Anthony Virgona was killed by the tram he was about to board when the waiting crowd surged forward and pushed him into the tram's path.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull proposes using bollards to separate motor vehicles from people, after a car killed six Melbourne pedestrians.

Bollards keep motor vehicles out of Canberra's Parliament House, and off our shared walking and cycling paths.

But we need more than bollards to protect the 150 Australians who are killed each year while walking across or along roads.

Many streets offer nowhere to walk but along the road.

Last year Mohgamat Hendricks got a $9 million compensation payout after his motorised bicycle collided with a car reversing out of a driveway. Such collisions are an inevitable result of allowing bicycles on footpaths that are designed only for walking speeds.

Leon Arundell, Downer

Kitty Flanagan's piece ("When I become a Trump-like 'dicktator"', Focus, Sunday Canberra Times, January 29, p19) begins by insulting Donald Trump and stating he became President by accident before lamenting that social media makes people rude and stupid.

Is that her excuse: social media made me do it?

Barry Hindess, ANU School of Politics and International Relations

Congratulations to Kitty Flanagan for her brilliant column on egomaniacal men with power and to Annabel Crabb for hers about men who think women are less intelligent or capable just because they are women ("Welcome to the public cervix", January 29, p21).

Scalpel-like satire from both writers (remembering that satire is truth highlighted through humour). They made me feel slightly uncomfortable even though I don't fit either subject category. Go ladies!

Eric Hunter, Cook

On January 24, 2013, four men (a people smuggler and three asylum seekers) attempted to paddle a raft from a disabled people-smuggling fishing boat to Christmas Island, during which the three asylum seekers died.

However, Jon Stanhope's claim (Comment, January 22, p20) the act is "indisputably deserving" of an Australian bravery award is false.

The men were not Australian, were not on an Australian vessel, and had no intention of helping any Australian.

Their act would have had no "effect of making a difference to Australian life" even if it had been successful.

Importantly, the event did not occur, as claimed by Stanhope, "in Australia".

Stanhope's language was passionate. He referred to a "mission of mercy", and claimed the men "were motivated by a determination to save the lives of others regardless of the risk to themselves". However, these men did not leave a place of safety: they were themselves in danger.

Perhaps they thought that the use of a raft gave them a better chance of survival than staying on the fishing boat.

This language reminds me of Stanhope's unwarranted support several years ago for a memorial to asylum seekers who perished in what was dishonestly described as Australia's greatest maritime disaster, even though it involved no Australians and happened just off the coast of Indonesia, nowhere near Christmas Island.

Both incidents were clearly tragic. However, they were not Australian incidents, so neither warrants an Australian memorial or an Australian bravery award.

Bob Salmond, Melba

Now the holiday period is over, can the ACT government please tell us what is happening with the shopping trolley fiasco.

Last September many of us were pleased to note posters at Woolworths and Dan Murphy's informing us that, in accordance with new ACT government requirements, from November shopping trolleys would have a deposit system to encourage their return.

Trolleys were modified with the required coin mechanism. Then came November and the system came into play.

But sadly it only lasted a day or two at Woolworths before their trolley coin mechanisms were strapped to the trolley handle so they could not be used.

Fortunately Dan Murphy's left the coin return system in place and joined Aldi in ensuring car parks and adjoining suburbs were not littered with trolleys.

If our "local council" cannot plan and fully implement an efficient system for the management of shopping trolleys, it is hard to have faith in them managing the bigger issues of the day.

R. Brinckley, Kambah

While it's admirable Chris Hansen presents the commonsense view on how climate change is exacerbated by human activity ("Tide of disbelief", Letters, February 1), to suggest that, if Australia ditches the renewable energy target, then sea levels will rise is counter-productive in terms of the argument, as it is demonstrably untrue.

The fact is, if we woke up tomorrow morning and Australia's emissions were zero, the difference it would make to global warming, rising sea levels and all the other associated horrors would be of roughly the same order of magnitude.

Harangue Tony Abbott and his fellow travellers, by all means, but keep the argument global, because, in the grand scheme, Australia doesn't matter.

We don't matter in terms of the quantity of carbon emissions we produce (less than 1.5 per cent of the world total) and in terms of persuading other countries to see the error of their ways.

By reacting to Abbot's pronouncements, you, and we, are giving his views oxygen, and that's one gas we don't want to waste.

Lee Welling, Nicholls

The headline on Sunday, January 28: "Mr Fluffy loose-fill asbestos has major impact on mental health, new report shows."

Wow, this complete and utter stuff-up by the ACT Green-Labor government just keeps on giving.

Michael Attwell, Dunlop