An option that should be considered by the government is the identification of sites for direct sale to independent operators in more central locations. However, as demonstrated by the experience in the 1990s when sites were sold directly to independents Woolworths (Woolworths was an independent then!) and Gull to improve competition, such a strategy is not without challenges.

The ongoing gouging of Canberrans by oil companies is also a consequence of higher average household incomes in the territory. The exploitation is not new and likely to continue until the car fleet is predominantly electric. Until then the government needs to pursue strategies to reduce the need for a car which would also have the benefit of reducing greenhouse emissions.

Such strategies include developing additional housing near employment, directing employment to locations near housing and well served by public transport (i.e. town centres), encouraging working from home and increasing the coverage, frequency and comfort of bus-based public transport.

The suggestion that light rail could be a silver bullet to improve the attractiveness of public transport is fantasy, as its cost may actually reduce funds for needed improvements to the public transport network.

Mike Quirk, Garran

Emily Chantiri (‘‘The rights of renters in bid situation’’, January 20) has written about the practices of real estate agents when people apply to rent a property. She went to great pains to emphasise the legality of an off-site bidding war following an advertisement for a rental property at a stated price.

However, she failed to mention the ethics of the situation. The applicants were asked to prove their bona fides, but were not given any reciprocal information from the agent or his client. Were there really other bidders for the apartment, which was advertised the next week at the same price, or was this just a gambit to pressure the applicants to raise their offer?

A real estate agent is really just a go-between and doesn’t incur any expense in the transaction, but is recompensed handsomely for their participation in such deals, which may involve either a house sale, or a home rental.

It is no wonder real estate agents are considered no more trustworthy than used-car salesmen?

Christine Mahe, Campbell

In my opinion, the laws of prohibition fail every time James Allan puts pen to paper about drugs (Letters, January 23).

Mr Allan should do his homework. Drug Watch International is not my former organisation with a new name – it’s an additional one. Before writing again on drug policy, he should read the article by Tony Wood, the father of Anna Wood (who died from an ecstasy tablet), which is now public knowledge. In it he said, ‘‘We were invited to sit around a boardroom table at the AMA with a panel of drug experts and professionals ... These ‘professionals’ spent an hour persuading us to use our tragedy to teach kids how to take drugs safely. We left that meeting shocked and horrified.’’

Twenty-five years after the tragic death of Anna, there is still no safe way of taking illegal drugs. And that includes pill testing, until such time as the responsible national toxicology organisation gives its approval to a gold standard for testing equipment. And Mr Allan should push the refresh button before making statements which argue against his own convictions, like: ‘‘... there are higher rates of drug use before it all began. It’s time to try something else.’’

The ‘‘it’’ he refers to can only apply to the very policy he vigorously supports and which has been in force for the past three decades.

It certainly is time to try something else, as Mr Allan suggests – and it is definitely not removing prohibiting laws against drug use.

But if that is OK, why not remove prohibiting laws against drink-driving ?

Colliss Parrett, Drug Watch International, Barton

About the only correct statement James Allan made in his letter (‘‘Prohibition fails again’’, The Canberra Times, January 23) was ‘‘It’s time to try something else’’.

That ‘‘something else’’ is to blame drug users for taking dangerous drugs, rather than portraying them as innocent victims criminalised and harmed by government policy. Of course, others are also to blame: drug pushers, and irresponsible libertarians like James who support dangerous behaviour by drug takers.

James pretends to deplore ‘‘failed logic and flawed thinking’’ but it is he who exercises these. No logical person could equate Australia’s refusal to allow drug taking at music festivals with ‘‘demonisation of black civil rights campaigners and opponents of the Vietnam War’’.

He said ‘‘banning drugs forces up their price’’, implying that is bad. However, the opposite is true because higher price lowers demand. He claimed that the price of marijuana plummeted after legalisation, but he didn’t comment on the most relevant effect of the legislation: whether it reduced usage.

He then used extreme exaggeration about prohibition creating enormous criminal organisations with more firepower than smaller nations, criminalising a large swath of society, entrenching poverty, bogging down justice systems and bursting jails. No sane person believes Australia’s laws against illicit drugs cause such harm.

He said ‘‘illicit drugs are only dangerous because governments handed responsibility for manufacture and distribution to criminal organisations’’. Rubbish! There should be no manufacture and distribution. What drugs does he think government should manufacture? Heroin? Ice? LSD?

Perhaps James himself should take a pill: a reality pill!

R.Salmond, Melba

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