Thanks, Rita
OUR sincere thanks to planning minister Rita Saffioti for her thoughtful decision to support, in part, East Fremantle council’s town planning amendment, limiting the height of any development on the rear of the Royal George Hotel.
Ms Saffioti listened to the community’s concerns and took them on board.
We understand that one of the conditions of sale of this site to Saracen Properties was that the Royal George is restored fully within three years from, presumably, the purchase date.
Assuming that Saracen are genuine about a faithful restoration of this iconic building, there should be no further delays and it is incumbent on heritage minister David Templeman to ensure that before any development takes place, the Royal George Hotel is fully restored to the satisfaction of the Heritage Council.
The risk, though, is that Saracen may attempt to on sell the property to another party, thus delaying the restoration even further.
Jono Farmer
Sewell St, East Fremantle       

Top marks
I’M a part-time high school teacher with Fridays off, so I was able to go to Parliament House to observe the students’ rally for climate action.
There were plenty of students there from schools in the Fremantle, Melville and Cockburn region.
During the week, I’d enjoyed energetic debate with other teachers about the rights and wrongs of the proposed student action.
What I observed on Friday convinced me that these students should be congratulated for demonstrating the very best of what education is all about.
Education is about learning to think for yourself and to value evidence: “the unexamined life is not worth living.”
Placards like “Why should we go to school, if you won’t listen to the educated?” expressed this in a combative renunciation of the attitude of Scott Morrison.
Their speeches were clearly argued, concise and reasoned – our MPs obsessed with cheap point scoring could learn from them.
The students spoke of their anguish at the failure of Labor and Liberal MPs to respond in any way that even remotely matches the response to climate change by all the major science academies of the world.
Writing in 1954 the great philosopher Hannah Arendt provided the best definition of education I’ve ever read, and it summed up perfectly why these students were doing the right thing last Friday: “Education is the point at which we decide whether we love the world enough to assume responsibility for it.”
Robert Delves
Gibson Street, Beaconsfield

Cheers
I WAS pleased to read that all parties have finally agreed on a size for the proposed new building on the site of the Royal George Hotel in East Fremantle.
The ‘Old George’ was the local watering hole for my late father and his mates, so it holds a place in my family’s history.
It would be good if this new establishment could both mirror the past and represent the future for the town of East Fremantle.
I just hope that it doesn’t fall into the same ‘cosmetic trap’ as Fremantle and displays some real East Freo character.
Anyway, good luck to all involved and hopefully as it rises in stature, our local WAFL team can draw some inspiration from it and do the same.
One can dream, can’t one!
Steve Grady
Murray Road, Palmyra