MUCH MORE REQUIRED ON SECURITY FRONT

WHILE the jury remains out on Canning MP Andrew Hastie’s recent use of parliamentary privilege re-FBI alleged, bribery charges etc; plain talk and proactivity must become a national priority.

Clive Hamilton’s Silent Invasion, given the book’s thorough documentation, is mandatory reading.

While a committee report on espionage and foreign interference with 60 recommendations has been recently handed down for parliamentary debate by Chair and Shadow Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus along with other bipartisan Pacific Island visitations, much more is required.

We’re a largely untapped resource rich repository and clean-green food bowl, but defence-wise a minnow in a rapidly changing regional landscape.

While the US Alliance is a cornerstone, until we have in place as a deterrent and fallback position a nuclear capability our nation of 24 million remains vulnerable. Yes we want to coexist in peace. Yes we want to share the mutual benefits of trade and prosperity.

Yes we want to see people delivered from poverty.

Yes we want to grow goodwill, tourism, health and educational scholarship etc.

Yet a nuclear capability deterrent line in the sand needs to be promptly put in place for all of that to continue to transpire on a sure-footed and sovereign basis. Richard Worland, Manifold Heights