WHO wants to defund the police today ('Broken hearts and heroes', Newcastle Herald 15/4)? Thanks to all who give so much for our freedom.
Steve Barnett, Fingal Bay
Firearm stance saved lives
GUN laws - thank goodness Australia has them. Think how many more would have been killed if the Bondi Junction stabbing perpetrator had carried an AK-47 instead.
Peter Hay, Islington
It's different with water at the door
I SEE Steve Barnett ("Climate strain subsidy premature", Letters, 12/2) treats rising sea levels associated with climate change in his usual flippant way.
I watched a documentary on SBS World News this weekend, about a village in Vanuatu where the people were moving, or rebuilding, their beachfront homes up the hills behind the beach as the rising sea level was starting to engulf them.
Still, what would they know?
They are living through it. They should defer to Steve Barnett's wisdom and stop wasting their time.
Jan Phillip Trevillian, Fennell Bay
A simple fix to many woes
TREASURER Jim Chalmers, you say you want to get people into and keep people in work.
Support funding for in-home care providers.
The equals work for parents, work for carers, taxes to governments and no government payments.
The list goes on. Put the money where your mouth is.
Amanda Johnstone, Mayfield
Stance on war fails to impress
I FOR one was saddened by the accidental killing of the Australian aid worker.
But I am a bit dismayed by the PM's and Foreign Minister's reaction to it.
I never saw them display similar outrage over the mass murder of innocent Israeli citizens by the HAMAS deviants or prisoners taken during their invasion of Israel.
I believe Ms Wong had to be shamed into visiting Israel.
Now they are providing support to Israel's sworn enemies. What would one expect from a Marxist Labor government?
Roll on election day.
Ray Cross, Morpeth
Lack of enforcement taken for a ride
I AM a regular user of light rail in Newcastle, and I estimate, on average, that less than half of travellers tap their Opal cards.
Now I know why . . .
Based on what I've been told, I believe fare compliance officers spent inadequate time in the Hunter last month to cover what must be thousands of ferry, bus and light rail services. This is supplemented by transport police (whom I have never seen on Newcastle transport), but why wouldn't one take the risk of being caught not paying if the risk would be so minuscule?
If the presence was increased tenfold or more (which in my opinion would still be inadequate) I think the costs would be easily covered by the additional revenue from fines and future revenue. I am advised that total trips on light rail are determined by Opal card usage, so I suggest that the patronage statistics would be significantly understated.
Time for state to deliver more
IT'S been 12 months since the Minns Labor government was sworn in.
Expectations were high, with five Hunter-based ministers all promising to team up to deliver for the region, but what's to show?
On the upside, frontline workers such as teachers and nurses benefit from pay rises. But Mr Minns promised this would be cost neutral, offset by efficiencies.
We now know union demands will have significant costs.
Mr Minns' answer? Break more promises; slash cost of living relief for families and cut spending on infrastructure and services.
We're down to four Hunter-based ministers following the former Minister for the Hunter Tim Crakanthorp's demotion. The scandal-plagued new Minister for the Hunter seems overstretched between the highly demanding police and Hunter portfolios and has faced calls to step down.
Rushed and disjointed housing reform has resulted in ongoing stoushes and delays. Rents and house prices remain at record levels, Hunter Park has stalled, and the Newcastle grouting fund was slashed.
I believe announcements on projects already progressed under the previous government give the illusion of achievement.
Take the $13 million port compensation ruling enabling the container terminal, Stage 1 Stockton Beach sand nourishment, M1 extension or the Newcastle education campus.
It's unreasonable to expect the world after 12 months, but fair to ask our Labor MPs to start pulling their weight in the June budget and do their bit to bring home the container terminal opportunity.
Thomas Triebsees, Newcastle Liberals vice-president, Mayfield
Investment's what costs nuclear
DISCUSSION continues on this page about the prospect of adopting nuclear energy. The prospect is remote - the money will simply not be there.
The cost of implementing nuclear facilities to provide sufficient electrical power for Australia, with limited renewable energy support, would run into hundreds, perhaps thousands, of billions of dollars - well beyond the capacity of governments.
Private investment of that scale for nuclear would simply not be available.
The most recent survey of the Investor Group on Climate Change, a coalition of 104 global and local institutional investors, canvassed the views of 63 superannuation funds and other institutions holding a collective $37 trillion of assets under management. Less than 10 per cent of investors said they were exploring new investments in nuclear projects.
"This is due to nuclear energy's very high cost, and the lack of maturity and deployment in next-generation technologies," the survey report says.
Almost half of respondents ranked renewable energy as the best opportunity for the best long-term returns, coupled with opportunities in areas such as energy storage, critical minerals needed to build clean technology, and green hydrogen.
Peter Dutton and others can try all they like to talk up nuclear, but, without corporate financial investment, it just isn't going to happen.
John Ure, Mount Hutton
It's not largesse, it's human rights
MILTON Caine ("Israel erred, but it is not heartless", Letters, 13/4), it is well known that aid workers are regularly targeted by Israeli Defence Forces. Chris Lockyear, secretary-general of Medicine Sans Frontiers, says they "don't accept the narrative of 'regrettable incidents'." .
November: MSF convoy, two shot dead at checkpoint. December: UN convoy targeted, despite both being in a humanitarian corridor and the IDF informed.
January: compound of Medical Aid for Palestine and International Rescue Committee destroyed. Their doctors left seconds before.
Handicap International Offices destroyed. March: American Near East Refugee Aid targeted. All despite all being marked protected. In April, a UNICEF convoy attacked.
Norwegian Refugee Council's Jan Egeland said "Israel has now killed more aid workers in Gaza than all other armies, militias, and terrorists in all other wars combined."
Note well, it is International Human Rights Law that requires Israel to provide food, water, medical care and safety to Palestinians. Impossible with most border crossings closed and aid trucks restricted to 1/5 of what is needed.
