Australia Day

It's Australia Day on January 28 and we all get a day off to celebrate....well, what exactly?

This year, for those in doubt, the Australian Government has helpfully commissioned ads, enjoing us to "celebrate what's great" and provides a checklist for the day. It includes "overcook a variety of meats on semi-hygienic BBQs" and "make a disparaging remark about English cricket." You could then "fill your togs (swimming costume) with sand" and "exercise your democratic right to give dead-arms."

Even Australians are baffled about why they've done it. It's mildly amusing, if predictable, but hardly worth bothering with on that score. The best explanation seems to be to prove that the country, under Labor, is now run by a bunch of ordinary blokes and sheilas, and not by those effete Liberal toffs.

By the way, one of those sheilas, the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, lived in Newport, South Wales, until she was eight and her parents emigrated.