Melbourne is no longer a haven for Jews
I have worked in the early years' sector for almost 40 years as an educator, coordinator, lecturer and consultant.
I take comfort knowing that most educators around the country are committed and dedicated early childhood teachers and educators who provide extraordinary education and care for children every day.
Department spot checks have always been the norm and a 'no phone policy' is usual best practice. No amount of CCTV cameras will stop paedophiles and no educator wants to work under surveillance.
Having at least two educators supervising children at all times is unrealistic. Family day care and some remote services would not be able to operate. Other professions such as aged care, disability and nursing do not require supervision.
The issue is the multi-national corporations who own up to 400 centres. Their main goal is profit for owners or shareholders.
This results in minimum staffing and poor working conditions for educators, high staff turnover and more relievers are required just to operate.
When breaches occur, the fine is paid and they are allowed to open more centres. This has been the problem since the Howard government de-regulated the market in the '90s. Remember the ABC centres?
We can only hope that these terrible recent events that have shocked our sector result in immediate action from all levels of government to stop this private sector growth, pay educators more so they stay in the profession and increase funding for services to improve 'educator to child' ratios. Profits should never be put before children's safety.
Louise Dorrat, Carlton
Unease lingers
As a parent of now teenage children who spent their early years in private childcare centres, I've been reflecting on that time with a new sense of unease. I find myself revisiting old memories – wondering if certain incidents were more than just harmless moments, questioning whether some educators were trustworthy. I can only imagine how today's parents must feel.
Justine Loe, Elsternwick
Bans solve nothing
Re banning males from childcare work. After watching ABC TV's Four Corners where two women laugh as one filmed the other smacking a crying baby, why not ban all females? Come to think of it, if we ban all babies in the first place – no childcare needed, no more aged care and perhaps no more wars! Brilliant solutions to so many problems.
Joan Lynn, Williamstown
Kneejerk logic
If we follow the logic proposed by those advocating for a ban on male childcare workers, then surely we must ban male priests given the history of child sexual abuse within the church. Male coaches and teachers could be next.
The sad fact is even fathers abuse their children, so why are we so quick to call for a ban on men in the caring professions but silent when the professions involved are ones of power and authority?
Lisa McArley, Witta, Qld
Play it with ambiguity
Jennifer Parker's analysis of a potential war over Taiwan is a sensible contribution to this complex topic (' As China prepares to invade Taiwan, a reality check: sitting on the sidelines won't help us ', 6/7).
But the issue is more complex than a simple military equation. For a start, almost no countries of any consequence recognise Taiwan – that was traded away decades ago when we recognised the People's Republic, and opened embassies in Beijing. While the US provides some military equipment and support to Taiwan, it has no formal military agreement. Its last formal military agreement with Taiwan was cancelled in 1980 by President Carter.
There are alternatives for China to direct military action – like a blockade. Taiwan's economy probably wouldn't last more than a couple of months under a sustained blockade. And the West's response – while not ruling out a military one, the normal response is trade sanctions, followed by a counter-blockade if the sanctions don't work.
Australia would be at the forefront of trade sanctions given that 35 per cent of our exports go directly to China. For the US and EU, that number is around 10 per cent – economically easier for them to do sanctions, harder for Australia.
Finally, in recent times, both Biden and Trump administrations have warned China that the US will get involved in any conflict over Taiwan.
One wonders how strong that US resolve will be once the sophisticated chip factories have been rebuilt in the US or other friendly country.
Once again, Australia needs to be careful making absolute commitments. Perhaps we need to maintain some sort of strategic ambiguity.
One would hope that our government is testing all of these scenarios, to make sure we don't just respond with the simplistic binary approach of we are in, or we are out of the conflict.
Ian McKenzie, Canterbury
Disappointment mounts
Surveys show that the vast majority of Victorians value national parks. The Allan Government does not. (″ Hopes dashed for new national park ″, 4/7). It has made the political calculation with the support of red-necked unions that a Great Forest National Park, as well as the creation of parks across Victoria, are not to be countenanced.
Simultaneously, Parks Victoria is being run down.
It is so disappointing that science, multiple environmental assessments, and the most recognised way to manage precious ecological assets are ignored on multiple fronts.
Russell Carrington, Williamstown
Ugly has no borders
On the same day that Trump's ″Big Beautiful Bill″ was passed, dozens of people have drowned in Texas. This so called ″Beautiful Bill″ cuts funding for climate change initiatives. If there was ever a glimpse into our future, this is it. Our planet doesn't have borders.
All people, all countries and all governments need to act. This bill may appear shiny on the outside but in many ways is very ugly.
Mick Hussey, Beaconsfield
Beyond Portland
Most South Australian readers of The Age are resigned to the eastern states view that Australia ends at Portland, but it's hard to accept the lack of coverage of the environmental catastrophe occurring here on our coastline.
From dolphins, penguins and sharks to leafy sea dragons and shellfish, our beaches are carpeted in dead and dying marine life as a result of the devastating algal bloom spreading along the coasts.
Apart from species loss, livelihoods are endangered, and health threats increase. Barely a peep from the media or government. Perhaps, when Coffin Bay oysters are no longer available in Melbourne restaurants or Bell's Beach is unsafe for surfers, will the big states take notice.
Kathy Keech, Beaumont, SA
Bot gets person al
Malcolm Knox's ' Customer Service A Conflict Zone ' (5/7) refers to the current way complaints are handled, by a bot issuing warnings about civility before you settle in for a long and frustrating wait listening to promotions for possibly the very thing you are complaining about.
If a human response eventually comes, you have had to jump through so many hoops by then that you are pre-disposed not to be exactly happy with non-answers that sound just like a shopping list being read out to you. There are two issues here: If the provider had a range that was less faulty, there would be less complaints; and secondly, if the supplier's contact-me service was more efficient, it would not attract such hostility.
How perfectly ironic that the very thing that is (supposedly) put in place to handle dissatisfaction, is, in fact, the cause of it. As if that wasn't enough, one recent request from a well-known insurer for my review of their inability to provide the necessary information for me to renew my policy, was withdrawn from my screen, together with its parent email as soon as I gave them a low score.
I was not even able to fill in the section that asked why I had given that score. I took that personally.
Pete Dunne, Highett
Bring call centres home
Qantas says to me and to millions of other Qantas frequent flyers, that its ″focus is on doing all we can to support you″ in relation to the hacking of six million customers' personal information. The best and most secure thing Qantas could do for its customers is to end its outsourcing of all its ″Qantas airline contact centres″, and return all Qantas call centres to in-house, and based in Australia, along with all Qantas data centres.
Merv Keehn, Melbourne
Carlton's coaching
Football reporter Jake Niall blames Carlton's lack of depth matching up against Collingwood's AFL team. Yet, the VFL Carlton team was competitive, beating the Magpies on Saturday night in an entertaining contest. Maybe the pundits' view of the Blues' lack of success should focus on coaching and physical preparation.
Andrew Smith, Leongatha
AND ANOTHER THING
Melbourne attacks
How do aggressive acts of antisemitism in Melbourne help the cause of peace in the Middle East, or anywhere for that matter?
Jane Sullivan, Kew East
Oh, the irony. Netanyahu decries recent attacks on Jewish establishments in Melbourne, while he goes about destroying an entire region and its people, with impunity.
Maureen Goldie, Blackwood, SA
Donald Trump
Your correspondent (Letters, 6/4) says that Donald Trump is a racist. Trump's claim that he didn't know the implications of the term Shylock, however, is entirely credible. The man is not only racist, he's illiterate.
Juliet Flesch, Kew
Recent Churchillian successes, culminating in his 'big, beautiful bill', decisively entrench President Trump as undisputed king of the global castle. Maybe it's time he read the Book of Proverbs (16/18): 'Pride comes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.'
Kevin Burke, Sandringham
Trump's new bill is big and beautiful if you happen to be a billionaire.
Doug Springall, Yarragon
Furthermore
″Mars colonisation is a necessary step for the survival of humanity,″ says Elon. What self-interested nonsense! Surely, it's time to stop the fighting (globally), stop destroying the environment, and learn to live together.
Ian Cooper, Bendigo
I thought we were meant to be headed towards a cashless society, so why are most businesses now charging fees for using a debit card?
Neale Woods, Wattle Glen
Re: the John Silvester article headline (5/6). The proof isn't in the pudding; the proof of the pudding is in the eating!
Norma Togneri, Ivanhoe
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Sydney Morning Herald
a day ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
This old bloke's guide to happiness has one golden rule
Geoff Hutchison has officially entered the harrumph zone. Change is everywhere. His waning status. His ageing body. This whole shot-to-hell world. Whether on ubiquitous screens or the drive to the supermarket, stupidity and inconvenience conspire to exasperate him. His mission now: How Not to Become a Grumpy Old Bugger. 'I genuinely think I'm a better person for having written it,' the former ABC radio presenter says of his first book, subtitled A bLoke's Guide To Living a Better Life. 'I've had cause at times to remind myself, if I'm going to tell other people how they should live their lives, I've got to respond to that. I've got to take this stuff seriously.' After 40 years as a journalist, not least with Foreign Correspondent and 7.30, he knows serious. But it was his last 16 in talkback on ABC Perth that gave him the necessary tone for a book addressing the minefield of male discontent: rigorous inquiry, sure, but with a lightness of touch that invites leaning in. 'I wanted to hit blokes between the eyes on a couple of things, but I also know they will put the book down and never read another paragraph if I can't win them over to the conversation,' he says. 'Although I still think their partners might read bits of it out loud to them in bed. That would make me happy too.' In terms of inspiration, he recalls one beacon of grump from early in his talkback career: February 13, 2008, the day new PM Kevin Rudd apologised to the Stolen Generations. 'I reckon the first six callers were blokes, and they were all saying, 'I don't see that I should have to apologise for anything'. I didn't say it on air but I thought, 'Oh my god, how can these blokes be such bastards?' 'Back then I took it personally. I don't now. I would now want to say to those blokes: 'This isn't about you. Not everything that happens in the world is about you.' That whole 'Harrumph, well I don't like it' – I want to convince them to just let some things go.' Hutchison's book is not interested in culture wars. He isn't out to debate pronouns or cancel culture. What he's describing is something quieter and more insidious: a kind of emotional shrinkage, a stubborn stand-off with acceptance. 'You raise the kids, the job ends, and you become a little less interesting to everyone. That's the bit no one tells you,' he says, with the fresh insight of the recent retiree. 'And if you were defined by that role' – the job, the dad, the problem-solver – 'I think you're very vulnerable to sadness. And loneliness.' The grim end of male sadness is devastating. In Australia, Hutchison discovered, 86 men call an ambulance every day with thoughts of suicide. In 2023 alone, 64 women were killed in acts of male violence. But he doesn't have to consult experts and statistics to see the darkness festering in blokes' heads. He recalls stumbling on a social media chat sharing the praises of Italian restaurants. 'Every positive comment came from a woman. Every negative and unnecessary one came from a bloke. And I'm just thinking, who are you? What are you doing, sitting at a keyboard, hating everything? Is there any pleasure in that?' Then there was a bloke named Ian, compelled to comment under an exultant photo of three young footy players with hands casually resting on each other's knees. 'Back when I played footy,' Ian said, 'we would get the shit kicked out of us for posing like that.' TAKE 7: THE ANSWERS ACCORDING TO GEOFF HUTCHISON Worst habit? It used to be celebrating cynicism. But after hearing Billy Bragg declare that 'cynicism is the enemy of hope', I am now determinedly of the same opinion. Greatest fear? I don't like them Fascists very much. Indeed, anyone who seeks political advantage by using fear to target and blame 'others'. And I'm wary of anyone who thinks the concept of Prosperity Theology is endorsed by a greater power. The line that stayed with you? ' Love this life, don't wait 'til the next one comes' – Neil Finn. Biggest regret? A kitchen accident that left my young son only partially sighted. I had my back turned as he tried to open a bag of apples with scissors. And yes, it was as awful as it sounds. I've written about it for the first time in my book in the chapter titled Regret. Favourite book? Richard Ford's The Sportswriter (1986). I was a young version of one at the time. The artwork/song you wish was your s? The Portrait of the Journalist Sylvia von Harden by the German painter Otto Dix. If you could time travel, where would you choose to go? London in the mid '60s please, with plenty of money in my pocket. And if you could get me into the Marquee Club to see … oh I dunno, David Bowie, The Rolling Stones or Jimi Hendrix that would be splendid. 'That bloke is just curating a museum of dickheadedness,' Hutchison says. 'It's awful, and I bet it's making him sick. I bet his wife doesn't like him much. And I bet his son doesn't come home to watch footy on Friday nights because he can't bear to hear Dad talk about their haircuts.' That author doesn't exempt himself. He recounts one episode of fuming at an umpire's call that his daughter, gently, had to tell him was pathetic. He talks about making his mates laugh by impersonating 'some dickhead' at the pub. 'I find that kind of cynicism less funny now. When blokes shrink into that tight, narrow worldview, they must be awful to live with.' He owns that too. Post-ABC, he assumed more time with his wife, Philippa. But her career as a documentary maker is firing. 'She's about to fly to the UK for three weeks of interviews. So I had to remind myself: you don't need to be at the centre of everything. You can swan around on the edges. Pick and choose how you want to engage. Just make sure you do.' The active pursuit of engagement is a theme of Hutchison's book. 'If you've got male friends, place some value on that friendship. Whatever the next five, 10, 20 years look like – and they might be terrific, or they might be absolutely shithouse – you want to have people to talk to about it.' That refusal to disappear, to keep showing up, runs through the people he interviews. There's social researcher and psychologist Hugh Mackay, still sharp and empathetic at 86. Alex Pearce, the Fremantle Dockers' captain is emotionally open in a way Hutchison finds quietly radical. Through his son he meets a trans woman named Gemma, whose calm presence contrasts powerfully with the rage of anonymous detractors. Two GPs talk bluntly about ageing bodies behind pseudonyms designed to tickle sci-fi-nerds: Peter Venkman and Leonard McCoy. At both ends, it's Hutchison's late father who anchors the book. The man who blithely proclaimed his unhappiness as a fact of life when Geoff was a boy 'used to come home from the Italian Club in Pickering Brook and say, 'God, people are stupid'. I used to think, 'Is it just the gang you're hangin' out with Dad?' I've got to believe not everyone is quite so venal or miserable. 'Dad came back from the precipice a bit,' he adds. 'In his last few years he'd listen to me on the wireless, and he liked it well enough. And two of his grandkids were here. So that made him quite a lot chirpier than he'd been.' Loading The common root of men's discontent? From this survey, it's nothing more radical or newfangled than change itself: the slow, inevitable erosion of lifelong comforts we've been privileged to take for granted. Asked to boil the grumpiness solution down to a golden rule, Hutchison answers without hesitation. 'Curiosity. Try and prise your world open. Curiosity provides beautiful opportunity to be appreciative of things and not so judgmental. 'Even if the world is going to hell, I want blokes to realise that there is really good opportunity to provide hope and comfort to those you love. And when that's reciprocated, when your granddaughter says you're terrific, you can just think, actually it is worth being around. And participating.'
Sydney Morning Herald
a day ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
The elephants with room to move and trumpeting their happy habitat
'You can't put visitors over the top of elephants because there's an implied superiority there, so what we did was we put the elephants over the humans,' Howard said. Fencing in the habitat was designed using recycled rail track and elevator cables and subjected to very specific stress testing, specifically being able to withstand a five-tonne male bull elephant running at the fence. Werribee Open Range Zoo director Mark Pilgrim said creating a habitat that enables elephants to live as naturally as possible – even if behind a fence – was the key principle guiding the design. 'We wanted the elephants to make decisions, particularly the matriarch, she can now make choices as to where she's going each day with the herd, where she's going to take them,' Pilgrim said. 'That's exactly what a matriarch in a wild herd would be doing, taking the herd to a different area to find food. And that's pretty groundbreaking.' Asian elephants in the wild roam across great distances. Research varies, but suggests the herd can travel about 10 kilometres on an average day. At Werribee, food is placed in different areas of the habitat each day so the elephants have to search as they would in the wild. Pilgrim moved from the UK to lead the zoo after working in elephant welfare and said there was 'huge global interest' in what the zoo had done. Loading 'It's really raised the bar for elephant welfare across the world,' he said. 'It's not just the open space, it's what that allows you to do in terms of having different habitats, giving them different activities at different times. So these are hugely intelligent animals and just being able to challenge them on a day-to-day basis is hugely important.' The habitat was created using an $88 million state government grant and is the same size as the entire Melbourne Zoo site. Previously the elephants were contained on two hectares of land, space which became even more constrained with the birth of the zoo's calves. Howard said she cried when the elephants entered the habitat for the first time and the calves ran to explore their new surroundings.
ABC News
2 days ago
- ABC News
7.30: Thursday 24/7/2025
ABC iview Home Watch all your favourite ABC programs on ABC iview. More from ABC We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live, learn and work.
