



Tony Abbott is leading the world in going backwards


I see the conservative position on climate change has moved from Australia "should not lead the world" to Australia should hold back the world ("Tony Abbott seeks alliance to thwart President Obama on climate change policy", June 10). Very much in keeping with Tony Abbott's Neanderthal views on most issues, but a big embarrassment on the world stage.

Louise Webb Kianga 

Has Tony Abbott lost his marbles?  The Prime Minister is swanning round the world at our expense trying to form a "coalition of  the unwilling" to circumvent the US' grand plan to dramatically cut carbon pollution. I'm incredulous.

Robin Gunning North Tamworth

Tony Abbott has recently peddled two lies about climate change. The first is that the number of emissions trading schemes throughout the world is in decline. The second is that President Obama's plan for emissions reduction resembles Abbott's Direct Action policy. Both statements are wrong.  The Prime Minister is in election mode again, where truth doesn't seem to matter any more. 

Colin Simpson Menai

Tony Abbott's opposition to carbon pricing is correct. Trading schemes are a failure and divert the attention from the real issue, that of developing renewable energy sources.

Mr Abbott should back up his opposition to carbon pricing with an announcement that the Future Fund is to be directed to explore ways of using its assets of $100 billion to invest, research and market renewable energy sources. We can all see the way manufacturing is going in Australia (out the door on the left), and we need to really be at the forefront of the coming technology.

Steve Johnson Elizabeth Beach 

Tony Abbott says it is important that policies to address carbon output do not "clobber the economy" while helping the environment. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper agrees. 

At the same time, the Australian Renewable Energy Agency is to be abolished and the renewable target cut, jeopardising billions of dollars of investment and thousands of jobs. Reports say this will lead to higher household energy bills. 

Did anyone tell the Canadian Prime Minister this before he joined the club?

Tom Andrews Roseville 

Tony Abbott seems to suggest – in his refusal to adopt carbon pricing – that unfettered economic growth is the only thing that matters in our society, ignoring the risk that climate change poses to our future wellbeing, let alone economic growth. Following this logic, he should abolish speed limits on national highways so freight and people can be moved at maximum speed to achieve maximum economic benefit.

Han Yang North Turramurra

It's clear now the government lied about its pre-election commitment to education funding, pensions, and taxes. Outwardly, their withdrawal of support from programs for climate change, renewable energy, science in general and even the funding of its own Direct Action policy indicates its members are climate-change deniers. Now internationally it is working behind the scene to hinder progress to a cleaner future. However, no one in the party has the guts to come out and admit directly to the Australian people that they think climate change is crap.

Christopher Dauth Randwick 

With Abbott overseas posturing on climate change, he wants to be more than a Rhodes scholar. He aims to be the Colossus of Rhodes kicking sand in the face of Obama. Us Aussies should be proud.

Ian Ferrier  Paddington

If lying politicians devoid of common sense or decency isn't enough, now we're part of the caveman coalition of science deniers. The Abbott experiment continues. 

Phil Bradshaw Naremburn

It is a sad state of affairs when Barack Obama would have more chance of talking Tony Abbott into committing our military to another war of US making and yet will have bugger all chance of convincing him to get on board the global warming bus.

Dallas Fraser Mudgeeraba (Qld)

No doubt Tony Abbott will return to Australia waving a piece of paper and declare there will be "no climate change in our time". And some will believe him. 

Norman Carter Roseville Chase 


Individual male circumcision cases don't prove a thing

Subbed/checked by RMu. contact 9322 8306.Saying circumcision is not a women's issue is like saying a male obstetrician shouldn't deliver babies (Letters, June 10). Any human with an analytic brain and the ability to research is able to weigh evidence for and against a procedure. Circumcision has its benefits, but most Western paediatric colleges conclude that, population-wide, on balance the disadvantages outweigh the benefits. Individual patient cases ("child x had a problem while uncircumcised") do not prove anything and are the exception. Do we cut everybody's little fingers off because some people later in life develop finger infections?  

My main opposition to circumcision is the barbaric way it is performed, without anaesthetic, by forcefully holding down a screaming terrified baby who is then cut. And please don't reply "they can't remember the pain" – the horror of pain is not in the recollection of it, rather it is in the experience of pain in the moment.

Dr Tarra Shaw Ryde

Our male children were "ringbarked" with a rubber band. In all the blather about circumcision, why have we not heard of this method? Might it be because a knife-wielding specialist misses out on a nice little earner? The non-srugical method entails no pain to the infant, as the foreskin just falls away. Is this not done any more?

Donald Hawes Blayney

European schoolboys in east Africa in the '50s were steeped in British history. In the showers of the boarding schools the circumcised and uncircumcised were labelled as Roundheads or Cavaliers. I fell into the royalist category.

Tim Wynn Jones Homebush

Unfair to mock our globe-trotting PM

Give me a break! The Prime Minister visits umpteen countries in umpteen days, having high-level meetings in each, and his tiny slip of the tongue in Canada is seized on by Chris Roylance (Letters, June 10) as making Australia a laughing stock. Roylance’s hostility towards the Prime Minister will probably only be surpassed by Mike Carlton’s next vinegary column entirely devoted to the same subject.

Lin Sinton Killarney Heights

It is not just the "Canadia" embarrassing moment; Tony Abbott reprimanded the Russian President for behaving "badly". Naughty Mr Putin. We seem to have lapsed back to the simplistic view of foreign affairs as a matter of "goodies and baddies". Is the G20 the one where they all get dressed up for the final photo? If so, the government might have them dress in white hats and black hats so that we know who is in what camp.

Brian Collins Cronulla

I hope that when Tony Abbott leaves Canadia he returns immediately to Austria.

Richard Eaves Tamborine Mountain (Qld)

I am wondering if there is a scholarship available to attend the Antone Abbott College of Linguistic Excellence, or do I have to know a member of the college board?

Paul Sweeney Newtown

Rieu to the rescue

Perhaps Australia Post could become even more profitable by not delivering mail at all and concentrating on its new core business of selling Andre Rieu CDs ("Don't bank on your daily delivery", June 9).

Stuart Ray Turner (ACT)

Putting minors on Manus is an outrage

Thanks to the Herald for reporting that unaccompanied minors have been sent to Manus Island ("Processing frozen before Manus Island riot began: secret tape", June 10). The litany of abuse against what are, in the main, innocent and law-abiding seekers of asylum has to stop. Australia needs to reclaim its voice and its place among civilised and humane nations in the global community. Children, regardless of their background, must be cared for and protected.

Andy Busuttil Hazelbrook

Australia’s asylum seeker policy is deterrence at all costs. The basic tactic is a terrifying isolation and deliberate delays in the fair processing of claims of persecution. Lies, misinformation and political spin cover up what is a  breach of law. 

Disdain for international obligations and inhumanity towards vulnerable folk is the name of the Coalition game, with Labor a disgraceful  accomplice.

Frederika Steen  Chapel Hill (Qld)


Cast in context

I can go along with Andrew Bovell's desire to see actors drawn from much wider racial backgrounds than is the case in Australia today or more instances of actors "playing roles from their own cultural stories" ("Racism blamed for theatres remaining 'dominated by whites'", June 10).  If a play is set in today’s Australia, of course it should include actors of varied racial origin. Should it be the role of the theatre, however, to try to remove racial bias in the community through the concept of "colour blind casting" if this involves some perverting of history? I would not expect to see on stage or film Jane Austen’s Pemberley drawing room peopled with actors from a range of racial backgrounds or Ned Kelly played by an indigenous Australian actor.  I don't think it is racist to suggest that casting should reflect the situation and mores of the country and period in which the theatrical events are set. 

Ken Knight North Turramurra


Hunters who spread ferals are no solution

The increase in feral pig populations near Sydney confirms what many people involved with national parks have suspected for many years ("Feral pigs' appetite for mayhem turns properties into sties", June 10). Pig hunters are not the solution to the problem, they are part of the problem. It is in the interest of hunters to ensure they have sufficient supply to last them into the future by introducing new populations to areas that were previously feral free.  

Gary Gibbs Rozelle

I was interested to read that feral pigs have come as close to the city as Hurstville and Hunters Hill. Now I am not a pig but, if I were, I certainly would not go anywhere near a place called Hunters Hill.

Jim Ellis Lane Cove

Pigs don’t fly, apparently, they stroll in unannounced 

Peter Lloyd Asquith


Loaded term no help

Bob Carr and Gareth Evans are keen to ensure the loaded term "occupied" be used in relation to Israel’s presence in the West Bank and east Jerusalem ("East Jerusalem stance will not aid peace process", June 10). Surely when you tell the Palestinians they are in the right by using such one-sided language, you are discouraging them from negotiating, and thereby hindering peace. It's interesting that we don't hear the same push to label Turkey's occupation of part of Cyprus, or China's occupation of Tibet or disputed islands in the Pacific.

Danny Samuels Malvern (Vic)


Merchant still has it

The Merchant of Venice is not a comedy, but it is a serious study of the cultural mix in the London (and Venice) of Shakespeare’s time (Letters, June 10). The audience, in the production that Genevieve Milton saw, ‘‘came away feeling sorry for Shylock’’, which is precisely what Shakespeare intended. The play has, indeed, stood the test of time.

Roderick West Manly


Cleanliness before hotel luxury

Hurray for Alan Edwards (Letters, June 10). As a retired nurse I would go further and say uniforms in general should remain in and be laundered by the hospital unless covered by a surgical gown at all times while in contact with patients, beds, etc. Another worrying issue is the trend to carpet the floors of clinical areas, particularly in the private sector. It is impossible to adequately clean a carpeted floor. Bleach is the only reliable cleaner and it cannot be used on carpet. I have seen caked blood on the floor of carpeted rooms in a top Sydney private hospital. 

A hospital is just that and not a hotel.

Heather Phillips Wahroonga


Golliwogs on shelves

Pat Sheil and James McBean (Letters, June  10) might care to know that golliwog books are indeed available and not just dolls. We were given a recent reissue copy of Little Black Sambo several years ago after our son was born. The preface by the publisher explains why they thought it should not be consigned to the dust bins of history.

John Swanton Botany


Road to no returns

With financial disasters of two recent tollways to go by (Brisbane's Airport Link and Sydney’s Cross-City Tunnel, both of which were built after wildly inflated predictions of traffic volumes) it's not surprising that Australia's sensible superannuation funds decline to fund tollway infrastructure (Letters, 10). Someone should write to the Canadians and warn them. 

Cassi Plate Leichhardt


Muir's rookie mistake

Ricky Muir’s agonising predicament (Letters, June 10) arose from his genuine attempt to actually answer the questions that Mike Willesee asked him. That boy sure has a lot to learn about Australian politics.  

David Grant Ballina

Does Motoring Enthusiast Party senator-elect Ricky Muir demand that the person who repairs and services his car has at least a basic knowledge of how it works?

Tony Judge Belconnen (ACT) 

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