Three years ago, before the state election, before a gathering of 250-plus hospice supporters, Mr Ferguson declared his support for a dedicated facility within close proximity to the Launceston General Hospital, as proposed by the Friends of Northern Hospice.

Also on that occasion, he left the notes he was referring to behind, I still have them.

On radio, the minister stated there are 15 palliative beds on the Melwood Unit at Calvary’s St Luke’s campus. Only four of those beds are for public patients.

Of course if you have private insurance you will always have the option of being admitted to a private hospital.

The Whittle Ward in Hobart, a dedicated ground-floor hospice, has 10 fully funded public beds for end-of-life care. Imagine the outcry if the minister decided to relocate those beds to the third floor of a private hospital?

The minister also stated that the feasibility study report found Northern Tasmania had sufficient beds and services for the next two decades.

Shortly after this report was released, Palliative Care Tasmania claimed that there were 10 public patients on the Melwood Unit. Who funded those extra beds?

Who funds the locum physicians employed to care for the public patients at Calvary?

The minister is basing his decision not to support a dedicated hospice on a flawed report and advice from senior advisors and health bureaucrats.

Care for the dying is about choice. Some people do not want to die at home, others are not able to.

The very least we should expect is to have the same option as the south.

I COME from a long line of Protestants and I have little sympathy for the Catholic Church. But Don Davey’s suggestion that Catholicism should be banned in response to their child abuse crisis (Letters, February 15) would cause more problems and suffering than it would solve.

So much of the suffering in history has been caused when one group did not like what another group believed (often with good reason) and tried to forcibly change their minds.

There are over one billion Catholics in the world. How exactly are we supposed to ban their religion and force them to stop believing what they think is true?

I HAVE news for those unreliable wind and solar energy deniers.

The science is settled.

Their unreliability can only be mitigated by expensive adjustments to not only networks but also by maintaining fossil fuel systems on standby ready to make up energy shortfalls.

Perhaps I should just forget that synchronous requirements are also important.

Oh sorry, I did forget this is just infrastructure that governments can pay for out of their bottomless banks.

I also forgot that if we have a lazy $100 billion for battery backups the  problem is sold, (I'm becoming a little tired of cries that batteries are rapidly coming down in price, just tell me when the ordinary person is able to afford them).

As for, in using wind energy, comparing Australia with its large area and small population to countries like Denmark with its proximity to France and Germany demonstrates the extreme ignorance of these deniers.