Political hypocrisy? No way!

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From "Surprise as Premier backs Liberal 'traitor'" (Gary Adshead, The West, 29 May 2012):

Simon Morgan was sacked for running a blog which attempted to undermine the political party which employed him. Now Colin Barnett supports Morgan as a political candidate for that same party.

Earlier this year Barnett sacked his own press secretary, James Larsson,  for an action which Barnett says, "crossed the line".

One person sacked for crossing the line. Another person supported, after being sacked for crossing the line. Is this hypocrisy in action?

"He (Larsson) was an employee of the Premier," Mr Barnett said yesterday.
"This is a different situation. This is someone nominating to stand for a seat."

The Premier is, of course, absolutely correct.

An employee is expected to show some loyalty to the employer.

There is no such expectation of a politician.

Would You Move for Money?

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Today's front-page headline reads, "Cash incentive fails to entice job snobs west" (The West, 30 May 2012).

What an insult to the unemployed. Makes you wonder who pays the wages of reporters Andrew Tillett and Shane Wright.

Oh, that's right. Those employed reporters are paid a regular wage -- or perhaps a commission on stories -- by the people who control the daily newspaper. People who are, most likely, large-scale employers. Based in the west.

Imagine that you are unemployed. Living in Sydney or Melbourne. Consider the points for and against a move to Western Australia...

• The government pays you up to $9,000.
• The cost of moving house is several thousand dollars.
• If you sell a house in Melbourne or Sydney, you are selling during a real estate slump. You will not get much money. If you sell at all.
• WA is also -- supposedly -- in a real estate slump. Except that our houses are already hugely expensive. Expect to pay more that you received for your old house.
• Unless you plan to rent in WA... Well, forget it! Renters are fighting to pay exorbitant rents for a shared campsite in a caravan park.

So, imagine that you bite the bullet, take the government's money and lose a lot of your own. Now you are living in WA...

• You apply for a hundred jobs and are rejected for twenty of them. Thirty respond with an automated email telling you that your application has been received; there is no further response. The other fifty don't even acknowledge your application.
• So you are still unemployed, and further in debt.
• All your social support contacts -- family, friends, perhaps a priest, even your family doctor -- are "back home". There is now no-one to talk to.
• Your family moved with you. The children moved schools, lost all their friends. Your partner also lost all social contacts -- and lost a part-time job. You now have no income whatsoever and neither friends nor family to provide support.

Glory be! You get a job in mine construction!

• Now you are a FIFO worker. Two weeks stuck with fellow workers that you barely know. Doesn't matter, they keep changing anyway.
• Two weeks away from "home". Where your family now live.
• No way you can afford to move your family closer to work, houses near the mines cost millions. The company provides quarters only for employees.
• Your family hate living without friends, without extended family, without a parent for half the time.
• But you are earning a heap of money!
• But then, so are some of your friends back home, in the city where you grew up. Except that they are flying in and flying out from their "real" homes.

And then the construction work ends.

• You are unemployed. Again. The employer has shed you like an outgrown snake-skin.
• You own a house in WA. You have no close friends in WA. You have no extended family in WA.
• Your children and your partner have made a few friends. They have lived in the one house for a year or two. They are just beginning to settle in.
• Your only option is to move back to Melbourne or Sydney. Back to your extended family, your old friends. Back to the familiar place where you grew up. Back to a new house, a new debt.
• Your partner has had enough. Your partner and the children stay in WA.

But at least the government gave you $9,000 !

There's another little snippet in the business pages of today's paper: "Coles supermarket boss accepts $10m pay cut" (The West, 30 May 2012).

A Coles senior executive was lured from Scotland. The lure? $15million per year for a guaranteed five years.

For fifteen mill you could buy a new house in WA -- and keep the old mansion in Scotland. Your children could stay at the same school -- and fly "home" to WA for weekends. You and your partner could keep up with friends and family via regular short trips home... Why miss a nephew's birthday when the corporate jet is always on stand-by?!

Fifteen mill times five years... Would you move house for $75,000,000 ? That's almost as much as the average person could earn from a Nigerian scam...

I'm sure that the Coles executive suffered from many of the same personal and family trauma as would the "job snobs" of the east. 75 mill is an awful lot of sweetener, though the separation from a familiar environment may still be a problem. Still...

Would you move house for $9,000 ?

Independent thinking & independent analysis of your problems. Agamedes Consulting: Support for your thought. email nick leth at gmail dot com

Political Humour

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You know, I don't often notice that a politician has a sense of humour. I mean, sure, they're laughing up their sleeves at the gullible voting public. But the visible humour is usually stamped out, in case a voter is offended.

Inside Cover provided an example of apparent pollie humour ("Tatt Talk", The West, 29 May 2012). An example of a carefully crafted insult, held off till just the right time. Then thrown in as though it were spontaneous. But real humour?

For real humour, just look to Colin Barnett.

Barnett has decided on a name for his waterfront eyesore. It will be... Elizabeth Quay.

Brilliant!

First, it's a suck-up job for the royalists. Lots of voters there! Second, it's a suck-up job for the Royals. Perhaps Barnett has his eye on a royal honour? Sir Col, perhaps?

Then there are the non-royalists. And the anti-royalists... Even amongst those voters -- there are very few royal-haters. Most people admire the Queen. Even if they want to remove her from her position as our head of state. The Queen is a nice person... So...

Who could possibly object to naming a massive eyesore after such a nice person?!

It's the same logic as the Polly Farmer Pipe, and the Fiona Stanley Big Business Profit Centre: give them a popular name and the objectors lose the potential for insulting name-calling.

So where is the humour?

Mr Barnett said the name... would be a constant reminder of the Big Aussie Barbecue on the waterfront during last October's royal visit.

Remember the royal barbecue?

Remember that we had it on the waterfront?

Well... We'll never be able to do that again -- I've bulldozed the whole area!

rofl

Statistics at Work

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Statistics, eh! Marvellous things, statistics. Natural sow's-ear-to-silk-purse converters. For both researchers and reporters...

Aussies waste time at work according to Ernst & Young researchers. I say "researchers" to be polite. They analysed a survey. Perhaps the problem is with Ronan O'Connell, who reported on the survey (The West, 28 May 2012).

According to the report, "one third of Australia's workforce did not meet the national 'productivity average'."

Goodness me! One third of workers are below average productivity! So how is this "average" computed?

One third of Australians are below average height! One third of Australians are below average weight! One third of Australians are below average age! Wow!

An "average" will always have some above and some below. That's why it's called an "average".

If the research calculated a "median" productivity then exactly half of Australian workers would be below that median value. How shocking is that?! Not shocking at all, because of the way that a median value is calculated.

One third of Australian workers work at below this mysterious "national productivity average"... So what?! Two thirds work above... The average is -- by definition -- somewhere in the middle ... at an average value!

If the survey report provided an independently calculated "national productivity expectation" -- that would be interesting. But an "average" -- presumably based on the workers who were surveyed -- tells us nothing.

Nothing at all.

Except about the quality of the survey. Or the quality of the survey analysts. Or the quality of the newspaper reporter.