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Digressions – Bob’s top gripes for 2023-2024

Yes folks, it’s a list, and not just any old list. This one selects (just some) of the things that gave the writer an urge to pen ‘outraged father of one’ letters to newspapers in 2023. All are ongoing issues in 2024.

Cash is King

Kudos to our local Credit Union teller who happily counted bags of coins and deposited them in our respective bank accounts. Some banks are no longer providing such service options, claiming to be ‘ cashless’.

We have encountered (as have you), instances of retail outlets (restaurants and bars) who refuse to take cash. Last time I looked up the legislation, cash was still ‘legal tender’. Did you know that includes one and two-dollar notes, phased out in 1984 and 1988 and replaced with the very same coins we took to the Credit Union. Go figure.

While it may be very old school to secret coins away in a container for use at Christmas, this year She Who Hoards bought a bottle of Mumm and a quality red with the proceeds. It’s called saving.

Help yourself check-outs here to stay

Major Australian supermarket chains will probably persist with their policy of encouraging customers to scan their own groceries at self-service check outs. I am one (and we are many) who refuse to do this.

The major chains will tell you they are employing more people than ever to cope with new shopping options (on-line delivery). But clearly, fewer staff are required when a store has (for example) eight service check outs and eight self-service stations. There is usually at least one employee in the self-service areas, ostensibly to ‘help’ people but more likely to spot opportunistic theft.

Large retailers including Booths (UK), Walmart and Costco (US) are reportedly winding back their self-service options. Booths is removing self-service check outs at 26 of its 28 stores, saying its customers rejected them as ‘unreliable and impersonal’.

News Ltd quoted a Marks and Spencers executive that self-service check outs lead to what he called ‘middle class shoplifting’, that is theft by people who normally would not dream of it but are motivated by an “I’m owed it” attitude.

Shoplifting is up 20% in Australian supermarkets, although there is no break-down as to how much of that is down to self-service customers leaving stores without scanning some items. Supermarkets have always had losses due to staff pilfering, shoplifting and fresh food wastage. The industry calls it ‘shrink’ and it’s factored in to financial operations.

Homeless, diamonds on the soles of their shoes (not)

If anyone’s keeping a list of things various governments promised to do about housing, prioritising the homeless is not one of them.

It’s a weight of numbers thing, true, and homeless people are more likely to gravitate to States where it is possible to live outdoors most of the year. The Census figures are damning enough, but already this snapshot taken every five years is hopelessly out of date.

The Census (2021) revealed that on any given night, 122,494 people in Australia are experiencing homelessness. One in seven are children under 12 and 23% of people experiencing homelessness are aged between 12 and 24. Homelessness Australia has a more pessimistic (or realistic) picture, but it too is dated. In 2021-22, 272,700 people were supported by homelessness services (source Institute of Australian Health and Welfare). In 2021-22, a further 105,000 people (300 per day) sought help but were unable to assisted because of shortages of staff, or accommodation or other services.

https://homelessnessaustralia.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Homelessness-fact-sheet-2023-1.pdf

What’s been done about this? Not much and even if it could be described as ‘better than the last guys’, governments are playing catch up. The stories that make headlines are homeless camps (under bridges and freeway ramps) being broken up by officialdom.

McCrindle Research reports that the average full-time annual earnings in Australia is $97,510 with household gross annual income at $121,108.

The majority of rental accommodation is expensive and in demand. House prices keep rising and interest rates are higher now than when mortgages were negotiated when rates were low. In November, 552,000 people were listed as unemployed. And don’t get me started on the plight of single pensioners who don’t own their own home.

Victorian Councillors surveyed about ‘perceptions of corruption’

In May the Independent Broad-Based Anti-Corruption Commission (IBAC) emailed all 632 Victorian local government Councillors. They were invited to participate in a perceptions of corruption survey. Reminder notices were sent over a three-week period to those who had not completed the survey. In total, 131 Councillors participated in the survey, representing a response rate of 21%. (Councils where Administrators were in place were excluded).

Almost 75% of respondents thought corruption was a problem in Victoria; 59% thought it was a problem among elected officials. Three-quarters agreed that some elected officials behaved inappropriately or unethically, but this did not necessarily extend to corrupt behaviour.

(Victorian MPs were also asked to complete the survey with similar findings and level of engagement).

Readers should be aware that this issue is not just about Victoria and Councils should expect scrutiny in an election year.

What good is the UN?

According to a databank maintained by Sweden’s Uppsala University, there have been 285 armed conflicts since the end of World War II. That doesn’t include the latest war between Israel and Gaza and who is to say there won’t be more before 2024 is out? The United Nations, previously the League of Nations, is supposed to keep the peace. The UN’s latest moves to stop the war between Palestine and Israel have so far been futile. There was a vote for a ceasefire, but it wasn’t a binding resolution. Both sides have since kept exchanging missile fire as the occupying force advanced. A United Nations Security Council bid to enforce a ceasefire was watered down to allow aid to get through to Gaza. Meanwhile, Houthi Rebels from Yemen (reportedly backed by Iran), have stepped up attacks on commercial shipping vessels travelling through the Red Sea. This too is a response to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza.

Yes, I mean no

Sydney Mayor Clover Moore was on ABC television yesterday claiming that 70% of Sydney people voted Yes in the October referendum (remember that?). I don’t remember the context but found this statistic in direct contrast to the Federal seats of Maranoa (where we live) and Fisher) where we used to live. In both these electorates the Yes vote was less than 20% and the No vote actively supported and sanctioned by sitting Federal members. Incidentally, Clover Moore defends the $6 million+ cost of Sydney setting off 50,000 fireworks at midnight as great international PR. This comes under the ‘I’m just going to leave this here’ category of social comment.

I could go on (the quality of on-line captions for the hearing-impaired, editors who organise lists into alphabetical order, hypocritical betting ads, the deterioration of ABC News (sliding rapidly into viewer-provided content and infotainment), venues that expect musicians to play for ‘exposure’, the worrying swing to the populist form of government (in Holland, Brazil and New Zealand…)

Most of all, we wish you all a Trump-free world in 2024.

People without lists are listless Part II

lists-listless-ocd — Bob’s latest shopping list – fuel, ah, fuel

This week let’s turn to the universal topic of lists and list-making.I instinctively feel that readers are ripe for a light-hearted look at something that’s not about Russia, the threat of nuclear war, the price of fuel or a new Covid strain.

I take issue with the medical journal articles that define excessive list-making as an indication of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). The fact that I re-wrote these two paragraphs 10 times is no real indication.

List-making is a solid aid to achieving goals and being efficient. Crossing items off the daily list is not a case of clinging to a way of remembering things. I just find it useful. What is not useful is when you are leaving the house (with list in pocket) and your partner calls out “get some gluten free bikkies that don’t have soy in them”. Never going to happen. It wasn’t on my list in the first place so doesn’t qualify.

Since the last time I wrote about list-keeping (2018), I have tried keeping separate lists relevant to the five or six key interests in my life, but that system became completely shambolic after a while.

So as per past habits of managing a busy life, I rely on a paper diary, an electronic task list and a small red notebook in which I list everything I’m meant to do that day.

If you too keep lists as a way of getting things done, having you noticed how the distasteful or low-priority tasks slip to the bottom or even off the page? Give dog bath usually gets skipped for a few days (added the un-completed tasks to the next day’s list).

As the subject of lists is up for review, I’d have to say they are essential when planning a lengthy caravan trip.

Fair dinkum, you’ve no idea. First you need the 10-point leaving and arriving check lists (ours is in 20-point text and laminated), so you don’t drive off with the stabilisers down or the power cable still connected to the box. Stuff like that.

Then you need a laundry list, a pantry list, two personal clothing and effects lists, a gadget list, and an ‘essentials’ check list which includes checking tyre pressures, making sure the gas cylinder is full and that there are matches and toilet paper in the van (not much use left at home on the kitchen bench). It also helps if you take the ‘dongle’ that allows you to do electronic banking along the way.

Most of you are familiar with the term ‘bucket list’ which was invented by the tourism industry to encourage people to try skydiving, bungee jumping or going over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

It took no time at all to find a list of bucket list songs swirling around on the bottom of that virtual music bucket, Spotify. Here you will find examples by songwriters including Charles Beckerson and Owen Moore. I’d never heard of them and I’m sure they have never heard of me.

Sunshine Coast songwriter Karen Law’s ‘Bucket List’ starts with motivational line – “I want to write one good song before I die”.

(Already achieved several times, in my opinion.Ed)

Writer Sasha Cagen took list-making to the wider world, first with a blog and then with a book, To-Do List: From Buying Milk to Finding a Soul Mate, What Our Lists Reveal About Us. As Cagen explained to NPR’s Diversions radio programme, it started in 2000 when she started publishing a magazine called To-Do List.

“The idea was to use the to-do list as a metaphor for all the things that we have to do to feel like we’re grownups.”

She asked readers to send in their to-do lists and in no time had about 5,000 to-do lists of all kinds, such as things to do before I die things to do before I get pregnant. She then decided to share them in a book.

Cagen was interviewed in 2007, the same year Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson starred in the dreary Bucket List, a film by Rob Reiner. The story involves two terminally ill men (from opposite sides of the track), with six months to live. They decide to explore life and make a bucket list.

Popular culture aside, the website ocdtypes.com has some pertinent things to say about the tendency for people with OCD to keep excessive lists to remind them of their daily routines.

“Research has shown that people with OCD do not have memory problems, so the lists are actually unnecessary. List-making would be considered a compulsion because the list reassures the person with OCD and helps them to feel temporarily better.”
I suppose this depends on your definition of ‘excessive’; for example ‘brush teeth, floss, polish shoes, iron shirt, put ironing board and iron back in cupboard, transfer lunch box from fridge to briefcase, kiss wife, leave’ is a wee bit over the top. You could in theory do all of this without having a list (although you left the ironing board sitting in the laundry).

A lot of lists are about people competing to reach the top of the list. Most domestic lists, by comparison, are about the efficient running of a household and equitable division of labour.

Other people’s lists (like a list of parks and reserves the local Council may or may not sell), can have a detrimental impact on our lives.

English writer and poet A.S Byatt once said ‘lists are a form of power’. More pointedly, Ahmed Yassin said: “there are many resistance movements in the world, like the IRA for instance. But it is only Islamic resistance movements that are put on the terrorist list”.

Despotic leaders have their hit lists and dispatch assassins with poisonous umbrellas and marker pens to cross their enemies off the list.

There is a top 10 endangered world heritage sites list – unsurprisingly most of them are in countries that have been split asunder by civil war. Australia managed to get on this list, however, by not taking care of the Great Barrier Reef. It’s not as if we didn’t know.

The entertainment industry absolutely loves lists, and if you are ranked number one, they will create a whole industry around you (until someone else becomes Number One). The same goes for pop music, professional sport and politics.

The world is enslaved to lists if you think about it; grand literary contests like the Booker Prize go from long lists to short lists, ditto the Academy Awards and song writing competitions. Panels appointed to review job applications or ministerial candidates also use the list system.

The traditional ‘bucket’ list usually contains travel adventures, dare devil pursuits and sometimes unattainable goals. Here’s a verse from my song, Another Year with You. How many of these things have you crossed off your list, eh?

My friends are doing marathons or they’re jumping out of planes,

The rich ones flew to the Kimberley; the poor ones caught the train;

Some heard Pavarotti sing that famous aria in the park

Swam naked with the dolphins, went croc-spotting after the dark;

Climbed Uluru at sunrise, dived for pearls at Broome,

Asked women far too young for them to come back to their room.

FOMM Back Pages

People without lists are listless

Bob’s list: “Sorry dear, there was no kale (or cabbage).”

Someone (possibly one of my lecturers), once said: ‘People without lists are listless’ – perhaps an observation on my then lack of motivation.

Decades later, I went in search of the origins of this quote and came up empty, although there are many other pithy quotes about the universal ‘to-do’ list.

Author Mary Roach, who has many opinions about lists, says that by making a list of things to be done, she loses “that vague, nagging sense that there are an overwhelming number of things to be done, all of which are on the brink of being forgotten”.

Alan Cohen, author of 24 popular inspirational books says “The only thing more important than your to-do list is your to-be list. The only thing more important than your to-be list is to be”.

I’ve been enslaved to The List since realising, as I tackled university at the ripe old age of 30, that if I wasn’t organised, it would not happen.

I‘d read a few time management books, back in the days when I aspired to be a supermarket manager, but later, embarking upon a three-year Arts degree, I made up my own system. This included hand-written term calendars posted on big sheets of butchers’ paper on the study wall. I had a diary with all lectures, tutorials and assignment deadlines colour-coded and a daily to-do list. The chief instrument of production was a huge old Olympia typewriter I bought from a Toowoomba police office sale. I decorated a large pin board with cartoons and illustrations which had something to say about productivity.

My thoughts on list-making were sharpened on a week-long trek to Gympie’s Heart of Gold film festival, followed by a spot of whale-watching. We have three one-page spreadsheets on which we tick off items every time we pack the caravan for a trip.

For reasons not easily explained, we departed from this time-honoured system and subsequently left home without a dozen items, including bath towels, phone charger, camera charger, SD card (from the camera), video camera (whale-watching, right?), a bottle of olive oil, my favourite pillow, oatmeal soap and a water bottle. Replacing the last two items was a cinch and we bought two towels from a discount department store (wash before using, the label hopefully said). The moral is, if you keep lists, actually look at them.

The three most common types of lists are (1) shopping (2) domestic chores and (3) motivational.

Motivational types will tell you it is not the items on your to-do list that matter, it is the prioritisation. People in general, but mild-mannered, non-assertive people most of all, consistently leave the most urgent and stress-inducing items for last. (Crikey, Mavis, we must talk to Jimmy (16) about his marijuana breath).

Since computers, tablets and smart phones became commonplace in homes and workplaces, the list story has taken precedence. The majority are ‘click bait’, which means whoever invented the list is getting paid for every click that takes you to an ad-festooned page. The worst of these show only one item per page, forcing you to click through if you really want to read about the 10 most successful bandy-legged men.

Some lists are, well, just way over the top. Like the one Franky’s Dad found, a list of the top 34,000 albums of all time. No, M, you don’t have time for this!

Journalist and bloggers have found that the quickest way to write a compulsive article is to turn your topic into a 10-point list. If you write a couple of paragraphs about each item you’ll quickly get to your deadline.

Lists pop up on social media all the time – ten ways to tame a wombat, 25 things you never knew about armpit hair, the top 17 crazy tattoos and so on.

Trivia aside, the shabby state of leadership and lack of sensible policy in this country suggests we all make a short list of important issues about which we feel outraged.

If you come up with more than three major items involving bad policy, prevarication, procrastination or short-term-ism, we need a change of government.

1/ #KidsoffNauru: This has become such a crisis doctors are signing an open letter to the PM; a coalition of humanitarian organisations have given the Federal Government a deadline to get 80 kids (and their parents) off Nauru. About a third of the child refugees left on Nauru are showing signs of Traumatic Withdrawal Syndrome. It is no longer OK to say it is a matter for the Nauruan government and its contractors. Whether these children are brought to Australia by November 20 or not, this has been an appalling outcome of the Federal Government’s refugee policy and should be judged so at the ballot box.

2/ Climate Change: A panel of 91 scientists has definitively told countries what they need to do by mid-century to avert the worst effects of global warming. Our Federal Government’s response to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report (which recommends phasing out coal power by 2050), was predictable. Deputy PM Michael McCormack (who may one day rue uttering these words), claimed that renewable energy could not replace baseload coal power. He said Australia should “absolutely” continue to use and exploit its coal reserves, despite the IPCC’s dire warnings the world has just 12 years to avoid climate change catastrophe. The Guardian quoted Mr McCormack as also saying that the government would not change policy “just because somebody might suggest that some sort of report is the way we need to follow and everything that we should do”.

3/ Homelessness and the cost of housing: You might dimly recall Bob Hawke’s rash promise in 1987 that no Australian child would live in poverty by 1990. Three decades later the goal is as unattainable now as it was then. Even when you take into account that Hawke mis-spoke (the script said no Australian child need live in poverty), it was an empty promise. Nine prime ministers later, close to 731,000 Australian children are living in poverty.

The official homeless figure at the 2016 Census was 116,000, with about 7% (about 8,000 people) said to be ‘sleeping rough’, defined as on the street, on a park bench, under bridges and overpasses, in their cars or in makeshift shelters. These statistics damn all sides of politics, worsening through a period in which there has been no meaningful increase in unemployment benefits or disability pensions.

Meanwhile, property investors continue to borrow money and claim expenses (notably interest payments) against rental income. In 2014-2015, 1.27 million property investors (12% of taxpayers), reduced their personal income tax through negative gearing. No government has yet had the guts to scrap negative gearing or change it in any way.

Economist Greg Jericho analysed a huge Tax Office data dump to glean a few insights – most importantly, 27% of taxpayers claiming on rental properties are in the $80k to $180k tax bracket (and another 8% earn more than that). Furthermore, just over 3% of taxpayers own six or more rental properties. The proportion that own more than one house has been on the increase in recent years.

It’s all too easy to raise other concerns, such as: Adani, Great Barrier Reef, Fracking, the threat to job security for gay teachers and even the Opera House furore (smokescreen that it is).

(Wow, that sure puts my forgetting the towels into perspective. Ed)