The overpass near Garvoc deserves its 80kmh restriction. The road is unsafe and unstable, but we shouldn't have signs, we should have someone fixing the problem.

At the dip between Garvoc and Panmure it seems to me that the crumbling section of road was fixed just a few years ago.

Why has it failed so quickly?

Instead of voting like machines, we should seriously consider all options on October 31. 

Sadly the ALP has shown its lack of respect for this safe conservative seat by not even nominating a candidate, but we have independents, such as former ALP candidate Roy Reekie, and a preferential system that we can use to send a message to all major parties that we don't want to be taken for granted.

Rick Bayne, Warrnambool

Tomorrow, I will start a short series of direct conversations with voters at The Royal Oak Hotel in Port Fairy at 2pm.

This Sunday session will be the first of four – at the Whalers’ Bluff Cafe in Portland from 2pm on Monday and two in Warrnambool on Tuesday, including at Bohemia Cafe at 7pm.

My aim is to speak directly with voters and to listen carefully to what they have to say; to create community conversations in which you can tell me directly what you would want me to do if you elect me as an independent member for South West Coast on October 31.

I have my own ideas and opinions, but I want you to set my agenda for action.

You can create or contribute to my policy platform.

I’m doing this because, as your local member, I would be your servant – a public servant.

I said as much in a short video speech I uploaded to Facebook recently – my Codrington Commitment.

Having resigned from the ALP, I am now totally free of central party control. 

This time, my campaign is just about the south-west and its future.

Help me to formulate an agenda for action.

Join me to discuss your ideas and mine for what a marginal South West Coast could achieve.

Roy Reekie, independent candidate for South West Coast, Warrnambool

Fracking and the unconventional gas industry is a significant issue in the south-west.

Warrnambool, Koroit, Port Fairy, Narrawong, Heywood, Portland and a whole host of other towns are under mining exploration permits.

In response to the Liberals and Nationals, who are proposing a five-year moratorium on the gas industry, that’s not good enough.

Our agricultural land, and the mining companies which wish to take over this land, cannot co-exist with each other.

Gas mining and the effects of fracking (a technique used to extract gas from the ground) pose a threat to our air, our land, our water and our health.

The proposed moratorium is a licence to hang around.

Lake Oil chief Rob Annells stated quite clearly his company is willing to wait until the moratorium is lifted.

We need to see a permanent ban on this industry.

Turning south-west Victoria into a gasfield is unnecessary, it’s unwanted and is nothing more than a quick cash grab by companies who want to exploit these resources and leave communities with the damage.

I will fight until there is a permanent ban on this industry – and I will fight until farmers have the absolute right to stop any mining company taking over their land.

Thomas Campbell, Greens Candidate for South-West Coast

Last year when I toured the state seeking public opinion on coal seam gas I listened with a growing sense of deep disappointment that so many respondents complained that local MPs could not be trusted to put local issues ahead of party politics. 

In the interests of transparency, readers of The Standard should be in no doubt that as a Liberal supporter running independent of the party, I will be a thorn in the side of any and all major parties in prosecuting a strong case for this electorate. 

Running on this kind of ticket has many disadvantages; not the least a lack of access to the bottomless financial resources that the party is throwing behind a tethered candidate whose party membership can be counted in weeks rather than months or years.

Therein lay the first warning signs of party politics and expectations. 

I will avoid Spring Street jargon of improving outcomes but failing to give specific details.

Instead of just committing to an issue I will give specific targets.

I won’t “reach out and engage in a dialogue” preferring instead to sit down and talk to people.

By the way, I won’t turn up to the opening of an envelope unless I’ve helped put something into it. 

I’m calling on voters who want to strive for a high-energy South West Coast to see through the temporary shop fronts, the TV advertising and Facebook pages and vote for a candidate free of party factions and any obligation to return favours. 

Pete Smith, Liberal independent candidate for South West Coast, Portland

The single most important issue facing our society is the level of violence within the community.

Social, economic, environmental and animal wellbeing issues are all vital however I believe these wellbeings are ultimately determined by the level of violence we accept in our community. If we look at different communities throughout the world, the key driver is nearly always determined by the level of violence perpetrated within that particular community.

There is a large volume of research linking violence, in particular against children and women, to how well both at an individual and also at a community level we can achieve our social and economic potential. When we have the nurturing environment we need to achieve these potentials then we are far more likely to develop a greater sense of responsibility for our behaviours. Along with this heightened sense of responsibility comes a greater awareness and desire to treat other people, our environment and the animal population in a healthier and more sustaining way.

Violence in society can occur at different levels from extreme ‘intimate partner violence’ through to the more 'subtle' normalisation of violence seen on television and in certain sporting fields. When children experience or witness violence during their crucial years of normal brain development there is a risk that their brains will internalise that experience of violence as 'normal behaviour' either at a conscious or unconscious level.

Until we focus more attention on reducing the level of violence in our community, all our efforts to achieve greater advances in the economic, social, environmental and animal wellbeings are likely to be doomed to never achieve their full potential.

A key part of this focus requires more emphasis to be placed on preventing children ‘normalising’ violence as an appropriate behaviour in the first place.  

Dr. Michael McCluskey, independent candidate, South West Coast, Warrnambool