Knee-jerk reaction to wildlife attacks on humans on Fraser Island

ONCE again authorities have had a knee-jerk reaction to wildlife attacks on humans.

A dingo on Fraser Island.

ONCE again authorities have had a knee-jerk reaction to wildlife attacks on humans.

Like alligator and shark attacks, where the offending animal is caught and killed, which could mean innocent animals die, local authorities in Queensland are planning to put extra rangers on Fraser Island. (C-M, Apr 20).

There are signs all around Fraser Island warning of the dingoes, not to feed them and to go near them, and to camp in safe areas and so on.

The dingoes have been there for thousands of years. Visitors are a modern addition to the island and have interacted to the point where dingoes are not afraid. Obey the warning signs, keep your distance and enjoy Australia’s native dog safely.

Alan Leitch, Austins Ferry

IT APPEARS park rangers and conservationists are more concerned about dingoes than children.

While they talk about what impact culling an animal will have on the remaining pack, how many more infants need to be at risk?

Either stop tourism or remove the dingoes – make up your mind.

It’s not as if there is a dingo shortage. Dingoes are just dogs and dogs are destroyed if they attack humans. No one will miss the dingoes if they disappear from Fraser Island.

Richard Marman, Parrearra

WHY should the dingoes be removed from Fraser Island, after all it is their home. They are not the interlopers.

If it had been a snake that entered the camp and bitten the child, would they be calling for all the snakes to be removed. When you enter an area where wild animals are in their natural environment it is up to us to take precautions and not put ourselves at risk.

Gary Ekert, Blackstone

IT’S a no-brainer! Fraser Island is no longer a remote camping destination.

Hundreds of people travel there for holidays. However, humans and dingoes do not mix. Round up all the dingoes and transport them to the mainland for the safety of all. How many incidents need to happen before action is taken?

Mike Flanigan, Toowoomba

I BELIEVE it is time the Government said enough is enough and destroyed the dingoes along with the fox and that flying vermin, the flying fox.

Forget protected or hereditary values, there is no value in any of these breeds. They are just thieving vermin, killing and destroying anything in their path.

Ray Evans, Beenleigh South

I AM disappointed by the partisan and combative debate over coal mining and the proposed Adani mine during the current election campaign (C-M, Apr 20).

Humankind can thank coal for bringing us many benefits from the industrial revolution, but its mass use as a fuel destroys parts of the landscape, fouls the environment and contributes to global warming.

Our increasingly overpopulated world cannot use such fossil fuels forever (over-population is the rogue elephant in the room that few want to address).

However, coal is still an essential transitional fuel as we move to cleaner energy sources such as solar and wind, and we should not demonise those who produce and use it.

By the same token, coal mines (including new mines) should plan gradual shut down now that renewables are cheaper.

Renewables also provide new jobs for their installation and maintenance. A bipartisan approach to this transition (as offered by Labor) is preferable to the current political conflict, and the right-wingers who dominate the Coalition need to be sent a message that they are out of step with public sentiment.

Donald Maclean, Fig Tree Pocket

THE anti Adani activists travelling 5700km are a hypocritical selfish lot.

Coal has provided and continues to provide their consumer goods and the comforts of their homes, and their mobility, and they are wanting to deny others the same luxuries and ease of life?

How many vehicles in the convoy will be $120,000 diesel SUVs and top of the range utes, not to mention the Mercedes, BMW, Volvo etc?

Surely there will not be many 30-year-old cars or other old vehicles which Joe and Jane Average can only afford; and the few electric cars will need to be recharged using coal-generated electricity.

Glen Stumer, Kingaroy

THE story about anti-Adani activists being responsible for “dangerous acts of sabotage “is disappointing (C-M, Apr 20).

Just who is committing “dangerous acts of sabotage’’? I would say that when the Great Barrier Reef is destroyed, the tables will turn on who has sabotaged, but by then it will be irreversible.

Is saving the Great Barrier Reef a problem? I would have thought no one would have wanted to destroy a heritage-listed site for the sake of “possible’’ jobs.

We need to support the activists, not treat them like criminals.

Jane Fry, Kenmore

IT is good to see anti-Adani coal activists being fined for trespassing and disruptions. For years they have been above the law.

The fines will mostly be paid by the Greens who support these protests.

Thumbs up to the businesses in Clermont for refusing to serve these people, other Queensland businesses should be doing the same.

Show your support for the mines and workers. Send these activists home.

Carl Hansen, Bundaberg

IT HAS to be said that within both the Labor and Coalition parties there have to be some statesman-like men and women with a good education, moral ethics and lawmaking abilities.

The only way forward to any sort of stability in government in Australia is for both parties is to swap preferences at the coming election and prevent the menace of minor parties who have no agenda other than to advance their own singular policies and thus causing political chaos both within and outside our parliament houses.

The current disrupting events as reported daily in our media is proof positive that we, as a responsible electorate, need to separate the wheat from the chaff and get on with electing statesmen as we have seen in earlier post-federation governments.

Alan Phillips, Macgregor

IN layman’s terms, here is the challenge in meeting the emissions reduction targets of the major parties: The Coalition has us attempting Everest base camp barefooted, and Labor has us then making a dash for the summit in board shorts and thongs.

We’ll apparently make the first in a canter and are awaiting instructions on the second.

William Mapleston, Ashgrove

PRIME Minister Scott Morrison now needs some shock and awe tactics on the campaign.

He needs to hammer Labor for making “pie in the sky’’ funding promises they have zero intention of keeping. When the Liberals bring things back to reality, Labor calls these “cuts’’.

Mr Morrison needs to renounce the Paris climate accord immediately. This massive waste of our money for virtue signalling will have negligible effect on world pollution. We must do what we can with emissions, but throwing tax money to a UN club is just silly.

He needs to announce an evaluation of nuclear power and the utilisation of our uranium instead of exporting it. With modern technology, it is largely emissions-free and the waste can now be safely disposed off. Unlike Japan we have stable geology.

With this, Liberals will upset the young brainwashed climate crusaders, but no votes are lost there anyway. So get some more mongrel going Mr Morrison. Show those shark teeth.

Ken Allen, Southport

LABOR leader Bill Shorten has again shown he is incapable of telling the truth about the economic impacts of his party’s policies.

Last week it was “no new taxes on superannuation” which was untrue for at least three reasons.

Labor has proposed an extra 15 per cent tax on some contributions; a new tax of 43 per cent on self-managed superfunds that depend of franking credits. Reduced contribution limits that will result in higher future taxes for individuals trying to fund their own retirement without a government pension.

This week began with Mr Shorten claiming that his proposed 45 per cent reduction in carbon emissions will have the same impact on the economy as the Coalition’s proposed 26 per cent reduction. There is no relevant study to support that claim which is clearly contradicted by the increase in electricity costs as a result of a few coal-fired generators being shut down in the southern states.

Ian Wilson, Chapel Hill

FORMER prime minister Malcolm Turnbull continues to snipe his own party through a series of unhelpful and damaging tweets which, to my mind, reflect his spiteful and revenge-ridden nature.

I believe it is well beyond time for the LNP to rescind his party membership. Mr Turnbull had his time and was found wanting.

Jim Anderson, Innisfail

JAMES Cook University has let down all Australians in its efforts to suppress free speech (C-M, Apr 18).

Much of the research that goes on in Universities is funded by tax payer dollars.

People want the truth, not some half truth that shows only what they want people to know.

Universities were once regarded as upstanding ethical institutions

dedicated to teaching and learning excellence. Yet when one of its own

leading academics (Professor Peter Ridd), dared to question the research

about the impact of climate change, he is vilified, fired and silenced.

Surely the research should speak for itself if it is transparent and

includes all the findings not just the ones that suit the agenda of those

paid to show a particular outcome.

Just because it does not fit the pattern that they wish to project, they are not even willing to debate the subject. Good on you Peter Ridd. A man of rare courage.

S Malkinson, Kewarra Beach

THE only way the hospital crisis will be fixed is to introduce means testing, which neither party will do sadly.

So many people who can afford private care, use the system, they tell you it’s their right.

They go overseas regularly, live in huge mansions, own cars, and have huge super investments, etc.

Maybe it’s time to think about the poorer classes, hard workers struggling to live each week.

J French, Hervey Bay

THE key Easter message from Catholic Archbishop Mark Coleridge was finding hope in the midst of hopelessness. (C-M, Apr 20)

The State parliamentary inquiry into voluntary euthanasia provides a flicker of hope for many Queenslanders facing their mortality.

We all desire a peaceful and dignified death. For some, palliative care, no matter how well-resourced, cannot deliver a peaceful and dignified death.

My message to the leaders of the Catholic church is to listen to the anguish of your parishioners and respect that their beliefs may be different to yours on this very personal matter.

This same message is for the politicians in our State Parliament. Please listen to your constituents.

Hope, love and respect are key Easter values.

They are the values that drive the push for law reform for voluntary euthanasia in Queensland.

Let the Easter values be a driver for change for a more compassionate society.

David Muir, Indooroopilly