WOULD the ladies in the floral petal bathing caps, who used to wade at Newcastle Ocean Baths every morning for many years, please come back?
We all miss your bright colour, chatter and laughter. You brought happiness to us all each day.
You are a part of Newcastle's living culture. We need you!
Peter McNair, Newcastle
Investigation has been a true gain
FRED McInerney ('Why all the fuss over letters?', Letters, 25/5): there's no fuss, it's just who penned them and from where that has been the sticking point in my view. Community consultation (not box ticking) and transparency count for a lot.
Investigative journalism involves working for the common good. Shining a light showing where and how our hard earned rate and tax money is spent.
Donna Page and Nick Bielby won a Walkley award for their investigation into Truegain's controversial waste oil recycling plant. The law was changed.
On Saturday the Newcastle Herald had the front-page headline Dirty Deeds: Truegain's owner $45 million dollar downfall. I understand this expose came about by the team work of the Herald's Donna Page and Nick Bielby, Sonia Hornery MP Jenny Aitchison and Rutherford resident Ramona Cocco.
I'd say see the Karuah River and think on investigative journalism, community-minded residents, MPs, and bad practices.
People in charge, paid large salaries (our money) are accountable for the way our money is spent. Consultation and transparency are practiced by some councils but not all. I think Newcastle needs to change, and investigative journalism unearths the truth.
It may seem irksome to you, but the old adage that there's no smoke without fire rings a bell to me.
Some in our community, suspicious of a cover-up, would like to know incontrovertibly who penned the letters and why Pinnacle was employed and paid (how much?) to produce a Clayton's report. Why weren't the full Herald backlog of Neylan /Neylon letters referenced, and why is the Office of Local Government looking on wringing its hands?
Go the Herald.
Catherine Whelan, Newcastle
Shining a light on solar 'nuisance'
THE editorial ("Home solar sting mixes the message", Opinion 20/5) and several letters since, from Ruth Burrell ("Power cost-shift unreasonable", Letters, 22/5) and Julie Smyth ("Stinging solar panel owners doesn't add up", Letters, 25/5), aren't happy with the Ausgrid plan to charge homeowners 1.2 cents per kilowatt hour (KWh), as a tariff on power from roof-top solar.
Why have they done this? When I first installed rooftop solar, the NSW government promised people 60 cents per KWh, now we get no more than 7 cents per KWh. But there may be some home-truths that people may have to accept.
As a power source for the grid, rooftop solar is, technically speaking, bloody terrible.
From day to day, Ausgrid has little idea of how much power they will get from rooftops.
So dependent on the weather it is that even a little cloud cover will drop output substantially.
If the cloud clears for no reason, the rooftop output will ramp up without notice; not good for grid management.
When heavily overcast, like over the last month on the coast, output will drop to almost nothing.
Even on clear days, most rooftop power output is only in the middle hours of the day - hence its nickname of "lunchtime solar" - when the grid doesn't need it.
When we do need it, at peak morning and evening hours, almost no rooftop solar is generated.
I had to laugh at the Ausgrid proposal to pay home owners 2.3 cents extra between 4pm and 9pm. There is very little power generated from rooftops in those hours and none in winter.
The truth is that Ausgrid doesn't need rooftop solar and doesn't want it. It's a bloody nuisance, to put it technically again.
The inclusion of home batteries will not fix this problem and will only add to the confusion with considerable extra cost to homeowners.
But the politics of power generation in this country has become so irrational, we can only expect this farce to continue.
Peter Devey, Merewether
The inquiry's worth it for mine
I CAN understand why Fred McInerney failed to notice letters by Scott Neylon in the Herald ("Why all the fuss over letters?", Letters, 25/5).
He may have read a letter and not noticed the writer's name and suburb.
His question concerning the relevance of the letters is an important one.
There are two people primarily involved here, one being City of Newcastle chief executive Jeremy Bath and his friend Scott Neylon, resident of Japan.
As a member of the public and frequent letter writer these are just some of the issues I see as arising.
They include the following possibilities: misuse of power; attempts to influence outcomes by stealth; lies and deception; the squandering of public money; the targeting of an MP and members of the public; and a Clayton's investigation. I believe the Herald's ongoing investigation is more than warranted.
Julie Robinson, Cardiff
Letters saga is worth the dig
IT'S disappointing that Fred McInerney, a regular letters page contributor, sees the search for Neylan/Bath truth as digging for dirt ("Why all the fuss over letters?", Letters, 25/5).
All it would have taken was a heads up from Jeremy Bath to the editor, and that would have been the end of the matter, but no.
As for "money wasted", in my view that blame lies totally with the Newcastle council who I believe set such a narrow enquiry range that the enquiry was never going to get to the truth.
Dave McTaggart, Edgeworth
Blame the leaders, not front liners
WAR crimes are an American invention, and as American as apple pie. Where is the outrage with supplying weapons of death to Israel? Politicians start wars, not the military.
Richard Ryan, Summerland Point
Don't tar all Trumpists the same
GEOFF Black ("Faith in Trump defies rationality", Letters, 25/5), why don't you tell us what you really think of Trump?
It's ok to give us your character assassination of a man you haven't met but to insinuate that those who voted for him in 2020, all 74 million of them, are somehow irrational is a disgraceful insult. It's a wonder you didn't call them deplorable, that worked well in 2016.
So how about you now tell us what you think of that great orator, Mr Biden?
Greg Hunt, Newcastle West
We take too much for granted
WITHOUT Captain Cook, would there be roads or mobile phones or less accountability and actions denied? We harp on and complain; so, are we grateful for what we have? I am but don't show it enough.
