Letters to the editor | March 1, 2021

In 2020 there were 202 track deaths, 9861 injuries and so far in 2021 there have been 27 deaths and 1483 injuries across Australia.

This is appalling. I volunteer with the Coalition for the protection of greyhounds so I know how these poor dogs suffer, and the woefully inadequate legislation applied to racing greyhounds.

I also foster with Gumtree Greys Rescue.

Many of these dogs are in a shocking state when they come from the trainers.

Again, I and many thousands of Australians abhor this "sport" and agree that the only way to end greyhound suffering is to ban the racing industry.

AT $2.5 billion per year, the proposed increase in Jobseeker will cost taxpayers (not the government) $9 billion over four years.

Add extra funding for the employer dob- in line, which will no doubt be outsourced.

At $6 billion minimum per year, franking credit dividends for those already comfortably off will cost taxpayers (not the government) at least $ 24 billion over the next four years. Are Australians happy with this government's nasty inequity? If so, it says far too much about us.

IT WOULD seem from the story in (The Examiner, February 26) that neither the Department for State Growth nor Gary Swain, the State Transport Commissioner, have any understanding of Commonwealth Legal Tender or it's application in Tasmania.

Cash is legal tender, whilst I understand that credit and debit card payments may be convenient but are not legal tender.

Discrimination against legal tender (cash) usage through increased taxi fares appears unsupported by the Commonwealth Government and Commonwealth Treasury.

Discrimination against state voters not holding the necessary cards to make such payments appears unsupported and but State Public Servants seeking to enforce their views on our population.

Our present state government members should be most concerned, but do they really care for anything other than your vote at election time?

TASMANIA cannot afford it's own AFL team and it's obvious the AFL will never pay for it, like it has the Gold Coast and GWS teams. If Premier Gutwein does carry out his threat about Hawthorn and North Melbourne, the only thing it will achieve is hurting Hawthorn and North Melbourne fans, and fans of other visiting teams, and Tasmania's economy. Stop being pig-headed Premier and stop trying to stuff up something that has worked for years, it has worked better at York Park than at Bellerive, but it has worked, so leave it alone.

SIR Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in December 1990. Among his considered comments is a pertinent reminder. "I think the main thing to remember is that any powerful thing can be used for good or evil". And so it has proven.

THE views of Launceston's mayor and aldermen to Tamar mud in (The Examiner, February 20) were useful. The councillors are the vital link of local government to the wider community and have significant responsibility for what is implemented.

The majority were not inclined to accept the advice to "love the mud", but accepted the view that raking does not work.

However, the council's bathymetric records [on raking] suggest otherwise.

They show that when Trevallyn Dam spills occurred, raking was able to flush substantially more sediment than would have been flushed by the spills alone and at 5 per cent the cost of dredging. At the conclusion of the Launceston Flood Authority's (LFA) five-year raking permit, sediment levels were 146,000m3 less in the Yacht Basin than when raking commenced in 2013.

Raking has been challenged as not fit for purpose. But the purpose was to reduce sediment, which it did, so how is it not fit?

The only way to fully understand is not from reports, but listening to the people with direct experience of the Yacht Basin, Seaport and Home Reach, the Tamar Rowing Club, the Tamar Yacht Club, Tamar Cruises, the Marina and the Seaport restaurants, now displaying "fix the mud stickers".

Also the 500 or so at the recent Henley on Tamar Regatta who saw a young female rower deep in river mud, rescued after grounding and falling from her single scull.

The program was then halted although still only mid tide.

But perhaps the most important reason for consistent sediment reduction is the simple message from the state government Tamar River siltation study (Foster): that flood levels will be higher if sediment is allowed to build.

It is easy to be laid back about that now, but when the South Esk next bowling rocks the size of footballs across the Yacht Basin, the difference between safety and disaster for Invermay becomes shockingly small.

Raking is reliant on South Esk spills and so is not 100 per cent effective all the time, but as a low cost solution, averaging productive and less productive years, it does a solid job and should remain.

It did the job from 2013 to 2018 and in experienced hands can do so again.