Unfortunately, this was not the case with our neighbour.

The fire was only a few kilometres away and heading in our direction when our neighbour informed us they were evacuating their site.

Chalice Mining just packed up and left.

It looks as if they are only concerned with what is below the ground, and not with what is above the surface on the properties they own.

For a company that has an assortment of fire-fighting equipment and trained personnel, it’s a bitter reality to know we won’t have help from our neighbours when the worst is heading our way.

Everyone, including SASTR, knows and understands the need to improve the road from a safety perspective.

But if it was just about safety, as Mr Neville argues, the road could be improved through far less expenditure, as has happened in the metropolitan section of Toodyay Road using road treatments that Main Roads WA (MRWA) data shows is the most cost-effective way to improve safety.

However, in order to respond to the need expressed by some in the community for “more passing lanes”, MRWA has had to spend a whole lot more money.

We can debate whether we really need the number of passing lanes that are being planned in a relatively short distance of road, particularly given the degree of environmental destruction that is necessary.

But the real issue is that federal funding was necessary to justify such expenditure and a business case had to be prepared in order to attract such funding.

SASTR has obtained that business case through an FOI request and carried out a detailed review.

It states that the investment in improvements to Toodyay Road will realise, and we quote:
“Travel time improvements of 20 per cent along the route through an increase in the posted speed to 110km/h and the provision of passing lanes”.

Such figures are arrived at using economic modelling, a technique with which this author has had some experience, and the numbers generated are predictions.

What is often not stated is that there is considerable error associated with such predictions and it is of some interest that in a presentation to Toodyay Council some years ago, travel savings from Perth to Toodyay were quoted as five minutes, not 20 per cent of travel time.

Leaving aside the flaws of economic modelling the key point here is to ask how is it possible for an organisation to attract funding based on a model or scenario that will not actually take place in real life, namely a speed limit of 110km/h?

We are slightly heartened that Mr Neville and his RoadWise Committee are not in favour of increasing the speed limit and MRWA has also since confirmed that the speed limit will remain at 100 km/h, thereby it would seem, undermining its own economic argument.

So, the business case for improvements to Toodyay Road seem to be a particularly egregious example of flawed thinking that looks at pure economics without consideration of other factors and the fault does not only lie with the funding applicant but also the organisation approving the funding.

The fact that more than 1200 people largely from the local community have signed our petition against the planned improvements, together with more than 4000 people online, would suggest that SASTR is amongst many who believe we, and our environment, deserve better from our governments!

They are active around big events such as Christmas, Easter, the Avon Descent, Anzac Day and on it goes.

Last year I was amused when the horses stood at the fence watching people go past on Melbourne Cup Day.

Recently they all disappeared with a sign saying “Gone Fishing”, only to be seen down on the river, fishing poles in hoof.

I have been watching these creatures for years and they bring me great amusement.

Does anyone else notice them?

To whoever is responsible, a big thanks.

The State Government conducted a comprehensive road safety audit on a 40km stretch of Toodyay Road from near Noble Falls to Toodyay in 2014.

This followed pressure from the Toodyay RoadWise Committee and residents, backed by local WA Nationals MP Shane Love and the Shire of Toodyay.

The Main Roads WA audit of Toodyay Road safety showed four people had died as a result of six head-on crashes in the previous five years.

The same period showed 45 “run off road” crashes, with 15 listed as being of “hospital severity”.

Fifteen crashes were listed as “hit tree”.

The audit showed that “run off road” and “head-on” crashes were priorities that needed to be addressed.

The State Government responded soon after in 2014 by reducing the main Toodyay Road speed limit from 110km/h to l00km/h, and to 90km/h for the final 10km stretch between Lovers Lane and the Toodyay townsite.

Main Roads WA has given no indication that the speed limit will return to 110km/h after the planned upgrades are completed.

The audit also revealed traffic safety deficiencies at every Toodyay Road intersection within the Shire of Toodyay.

The State Government is responsible for maintaining Toodyay Road and has listed the intersections for future upgrades.

To assert that the “major justification” for money being spent on Toodyay Road to make it safer is “allowing traffic to travel at 110km/h” is clearly incorrect.

As required by law, we call a shire ranger who takes the cat to check if it is registered, sterilised, micro-chipped, identified with a collar and tag and has an owner.

Feral cats are promptly eliminated as ought to be the case.

Households are permitted to own three ‘legal’ cats, but some people keep more and allow them to have the run of the land – and wildlife.

Cats are killers even when their owners abide by the law.

In the ACT, cats are required to be housed outdoors in cat-friendly, environmentally sound enclosures or kept indoors at all times – they are not allowed to run free at all.

Several shires are working on similar action plans.

Studies show that feral cats in Australia eat about two billion reptiles, birds, frogs and mammals and more than a billion invertebrates per year.

Mammals are the most common prey, with more than a billion killed by feral cats every year.

Pet cats are responsible for the deaths of an additional 390 million mammals, birds and reptiles annually.

Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) estimates that in just one day, millions of Australian cats kill approximately 1.3 million birds, 1.9 million reptiles, more than 3.2 million mammals, three million invertebrates and at least 250,000 frogs.

Iconic examples of their victims include native marsupials such as two species of pig-footed bandicoots, the lesser bilby, the Nullarbor dwarf bettong, the desert rat-kangaroo, the broad-faced potoroo and native rodents, including at least four species of hopping mice, two species of rabbit rat, and the lesser stick nest rat.

Cats have also been primary agents in the extinction of island-based birds such as Australia’s Macquarie Island parakeet and the Macquarie Island buff-banded rail.

Many native species – for example, the greater stick-nest rat and banded hare-wallaby – now exist only in areas that have remained cat-free.

These include some islands and inside recently fenced enclosures.

Australia’s feral cat numbers are estimated to range from about two million to more than six million in wet years when prey becomes more abundant.

It is estimated that every feral cat in Australia kills about 740 native animals annually – and there are millions of them.

Pet cats become feral if they stray or are dumped, while others behave like feral cats, including on farms and pastoral stations.

Owners clearly need to be more responsible day and night for their furry darlings.

Those who feel a community responsibility to protect our native wildlife need to be more active about managing cats lest we lose ever more of what is still alive on our lands.

Figures quoted are based on research published by the CSIRO and other sources.

To put it into perspective, even though it sounds such a long time ago, my great grandmother was born in Australia in 1855 – two years after her parents fled a potato famine that killed a million Irish people.

Many of today’s First Nations Australians would have great grandparents who were born at around the same time.

What we need to understand is that in 1855 their families were being massacred and driven into exile across Australia to make way for others arriving from overseas to take over their ancestral lands.

When I was a teenager in the 1960s, children were still being forcibly removed from their homes and placed in foster care never knowing their true cultural identity, heritage or often even their parents’ names.

It wasn’t until 1967 that Australia’s original inhabitants were even counted in the national census.

Yet in 1984 the late mining magnate Lang Hancock – who attended boarding school in Toodyay – told a national TV audience that chemicals should be put in the water to stop Aboriginal families having children.

This is all a well-documented truth that cannot be denied.

My point is that some among us say the past is the past and should not influence how we view our nation’s history or its ongoing impact on Australian society.

They say it all should be forgotten because Australians need to ‘move on’.

But for many First Nations people, what happened is still very raw and far from something that can or should be forgotten.

The truth needs to be told, and only then will we all be able to move on together as one nation.