RSL delays a disgrace
WHERE is our RSL Club? Six months after the floods and it’s still in limbo – embroiled in a dispute with the assessors and insurance companies. Why?
The RSL employed many young people and provided a vital service to both the young and old ex-service people alike, as well as the rest of the community as a whole.
The RSL has always been a part of Townsville, providing a venue for all types of activities. In fact it was the de facto centre for the socially isolated parts of our community.
You only had to attend any Friday night or Saturday night at the club before the floods to see how the club serviced the community.
The women’s auxiliary donated $50,000 through selling raffle tickets to keep the club going to pay wages. These ladies also worked hard to supply money to various community and sporting groups.
Townsville cannot afford to lose the RSL, which has serviced the community since 1917.
The Townsville RSL Sub Branch was operational from 1917 and its official charter was received in 1919. It operated out of a series of establishments in the Townsville CBD, including the Soldiers Rest.
In 1933 the first Memorial Hall was opened in Sturt St. Land was purchased in the 1960s at its current site, on 139 Charters Towers Road, Hermit Park. They are not asking for handouts, just reasonably swift action from the insurance companies.
Where are our local, state and federal representatives? They should be asking questions as to why so many people who insured their houses in good faith are yet still in crisis.
Our elected leaders should not be standing by and taking a wait-and-see strategy while we watch the demise of the RSL due to a dispute with an insurance company.
Maybe the top end of town, the movers and shakers, the business moguls, should step up, use some of their knowledge, success and profits to take the lead, provide impetus and direction to ensure that this does not happen again.
For far too long the North has been used as a cash cow for the insurance companies. About time they return some of the high premiums we pay in the North. SANDRA CHESNEY, Jensen.