Letters to
the editor

Richo’s own goal

It is revealing that all the effusive praise for the late Graham Richardson (Jason Koutsoukis, “The Richo pact: How Graham put Albanese in charge”, November 29–December 5) came from Labor mates; that is, politicians united in pragmatism and timidity, not from Labor historians. Richo was general secretary of the New South Wales Labor Party when Neville Wran fumbled optional preferential voting into history, by embedding it in the Constitution of NSW, so that it is well nigh unalterable. It was Labor’s worst own goal in NSW since the Great Split of the 1950s. How was that myopic decision made? Probably in Richo’s characteristic way, which he later explained to Bill Hayden: “... all decisions are democratically taken at a meeting of one; me.” (Hayden: An Autobiography, p160.)

– Roderic Pitty, Mongarlowe, NSW

Price shock

John Hewson’s article “Embarrassment of ditchers” (November 29–December 5) really does take the cake for one of the poorest pieces of economic analysis I have seen on energy. He accuses the Coalition of basing their decision to abandon net zero on a “big lie” that power price rises are due to renewables and then claims that wholesale prices have “been falling”. The prices that consumers pay are not falling. You only need to look at the Bureau of Statistics’ most recent annualised increase showing that the prices consumers face have jumped by 35 per cent and the regulator just put power prices up. Hewson also tries to make out that the world is shifting to renewables and we will be left behind. This is objectively not true. The International Energy Agency said that the world has hit record annual emissions. This is because most of the big economies are doing little to curb emissions. China is the biggest contributor to the growth in emissions. My guess is that the Coalition was concerned that Australia is spending a lot of money making itself economically uncompetitive with renewables that are expensive. They are expensive because you need about four times as much renewable capacity to get the same energy as a coal plant, and then you have to back them up, and you have to pay for a lot more network.

– Danny Price, managing director, Frontier Economics

Seventy not out

What an eloquent account was Wendy Harmer’s exposé on reaching the tender age of 70 (“Now we are extra”, November 29–December 5), a milestone my wife and I are about to celebrate. Allow me to proffer some additional observations about the ageing phenomenon: an insidious and creeping invisibility, that tendency to blend into the background in the public square – and its flipside, the feeling of incredulousness when it seems every doctor, dentist, police or politician with whom your wellbeing has been entrusted looks like they just emerged from high school, or earlier. Yikes!

– David Beins, Cooks Hill, NSW

Very dunny

I must congratulate Liam Runnalls for the wittiest, laugh-out-loud cryptic crossword clue –“John Eliott misspelt” (The Cryptic, November 22-28). I nearly wet myself!

– John Back, Moss Vale, NSW