AFL lost in the past
FOR A game that purports to be an indigenous form of football (some claim that the Aboriginal game of Marngrook was a forerunner to Aussie rules) that is supposedly proud of the role played by some fantastic Indigenous Australian athletes, AFL has a shabby, bogan-esque way of showing thanks.
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The sort of rampant, low-level, casual racism that is all too common in AFL is nowhere to be found in rugby league or soccer in Australia (league has had a distinguished relationship with Indigenous Australians and Pacific Islander boys - soccer in Australia was boosted by post-war immigration from Europe and more recently with the large influx of African-Australians into the sport).
If the AFL fails to move into lockstep with modern Australia and take real action against some of the cheerleaders of casual racism in the sport (I'm looking at you, Eddie McGuire), the game will find that it will be on a downward spiral into the realms of insignificance in no time at all.
AFL is fast becoming a white picket fence 1950s head-in-the-sand sport that holds no cultural currency in modern Australia.
David Fletcher
Wagga
Pool groundhog day
AFTER reading Brodie Owen's article "Pool's future still in the air" on Saturday, July 18, I felt that it was groundhog day again!
How long are the people of this region going to put up with being treated contemptuously while our political Mafioso tweak our health system to suit their own agenda?
Let’s look at our hydrotherapy pool fiasco; while centres such as Bathurst and Tamworth retain public hydrotherapy pools that charge next to nothing for public use, our facility is let slip into a state of disrepair and with that as an excuse, charges are raised so that many local groups cannot justify the cost of using our public facilities.
There has been an axe hanging over the service for over 12 months now and Daryl Maguire refuses to make his personal position clear on whether or not the hydrotherapy pool will be kept, repaired or even replaced once the next stage of the hospital is released. He has passed that responsibility on to the base hospital GM - as if the issue is not important enough for his personal attention.
The people of this region could be forgiven in believing that maybe Mr Maguire does not care about our public health system as most of the noise he has made on health in the past is about public/private partnerships.
Maybe this is why he would like to see this issue go cold so that changes can be made without too much public scrutiny.
A comment made by the hospital GM has lifted the lid on what may be happening: "MLHD was working with Wagga City Council and Calvary for integrated hydrotherapy pool services..."
With Calvary hospital just about to complete their new rehabilitation ward and hydrotherapy pool, are we going to see a situation where those with private cover will be directed to Calvary while pensioners and the battler are shuffled off to the local pool?
Mr Maguire has asked Mr Merrylees to write to him on this issue rather than going to the media. I have to ask, how many people have to write (or how many times does the DA have to bring this issue up) before he gives us a straight answer on what is happening? The people of this region deserves better than this!
It’s time for the voters of this electorate to consider an independent candidate that represents the people and not just their political party.
Maybe this is why electorates such as Tamworth and Port Macquarie want for nothing as both have been represented by independents in the past and the major political parties have actually had to work hard to get them back.