The dodgy business case for this project was heavily redacted to prevent public scrutiny of the details. It drew scathing comments from the Auditor-General. Excluding the so-called "wider economic benefits", the real benefit-cost ratio is not high enough to justify Commonwealth funding. When borderline projects like this were funded by the previous government, they were heavily criticised.

The feds have already recognised a dud when they see one. The possibility of a $200 million Commonwealth contribution has already been abandoned. The ACT taxpayers would be left to carry the burden of a project that has been estimated to cost as much as $3.8 billion.

The Chief Minister's claim that the Commonwealth stands to benefit the most from "an efficient public transport system" are ridiculous. There is nothing efficient about a tram which takes nearly twice as long as the current City to Woden express bus. Electric buses would come in at around one-tenth of the cost.

The incoming federal government is not going to make the mistakes of its predecessor.

Listening to the Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce during and after election night confirmed what a selfish and self-serving politician he is. He is everything people despise in politicians, so much so that we voted the Coalition out of office. He constantly referred to himself as a National, crowing about all the seats the Nationals had retained (despite the swings against them) or won (one).

He was, in effect, denying the existence of the Coalition. Don't get me wrong, I am not criticising the Nationals or the regions they represent. But it is politicians like Mr Joyce who do the party a disservice. He was more than happy with the arrangements while in government, with all its benefits. But now on the outer, it appears that the arrangement doesn't suit his agenda particularly well.

A classic example of "run with the hare and hunt with the hounds".

Other correspondents have taken a degree of satisfaction from the fact that Kristina Keneally was unable to win Fowler for Labor because she was parachuted into the electorate as a "captain's pick".

While I don't condone the practice of the "captain's pick", it is useful to note this was done because of the Left and Right factional rivalry in NSW which left her in an unwinnable third place on the Senate ticket.

The outcome is that Labor and the Parliament have lost the services of a highly articulate, intelligent, experienced woman who had demonstrated in opposition that she was hard-working, well across her brief as shadow minister for home affairs, and likely to make a significant contribution to the contest of ideas.

That's not really an outcome to be satisfied about.

Of the all those who lost seats in the election, the saddest loss to Australia was Senator Rex Patrick.

He was, without doubt, one of the most ethical politicians in the country. He did so much to raise awareness of corruption, supporting a strong federal ICAC, exposing the dishonesty over Timor-Leste and the prosecution of whistleblowers such as Witness K and Bernard Collaery, and fighting the secretive Morrison government with tireless FOI requests.

It is particularly galling to think that while Mr Patrick will not get back in to the Senate, Pauline Hanson, who has contributed almost nothing in her long years in the Senate, may well sneak back in.

Bob Salmond (Letters, May 15) seems to think Taiwan does not have the right to self-determination because it was ceded to China from Japan in 1945, and hence was considered part of China at the time the United Nations was formed.

I'm sure President Putin would agree with this logic, but I doubt he would find many supporters among the former Soviet Republics (including Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) who were deemed part of the USSR at the same point in history.

In his letter suggesting solutions to perceived problems with housing affordability and amenity (Letters, May 17), Jack Kershaw begins by stating, boldly, that we do not have a "sprawl" problem. The straight-line distance from the southern edge of Banks to the northern edge of Jacka is about 40 kilometres. The road distance is somewhat more. I would say that that constitutes a "sprawl". Growing up in the UK I used to travel shorter distances to go on holiday.

And let us not forget the latest "sprawl" developing west of Holt and Macgregor - "sprawling" towards and maybe into NSW, no less. "Sprawl-wise", things will only get worse.

Our drug policy largely explains why illicit drug use has found its way to the upper levels in the Alexander Maconochie Centre. Harm minimisation flows from an ideological dreamworld by an American billionaire who has no basic objection to illicit drug use.

However, this approach doesn't pass the Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn test, which says even the most rational approach to ethics is defenceless if there isn't the will to do what is right.

By no definition does inferring or telling a community there's nothing illegal or wrong with using illicit, mind-altering, toxic drugs align with doing what is right.

Limiting the aims of drug policy to basically "reducing the harmful effects of drugs" is to capitulate to illegal drug trafficking and to accept that drugs have come to stay in our societies.

A limited aim of this kind is in practice a lowering of society's ambitions, and sanctions the marginalisation of certain groups in society. Limiting the harmful effects of drugs is one part of the efforts made in drug use care on behalf of persons who have become addicted to drugs.

But if a strategy is formulated and implemented essentially in terms of alleviating the situation of those who have already become dependent/addicted, the role and effectiveness of primary prevention is severely reduced and results in growing numbers of first-time users who feed expansion of use.

Anyone who actually thinks the ACT government's annual kangaroo cull is about conservation should consider this: the nature reserve, Callum Brae, is a 143-hectare reserve. The kangaroos there have been shot almost every single year since culling began in 2009. For what? There is allegedly a small population of perunga grasshoppers on the reserve - so small that the 2021 Canberra Nature Park Management Plan has not even identified where the grasshoppers are located on Callum Brae.

To claim that the few remaining kangaroos are harming the habitat of these grasshoppers, which have evolved alongside kangaroos for millions of years, is absurd.

According to the ACT Environment Directorate's own Threatened Species Management Plan, the key threats to the perunga grasshoppers are human development (urban, industrial and infrastructure), agricultural practices (use of weedicides, herbicides), feral animals (cats and foxes), drought and climate change.

Kangaroos are not listed as a threat to perunga grasshoppers, but are being made the scapegoats. To call these repeated massacres of kangaroos a "conservation cull" is disingenuous in the extreme. It's not a conservation cull. It is a con on the people of Canberra.

I refer to Graham Downie's letter of May 19 about light rail. In Canberra we are irrefutably on the wrong track by bulldozing ahead with stage 2. What a waste.

This is how it should be done. From the Brisbane City Council: "As part of Brisbane Metro, Brisbane City Council will introduce a new fleet of 60 battery electric, high-capacity metros. The metros will integrate seamlessly into busway operations, sharing the busway with existing bus services."

And: "Council is working with world-leading vehicle manufacturer HESS, electric infrastructure experts Hitachi Energy and leading manufacturer Volgren to design and build the battery electric metro fleet and state of the art flash charging infrastructure."

Google it. Can someone please show the Greens how to do that?

The Coalition didn't take long to bring out their big weapon, the coal-powered "blame thrower".

It's too bad Zed probably won't be around to be "numbers monitor" for Dutton when the Libs look for a new leader. With the smaller numbers involved, he might have been able to count them properly this time.

I wholeheartedly agree with John Walker (Letters, May 22) about incorrect grammar by people who should know better. While I have reluctantly accepted that "whom" is disappearing, "who" seems to be too, as it is frequently replaced with "that".

Every elected politician, including Mr Albanese, talks as if they will transform Australia into a utopia. We have all seen and heard this before thousands of times. Three years down the road and things only ever change for the worse. What do these people think we are?

Why the silence on the 300-plus eviction letters to Housing ACT tenants? Is our Labor/Green government scrambling around for excuses, or is this the "new normal" for the way public tenants are treated?

The ACT ban on some plastic items such as straws is very welcome. But businesses saying there is no acceptable alternative to plastic fruit and veg bags? Really? What about paper? It worked for generations. Or charging for plastic, with reuse multiple times being the norm?

Should David Pocock replace Zed Seselja in the Senate, he will have three years in which to bring home the bacon. Surely enough time to learn the art of deal-making, creating alliances and maybe Googling Jacqui Lambie to see how she got her way.

So Barr wants Albanese to waive $100 million of housing debt, according to Tuesday's The Canberra Times. If worried about debt, maybe Barr could abandon the next tram to nowhere as a start? He could then ask for financial help to provide an excellent electric bus system.

Dutton for leader? Here go the Libs making yet another very stupid mistake. Why don't they learn? Talk about digging your own grave, just like ScoMo did. I will enjoy watching the outcome of this choice.

If the Liberals want to get in again, please don't give Peter Dutton the leadership.

If the Liberals are serious about equality and looking after women, give the job to a woman.

It will be a long time before I give Liberals the vote if Dutton is the leader, and not a woman.

It's hard to see why anyone, pedants included, would hold a torch for pedants (Letters, May 25). They are, as pedants ought well know, nothing less than nitpickers, carping cavillers.