Commenting on the story: Premier rebuffs populist politics claims over sports car regulation 

While I don’t disagree with bringing in a new licence class, it will have little impact for most South Australians. At the end of the day, if the driver wants to be irresponsible, it does not matter if they are in a Lamborghini, a V8 Commodore or a Camry, any car is lethal in the wrong hands.

It’s also pointless in mandating that traction control and other things can’t be turned off, as there are situations where having the safety aids on make driving dangerous. For example some stability control systems make cars sway uncontrollably while towing.

Further, locking features is an issue that needs to be addressed at the federal level through the Australian Design Rules to ensure consistency across all states and territories. Cars would be sold in other states that won’t have these requirements.

The bigger risk to road users is caravans and 4WDs: introducing new licence classes for these would have a much bigger impact on road safety than the one proposed. I would suggest a new class for towing anything over 1.5 tonnes.

At the end of the day, I propose that they go further and introduce tougher driving licence testing standards for all drivers, with a requirement to renew your testing every 5 or 10 years.

As people rely more and more on safety aids in modern cars, they are actually losing key driving skills, are getting lazy and have become over confident in their abilities. Hence when something does go wrong they don’t have the abilities to deal with it. – Julian Thompson

One of the great things about electric cars is that they have instant torque, allowing them to accelerate very quickly. So much so that the performance version of the most popular electric car sold in Australia today, the Tesla Model 3, is as fast as the Lamborghini Hurracan and there are other Teslas that are even quicker.

Whilst not all electric cars are fast, it would be ironic if the government’s proposal to impose extra licensing requirements for drivers of high powered vehicles resulted in people buying less electric cars. – Jason Kuchel

Commenting on the story: Resilience is catch cry for Adelaide emergency event 

Whilst recognising Professor Crouch as an expert in this area, there are a couple of observations.

The first relates to low/ no alcohol wine. There is little doubt that the market exists for these products. The difference between beer and wine appears to be that the alcohol in the natural fermenting of wine is the major determinant of taste. Beer has been able to replicate taste so that those preferring to not drink alcohol can feel socially comfortable, or meet social responsibilities of not drink driving. There is strong scepticism amongst winemakers that you can replicate taste without alcohol.

So the wine market may be currently somewhat restricted to those consumers for whom taste is not a major determinant in the purchasing of wine. That somewhat defeats the purpose of drinking a “no alcohol” wine, apart from it being something that can be used as a tool for social acceptability and responsibility.

The real challenge for winemakers is to replicate taste without alcohol which is clearly Professor Crouch’s point. It could be suggested though that it is something which has so far not been successful.

The second point is about bringing the wine maker to the market, rather than waiting at the cellar door. That already occurs but if winemakers were to spend too much of their time doing this, they would undermine the wine industry by damaging wine tourism which underpins the industry in many ways apart from just selling wine.

People go to the cellar door to experience the romance of winemaking and wine tasting, and maybe stay over to visit a wide range of experiences in a region. Wine tourism is a critical component of the wine industry that cannot, nor should be, undermined by promoting the concept of bringing the wine to the larger communities through pop ups etc.

These are challenging times for the wine industry but they won’t be solved by a temporary fix that will create a separate, unintended set of issues. – Eric Granger

Commenting on the story: Is Adelaide’s arts infrastructure keeping up with our ambitions?

What a pity this event coincides with the ASO’s Beethoven series of concerts at Elder Hall. Many music lovers will not be able to take part, though I am pleased to see it will be podcast.

The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra is highly regarded both here and across Australia, yet remains the only capital city without a dedicated purpose built concert hall. Such a venue would be an enormous asset for all music genres, not only for what is perceived by some as “elitist” classical, or fine, music.

As Adelaide is a UNESCO City of Music, this is an embarrassment for Adelaide’s arts lovers. – Linda Sampson

Commenting on the story:Quiet voices: The slow contraction of playwriting in South Australia

Great piece that sheds serious light on the situation. Very comprehensive piece of arts reporting. – Ron Hoenig