Canberra's action on wood heating will deliver a healthier future for all

More people will understand that the methane, black carbon and carbon monoxide emitted by the average wood heater causes more global warming than a gas-log fire and 20-100 times more than an efficient heat pump.

Everyone will benefit from less wood heater pollution, especially young children, unborn babies, and those at risk of asthma attacks, cancers, heart attacks, strokes or dementia.

The ACT panel survey found that 28 per cent of Canberrans - over 2.5 times the 11 per cent of respondents owning wood heaters - were frequently or sometimes impacted by smoke from a neighbour's wood heater.

Sadly complaints about the problem often remained unresolved.

As the new policy is developed, or the "right to a healthy environment" is incorporated into an updated Human Rights Act, perhaps these problems will be also addressed so that everyone, including the 28 per cent of Canberrans affected by other people's wood heater pollution, will be able to look forward to a cleaner, healthier future.

It's incredible that the ACT government will continue to allow people to use wood fired heaters until the 2040's. They are clearly bad for people's health, spewing pollution into the environment and causing respiratory illnesses and other health conditions. The government should have the guts to start tackling the issue straight away.

On the face of it, your headline ("Intergenerational report puts 'big Australia' back on the agenda", August 23) doesn't seem unreasonable.

Even excluding the war years, our 20th century net migration only averaged a little over 60,000.

But get this, the crazy "big Australia" years, 2007-2020, yielded a 225,000 average.

It's not rocket science that the Treasurer's reported IGR target of 235,000 is even higher than 225,000. He is targeting 715,000 for the 2022-24 period.

Here's the catch. The Treasurer has already cemented, that up is down, and his IGR is no Big Australia 2.0. Silly reader - you just imagined it.

According to The Guardian, Big Australia is just a rumour "used by the Coalition and Pauline Hanson" and actually we're facing our "slowest" population growth since federation.

At "not my ABC" "population will grow at a slower rate in the next four decades, than any other 40-year period since federation".

In the Nine papers the Treasurer also gets to say "our population will grow more slowly".

Upping the ante, the Business Council hectors me that Big Australia is a "myth". For inveterate influencer Abul Rizvi, it's just a "scare campaign".

As naturally as night follows day Chalmer's big migration also requires the continual repetition of these big fibs by him and all his other "stakeholders".

His mass migration Intergenerational Report also institutionalises, rental and housing unaffordability, as part of the furniture for decades to come.

More fibs necessarily must follow from all the usual gang.

I feel I must express my concern regarding the lack of recommendations made by the coroners working within the ACT.

Division 1.2 Objects and important concepts of the Coroners Act 1997, states:

3BA, (d) allow a coroner, based on the coroner's findings in an inquest or inquiry, to make recommendations and comments about the following:

(i) the prevention of deaths;

(ii) the promotion of general public health and safety including occupational health and safety;

(iii) the administration of justice.

A five day coronial hearing was conducted in 2022, following the unexpected and tragic death of my daughter, Brontë, in February 2020. We waited over 12 months for the findings to be handed down. The anguish was exasperating.

All we wished for were tangible recommendations which could potentially save the lives of others living with co-occurring conditions, as well as accountability into the "lost opportunities" from the services who effectively failed our beautiful Brontë.

Nope, not one of our family recommendations in our submissions were endorsed.

The coroner endorsed one recommendation, one which was made by him; and there is no guarantee that this recommendation will be implemented, let alone monitored and reviewed.

Quite simply, the Coroners Act needs be reviewed and overhauled if lives are going to be saved in the future. Further, coroners need to acutely aware of the timeliness of handing down findings to families.

As I recently spoke a eulogy for my mother and read her story of her childhood at her funeral, I was struck by how lucky she was, despite living in a timber slab hut with dirt floors and hessian bag ceilings.

No modern conveniences, but fresh air, enough to eat, and a future to look forward to.

My children live every day knowing that our governments are not doing enough to allow them a decent future. House prices impossibly out of reach, bushfires and floods increasing, the natural environment being destroyed. No wonder suicide is the leading cause of death for our young people.

Climate heating and its effects are escalating. We are seriously running out of time to maintain a viable world. The latest Intergenerational Report shows our government to be well aware of the impacts of climate change yet our politicians continue to fund fossil fuel companies and sell fossil fuels to other countries.

Our children will be the ones who suffer most. How will our children survive? What quality of life will they have? Surely our government has a legal and moral obligation to urgently address the issue of climate change.

Congratulations to Mark Kenny for an exceptionally good article ("Intergenerational Report's warning on lost productivity a side-issue in climate crisis", August 26).

We are facing a climate emergency and the lost productivity lamented in the sixth Intergenerational Report (IGR) pales into utter insignificance alongside the ecological and social devastation that climate change will bring.

As Professor John Quiggin noted in an article in The Conversation all the IGRs have presented ageing as near-catastrophe. It's not, and he cites many reasons.

The catastrophe we do face is climate change.

The IGRs will become increasingly irrelevant if viewed from a narrow economic perspective.

What price do we put on the loss of the Great Barrier Reef when temperatures rise to two degrees above pre-industrial levels? The IGR says tourism will be affected, but what about Nemo?

Reports the Trump campaign has reported an $11 million boost from sales of mugshot merchandise illustrate the strange state of US politics.

The more indictments and criminal charges Trump amasses, the more popular he becomes. Trump may well have been right when he claimed that he could shoot someone dead in the street with impunity.

What a crazy country the USA has become.

I commend the ACT government on their goals for a circular economy. I hope there are incentives backed by funding. Grants for research into ways to recycle soft plastics at scale would be hugely worthwhile.

It seems Mr Seselja is mulling over a political comeback and is fully supported by Matt Canavan and other members of the right wing of the Liberal party.

But would Canberrans mull over the return of Mr Seselja? Has he had an epiphany? Does he now believe in territory rights, something he blocked the citizens having the right to have a vote on for a decade?

The Albanese government has returned the rights to the ACT denied by the Andrews Bill. Since then Matt Canavan, Mr Seselja's great supporter, has instigated an Inquiry into the ACT government's right to take over Calvary hospital. Yet again the validity of our territory rights has been questioned.

Mr Seselja was also very vocal about the takeover.

Why would people vote for a Senator who believes Canberrans don't deserve to make decisions for themselves?

David Pocock has given a lesson in how to represent the ACT. Are Canberrans interested in Zed the Sequel?

The moral of the Prigozhin story in Russia is not to be "talented" or have "a complicated future" if you live in Putin's Russia.

In his mugshot Trump looks more like a Mafia gangster than a former president of the United States.

I am concerned about the animosity towards animals in recent letters to the editor. If we don't tolerate this harmful language towards people should we tolerate it towards animals?

Alan Joyce's ripping yarns about Qantas's performance should be read in the context that it is his business to take people for a ride.

I sincerely hope that Zed Seselja runs for an ACT seat in federal Parliament at the next election so that, once again, we can vote "A to Z" (like we did last time).

The Prime Minister dressed in a Rio Tinto shirt with the name "Anthony" emblazoned on the chest might be a good little earner for a Labor party donation, but what will it cost our grandchildren in terms of the future environment? Political donations will yet be the death of us all.

Bob McDonald (Letters, August 24) worries about the negative impacts of "the government's rush to renewables"(sic). If he means rushing like a tortoise I must agree with him. The blackouts and power rationing he fears will be worse and come a lot sooner unless we act faster.

I find Catherine King's stance on the Voice bizarre. She nominates issues in Indigenous communities but then says the Voice is needed to both identify and to fix them. Surely as a minister she is in a position to do this without a Voice.

Senator Cash suggests "if you don't know, vote no!" I suggest "if you don't know, get off your bum and find out!". If we followed her logic, we would still be living in the trees, eating nuts and berries. Surely no-one is that conservative?

With the expected dry summer and warning from the RFS penalties for arson should be severe. I suggest a fine of $10,000 plus at least two years jail time. Actual jail time. Well publicised too. Acreage, livestock, homes and potential loss of life are possible outcomes.

Ah, so the old cop shop-zambuck-firie land on Lathlain Street has been sold by the ACT government for a motza so some "mixed" development can happen. Shoulda oughta had a punt on that happening instead of a park. When will it ever stop?