Burning the bush gives short-term gain but long-term pain

Of course wildfires will occur. The point is that ACT fire records tell us they occur most often in forests disturbed by the last fire. That's not a fringe idea, it's maths. We counted the fires, had our work independently peer reviewed and published, and it has never been refuted. "National best practice" models say it shouldn't be, but do we believe the model built on nine data points, or the mapped records of thousands of fires?

We found the same thing in south-west WA. It was peer-reviewed by international experts and torn apart by an entire government department, but the scrutiny just strengthened the findings.

Burning the bush gives short-term gain but long-term pain. We see the dense regrowth after fire with our own eyes. It's like buying groceries on the credit card: you eat well that week but you're worse off overall.

When working in fire management, I was once told "you think you're here to save homes and lives. You're not. Your job as a public servant is to get the government re-elected".

Fire crews wryly joke about the "hazard production burns" they are forced to perform by the bureaucracy, then fight the next bushfire in the dense regrowth created to tick the box and keep the government elected. Forget the old model, let the bush recover, and instead fund the firefighters.

Jack Waterford may count me overall as a fan. So, it is with regret that I find his self-serving Forum article (May 18) is not entirely supportable.

David McBride stole and disseminated to eager journalists material which he freely swore not to. Parallels with Bernard Collaery's activities are clear.

The latter was let off the hook because new Attorney General Dreyfus, without so much as a Philadelphia lawyer's distinction, withdrew the charges against him. The Attorney-General was able to attack the Coalition's Alexander Downer who had extraordinarily difficult issues, political and commercial, to deal with relating to Timor. Funny that.

Major McBride did not need to disclose secret material regarding Afghanistan, or the absurd overuse of SAS troops, or the failure of Major-General Brereton to focus on missing-in-action subalterns, captains and majors - at the expense of other ranks. Adequate journalism and public interest would have pin-pointed the discrepancies. Funny that.

Mr Collaery did not care or understand that China's nefarious commercial activities in and around Timor had to be countered. And Major McBride was certain that his disclosures would not harm Australia's interests. Funny that.

Your opinion piece on Julian Assange ("The US must stop persecuting Assange", May 22) omitted one very important fact. The reason why Assange spent so long in the Ecuadorean embassy in London was that he had skipped UK bail in order to avoid extradition to Sweden to answer two allegations of sexual assault.

Investigations into those accusations were only dropped when the Swedish authorities concluded they had no realistic prospect of bringing them to conclusion. It was his choice to lock himself away in the embassy, and then, having already jumped bail on that matter, it was not surprising that the UK authorities have since denied him bail while he fights extradition to the US.

In offering sympathy to Assange for his "ordeal", you should also have offered some support to the Swedish women who were denied their opportunity for justice. Being a media celebrity should not entitle anyone to a free pass from sexual abuse allegations.

I must commend the editorial "The US must stop persecuting Assange" (May 22) in which the plight of Julian Assange was neatly summarised.

As far as I know Assange has never set foot in America, nor has he broken British or Australian laws. Reportedly, he offended the sensibilities of the Pentagon, apparently his principal protagonists.

If there was any doubt that the United States is an imperial power, then this overbearing overreach is proof.

The CSIRO reports that nuclear power would be about twice as expensive as renewables, and that if construction were started today the plant would not be ready before 2039, by which time it may be too late to address global warming.

In addition, nuclear power has other disadvantages not mentioned in the CSIRO report that seem sufficient to rule it out as a power source. There has been a history of dangers narrowly averted that culminated in the explosion at Chernobyl in 1986 that destroyed the plant and spewed radioactive contaminants far beyond the Soviet border.

Then in 2011 came the disastrous explosion at the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan. Other unsolved problems are how to deal with the radioactive waste and how to decommission the plant at the end of its active life. Such a history should have been enough to have banned such a dangerous power source, yet nuclear power continues to be generated.

It does seem likely that the real reason for persisting with nuclear power has been that these commercial plants produce plutonium as a by-product of operation. This plutonium has been then used as the active material in nuclear weapons. Nuclear power and nuclear weapons need each other. In Australia we don't contemplate becoming a nuclear power, so we would have no use for the plutonium we would make in nuclear power stations.

A key factor the CSIRO seems to have overlooked in its report is that a nuclear reactor never shuts down; not even when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow. Even at twice the price it's better value.

The government decision to tax unrealised capital gains in super funds is just another crazy idea like the previous franking credits debacle that cost the ALP the 2019 election.

A capital gain is not real until it is realised (by cashing the investment in).

In 2020 the pandemic saw the stock market fall from 7197 in February to a low of 4403 in March; a "loss" of 38 per cent.

If it had occurred on 30 June you would have been taxed on a gain which was non-existent six weeks later.

These massive super funds, one of which holds at least $100 million, have been created by the fund being allowed to borrow money.

Has that loophole been closed? A very wealthy person lends money, many millions, to the super fund at minimal rates and the fund then invests it in growth stocks such as NVDIA.

If the ALP wants to tax non-realised capital gains in super funds why not extend it to investment properties - that would certainly create a hornets nest but it would dramatically see prices fall as people had to sell to pay capital gains.

Congratulations to the ACT government on the "extremely impressive" rating it earned regarding the kangaroo cull. A successful outcome for just about all the stakeholders.

While everyone loves our kangaroos, I guess we have to accept that some need to go so the rest can prosper.

Perhaps the government could turn its attention to other areas where reduced numbers would mean better use of resources. Contractors to government departments, NDIS recipients, pesky residents over 75 years, and politicians, come to mind.

At most of the public libraries that I visit there is usually a sign above the borrowing desk stating that library staff are not allowed to comment on council matters.

Following the storm in tea cup of confected outrage at Cumberland Council, manufactured by non-book reader Steve Christou, would it be too much to ask for a "councillors may not comment on library matters" sign to be nailed up in council chambers?

So the Commonwealth government is trying to stop the monopoly of Coles and Woolworths.

But what's the deal then when the ACT government gave Vinnies the monopoly which closed down the Green Shed?

Surely we can compare the former with the latter?

Come to think about it, the ACT government also forced the takeover of Calvary Hospital. The local government needs to stop compulsory takeovers and allow more players into the fold.

Apparently multi-property owners will be able to claim the $300 energy rebate on each property as long as the energy account is in their name. This must seem particularly egregious to those on Jobseeker and low incomes.

No, Simon Clarke and Felicity Chivas (Letters, May 21) it is not hypocrisy when the demands of war or law demand that ordinary folk do things they would otherwise not contemplate. It is irony.

I agree with Byam Wight (Letters, May 20) that we should be delighted with Ricky Stuart's continued leadership of the Raiders. But maybe some of the defectors might want to return. Are you listening Jack Wighton?

Three of the four residents who need to vacate their current housing by July 5 ("One last Salvo", May 19) had not been assigned a caseworker by last Sunday. The Salvation Army must make strenuous efforts to find alternative accommodation and allow them to stay where they are until then.

S Davey (Letters, May 20) said we should eat kangaroos. Kangaroo meat a very high concentrations of L-carnitine, a compound associated with the build-up of plaque in arteries which causes heart attacks, strokes and vascular disease. Kangaroo meat is also known to harbour parasites and pathogens.

We don't need a $20 million inquiry into how to improve the train service to Sydney. A train driver told me he was on one-third throttle for more than half the journey because of the poor track. Just fix the track.

Isn't there already a young Trump biopic screening on free to air? It's called South Park. The young Trump is played by Eric Cartman.

The ACT leader of the opposition smells a rat ("Education boss launched legal action to end integrity investigation", May 21) . Well, rats are canny and cunning beings, able to plan, delay and defer actions until the time is right. In Canberra they probably can even make sense of an election timetable.

Is it just me, or is the engraving on the Stone of Remembrance grammatically incorrect? It says "Their name liveth for evermore". But shouldn't it be "their names"? Or was the author just way ahead of their day with pronouns?

Mark Sproat (Letters, May 23), who was the last Liberal treasurer with any economic qualifications? And how does Angus Taylor shape up after his "I'm not going into any details" performance at the National Press Club? My reaction was "very qualified".