Swipe

BRYN JONES’S last hurrah as Fremantle council’s planning committee chair was a well-deserved swipe at the state government for its latest example, the new police complex, of the neutering of local government’s planning powers.

Councils have been reduced to lackeys of the WA Planning Commission, providing services on demand for which they are not paid, including the so-called “Responsible Authority Report”. 

To call council the “Responsible Authority”, when it has none and is even denied important information such as the heritage report provided to  the WAPC, is a positively Orwellian abuse of the English language.

It goes along with those other examples of government newspeak such as “reform of the planning system” – for which read “hand it over to the developers”.

Andrew Smith’s editorials in the same vein call into question the future role, if any, of local government in the assessment and approval of major development projects that can have profound effects on their communities.

Are we in fact witnessing “the death of planning”?

Gerry MacGill
Convenor NFCA

Knight in shining ute

I WOULD like to ask anyone in Freo who knows a diesel mechanic called Dylan, who is in his 20s, tall with long dark hair, lives in Fremantle and has a girlfriend who works in Hilary’s – to tell him that he a true gentleman. 

Dylan came across my path when I had a flat tyre outside my children’s daycare centre.

I’d had a very long day at work, it had just started raining and I was wondering how to get my husband to get here and collect the kids and then change the tyre and then get my flight for a business trip… when Dylan drove past, leaned out of his ute and offered to change it. 

He proceeded to do it very quickly in the pouring rain, and he was just so friendly and cheerful. 

I wanted to ask for his address to send him a thank you gift – but as I am a mum in my 40s and he a handsome young man in his 20s, I was worried this might look creepy, so I left him with what I feel was a rather inadequate “thank you so much!” and was able to collect my kids and go home as planned. 

What a legend he is – if you know Dylan please tell him he has re-ignited my faith in the basic decency of human nature. 

Helen
Via fremantleherald.com

A man with manners

ROEL LOOPERS is a man after my own heart.

I concur with every word of his recent article (“Manners matters,” Herald, September 23, 2023).

Say ‘please’, say ‘thank you’, say you’re ‘sorry’.

It’s not hard.

Take your nose out of your phone, consider others – stand to the side on escalators to let people through.  

The train standing at the platform might not be yours, but you might be blocking the way of passengers.

Think about others – don’t play loud music or have loud conversations in public places.

Open doors for people, stand aside for others, offer help if it is needed.

Small things, things that used to be considered the norm, make a huge difference.  

Courtesy IS the lubricant of society – pity it is practised by so few.

Sheila Robbshaw
Leeming

A question of hope

ABORIGINAL people continue to be relegated to the edges of our society, treated by many with hostility and disdain. 

This marginalisation shames modern Australia. 

Will we maintain this for generations more or create a new opportunity for progress? 

That is the true question of this referendum.

Hope underpins the call for recognition and voice. 

People of good-heart will tune into this and vote YES, not only for Indigenous people, but for the character and reputation of our country.

S Booth
East Fremantle