This week, letter writers discuss the capital’s kangaroo situation, Indigenous matters, Ben Roberts-Smith and more.

‘Mountains of cash’

Given that the ACT government has been unable to demonstrate any ecological justification for shooting thousands of healthy adult and juvenile kangaroos and bludgeoning thousands of infants, I suggest the following might be a plausible agenda for the killing. (For those who know it, the tune is ‘The Ash Grove’).

The ash blows! How grateful we are for this burning!

It’s turned all this parkland to smouldering ash.

We’ll make it a carpark, and soon we’ll be turning

all this burnt-out nature to mountains of cash.

‘Twas there when the reptiles were all disappearing

we made sure the weeds grew by killing the roos,

and then when the drought brought us days that were searing

we’d just need some vandal to kindle the fuse.

The white glow of sunlight on concrete is blinding.

Oh, why did we waste all this land for so long?

And those that think nature is nice need reminding

that nature is nasty and messy and wrong.

And now on the concrete we’ll install the meters.

From workers and shoppers we rake in the dough.

It’s so much more useful than those worthless creatures.

Those lizards and sun moths, they just had to go!

• Frankie Seymour, Queanbeyan

Roos at Red Hill

I have read with sympathy those concerned regarding kangaroos that there are “hardly any left after the cull last year” on the Red Hill reserve. The mystery is solved. There are hundreds and hundreds on the Federal Golf course. I invite all those concerned to drive or walk into the clubhouse, relax, enjoy a coffee and ask at the pro shop where to walk in the tree line between the fairways. Visiting twice a week, I can vouch for the fact that there are usually mobs of 250 or more enjoying the grass, shade and water facilities. Many also enjoy a rollicking in the sand bunkers. Members frequently have difficulty moving them out harm’s way, they are so tame. They arrived in the drought, multiplied, and have never left. Rest assured there is no shortage of kangaroos in the Red Hill vicinity. The club values and protects them as an asset to the natural beauty of the course.
– Mike Prunty, Monash

Electricity Bill

Bill Stefaniak (CW 25 May) congratulates Finland on dropping the wholesale price of electricity by 75% by opening its newest nuclear power plant. Yet a Google search of power prices to Finnish domestic consumers appears to be in the order of 42-euro cents per kwh (around 50-70 Australian cents). In his tirade on renewables a week later (CW 1 June) he notes he’s paying 21.7 cents. I could be wrong but that does look cheaper.

Bill also congratulates Peter Dutton for saying nuclear power has to be in the mix if we’re to get to net zero by 2050. If the decision were taken today to go nuclear, think about the process. Which of our states would take it on? Which private generator have you identified would take it on? Environmental clearances, waste storage, build time, where does the fuel come from, do we have the expertise and trained personnel? All in the next 25 years. You might as well congratulate Dutton for saying we should cure cancer.

He castigates us for the rush to unreliable renewables; hardly supported by the take up of solar panels by households. Bill states that 10 years ago we had some of the cheapest electricity in the world. What happened 10 years ago (election of a Liberal government maybe)? Does Bill know where we stand globally on electricity rates today? Who’s cheaper? We feel for those struggling in meeting energy costs but methinks it’s a global problem. And Australian power suppliers spent years gold-plating their supply systems and increasing their prices to us.

Bill also expresses disappointment in the lack of increased spending on defence in the Budget and cuts to our fleet of armoured fighting vehicles. We’re surrounded by sea. Where do we drive these vehicles to? Surely the move to missiles sounds sensible. And $400 billion on submarines is not enough? You’re happy to quote Chairman Xi on energy. Same bloke our armoured fighting vehicles are to be aimed at?

• Alma Quick, Garran

‘One but many’ or not?

Letters (CW 15 June): “Non-Indigenous belong”, highlights, once again, how overt political correctness has muddied our relationship with Indigenous Australians.

I do not see the need to act out a welcome to country at every conceivable opportunity. Nor am I apologising to someone who may or may not be related to any currently living Indigenous person or people, who may or may not have been the victim of some alleged atrocity or colonised, by someone who may or may not be related to me.

Australia is rapidly heading down the slippery path where anything bad that has happened in the past, the present, or that will happen in the future to Indigenous Australians is the fault of its colonists – the good things, conveniently forgotten, such as … institutions, infrastructure, and the very democracy we, all mobs included, cherish and enjoy.

Neither am in interested in “my culture is older, bigger and better than yours” comparisons and discussions that we constantly hear from many Indigenous activists.

We, Australians all, have acknowledged the past, colonisation, the Stolen Generation and finally – thanks to Kevin Rudd – made our sincerest apologies. Successive federal governments have continued, and will continue, to address these inequalities in our society.

I fully embrace the Australian anthem that “we are one, but we are many” – problem is we are not and, ironically, it is often Indigenous Australians, albeit a loud minority, who are undermining this ideal. If we continue look back in anger, we cannot move forward unified.

• Declan McGrath, Gordon

Non-Indigenous belong

Thank you, Vi Evans, for your timely letter (CW 15 June) expressing views about the over-use of welcome to country and challenging the need for this to be in our face with frequency. I could not agree more and think it distressing that this sensitive act, which would normally be given by Indigenous folk, has been ripped off by whites in the mistaken belief that it’s politically correct and culturally sensitive, when in fact it’s negative and divisional. After reading the government’s letterbox drop ‘Our Canberra June 2023 Belconnen’ it’s hard to refrain from calling our Chief Minister “Two-bob each-way Andrew” when his politically correct feel-good acknowledges the Ngunnawal peoples as the traditional custodians of the ACT and with last thought also recognises any other people or family with connection to the lands of the ACT and region. A real neat fail-safe, just throw a blanket over everyone and cross your fingers. Just exactly who anchors what because the way it’s published drives a wedge, and leaves those contemplating a green light voice vote in the upcoming referendum wondering who the hell the voice will be if this gets up, and the babble also possibly confuses Indigenous people. Would the Chief Minister clarify this in consultation with Indigenous leaders and respectable authority because this isn’t going away.

• John Lawrence, Flynn

The right to know

Like many others, I want the Voice referendum to succeed, but not under the proposed flawed, divisive model. The Voice appears to have been hijacked by the Indigenous well-off of the ilk of professors Tom Calma and Marcia Langton, meanwhile the Indigenous outback community, together with the voters, are left in the dark about how the Voice might improve their lifestyle in practice. As it is up the Parliament to finalise the minutiae, this is an unacceptable situation as voters have a right to know beforehand what they are going to vote for or against. The government has to date obfuscated, intimidated and indulged in secrecy regarding the Voice, which begs the question: what have they got to hide?

• Mario Stivala, Belconnen

Errors of fact

Ian Pilsner (Letters, CW 22 June) makes several errors of fact. Ben Roberts-Smith personally murdered at least one unarmed Afghani and ordered the execution of another. In my view he is not worthy of a Victoria Cross.

Mr Pilsner defends the use of nuclear energy in Australia on the grounds that it has been used in 30 countries and produces isotopes for medical use at Lucas Heights south-west of Sydney. Has he forgotten about Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, Windscale and Fukushima? Furthermore, there is simply insufficient time to build and commission a nuclear reactor in Australia before the world comes dangerously close to climatic tipping point.

– Douglas Mackenzie, Deakin

Our right to question

Ian Pilsner (Letters, CW 22 June) says we cannot question Ben Roberts Smith’s VC. My lifetime has encompassed conflicts from World War II onwards and there have always been questions about particular past recipients of bravery awards and how they were assessed. Likewise, it has been asked why others who clearly deserved awards didn’t get them. Why shouldn’t we ask why as well as why not? My brother was wounded three times on the beach at Tarakan in 1945. Would anyone doubt his bravery and that of his mates in staying on the beach, essentially unarmed, unloading supplies while under enemy fire? They didn’t ask for or receive any awards, not even an equivalent of the US Purple Heart.

Our military personnel sign up to follow set rules of engagement. If any decide they can willfully ignore those rules and act like the enemy, they are diminishing the rest of us as well as themselves.

As for nuclear energy, we similarly have a right to question. My conclusion, clearly stated, was that of the CSIRO’s professionals (supported by the Climate Council). Specifically, nuclear does not stack up for Australia against renewables, either on cost or build time.

I’d hope Mr Pilsner would be strongly supportive of our right to question – it’s fundamental to ensure we consider all sides of an argument before we reach a conclusion. To deny that right is, again, to diminish our society.

• Eric Hunter, Cook

Objection to welcomes

Eric Hunter (Letters, CW 22 June), what I am objecting to with the ‘Welcome to Country’ being recited at every opportunity, it is not the Aboriginals doing it, it is every man and his dog, so it has nothing to do with respect. I bet the Aboriginals did not charge hundreds if not thousands to perform the Welcome to Country and Smoking Ceremonies within their own tribes like they do now when performing for the rest of Australia. It is now a way of making money for them. When Bathurst Council said they were no longer going to pay, the Aboriginals said they would no longer perform the ceremony. That demonstrates just how unimportant (apart from getting money) the “welcomes” are for the wider Australian community.

It is not being done as a matter of respect because it is being performed by anyone and everyone, and to anyone and everyone. The white people may have only been here for just over 200 years, but it is time to just all get along. There may have been wars, but this has happened in every country. The Aboriginals were a warring race long before the white man arrived. I have read enough Australian history books that give a very different picture than what Eric is implying.

As to whether I was ‘put out by rising to my feet for God Save the Queen’, I do not see it as less relevant symbol of imperial obeisance compared to the Welcome to Country, and it was not played at the start of every gathering.

• Vi Evans, MacGregor

Consequences

At last the true horrors of the voice can be revealed!
Remember the damage the Mabo decision did to Australia and Australians? Remember how bad things became as soon as gay marriage was allowed? Remember the disruption to our culture saying Sorry caused? Remember how the apology to the Stolen Generation caused so many catastrophes?
Remember how Acknowledgement of Country gave us a communist dictatorship? Be warned!
The voice is going to cause exactly the same disasters!

– Doug Steley, Heyfield VIC

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