People are amused when I tell them my birds are just smart enough that you can see their brains working – you can see them making decisions. It’s the same with politicians. On the subject of cuts to student debt (“Labor to wipe $16b off student loans”, November 3), here’s what you can see Labor’s strategists thinking: “We’re barely head-to-head with the opposition. We are at real risk of losing the next election. So, what voters have we lost and what can we do to stay in power? Young people, especially politically aware, university-educated young people, are unhappy we’ve been so passive about Gaza. OK, so let’s offer them a really big cut in HECS – but don’t do it now, promise to do it after the election, so they have to vote for us to get it.” This is nothing more than vote-buying. If this is the right thing to do and the right way to spend that many billions, Labor should do it now. They have the power to. It is an abuse of that power if they promise to do it – but only if you vote for them. Gordon Drennan, Burton (SA)
Students will receive relief from HECS loans from June 2025. Credit: Louise Kennerley
While the government is tinkering with some relief for HECS/HELP debt, the loan system for vocational education and training (VET) courses for students undertaking higher-level (diploma and above) courses at TAFE, private colleges or other registered training organisations, remains grossly unfair. In order to access a VET loan to fund education fees, a 20 per cent VET loan fee is levied and added to the loan amount. No such fee is levied on HECS/HELP. Why do we discriminate between university and non-university tertiary students in this way? We should be incentivising all students and treating them equally. Mark Stackpool, Drummoyne
Cost of water
Your leader (“Water bills to cover price for not keeping up with Sydney development”, November 2) on the sudden realisation that we need to invest in water infrastructure points at only one dimension of a long-developing problem – that we have concentrated on “small government” and “small public service” and “lower taxes” while ignoring the slow, inexorable degradation of the public sphere that results. Issue after issue is discussed in the media. Nary a day goes by without a story ending in “we can’t afford that” – hospitals, roads, heritage, railways, bridges, dams, education, disability access, decent ferries, preschool education and childcare, species extinction, music education, bird flu monitoring, just to mention a few. Bit by bit, these services and public utilities have been degraded, some to the point of ineffectiveness. For example, there is one National Parks heritage officer for the whole of NSW; also, the public service is so depleted that savvy businessmen run rings around it in negotiations such as motorway toll contracts. In this case, year after year Sydney Water avoided upsetting the voter by limiting water infrastructure expenditure, and now huge increases are urgently needed just when cost-of-living pressures seemed to be easing. When will we learn that when politicians offer tax cuts, price freezes and small government, they are also offering future public hardship. Stein Boddington, St Clair
Lounging in privilege
Jacqueline Maley (“Pollies can have their Chairman’s Lounge, as long as they pay for it”, November 3) provides us with real insight into the psychology that goes with access to upgrades and the like. In particular, the belief that this is where we belong and others don’t is so compelling. In suggesting that politicians should pay for access to the Chairman’s Lounge, she unfortunately missed a key point: the Chairman’s Lounge is invitation only. No amount of money can buy you access. That’s why politicians and High Court judges crave it; because it proves to both them and the rest of us how truly special they all are. We need to ban it altogether. Brian Barrett, Padstow
Jacqueline Maley says an upgrade to business class for MPs gives them a sense of entitlement. I would say it’s a small perk, considering they carry the weight of responsibility for governing 26 million Australians. If I were prime minister, I would expect to be in the Chairman’s Lounge and to travel first class. It seems Maley was swayed by a “free glass of champagne and canapés” – a perk of her employment. Does she really think the PM should be plonked next to me in economy, or be driving around Canberra in a Holden ute? Christina Foo, Wahroonga
As a frequent flyer working for an international company, I always used the Qantas Club pre-flight. On one occasion, I was invited to the Chairman’s Lounge by a colleague. All this fuss about that lounge is a brouhaha. It’s much the same as the Qantas lounge, perhaps quieter with fewer people, but the food and drinks seemed the same. I believe I detect envy from some parties. Richard Stewart, Pearl Beach
Regular travellers can only dream of gaining access to the Chairman’s Lounge.Credit: SHUTTERSTOCK
I agree with Paul Sakkal and Jacqueline Maley in their commentary on the Qantas political travel quagmire. It really is a sad indictment of contemporary Australia that former prime minister Ben Chifley’s vision of politics striving for fairness and egalitarianism’s “light on the hill” has become a “flight on the bill” of elitism and privilege (taxpayer’s expense, of course). Barry Ffrench, Cronulla
Maybe it slipped Albo’s mind that Qantas was privatised by Paul Keating, as Labor prime minister, no less. Qantas is now a commercial business answerable to its board and shareholders and, if politicians and bureaucrats want to fly in the pointy end of the plane and get all the perks of the rich and famous, they have to put their hands into their own pockets. Sue Jones, Bathurst
Election problems
Peter Hartcher wrote of renowned political scientist Francis Fukuyama’s alarming conclusion that if Trump can destroy democracy in the US, it can happen anywhere (“Election to make history or end it”, November 2). I don’t think it would happen here because we have an incorruptible election system and a non-political public service. If Trump wins, we should welcome Americans fleeing the Trump autocracy. Andrew Macintosh, Cromer
It is right that the Herald should editorialise on the coming US election, the outcome of which should be of concern to every Australian (“It’s absurd for US newspapers to not make an endorsement in the presidential election”, November 1). Amid all the hype that precedes an election, Americans seem to have forgotten that Trump was the president who presided over the unnecessary deaths of millions of Americans from COVID-19. Mocking the sciences, humiliating eminent medical experts, denying the efficacy and delaying the availability of vaccines to his own people, Trump’s record on this tragedy alone should have had him banished. Perhaps the Herald’s voice, distant though it be, might be picked up by media in the US to remind Americans what sort of leadership awaits if Trump returns. Lest they forget. Peter Skinner, Beecroft
Thank you, Peter Hartcher (“If America buckles to a rampant Trump, it may be the end of history”, November 2). When I hear Trump repeat his favourite line, “If we lose this election, it will be the biggest electoral fraud in the history of our nation”, what I hear him say is, “If I don’t get what I want, I will tell the biggest lies in the history of our nation”. I hope the American voters can hear it, too. Patrick McGrath, Potts Point
Home work
As Shane Wright points out, no side of politics is prepared to argue that house prices should fall (“The home ownership system in Australia is broken. But is it beyond repair?”, November 2). Young people are saddled with unaffordable housing and generational inequity. However, one thing governments can do is develop thousands of quality apartments for rent, and do it quickly. Bringing down the cost of renting would take financial pressure off young people, whether or not they ever have the means to buy a home. Brian Watters, Mosman
No side of politics is prepared to argue that house prices should fall.Credit: Anna Kucera
Shane Wright, Saul Eslake et al trot out the well-known facts of this society-wrecking housing crisis, but in one crucial point they are wrong. Don’t count all of us owners of just one home among those who will vote down reforms that reduce its value. When that value passes to our children and grandchildren and helps them weather the housing crisis, its benefit will be proportionally the same whatever the state of the market. A housing price collapse would be loudly cheered by us and them. Jeffrey Mellefont, Coogee
Shane Wright asks if there is an easy solution to the housing crisis. I think one major factor that has been largely ignored in this debate is the real estate industry itself. It has been artificially increasing prices to the benefit of its vendors for years. Dummy bidding (which became outlawed), government home-buyer schemes and encouraging owners to increase the value of their assets through renovations are huge drivers in the steady increase. Anthony Connolly, Beacon Hill
Glass houses
Bridget (sports rorts) McKenzie and Peter (Gina, can you spare a plane?) Dutton do not practise what they preach (“The remarkable hide of Bridget McKenzie”, November 2). It makes me boiling mad when I see former ministers, after nine years at the trough, accusing Labor. What did they do during their terms to reform this? Nothing. I notice Liberal deputy leader Sussan Ley, who took a taxpayer-funded flight to Queensland to inspect an investment property, has been tellingly and uncharacteristically quiet. In a vast country like ours, flying for work is common, even the norm in some industries. If Dutton and McKenzie are so offended by legal, declared travel upgrades, let them travel on buses. Wayne Duncombe, Lilyfield
It was amusing to see the Coalition’s attack on Labor, especially Albanese, backfire on Dutton and McKenzie. When will they learn that people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones? Didn’t they think they’d be subjected to the same scrutiny? David Gordon, Cranebrook
Exhaust tax
Kate Charlesworth reminds us that we all breathe vehicle exhaust (“We banned smoking. Why do cars get a free ride?”, November 3). It’s not good for anyone, especially children made vulnerable to long-term health effects.
A practical solution to cut down vehicle exhaust would be to have a hefty annual climate and health tax on combustion vehicles at registration time, combined with cash incentives and interest-free loans to buy electric vehicles. It really is time to end our love affair with the exhaust pipe. Dennis O’Hara, Wanniassa (ACT)
The advent of electric vehicles has given us the opportunity to finally clean up our streets, improve our health and stop global warming in its tracks. Having purchased an EV at the start of this year, I haven’t had to think about petrol or oil or hot, smelly engines. But when I offered to check the oil in a neighbour’s car last week, I emerged with black, greasy hands – an instant reminder of just how dirty these vehicles are. I would never go back to driving one. And with brand new EVs on sale for less than $40,000, why would anyone want to? It’s a win-win situation. All we need is for people to wake up to it. Ken Enderby, Concord
Courting controversy
That Pauline Hanson is a very disagreeable person and, to most Australians, a waste of space in the Senate, is pretty much a given (“Hanson racially vilified Faruqi: court”, November 2). But isn’t it about time that members of parliament, like Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi, stop running to the courts every time someone says something nasty about them? They have plenty of opportunities to respond, not least of all the free-to-say-anything pulpit in parliament, as well as easy access to the media. Tony Mitchell, Hillsdale
Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Medicare inequality
Your correspondent wonders if Viagra should be removed from the PBS list. This raises a question about the equity of medical funding in general (Letters, November 2). A woman I know had to pay nearly $800 for a follow-up MRI to check that her breast cancer (which showed up only on an MRI, not initially on mammogram or ultrasound) had not returned a year later. This follow-up MRI to check for recurrence was not Medicare rebated. Her husband, on the other hand, who had undergone a non-cancerous prostate procedure, had his annual follow-up MRI bulk billed. Some may consider this unfair. Alison Stewart, Riverview
Over-populate and perish
One reason so many more people are being affected by climate-induced disasters is the world’s ever-increasing population, now more than 8 billion (“Spain’s pain the latest climate alert”, November 2). Our increasing numbers add to greenhouse gas emissions. Expanding hard surfaces like houses and roads, built to accommodate, feed and employ more people, exacerbates the impacts from floods. Until we rein in our population growth as well as greenhouse gas emissions, the global warming will only continue to worsen, to our detriment and all life on earth. Karen Joynes, Bermagui
Humanity writ large
I cherish my subscription to the Herald. I value the objective daily reporting and the intelligent opinions on local and international issues. But the cherry on the cake for me is the heartfelt and compassionate human-interest articles in Good Weekend. I compliment Melissa Fyfe (“Wild Ride”, November 2) and Jenna Price (“It’s downright un-American”, November 2) for two of the best human interest articles of 2024. Please keep it coming. John Brown, North Sydney
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