Zed Seselja should have conceded defeat weeks ago

Apparently all but Zed knew this on the post-election Monday. He was no chance, depending on progressive preferences. It was like watching a train wreck, with a true-to-form Zed conceding nothing.

This week, after the AEC announcement, he finally made the "congratulations" call to David Pocock; nearly a month too late.

Recently, former UK cabinet minister David Davis said this of Boris Johnson: "You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. In the name of God, go." He was paraphrasing Leo Amery in 1940, addressing Neville Chamberlain.

Zed has said his political career is over, but in true Zed fashion, he still held a caveat.

What Zed has to do now as he slams the door behind himself, is to leave a real legacy for the people of the ACT, and that is to disband the controlling "necklace of death" he and his acolytes have imposed on the ACT Liberals.

Despite leadership changes, the ACT Liberals in the Assembly still labour under the shadow of Zed. I am told he still controls the important branches. Will he relinquish that control and restore the ACT Liberals as an electable alternative?

ACT voters are not mugs, and given a genuine choice, the majority could vote for change, tired of an ageing and arrogant Greens-Labor government, which is more pro-development than any conservative offering.

For at least a decade, most could not bring themselves to vote for the ACT Liberals. That will not change until they receive absolute confirmation that the Zed-driven "Sword of Damocles" has truly ridden off into the sunset, and that the ratbags at Advance Australia are retired.

Logically there is a connection between inflation the minimum wage that employees must pay their staff. However, evidence suggests that other factors are more important.

The federal minimum wage in the United States is just $7.25 per hour and has remained unchanged since July 2009. The tipped minimum wage, for those in the service industries who may receive tips, is just $2.13 per hour. Yet inflation in America was running at 8.58 per cent in May 2022.

In Australia, where there have been annual wage increases, it was 5.09 per cent.

I have read online media reports about a team of mechanics in Ukraine converting twin cab utes purchased from the UK to mount anti-tank missile systems on the rear flat bed for use against Russian armoured formations invading their country today.

It is ironic that the Australian-developed Malkara anti-tank missile was fixed to the back of a Humber chassis in 1959 and adopted by the British Army as one of its weapons against the then Warsaw Pact army tanks some 70 years previously.

The letters editor has used the clever strategy of placing the letters (Letters, June 15) from Doug Hurst adjacent to that of Peter Campbell. Mr Hurst is clearly besotted with coal, and seems to regard renewables as evil. In contrast, Mr Campbell recognises that coal, which was largely responsible for initiating global warming, is history, and renewables are the future.

The science of global warming is now all but incontestable: the world must phase out the burning of fossil fuels, beginning with coal, as quickly as possible. We may already be too late, and could face a future of more extreme heat, droughts and flooding; and enormous wildfires that make the Black Summer bushfires look puny.

In reply to Peter Campbell (Letters, June 15), the reason why we must continue with coal for quite some time is simply that renewables don't provide continuous power (known as base load) for homes and buildings, and they cannot provide process heat (high temperature, around 1000 degrees) for industry.

The naivety of the climate warriors in thinking renewables are magic leaves us exposed to energy insecurity and high prices. Many local industries will close. Even Labor knows coal is necessary to keep things going.

Now that Zed Seselja has lost his Senatorial gig, he'll no doubt be looking for a new job. You better watch your back, Elizabeth Lee. Zed has a history of knifing more moderate ACT Liberal leaders. Of course, like Peter Dutton and Scott Morrison, he might have turned over a new and cuddlier leaf, but I haven't spotted any aerobatic porkers.

Although the Coalition, who I support, made the mistake of trying to politicise national security at the last election, it is pleasing to see Labor standing by the long-standing principle that national security is bipartisan.

Let's hope political parties learnt valuable lessons from the last election.

A market energy solution involving electricity generators and consumers surely completely misses the source of the problem; the gas suppliers.

How about we tax them and use the money to subsidise the generators? Imagine; this gas gang who are now profiting at the expense of the nation are the ones ScoMo and co wanted to lead the nation forward. Mind-boggling.

It has long been recognised that the first five years of a child's life are most important as the foundations laid in this period are essential for the child's success in later education.

The government is offering money for parents to help pay for early childhood services and also for the building of early childhood centres. But no mention is being made of additional resources to provide quality, university trained, early childhood teachers.

This is a serious concern as one of the main reasons for the additional support is to increase womens' participation in the workforce. Children are being minded for long periods but not getting the essential education that is required.

Although there is already a shortage of qualified teachers there is no mention of how this will be addressed.

The June 14 editorial "Communication with China welcome" was surely influenced by US propaganda.

It argued "China's slap down of Australia, for Australia's call for an independent investigation into the origins of COVID, led to America rallying to Australia's side to a degree not seen since World War II". Nonsense. Australia has been a puppet of the US for years, and Australia's call was directed by the US which was trying to take world attention away from the US's abysmal handling of the pandemic.

The recent RAAF P8 surveillance flight over the South China Sea, which I suspect was requested by the US, and used a US base, was another example of Australia's subservience to the US.

The "supercharging of the quad, and the negotiation of AUKUS, and the nuclear submarine program" all had nothing to do with China's reasonable reaction to Australia's provocative (and idiotic) call for the investigation into the origins of COVID.

The quad and AUKUS were just moves by the US to have some nations join its cold war against China, and to slow China's growth towards becoming the world's strongest economy. The US's determination to slow China's economic growth, and thus keep China's 1.4 million people in relative poverty, is unconscionable; it shows how immoral the US has become.

The submarine deal was probably intended to provide a submarine base for the US in the south west Pacific.

Australia should not support the US's cold war. Instead, it should become non-aligned and advise the US to end provocative actions against China.

I applaud Mark McGowan and the Western Australian government for taking the politically bold step of closing their remaining state-owned coal generators by 2030. Investing in renewable energy, storage and infrastructure is a sensible plan, given the growing cost of maintaining their ageing coal plants and the availability of cheap excess solar generated during the day.

More admirably is the WA government's plan to support workers and the wider community in Collie in the transition to other industries. This is what leadership looks like- foresight and future planning. One hopes that similar support will be provided for our remaining 10 coal mining communities when it is their turn for transition.