Viewpoint: On the PM’s to do list

Dear Prime Minister,

The readers of this column will be doing so on Friday, July 5, the day after the general election. However, due to the need to meet publication deadlines, I am writing this a few days before that election. I am therefore writing this to you prior to knowing the results of the general election. Interestingly, it does not really matter which of the political parties you represent as what I have to say should matter just as much to you whatever your political persuasion.

I have been a qualified optometrist nearly as long as one of the leaders of the two major parties has been on this planet. In that time, I have watched both parties ignore the benefits to the electorate that good eyesight and good eye health bring. Indeed, many who voted in this election just gone will be, what you term, blind. The saddest fact is that the blindness of many of those people was avoidable. You and previous prime ministers have been warned of the disastrous outcomes of some of your eye care policies countless times over the decades.