ACT power price increases will wipe out cost of living assistance

I don't know whether others noted that within a week of the government extolling the virtues of the government's initiatives, the ACT Independent Competition and Regulatory Authority increased the prices consumers would be paying for energy consumption across the board.

Those who thought they would receive a $300 deduction from current energy accounts should think again.

"Unrepresentative swill", which was a descriptor famously applied to another body, could equally apply here.

I'm fairly confident that the federal government in planning its assistance to consumers did not envisage that some body unanswerable to the community and lacking transparency could, without consultation or explanation, seize the entire benefit leaving consumers as badly, if not worse, off than before.

The benefit was not provided to supplement the revenues of the energy providers.

In the last week or so I have received letters advising of ACT electricity price increases, and reduction in my solar feed-in tariff (an incentive to use electricity over gas? maybe).

There are also rates rises and gas price increases.

The Chief Minister urged us to spend our tax cuts on "treats". As I see it the only "treats" are going to the ACT Treasurer's coffers. And, surprise, surprise. That's the same person.

I understand we will have to vote again soon, even though a majority of us voted "no" to self-government decades ago.

I will vote for the party that seems most likely to improve our roads. That must include turning our roads back to what they were 50 or more years ago.

This will need far more than patches. It will mean removing judder bars (at my age they are torture and Canberra Hospital car park is the worst), remove all the tiny concrete walls we have on our roads (paint to replace them), re-paint the lines on the roads and the parking spaces, and do as the signs have said for three elections "Making your trip faster, duplicating the road".

And can someone install traffic lights which are coordinated to ensure I never again drive from Coolemon Court to Fyshwick with every single traffic light turning red as I approached.

Our multi-storey carparks are a nightmare. They are very poorly lit, riddled with hard to see mini concrete walls and the ticket machines are too far from the car.

I recently removed a boom gate as I departed the dark car park while squinting into a bright light ahead of me. I did not see the gate. I thought it had opened and it left an unnecessary dent on my car.

We simply cannot do the things we do with a car on a bus. My wife cannot manage the bus because of the horrendous mess of interchanges such as Woden.

Our roads will soon be as bad as those on Norfolk Island.

I notice Biden is now blaming "jet lag" from two overseas trips on his disastrous debate performance.

What would happen, I wonder, if he suffered jet lag after flying to meet Xi to mend US China relations, or Putin on bringing peace to Ukraine?

What a choice the US (and the world), is now facing: a decent man who is obviously at the end of his mental best or a lying megalomaniac who seeks to become America's first authoritarian president - and most likely will.

Kate Duggan's complaint (Letters, June 30) that the ACT government is killing kangaroos but leaving the rabbits alone is simply not true.

In the ACT and Australia-wide, government approved killing of our native, iconic, keystone kangaroos and their helpless joeys is grievously cruel and unsustainable.

But these same governments are also killing many more rabbits than kangaroos, and killing them much more cruelly. Rabbits are subjected to excruciating poisons, warren gassing, trapping, and deliberate infection by myxomatosis and rabbit haemorrhagic virus disease.

Unlike kangaroos who bear only one joey a year, rabbits bear litters of three to eight babies, three to four times a year.

This is counter productive. Because of this high breeding rate, the random killing to which they are subjected actually sustains much higher than natural numbers of rabbits because the resulting rabbit populations are perpetually comprised of younger and, therefore, more fertile individuals.

Please, people, governments are to blame for all this cruelty and carnage, not the innocent animals they persecute, not kangaroos, not rabbits, nor any other animal.

Foxes and dingoes, who provide natural population control for both kangaroos and rabbits, are also subjected to deliberate, agonising death by 1080 poison.

US President Joe Biden's disastrous performance in the first presidential debate (and possibly his last) has raised the question "is he fit enough to serve another term?"

His pitiful performance attests that he is certainly not.

During the debate he appeared to be confused and mumbling drivel at times.

Biden would be well advised to stand down for his own sake and for that of the country, giving his successor time to prepare for the election due in November.

There are several potential nominees including Vice-President Kamala Harris and three state governors - Gavin Newsom (California), Gretchen Whitner (Michigan) and JB Pritzker (Illinois) who is also a billionaire.

Unfortunately for Kamala, Biden's anointed successor if he steps down early, she is not very popular and apparently lacks political nous.

As all of the potential nominees have staunchly supported Biden's campaign the $64,000 question is should Biden decide to stand down as the presumptive candidate who would he back as his preferred successor?

Your guess is as good as mine.

Biden's refusal to stand aside is giving Trump, a convicted felon, proven compulsive liar and narcissist a free kick.

It would be a disaster for the US and the rest of the world if he was to return to the White House.

Solidarity is a key principle of the labour movement and the Australian Labor Party. If you don't believe in solidarity you shouldn't be in the ALP or a Labor caucus.

Any ALP member of parliament is free to express an opinion within the caucus to try to convince a majority of their colleagues to take a particular course of action.

If they fail, they must abide by the will of the majority, even if it is something they feel strongly about.

Fatima Payman knew of the rules when she stood as an ALP candidate in the 2022 election. In that poll, although she only received 1681 for herself as an individual, she was elected thanks to the 511,226 above the line votes for the ALP.

If Ms Payman knew that she was unable to abide by party rules she should have stood as an independent.

Annabel Dulhunty ("Can Australia do more for victims in Gaza", Letters, June 29) makes numerous incorrect claims.

Israel's actions aren't "revenge". Hamas vows to repeatedly attack Israel like October 7, so Israel must prevent that.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) didn't order Israel to stop attacking Rafah. As the four judges who explained the order clarified, it ordered Israel stop to the extent it may cause conditions which could lead to the Palestinians' physical destruction. By providing aid access through other crossings and evacuating the population (which Dulhunty pejoratively refers to as displacing them) Israel complied.

Israel's government condemned soldiers strapping a wounded Palestinian to a jeep in the West Bank, and disciplinary action has commenced.

The ICJ didn't say it's plausible Israel is committing genocide. As Court President Joan Donoghue subsequently clarified, it said the Palestinians had "plausible rights to protection from genocide".

The attacks she claims were on civilians were actually on Hamas bases. Her "solution" - recognising a non-existent Palestinian state - would reward Hamas terrorism and Palestinian Authority intransigence.

Peace can only come after Hamas is defeated enabling negotiation and compromise with a reformed Palestinian Authority that genuinely accepts Israel's right to exist in peace alongside a possible future Palestinian state.

I'm surprised that the academics at the CIT didn't grasp the opportunity to harness a breeding pair of "spatial and temporal scales" when they were within reach, although I have heard of lesser specimens being caught in a trap, banded, and released back into the wild!

The posturing by Dutton and company is all about power. Sadly it's all about political power for Dutton and company, not affordable electrical power for Australia and Australians.

"Kindness, care, respect". Well said by the 28th Governor-General at her swearing in ceremony. May we embrace these as pillars of our society.

I have some sympathy for Chris Steel being deceived by the former CEO of CIT. But his statement to public servants that "corrupt behaviour would attract severe consequences" is risible. Two years doing nothing on full pay totalling $740,000. Can I have some of those severe consequences?

Joe Hockey famously suggested life expectancy could be 150 years. We now know life expectancy has taken a downturn not only overseas but also in Australia. I always said you cannot trust what politicians tell you.

To be fair, a two-state solution means recognising both, not just the one.

Seeing what's going on in America, France, Italy and other countries leaning towards the far right I fear we may be saying goodbye to a free Ukraine very soon.

Memo to M. Flint. Calling people who don't agree with you "idiots" won't persuade them to vote your way (Letters, July 1).

I seem to remember quite a few members of the federal Labor party applauding Tasmanian Liberal MP Bridget Archer when she crossed the floor in Parliament. It seems the shoe is now on the other foot.

Dutton you naughty boy. You have been diverting us onto nuclear power while working on new tactical objectives.

It is good to see Assange back in Australia after being deprived of his freedom for 15 years because of crimes committed by the US military.

Police arrested a man falsely believed to be trespassing on his own property because they "met some resistance". Try and arrest me for trespassing on my own property and I'd bloody resist too. Lift your game AFP.