Climate, fire and politics: Perhaps there should be an exam for candidates

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This was published 4 years ago

Climate, fire and politics: Perhaps there should be an exam for candidates

Peter Hartcher (Comment, 16/11) gives a depressingly accurate description of the history of ineptitude and incompetence of many of the politicians we elect and pay to manage the affairs of this country. They are willful in their disregard for advice from scientists, economists and others, preferring to rely on their ingrained outdated and irrelevant political philosophies and avoiding any evidence that might be seen to contradict these fixed positions or imperil their status within their party. Their conduct, disgraceful by any measure, might even be excused by their ignorance if it were not for their overwhelming vanity, sense of entitlement and hubris. As others have pointed out, it is high time we developed some national system of minimal entry standards of knowledge ethics and probity to be applied to candidates for office. If such a test was applied retrospectively, a large number of seats would fall vacant overnight.

Peter Crocker, Strathmore

Illustration: Pat Campbell

Illustration: Pat Campbell

Look to the past to battle the present . . .

Tony Wright (16/11) is on target about the lack of rationality associated with the bushfire crisis in NSW and Queensland. His observations and recollections about burning by settler descendants learnt from the Indigenous people and reflecting the long experience of historic strategic burning of the latter go to the very nub of our current fiasco.

Notwithstanding climate change effects, the occurrence of fire-friendly weather conditions or the proximity of houses to forest areas, the simple reality is that by pre-burning the fire-prone bush, patch by patch, regularly and with due diligence mitigates the effects of fires, their intensity, capacity to spread uncontrollably and resources required to fight them in extremis.

Although firefighting is a state responsibility, it is perhaps time the federal government stepped in and engaged directly with the Indigenous community to come up with an approach including personnel, training, burning methodology and short-term accommodation for persons locally affected.

I suggest using the Indigenous community in this role for obvious historic reasons, as a vector for restoring some otherwise well-deserved respect not currently given them and because it is plain as day the "settler" population has made this whole area a complete and utter dingo's breakfast. The Greens and "white" eco-supremacists are particularly to blame on account of their evangelical approach to the environment that lacks any real understanding of the reality of nature.

Mike Seward, Port Fairy

. . . That's all very well, but don't forget science

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While I agree that Indigenous fire management experience should be taken into account along with what our fire scientists have learnt, we don't want to idealise these practices. We don't know how often burning "went wrong" pre-white settlement after all. Indigenous people weren't operating in a continent with 25 million humans, a vastly complicated infrastructure, and a climate regime that is rapidly becoming more fire-ready and unpredictable. The science must be the main guide if we're to get through this with a minimum of destruction.

Mick Webster, Chiltern

The Greens are not the problem

Phillip Edwards (Letters, 15/11) says the Greens helped create the current situation of increasingly intense bushfires because they voted down the Rudd government's emissions trading scheme in 2009. But they did this because it wasn't good enough, as its targets were inconsistent with keeping global warming below 2 degrees. In 2010 the Greens voted with the Gillard government for the better policy of a fixed carbon price. This scheme proved its worth, as emissions did go down. It was repealed in 2014 by the Abbott government.

To be fair, the Greens have been much more constructive than any other party in trying to prevent the devastating bushfires we are experiencing now.

Jane Leitinger, Albert Park

FORUM

These fuel-ish things

I don't wish to be a bowser chocolate wowser but is there some way fuel companies could provide a "pay for fuel only, no questions asked" checkout lane? I'm over being asked if I want to buy cheap, nasty chocolates when I'm paying for fuel.

I quite like chocolate and, on the rare occasion I buy them from a proper chocolate shop, I've never been asked if I would like petrol to go with the truffles or whatever takes my fancy.

Over to you multinational, highly profitable oil companies.

Mark Biss, Camberwell

Positively kind

Over the years I've read many corny articles on happiness. Wendy Squires comes up with a brilliant conclusion to her insightful article "Kindness is key to happiness" (16/11) by resolving that "I'm going to fight the helplessness I feel with kindness by being the best human being I can be". May her newfound positivity become wildly contagious.

Kevin Burke, Sandringham

A nation's shame

Behrouz Boochani, a Kurdish-Iranian refugee locked up in off-shore detention for six years by Australia, has been welcomed to New Zealand. Boochani is a journalist who repeatedly spoke out about the cruelty of life in detention and won Australia's richest literary prize for his book No Friend But the Mountains.

It is wonderful that Behrouz has been able to leave PNG, but we must continue to advocate for the 46 men still detained in Bomana prison in Port Moresby for the crime of seeking asylum.

Now the medevac law is in danger of being repealed. And let us not forget the Tamil family from Biloela who have now been detained on Christmas Island since August.

Australia has repeatedly rejected New Zealand's offers to resettle refugees from offshore detention.

This is Australia's shame.

Jen Hooper, Box Hill

Future impacts

The impacts of climate change on Australia are becoming clearer with bushfires, longer and more severe droughts, the dying Barrier Reef and rising sea levels. However, to assess the full impact on Australia, consideration needs to be given to the effects on our neighbours to the north and what the implications are for us. For example, Bangladesh, with a population of 165 million people, is a low-lying, riverine country where up to 1 million people are displaced every year during the monsoon season. With rising sea levels there could be somewhere between 10 to 100 million people permanently displaced. Where will they go? Similarly, India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia have large populations living on the coast and in low-lying areas.

We may be able to turn back the handful of refugees coming by boat at the present time, but how could we handle the possible, indeed likely, millions in the future?

Ivan Gregory, Rowville

Hold them to account

I am an agriculturalist scientist with first-hand experience of the farmers in Australia changing their farming systems to survive and profit while tackling the challenges of climate change. I also have worked in the field for decades in the tropics and have observed dramatic changes to agriculture, health challenges and an increase in intensive weather events where there is still essential reliance on subsistence agriculture.

So I find the Deputy PM's comments demeaning and foolish. His refusal to acknowledge the role of climate change as the major factor in long-term drought smacks of the Republican Party's response to not mention the guns issue each time there is yet another massacre in the US.

This is unworthy of a senior politician. We must hold Michael McCormack and his like-minded colleagues to account.

Richard Caven, Melbourne

There are solutions

Many of the problems in relation to fires are solvable. We need to reduce carbon emissions to reverse climate change. In many regions there is insufficient water available to fight major fires. Yes, we are in a drought, but clearly in an already arid continent, too much of the available surface water has been diverted for inappropriate agriculture. Reassessing what is sustainable agriculture and what is not sustainable practice is urgently needed.

Deforestation of large areas for centuries is also to blame for inadequate water. Regionally, extensive inland forests generate their own water-recycling weather systems through transpiration. That no longer happens in many regions.

We don't have enough personnel to fight fires. Our armed services should be trained to respond to natural disasters like this. We lack adequate equipment, including aircraft. We spend tens of billions of dollars on fighter planes and submarines that will not be delivered for decades and will be obsolete when they are, but we have a more immediate enemy – fire and other natural disasters, for which we should be buying plentiful fire-fighting aircraft and other equipment.

Emeritus Professor Ray Cas, School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment, Monash University

Truth is baseline

It was heartening to read Peter Costello's take on the press freedom debate ("Costello weighs into press freedom fight", 13/11), but disappointing to learn that he didn't think Julian Assange should receive the same freedom to report as the "real journalists". I would have thought the criterion for such eligibility would be whether the report was truthful or not, even if you disagreed with it.

Rosemary Taylor, Castlemaine

Flawed argument

Tim Mahar (Letters, 14/11) seems to be conflating NAPLAN testing with "intensive systematic phonics instruction and grammar lessons". This is a flawed argument. With respect to phonics, all children must learn to decode if they are to become able readers. Overwhelming cognitive psychology research from the past 20 years (increasingly supported by neuroscience evidence) informs our understanding of best practice when supporting children to learn to master the biologically unnatural act of reading.

This evidence translates into practice by ensuring that children are intentionally taught to crack the alphabetic code as the starting point for reading competency, alongside promotion of the vocabulary, background knowledge, and comprehension skills. This cracking of the code is achieved most efficiently and effectively via explicit and systematic teaching of phonics. Done well, 95 per cent of children, regardless of social disadvantage, language background or family history, will learn to decode after two years of school. Sadly, we know that this is not the norm at present.

Dr Tanya Serry and Professor Pamela Snow, La Trobe University

Shuttered logic

So the state government has invested in 11,000 body-worn cameras for police. It means evidence can be accrued against criminals. But it should also mean that any wrongdoing by police can be properly investigated. It is unnerving that the legislation as it stands allows police to turn their cameras off, but more worrying that police officers are allowed to "edit or redact the footage" when preparing evidence. Also,complainants with regard to police action may be denied access to said footage. My question is simple: with these caveats, what's the point of having them in the first place?

Dave Quinn, Collingwood

Can't connect dots

In recent days the Prime Minister has said that outbursts on all sides regarding climate change and the fires engulfing NSW and Queensland are "unhelpful". He would much prefer silence on the issue so he doesn't have to deal with it. Peter Dutton says, "It's much more important that we focus on the here and now." Well hello. We cannot focus on the here and now without at least discussing the potential effects of climate change linking mega-fires, unprecedented drought, torrential floods, and the dying reef. Our leaders are unable and unwilling to connect the dots and they are ultimately the unhelpful ones.

Debb Schmetzer, W Tree

How to force change?

Peter Hartcher's analysis (16/11) is a good one from a political perspective but with the parties having no sensible holistic way forward for all Australians, where or how can the frustrated public force change in the political structure using the democratic process of elections? Australia is already 20 years behind where it should be and without change now the growth of stagnation, poverty and inequality will only accelerate.

Trevor Pratt, Eaglemont

Strong language

Greens senator Jordon Steele-John has been savaged by several commentators for his views on the major parties on climate change. While his comments were a bit "over the top", for me they represented the frustration and anger of an increasing number of Australians who are disgusted, frustrated and angry at the refusal of those parties to address this issue. Certainly the Greens made a tactical error in 2009, but they were aiming for a better bill than the compromise that was on offer.

However, they have been the most persistent strong voice for change before and since then. Sometimes, crude language is necessary to demonstrate the depth of feeling that exists.

Rodney Syme, Yandoit Hills

Levelling the field

Congratulations to Samantha Silon-Biet, a winner of L'Oreal-UNESCO Women in Science Australian and New Zealand Fellowships. However, as a researcher myself, I believe we need to lobby the National Health and Medical Research Council to take career disruption seriously so that women do not have to work every day of their maternity leave. Last year, only 29 per cent of female applicants for senior fellowships were successful compared to 49per cent of male applicants.

Dr Louise Crowe, Essendon

AND ANOTHER THING

Trump

If Donald Trump makes America any greater it will explode.

Henry Herzog, St Kilda East

Every time you think Donald Trump's behaviour can't get any worse, it gets worse.

Phil Lipshut, Elsternwick

Donald Trump says he is the most transparent US president in history. Absolutely correct – we can all see through him.

Brian Kidd, Mt Waverley

Asylum

New Zealand is one small step for Behrouz Boochani and a huge slap in the face to the "freedom loving" parliament of Australia.

Bruce Dudon, Woodend

NZ rejects Behrouz Boochani's plan to extend visa (16/11). Why?

Jenny Bone, Surrey Hills

Politics

Scott Morrison fiddles while Australia burns. It's a very sour note.

Perry Becker, Gowenbrae

More planning, less praying, please, Prime Minister.

Bernd Rieve, Brighton

The only people who've politicised climate change are Coalition MPs who want to take it off the agenda.

Nic Barnard, Fitzroy North

Several political leaders are saying now is not the time to talk about climate change and the link to the fires in NSW and Queensland. If not now, when?

Jack Morris, Kennington

Maybe we could remunerate all the lunatic climate change deniers in the Morrison government by paying them in thoughts and prayers. Think of the savings.

Denis Evans, Coburg

Furthermore

Prince Andrew says he stayed at Jeffrey Epstein's place as it was convenient. Convenient for what?

Susan Munday, Bentleigh East

Nice illustration of a furphy and a watercooler, Matt Golding, (16/11), but you left out the scuttlebutt.

Michael Spillane, Bendigo

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