The industrial action by rail workers over the holiday period is a kick in the teeth for the public (“Rail chaos threatens New Year fireworks”, December 21). I have been both a federal and state government worker for most of my professional career, and for all of that time I have also been a member of the relevant union. My union co-members recently agreed to an 11.4 per cent pay increase over three years offered by the NSW government. This was considered fair by most, and we all moved on.
I regularly use the trains to get to work and have been affected by the industrial action this year. As a union member, I am appalled by the tactics of the rail unions, which are essentially holding the city to ransom for an unrealistic pay and working conditions claim. Also appalling is the government’s refusal to go to the table with a fair counter-offer. Both sides need to stop playing silly buggers and negotiate in good faith. Consider it a Christmas present to the state. Elizabeth Hadlow, Gymea Bay
Sydney commuters have been hit by industrial action this year.Credit: SMH
Your correspondent Colin Hesse (Letters, December 21) is wrong to say rail workers do not want to inconvenience the public. I don’t know the public transport situation for him in Nowra, but in Sydney travellers are constantly being inconvenienced by delays and cancellations on all sections of the rail network. The current pay dispute has just made that 10 times worse, at the worst possible time of year for the public. Clearly they don’t mind inconveniencing the public. And as the police commissioner has pointed out, this is becoming an issue of public safety. Stephanie Edwards, Leichhardt
Though I share the safety concerns held by the police commissioner, I’d suggest she stays out of politics and leaves it to the union, the government and the Fair Work Commission to resolve the dispute. Peter Mahoney, Oatley
I do support John Carmody (Letters, December 21). This government is saying it can’t afford to pay rail workers and I ask why. Tax cuts are used to buy elections without recognising that each cut cost the public a nurse, a policeman, a fireman, an ambo, a teacher, and so it goes. Now that the chickens have come home to roost and we’re facing industrial action, we wonder why. It’s pretty obvious! To be fair to the workers, Mr Premier, you may have to unbalance the budget. Mitch McTavish, Cootamundra
Political lesson from the US
The increasing influence of Elon Musk on US politics is a salutary lesson for Australia (“Musk helped kill a bill. But much of what he spread was misinformation”, December 21). Musk contributed about $250 million towards Donald Trump’s election campaign, but it appears that his investment is paying off even before Trump has been inaugurated. By weaponising X, Musk cowed many Republican members of congress into killing a budget bill that disadvantaged his business interests. One suspects, similarly, that he will pressure Trump into allowing Tesla to import Chinese parts free of the planned 60 per cent tariff. America’s administration is at risk of becoming a duopoly, with two billionaires using the machinery of government to further enrich each other. Australia’s electoral reforms must be fast-tracked to ensure that one of our billionaires does not become the puppet master of a future prime minister. Mike Reddy, Vincentia
It used to be that if you told lies continuously, you would lose credibility, and people would ignore you. Now it seems, that is not the case. When did it change? Neville Turbit, Russell Lea
Elon Musk offered his services to Donald Trump in his election campaign. Now two megalomaniacs are arguing over who’s running the country. A bad marriage if ever there was one. Ian Adair, Hunters Hill
Let’s talk about justice
In my former role as director of public prosecutions I may well have said, and I still say, that most laypeople don’t understand the criminal sentencing process – it is extremely complex and difficult even for judges and magistrates (Letters, December 2). But I have never said that people should not comment on the outcomes. Community engagement in the criminal justice process is very important. I welcome your correspondent’s comments and others published. They help to signal to the judiciary and to policymakers the standards to be expected by the community in the application of the law. All public administration should be open to public scrutiny and fair comment. Nicholas Cowdery, Northwood
War memorial defies its charter
The Australian War Memorial has long since stopped being a memorial and become a symbol of Australian war glorification (“Leaked War Memorial files show ructions over war crimes exhibit’” , December 21). Now, long-term government policy of glorifying our role in wars has collided with evidence that some of our blokes who went to fight committed war crimes, which we have always loudly accused others of. Perhaps the AWM could please once again become a memorial, allowing us to commemorate instead of celebrate and glorify. Michael McMullan, Avoca Beach
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese lays a wreath for Remembrance Day at the Australian War Memorial.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
I couldn’t agree more with the proposal to have a war crimes exhibit at the Australian War Memorial, free from the influence of vested interests. War memorials show the sacrifice of the men killed in wars engineered by the political bosses at that time. They help the victors write their versions of history and falsely show their domestic audience how clean their hands are. But a war crimes exhibit would show the humanity and tragedies suffered by the other side, while accepting that we, too, are prone to failures of character war can expose. Manbir Singh Kohli, Pemulwuy
One reason Australian War Memorial staff have fears about advice and possible pressure coming from the memorial’s council on how to report on special forces war crimes is that the council does not include a historian to advise council members on historical perspectives. In 2019, when the Morrison government appointed Tony Abbott to replace Les Carlyon, respected writer of bestselling books on Gallipoli and the Great War, war historian Professor Peter Stanley said: “A memorial lacking historians is like a hospital having no doctors on its board, or if it does, they are chiropractors or homeopaths. It lacks fundamental professional expertise at the highest level of policy-making in the very field in which the institution operates.” John Payne, Kelso
Chalmers a steady hand
Your editorial is unfair on the treasurer (“Dismal data a symptom of Labor’s poor economic vision”, December 21). Jim Chalmers has been a steady hand in difficult economic circumstances when there are no easy answers. Post-pandemic low growth with high inflation is anomalous and requires a balance, as remedies are contradictory. Spending more for higher growth may mean higher inflation, spending less means lower growth, including recession if the stated hard-cutting prescription of the Liberals and some commentators was followed.
The “new spending” isn’t excessive and it includes things of merit and keeps the economy ticking over. It’s not vote-buying rorts like the Liberal Party’s car pork commuter car parks. In fact, the budget is well ahead of the projections made in the 2022 pre-election economic forecast and the Liberals’ 2022 budget, with debt $177 billion lower. There’s no blow-out. It’s easy to point a finger at Chalmers, but the alternative is trickster Angus Taylor, fresh from making wildly lurid claims of power bill savings from nuclear energy. Be careful what you wish for. Nick Wilson, Palm Beach
‘Forest conversion’ the real problem
I would like to clarify the facts behind the story (“State loggers admit to ‘very serious offence”’, December 21) in felling a hectare of national park forest. The clearing of natural forest within Bindarri National Park is actually secondary to a bigger issue.
I reported this offence in 2023 and received a response from the Forestry Corporation of NSW telling me everything was compliant with the law. The Department of Primary Industry (the authorising agency) told me any clearing was within a “tolerable margin of error” and that I had no case. This forest was zoned plantation, and under the NSW Plantation and Re-afforestation Act any area of native forest may be declared plantation, and cleared. This incident was one of many in these compartments of Orara West State Forest. Original, remnant, native forest, rainforest and large trees were cleared across the plantation. This is known as “forest conversion” whereby natural forest is cleared and changed (converted) to plantation.
Ranger Martin Smith in Bindarri National Park.Credit: Janie Barrett
It is common for plantation operations in NSW to stray over jurisdictional boundaries, and for Forestry Corp to redraw boundaries to allow for this practice. During the current negotiations for the proposed Koala Park, Forestry Corporation annexed another 1500 hectares of native forest and reclassified it as plantation. This was overlooked amid the hysteria surrounding the logging of national parks.
In reality, forest conversion is common practice, but because everyone dismisses these areas as “just plantation” the loss of habitat, natural forest, old growth, and rainforest goes unnoticed. Forestry Corp has taken out the trash at Christmas to hide a much more pervasive problem, and it looks like they got away with it. Again. Dr Tim Cadman, Griffith University
Scaling the HSC heights
Changes to the maths and science scaling made by the Universities Admissions Centre are not sexist, as correspondent Elfriede Sangkuhl claims (Letters, December 21). The changes are an acknowledgment that these subjects are more difficult and students who undertake them should be rewarded appropriately. If a student wants to take advantage of these changes, all they have to do is enrol in these courses, work hard and they will get the rewards, regardless of their gender. Dean Clark, Moorebank
Health system also fails men
Your series on medical misogyny is certainly appalling reading (Medical misogyny, December). I hope that publishing such information leads to positive outcomes for women in our health system. The difficulties faced by First Nations women would be determined by both racism and misogyny, and it would be enlightening (and probably even more appalling) to hear from First Nations women about their experiences.
Evidence of racism within the health system abounds. From 2009 to 2014, I was part of a NSW Health research project investigating the impact of racism on the health of Aboriginal men. Their experiences in some ways paralleled the experiences of women. Stories of men being refused treatment in an emergency department and dying across the road; of men extracting their own teeth with pliers; men being refused pain relief. To exacerbate the racism faced, our final report was never acted upon. The Aboriginal men were effectively silenced. Hopefully, such investigations of medical misogyny by the Herald prove more fruitful and justice is both done and seen to be done. Graham Fazio, Cootamundra
Hold the line
Soon after “the godfather of AI” Geoffrey Hinton accepted his Nobel Prize this year, he again warned that AI might end up controlling humans. Well, think of the control chatbots are already exercising. They may not yet be able to answer our questions on the phone, but they are training us to be patient while we wait and wait for a real person. Hang up and you’re back to square one.
These days it’s not unusual to wait 20 minutes to be transferred to a human – 40 minutes and counting if you’re trying to contact a government department. While you wait, increasingly trying not to do your block, a recorded voice will lecture you, at length, about the respect expected of you. You will then be subjected to repetitive house advertisements and Muzak.
Why do we put up with this alleged customer service? Has a class action been considered? Surely this growing trend to make the customer wait unreasonably for service provokes stress – and has anyone calculated the amount of potentially productive time wasted in Australia each day by busy people hanging on the phone? Ava Hubble, Pyrmont
Much time is wasted in Australia every day by busy people being stuck on hold.Credit: iStock
Artifice of intelligence
Associate Professor Griffiths wants to have it both ways (“How chatbots can help revive the university essay”, December 21). On the one hand, he would like his students to think more deeply about literature; on the other, he’s quite happy for AI to do that thinking for them. It apparently escapes the professor that the reductio ad absurdum of his position is that teachers are therefore redundant. Mind you, if his students struggle to understand when Shakespeare has used a word metaphorically, then all hope is lost anyway. David Salter, Hunter’s Hill
Lucky for some
Nick Bryant’s reminder of Australia’s achievements in fine-tuning and strengthening genuine democratic governance was a pleasure to read (“Lucky country, but not all dumb luck”, December 21). Bryant noted the mediocre years of Holt, McEwen, Gorton and McMahon, but acknowledged Whitlam, Fraser, Hawke, Keating and Howard as “not second-rate leaders.” But why no mention of Julia Gillard’s massive contribution to a minority government’s progressive achievements? There are thousands of NDIS folk who would at last feel they are now in the “lucky country” – where the very unlucky, eventually, get a little lucky. Peter Russell, Coogee
It is evident that much of Donald Horne’s analysis is still relevant. Despite Australia being blessed with incredible mineral resources, inequality and poverty is substantial. About one in six children live in poverty, and the latest Foodbank Hunger Report found that 19 per cent of Australian households were suffering from severe food insecurity and another 13 per cent from moderate food insecurity. Instead of the federal government retaining our mineral wealth, all of it is in the hands of phenomenally wealthy individuals or foreign corporations – incredibly dumb. Alan Morris, Eastlakes
Bright idea
All this talk about nuclear versus wind and solar should be silenced once and for all by those of us who’ve gone solar. I was fortunate enough to be able to afford the installation of solar panels a few years ago. My power bills are now mostly zero so the installation costs have been well and truly covered. If the government loudly pushed loans and benefits for going solar, Dutton’s claim of bills being reduced by 44 per cent by going nuclear would then look rather pointless. Ingrid Haydon, Long Jetty
Heads you win
The Letters page continues to provide interest and balance (Postscript, December 21) A shout-out to whoever writes the letter headings: they are brilliant. Season’s greetings to all. Vicky Marquis, Glebe
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