Harsher penalties for drug-drivers needed after lives ruined

These people always walk away from jail.

Good behaviour, big deal.

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Drugs ruin innocent families.

These people should néver have a licence, made to sign in at the police station every day for life. Jail for life would be good, but as usual, the law stinks and lets them walk.

BARRY Prismall's claim (The Examiner, September 19) that free bus rides will "ease congestion" is not supported by any research.

All the research into public transport shows that it is the quality of the service (frequency and geographic coverage) that is the major factor in how many people use it.

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Reducing or eliminating fares will not encourage people to use buses if there is no service that will take them where they want when they want.

On the other hand, eliminating fares would eliminate the need for all the infrastructure needed to handle green cards and the collection of fares, saving the government some money. No public transport system covers all their costs with fares. They always require a government subsidy.

The quality of the Metro services depends entirely on how much money the government is willing to spend on the subsidy.

The government sees Metro Tasmania as (a) a service to commuters going to and from work, (b) a service to students going to and from school/uni, and (c) a social service for the poor and desperate. And they will spend as little as they can politically get away with on that social service.

WELL said Scott Bell (The Examiner, September 20) regarding Burnie mayor Steve Kons and his comments about members of The Bob Brown Foundation, over the recent protest at the Burnie wharf.

I wonder how serious Mr Kons is, when he said "If any of them need a job, I've got plenty of work available".

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I would think by the tone of his voice, and his attitude towards these people, that none of them could be assured of a place on his payroll. Come on Mr Kons, you do not like, nor have any time for them. I believe they are only trying to protect what we have today, as we may not have it tomorrow.

This lovely state, in my opinion, is the best place in the world. Let's keep it this way.

MAYORS, TasCOSS and the Salvation Army are putting their points forward on the harm caused by electronic gambling such as poker machines in casinos and pubs.

No mention is made about the sudden influx of ads on most TV channels by gambling companies urging more electronic online gambling. They are now using the term "gaming instead of gambling".

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These ads are being saturated to us at least every 10 to 15 minutes and are just a damn nuisance. Perhaps Launceston mayor Albert Van Zetten, TasCOSS and Salvation Army could put their weight behind the government to ban these ads promoting online electronic gambling which is what they are trying to limit anyway. It's just not casino based but is just as harmful.