Views on the news from Canberra’s top columnists
"If encouraged, the golf course roos will move off on to the reserve, but I have no doubt they will be unnecessarily and brutally slaughtered." Letter writer GWENDA GRIFFITHS despairs for the Red Hill kangaroos.
Cartoonist PAUL DORIN takes a look at the impending federal budget.
Legal columnist HUGH SELBY offers a spirited response to an opinion column by Kelly Saunders in which she posed the question over a defendant's right to silence in a sexual assault prosecution. Selby argues she's wrong...
Chinese swimming scandal: a strong defence by world anti-doping body, but narrative of ‘cover-up’ remains, write TRACEY HOLMES and CATHERINE ORDWAY.
Sexual assault victims give evidence in court, but alleged perpetrators don’t have to. Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation case shows why that needs to change, says KELLY SAUNDERS.
"Japan’s membership of AUKUS could hardly be more provocative to a country that suffered the indignity of Japanese control of its Taiwan province and its invasion of the mainland in World War II," writes columnist ROBERT MACKLIN.
"I saw old men die at 90 without telling their brother they loved them because of some forgotten insult from 40 years before. Talk. Listen. Listen more than you talk." ANTONIO DI DIO continues his Brief History of Kindness series.
Cartoonist PAUL DORIN salutes Anzac Day.
Many Australians face losing their homes right now. CHRIS WALLACE says here’s how the government should help...
KEEPING UP THE ACT channels Taylor Swift as our Dear Leader endlessly chases the Commonwealth for cash.
"We are more informed and better educated today about... the harmful health impacts of smoke from wood heaters, despite what the wood-heating industry claims," says letter writer DARRYL JOHNSTON, of Tuggeranong.
Long term underperformance in education outcomes in the ACT must be addressed. Submissions to the current Inquiry into Literacy and Numeracy suggest that vested interests may be acting as a roadblock to change, says KAREN MACPHERSON.
The judicial task of judgment writing is solitary work so that what remains is scrupulously fair. Let us be grateful for the work of Justice Lee, his staff, and the decision to show it all on YouTube, says legal columnist HUGH SELBY.
Cartoonist PAUL DORIN sees some budget-cutting ideas through young eyes.
Working from home is producing economic benefits that return-to-office rules would quash, writes LEONORA RISSE.
"The considerably lower per km cost of the Brisbane Metro compared to the Canberra Metro results from using existing infrastructure, including busways, and not investing in rails," writes BEATRICE BODART-BAILEY.
"The vice-regal operations would greatly benefit from the 'sunshine of public exposure'... we have every right to know the attitudes and actions made on our behalf by the governor-general herself," writes columnist ROBERT MACKLIN.
"I’m still trying so hard to impress mum and dad, and just because they’ve been gone 15 years now, I cannot be sure they’re not watching me from the sky somewhere". ANTONIO DI DIO continues his Short History of Kindness series.
"Prostitutes Appeal to Pope"... Whimsy columnist CLIVE WILLIAMS has been looking for examples of amusing headlines from international newspapers. He found quite a few.
![Teacher Vanessa Jones has been living in Higgins since 2001, and while she loves the area, she says she is “fed up” with the neglectful ACT government.
The Higgins shops have been completely abandoned, says Vanessa, preventing the opportunity for residents to have a community-centred space to socialise.
They only received bins nine months ago, she says, and requests for a water station and repairs to the bus station have gone unanswered.
“It’s very, very slow,” says Vanessa.
“I asked for the zebra crossing on Fullagar [Crescent] to be repainted, and we had to wait about six or nine months.
“That’s just such a long time… we pay a lot of rates.”
Vanessa says assistance from the government only seems to go to communities with time-rich and assertive communities, leaving places such as Higgins, where the majority of households have both adults working full-time and English may not be the first language of the family, at an automatic disadvantage.
“If you’ve got two people working, paying a mortgage, raising two or three kids, they don’t have the time,” says Vanessa.
Vanessa says the lack of attention quieter places such as Higgins is receiving is starting to look a lot like favouritism.
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