ABC arts funding:

Sharon Grey writes: Re “Outsourcing the arts at Aunty: the problem with commissioning” (Wednesday, Item 2).  One of John Howard’s gifts that seems to keep on giving appears to have been the appointment of Maurice Newman to chair the ABC in January 2007.  Should anyone care enough in future to write about Aunty’s history during this tenure, it would not surprise me in the least to learn that the de facto brief has been to ‘Channel Ten-isise’ the organisation.

The line “the recently appointed ABC Controller Brendan Dahill has been given five years to turn the network’s demographic around from a majority of over-65s to an audience from 18-40” is a case in point. While continuing to dumb-down the ABC alone will see the older age group off in my opinion, the demographic question remains: because the largest-ever demographic bulge in Australia’s history — the baby boomers — is turning 65 this year, and thereby standing to substantially enhance the ABC’s ‘majority … over-65s’ audience, why would the ABC, during the next five years, seek to turn-off the largest audience slice that it would ever have?

If this is a case of trying to have one’s cake (via assuming the loyalty of the so-called ‘natural constituency’ of the older demographics) and eat it too (trying to cater for the young across diversifying media platforms), one must ask why?  Why is the ABC chasing an ‘unnatural constituency’ and aping Australia’s commercial media instead of playing to its strengths?  Strengths, that will, in fact, become stronger during not only the next five years, but the next twenty years.

I, for one, don’t mind paying my eight — or eighty, for that matter — cents worth for an ABC of calibre. If the Newman strategy, however, is to make people begrudge paying anything for pap, well, that’s another matter, isn’t it?

High speed trains:

Bryan Nye, chief executive officer, Australasian Railway Association writes: Re. “The high-speed rail project and the fairytales that surround it” (yesterday, item 3). It is interesting that Ben Sandilands seems to be the only person in Australia not excited by the prospect of High Speed Rail in Australia. In his article yesterday, Ben lamented about the “implausible capital costs” of the proposed high speed rail network. He said “How come the entire rail infrastructure could cost between $61 billion and $108 billion in today’s dollars when the estimates for extending M4 motorway to the edges of the main CBD with a branch to Port Botany and Sydney Airport is only $12-15 billion? The answer to this lies in his question. This is because it is the “entire rail infrastructure”, one that will open up the East Coast of Australia. This “entire rail infrastructure” is more than 1600kms long not 46km in length like the current M4 or 60-70km like the “future” M4. Ben also did not recognise the fact that since 1985, Australian Governments have spent more than $293 billion on roads. This spending has brought us the problems of today; road congestion, high level of carbon emissions and rising road fatalities.

A High Speed Rail network is an infrastructure that will dramatically change where we live, work and how we travel.  Through this network, we will be able to travel from Sydney to Brisbane or Melbourne in 3 hours, Sydney to Canberra in less than one hour and Brisbane to Gold Coast in 15 minutes. It will also help reduce road congestion and carbon emissions. Access Economics recently found that one passenger train can take 525 cars off the road. This is 3.2 million vehicle kilometres per trainload removed from our roads each year. The same passenger train also reduces carbon emissions by the same amount as planting 320 hectares of trees. Clearly, rail has “proven” green credentials. Another study prepared by North American economists found that electrified high speed rail is about 9 times more energy efficient than private road vehicles or domestic jet travel. Rail only emits about one-ninth as much pollution as air or road.  In 2036, it is likely that high speed rail would be even more energy efficient. There will be technology that allows us to produce electricity solely from natural and renewable sources.

The benefits of a high speed rail network along Australia’s East Coast go on. The high speed rail network will create more jobs, rejuvenate regional Australia, provide people with greater access to employment opportunities, increase land value and promote social inclusion. To put these benefits alone into a dollar value would be astronomical.

Furthermore, in his speech at the Infrastructure Partnerships Australia Conference yesterday, the Hon Anthony Albanese said that Sydney Airport will not be able to cope with future growth. He is right. We will need a second Sydney airport. At present, the Sydney to Melbourne air corridor is the 5th busiest in the world and Sydney to Brisbane is 7th. High Speed Rail links between Sydney, Newcastle and Canberra could remove the need for a second Sydney airport by providing Newcastle and Canberra as overflow airports. Further, as the Government’s Study has found, High Speed Rail encourages people to travel by a more environmentally friendly and energy efficient mode of transport. It has the ability to shift about 50% from air travel by 2036. This is a significant achievement.

Air corridors are diminishing around the world. There are no longer flights from Paris to Brussels and between Paris and London, 90% of people travel by high speed rail.  High Speed Rail is being constructed and actively planned throughout the world, including in the USA, UK, Argentina, Poland, Morocco, Turkey, Iran, Portugal, Saudi Arabia and India. In Italy, High Speed Rail is travelling at 360kph, connecting Rome to Naples and Milan and in Japan, the government is about to launch a High Speed Rail program that allows customers to travel at 500kph. Clearly it is the way of the future.

Overall, the benefits of high speed rail far outweigh its costs.  The High Speed Rail Study and the effort of those who were involved should be commended and not criticised. Australia needs to move towards the future and not continue to live in the past. High Speed Rail is the Future. The facts stack up and those who are blinded by the dollars.

End of the retail boom:

John Hunwick writes: Re. “Dick Smith: get used to pain retailers, time to stop the growth fetish” (yesterday, item 2). Getting the economy back on track is just postponing the inevitable. In recent years with increasing consumption our community has sped towards the limits to growth as measured by material goods and non-renewable energy use. Even as we argue, most of it illogically, towards the necessary air pollution tax (misnamed the carbon tax) we still seem to be oblivious to peak oil — the time rapidly approaching when the amount of oil available deceases no matter what, and the price increases correspondingly. The fact that oil and coal should be phased out within a generation is too horrendous to even think about for most people. Now that more efficient ways of retailing are available that too will be quickly adopted by consumers, as Dick Smith and other are pointing out. If bookshops are disappearing, and my wife is buying clothes and shoes online at about 30% or less of the shop price, the sooner the changeover comes the more savings there will be.

Nuclear interests

Geoff Stennett writes: Re. James Eggins’ response (comments, yesterday) to Ben Sandilands article on the Fukushima. He talks of  “journalistic ethics” — would it not be ethical of him to mention in passing his interest in the matter? From his employer’s website:

James Eggins has been involved in marketing and sales administration in the uranium business for 25 years. Mr Eggins began his career with Queensland Mines Limited which operated the Nabarlek uranium project in the Northern Territory. Mr Eggins subsequently worked on the Kintyre Project with CRA Limited before joining WMC Limited in 1989 where he spent fifteen years in various marketing and commercial roles with the Olympic Dam business unit. Mr Eggins is a director of the Uranium Information Centre Limited (now the Australian Uranium Association) and has served on various committees of the World Nuclear Association.

The Renovators

David Havyatt writes: Re: “Last night’s TV Ratings” (yesterday, item 17). Glenn Dyer wrote: “For Ten, the news about The Renovators is terrible. It is supposed to anchor Sunday-to-Thursday ratings after MasterChef finishes on Sunday night. With these figures so far, Ten will be buried. The weak ratings for The Renovators must be giving Ten palpitations. I wonder what interim CEO Lachie Murdoch will do with this flop? If it’s not fixed, the rest of 2011 will not look good.”

Important to note that the show comes from Shine Australia — Lachlan’s sister just sold the parent production company to his dad (and him — he is on the board at News Corp still) for an amount that market watchers claim was excessive. Hard balancing act that one……

Won’t somebody think of the hat?

Anonymous Crikey reader: Re. “Media briefs” (yesterday, item 16). I read the article about the hat in the tree with some amusement. However, my mood soon turned to one of anger when I read that if not claimed, the hat will be destroyed. Don’t people know that a hat is for life, not just for Christmas? And why knit or buy when homeless hats die?