By not acknowledging that they have fiddled with due process and the proper distribution of funds with the sports grants ("Libs spent $25m to shore up NSW seats", "Fresh scrutiny for McKenzie over $100m 'slush fund' role", January 18), the Coalition will no doubt have set its sights on how it will spend the money allocated for supporting the victims of the fires and for rebuilding ravaged communities. Who will decide who gets the bulk of the funds? An independent body committed to equity and genuine need or a think-tank of political strategists seeking the best possible electoral advantage? The precedent has been set that the current government will adopt the same Machiavellian principles in spending our money. - John Nichol, Baulkham Hills
Illustration: Vintage Cathy WilcoxCredit:
We live in a society founded on two sets of rules: the written rules that Parliament makes, and the moral and ethical compass by which most of us live. The claim that there are no written rules that specifically preclude the expenditure of taxpayer funds for electoral gain overlooks the facts of equity, morality and ethics, “rules” that are critical to a fully functioning democracy. It is apparent that many of our politicians, once elected, lose any objectivity when it comes to equity, morality and ethics. - Chris Rivers, Port Macquarie
Let the public judge whether or not the awarding of sporting grants were a rort. All the government has to do is publish three lists. One list would contain the name of every applicant and the purpose for which the grant would be used. Another list would include the names of the organisations recommended by Sport Australia for funding. The last and most critical list would show the names of every successful applicant and the amount granted. From the lists it would be clear whether or not there was political favouritism in the final decisions of the government. - Tony Re, Georges Hall
The Canterbury-Bankstown local government area (forcibly amalgamated by the NSW government) has a population greater than the combined populations of Tasmania and the Northern Territory. This population continues to grow as high-rise development overwhelms schools, hospitals and recreational facilities. The failure of the Coalition government to approve any sporting grant applications demonstrates the contempt it holds for people living in this part of Sydney. - John Bailey, Canterbury
The real scandal is not the way grants were handed out, but that the fund exists at all. It should be referred to the Federation Integrity Commission - if we had one. - Hal Colebatch, Pretty Beach
Bridget McKenzie insists she did nothing wrong, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t unethical. She needs to be reminded of the quote: “Ethics is knowing the difference between what you have a right to do, and what is right to do.” Let’s hope that now, at least, she does the decent thing - and resigns. - Edward Loong, Milsons Point
If McKenzie did not break any rules, then clearly there were rules. So which rule allowed her to ignore the rest of them? - John Christie, Oatley
Politics must be the only sport where ministers are not penalised for own goals. - Jerard Barry, Engadine
McKenzie must be regretting she used a spreadsheet rather than a whiteboard. Like Ros Kelly. - Louise Dolan, Birchgrove
Hockey will feel at home in Trump's new Rome
The unsurprising news that a senior politician, turned diplomat, should choose to stay in the US raises questions (“Hockey reveals plan to remain in US”, January 17). Not that he should be prohibited from staying in any country of his choice. Joe Hockey in Donald Trump's US sounds like a perfect fit. However, the fact that Hockey, who in retirement will receive a decent superannuation, is allowed to further profit courtesy of his “close connections” with the likes of Trump presents an ethical concern. More significantly, our nation’s sovereignty potentially could be compromised. Shouldn’t ex-politicians and diplomats be independently scrutinised and regulated regarding utilising their links with foreign interests? After all, they receive generous superannuation because they have served our nation’s best interests rather than their own. - Cleveland Rose, Dee Why
Busily engaged in trousering income from his parliamentary pension, ambassadorial salary and hobnobbing with Trump disciples, Hockey probably doesn’t have a lot of time to read ("How Joe Hockey remade himself into Australia's Trump whisperer", January 18). He certainly would not have read history, otherwise he wouldn’t have compared Washington to ancient Rome. A long-time admirer of the United States, the distinguished British historian Sir John Plumb was less optimistic about America’s survival than Joe. Plumb likened modern America to the late Roman Empire, circa AD300, “impossibly overextended, beleaguered by barbarians, aware that all its glories of law and engineering might yet be demolished by incomparably less sophisticated peoples for whom destruction is a vocation and life is expendable”. - Leo Schofield, Potts Point
I applaud the decision of Australia’s greatest leaner to remain in “New Rome”. However, I disapprove of the lifters of the Morrison government holding their own toga party with the public purse. Minister McKenzie’s denials of wrongdoing could well be based on Roman advice. Cato the Elder noted: “Thieves of private property pass their lives in chains; thieves of public property in riches and luxury.” So, nothing new to see here. Perhaps the Coalition should pause and consider the great Roman historian Sallust’s observations of the consequences of a party’s only policy being the defeat of its rivals, whatever the cost. “It is this spirit which has commonly ruined great nations, when one party desires to triumph over another by any and every means.” New Rome is no place to go, ScoMo. - Geoffrey Dyer, Bundanoon
Our man in America sees his adopted country as the new Rome. In 1993, the Australian intellectual Robert Hughes wrote, "America resembles late Rome ... in the corruption and verbosity of its senators, in its reliance on sacred geese (those feathered ancestors of our own pollsters and spin-doctors) and in its submission to senile, deified emperors controlled by astrologers and extravagant wives." Put it rather well didn't he? - Keith Hartmann, Moruya
So Joe Hockey has a "passion for infrastructure and public policy". It’s a shame we never saw evidence of it during his term as Treasurer. - Michael Kenneally, Balmain
World is watching our climate response
It has been argued that even though we produce only a small amount of the world’s global warming pollutants, we should take stronger action to reduce our carbon footprint as an example to other countries. I would argue that we are having a much greater impact on the world as it watches in horror at images of skeletal cattle dying of thirst from our devastating drought; at footage of once great rivers dust dry and choked with dead wood; at heartbreaking, distressing images of massive native fish kills as they choke to death in deoxygenated, algae-choked puddles of mud. And finally, an apocalyptic inferno that destroys everything in its path, leaving a charred scar the size of Belgium on the landscape. We are the world’s canary in the coal mine. They are taking notice, and right now the bird is slumped , on its side, and breathing very rapidly. - Matt Kaarma, North Nowra
I despair at our PM’s lacklustre response to Larry Fink's Blackrock Investments announcement that it is reviewing its investment strategies ("The big money leaves coal for dust", January 18-19). After a decade of ignorance and procrastination, and a year of thoughtful activism from our concerned young, of recent pleas from esteemed scientists and fire experts, of a summer of record temperatures, record drought, record firestorms and death and destruction along the eastern seaboard and still our Prime Minister doesn’t get it. Please Mr Morrison, you have time on your side. Start to look at other industries in these coal-dependent electorates and deliver a vision and a path for the future. There must be no end of great ideas which – given financial incentive and tax breaks – invest and establish clean green employment and position Australia for what remains of the 21st century and beyond. At the moment, we are a model example of how not to manage this climate crisis. - Antony Bennett, Bar Beach
The two fastest-growing jobs in the US are solar installers and wind turbine technicians. And Warren Buffett says manufacturing plants and jobs are flocking to areas with large wind farms because their energy costs are dirt cheap. We're not just leaderless but rudderless as well, it seems. - Steve Nelson, Neutral Bay
There is really no need for a royal commission on how to respond to a bushfire emergency. The government just needs a Parliamentary library researcher to spend a month pulling together the findings of the 57 public inquiries, royal commissions and reviews related to bushfires and bushfire management that have taken place in Australia since 1939. If that’s not enough, there is already a 28-page National Bushfire Management Policy Statement for forests and rangelands prepared for the Council of Australian Governments in 2014. Fourteen national goals were identified to achieve a (currently non-existent) comprehensive and sustainable bushfire management policy. - Clive Williams, Forrest, ACT
According to NASA, earth’s global surface temperatures in 2019 reached 0.98 degrees Celsius above the 1951-1980 mean. We have seen the devastating results. Heaven help us if we reach the 1.5 to 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels that we are aiming for according to the Paris Climate Accord. The latest UN Climate Change Report (November 2019) says global greenhouse gas emissions would have to be cut by 7.6 per cent annually for the next decade just to meet the 1.5 degrees warming goal. So what are we doing, Australia? Where is the plan? We have the world’s attention. - Hugh Barrett, Sanctuary Point
Strike while the irony's hot
The PM says the government will fund a campaign encouraging us to take our holidays in Australia. I am glad his sense of irony survived the fires. - Don Firth, Wooli
Scott Morrison promised us we'd be in the black this year. Well, he was right. We're in the black all right. Charcoal black. - Geoff Gordon, Cronulla
No doubt those climate science experts among the ranks of the Coalition will soon be attributing the flash flooding in Brisbane, the Gold Coast and the Sunshine Coast to the work of arsonists. - James Bennett-Levy, Bangalow
Cover the costs, Canberra
It turns out that although most people insured their properties, they will not have the funds to rebuild like for like. This is because new, stricter building codes now exist in bushfire areas. The government should accept responsibility for these extra costs. After all, it will assist people who didn't insure themselves. Why should people who did the right thing suffer? Haven't they suffered enough already? - Sandy Mackenzie, Bundanoon
Stringent regulations attached to building in bushy areas now specify everything from the type of material that may be used in construction down to the size of the holes in a flyscreen ("Welcome to the new normal", January 18-19). Those extra measures can add more than 50 per cent to the cost of building a house. Thus, building an affordable, good-sized house in a bushland setting for the family to enjoy becomes prohibitively expensive. While it may be useful to set standards by which house construction can be measured against a bushfire attack, surely it should be the decision of a homeowner to decide what level of risk he/she is prepared to accept. - John Broadbent, Wahroonga
Beat the cheats
Under the present business model of quid pro quo, to be read as 'degrees for tuition fees', the cheating is here to stay, permanently ("Uni watchdog to join global fight against cheating", January 18-19). Only a small percentage of international students from non-English speaking countries are proficient enough in English. The solution seems simple. All assessments should be based only on formal examination components. Completion of assignments should just be necessary parts to fulfil the requirements, but with no marks allocated to them.
Muthukrishnan Srinivasan, Riverview
Ahead of its time
Some firms, particularly in Britain and Japan, believe allowing workers to have a 30-minute power nap during the afternoon improves productivity (“Power naps a wake-up call for woke workplaces", January 18-19). In the 1970s, while I was working in the NSW Department of Public Works, a colleague who unfortunately had a heart condition used to take tablets that made him drowsy. One day, the minister for public works was taking important guests on a tour of his department. As he walked past, this colleague was not only asleep but snoring loudly. The minister was embarrassed but little did he know then that the public service was so ahead of its time and at the leading edge of productivity. - Bruce Johnson, South Turramurra
Where are we now?
Lithgow and Oberon are regularly mentioned in news items as being in the Blue Mountains, which they are not. Now we read that Faulconbridge is "near" the Blue Mountains ("Largest rainfall in months expected over weekend", January 17). Being west of Springwood places it fairly well and truly "in" the Blue Mountains. - Ian Grant, Mount Victoria
Petrichor blimey
I am so pleased you can now revel in petrichor Anne Steyns (Letters, January 18-19). So not yet a Paul Kelly fan then? - Susan Newman, Mona Vale
Common people
Does protocol now dictate that we address the Sussexes as their Royal Lownesses ("Prince Harry and Meghan to give up royal titles", smh.com.au, January 18)? - Bruce Hulbert Lilyfield
Working royals? Surely an oxymoron. - Bill Thomas, Castle Hill
Voting with my feet
On the weekend I went to Events Cinema Bondi Junction. Is it the new norm that when people sit down they take off their shoes and put their dirty feet on the chairs in front? Looking around I discovered more than one person doing it. It's a disgusting habit. Now to whom does one complain? A person? No, they've been replaced by a machine. A machine? No, they only take bookings. Online? No, they only want to sell you a ticket. Guess I just have to wait for the movie to come out on TV. - Lia Friedler, North Sydney
All good, Shane?
Has anyone asked Shane Fitzsimmons: R U OK? ("Tears on the darkest days'', January 18-19). - Helen Atkins, Hamilton South