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Words to no effect
Apropos of Immigration Minister Andrew Giles extolling the benefits of high immigration (″Migrants ‘needed to build homes’ ″, 10/11) I would be more than curious to see what would happen if he was to get onto a soapbox in front of a line of house seekers snaked around the block in Sydney or Melbourne desperate to find a property they can afford to rent or even any property at all.
The minister could elucidate the benefits to them all of adding nearly the population of Canberra every year at a time when vacancy rates are down to 0.2 per cent. I’m sure they would listen attentively.
Tony Davidson,
Glen Waverley
Stay in the Loop
The Suburban Rail Loop seems like a sensible idea, but many Melburnians lack enthusiasm for it. We know it is going to cost at least twice as much and take twice as long as proposed. We know that if private enterprise is involved, all the risks will rest with the state while guaranteed benefits will flow to investors for umpteen decades. We know that there will be unexpected issues, prolonged industrial disputes, union blackmail and featherbedding.
Still, the concept is incredible value for money when compared with the forehead slapping stupidity of the AUKUS submarine proposal. Let’s do it.
Peter Barry, Marysville
TACA fracas
The acronym TACA (The Airline Customer Advocate (″Delayed travellers in the EU can receive up to $1000″, 10/11) in my experience stands for Totally And Completely Abysmal. TACA serves the airlines. To say it represents airline customers is an airbridge too far.
George Greenberg, Malvern
Long-term vision needed
Your correspondent (Letters, 11/11) is so correct about the Suburban Rail Loop. Not since the Snowy Mountains scheme has Australia engaged in long-term development. We have passed up opportunities on a fast train and inland irrigation systems on a large scale. Most politicians can’t see past the next election and, unfortunately, a lot of people get carried away by the prospect of debt – and yet most young people take on 30-year mortgages to buy a house.
Michael McKenna, Warragul
Optus, give a refund
Optus should consider giving affected customers a one-month service refund, given the lengthy networks outage, rather than a data credit that might or might not be useful.
Matthew Hamilton, Kew
Voice committee would do
Now that the Voice to parliament has been done and dusted and lost, there is no reason that there cannot still be a Voice advisory committee to parliament.
There are already a number of Indigenous federal politicians in Parliament. As well as working for their electorate they could form an advisory committee along with non-Indigenous members to form an advisory Voice to Parliament committee as was part of the referendum.
As far as special recognition to the Indigenous community in the Constitution, everyone in Australia is already recognised in that document and there should not be any community group singled out for special mentions. After all, we are all Australians.
Alan Leitch,
Austins Ferry, Tas
Change the systems
It’s striking how readily people have taken sides in the Middle East horror. Those who have been harmed or whose family and communities have been harmed rightly feel the need to express their pain – it’s unimaginable.
Those who haven’t might reflect on how much they actually know about the centuries of conflict, pain and suffering, before they “back a side”. There are surely, and undeniably, two sides. First, the innocent, the moderate, the accepting and the peace loving. Second, those who aren’t.
Those who need to have things laid out as binary, good/bad, right/wrong are perpetuating the tradition that got the players here in the first place. If you need a binary world perhaps think of all of those generations of people of all cultures and faiths who have reached out to make change. Think of the peace that almost was, and the people on all “sides” who got in its way. Perhaps think of what these haters of peace (mostly men) had to gain, and what would happen to their money, status and sense of self if there was no conflict.
If you have to be against someone, be against the people whose lives depend on conflict. If you demand change, demand change to the systems that conspire against the majority to support the very few.
Matthew Thornburton, Preston
The cruel experiments
The only pleasing thing about the birth of the monkey with fluorescent eyes and fingers (″Green and glowing DNA monkey key to stem-cell cures″, 10/11) was that he died 10 days after birth. We live in an age where 3D printers can restore mobility to humans who have lost their limbs, and research groups are well on their way to being able to custom-make body parts and organs. Experimenting on non-human beings with the same capacity for suffering as ourselves is both cruel and archaic.
Jennifer Moxham, Monbulk
Make bags free
A recent weekly shop cost me more that $220, but more galling was that I left all my shopping bags at home, including those for fruit and vegetables. Coles charged me $3.25 for a cooler bag and six brown paper ones.
With not a peep from the big three supermarkets on their alleged efforts to resume accepting responsibility for plastic waste, why can’t shoppers be provided with reusable bags free of charge until a workable, new system begins. Plastic veg bags are free so why not reusable bags?
Frances Thompson, Nelson
Tuvalu too little
Anthony Albanese is offering special visas for climate refugees from Tuvalu, and he’s committed $16.9 million ″to expand Tuvalu’s landmass to help withstand sea level rise’. He sees the risk, he recognises the reality of the climate change threat. Then why, oh why, is he still allowing his ministers to approve new fossil fuel projects? If he can see the existential threat in the future, why is he still pouring oil (and gas and coal) onto the fire?
Chris Young, Surrey Hills
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