The article related to a young person who took a stand on something she deeply believes in, as a result, was attacked by a small number of people in the accompanying comments. I don't want to get into the content of the article, the point I want to make relates to the comments themselves and the impact they have on a person who is simply standing up for what they believe in.

As a candidate in the last state election, I am very familiar with the sorts of comments that a small minority of this community can make. I have no problem with people having a different view to me or anyone else. I don't have a problem when people challenge my views or the views of others. I do have a problem with people personally attacking others for expressing a view.

We encourage young people to actively participate in society. And then when they have the courage to speak up on something that they believe is important, some older people feel they have the right to tear them down in a personal way. And some of the negative comments last week were directed at young people more broadly. There is no excuse for this behaviour.

The standard we walk past is the standard we accept. I can't walk past this. Let's support our youth and show them what a respectful debate looks like.

Editor's note: Thank you Leanne. That conversation was certainly passionate and, at times, vile. We moderate all Facebook threads and will delete any comments that breach our stated terms of use or legal concerns (we don't have the ability to prevent people from making those comments in the first place). We encourage healthy debate on the topics we publish and believe everyone is entitled to their opinion. However, personal attacks are not tolerated and repeat offenders are blocked from further involvement.

Not for the first time have I written to this newspaper, demanding that authors of letters with political agendas declare their political associations. However, yet again, Jon Gaul has written a party-politic letter and failed to disclose his role as a senior office bearer in the Liberal Party.

He is notorious for trying to represent himself as 'Joe Average', as we saw when he made an oral submission to the 'Inquiry into the implications of removing refundable franking credits' public meeting held in Merimbula. Twenty-four hours later he was outed as a Liberal Party stooge by the national media who had subsequently made some investigations into his background.

Interestingly, Jim Molan's personal campaign to seek Senate re-election, to which Mr Gaul refers, was contrary to the pre-selection agreement the Liberal Party had with their Nationals coalition partners. Those in the Liberal Party who acted contrary to the direction of head office could be the subject of severe sanctions or even expulsion from the party. Is this perhaps why Mr Gaul has failed to disclose his presidency of a local Liberal Party branch?

I recently read in the Sunday paper an advertisement from "which" bank offering lots of incentives to use the bank.

In the mid seventies I had $24,000 and wanted to borrow $6000 to buy a house, but they couldn't help me. I had banked with them for 19 years, always had a secure job and played squash with the accountant who said if I transferred funds from the credit union to the bank they might think about it. I secured funds elsewhere at a cheaper rate, but now I smile at the advertisement trying to get customers "when you already had me in the first place".