Bravo! I say this new and improved council has made an encouraging start and is actually listening by firstly reversing the one-way Chandos Street, work it did not have mandate to to carry out in first place.

Now if we can just get the tourist information back to the purpose-built visitor information centre, thus reducing the bottleneck, log-jam of vehicles and humans at the overloaded Civic, then all our dreams will be granted.

Recently I was sitting in the crossing theatre carpark at Narrabri reflecting on their great visitor information with rear and front access, even small centres at Werris Creek and Willow Tree far outshine Gunnedah with its small computer stuck into a corner of a cramped space.

How will this ever cater for future planning with greater population and Civic patronage? New councillors, the ball is now in your cultural court, so to speak.

Leonie Harley, Gunnedah 

Adam Marshall's petition to shorten daylight saving tabled with 6000-plus signatures: daylight saving ending the first Sunday of March. The petition was started late last year in support of Tweed MP Geoff Provest's private member's bill which would soon be introduced into the legislative assembly. This is a serious issue in the bush. It's not about ending daylight saving, just a month earlier. 

This issue has plagued communities for 45 years so in April, 2015, Adam Marshall and Kevin Anderson, local MPs, started their campaign to lop off two months, bringing hope to people all over NSW, in towns, on the coast, in cities. The Northern Daily Leader asked its Facebook fans and the response was like greased lighting, 50 responses in the first 15 minutes. Daylight saving is now two months more than originally accepted. This is much more than just a passionate subject, many medical reasons against DS but these have been ignored so the question is, why? 

Jillian Spring, Billinudgel 

Emmeline Pankhurst was a British political activist and leader of the suffragette movement. She helped women win the right to vote. In 1999 Time magazine named Pankhurst as one of the 100 most important people of the 20th century. She founded the “Womens’ Social and Political Union”. As they fought for women’s right to vote, suffragettes resorted to physical confrontations, members received prison sentences.

Protesters have had to resort to physical confrontation, defy the law and be labelled as “ill-informed activists”.  Protesters have come together from all walks of life to protect what they see as the future sustainability of this nation. The realisation that politicians lack the integrity or courage to deal with large extractive industry companies or their silence has been bought with large donations has meant that people have had to rise up and fight to protect our land, water.

Santos states within the referral to the Federal Government’s  Environmental Protection Biodiversity Conservation Act – page 65: “the duration and…extent of depressurisation of groundwater head within the coal seams and adjacent strata will cause a significant impact to the groundwater resources of the Gunnedah – Oxley Basin.”

History will judge the people who have had the courage to stand up to gas companies and politicians and be branded as activists. When politicians come to the realisation that water is the most precious resource we in Australia possess only then will the “activists” cease and desist.

Why would we be party to any coal seam gas project in this region that “will cause a significant impact to the groundwater resources of the Gunnedah – Oxley Basin? 

Robyn King, Mullaley