The alternative to the north east rail (cycle) trail is tourist and heritage rail, organisations which, with a few notable exceptions, are not for profit commercial operations funded by user pays.

Rail (cycle) trails, on the contrary, are fully funded by tax and ratepayers and offer no return, other than the experience for those fit enough to ride bicycles.

THE POOR old Launceston General Hospital is in the wars again and getting bashed around by the pollies in a war of words between new Labor leader Rebecca White the and Health Minister Michael Ferguson. Bed numbers change from day to day and even hour by hour and Ms White’s claims cannot be taken as a true picture of the hospital’s performance. Hospitals all over Australia are battling to perform on the money given to health across the country.

SUSAN Goebel (The Examiner, April 30) describes the destruction of posters for Greens candidates as "The most deplorable act I have ever heard of." Perhaps she is unfamiliar with war, terrorism, exploitation of children and other sexual assault crimes, animal abuse, in fact there are so many more heinous acts. Or is Ms. Goebel familiar with all these atrocities and deems what is relatively something minor as more heinous than anything else? If so then such a claim is an insult to the victims of war, the victims of terrorism, the children victimized by their abusers, even an insult to workers who thanks to the Greens are out of a job.

I SHARE The Examiner reporter Zona Black's lament over the number of impending church closures in Tasmania, such as those in the Uniting Church of Evandale, White Hills and South Launceston  and what it means for Tasmania's future.

For as Ms. Black states, church doors are not just open for Sunday service, but during the week as well, with such activities as  fundraising for charity, craft classes, youth groups and community connect events. Yet it's the last sentence of Ms. Blacks' ponderings that intrigues me the most.  

"I won’t be the one to join the ranks, but I still lament the closure of churches".

She suggests this may sound hypocritical, yet may I say as a Christian, God's church is not a building made by man, but a repentant heart by those who seek him. So meeting together as one (even under a gum tree) is still his church.  

WITH all that is currently going on with Aboriginal recognition and the relics act changes, I do hope that people acknowledge that the same people putting these changes through are the same ones that have dragged the Tasmanian Aboriginal community through the courts.

These are the same people who, along with the Labor government on the West Coast, have opted to deem destructive driving more worthy of protection than Aboriginal heritage sites in this state.  The West Coast tracks saga is still ongoing and so are the issues with takayna/The Tarkine.

Anytime you interact with any of the major political parties or politicians in general for that matter, remember this. We have very few allies in politics in this country; you could count them on one hand.