Letters To The Editor

Red Cross thanks

On behalf of the Australian Red Cross voluntary aid detachment, Lismore branch, we would like to sincerely thank all who contributed to the Tsunami Appeal at the Lismore car boot market on Sunday, January 2. The response was overwhelming and your donations were part of a grand total of $5100 collected on the day.

Thanks to Steve for allowing us to have 'charity of the day' at the market.

Helen Wynd & Clare Dwyer
Lismore Voluntary Aid Detachment

A Mungo of a year

What a treat to get a Christmas edition of The Northern Rivers Echo - full of exciting things to see and do over the holidays, and with encouraging news of the achievements of our young people in the recent HSC examinations. And then I came to your federal political columnist Mungo McCallum whose vitriolic headline read "Enjoy the peace and goodwill, or else!"

Do we really have to put up with this sort of diatribe for the next four years? Does McCallum only approve of democracy when his side wins? More Australians voted for the Coalition than voted for Labor, and he should get used to it.

If, as your footnote states, he was carried off sobbing and placed in a darkened room, then please do your readers a favour and leave him there. Not only is his writing negative, it insults the intelligence, and more than that, it is boring.

Mike Rushby
Wardell

Special lunch

On Saturday, December 18, Lismore Uniting Church put on a Christmas lunch for the street people of Lismore and volunteers who prepare the meals for Lismore Soup Kitchen.

The lunch was preceded by a Christmas service in the church and then over 60 people enjoyed a 3-course meal prepared by volunteers from Lismore Uniting Church.

They were entertained by Marge Graham who sang many Christmas carols for the appreciative audience.

Lismore Uniting Church would like to thank Coles, Hunter Wholesale and Marge Graham for their contributions to this very special Christmas lunch.

Rod Campbell,
Media Officer, Lismore Uniting Church

Flogging a dead horse

The Department of Infrastructure, Planning & Natural Resources (DIPNR) has advised the Lennox Head residents that the December 17 deadline for submissions regarding the Draft Master Plan for Survey St has been extended until February 7, 2005.

Members of the Survey St Action Group requested this extension due to the inconvenient timing of the Draft Master Plan being submitted, with most people involved with Christmas and New Year preparations, visitors and holidays.

We urge all concerned residents and visitors to keep submitting their objections to the proposed Draft Master Plan. We would like to stress that NOW is the time to make any objections to this draft master plan to achieve the best possible outcome for this sensitive site and our community.

We are also concerned that some members of the public have been given the wrong documentation from Ballina Council when they have requested a copy of the Draft Master Plan. They were given the previous DA application, which was rejected by Ballina Council in 2000 and rejected again in the Land and Environment Court in 2001. This has led to confusion among those wishing to make an informed opinion.

The Draft Master Plan does state that it relies heavily on the information in this previously rejected DA application. We find the reliance on this out of date DA shows a lack of forethought and planning with again all detailed designs for the critical issues left to a later stage, showing a blatant disregard to Judge Sheahan's final decisions in the Land and Environment Court. Judge Sheahan made it absolutely clear that "too much of the proposed development of the subject land has been left for definition at the design stage."

Ballina Council spent over $200,000 of ratepayer's money in the Land and Environment Court when challenged by the developer.

Why do the applicants keep flogging the proverbial 'dead horse'? Are they bereft of new ideas or just downright arrogant?

Mandy Andrews
Lennox Head

Driven mad

I am writing to inform your many readers of The Echo, that yes - I do in fact sit in my lounge room and watch the idiot drivers go by at break neck speeds in a 50km/h zone, including P plates. Of course it never ceases to amaze me just how stupid they are, not only placing their own lives at risk but also other residents as well.

And further, when they are stopped by police and booked for speeding, the police and residents are the worst in the world for reporting them. I have no problem with putting my hand up and lodging a complaint with police, and for the readers whom feel I have nothing better to do, I say one thing - "tough".

I don't see many residents doing the same thing, probably because they don't want to become involved. Maybe they are happy to put up with it, but not me.

I recently had to write to the new commander of police in Lismore to get action moving. Hopefully action was taken by police and as a result, we'll see drivers receive hefty fines.

Allan O'Neill
Ballina

The war continues

I am in the unique position of owning the North Coast's only crap detector - it lights up like a Christmas tree every time I read one of Mizzi's letters. Mizzi has shown a remarkable degree of consistency on Iraq - he has been wrong on almost everything he has written, though he is hardly Robinson Crusoe there.

If America is an imperialist state, as suggested by Mizzi, Tom Koo and others then it is far and away the most benign. Think of Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia or Mao's China to give you some perspective.

Last week's Echo also featured poor Tommy Koo with a banal US animus that would disgrace a 16 year old Trotskyite. Tommy Koo has obviously been listening to the voices in his head again as he spends 13 paragraphs talking about the American empire defeating the human spirit. Was this the human spirit that was nurtured by the Taliban, Mr Koo, or perhaps the one that flourished under Saddam's rule?

Unfortunately Mizzi, Koo, BP Carr or any of the other no-nothings ever seem to mention the record of Saddam in any of their tirades. Judging by the ferocity of their attacks on the coalition of the willing, Saddam must have been a great humanitarian. You lot also seem uncharacteristically silent on the issue of Afghanistan - it must be embarrassing to observe how quickly they have embraced democracy.

Finally, if Mizzi is so proud of his Maltese origins and so ashamed of all things Australian, then perhaps he should go back there, and if he believes his letters are representative of the wider Australian population, perhaps he should revisit the last election result.

Tom Murdoch
Lismore

Meanwhile...

Over 100,000 dead in Iraq, and billions spent to kill them. Nearly that number wiped out in monstrous tsunamis and America gives spare change. An Administration that would spend billions to kill yet gives almost nothing to help. What message does that send to the world about the self-proclaimed World Police?

Does the American Administration even grasp the concept that the "terrorists" of the world are the most rash of the majority of us who are sick of the world police agenda? Most people would rather America back off and mind their own business, but do nothing about it. Killing is definitely not on most individual's minds. So we sit feeling powerless while the frustrated and the rash plant bombs and think it will change things, only to a futile end. It seems the American Administration does not listen to any advice but its own and, by its actions, appears as a ruthless conqueror with ideology that screams "I am the world police. We are Christian and we are right".

I hope that I exaggerate but sometimes, if you close your ears and just look at the pictures, read the numbers, and miss the rhetoric and verbosity that comes from a White House press release or conference, you can almost believe Orwell only got it wrong by 20 years.

Derek Langley
Lismore

Medals found

My hobby is returning lost war medals to veterans or their families. I do this free of any charge and to date I've returned 119 medals.

I have recently been asked to locate the family of a WWI soldier who's last know address was in Byron Bay in 1923. The soldier in question was 5078 Private Wilfred Arthur Montgomery, 26th Battalion, AIF. He was born in Lismore and enlisted in Brisbane. His Father was Mr G M Montgomery and his Mother was Mrs Harriet Montgomery. There last know address was Box 3 Saw Mill, Byron Bay.

I believe that Mr and Mrs Montgomery had eight children so it is possible that descendents of this family still live in the Lismore area. If any reader has any information on this family I would appreciate them contacting me via email llanwarne80@hotmail.com or on 0414 649 079.

Lieutenant Colonel Glyn Llanwarne

Road woes

The upgrading of roads and construction of new roads typically encourages additional use of those roads. Where the road project is aimed at alleviating traffic congestion, the consequence is often that the accompanying increase in traffic largely cancels out any improvements made and/or just shifts the problem elsewhere. Many people argue that the upgrading of road infrastructure will always be outpaced by the increased road use that accompanies it.

Anyone looking for a practical example of this phenomenon is encouraged to visit Brunswick Heads this holiday season. I understand that last summer it was taking motorists around 45 minutes to traverse the section of highway between Brunswick Heads and the start of the Chinderah-Yelgun motorway. This year the delays have reportedly exceeded two hours. I understand that this traffic congestion was not of this magnitude before the opening of the Chinderah-Yelgun motorway.

What we need is more investment in our rail system to take some of the long term pressure off our roads. The starting point should be the re-opening of the Casino-Murwillumbah line, before it is left to fall into further disrepair. This year marks the 150th anniversary of the opening of the first rail line in NSW, which was also the first publicly-owned railway in the British Empire. In this anniversary year it is a great shame that whilst other governments around Australia and the world recognise rail as an integral part of the solution to future transport challenges, our rail infrastructure is being left to decay.

Railways won't instantly relieve the pressure on our roads, but they should be at the heart of long-term transport planning strategies. We need to stop looking for short-sighted quick-fixes, and start planning for genuine long-term solutions.

Nick Casmirri
Lismore

Thanks Lismore

Every year in December there is an appeal for the under privileged in the Lismore area undertaken by UnitingCare and Target stores.

UnitingCare, one of Australia's largest providers of community services, cares for the homeless, families in crisis, the frail aged, the sick and abused and neglected children. Services are provided regardless of race, culture, religion, gender or age.

This year the appeal was very successful and nearly double the number of gifts were donated than last year, with many families receiving gifts that are delivered by volunteers from Lismore Uniting Church.

Also some of the gifts are delivered to the Family Support Network in Lismore and distributed by their staff because some families want to remain anonymous and some are delivered to the Lismore Soup Kitchen Christmas luncheon held at Lismore City Hall for distribution among the homeless and street people.

Thank you to all the wonderful people who donated gifts and a special thank you to Target Lismore management and staff who were very helpful during the appeal and I can assure everyone that the people who received the gifts were very appreciative.

Also thank you to The Echo for a photo and story advertising this very important event.

Rod Campbell
Local Co-ordinator
UnitingCare Share Christmas Gift Appeal

Sydney-centric

There is no NSW wide decentralisation objective in the Greater Sydney Discussion Paper.

The paper deals with managing population growth in the Greater Sydney Metropolitan Region. What this means is that the less populous regions at the periphery of Sydney, that is the adjacent regions, would be developed to provide, hopefully, "sustainable living conditions", draped around "Centres".

This is a Sydney-centric approach which has serious shortcomings in that it doesn't look much beyond Newcastle, Sydney and Wollongong, if at all. Yet the issue really is that the growth of the metropolitan area spilling over into the outer urban regions should be stopped altogether and decentralised to country NSW and other coastal regions.

Instead, the Sydney sprawl is accepted as a given, something that is happening and cannot be avoided.

As one who lives on the central coast I would say there is no need to accommodate another 100,000 here. Few people would favour it. With the huge amount of space Australia has at its disposal, even accepting that only 10% is arable land, a completely new direction is called for.

The decentralisation of Sydney citizens should be stimulated so that more people move to country and regional towns further away and to other coastal areas by providing massive incentives to settle there.

Simply enlarging Sydney further by adding adjacent regions to the existing metropolis is/was the solution of yesteryear to population growth which we should actively discourage. Decentralisation in NSW has largely failed since the 1940s because it has been left far too much to the market place, which tends to seek short term solutions.

Effective decentralisation requires a strategy of extensive and sustained government intervention over a long period of time and an appropriate strategic plan to implement it. Excellent transport and communication means now exist to spread the population. An appropriate dispersal of the population has taken on a new urgency for security reasons. Further concentration of population in metropolitican areas would be irresponsible from a defence point of view alone. As to the NSW ALP Government, for the past decade at least it has actively removed several important Government regional branch offices from country towns applying "economic rationalist" principles to public policy, reduced rail services to country areas and given up completely on an effective decentralisation strategy.

Klaas Woldring
Pearl Beach

Don't blame cows

Removing dairy products from your diet, in the hope it will reduce mucus production, sinusitis or hay fever is a common misconception; highlighted in your article When allergy season strikes (Echo, Dec 23).

Many people wrongly believe that consuming dairy foods increases mucus. This is generally based on anecdotal evidence and is not substantiated by peer-reviewed science. The sensation in the mouth after drinking milk has nothing to do with mucus. It is simply related to milk's physical properties and can be experienced with non-dairy drinks of a similar thickness .

Food allergies are relatively rare, occurring in about 1 in 100 adults and around one in 20 children. Moreover, most children out-grow cows' milk allergy by the age of four years. Those suspecting they have a food allergy should always consult a medical practitioner and have it properly diagnosed. Dairy foods are the richest source of calcium in the Australian diet and the exclusion of a core food group such as dairy foods without the supervision of a medical professional may place a person at risk of nutrient deficiencies.

Katrina Strazdins
Nutritionist
Dairy Australia