While I am no apologist for the ALP or Anthony Albanese, I believe he was a lot closer to the real number of unemployed than the current government would have us believe.

When official unemployment figures leave out all those who only work for as little as an hour a week, it immediately becomes clear that the 4 per cent rate is inaccurate.

Paid employment should enable people to pay for the cost of living.

How many people employed for even 10 or 20 hours a week, let alone one, are able to survive on what they earn?

Your editorial "Pushed to their limits, Canberra's nurses need help" (canberratimes.com.au, April 10) notes "the community has been instructed [to live with COVID]".

Nurses are not the only people victimised by the "let it rip" policies of federal, state, and territory governments. Some 50,000 people a day get COVID in Australia, and nearly 500,000 people have it at any one time, with costly human and economic impacts.

Governments don't reveal data on COVID becoming long COVID, or its effects and duration. To understand long COVID, talk to someone whose life has been blighted by chronic fatigue syndrome, whose very existence as an illness had long been denied by most medicos until they came across similar post-viral symptoms in long COVID.

For months, the simplest, yet most effective, guards against COVID have been, effectively, thrown to the wind; social distancing, P2 or N95 masks indoors and hand-washing. Unlike some other vaccines, COVID vaccination will not necessarily protect a person from catching COVID from a carrier, though it will usually mitigate symptoms to such a high degree that getting three, or if eligible four, vaccinations is an absolute no-brainer. But if an unwitting carrier, and a non-carrier, are both wearing P2/N95 masks, the risks of actual transmission are so reduced that mask-wearing is also a no-brainer.

If only one person is masked, it's potluck. Perhaps, governments and people are still under the erroneous impression, created in 2020, that "masks don't work".

Your editorial "Frydenberg, Albanese and Alice in Wonderland" (canberratimes.com.au, April 2) stated " the first home buyer affordability issue is one of supply", whereas Bob Salmond (Letters, April 10) says it's one of demand. Surely it's both.

Salmond suggests reducing immigration intakes until housing supply catches up. There are other demand levers. In Canada the government has banned foreign investors from buying homes for two years in a bid to cool off the market. We should do likewise.

A second demand lever is to ban investors from new purchases of individual homes and apartments. All existing investments should stand but new investments should be directed to buying shares in large construction companies and major building supply companies.

Thirdly, no more schemes enticing young people to enter the market at lower than normal deposit rates, only to be faced by substantial debt when interest rates rise .

Various politicians claim the solution is to increase the supply of housing. But they ignore obvious factors. Many building tradespeople are occupied replacing existing homes destroyed in bush fires and floods. Others are engaged on renovations to existing properties, and overall numbers are insufficient because of cuts to TAFE funding over recent years.

Furthermore building supply chain times have lengthened during the pandemic, and new housing normally takes years to develop because of the need to purchase and service land and actual construction times.

Obviously both supply and demand factors need to be addressed by politicians

I hope Jennifer Bradley (Letters, April 9) sent a copy of her insightful letter to the (un-elected) ARM and ABC. At some point they need to realize that, as Jennifer explains, our republic must be built on foundations of greater substance than "monarchy bashing".

This is why I was hoping to see a few "republican independents" offer themselves for election in the next month. If elected, they would have three years to demonstrate their integrity, economic sense, compassion, environmental credentials and a vision that unites and inspires our nation.

The republic will change the fabric of our nation in subtle and profound ways at enormous expense to the taxpayers. We, the people, have the right to know the exact details of every aspect of this transformation - and (above all) trust in those chosen to create the Republic of Australia.

A number of your recent correspondents have criticised Senator Seselja for his opposition to Voluntary Assisted Dying (VAD). While I also disagree with him, he is entitled to voice his opinion and argue his case.

However, he is not entitled to use his position and the quirks of the Australian constitution to deny ACT residents the opportunity to debate the issue.

Five states of Australia have not only debated VAD in their parliaments, but passed legislation. Meanwhile, Senator Seselja and his cronies in the federal government deny ACT citizens the right to even debate it.

The Senator is once again offering himself to be our representative in the Senate, but at the same time advocates for us to be treated as second class citizens with rights inferior to our fellow citizens in the states.

This is nothing short of disgraceful. It is not representation. Senator Seselja and his inept colleagues have many, many failings, but this issue alone should be sufficient for ACT residents to vote him out of office.

When you go to the ballot box, please consider if you wish your representative to treat you as a second class citizen. If you would like the same rights as other Australians, vote for the candidate of your choice in the Senate, but also put Zed last.

When he called the election for May 21, Prime Minister Scott Morrison made some interesting comments.

One was his claim that "we are upfront". On June 5, 2019, The New York Times ran the headline "Australia may well be the world's most secretive democracy". This was shortly after Scott Morrison sidled into the Liberal leadership from his position as 'Minister for Stopping the Boats' with his highly secretive "on water matters".

Another comment was Labor "can't manage money". The "captain's pick" nuclear submarine fiasco will cost Australia at least $90 billion for vessels that may well be obsolete before they are all delivered in about 2040. Then there is up to $5.5 billion compensation for the cancellation of the French submarine contract. Is this good money management?

Voters in the May 21 election need to remember that a vote for their local Liberal or National's candidate, no matter how much they might like him or her, is a vote for that "horrible, horrible person" (Gladys Berejiklian, former NSW Lib Premier), a vote for "a hypocrite and a liar" (Barnaby Joyce, National Party Leader and Deputy PM) and for a man who is "unfit to be PM" (Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, NSW Lib senator).

A vote for a local Liberal or National's candidate is an enabling vote that could see three more years of Scott Morrison ignoring the struggles of ordinary Australians, be they caused by fire, flood or wage stagnation and cost of living pressures.

I applaud Andrew Leigh's plan to double the level of Australian philanthropy. This would not be to substitute for government effort to get above the poverty line the three million of our citizens living below it.

I have absolutely no doubt that he thinks that no one in this, one of the wealthiest countries in the world, should have to ask for charity to live a life of dignity.

I am sure our charities will continue to lobby government to fix the problems they fix and, as Leigh says, a Labor government will ensure that in this they are in no way constrained.

Australians donate about $12 billion per annum, $1 billion of which goes to developing countries. I look forward to the day when government has ended poverty here and done a lot of what we now rely on charity to do, and much of that extra $12 billion can go to people in desperate need in countries where governments cannot or will not serve their people effectively.

Several letters have commented upon the abundance of corflutes featuring Senator Zed. My first reaction was he was recycling those he used last time. Not so. These feature a rosy-cheeked version not previously seen.