Pardon who? America is a global laughing stock

THE FORUM

At the margins
There are good reasons to limit urban sprawl. Protecting peri-urban farmland probably isn’t one of them (“‘An existential issue’: Property speculation threatening Victoria’s food bowl”, 30/11). Land on the fringes of our cities has always been used for agriculture and likely always will, but where our cities end and where agriculture occurs has changed over time. In general, these changes have been consistent with our lives getting better.
Peri-urban land doesn’t have some intrinsic value that makes it better for farming (like more fertile soil). It is used for this purpose as at any given time it is a comparatively more valuable use of the land than what we do with land further out and a less value use than land closer in. That is, farming has a comparative advantage over some other uses.
The first home I bought was a citrus orchard until the 1950s. Where I live now in Melbourne’s middle suburbs was once a dairy. Similarly, when my grandfather lived in Willoughby in Sydney he was surrounded by dairies. (He lived in Canberra when it was a sheep farm too.) Improvements in transport and refrigeration over time meant citrus and dairy farms could move further from the city. Dairy farms became larger and more capital intensive as part of this shift. Milk today is much cheaper in real terms than when the cows were milked in what are today’s suburbs and transported by horse and cart.
The land dairies once occupied is now put to higher-value uses, housing our cities’ growing populations and providing them with recreational and employment opportunities. Using our land for its highest-value use (if we properly account for all economic, social and environmental value) makes us all better off.
Sam Gow, Hughesdale

Growth mindset
Protecting Victorians from the urban sprawl should have been an issue with the Liberal governments of Bolte and Hamer and attempts to curtail urban development were developed by Mary Delahunty and the Bracks government in 2002 with a policy – Melbourne 2030. Since then developers have lobbied governments and we now live with the consequences.
Margaret Raffle, Keilor East

Lands divided
The Age reports “Brighton still baying over development plans” and “Hatching plan to keep land for farming as sprawl bites” (2/12) should have appeared on the same page. Both quote people who do not want more housing in areas they care about. Both groups don’t address where the housing shortfall should be rectified, for the tens of thousands of new dwellings required right now and the hundreds of thousands needed in the next few decades. Perhaps the respective parties should be locked in a room and not released until they have agreed on the location where these houses should be built. And no, they can’t say “Sydney”.
David Francis, Ivanhoe East

Living in a bubble
I suggest that the “Brighton residents baying over development plans” face the reality of our city today – rising homelessness, difficulty faced by new home buyers, rising cost of living, and population growth just to name a few. Their complaint that they have been silenced just shows how isolating it is to live in a bubble.
Julie Ottobre, Brunswick East

Taking patients seriously
I was distressed to read about the late diagnosis of Nikki Purtill’s brain cyst (“The medical bias that affects half of Australia,” 2/12). We would like to think that in this day and age, with the availability of advanced medical research and technology, this could never happen. Unfortunately, this is an old problem. In the 1980s, our young son displayed worrying symptoms for four years before he was found to have a brain tumour. Over that period, I met with several GPs and some specialists, and was told that he had other conditions, such as Meniere’s disease, which is rare in children. As the symptoms worsened, the message circulated between doctors that our over-anxiety was causing his headaches. When our son was finally diagnosed with a large, slow-growing tumour, the first thing the GP who relayed the scan results said to me was that I should have stopped procrastinating.
If our son had been diagnosed earlier, he would not have suffered major brain damage during surgery. Looking back, I think a different aspect of gender bias may have been involved in our situation. In those days, it was usually mothers who took their children to medical appointments. I suspect that fathers would have been taken more seriously. I also think that some doctors may respect fathers more than mothers when they offer their opinion about a child’s condition. In any case, doctors can be reluctant to admit that they don’t always have an answer for every situation they face.
I hope that the Victorian government’s inquiry is broad enough to review overall gender bias in doctor-patient communication, and that medical schools teach doctors to listen very carefully to parents’ experiences.
Margot Rosenbloom, Princes Hill

Ready for an emergency
How good to read articles and letters about the use of cardiac defibrillators to save lives (Letters, 2/12) and to learn about their successful use. As a club with retired members, Probus Bayside recently invited members of Victoria Ambulance to give a demonstration to the members and a monthly newsletter describes the exact position of the two defibrillators at our meeting place.
Of course, we hope we never have to use them, but we are equipped in case of need.
Judith Hudson, Elwood

Business cases
Re “I’m a planning expert and have reviewed the SRL business case. It’s no wonder the feds won’t fund it” (Comment, 2/12), business cases are not the way to judge projects designed for the social good. No large-scale public transport system makes any money – anywhere. The last time full cost recovery for the Victorian rail network happened was during World War II. There was never a business case for Melbourne’s rail system or for its electrification. There were no business cases for rail lines to Bendigo, Ballarat, Geelong or Warragul. There was no “business case” for the $368 billion AUKUS nuclear submarines.
Mass transit in a mega city relies on connectivity. It depends on the number of nodes in the system. It’s Mathematics 101. Nodes are created when rail lines intersect. Circular linking lines for legacy radial lines have proved crucial in every large world city. They change living and working patterns. They spread social good within established areas, not to an endless suburban sprawl, for which there has certainly never been a business case.
Paul Kennelly, Caulfield North

Be prepared
Reporting on cost overruns in state government infrastructure works regularly fails to explain why major infrastructure projects are rarely completed on time or cost. Part of the reason rests with the fact those who bid for the works often appear to underestimate the costs to get the contract, knowing that once work commences governments have little bargaining power. Perhaps we need an ombudsman to review contracts submitted for work to ensure the costing is adequate and to protect taxpayers.
Ray Cleary, Camberwell

Limits to plans
Business cases are important for business decisions, but I spent many years researching public sector programs and for them, business cases are not the only factors in decision making (Comment, 2/12). There are benefits that cannot be quantified, because they are social, not financial. Community service obligations play a big part in government decision making, but monetising them is problematic. There are future environmental benefits that may accrue, and replacing fossil fuel use by cars with electric trains is one for the SRL. Reducing road congestion by replacing cars with trains can be monetised in part, but not fully. With population growth, congestion can only worsen. Buses are important in public transport (I frequently use one) but one bus can carry 100 people, one train can carry up to 1000.
As for buses along dedicated corridors, the orbital bus service 903, which goes from Mordialloc to Altona can take four to five hours to complete its run, hardly an excellent outcome. Further, cost estimates now for the second stage of the SRL project cannot be accurate so far in the future. Once completed, future generations will wonder how we ever managed without the SRL.
Louise Kloot, Doncaster

Further omissions
Eric Keys describes the planning failures, or at least omissions, with the SRL. He should have gone further. The poor design of its stations means that interchanging with existing trains or buses will be torturous and time consuming, thus discouraging SRL’s largest patronage cohort. And then there’s things like building a railway under Monash Uni and not having a station there.
Russell Crawford, Mitcham

Quota chaos
Have we learnt nothing about quality and productivity? Woolworths management and the unions (“Woolworths’ strike-busting bid to end $50m warehouse stand-off that’s cleared shelves”, 3/12) should have a close look at Dr W. Edwards Deming’s Out of the Crisis. In particular: point 11: “Eliminate numerical quotas for the work force and numerical goals for management.” Consider a quota that is set to the average output of a group of workers. Half will be above it and half below. The result is loss, chaos, dissatisfaction, and turnover. Sometimes, Deming notes, management will set a work standard on the high side to weed out people who can’t meet it.
Kaj Nieukerke, Esperance, WA

AND ANOTHER THING

US politics
By pardoning Hunter Biden, his father simply emphasises that the rule of law excludes a president.
Gary Bryfman, Brighton

Over the next four years can The Age please introduce Trump-free Tuesdays – no reporting of his latest thought bubble, no photos of his hair, no mention of his name. We need 24-hour breaks to enjoy our newspaper again.
Ralph Frank, Malvern East

Woolworths
Apparently a supermarket giant’s “optimisation” workplace strategy is achieving “maximisation” of employee resistance. They are indeed not robots.
Glenda Johnston, Queenscliff

Woolworths: Profit gouging, obscene executive remuneration, stiffing suppliers and too lousy to look after workers.
James Young, Mt Eliza

Federal politics
Liberal MP Paul Fletcher says voters were conned by teals at the last election. Nothing at all to do with sports rorts, robo-debt, climate change inaction, treatment of women, embarrassing mismanagement of international relations and a massive debt.
Tim Douglas, Blairgowrie

The apparent backflip by Albanese on protective measures for the environment is very much misguided. If he thinks that he will secure more seats in WA he is wrong. If he ever had a sincere concern for the environment he should have supported the vote against the miners, even if it meant losing the election.
Rob Park, Surrey Hills

The RBA has been given the stick for “getting it wrong on jobs”. I believe the person who never made a mistake never made anything.
Jim Lamborn, Doncaster

Furthermore
Swallowing flies? Your correspondent needs to breathe through their nose.
George Stockman, Berwick

Your correspondent just needs to swallow a spider and his fly problem is solved.
Angus McLeod, Cremorne

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