I further agree with Mr Birchmore that if the state government can rectify the situation within five years, in lieu of 10 years, by taking over TasWater, as Treasurer Peter Gutwein indicates, it is pretty obvious this should occur at the earliest opportunity.

The state government should also be seeking urgent financial assistance from the federal government to help fund an immediate upgrade of sewage infrastructure to tertiary treatment level and capable of servicing Launceston, and the entire Tamar Valley, for the next 100 years.

Those that previously, and currently, had responsibility for the infrastructure have had plenty of time and notice have failed miserably by allowing it to deteriorate to the pathetic and totally inadequate condition that it is now in.

In addition the state government should be pressuring Hydro Tasmania in the strongest possible terms to significantly and permanently increase Cataract Gorge flows to flush out all the toxic contamination currently polluting the Tamar River’s upper reaches.

LARGE parts of Africa are being impacted by a major humanitarian crisis with 20 million people across the region on the brink of famine. This crisis could potentially be the worst since the Ethiopian famine in 1984. Large-scale droughts compounded by climate change have left millions of Africans without water and sustainable livelihoods, says Caritas Australia. The major crisis has been driven by ongoing conflict in some countries particularly South Sudan and Yemen.

I ask those who maintain “charity begins at home” to please consider this. A young woman with a newborn in the pusher and another two young children in tow approached the promoted booth, in an obvious distressed state has this to say to me.

Thrusting a cloth money bag into my hands she said, this was to before my kids Christmas box. Asked if she may have been over generous with her giving to the appeal, she replied saying “they don’t need what this money would buy, at least they are not starving”. One billion dollars was given to Indonesia by the Howard government. Prime Minister Turnbull, is it the case with Africa (not trading in our region)? Out of sight, out of mind, sorry. 

AS POLITICS sinks ever deeper into the slough of despond may I quote In his 1946 essay "In Front of Your Nose", George Orwell wrote: "We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield."

LAST WEEK during the Forestry Bill debate in parliament, Greens leader Cassy O'Connor labeled log truck drivers as murderers when she singled out log trucks as killers on our roads.

In a media release from Markets for Change, CEO and former Greens leader Peg Putt labeled forestry workers as rapists of the forest. These comments are deliberate acts of inciting hatred, and are discriminating against people who work within the timber industry. When will the vitriol and vilification of our hard working timber people stop?