WHAT will it take for NSW Health to stand up for its staff and tackle both the state and federal government about their priorities? ('Lacking staff and lacking resources', Newcastle Herald 26/10).
Reading about Mr Barrett's recent experience of the Mater Mental Health Service is disturbing, not because it is unique, but because it is typical. Assuming it is a matter of lacking staff, and those staff lacking compassion, oversimplifies things. Certainly understaffing of psychiatric wards is chronic and persistent. It is hard to be empathetic when you are run off your feet. I applaud the staff specialist psychiatrists who threaten to resign unless something was done.
It appears there were not enough senior staff to look after Mr Barrett with the level of sensitivity, understanding and close personal attention required.
Working with someone who is experiencing an episode of severe mental distress, increased by what could be chaotic medication management, is not easy. But what makes it harder is that it is so risky to give empathy when you have so many other people to attend to, and when there is no support.
I found the response from management typical: the threat to staff about "discussing" the importance of discharge planning. In other words, more forms to fill in with tick charts and bureaucratic structures for staff to follow. Nothing about their failure to tackle their bosses, and their lack of courage to publicly protest and take action so the team is adequately resourced and emotionally supported. Managers, hassle your bosses.
Niko Leka, Mayfield
- Support is available for those who may be distressed. Phone Lifeline 13 11 14; Mensline 1300 789 978; Kids Helpline 1800 551 800; beyondblue 1300 224 636; 1800-RESPECT 1800 737 732.
Harness potential of another site
ANOTHER option for the location of the proposed new $82m basketball stadium is to build it on the site of the existing Newcastle Harness Racing facility. A staged development could be undertaken which would entail building a new harness racing track in the Maitland area, then building the new basketball stadium to incorporate the existing grandstand, offices and car parking facilities in the area. Then, finally, they could sell the existing basketball stadium site for residential development.
Funding would come from using the existing funding, plus investment from Racing NSW and the sale of the existing basketball stadium land at Broadmeadow for residential apartments. Any remaining funds required would be drawn from the Hunter's annual $6bn coal royalty's payments to the NSW government currently invested in Sydney projects.
A win-win for all parties is possible, and the design and construction work (using local firms) could be started now with completion in two to four years.
Ian Pedersen, Jewells
Schools can be selective too
IF parents want to increase the appeal of their children to the selection committees of the various NSW selective and agricultural high schools, in a way more effective than spending big on after school coaching, they might consider actively taking part in the life of their child's current schools.
I mean, if you were on the committee and faced with deciding where to draw the placement cut off between an after school coached greenhouse flower and the free range child with much the same school and test scores, but who had parents who were known to be very active volunteer contributors to school life, and who might transfer that involvement to the new high school, where would you draw the line?
Parents who view selective high schools only through the blinkered prism of 'what can they offer us?' are blind to the challenge of the late president Kennedy and limit the opportunities of their child. They should instead re-consider what it is that their family can offer the school, state or private, selective or non-selective.
As for a few Sydney kids riding the trains to Gosford, this pales into insignificance compared to the thundering herds of fleets of liveried private school buses choking the roads doing the morning and afternoon runs.
Garry P Dalrymple, Earlwood
Great to see lord mayor there
I have a coffee most mornings at Elermore Vale shopping centre, El-Amore. It has been a refreshing surprise to see lord mayor Ross Kerridge there soliciting public enquiries on the community's needs. I have never seen any of the appointed ward councillors or their representatives in the area before.
I have noted letters to the editor and newspaper articles suggesting an internal councillor blockage of ideas presented by the newly appointed lord mayor; the removal of powers available to previous lord mayors and not showing any tolerance for new ideas. I fear it's the ugly side of political chest-thumping, and teaching the new boy to fall in with accepted practices. Too many political aspirations getting in the way of good local government management, if you ask me.
Paul Duggan, Garden Suburb
THANKS to the editor of the Newcastle Herald for recent letters and editorials. John Pritchard's "Why Glendale is a slam-dunk for new stadium" (Letters, 23/10), is a sensible proposal regarding the future whereabouts of a new basketball stadium and amenities. The editorial ties in nicely with Tony Brown's letter, "Student objections worth hearing". Give the people in the outer suburbs a chance to enjoy some benefits of a modern society. The new lord mayor will have a trial taming what I think has been a recalcitrant group of councillors to respect the ideas, values and expectations of the Newcastle community.
Pat Garnet, Wickham
Qantas workers' plight recognised
AFTER four years these Qantas workers who were unjustly sacked have won the court case. Another blot on Alan Joyce's record.
Shane Tull, Redhead
Drop in grandstanding welcome
I BELIEVE our city hall must be a very solid structure to have been able to withstand all the self absorbed, egotistical grandstanding displayed primarily by many Labor and Greens councillors at the last Newcastle council meeting. Likewise, the sewers would struggle to cope with any more. Hopefully at Tuesday's meeting they are committed to getting on with what they were elected to do and stop wasting ratepayers' money.
Christine Phillis, The Hill
US can't play all sides of war
WHAT a disgraceful hypocritical country America is. On the one hand they send Anthony Blinken over to the Middle East to press for a cease fire while supplying bombs and other weapons to maim and kill. They could stop the war now, but won't.
Julie Robinson, Cardiff
The answers at your fingertips
STEVEN Busch ("It's plain planes are a problem", Letters, 23/10), it seems is being obtuse about renewables and batteries, which are recyclable already, and it will be more economical to do so at the end of their life. It's funny that he singles out planes, not ships, which produce three times the CO2 as planes or cars and trucks, which produce approximately 15 per cent of the world's CO2 by themselves. The internet is a wonderful thing when used, and all these figures and more are readily available, including research into hydrogen powered planes and other low carbon alternatives.
