All three participants in the two cars were taken to the Warrnambool Base Hospital and I would like to say a great big thank you to all the people that helped us throughout the day. Some of them I can remember.

Some people first on the scene (including a local resident) assessed the situation and rang the ambulance and police. Thank you.

Grant parked his car close to mine and I sat in it out of the rain and he talked to me till I got into the ambulance. Thank you.

The police and ambulance were very quickly on the scene and they directed traffic and attended to the injured. Thank you.

The fire brigade turned up to make sure that there was not a fire hazard. Thank you.

The SES attended and made sure the cars were safe and assisted the other occupants from their car. Thank you.

The tow company picked up the cars and took them to Warrnambool and were obliging when it came to getting personal items from my car. Thank you.

The nurses and hospital staff were brilliant and attended to others and myself. Thank you.

Friends offered support, transport, meals, a coffee and bed for the night. Thank you.

And although we didn't have our Hands On Learning meeting at Hawkesdale P-12 College that night it was a privilege to see community support and love in action from colleagues, friends and the wider community. Thank you.

David Scarlett, Geelong

Through you paper I would like to thank the good samaritan who fished my wallet out of the gutter, where it must have dropped after my wife and I had coffee in Warrnambool last Friday.

We had backtracked some 50-odd kilometres and never really expected to see it again.

Thankfully when I reported at the police station to obtain an interim driving licence, my wallet, with all contents in place, had recently been handed in.

It restores one’s faith in human nature and I'm eternally grateful to that honest person.

A. N. Langford, Young, NSW

Member for South West Coast, Roma Britnell, says the funding for extra train services is long overdue and not before time (The Standard, April 28).

I wonder if, in her opinion, there is a reason that the former Minister for Transport, Terry Mulder, in the neighbouring electorate did not listen to his constituents and failed to allocate this funding to improve the rail services for the people of Warrnambool. Give me a break.

The Member might have just been given her L plates, but her understanding of meeting the needs of her electorate and of budgetary issues and processes is obviously limited.

The level of representation for South West Victoria is incredibly disappointing.

Lynn Lyles, Warrnambool

After reading the about horse trainers and their perceived benefits of using local beaches for training horses I would like to make a few comments.

There may well be something in the water for the trainers, but it is what is going on above the water that is of a concern to me. I have written previously about the issue of public safety and the use of public carparks, access tracks and the main beach at Killarney by trainers, bringing horses into close proximity of other beach users, along with the associated smell created by manure, urine and wash down water in the parking areas and lack of parking space for other users.

According to the articles (April 30), trainers are looking to increase these activities.

This is not about a few horses having a trot and a swim at the beach.

This is a major commercial activity using public land and facilities for a perceived advantage, and I assume monetary gain.

I don’t know of any other business that would be allowed to do this without regulation, fees, environmental impact assessment etc. and be able to access any area at any time regardless of public safety or comfort.

Over summer and the peak holiday period when horses are not permitted on Warrnambool beaches, there are around 50 to 60 horses using the main beach at Killarney from before sunrise till 10.30 to 11am seven days a week.

Although some trainers have returned to Warrnambool, there are still many horses using the beach each day.

Because it is a low energy beach with minimal wave action the main beach resembles a ploughed paddock.

The horses are ridden at the very base of the dunes and are destroying the sea rocket (Cakile Maritima ) which is a frontline pioneer plant that allows other species, such as marram grass and coast saltbush to establish and help protect the dunes from erosion.

Horses are now being ridden through the tops of the dunes in the area from Gormans Lane to Towilla Way which is destroying vegetation and will lead to deep rutted tracks at risk of erosion.

The beach in this area, which is also used by riders and trainers, is home to the endangered hooded plover and their nesting areas.

Once again I understand the economic benefit and enjoyment that racing brings to the area. I am neither pro nor anti racing. There needs to be a sensible, viable alternative found that protects public safety and the environment. A Moyne Shire Council report from its March 22 meeting, page 59, about this issue is on its website.

Bill Yates, Killarney

I am more than happy that the notion of getting bogged down at Warrnambool City Council meetings can be resolved by new rules.  

I often grit my teeth when the same debate appears reworded time after time, week after week only to be re-debated and reach the same conclusion.  

The public pay for fresh new ideas from its representatives and when an idea has been aired and dissected in front of the public it should either be acted on there and then, agree to re-discus at a future named date  or shelved, end of story.  

This continual reappearance of items that have already been dealt with on the agenda will only serve to bog down council in unresolved issues and bring their meetings to a grinding halt and perhaps that's what is intended using the spanner in the works tactics?  

We used to call these sort of disruptive inclusions as out of order  and if they persisted the person causing the disruptions would be escorted off the premises until the next meeting.

It needs to be made clear that if a properly convened forum of councillors vote against something then it stops there. It is not a kindergarten scenario where if we don't get what we want we can keep asking until someone gets fed up and gives it to us.  

This new legislation should stop this very issue. Let’s hope it comes with the power to remove people from the meetings who do not adhere to policy.

I can already hear people grunting, jumping up and down and thinking on the best way to challenge the new rules.  

I can tell you all what will be achieved by going against these new rules is the shut down of our council like they did with Geelong. They are watching us, there is nothing surer, so please act with some dignity.

David MacPhail, Warrnambool

The Australian Defence Forces have been used as an instrument of asylum seeker policy since 2001 when the Tampa was stormed by the military commando unit of the Special Air Service. A decade later Tony Abbott talked gravely about being “at war” and the need for ‘‘the discipline and focus of a targeted military operation.” 

That operation was Operation Sovereign Borders which was drawn up after years of work with senior defence advisers. OSB is headed by a military commander and sailors involved in “on water activities” have effectively been placed on a war footing, legally exempted from their usual obligation to ensure their own safety and that of asylum-seekers.

As our leaders describe their asylum seeker operation as a war I think it is reasonable to describe the crimes committed implementing OSB as war crimes, and the people who commit them as war criminals.

A person does not have to physically commit an actual war crime to be convicted as a war criminal. Paragraph 500 of the U.S. Law of Land Warfare defines “complicity…in the commission of …war crimes” as a war crime itself.

It is no defence to protest, as Adolf Eichmann did, that “I never killed any human being. I never gave an order to kill either a Jew or a non-Jew”. It is no defence to pass the buck to the governments of Nauru or Papua New Guinea.

The United Nations Special Rapportuer on Torture has found that various aspects of Australia’s asylum seeker policies violate the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

Submission 95 to a Senate select committee on conditions in Nauru details the use of waterboarding, a practice that is now almost universally condemned.

There is also the description of a practice called "zipping," which involves using cable ties to secure an asylum seeker to a bed frame. The bed frame is then thrown into the air and allowed to crash onto the floor, thereby inflicting injury. 

Health professionals, teachers and humanitarian workers have attested to murder, rape and sexual predation, systemic abuse, violence by guards and corporal punishment.

These “war crimes” take place at the instigation and with the complicity of our armed forces and government.Therefore, if Nuremburg style trials were held today, would it be a surprise if members of our current and past governments were found guilty of war crimes? As for the Australians who elected them, are they also complicit?

Peter Martina, Warrnambool