Letters, April 12, 2023

Main street chaos
NOT Again! At 2.01pm, Main Street, Hahndorf, opposite Geppetto’s, a large bus on Route 864 meets an oncoming semi carrying grapes from the Southern Vales to the Barossa.
The cabin of the truck has started to pass the bus, then both drivers realise that there is no way they can pass.
They halt and look at each other for several minutes. Traffic is banking up behind both vehicles.
Cars behind the bus realise the predicament and start to reverse into the entrance to the Hahndorf Old Mill.
When there is some clearance the bus slowly reverses until it’s clear of the semi.
The semi finally has a path clear to proceed. Meanwhile some 30 cars and trucks have been banked up behind each of these vehicles. After 10 minutes Main Street is operational again.
This isn’t a one-off incident.
This occurs around once every two weeks on Main Street.
We don’t even bother to count the mirrors that get broken, only the several car doors that have been taken off in the past two months alone.
The Department for Infrastructure and Transport knows the problem but is directed by politics to air-brush it away. Hahndorf needs its Federally-funded bypass.
Harold Gallasch, Hahndorf

Wrong culprit
MASS indoctrination is dangerous as it excludes logical thinking and results in failure to see the whole picture.
The letter, “Cat experience” is an excellent example of this as Ian Hobbs has been so influenced by the publicity denigrating cats as a threat to native wildlife that he can’t see other threats when he is literally making eye contact with them, such as the goshawk (The Courier, March 29).
Mr Hobbs has not seen a cat in his yard so he assumes this is the reason he has so many birds and native wildlife, but he cannot see that this wildlife has also attracted the goshawk, which he is delighted about.
Like other birds of prey it swoops and kills other birds and small mammals, but apparently Mr Hobbs has not realised the threat the goshawk is to the native wildlife which he thinks is being protected by confining cats.
All predators are a threat to other animals, but we can’t blame animals for doing what nature has created them to do – survive.
Confining cats while we have so many other introduced species (rats, mice, rabbits and birds), which are their main prey is absurd. We are already suffering from plague proportions of these, during the lapse between new cats infiltrating the vacated spaces, and breeding.
Sadly, the native wildlife is suffering even more from confining cats, as evidence proves the massive increase in sales of rat baits which are killing thousands of natives.
How is this saving native wildlife?
Carol Patricia James, Kensington

Cruel methods
THE Australian pork industry is having to come clean on its cruel stunning method of placing pigs in toxic CO2 gas chambers before killing thanks to Chris Delforce, Farm Transparency Project Director.
His covert filming shown this week on ABC’s 7.30 is a significant contribution to the animal protection movement.
Chris follows in the footsteps of the whistle blower who filmed conditions of sheep transported on the Awassi Express in 2017.
That expose generated massive community outrage and was a catalyst for government inquiries, investigations, reforms and an imminent end to the live sheep trade.
Science has proven animal sentience so it should be a legal and enforced requirement of industries to respect animals’ intelligence, feelings and innate needs. Pigs have the intelligence of a young child.
It can’t be dignified work doing things to animals that industry keeps hidden from public view.
Handling animals with respect and dignity, providing them with good living conditions is a mark of a civilised society.
We cannot progress as a more humane, caring, just society while ignoring animal suffering.
Simone Hunter, Hove

Library promotion
THE Mt Barker Community Library has a range of high-quality activities, programs, and services available throughout the year.
To promote these properly, the library needs its own Facebook page.
Current arrangements force people to go through a Mt Barker Council Facebook page, with very little library related content.
At least 50 libraries across SA have their own Facebook page, out of 68 councils.
There are many library Facebook pages internationally that showcase what their libraries have available and what friends of the library groups do.
So, it is only fair and reasonable that the Mt Barker Community Library can do the same.
The Mt Barker Council is out of step with the majority of local councils in SA, and we call on the council to enable the Mt Barker Community Library to have its own Facebook page to positively promote what it does in the community.
Nathan Rogers, Chairperson, Friends of the Library, Mt Barker Incorporated

Simple approach
THERE is one church organisation I believe the vast majority of conventional religions should follow, especially with confusion and growing uncertainty within our western society.
King’s Cross Sydney Wayside Chapel, to my mind, stands out with its down to earth acceptance and teachings.
It never matters whether people are off the streets or a millionaire – they are welcomed with all the home comforts and support like food, showers, bed, with no questions asked.
Religion does not need magnificent cathedrals, statues or highly dressed individuals to look down to its mesmerised followers.
Personally I have enjoyed a religious background, but the Wayside Chapel approach is one that I admire for its simplicity and sincerity.
Glen Chenoweth, Goolwa North

Birds in danger
NO one is fooled by the apparent concern of duck hunters for the wildlife at Tolderol (Hunters Celebrate, The Courier April 5).
Providing better habitat for migratory waders at Tolderol Game Reserve will only put more birds in danger of being shot.
Alice Shore, Birdwood