Like Jack Kershaw (Letters, August 31) we too share the same experience in Forrest of ugly shipping containers plonked on properties for an unknown period.
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On Fitzroy Street, a house owner has had one "site office" container only recently removed after close to two years, and still has one shipping container with building material piled on its roof, and one cage overflowing with cardboard and other rubbish that could easily be disposed of with a little bit of effort. While there are renovations under way the site has more containers than some new building sites.
According to Access Canberra there are no hard and fast rules about the length of time a shipping container can be on a property, or what it may be used for, and they have no enforcement options unless the containers are on ACT government land such as a verge. Given an election is on the horizon perhaps we will see an election commitment to review this untidy practice.
R. Scouller and R. Baker, Forrest
Tram exercise defies logic
It took a freedom of information request to uncover 2013 advice to the Chief Minister ("Buses beat tram: report", August 30, p1) to reveal why the government wants to saddle us with a vastly expensive tram. It is not intended to improve on, or even match, bus services from Gungahlin to City. Instead it is presented "as an integrated land use, transport and planning policy project".
Light rail is to be the agent of "value capture", from higher-density development in North Canberra. In other words, this inferior form of public transport is intended to generate higher rates and taxes that will help to pay for it!
The genius who came up with this circular logic forgot that zoning for higher-density development in North Canberra has been raising revenues before there was any prospect of a tram. Those revenues may have been put to worthwhile community use, but will instead now be devoted to helping to pay for a disastrous white elephant.
Ian W.Morison, Barton
Raiders' wins a challenge for 9
I am not a Canberra Raiders supporter but I am a proud ACT resident, so congratulations to the Raiders for coming home in the top three, irrespective of the outcome this weekend. It must be terribly distressing for the owners of the game at Channel 9 to have to televise a Raiders game for at least two weeks in a row. I wonder if they will be able to identify any of the players when they call the game?
Mike Harding, Holt
Manly's humble beginnings
Manly supporters will be encouraged to learn that there is still plenty of hate out there for their rugby league team. I suspect Murray Hunter (Letters, August 31) – a former resident of western suburbs – was not living in one of those suburbs "in 1956 when at the Manly Council Chambers a decision was taken to form a licensed club to compete in the player market against St George and Western Suburbs". The quote is from the book League of a Nation, edited by David Headon and Lex Marinos, published in 1996.
R.J. Wenholz, Holt
Taken for a ride — if only
One hopes that the new bus schedules, introduced on Monday last, have seen an improvement in the long-standing and costly issue of the "dead running" of Action buses, but it remains to be seen. On Sunday, I just missed the last bus from Woden to Kambah (No 62) and I had little recourse than to walk home. And it is a long walk, I can assure readers. As I trudge, three Action buses passed me by, heading, one assumes, to the Tuggeranong depot.
In this case, shouldn't the transport services be so designed as to complete their journeys in Tuggeranong, rather than in Woden or in the City, and by so doing to eliminate the drive of an empty bus to Tuggeranong?
Don Wilkey, Kambah
ESA workshop fit-for-purpose
The article "Emergency services HQ call reversed by cabinet", August 31, p2) gives the impression that the current ACT Emergency Services Agency vehicle workshop is inadequate.
The Auditor-General's report, and the documents released under Freedom of Information referred to in the article, identified concerns raised regarding site selection for ESA Headquarters and the suitability of existing buildings at Fairbairn.
These concerns were addressed after negotiations with the Canberra Airport Group, and resulted in the construction of purpose-designed facilities for the ESA headquarters.
The current ESA vehicle workshop is fit-for-purpose, and has been adequately serving the needs of the ESA's operational services since construction and fitout of the facility was completed in September 2010.
It would be appreciated if this matter could be corrected in any future reporting on this issue.
Mark Brown, acting commissioner, Emergency Services Agency
No need for knotted knickers
Conrad Liveris ("Low expectations provide for gender inequality", Comment, August 31, p18) seems unduly exercised over the workplace diversity displayed recently at a Geocon workplace. The fuss in Canberra mirrors the consternation in London in the late '60s when it became known that a play displaying full frontal male nudity, You know I can't hear you when the water's running, was transferring from New York to the West End.
A well-known drama critic – it may have been Kenneth Tynan – attended opening night with a front-row seat and the play begins with a bedroom scene, a woman and an open door leading to a bathroom. The woman calls out to her husband and he emerges naked from the bathroom cleaning his teeth and quotes the play's title.
The critic wrote that there was nothing unusual in the shape, colour and size of the man's member, and considering that 50 per cent of the audience had one, and the other 50 per cent probably had access to one on a temporary or permanent basis, he couldn't see what all the fuss was about.
A jolly good example of British sang froid – now referred to as "cool" – I would have thought. Why can't we display it?
Bill Deane, Chapman
Outlaw all foreign donations
Senator Sam Dastyari's decision to ask a Chinese Communist Party-linked donor to foot his expenses bill ("Pressure builds on Dastyari", September 1, p6) highlights two aspects of political life in Australia which need to cleaned up. The first is the length that political parties will go to to protect wrongdoing in their own party and at the same time require a higher standard from their opposite numbers. This hypocrisy is one of the reason that the political system and politicians are held in such low esteem by voters.
The second is that we have laws and procedures which allow politicians to accept money, either personal or donations to political parties, from foreign entities. In this case it appears that the Chinese have had some measure of success as Mr Dastyari supports Beijing's untenable South China sea claim, despite this being at odds with his own party platform.
It is staggering to realise that relatively small donations to political parties enable access to the higher echelons of the party system which can have a large sway in the formation of party platforms. No politician or political party should be allowed to accept money or favours from foreign entities.
Mr Dastyari is reportedly a power player within the Labor Party. What influence will he have in how the ALP's formulates its future China policies?
R. Knight, Bywong, NSW
How ironic that Tony Burke says Sam Dastyari has acknowledged his travel misdemeanour in accepting money from Chinese interests and has given the equivalent amount to charity after being found out, we should now leave Sam alone and all move on. After all, Tony himself is an expert on travel rorts having flown his family to Uluru at taxpayer expense while visiting there on so-called official business.
David McCarthy, Wallaroo, NSW
Remember when anyone who opposed the China FTA was labelled racist? Funny how a change in the composition of the Senate suddenly makes Chinese companies persona non grata with the Coalition.
Peter Edsor, Bungendore, NSW
Privatisation poisons
Although I could not find any reference to this in the Liberal Party's Our Plan website, the Coalition government, before the last federal election, asked the Productivity Commission to look into introducing competition into human services, including health and education.
Of course the term "introducing competition" is a euphemism for privatisation. People may recall that when the Gillard government "introduced further competition" to the vocational education and training sector, the results were disastrous results for students, industry and taxpayers
Yet during the last election campaign, the government flatly denied any intention to privatise Medicare. Given what has been revealed about the widespread fraud and rorting engaged in by many banks, financial advisers, insurance companies, private health insurance, employment services and dodgy private vocational colleges, why on earth would any government even consider further privatisation?
Pauline Westwood, Dickson
Destroying ARENA
Not long before the election it was announced that the Labor Party would accede to the government's proposal to remove from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency its unspent funds, about $1.3 billion. Shadow environment minister Mark Butler justified this on the curious grounds that the usual supporters of ARENA had not complained loudly enough.
The Labor Party was at the forefront defeating, just, the attempt of Tony Abbott to destroy ARENA. The agency's supporters are now were dismayed at Labor's so ready abandonment of it.
The $6 billion to be "saved" by the government's "Omnibus Bill", shortly to be presented to Parliament, contains the ARENA funding. If passed in its present form, this will seal its extinction. Malcolm Turnbull will have done what Tony Abbott had been unable to do.
I do not know how many people in the higher levels of the federal Labor Party read the letters to The Canberra Times. But hopefully the three ACT Labor parliamentarians do. They should reflect on the fact that Canberra voters are more aware of and exercised by this issue than most, and are watching what happens.
John Cashman, Yarralumla
Get serious on climate
What on earth is Malcolm Turnbull playing at putting solar-sceptic Craig Kelly MP into the chair of the Coalition's environment and energy committee? It is a red rag to the bull that is the environment movement in this country. Apart from mass reafforestation, the only way we are going to avert dangerous climate change is to move the economy away from fossil fuels and adopt renewable energy, including solar. The top climate scientist at the US National Aeronautical and Atmospheric Administration, Gavin Schmidt, has just announced that the planet is warming at a pace not experienced in the past 1000 years. Urgent action is required and I fear Craig Kelly is not the man for the job.
Jenny Goldie, Michelago, NSW
Marriage freedom
Stewart Back (Letters, August 31) asserts that mono-sex couples are not normal in the animal world and that our marriage laws should "support nature." Homosexuality, heterosexuality, enthusiastic sexuality in a variety of forms and positions is commonplace in nature. Scientific reporting on the subject is extensive, but if you're still in doubt visit your local dog park. It is monogamy that is not the norm in nature.
Even animals such as the prairie voles and penguins that were once thought to mate for life have been found to routinely stray. Marriage is not natural; it is intrinsically human. We created it and it is whatever we choose to make it.
I want it to reflect what's best about us: our ability to love, our kindness and our willingness to accept people for who they are.
Kate Roediger, Melba
The only value I could see in Stewart Back's letter in which he claimed, amongst other things, that the vast majority of the population do not support marriage equality, is that it does provide some evidence that there may in fact be a multiverse.
Justin McCarthy, Chapman
TO THE POINT
LAME TURNBULL
Never has a newly elected prime minister seemed so lame. Will it be 15 months before the rest of the Liberals "aTone" and dump Malcolm Turnbull of leader? Where to from here for Australia?
Jeff Bradley, Isaacs
IRISH APPLE ROT
If you require one searing indictment of the utter corruptness of trade globalisation, and of how it warps nefariously the very governments that wallow in it, just contemplate the Irish Apple case.
Alex Mattea, Kingston
CONFUSED TERMS
David Z. Hughes (Letters, August 30) suggests "Canberra" has variable 2.75 year terms? I hope he's not one of those misguided Australians who confuses "Canberra" with the Federal government. The ACT, which includes Canberra, has fixed four-year terms.
J. Wyburn, Narrabundah
POLITICAL STUPIDITY
The Vietnam War Memorial obstructs the footpath, forcing people to detour to continue along Anzac Parade. A silly and inconsiderate memorial reminding us of the stupidity of the politicians who declared war on the Vietnamese people.
Leon Arundell, Downer
$90 BILLION SAVING
Craig Kelly needs to learn more about the solar energy industry, which provides more jobs than the gas, coal and electricity sectors. Australia would save $90 billion by going 100 per cent renewable by 2050.
Sylvia Carr, Curtin
DRUGS NOT RECREATIONAL
Your article "Parties not keen on music fest drug tests" (August 31, p5) refers to "recreational drugs". These are illegal and extremely dangerous, and describing them as "recreational" is inappropriate.
Tim McGhie, Isabella Plains
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