The plan is being described as a national disaster, as well as a crisis that is crippling communities, breaking up families and destroying businesses. 

A small group of senators attending the hearings are sympathetic to the plight of these communities. 

However, if we are to achieve the change that we need many more politicians must start sitting up and taking notice. 

All of the words used above to describe the impact of the Basin Plan are accurate, yet in the midst of it we have a Canberra-based Murray-Darling Basin Authority that refuses to acknowledge the reality of the situation that has been caused by flawed decision-making and an inability to deliver equally to our environment, people and economy. 

We have communities and food producers that are in despair as millions of litres of water are sent out to sea, yet scientists are unable to demonstrate the environmental benefit. 

In the interests of our future generations who expect us to leave a legacy of food security, I appeal to all politicians to take heed of the crisis we have created with knee-jerk reactions to the Millennium Drought. 

Let’s do something about it before food producers and the communities which rely on them are destroyed. 

SENSIBLE people stopped eating meat after the World Health Organization announced that processed meats cause cancer, and that red meat is probably carcinogenic, too.

Not me. I stopped eating meat years ago, when I realized that pigs, chickens, cows and other animals are sentient beings who suffer horribly when raised and killed for food.

I was about 10 when I learned that lobsters were boiled alive so people could break them apart and suck out their flesh. A year or so later, when my father bought a share in a dairy farm, and I could hear mother cows bellowing frantically for their newborn babies, who were torn away from them so that humans could have the milk that was meant for the calves, I learned that cows mourn when they lose a loved one, just as we do.

I later learnt that chickens, too, form strong family ties. When they’re not confined to factory farms, hens will lovingly tend to their eggs and “talk” to their unborn chicks, who chirp back. How could I eat an animal knowing that it feels pain, sadness, joy and love, just as humans do?

We’re right to worry about cancer and other illnesses that are linked to meat, eggs and dairy products, but we also shouldn’t eat animals because it’s unethical – and unnecessary. We have great-tasting vegan options that are good for us and better for the environment, too. 

THE city of Albury RSL sub-branch is a not-for-profit organisation that does not have any paid staff and relies only on volunteers to raise funds to directly support the welfare of veterans, members of the ex-service community and the operation of ANZAC House.

This year school children and volunteers will be out and about in the shopping centres and on the streets of Lavington and Albury selling poppies and badges on Friday November 6.

We would ask that our community support us and would like to notify that the 2015 Albury Remembrance Day Service will again be held in St Mathew’s Church, Kiewa Street, starting at 10.30am.