Coral Sea battle memorial damaged

The Japanese were deflected from landing at Port Moresby by the RAN cruisers Australia and Hobart and the USS Chicago. It was the first check to Japan in the Pacific.

The leader of the Australian squadron was Vice Admiral Sir John Gregory Crace, the son of local grazier, Edward Crace.

The suburb of Crace is named after Edward Crace and is located on land the family once owned.

Hilltop Reserve in Crace has a memorial to Vice Admiral Crace and the famous battle.

In recent weeks someone (possibly an ACT agency or contractor) has abraded back the surface of the maps and text; possibly using a sander or brusher.

Now the map of the battle is almost indecipherable. The ACT government should repair the damage.

Jorge Gapella finds the statement that if Australia unilaterally ends the use and export of coal then "emitters such as India and China will simply get their coal supplies elsewhere" to be disturbing (Letters, April 30) but I note that he doesn't refute it (because it is obviously correct) nor does he deny that any such action by Australia will be futile in terms of achieving real impact.

Rather he appears to argue that we should make a grand (if pointless) gesture for the sake of future history writers. I suggest to Mr Gapella that those writers would more likely say we sacrificed our economy, our workers and our future in a Canute-like attempt to stop something beyond our power.

While the world follows the path it is on, our only sensible option is to keep exporting and use the royalties to build up our economic fortunes and use them to develop climate mitigation strategies and infrastructure.

Finally, his concerns for the future of the Pacific Islands are somewhat negated by the fact the Solomons have sought funds from China, the biggest and fastest growing emitter in the world. Obviously they are not reluctant to put cash before any concerns over the environment.

It is almost voting day. One hopes that history will shortly hose Mr Morrison away and judge him as an aberration. He has failed the country on so many issues: bushfires, floods, vaccines, parliamentary integrity, and protecting fundamental democratic freedoms and common decency.

He has even sought to use national security as a plaything to wedge Labor. He has led an ugly and shameless government.

His greatest failure is climate inaction. He has been constrained by more powerful Coalition colleagues, his vacuity, and possibly his own religious beliefs. He and his government clearly have no ability to lead on climate and no interest in developing realistic and urgently needed climate policies.

His obduracy and determination to ignore climate science now put every citizen in this country and every citizen on the planet at greater risk. The science has been clear for decades and the numbers are now stark and dire. We are blindly galloping towards a climate catastrophe that has the potential to make much of the planet uninhabitable and to bring unutterable misery and death to countless millions.

This is not a time for "the usual vote". This is a time to vote for a habitable planet for our children and grandchildren and for all life on earth. This is a time to vent anger, to vent frustration, and to cast a vote to dismiss political leaders who on climate have made no attempt to honour their obligation to govern wisely. Let it rip!

With all the noise in the 2022-23 federal budget about assistance to meet increasing cost of living pressures, there has been a typical sleight of hand by the government.

At election time the government is banking on an extra $420 in the pocket this year to distract taxpayers from the fact that the Low and Middle Income Tax Offset will disappear altogether next year. About 10 million Australians are expected to be affected by this change.

There will be some in this cohort who will experience a consequential rise in tax of up to $1080 in the years ahead.

It is hard to see how this will help with cost of living pressures.

Many in this bracket will be wondering why they have been singled out compared to generous tax cuts for the wealthy of up to $9000 in 2024-25 (and not to mention large companies with millions of dollars of overpaid JobKeeper funds not required by the government to be paid back).

If the Labor Party just tags along with this tax policy it should remember that its disastrous franking credit policy was certainly a factor in its shock election loss in 2019 when then (as now) it thought it was going to win.

Why does ACT Greens MLA Jo Clay propose to increase greenhouse emissions by increasing bus services?

The ACT government subsidises Transport Canberra's operations by about $50 million per year.

The main beneficiaries of those subsidies are organisations that choose to locate in the CBD, rather than locating closer to their clients and their employees. The subsidies also benefit people who choose to live beyond cycling distance of where they work or study.

An average nine-kilometre local car trip emits less than two kilograms of carbon dioxide per person.

Local public transport journeys average ten kilometres. In 2020-21 Transport Canberra's buses and trams emitted more than three kilograms of carbon dioxide per passenger journey.

We can increase public transport patronage by reducing public transport fares, transfers or in-vehicle times, or by increasing car parking charges. Those changes would cause no or negligible increases in emissions.

Each 10 per cent increase in bus services will increase bus emissions by 10 per cent.

The ACT Transport Demand Elasticities Study estimated that a 10 per cent increase in bus services would increase patronage by less than two per cent.

Prepare for a real interest rate shock if a new ALP government is formed after the election on May 21. It could be just like Keating's standard variable home loan interest rates at an all-time Australian record high of 17 per cent in June 1989.

They stayed there until April 1990. By July, Australia was in recession and in November the Treasurer Paul Keating said: "This is a recession that Australia had to have".

Many people lost their homes and businesses.

He was smarter than this lot so expect higher interest rates with another recession we have to have, from a leader who cannot answer questions, refers to notes and just does not appear to understand economics and fiscal management.

The Hawke-Keating ALP Economic Forum eventually concluded what everyone else already knew. To stimulate the economy and get employment going we need to build more affordable housing.

This is not the time to waste money on impossible election promises that will never eventuate.

We observe from afar, thankfully, the deteriorating situation in Ukraine and hold our breath that Russia's ruler does not unleash a nuclear attack.

The ramifications of that would surely be felt worldwide. Whilst the current situation is the Ukraine is frightening, by any assessment, we should be equally concerned with the state of politics in that bastion of democracy, the United States of America; a country with arguably the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons in the world.

One would think that after the defeat of the Trump Administration the USA may have returned to some sense of moderate and representative government rather than the verge of anarchy. But let us not forget the storming of the Capitol Building by thugs posing as concerned libertarians.

Now we have the US Supreme Court on the verge of denying millions of US women the right to decide whether they will give birth.

Unfortunately for America, whilst the Trump Administration no longer exists its legacy remains with the appointment of carefully selected conservative justices.

If a country is unable to rely on the doctrine of the separation of powers to ensure stability in its government and legal system is the next step anarchy and then all-out civil war?

What is happening in the USA is not new. The fall of the Roman Empire occurred because of the loss of political control that occurred when the empire failed to enforce its own laws.

If the USA follows a similar path the situation in Ukraine will be simply a side show.

Why does anyone worry about interest rates? Palmer's party guarantees it will be below three per cent for five years. Do Aussies believe he is a big liar?

I didn't hear many letter writers complaining about Advance Australia whinging about Get Up at the last election.

Another Coalition candidate, Mr Gerry Nockles, has added his voice to the many people all over Australia and of all political persuasions who believe enough is enough for this little family. Let them come home.

Last time around ScoMo fooled many voters with his daggy dad routine. This time he's trying to pull the wool over people's eyes by claiming that he's not that political; that he sees things the way ordinary Australians see them. What a load of rubbish. Everything ScoMo does is weighed against the political barometer.

While other Senate candidates present policies in broad generalities Kim Rubenstein articulates policies in sophisticated detail reflecting her decades of experience in public policy reform. If elected she will be an outstanding senator for the ACT.

Headlines scream "Zed does not represent Canberra". Can someone tell me what the other Canberra Senator has done for Canberra ? Of course before she made the leap from local ACT Assembly to the Senate she saddled us with the light rail with her alliance with the Greens.

Why is there no powerful anti-corruption body at federal level? We're lucky Scott is religious and honest.

It seems from the daily national statistics that living with COVID now means dying with COVID. Is this "new normal" the best national cabinet can do?

Peter Toscan and Mario Stivala (Letters, May 3) identify complications arising from Labor's proposed shared equity housing scheme. Correct, but fear not gents. If the party proposing this is elected, the focus will shift away from political expediency. Remember recent experience with Julia Gillard? Government will plan, adapt, negotiate, and implement important policy, for the people, not just for the party and supporters.

At Zed Seselja's campaign launch on Saturday, April 30 Angus Taylor (Minister for Energy, Industry and Emissions Reduction) said: "We need to fight every day for the next three weeks". What a perfect example of the Morrison-Joyce government's lack of commitment to good governance for the long term. It's clearly all about nothing more than the few weeks of an election campaign.