• MAY 30

Last year a good friend of mine had a terminal illness and was rapidly deteriorating in capacity.

• MAY 29

It seems our governments will stop at nothing to pander to the desires of the property industry.

• May 28

Hygge is the real concept of the moment.

• May 27

As a former employee of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, who was there at the time of the Lindt Cafe siege, I read with interest the bail chapter in the coroner's report.

• MAY 26

It's time to re-evaluate our notions of what constitutes "expert" advice – I hope the police are doing that right now.

• MAY 25

There are two separate prisms through which the Manchester bombing must be viewed.

• MAY 24

The future loss of valuable infrastructure and land due to rising sea-levels is another example of inter-generational theft.

• MAY 23

I am dumbfounded that Dutton can claim asylum seekers are "taking the system for a ride".

• May 22

The Lindt Cafe siege perfectly illustrates the truth of the old saying "A stitch in time saves nine".

Demountables have morphed into cheap alternatives to solid infrastructure and facilities.

• MAY 20

Whatever the true jobs figure may be, once the coal from this giant mine is burnt, the carbon dioxide which is released into the atmosphere will effectively cook the planet, and all the aspirations of the Paris Climate Summit will be lost.

Irritatingly bland or alarmingly self-indulgent, readers could get no satisfaction from the public utterances of our top political leaders this week.

• MAY 19

Although inconvenient to commuters, I feel the bus strike on Thursday was necessary.

• MAY 18

It took a week to figure out that Gonski 2 is just as flawed as Gonski 1?

• MAY 17

Governments are intervening increasingly in our lives, now they want to intervene in our death.

• MAY 16

It is hard to feel sorry for the fruit and vegetable growers complaining about not having enough labour to pick their produce.

To Westpac chairman, Lindsay Maxsted, let me say "Welcome to the real world" (Bank tax will set 'a terrible precedent'..."May 13-14).

• May 14

I was told by an eight-year-old Fidget Spinners are good for fidgeters ("Fidget spinners taking over city", May 7).

• MAY 13

It is not the entity – the bank – which is greedy, it is the people who run the banks.

• MAY 12

There's a reason that Australia's biggest banks are so widely loathed.

• MAY 10

The Australian government is continuing its selective vision of entitlement.

• MAY 11

Australians will pay dearly for the Coalition's short-term focus on the next election rather than our future.

The fact that Malcolm Turnbull could applaud the most regressive step in American healthcare in decades is a pretty fair indication of the direction in which he would like to take the Australian system, if he could get the parliamentary majority to do it.

• MAY 4

Values, unlike Tony Abbott, evolve. Over time they change to more closely reflect the people who make up Australian society.

• MAY 4

Gonski is wasting his time and efforts with useless successive governments.

• May 7

The solution to the "shark problem" would seem to be quite simple: don't go swimming in their dinner bowl ("Shark bite survivor bitten but not shy", April 30).

• MAY 3

Why should Sydney Airport take all the risks when it knows very well the federal government will do it all for it.

• MAY 1

I live in Randwick, with absolutely no chance of losing my home to a bush fire and yet I am to pay double the levy cost to those who choose to live in the Blue Mountains surrounded by trees.

• APRIL 24

By now it must be evident to everyone that our democracy has failed, given that our nation's politicians are incapable of addressing the housing affordability crisis by virtue of their monstrous conflict of interest ("Houses of Parliament: MPs on top in property game", April 22-23). That these very same real estate speculators have the effrontery to lecture Australians on what our nation's values should be is not only the height of conceit, but damning evidence of their collective sophistry. If ever the phrase "a pox on all your houses" was appropriate, this is surely the time.