On climate, governments need to draw a line in the sand

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Thank you to Nick O’Malley for spelling out the devastating reality of climate change as it unfolds in real time across Melbourne and the globe (“Nepalese know only too well the devastating dangers of climate change as reality hits”, and “Melbourne records its warmest winter on record”, 2/9). The Pacific Island Forum is an opportunity for leaders, including Anthony Albanese, to draw a line in the sand on the fossil fuels driving the climate crisis. Thirty-six new coal and gas approvals since 2022 is thirty-six too many.
Woodside’s Browse proposal, which would be Australia’s biggest ever polluting gas project, is now on Environment Minister Murray Watt’s desk. If Labor wants to retain any credibility on climate, the rubber stamp on Browse needs to read “rejected”.
Isabelle Henry, Ascot Vale

Who benefits from inaction?
Nepal may be on the other side of the world, but as Nick O’Malley reminds us, that “whatever melts in the Himalayas rises in the sea”. We are surrounded by sea, and are one of the driest continents on Earth, so our farmers and coastal communities are especially vulnerable to the threats of extreme weather from climate change.
Climate change does not care for dodgy deals with carbon credits or the profits of coal and gas companies. So as the major parties dither and One Nation takes a hammer to climate policy, you have to ask just who will benefit? Maybe the gas and coal companies, maybe some finance companies. Not ordinary farmers, or small business owners or people who just want a safe place to live.
Jenny Kashyap, Bentleigh

Most politicians should be ashamed
The article “A warning to the world: ‘Whatever melts in the Himalayas rises in the sea’ ” (2/9) reveals an important point about climate change. When the prime minister says, “My thoughts are solely focused at this point in time on the families and on the extraordinarily difficult time that we’re going through”, he is resorting to the cynical refuge of politicians who, after catastrophic climate events, declare, “Now is not the time to be talking about climate change”. On the contrary now is exactly the time for straight talking, following heatwaves across Europe, ″⁣more than 300,000 people″⁣ displaced by fires and polar sea ice at historical lows. And now the most deafening warning, the terrifying rock-ice avalanche in Nepal.
Most of Australia’s politicians should hang their heads in shame. We have conservative parties, including One Nation, playing politics with ″⁣net zero″⁣. And Labor itself, which talks tough on climate but, in reality, has approved the 45-year extension of NW Shelf gas, and continue to approve other greenhouse-gas emitting gas and coal projects. It seems our only politicians working for a safer climate are the independents, Community Strong and the Greens.
Rob Firth, Red Hill, ACT

One Nation out in the cold
Reports of Melbourne’s warmest winter and devastating climate change impacts in Nepal and One Nation’s climate policy asserts “extreme weather events were more common prior to 1960″. Total agreement with your correspondent (Letters, 2/9) who says that climate action should be a bipartisan policy. But I cannot see Pauline Hanson joining in.
John Hughes, Mentone

A stance beyond comprehension
Melbourne’s warmest winter on record (2/9) does not auger well for the approaching summer season. I note that both the state opposition and One Nation want to expand or extend the life of coal-generated energy while curtailing renewables. With the overwhelming evidence of global warming generating catastrophic climate change it’s difficult to comprehend the stance of both.
Phil Alexander, Eltham

THE FORUM

Casting shadows
The approval for the massive towers has been done without community assent (″⁣Massive RMIT tower will loom over State Library″⁣, 2/9). These towers will overshadow the State Library. RMIT has also invested interest in these towers. Both RMIT and the State Library are places of learning and I wonder how much knowledge has been learned about the impact of these towers on our city.
Big buildings in such a delicate part of the city is short-sighted, and with the number of international students dropping I wonder what accommodation is needed. I have spent many years in the State Library, which is dedicated to housing books and is also a work of art, the green space is beautiful and provides a calming atmosphere in our busy city.
Julie Ottobre, Brunswick East

Not a catastrophe
Well said, your correspondent (Letters, 2/9). The media needs to stop catastrophising about what is undoubtedly a temporary fall in house prices, which will allow more first home buyers into the market and get back to the notion that a house should primarily be a long-term investment and a place to live, not a means of making money. Recent history shows us that house prices eventually rise again.
Grace Brisbane-Webb, Skye

Election plays
Shaun Carney strips bare the shortcomings of state Labor, suggesting Victoria will soon undergo an ″⁣identity change″⁣ (Comment, 2/9). Jess Wilson is in pole position, but as Carney says, there is some disquiet about the quality of her team and its policy formulation. But the election is not just Labor against Liberal. The door is wide-open for a resurgent One Nation, supporters of which, according to pollster Kos Samaras, just ″⁣want to burn the place down″⁣. One Nation represents a seismic shift in voter behaviour, and Victoria, as the most progressive state in the nation, is not immune. The election is shaping as ″⁣a classic pox-on-both-your-houses election″⁣, according to columnist Michael Bachelard (Comment, 6/8), causing him to reflect on ″⁣what kind of zombies will be left holding power for the next four years″⁣.
Neil Hudson, East Melbourne

Heavy lifting
I, too, like Shaun Carney (Comment, 2/9), worry that Jess Wilson and her inexperienced colleagues, while appearing to be brimming with enthusiasm, lack a broad, long-term vision for the state. Sure, fix the roads. Then what? Stop building the SRL? Then what? If the LNP wants Victorians to back them for more than one term, they’ll need to do more heavy lifting than they’re offering.
Frank Flynn, Cape Paterson

Seen in contempt
Another day, another damning article, (″⁣Another Victorian era is set to crash″⁣, 2/8). I was a Labor supporter for most of my adult life because I was attracted to the values the party purportedly stood for. But no longer. For all the reasons Shaun Carney outlines and more, I am now firmly one of the 75 per cent of voters who hold this government in contempt.
Ivan Glynn, Vermont

PM, turn off the taps
Of course Prime Minister Anthony Albanese ducked a question on whether the world shared collective responsibility for the climate change-driven disaster in the Himalayas (“Nepalese know only too well the devastating dangers of climate change as reality hits”, 2/9). He knows Australia is failing its climate commitments. Despite promising action and progressing well with the renewable energy roll-out, the Albanese government continues to enable and promote the coal, oil and gas that drives climate change and all the disasters it is bringing.
Nowhere is immune. Even my home state of Tasmania has had its warmest winter on record and is at higher risk of bushfires this spring (“Melbourne records its warmest winter on record”, 2/9). If Albanese wants credibility on climate, he needs to back our Pacific neighbours and start to turn off the coal and gas tap.
Sharee McCammon, Pelverata, Tas

Energy policy folly
On Monday, after celebrating its win in the Secret Harbour electorate in WA, One Nation announced its energy plans for Victoria outside the Loy Yang A power station in Gippsland. These plans would be a disaster for Victorians. One Nation plans to keep Loy Yang A station running, which is owned by AGL and planned for closure in 2035 due to its age and being no longer able to compete against the cheap renewable electricity now available from wind and solar. The station is 50-years-old and has enormous maintenance costs. One Nation says it will shut down the planned expansion of wind farms and hopes to introduce nuclear power as the main form of baseload electricity. The CSIRO and energy experts have all warned this would be far too costly and take too long, not to mention the problem of storing the radioactive waste.
Victorians have every right to be dissatisfied with the way the state is being run by the Labor government but One Nation would increase state debt. We are blessed with renewable energy assets, solar being the cheapest way to make electricity that humans have invented. The world would take us for fools if we neglected this opportunity.
Derek Ryan, North Geelong

Stop stoking fear
Waleed Aly (Comment, 28/8) recently wrote that to One Nation and sadly its supporters, details don’t matter. This was chillingly accurate. It doesn’t matter that Pauline Hanson, Barnaby Joyce and David Farley espouse different numbers on their immigration policy or that they have no coherent education, health and aged care, foreign affairs and trade or social services policies.
Some of the media’s failure to scrutinise One Nation to the same degree as is done to Anthony Albanese and Angus Taylor and the constant portrayal of a country in ″⁣crisis″⁣ has fed the masses. Even though we still face challenges, you wouldn’t know we still have a triple A credit rating, envious universal healthcare including a life-saving PBS. Public education remains strong as do opportunities in multiple fields of employment. Ironically, we are have arguably the world’s most successful multicultural society, although One Nation exploits this as a division rather than economic, cultural and societal strength, as it is. But once again, details and facts don’t matter for some, but you’d hope sections of the media would do better than to stoke fear and anxiety.
Craig Jory, Albury, NSW

Joy of live music
David Crowe’s tribute to the live music he enjoyed in a Dublin pub struck a chord with me (″⁣Traditional music still strikes chord for fans″⁣, 1/9). I am lucky enough to live near the Merri Creek Tavern in High Street, Westgarth, where there is an old-time music jam every Saturday afternoon. There fiddlers are joined by guitarists and banjo players, the man with the double bass and one playing the mouth organ. The group of players can add up to between a dozen and 20. The music spills into the street and passers-by stop for a while to listen, with some even venturing in.
May it continue to give us joy.
Janna McCurdy, Northcote

News from the street
On Sunday, I fell on the footpath and then fainted. I came to with three concerned strangers around me, one ringing for an ambulance. Two men and one woman, they all stayed with me until the ambulance arrived. They deserve the warmest thanks. It was such a good experience, when the news is so full of street violence.
Robin Burns, Ivanhoe

Dangers of algorithms
The damage that social media algorithms do is not confined to children and teenagers.
While the belated efforts of government to regulate harmful and addictive business practices is welcome, social media algorithms are still the enabler and amplifier of grievance politics.
Before social media, it was difficult for extreme views to take hold. Now, the scrutiny and fact checking of traditional media can be bypassed by those seeking to harness dissent.
Algorithms that feed on difference and conflict are driving consumption of content by adults that undermines rational debate and threatens democracy.
Turn off the algorithms and the content will wither.
Greg Williams, West Footscray

Work for the soul
I can see positive outcomes in involving low-risk prisoners in road maintenance support roles. Prison existence is a dull, aimless, daily grind of nothingness. Some inmates who have almost done the time for their crime are going to be released soon. Rather than a traumatic hit from the mainstream world upon release, an incrementally controlled contact program with the real world would be of great therapeutic value. I reckon it’s a terrific initiative. And satisfies my belief in the philosophy of Jeremy Bentham, whose tenet was ″⁣The greatest good for the greatest number″⁣ is the way to go.
Ray Bannister, Somers

Little meaning
The word science derives from the Latin ″⁣scientia″⁣, which means ″⁣knowledge″⁣, ″⁣awareness″⁣ or ″⁣understanding″⁣. With climate change having catastrophic effects on our planet already, and with worse to come, it’s obvious that with One Nation pushing fossil fuels, they have none of the three above.
George Djoneff, Mitcham

State’s black holes
According to many local British councils, a hole becomes a pothole when it measures about 40mm deep and 300mm wide. In Victoria, forget about holes and potholes, we now have superholes to which there’s no limit on size.
Lyn Bayley, Kyneton

AND ANOTHER THING

Potholes
With all the discussion about potholes on Victorian roads, I am not reading about the danger to motorcyclists. If you think a pothole is dangerous to car drivers please spare a thought for us on two wheels.
Peter Sherry, Maidstone

Having travelled extensively across Australia, I can assure you that potholes don’t stop at Victoria’s borders.
Kathy Diviny, Coburg

One Nation
Pauline Hanson’s coffin representing the end of our emissions reduction pledge is the height of bad taste, given the glacial collapse and loss of lives in Nepal.
Greg Curtin, Nunawading

Words have consequences, says Pauline Hanson. Well, yes.
Maureen Goldie, Blackwood, SA

Matt Golding’s cartoon (2/9) certainly tells it all. How to vote for nothing.
Doug Shaw, Sunbury

Secret Harbour is the latest in a growing list of electorates that have shown there is no such thing as a ″⁣safe″⁣ seat for either Labor or the LNP. Take your electorate for granted and out you go.
Belinda Burke, Hawthorn

Few will vote for One Nation when it expresses support for the cruelty of the live animal export trade.
Ronald Elliott, Sandringham

Funny how One Nation has selected orange as its colour when the US has an at-times orange-coloured president.
Michael Brinkman, Ventnor

Furthermore
While our planet is either drowning or burning, it’s good to know we can buy a toothbrush that takes film only your dentist can see. And, it’s only $799.
Myra Fisher, Brighton East

I’m longing for the day when Niagara Falls becomes Trump Falls.
Tony Andrews, Seacliff, SA

Is it too late to turn Dan Andrews’ unfinished statute into Dolly Parton?
Peter Venn, East Bentleigh

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