As a North Sydney Council ratepayer still stunned by the proposed 50-75 per cent rate increase next year, it was certainly news to me that the six high-fee-paying schools in the North Sydney LGA do not pay rates (“Broke and desperate for cash, North Sydney Council asks top private schools to pay voluntary rates”, December 12). As anyone who has driven or walked past these schools at drop-off or pick-up time will attest, they are a significant challenge to, and user of, local infrastructure. Zoe Baker is too polite to point this out, asking instead for these institutions to pay voluntary rates. But private schools are significant financial enterprises, and the time for them to be given exemption from the payment of rates has long gone. Richard Holliday, Cremorne
St Aloysius’ College, Milson’s Point, Kirribilli is part of the North Sydney council area Credit: James Brickwood
The report that schools will be asked to pay council rates triggered a memory of my father. We moved to Wahroonga in 1951, and my father noticed a number of sites owned by churches on his drive to the station every week. He also noted that no rates were paid on these substantial land holdings. So, he came up with the idea of establishing a new church that would worship money to avoid having to pay rates on his modest property holding. If he was a believer, I’m sure he’d be applauding up in heaven (but more likely hell).
Elizabeth Elenius, Pyrmont
If you use the service, you should pay for it. There will be exceptions, such as a charity for the bewildered or a small temple, but schools, church halls, nursing homes and NDIS-funded NGOs all have incomes. Get them to pay. If the laws don’t allow this, stop collecting their garbage and make maintaining their pipes and roads the lowest priority at the works depot. Soon, the school will find the funds to pay for the services they now receive for free courtesy of their, probably already very peeved, neighbours. David Neilson, Araluen (NT)
Loreto Kirribilli and St Aloysius College, both local high-fee-paying schools, regularly use the former bowling green at Alfred Street near Fitzroy Street for sporting and other activities. Surely it’s high time for them to contribute towards local rates, especially since hapless local ratepayers now face huge rate increases as a result of the blow-out costs in the redevelopment of North Sydney Olympic Pool. Edward Loong, Milsons Point
A significant number of Sydney’s wealthiest private schools are buying up surrounding residences. The effect is twofold – a reduction in Sydney’s housing stocks and a considerable reduction in council incomes from rates. Should private schools pay rates, albeit at a reasonable “concessional” rate? Many ratepayers would certainly think so. Paul Parramore, Sawtell
Orwellian omission
George Orwell’s novel 1984 has been “disappeared” from the texts recommended for HSC English study (“Dickens, Orwell and Plath dumped from HSC English lists”, December 12). How appropriate that, in an age of disinformation and cancelling, the genius of a writer who first tracked the rise of authoritarianism should himself be suppressed by sloppy thinking do-gooders in the education system. Terry Aulich, West Hobart (Tas)
There is probably no more important literary work for our young people (and everyone) to read at this moment than George Orwell’s 1984. Age, Laura Craven, makes some things better. Mark Paskal, Austinmer
It is disappointing that Orwell’s 1984 has been cut from the 2027 HSC English booklist. Never has its central messages been more relevant than today. I was also surprised by one teacher’s comment that Pride and Prejudice is “a bit stale” and “lacks the academic difficulty we could ask of students”. Neither I nor the teachers I have interacted with found any trouble engaging year 12 students with the complexities of this great novel. Barry Dahms, Mosman
English texts for HSC study need to be rotated. New texts bring challenges for both students and their teachers and mitigate against staleness and rote learning. The process of renewal also assists the marking of scripts and keeps markers fresh and responsive to the nuances posed by new texts. Charles Dickens has not really been “dumped”. As any good football coach will explain, he has been rotated to the bench, and he will be back with his best mate, who wears the shirt number 1984. Rod Leonarder, Roseville
So sad to read about the “modernising” and “feminising” of the English reading list. Back in the ’70s, we had an appalling English teacher, but what kept me engaged was the amazing literature we were reading. Hamlet was incredible, as was Sophocles’ Oedipus the King – questions about fate and free will, while George Bernard Shaw kept us amused. Graham Greene, George Orwell, E.M. Forster, while at times heavy going, were powerful writers and, of course, the incredible poetry of Coleridge and Chaucer. As a working-class boy from Newcastle, these texts opened my eyes and my mind. Peter Brown, Darlinghurst
Anna Funder, author of WifedomCredit: AFR
I’ve not long finished reading Anna Funder’s Wifedom. No wonder George Orwell has been cancelled! Viv Mackenzie, Port Hacking
Context is no crime
The treatment of Jayson Gillham reminds me of the treatment of Shostakovich under Stalin (Letters, December 12). Giving the political context of a piece of music is completely normal and has been cheered in the past by the same people now condemning Jayson, as when performers like Lior Attar called for peace in the Middle East in his many concerts with the MSO. Did the MSO expunge any political context in their recent concert commemorating composers killed during the Holocaust? Did they ignore the political background of Deborah Cheetham’s requiem about the inland wars of Victoria Eumeralla, a war requiem for peace? The use of legal contract law to both control artists and remove any obligations is the end game of the gig economy. Jayson’s real “crime” was to criticise Israel to an audience of powerful people who refuse to hear it, many of whom are major donors and legal experts aiming to crush opposition voices. Giles Parker, Riverview
China owns our EV future
As the owner of a Chinese-made electric vehicle, I can perfectly understand how China has come to dominate the market for EVs (“China is streets ahead of its rivals in EV carmakers’ race”, December 12). Its cars are well-made, technically advanced and competitively priced. You can now buy one for under $40,000, which is not much more than you’d pay for an equivalent petrol-powered vehicle. And the EV will save you money on fuel and maintenance over its lifetime. The legacy carmakers are now paying the price for resting on their laurels and for believing the dross being pushed by climate sceptics and the fossil fuel industry. The Chinese, by contrast, could see the future and pulled out all the stops to make it theirs. Kodak failed to adapt to the digital revolution and went from shark to minnow almost overnight. GM, Ford, Toyota and all the others who kept their eggs in the legacy basket now risk a similar fate. They have no one to blame but themselves. Ken Enderby, Concord
Labor not to blame for antisemitic attacks
Smearing your opponent is an age-old political exercise, but it can so often fail when it is not based on fact (“Jewish leaders split over Labor’s liability”, December 12). Members of the federal Coalition have inferred, with no justification, that the Albanese government is in some way responsible for the arson attack on a Melbourne synagogue. Peter Dutton, along with Benjamin Netanyahu, has condemned Penny Wong for voting in the UN for a motion that is virtually the same position that the previous Howard government once held. This motion is supported by 156 countries such as Britain, France, Germany, Canada, New Zealand and Japan. I have yet to see the leaders of those countries suffer the opprobrium Wong has. Our government is clearly trying to find a solution that will break the endless cycle of violence in Gaza and on the West Bank. When Dutton persistently maligns Labor policy on Israel and panders to the populist right, we are in trouble. While Netanyahu and Dutton continue to equate justifiable criticism of Israel with antisemitism, the real meaning of that genuinely repulsive creature, antisemitism, is lost. Bruce Spence, Balmain
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visits Adass Israel Synagogue in Ripponlea that was destroyed in a firebomb terrorist attack last Friday.Credit: Justin McManus
I once voted proudly for the Greens. I argued on behalf of them, insisting they were not racist or antisemitic, merely anti-Zionist. Sadly, I have been forced to eat my own words. I have had to watch one senior Green describe Jews as having tentacles, and another pose next to a sign that would not be out of place in Germany in the 1930s. Now come the conspiracies about the synagogue bombing. Is this far-right or far-left politics? I can’t tell.
The insistence that “Zionists” are the true antisemites is a form of mental gymnastics that reminds me of the far right’s excuse for their own racism in the wake of 9/11: that Islam is “a religion, not a race”. But ultimately, it is a tragedy for Australia because this is a country of many cultures and we all have to live here together in peace. The blaming and scapegoating of an entire ethnicity for an undeniable atrocity is a blight on the Greens that will never be effaced. Simon Tedeschi, Newtown
So in Jane Hume’s fevered imagination, a gang of antisemitic thugs are sitting around, planning their outrageous attacks when one of them says, “Hang on, first let’s see what Anthony Albanese does.” The Coalition really would say anything, wouldn’t they? Colin Stokes, Camperdown
Caught short on gas
To Barbara Chapman’s list of John Howard’s incompetent decisions should be added his government’s decision to give our gas away to China for free (Letters, December 12). As the Australia Institute pointed out in April, while Australia will have received about $2.27 billion in royalties on its LNG exports in 2023-24, Qatar is earning about 20 times as much. Norway, meanwhile, earns similar, large amounts for its sovereign wealth fund. Only Australia, thanks to those “better economic managers”, the Liberals, receives much less. When Ken Henry proposed to reform resource taxation in 2010, the Liberals ran a treacherous and dishonest scare campaign against it, costing Australia hundreds of billions in lost revenue in the ensuing years. I can only hope that a good teal candidate will be running in my electorate next year. Nicholas Reid, Hughes (ACT)
Leadership stalemate
It is hard to envisage our government doing more than work at the margins on our many national issues. Major reforms would result in our risk-averse electorate going for the do-nothing option rather than accept improving housing affordability by tanking house prices, fixing the health system and other inadequately funded services via a range of taxation reforms and accelerating decarbonisation by curtailing the export of fossil fuels. All these measures seem about as unachievable as reforming our less-than-fit-for-purpose Commonwealth Constitution. It is all very well to demand a majority government do brave things, but they have to get the initiatives through a hostile Senate. Then it could be reversed by the incoming Coalition government. At this time in our history, we clearly will not accept brave reform if any pain is involved. Ross Hannah, Bowral
Ross Gittins refers to our government as “gutless”. How can the government possibly achieve anything when they are only given one electoral term? When you look at the number of prime ministers we have had over the past 10 years, voters have zig-zagged from one major party to the other. Once elected, the prime minister spends all his time protecting his position, leaving little time to address real issues. Now, because Albanese is not perceived as a “strong” leader, voters are drifting towards Dutton, with his nuclear dreams and empty promises to reduce supermarket bills, leading to a situation as stagnant as the previous No-alition government. Judith Rostron, Killarney Heights
Travelling light
To anyone discouraged by Julie Lewis’s article on travelling with carry-on luggage only, let me offer some encouragement (“My ‘insane’ attempt to spend a month in Europe with only carry-on bags”, December 12). It is completely doable! My wife and I went on a cycling holiday in Europe in 2003. We packed two pannier bags each, total weight 8kg per person. All went swimmingly until our bikes were stolen in Bologna at the end of the second week. We then opted to mail one bag each back to Australia with our redundant cycling kit, and carried on by train through Switzerland and Germany for a further four weeks, with 4kg of luggage each. So encouraged were we that we returned to Italy in the spring of 2006 and travelled the length and breadth of the country with just a 4kg day pack each. What a liberating experience! Our luggage fit under our chair in a restaurant. We could rent a Vespa and go sightseeing with our luggage on our backs. I’ve only ever checked in a bag once since. Peter Craig, Dulwich Hill
The two 2.2 kilo suitcases my husband and I take to Europe.Credit: Michael Carey
Airwaves’ great loss
Vale Clive Robertson, the most innovative person on TV and radio (“Veteran broadcaster Clive Robertson has died, network reports”, smh.com.au, December 12). I will never forget listening to him on the radio one morning in the mid-1980s when he joined stories about the quality of Qantas and the fact that Qantas tested its engines for bird strike by throwing frozen chickens in them – as he painted the picture of chefs standing behind the engines making chicken sandwiches in his classic stream-of-conscious rambling. I laughed my head off as I sat there in traffic – and wondered whether other drivers also laughing were listening to the same program. We will not see his like again. Kirk Wilson, Berowra
I was sorry to learn of Clive Robertson’s death. His breakfast show on 2BL (now ABC Radio Sydney) with its often quirky and sometimes politically incorrect songs, interjections and observations by him always helped start my day with a smile. I especially liked his sign-off before the 7.45am news: “That’s it Clive, better hit the road, you ain’t no frog, you’re a horny toad.” Vale. Rodney Commins, Naremburn
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