I am so very hopeful that my colleagues under MetLife have their claims settled quickly now because of your efforts. A lot of those members are people who I’ve worked with and care about.

 I’m a current serving police officer with 20 years’ experience. But I’m only 39. I’m a mother of the most beautiful children in the universe. I’m a wife, a daughter, sister, aunty, cousin, friend. I am loved. I am important to my family and friends.

 I have PTSD, depression and anxiety. I have had to take lengthy periods of time off for this in the last five years. I am currently full duties but my psychiatrist, a beautiful man with whom I accredit to still being alive, did say that if I was to fall so low again, I won’t ever recover.

 So Mr John Cox, I’m hopeful that you maintain your dedication and passion for those of us that remain. Because all police officers will always need you in our corner, the injuries will continue and the insurance companies will continue in their sickening manner.

 This sums it up for me:

 I have been where you fear to be. I have seen what you fear to see.  I have done what you fear to do – all these things I have done for you.

 I am the person you lean upon, the one you cast your scorn upon, The one you bring your troubles to, all these people I’ve been for you.

 The one you ask to stand apart, the one you feel should have no heart, The one you call ‘‘The Officer in Blue,’’ but I am a person, just like you.

 And through the years I’ve come to see, that I am not always what you ask of me. So, take this badge...take this gun...will you take it...will anyone?

 And when you watch a person die and hear a battered baby cry, Then do you think that you can be, all these things you ask of me? 

(Name and address supplied)

As an ALP member, I am sure the party is always open to constructive ideas.

 However, I am unable to see how Richard Burnett’s proposal to reduce tax on cigarettes and alcohol will create jobs or benefit the community.

Bob Fulton, Darkes Forest

 In addition to lung cancer, emphysema, throat cancer, gangrene, chronic bronchitis, brown teeth and fingers, stinky breath and body odour, I would like to add another result of smoking: brain damage.

 This is the only explanation I can think of for the number of tobacco junkies who illegally smoke at train stations, bus and taxi stops, cafes in the mall, in toilets on the train and in disabled toilets in the clubs, often while sitting directly under a ‘‘No Smoking’’ sign.

 And then, of course, toss the butts on the ground with a ‘‘the world is my ashtray’’ attitude. There are laws against this behaviour; why don’t you hear of offenders getting fined?

Thomas Tobey, Wollongong

I can imagine nothing worse than a politician living to 150 and still being on a parliamentary pension.

Tony Abbott cannot make up his mind whether he is standing in a political wasteland of quicksand or slow-sand, either way his political leadership is sinking.

God help the whale when the Liberal Party throws this Jonah overboard.

Dave Cox, Corrimal