The commonality of all patient is that they are all in need of hospital care. That care was fantastic during my stay.

Sometimes prioritisation means that finding a lost television guide is well down the list of their priorities, as it should be.

The disgusting, and on some occasions, racist and sexist abuse I witnessed is intolerable. I asked one nurse was she okay and she replied, "yes, we are used to it".

Used to it, no way.

None of us would tolerate the abuse they suffer as something they need to just suck up and get used to.

To hear nurses and other allied staff deliberately lied about by patients unwilling to take responsibility is disturbing, but then hugely humorous to one and all when these people are shown clearly to be lying.

The nursing staff in our hospitals are dedicated, professionally trained practitioners paid peanuts to provide what is care of the highest standard only ever affected by the circumstances they are given to work with.

Being courteous and polite costs you absolutely nothing and creates a better environment for nursing staff and other patients. Pull your heads in and give all the staff a fair go. If you have a complaint take it to the grand planner of the current fiasco and let him know but please stop abusing our nursing staff. They do a great job.

DON Davey once again brings up the subject of the Tamar crisis and brings back to life the original Lake Batman proposal of almost a decade ago.

Yes, since that time The Examiner readers have been taken around the mulberry bush with grandiose ideas that don’t take in the real issues that are now building to crisis point with flood issues in the North Esk, and the massive silt issues caused by this massive drain of pollutants constantly seeping into the Tamar Basin.

The traffic problem has not been looked at with any seriousness for decades and that too is now long overdue and that crisis is already upon us with nothing in the wind except perhaps the mayor’s idea of placing a bridge from the West Tamar to Forster Street, and even the layman could see the folly in that.

Don Davey is able to look at the big picture for our struggling city while realising that far more effort is needed than simply decoration and huff, but decoration alone doesn’t provide Launceston with a very healthy image and of course the dramas today are multiplying quite profusely.

MERRY Christmas to you - to the “L” plater driving the light-coloured Mitsubishi Lancer towards Launceston, past the Agfest turn-off, on the Bass Highway about 10.15am on December 19.

Whatever it was that occupied your mind for those four to five seconds when you crossed the dotted lines and kept coming towards me in my lane (I’m sure you would remember me as I had to run off the side of the road to avoid you at 110 km/h and I know I will never forget it), surely it wasn’t important enough to stop you from concentrating on driving in your lane, and surely it was not worth the near miss that we had.

Maybe one foot closer and it would have been a completely different ending, with your car and mine scattered across the highway. Another three casualties to add to the 2017 road toll, a week after my son’s 13th birthday, one day before my daughter’s grade 10 graduation and just six days before Christmas. And what to say to the supervising driver… my Christmas present to you is that you do get to spend the holidays with your loved ones, as do I.

THE recent decision by the European Court of Justice regarding Uber ride-hailing services may set a precedent for many countries, apart from the 28 countries of the European Union.

Quintessentially, the ruling states that Uber should be regulated as a  transport company, instead of a technology service.

Uber, the San Francisco-based company, has used the descriptor of “disruptor”, which has been duly echoed by many political parties.

But it is really a means of skirting around regulation, and to drive down labour costs – sound familiar?

WITH a recent reduction of $2 billion in tertiary education expenditure by a Mid Year Budget Review, and a past NBN change of policy to fibre-to-the-node by the current Liberal federal government, it seems “Advance Australia Fair” is an anachronism.

I HAVE my well-travelled nephew from France visiting us for Christmas. He is enchanted by the setting, and the beauty of the architecture of Launceston. When he saw the picture in the paper (The Examiner, December 30) of the  proposed hotel ‘Fragrance’,  “Quelle horreur”, he exclaimed.

He could not believe that we would be so short-sighted. “Don’t they know what a rarity this city is in the world?”

It seems ‘they don’t’ – but it is not too late to do something about it. Surely development should not only be about money. Why not have all these new hotels, with access made easier, near the silo development, but no higher than it?

ASK ANYONE who knows me, I’m not a prude. However, I find the BCF ad to be bordering on obscene. I realise it’s a play on words, but to have children sprouting it’s “BCFing fun” is really pushing the envelope.

EFFORTS by the Liberals and Federal Hotels to paint Labor's policy to remove pokies from pubs and clubs as impacting employment are not supported by independent studies.

James Boyce's excellent book "Losing Streak" quotes from the South Australian Centre for Economic Studies report "Social and Economic Impact Study into Gambling in Tasmania". It concluded that gambling reduced rather than increased business investment, and sucked money from the Tasmanian economy that would otherwise be spent locally on hospitality and entertainment.

The scare campaign during the recent Pembroke by-election, about hotels closing if denied income from pokies, was at the time rubbished by several of the very hotels claimed to be affected, and studies quoted by Boyce suggest that money retained in Tasmania may well lead to increased rather than reduced employment opportunities, in sectors related to so-called recreational gambling.

So far no argument against the removal of pokies has addressed the social ills and their cost to the community and to government, but well done to the CWA for stressing just such costs.

BASS Liberal MHA Sarah Courtney’s recent comments regarding “highly unregulated” gambling in Tasmania, as a scare tactic regarding the removal of poker machines, are deeply alarming. One could be excused for thinking that this phrase might suggest illegality.

The fact is that the Liberal Party has been caught on the back foot by a visionary poker machines policy released by both the Greens and the ALP. There is incontrovertible proof that these machines have profoundly negative social and health impacts on many of Tasmania’s smaller communities, and their eradication from our pubs and clubs cannot happen quickly enough.

AS AN employee of the Federal Group and a hard-working Tasmanian, I would like to take this opportunity to voice my concerns around Labor’s proposed gaming policy changes.

It would be naive to think that the effect of Labor’s gaming policy will be limited to pubs, clubs and Tasmanian casinos. I work at The Henry Jones Art Hotel and I have grave concerns that my role will be in severe jeopardy if this policy goes ahead.

Labor’s gaming policy dictates how hard-working Tasmanian, consenting adults should spend their money. This policy is a political stunt to win the state election in March and does not do anything to address problem gaming but instead takes away our choice. Labor has gone too far.

DR MICHAEL Powell (The Examiner, December 26) complains about the poker machines. Federal Group’s Greg Farrell is concerned about jobs, not for the profits.

Dr Powell says about the poor and addicted, well he should stop and think, the poor and addicted are self-inflicting themselves, no one tells them to gamble, drink or smoke, and also nobody should be dictated what they can do with their money. Labor is supposed to be for the working people, obviously they are not.