Charles Dickens's fecund imagination allowed Pip's benefactor Magwitch to return to England from transportation to an Australian penal colony, albeit at risk of judicial execution. By all accounts, thanks to the triple-knot of location, location, location, escape for real-life transportees wasn't all that simple. What the desperate convicts of the nineteenth century needed was the…
No flies on them, mate
Filling in the immigration card at the start of the descent into Melbourne International Airport earlier this week, I could not help but chuckle as I checked the "No" box against the question "Do you have any criminal convictions?" I was unavoidably reminded of that hackneyed joke, attributed to the late Tony Hancock and especially popular…
Turning left at the end of the world
A few years ago the president of one of those numerous archipelagoes peppered across the Pacific Ocean made an accusatory statement about Australia that threatened a diplomatic incident. Listening to an interview on the BBC with the then Australian foreign minister my mind was tuned to expect a suitably circumlocutory diplomatic reply. "Frankly, he is talking a load…
Tax Break 