Scrutineer

I always thought the sale of Australian residency to the wealthy was really tacky and vulgar, but then as Australia Americanizes should we expect any different? The Yanks have been selling residency for decades.

Lived on the beach for many years, and I mean on the beach - 60 seconds walk. Nice on the right night when you could go out and swim, or just float out there and look up at the sky (the Gulf waters can be as still as a mill pond, literally totally flat) so all that was beautiful. I prefer living in the hills - feels more like Australia to me.

Seriously, I wouldn't eat any prawns, shellfish or fish from anywhere in SE Asia. Some of the conditions these things are raised in are the worst anywhere in the world. When it comes to shrimp/prawns then buy Australian if you can afford it or not at all. The majority of these shrimps come from toxic sewage environments. http://nutritionresearchcenter.org/healthnews/90-of-shrimp-is-from-toxic-sewage-ponds-in-asia/ If anyone doesn't like the source just Google it - you'll find plenty more out there.

Profit margin. Who cares if people get infections from poisoned fruit so long as the profit margin is high enough?

Australia's labelling laws are way too relaxed. As I mention earlier the "flavours" thing really irritates me - what if you have allergies? What the hell is a "flavour"? This should be illegal.

So the infection in question is very common in the third world, and also in sewage. It is relevant that it came from China because they have significantly lower levels of health and safety.

Problem is they don't have to tell you the country of origin - it simply says "Made in NZ from local and imported ingredients" so you have to guess the rest. I like this almost as I like the notorious use of "flavours" in the ingredients panel - get guessing!

Thanks Skani - we would avoid everything from China for a variety of reasons except for the fact that it is where literally everything comes from, especially in Australia.

What isn't? I hate the way they manipulate people with the "granny's wholesome lentil soup from her country kitchen" spiel when it's from a poorly-regulated industrial facility in Shandong.

As with all things that emanate from the far Left, "safeguarding" is just more semantics, in this case, this neologism really means "pre-emptive intrusion into the private family based on no evidence". We should ignore the transient opinions of the liberal elite and focus on maintaining the ancient and solid rules of our civilization. Here again in your post is a presumption that what is best for the child is state intervention against the family (when there is no evidence of wrong-doing), when we have seen very vividly in recent times, thanks to the Savile enquiry, that in general children are most at risk under the care of the state and in large state institutions, and safest in their own families. Asking for a forwarding address is an outrageous affront to the most fundamental basis of our society, and on a more superficial level, extremely rude to the parents. I will add that this is in the normal case. There are special cases, like for example, where a family has had to have social services intervention, for a good reason, and therefore I believe asking for forwarding addresses is necessary, not just preferable. I wonder if you realize how dangerous your view that "it is no longer considered acceptable to simply wait for a crime against a child to be committed or reported before it is investigated" really is, and what the implications are. Perhaps the state should have a right to go through your bank accounts and bedroom cupboards just in case you are planning a crime? It would reduce crime rates, after all.

Seems like a precarious visa to be honest.

If what they say about their agent is true then I would hope the minister will hear their appeal and rule in their favour.

The Soviets used child informants in this way all the time, but it is a matter of degrees. The OP is fully intending to tell the school of their plans in their own good time, so in the meantime it's simply a case of child's casual talk about leaving. It becomes the school's business when the child drops off the radar, and then I would see it as proper that the state made enquiries about the child's welfare, and it would be entirely the fault of the parents for not bothering to inform the school of their intention to withdraw the child. But that is not what happened here. Here a private family had the Stasi on their doorstep based on the playground chit-chat of kids. If they were really intent on intruding into the family's private life, an informal telephone call to the parents from the school might have been in order, but sending welfare officers to the house is disgraceful. I feel this is only possible because people no longer know where the line is between private and state. One of my favourite books at uni was Zamyatin's "We" - a dystopian story partly ripped off by Orwell and Huxley for their classics - he was a Soviet writer and in the story everyone has a number, not a name, and they all live in glass houses that are totally transparent - you see what he was getting at. It was written in 1921. I should add I read this privately - as if a British Uni would put that on its reading lists!

The entire point is that the council has no duty of care towards the children unless they are in the school, or if have very good evidence of mistreatment while the kids are at home. I'm saddened to see the extent to which some people have happily accepted such intrusion into their lives and have lost all sense of the private family sphere and what it means. The state has no place "checking out" the actions of private citizens unless they break the law, except, of course, in police states, where that is precisely what the state must do. Again, the whole point, and by this I mean the entire fundamental basis of our civilization, is that the authorities have no right to "follow up information", i.e. monitor and persecute individuals, unless there is evidence of a crime in commission. Telling your school that you are moving overseas is not sufficient information for them to presume you are guilt of committing a serious offence, and therefore that is the end of it. Sorry for the lengthy reply but some thing are important enough to warrant them I think, even this early in the morning!

Ours was on for 18 months, with a sale around half way in that which fell apart. Rate dropped from around 2.52 to 1.6 in that time. We held the cash in the UK for years to squeeze more from the rates. I doubt we'll ever see the days of 2.5 again. All economies are crashing now because of neoliberal economics leading to deflation, but the UK is in a worst state. I guess the Aussie rate cut has breathed a bit of temporary life into it. Not for long. Look at what colour Carney is turning.

The school has no right to know anything about your children. As a matter of courtesy you should of course write them a short note explaining the children will be ceasing attendance because of emigration, the end. People are slowly forgetting what "private family life" means.

It absolutely none of the school's, neither the state's business where you take your children. If it's a matter of records being forwarded then they give those records to the parent and the parents hand it to the new school. Unbelievable. You should take great exception to being intimidated by a state official. If they send the police around to your house on the pretext of "missing children" then simply show the police that your children are not missing because they are in your house. Then lodge a formal complaint against the council for intimidation and wasting police time. Also Daily Mail would love this, and maybe Guardian, but that one could go either way because while they love their civil liberties over there they are big on state intrusion into private lives.

You could get an imperial pint for $7 in the place I used to go, but here in our new house the only watering hole is a dump filled with pokies and bogans so I wouldn't know. Last time I was in Britain I think I had to pay £4 for a pint anyway, so same thing.

The ABC is basically a mouthpiece for the Labor Party so it's to be expected.

It depends on their chances of winning the next election when they run the numbers, which they will be doing furiously this week. A good chance at winning then Turnbull might go for it, no chance then either Abbott or a caretaker leader. Australian politics is so ludicrously volatile I don't bother to follow it to be honest because every time I tune in there's a different PM. I watched Turnbull give a foreign policy lecture once and I can assure you he knows what he's talking about and makes Gillard and Abbott look like idiots in comparison.

What saddens me is the endless, desperate endeavour engaged by the British to try and prove they're still important in some way. It's embarrassing. It's not 1815, or even 1915 any more. In fact it was over for Britain as a serious power by 1895 when both the US and Germany had overtaken it in terms of economy and it was downhill from there. The whole of the 20th Century for Britain was about the management of decline. Now they talk of reducing the British Army to 60,000 (the Australian Army is 30,000 and Australia has only a third of the population of Britain), and with the annihilation of the armed forces due to bankruptcy we now get all this desperate waffle about how we're a "soft power". No one's listening. The 21st Century is about the Pacific, Chinese expansion, US holding on in that theatre, resources in Africa and Australia. The Royal Navy only has 29 more ships than the RAN - that is just unthinkable when you look at the histories of the two nations. It won't be too long before the RAN is more powerful than the RN, not just because it has to be in this century but because Australia can afford it. It's shocking. In 1914 - just 101 years ago - the RN had 450 ships, today it has 77. China has 495 ships. Britain has very little power, which is a bad thing for the world, but there it is.

Marmite - $5 for smallest jar here. Proper beer. BBC (but less so now it's deteriorating). Trips to Europe. Browsing affordable books. Decent vegetables. Everything is more expensive in Australia except houses, petrol and red meat. Books mainly, box sets, decent cheese like Camembert only when on offer - we buy nearly everything online from overseas because retail is so expensive here. Single malt whisky, although the price is getting so high in the UK now that the disparity is shrinking.

I hardly think so. For all its faults, Australia is much more progressive and egalitarian than the UK, leading Britain in many democratic innovations, such as female suffrage and an accountable upper house. There is much greater social mobility in Australia leading to a more representative democracy, as well. And of course the UK isn't the oldest democracy in the world.

I have no problem getting on with Australians at all - I think it's a very easy country for British people to integrate into. The differences are superficial and unimportant. Also, and I don't want to be too controversial here, but the other British people you meet in Australia are different to those you meet in the UK because they've had the gumption and courage to get up and go and emigrate, so you have that in common and it takes a lot of courage to do that sometimes.

We were really surprised and pleased at how quick the turnaround was when we ordered a British passport online. I think it's faster for people overseas because I know people in the UK who have waited the entire course of their natural lives for passports to arrive...