Our amazing nurses deserve better
IF you have never been a nurse, you have no idea what they are worth and what they have to do.
Nurses deal with challenging situations all the time. Trauma, grief, death, blood, guts, stressful emergency situations, putting themselves at risk to care for their patients, and very often have little support from management to cope with it.
Some of the best nurses I have ever worked with have totally burnt out because they gave everything and got nothing back from the system. It’s a really thankless job at times.
Nurses are invaluable, but it would appear that many are over their working conditions.
What will we do then, when they leave in droves?
The politicians making decisions about the worth of nurses should walk a mile in their shoes. Sarah Charlton
Hobart
SANGER ON THE MONEY
Two correspondents question the claim by Jennifer Sanger that it is better to preserve native forests than log them (Letters July 21).
Sanger’s claim is backed up by a recent analysis by Professor Andrew Macintosh of the Australian National University for Frontier Economics.
Based on conservative assumptions, the study found that “stopping native forestry in the Southern and Eden RFA areas of NSW would produce a net economic benefit to the state of approximately $60 million, while also reducing net greenhouse gas emissions by almost one million tonnes per year over the period 2022-2041”.
Further support for Sanger comes from the recently released State of the Environment report that “86 per cent of Australia’s threatened species are subject to multiple threats that amount to habitat destruction and degradation, including logging, mining, urbanisation and agriculture, for which the key conservation response is habitat retention and restoration”.
The 15-year-old IPCC quote selected by forester Mark Poynton is outdated.
The most recent IPCC report, Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change, states that, in 2019, approximately 22 per cent of total net anthropogenic GHG emissions came from agriculture, forestry and other land use.”
That is, the net effect of forestry is to emit carbon, not sequester it.
From a holistic, scientific perspective, Sanger is right.
Ray Peck Hawthorn, Victoria
RECKLESS ACT
The decision by Morrison’s government to leak information about a suspected asylum-seeker boat entering Australian waters to selected journalists on the day of the election was an extremely low act even for him.
A new inquiry has shown that the government did it against the advice of the Department of Home Affairs. Surely this highly political act could have jeopardised the security of the activity. The former prime minister should be condemned for this reckless act.
Ike Naqvi Tinderbox
NOT THE SOLUTION
Ike Naqvi wants every refugee, immigrant, runaways, “hidden terrorists” in the whole world brought here.
Are they going to bring their own homes? No, all supplied by government, all social services arranged, transport, mobile phones etc. Dear Ike, there is no magic, just
tragic circumstances all over the world, if we could wave a wand and fix everything … then we would.
The answer is certainly not taking the homes, jobs, opportunities of the first nations and settlers (willing or not) that are more than likely worse off than refugees.
Look in areas where tent cities are unfolding, you will find the occupants are old, young, families … no refugees, no immigrants, normal Tasmanians. Who’s worse off? BW Sullivan
Swansea
LOOKING FOR FEEDBACK
Trials are an important way of testing the long-term viability and the impact of new initiatives on our city and community.
I wanted to comment on some of the recent public commentary surrounding the City of Hobart’s current e-scooter trial.
The trial is collecting data from a wide range of data points from sources such as the trial operators, community surveys, direct correspondence and in-person community group engagement.
When using a comparison to help demonstrate some of the potential positives of the e-scooters in our city, our officers do a conservative equivalency based on observations in other communities so as to not overstate examples such as how many car trips the e-scooters may have replaced.
The survey is currently open for community feedback and uses a range of multiple choice and open questions to offer the opportunity for a range of Hobart-specific feedback to be collected and analysed including the mode of transport replaced by e-scooters.
The e-scooter trial runs until the end of December, when all data collected will be assessed.
Bill Harvey
Hobart
THANKS FOR HEADS-UP
Let me thank Rob Inglis and Alison Hetherington for drawing attention to a dastardly change to the Statewide Planning Scheme (Mercury, July 22).
Unless I’ve misunderstood: 1: A previous draft included a sensible clause requiring all new developments to include secure parking for bicycles. 2: The latest draft has lost that proposal.
If this is the result of a genuine mistake, I can accept that we all make mistakes, and the error can be fixed easily.
If it is the result of dastardly mischief, can we know the name of the culprit and of a supplier of tar and feathers?
Keith Anderson Kingston