I was listening to Alan Jones

the other morning complaining about hold ups to the dualisation of the road around Gundagai. He puts it down to Aboriginal landholders stubbornness in not agreeing to the route through tribal land. There is a similar problem up here to do with the rights of traditional landholders. So I wondered how long is tradition? Rousseau talked about the origin or man's woes as being with the first rogue to lay claim to private ownership saying this land is mine and other people's believing him. In soccer and rugby, the team with the ball has the right to the ball provided they do something with it. In a maul the team has to move forward with it other wise they scrum for it. In soccer they cannot just play defensively. They have to attack. But how would you get a society to agree to the concept of doing something with the land if people just wanted it for the future and some sort of rainy day? In Sydney there was this big hole in the ground for about 20 years which was undeveloped after the '87 stock crash. The City council should have confiscated it after 5 years and sold it off. Use it lose it. Land ought to be a public asset which is sold off to someone to do something with - either housing or commerce or farming , with some set aside for public recreation.