cents per can, judging by the increase in supermarket prices.

However, as I live in Hawker and there appears to be only one drop-off depot for Belconnen, I am disinclined to drive to a parking-short drop-off point several suburbs away and probably wait in a line. Mea culpa for my laziness.

If I throw the cans in the yellow bin who gets the money from the cans. The ACT government, the recycler, or just who? I wonder how many Canberrans now throw the cans or bottles into the red top general bins. A number of people I meet in the supermarket say they are doing just that as a protest.

Surely not the results we hoped for when the yellow top bins were introduced and I thought were helping the environment.

P. O’Connor, Hawker

Why would anyone be surprised at the actions of the Attorney-General Christian Porter in deciding to suppress information in an Auditor-General’s report (‘‘Gagged: A brazen attack on Parliament and the public interest’’, canberratimes.com.au, November 6).

As a member of a government that believes public standards are determined by what kind of lapel badge or silly cap one wears, the Attorney-General has surely demonstrated that the most important fact in this nation today is that we have no standards and anything goes.

As for those who think that the Attorney-General has diminished himself by censoring the government’s most important watchdog, I would suggest that the cowardly decision to persecute true Australian patriots Bernard Collaery & Witness ‘‘K’’ in secret had already well and truly ticked that box.

J. Richardson, Wallagoot, NSW

Dr Brendan Nelson’s plans, with bipartisan political support, to expand the AWM have caused quite a stir in the community. Two points have come to the fore, the cost and, is the AWM a museum or a memorial?

The answer, why not have both? Leave the memorial where it is as the focus point of remembrance, even reduce its exhibits to focus on the memorial aspect. And build a new War Museum down at Yarramundi Reach, where the Australian Museum was supposed to go. The cost of a new building on a green field site would surely be far less than that of demolishing and rebuilding the current structure, and the Mitchell Annex could be incorporated into the new facility.

D. Wade, Holt

My dismay turned to anger as I read your reports about the proposed $498 million ‘‘renovation’’ of the Australian War Memorial.

Why would we want to glorify war? We need a peace memorial not more violence and destruction in the world. The other contradiction regarding the ‘‘Australian War Memorial’’ is that the only wars fought on our continent were the Frontier Wars, which are not included.

We have national institutions fundamental to understanding our past and developing our future that deserve increased funding, including the Museum of Australian Democracy, the National Archives, the National Library, the National Portrait Gallery and the National Museum of Australia.

These are the institutions where we can learn more about where we’ve been and where we want to go.

Pamela Collett, Narrabundah

I do wish deluded tram supporters like Victor Isaacs (Letters, November 8) would get their facts straight before showing their ignorance. The tramway in Caen France (also in Nancy, France) is not a ‘‘trackless’’ tram. It is a Guided Light Transit system, using a single, central, non-supporting guide rail in the ground.

It was commissioned in 2002, is now obsolete, and has absolutely nothing to do with the modern steel-trackless, autonomous, rubber-tyred trams now available and already operating in China.

M. Flint, Smart Canberra Transport, Canberra

Congratulations to Chief Minister Andrew Barr for expressing caution about approaches from the Commonwealth for the ACT government to provide public services in Norfolk Island (‘‘Barr: ACT ‘highly unlikely’ to deliver Norfolk Island services’’, canberratimes.com.au, November 6).

The unilateral and anti-democratic abolition of self-government by Federal Parliament in 2015 has spawned a huge range of problems for the Norfolk Island community.

The process has been dominated by false information from federal politicians and senior public servants and the imposition of new taxes and governance mechanisms with little or no consultation with Island residents.

A recent independent report has detailed the loss of services and local autonomy through this imposed process, and the ACT government would be asking for trouble if it took on the task of trying to pick up the shattered pieces left from the Commonwealth’s destruction of the Norfolk Island economy, governance, environment and community.

P. Maywald, Queanbeyan, NSW

As we wind down to Christmas and perhaps think about the new year, can we all take a break from the rat race?

If the Greek philosophers well understood the importance of leisure, why do efficiencies have us doing more not less?

My 15-year and 14-year-old daughters are given endless school assignments with high word limits, rather than being taught the value of plain english and brevity.

We toil at work and school for 30-40 hours each week. Yet society could run with most people enjoying a three-day weekend given the vast productivity growth over the last 50 years.

There is little promotion of concepts such as the five-hour work day. What should be the norm has to be fought for.

So many of us are forced to race through life without having the time to reflect and appreciate what we have.

As my twin girls turn seven next Saturday, I feel sad that I have missed so much of their precious years serving endless masters in the rat race.

I wonder when I will have the courage to drop out.

If ScoMo or Shorten have something to say on this topic, my vote will be listening.

Kate Lawrence-Haynes, Braddon

Dr Kerryn Phelps, the new member for Wentworth, has pointed out that the Coalition would be naive to think that concerns about climate change are found only in progressive (as opposed to regressive?) seats.

In fact, 73 per cent of Australians and almost 80 per cent of Wentworth voters are concerned about climate change.

Before the Wentworth byelection, the Morrison government gave Australians the impression that it would take up New Zealand’s offer, backed after the byelection by Labor, to accept 150 refugees from Nauru and Manus Island.

It now seems that the government has changed its mind, extinguishing any hope that it would become more compassionate.

The performance of the Morrison government now looks very much like that of the newly elected Abbott government.

Mr Abbott famously said that there would be ‘‘no cuts to education, no cuts to health, no change to pensions, no change to the GST and no cuts to the ABC or SBS’’ and proceeded to break most of those promises.

Douglas Mackenzie, Deakin

Climate change deniers in the Scott Morrison government should listen very carefully to the ordinary voters.

If it was all right for the now Prime Minister to hold up a lump of coal to the opposition crossbenches and sarcastically shout ‘‘look this is coal and it won’t hurt you’’ would it be all right for the opposition spokespeople for primary industries, the environment and foreign affairs to hold up a half-starved lamb, a hand full of red scorched earth from a drought-decimated farm and a bucket of sea water that washed up for the first time ever onto the doorstep of a Kiribati family home and shout back ‘‘yes it does’’.

No they should not. That was appalling behaviour at the time by Morrison at worst and poor theatre at best. Since then we have had the Wentworth byelection results with an almost 20 per cent swing against the Morrison government without very much help from Bill Shorten at all.

While acknowledging the electoral backlash, Morrison was fighting to hold Wentworth from the outset following the sacking of very popular local member and former Prime Minister.

The potent cocktail of own goals by him and his colleagues during the byelection may be enough to ensure Kerryn Phelps retains it at next year’s election.

The Wentworth byelection result sends a clear message to the Coalition’s hard right conservatives that they must listen to the ordinary voters’ messages, not the shock jocks and lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry.

Inaction on climate change and asylum seekers can only lead to defeat at the ballot box.

Kerryn Phelps has shown the way.

G. Brady, Hughes

Tony Abbott tells us that ‘‘Nauru is no hellhole by any means. I’ve been there’’.

Well he could hardly say that if he hadn’t been there, but it does not make his view correct.

I imagine Abbott went there for a couple of days at the most and had a busy program of events, then he got on a plane and flew away.

I lived on Nauru for about 17 months. When I lived there many years ago, it was far better equipped place than it is now. I was in a privileged position and had a very full work program and ample recreation.

I also got off the island (which is 20.98 square kilometres in area) about every two months.

These regular movements off the island were very important psychologically. Nauru is now essentially a bankrupt rocky outcrop in the middle of nowhere. The Nauruan government has sold itself to Australia as warehouse for Australian asylum seekers.

If Abbott had had a real medical emergency while he was there he might have better appreciated the limitations of being in so remote a location.

His view also fails to take account of the psychological impact of living in such a remote location surrounded by a local population who don’t want you there.

Appealing to Tony Abbott’s imagination to put himself in the place of the refugees on Nauru is futile.

Abbott has no imagination, which is why he is still droning on as the member for Warringah.

Jeff Hart, Kingston

I agree with the last nine words of Judy Bamberger’s diatribe: ‘‘...get out and face whatever music he must face ...’’ (Letters, November 1).

But I am scandalised at her overall evaluation of Julian Assange’s behaviour while imprisoned within the confines of the Ecuadorean embassy in London.

How callous can you be? Has Judy ever lost her freedom for the simple act of telling the world that some of our leaders (for example, the likes of Donald Trump) are not really acting on our behalf?

Please Judy, Assange is a human being who is suffering imprisonment in a very confined space, a few square metres, because the rest of us do not have the guts or the opportunity to do what he did; send the leaked emails to The New York Times and a few other US newspapers.

And, please, do not mention the sexual assault issue.

The Swedish authorities dropped the case some time ago.

J. Rodriguez, Florey