Posts filed under 'Talkback Emails'
Good evening Stuart,
After seeing the chaos that APEC is causing in Sydney on Channel Nine News tonight, I have come to the conclusion that APEC would have been much better off in Canberra, not because it is the home of parliament, but because the city is more suited to hosting such an event.
For example, the Chinese president spent a day here before flying to Sydney, he had a police escort and a couple road blocks were set up for him. Traffic was almost unaffected, whereas in Sydney, one street was shut down and the buses were backed up across the harbour bridge.
George Bush visited Canberra briefly a few years ago, causing the closure of a few main roads. It was an inconvenience and traffic flow was disrupted, but due to the way Canberra is planned, delays were minimal, most people weren't affected, and alternative routes were easy to use.
Canberra would also require a bit less security work for a number of reasons, not the least of which is our inland location.
I can understand that Sydney is more marketable as the host of APEC than Canberra is, but logistically, everyone would be much better off if APEC were being held down here. I feel sorry for all of you that are suffering in Sydney.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
P.S. Please send my best wishes to Charity. She was admitted to hospital rather urgently this afternoon on the advice of her GP.
September 5th, 2007 at 08:50pm
Good morning Tim,
Your short amusing comment at the start of the show about not parking your car in any "suspicious" places near APEC in case the police decide to blow it up raised a point that I have brought up on a number of occasions.
Why do the authorities blow up things ir order to see if they're explosives? Surely there has to be a better way to examine suspicious packages. Just imagine for a moment if a powerful explosive was left somewhere and the authorities decided to blow it up in order to dispose of it…the devestation such an act could cause would be horrendous.
As I said, there has got to be a better way to deal with suspicious objects than blowing them up…if not for the sake of saving someone's lost luggage, then for the sake of not accidentally causing a much larger problem.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
September 3rd, 2007 at 09:50am
Good evening Stuart,
A couple months ago I received a shop-a-docket with a voucher for a free cup of coffee on the back, and a 4 cents per litre petrol discount on the front. The coffee was worth about $3, whereas 70 litres of petrol discounts is only worth $2.80
Needless to say, I chose the coffee.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 21st, 2007 at 09:23pm
Good morning Lawsie,
Well you're an awful lot more patient with Alex, the organiser of the APEC protester, than I am.
I found his answer to your question about taking responsibility if the protest turns violent to be very interesting. Based on his logic, Earth getting two degrees hotter in the coming years as a result of climate change is a hypothetical thing which hasn't happened yet, and therefore nobody can take responsibility for it. I'm sure he would love to blame the current government for climate change, and yet he refuses to give you a straight answer about the protest.
Alex, you can't have it both ways.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 21st, 2007 at 09:53am
Good evening Stuart,
You just had a caller who said that if you pres "5" repeatedly when you dial 000 from a landline, it will reveal your location to the 000 operator. This information is incorrect.
000 has access to a caller ID system which is more useful than the one the public have access to. When you call 000 from a landline, the number you are calling from, along with information about the address the service is connected to, and probably some other information about the customer in charge of the phone number, is displayed to the 000 operator.
The "5" button is used for another purpose on the 000 service. When somebody calls 000 and the operator can't hear them, they put the call through to an automated system which asks the caller to press "55". This is used to confirm that the call is legitimate, and not a prank call. This was implemented a few years ago due to the sheer volume of prank calls 000 receives.
Have a great evening,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 20th, 2007 at 09:53pm
Good morning Clinton,
Your question about how fast can a bus travel caught my attention and I thought I should answer it for you.
A number of your older buses in Sydney are ex-Canberra buses and slightly older than Canberra's current oldest buses. I'm not sure of the rated maximum speeds of Sydney buses, but I can tell you that Canberra's older buses supposedly have a maximum speed of 83km/h…some struggle to reach that and others will easily eclipse that, especially when going downhill.
Canberra's newer buses, which are somewhat similar to Sydney's newer buses, could easily reach some very fast speeds, however they are electronically limited to 85km/h.
I hope this helps.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 18th, 2007 at 12:24am
Good morning Lawsie,
Just a quick note to wish you all the best for your trip to Hamilton Island.
I hope your week over there is a wonderful week.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 17th, 2007 at 11:54am
Good evening Stuart
I thought it was just me…but your caller Tony has confirmed that I'm not nuts. I personally try to apply the basic road rules to the footpath and where possible walk on the left, and overtake on the right. I'm generally a quick walker so I often have to overtake herds of slow walking people who are either spread out across the entire footpath, or just can't make up their mind which part of the footpath they want to use. It is all very frustrating and I would be much happier if people could just keep to the left!
Another pet peeve of mine is people who insist on crossing against the lights…oddly I didn't notice much of this behaviour the last time I was in Sydney…possibly because there is more traffic and a greater risk of being run over if your cross against the lights in Sydney when compared to Canberra. But that's a story for another day.
Best wishes,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 15th, 2007 at 08:54pm
Good evening Stuart,
I was rather interested in that story during the 8pm news about the National Security Hotline having received 100,000 calls since its inception in December 2002, which is about 4 and three quarter years ago, which means an average of just over 21,000 calls per year, or about 57 calls per day, which is fairly impressive.
Phillip Ruddock said that over half of the calls were referred to security agencies, which is a good thing, however I am a bit surprised by that percentage as I rang the hotline last week for some advice. I'm an amateur photographer and I was a tad concerned about the possibility of somebody thinking I was acting suspiciously by taking photos of various things, so I rang for advice about minimising my suspicious appearance, and the friendly operator told me that they receive a lot of calls about photographers, and most of the reports go nowhere because the photographers in question aren't suspicious.
I would imagine that it is up to the security agencies to decide who is and isn't suspicious…which means that a lot of those calls being referred are actually non-issues, and a lot of the calls not being referred are probably nuisance calls or nutty paranoid people.
Don't get me wrong, It's great that the hotline has reached 100,000 calls and people are keeping a look out for suspicious activities, but I would be much more interested in a statistic about the number of potential problems the hotline has helped to prevent. I think that would be a much more important thing than the number of calls they receive.
I hope you had a good weekend,
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 13th, 2007 at 08:25pm
Good afternoon John,
I think we're both fans of the television program Thank God You're Here, but there is one thing that drives me nuts about it. The way Shane Bourne insists on talking while everyone is clapping. It is impossible to understand any of what he is saying when he does that.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 9th, 2007 at 11:56am
Good evening Gibbsy and Brandy,
To answer Brandy's question, no, human enduced global warming is not fair dinkum. The whole notion of humans being the primary reason for global warming is ludicrous…and as for the nut case who rang up earlier to suggest that we shouldn't have any night time football matches because it's warming the planet, how about we send him off to another planet, then this planet will be a lot cooler because he won't be spurting crazy hot air!
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 3rd, 2007 at 06:59pm
Good evening Stuart,
I think the important thing to remember when it comes to unmarked police vehicles is that it is actually a criminal offence to impersonate a police officer, and as such, if somebody is pulled over by somebody pretending to be a police officer, they should ring the police and report it. When it comes down to the crunch, a real police officer isn't going to mind if you call a police station to check that they do work there.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
August 1st, 2007 at 09:29pm
As a non-Victorian resident, I had hoped that a change in premier might bring some sense to the Victorian government over the Murray Darling basin takeover. Sadly, it would appear that John Brumby also suffers from the delusion that Victoria owns the water and is just as willing as Steve Bracks to waste a heap of taxpayers money on a high court challenge.
It is unfortunate that a bunch of stubborn politicians can’t see past their state border, and see that handing control of the Murray Darling basin to the federal government is in the interests of all Australians.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
July 30th, 2007 at 02:38pm
Good afternoon John,
I think the reasons for Steve Bracks' resignation are fairly obvious. The Victorian government's opposition and apparent high court challenge over the federal government's plan to take control of the Murray Darling river system is ridiculous, there is a precedent which will allow the federal government to forcefully take control of the river system, and the high court challenge will only delay the inevitable, waste a whole heap of taxpayers money, and make Bracks look like a goose when Victoria loses the challenge.
Steve Bracks, after the opposition he has put up to the plan, can't really back down and give the river to the federal government, but he knows the fallout from losing the court case will be disastrous for him. Much like Bob Carr did to Morris Iemma, Steve Bracks is getting out while he's on top, and leaving the mess to his successor.
Enjoy your weekend,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
July 27th, 2007 at 12:31pm
Good morning Lawsie,
Your earlier caller Tony certainly inhabits an interesting world…everything seems to run backwards there. Based on his logic, petrol enters cars because they move, and you get electricity because the light is turned on.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
July 25th, 2007 at 10:25am
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