Bec Wilson asserts the banks believe cash will disappear in seven years (“Cash is dead. Why are we still pretending it isn’t?”, May 11). She should have written that the banks want cash to disappear in seven years. This is so they can charge retailers more in transaction fees who can then pass it on to consumers. It sounds a little inflationary to me. No matter, as long as the banks make more profit and exert more financial control over our lives, and close branches, leading to more redundancies. Mike Keene, Stanwell Park
Cash is still king for many of us Credit: AFR
Bec Wilson’s article completely ignores the more frequent natural disasters that take out electricity and telecommunications, sometimes for more than a week. In the bushfires of 2019-20, we couldn’t buy petrol to fuel our cars to flee the fires, and we couldn’t buy food or bottled water as the shops had no digital way of taking electronic payments. So unless we fix that issue, this senior is hanging on to her cash! Leone Moffat, Long Beach
Bec Wilson may claim “cash is dead”. What she fails to understand is that not every old person has an email or mobile phone number – no law requires either. Let alone the visually impaired persons or those with dementia. And young children who have pocket money cannot have legal liability for debit card transactions. How can the new refugee immigrant in our community understand all the bank terms? How will we pay when there are power outages when no eftpos terminal works if there is no cash? And what of all the unreasonable extra card surcharges above cash? Polly Seidler, Darlinghurst
“Cash is dead”, writes Bec Wilson. In our digital-literate seniors’ household, no, it isn’t. Though we ourselves bank online, and pay bills by direct debit and cards, we also use cash as a means of budgeting and will continue to do so until either we, or cash, are dead. It’s simple to withdraw a fixed cash amount weekly for such items as groceries, the daily coffee shop visit, tips, the barber, unessential pharmaceuticals. Underspend on these items and you put the residue away as a reserve. Attempt to overspend on them, you draw on the reserve, or simply don’t buy. By all means assist older people or those without skills with or access to the digital world, but it is insensitive and even arrogant to pressure them to re-educate. John Flint, St Leonards
I wish to take issue with Bec Wilson in regard to the future of cash. I am one of the oldies she refers to, and many of my financial transactions are processed online or with a credit card. However, smaller transactions are all done with cash. Why? Because I can more easily keep track of how much I spend, and I do not incur the charges associated with using a card or a wallet. If Bec Wilson et al get their way, I will be tempted to buy shares in the only winners in this situation – the financial institutions. William Roberts, Randwick
I have seven years to adjust to a cashless society; but I don’t believe in online banking, don’t have a smartphone or watch or a digital wallet. Why should I have to change and waste my money on a smartphone because it’s convenient to banks shops, banks and governments for us to use modern technology? Robert Pallister, Punchbowl
Throwing out the Earth with babies’ bathwater
We live on a planet with finite resources and the 8 billion people we have now are using up these vital resources way faster than the 2 billion did a hundred years ago (“Chalmers wakes the baby debate the country needs”, May 11). Is the solution to keep our heads in the sand, increase the birth rate together with the economy, as suggested by various treasurers, and let nature take care of our grandchildren’s future? Or isn’t it time to have a rational, worldwide discussion to find a humane solution to this urgent problem?
Henry Schneebeli, Moree
Jim Chalmers could act to protect the threatened ecological environment that provides life support for humans. Threats to this life support in Australia include climate change, ecosystem collapse and species extinctions. These impacts are unsustainable and arise from the human growth agenda. Since environmental damage is the product of average ecological footprint per capita times the number of people, both consumption rates and population growth are underlying root causes of these threats. If we can’t constrain our growth agenda to sustainable levels, especially in rich countries, future generations will suffer unthinkable consequences on an impoverished planet. Alan Jones, Narraweena
Treasurer Jim Chalmers, wants us to have more babies. The very last thing planet Earth needs is more people. David Attenborough reminds us of the world’s population growth since he was born 98 years ago. These stats were superimposed above heartbreaking images of an orangutan on the sole tree left in what had been a vast area of forest in Borneo. Increased population has caused that with our insatiable demands for more and more of everything at the terrible cost to the planet, human welfare and biodiversity. We have a finite planet with finite resources and, as an admirer of Jim Chalmers, I am mightily disappointed in his comments. Judy Hungerford, Kew (Vic)
Sir David Attenborough back at the Great Barrier Reef.Credit: Atlantic Productions
The treasurer admits that it’s expensive to raise children. The financial stress on parents is already causing problems for many. Apart from the in-home costs, what about the pressure caused by inadequate infrastructure to support the requested growth, such as schools, teachers, dwellings of a decent size to accommodate burgeoning growth, not to mention transport, hospitals and the staff who work in them? And then there is the cost to the environment. We already lack the capacity to cope due to the mismanagement of previous governments from both sides of politics who didn’t plan properly for the future. Tina Butler, Bilgola Plateau
Why on earth do governments of rich countries like our own exhort their fortunate populace to have more babies, when there are thousands of people who lose their lives every year trying to reach countries like ours? Record high immigration has been a major driver of the housing crisis and is rightly being eased, but accepting more asylum seekers is surely a more humane way to achieve economic goals. It seems to me the height of immorality to promote population growth when 8 billion humans are squeezing countless other species to extinction on this finite planet. When are we going to start planning for the inevitable end to growth? Linda Tabe, Bawley Point
How many houses does one need?
Amid a housing crisis, you have to wonder about Mike Cannon-Brookes’ ever-growing mega property portfolio (Title Deeds, May 11). Why? How many homes can one person live in at any one time? What is he doing with the others, renting them out, claiming them as a tax deduction? Despite his commendable efforts for the environment in the corporate world, he clearly doesn’t understand how much is enough. Craig Forbes, Lewisham
This Mittagong house on 4336 square metres sold for $2.25 million to Mike Cannon-Brookes.Credit: Bethany Rae
Nan and pop, go public
There is so much wrong with this (“Nan and pop paying children’s school fees”, May 11). If those in their late 70s have $3 million in superannuation and don’t know what to do with it, clearly our taxation system is at fault. Superannuation is designed to pay for our living expenses in older age, not to subsidise independent schools. There is a perfectly good, tolerant and inclusive public school system, which teaches the same curriculum and whose students sit for the same HSC. Maybe these rich 70-somethings could donate to their local public school? This “me, myself, and my DNA only” perpetuates the widening socioeconomic chasm of our society and is detrimental to our social capital. Jenny Baker, North Bondi
The inequity in our society is certainly glaring. We have a public system of schooling that is under-funded and under-resourced. Many parents have no choice but to send their children to a public school while others have enough faith in their own parenting to guide their children through their educational life within one. Entitlement continues. Parents, squeezed by rising interest rates and cost of living pressures run to nan and pop, who are accumulating millions in untouched super accounts so that they can enrol their children (and grandchildren) in a private school. Meanwhile, others who are struggling under the same pressures strive to put food on the table and to clothe their kids, and the public school system desperately tries to assist them in any way possible. Philanthropy by older Australians should not be a treasure chest for exclusive private schools. Perhaps these grandparents should consider directing their largesse to a more worthy cause. Scott Warnes, Suffolk Park
Gaza’s mountain of deaths
The scale of human destruction in Gaza is difficult to understand when only raw figures are quoted (Letters, May 11). According to the UN, approximately 34,000 Palestinians at a minimum, mostly non-combatants, have died in the Gaza war in the roughly 200 days between October 7, 2023 and April 23, 2024. The Australian War Memorial records the death of 39,767 Australian service people during WWII, which it dates from September 9, 1939 to June 30, 1947; 2852 days. This equates to 170 deaths a day in Gaza against about 14 a day during WWII. I cannot see how this can ever be considered a proportionate response against a population of 2 million people. David MacKintosh, Berkeley Vale
Book ban benefits none
Another correspondent has said that the books on same-sex marriage are available at other libraries (Letters, May 11). Since the books are to be removed from all the council’s libraries, residents would be able to get them only from a library in another local government area. Or they could buy the book. Considering that residents pay rates, they should not be financially disadvantaged by purchasing the book and nor should they be inconvenienced by having to travel outside their area to access a book.
Rodney Crute, Hunters Hill
It’s irrelevant whether western Sydney was a localised majority voting against same-sex marriage. The result might offend residents but it didn’t stop them marrying who they want and it didn’t make same-sex marriage compulsory. Their right to think as they choose was not restricted. Book banning closes off ideas to all, minority or majority. Michael Berg, Randwick
The traveller’s toll
Brian Johnston in his travel article (“White Hot”, May 11) mentions that all of Iceland’s glaciers are melting, losing some 11 billion tonnes of ice per year. He takes some of the blame for this with his travel pollution footprint. Most travel writers don’t mention this elephant in the room. I wonder if there is a growing number of people who are avoiding holiday travel because it causes air, land and sea transport pollution. As climate events worsen and sea levels rise, perhaps by the 2040s we all won’t have the automatic right to unnecessarily pollute, as we do today. Dennis O’Hara, Wanniassa (ACT)
Cricket’s days numbered
As a brown-skinned cricketer of Filipino-Australian heritage, I can empathise wholeheartedly with the passive and not so passive abuse Usman Khawaja would have experienced from oppositions, administrators, parents and unfortunately teammates as he made his way through the Sydney grade cricket system (“Usman Khawaja used to shrug off racism. Then he stopped trying to please everyone”, May 11). Whilst Usman is a beacon of hope and inspiration, one can only wonder how long it will be before he thinks deeply about the ecological impact his profession is having on the natural world. The preparation of a cricket wicket and field utilises thousands of litres of water. Amid the climate emergency we find ourselves in it will only be a matter of time before governments and social organisations realise the insanity of wasting precious water to serve the needs of the bourgeoisie. In the not too distant future, there will be no cricket played on turf. Lucky for Usman he has the skills, intellect and character to pursue a different path; similar to the magnificent Imran Khan. Jonathan Hill, Old Erowal Bay
Usman Khawaja, pictured with daughter Aisha and LeBron the dog. To those who suggest he “shuts up and plays cricket”, he says, “At what point do you qualify to have an opinion? … Either we live in this world all together or we don’t.”Credit: Paul Harris
Gas push just more hot air
When Anthony Albanese promises not to use public money under the “new” gas strategy, one wonders whether this is just another empty promise (“‘Not a single government dollar’: Albanese plays down gas policy push after blowback”, May 11). Currently, the gas industry receives generous subsidies and tax breaks from federal and state governments. These are part of more than $11 billion government payouts to the fossil fuel industry every year. No-one expects the gas industry to disappear overnight but realistically, most people know it is impossible to call gas a “transitional” fuel. It is a fossil fuel. In Australia, we are well on the path towards a renewables future; the nation’s renewables are supplying the grid to nearly 40 per cent capacity. Considering that Australia is the biggest exporter of gas in the world, it can hardly be suggested that it is ever short of gas.
The gas industry, as is the Australian government, is conflating gas for domestic purposes versus gas for export. Eighty to 90 per cent of gas mined in Australia is for export.
Do Australians want the government to keep paying mostly foreign-owned companies to mine new gas, knowing that this is causing untold damage to our health, the environment and the climate?
Instead of getting handouts, the industry has to pay tax. Royalties at the current 8 per cent to 12 per cent should be upgraded. Anne Ammann, Dargan
Shark bait
Surely I am not the only one to notice that since Scott Morrison relinquished the number one ticket, the Cronulla Sharks have started leading the NRL competition. Paul Totman, Mittagong
A Bert each way
Many years ago, my father’s cousin Bob went to his first job (Letters, May 11). The boss said: “We have three Bobs here already, you’ll have to be Bert.” And so he was for the rest of his life. Alastair Wilson, Balmain
In our hearts
Mother’s Day is over. Wonderful for many, but for those mothers who were forgotten, it must have been not at all wonderful. Mary Julian, Glebe
Mother’s Day Credit: Jim Pavlidis
Easy come, easy go
The other thing with a snail-mail letter was that, after the effort involved in writing, folding, enveloping and posting, it was so exciting to have it published, and I would treasure the moment, keeping the page from the Herald as a treasured memento (Letters, May 11). I still remember (hazily) my first published letter. Nowadays, with my regular, and so easy to compose and send “thought bubbles”, I still get a buzz, but I no longer keep any record, or consider it unusual. And, of course, little memory of any! Robert Hosking, Paddington
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