Where might the workers come from?

In  Parkinson's law of government and associated matters part 1, I referred to that excruciating press conference with General Campbell. Now the Australian Government has moved to split the border protection briefings into two, saying that it wants to protect the integrity of the Australian Defence Force. It should have thought that issue through from the beginning. Meantime, Mr Abbott finds himself in a degree of trouble over the refusal to allow an asylum seeker to stay with her premature baby.

Leaving these matters aside, in yesterday's post Why Australians aren't spending - the effects of growing casual and contract work on the consumption function I looked at the ways in which the growing proportion of casual and contract work affected the consumption function, making Australians less willing to spend.

Tonight's short post focuses on another aspect of the labour market. To set the scene, we need to distinguish first between actual and potential GDP. Actual GDP is what is produced, potential GDP is what might have been produced if the economy were operating at full capacity.

This spare capacity is quite important during upturns. As the economy expands, more labour is applied to existing capital stocks. Machines are worked harder, more people are employed, output expands and productivity increases. One of the interesting if depressing things flowing from this downturn is that there is some anecdotal evidence to suggest that in at least Europe and the US, potential GDP has actually declined because of lower previous capital investment as well as declines in work force capacities. This limits the scale and speed of recoveries compared with the past.

There is, I think, some evidence of this in Australia too. Outside mining, investment has been quite low. There has been something of an investment strike to go with the consumer strike, with business focused on cost cutting. Further, while the unemployment rate has stayed relatively stable, that has occurred because the participation rate (the proportion of working age people actually in the workforce) has declined.

There are a fair number of people around at the moment already engaged in or at least connected to the workforce who would like to work more hours. They aren't making enough to meet their needs. So as the general economy expands, they can either expand hours or enter jobs. Now we run up against basic constraints.

The first is the production constraint created by low investment. Firms will invest if they can see profits, but it will take time for capacity to expand. The second is people. If expansion is to continue, people will have to be drawn back into the workforce, and those people will have to come from three main groups:

• The young who are engaged in neither work nor study, who have been dropping out.
• Women, for the female participation rate has declined.
• Older men (50+) who are dropping out of the workforce at an increasing rate.

The difficulty is that none of the standard prescriptions that centre on mandated training actually see to work with any of these groups. A new way needs to be found.           

Why Australians aren't spending - the effects of growing casual and contract work on the consumption function

In the latest political round, the Greens and Opposition have combined in the Senate to effectively block the immediate increase in the Australian Government's debt ceiling from $300 to $500 billion by passing a motion limiting the increase to $400 billion. The Government won't accept that, so the matter will have to go back to the Senate at a later date. 

While this gives the opposition some satisfaction in reprising the Government's words and approach, this is silly stuff. It is also a tad dangerous. Among other things, it gives the Government a lever, should they want to use it, for further expenditure cuts. And we don't actually need that just at present. However, this is not what I wanted to write about this evening.  

Today's post explores a simple question. Why aren't Australians spending?

Retail sales have been relatively stagnant over the last few years. Effectively, consumers have been on strike. There have been good practical reasons for this. In Australia as in may other countries, personal debt levels rose during the long period of economic growth, supported in part by rising asset values. Savings rates dropped to very low levels.

This process went into reverse following the global financial crisis and subsequent global recession. People sought to save more, to spend less, to de-leverage, adding to downward economic pressure. The effects were muted in Australia by the mining boom, but persisted nevertheless. However, this is not the whole story.

You can see this in the way that commentators discuss consumer spending. They are puzzled at the continued reluctance to spend when Australian economic performance has, in fact, been quite good. Some look at the increase in on-line sales, others suggest that de-leveraging has not yet finished, some point to continuing uncertainty.

My view is a little different. I think that there has been a structural shift in the consumption function linked to changes in workforce structures.  

Work force flexibility is very important to individual businesses. It allows businesses to more easily expand or contract numbers employed to meet changing business circumstances. This aids viability at firm level. However, the growing proportion of the Australian workforce working in contract or casual roles has affected consumer behaviour. Greater work uncertainty requires people to hold larger cash reserves, as do the periodic employment gaps often associated with such work. It also depresses Christmas sales, since a not insignificant proportion of the workforce is now only paid when they work. Christmas is actually a low income period for many people.

Let me illustrate with some simple hypothetical maths.

Say you are paid $200 per day, but only when you work. Say the Christmas shutdown period is two weeks. Say you are paid weekly. Then at Christmas you face three weeks without income, two because you are not working, one because of the week's lag before your first pay comes through. So to get through Christmas you have to save to cover both foregone income and the extra spend associated with Christmas. This means that you have to save a minimum of $3,000 (three weeks times $1,000) to give you you your normal cash availability plus whatever cash you need to buy presents etc.  

The story doesn't end there, for contract and casual workers on rolling contracts have to consider the potential lag between jobs, When might my current work finish, how long might it be before I get more work? Money must be saved to cover this. This has two effects.

The first is that a casual or contract worker will necessarily need to hold more cash reserves than a permanent worker on the same notional pay. This leads to a shift in the consumption function while the necessary reserves are built up. People spend less. Once the necessary reserves are there, spend as a proportion of income can increase, However, we now need to factor in a second factor, uncertainty.

The greater the uncertainty, the more people will want/need to save. This is both structural and cyclical. In structural terms, people just need to save more in general, leading to a shift in average savings. However, marginal spending will also shift up and down. As uncertainty increases, people will cut back on spending. Conversely, as they feel more secure in their jobs, they will spend more.

Just at present, uncertainty is quite high, although recent increases in consumer confidence have flown through into an increase in retail sales. How people will respond the Commonwealth Government's latest cut backs is still to be seen. My feeling is that it will act to depress growth in consumption beyond those immediately affected.      

Australian life - that's Sydney

I have a love-hate affair with Sydney.

I love the city's variety and beauty, but dislike its pretensions. It is a wonderful place to visit and just spend time wandering through, but increasingly its becoming hard to live there.

I haven't checked the latest statistics, but the median Australian income is about $50,000. That is, half earn less than this, half more.

In Sydney, the median house price has reached $722,00, close on fifteen times the median income. In Sydney, rental vacancies have again dropped below two per cent, The median rent for all dwellings in greater Sydney has reached $470 per week. In the inner ring, the suburbs immediately surrounding the central city, the median rent for a two bedroom house or apartment is $600 per week. That's quite a lot of money, more than a person on the median income can afford.

These price effects are creating some quite interesting and indeed profound social changes. The Sydney papers such as the Sydney Morning Herald have been featuring a series of stories on what we might call inter-generational conflicts. The house owning old want to realise or manage their assets to support their retirement. The non house owning young want to access those assets to help them into housing.

You can see why conflict might result. Young Sydneysiders even in the professional class struggle to save the basic deposit to buy a place without parental top-up.

Once you do have your first place, life becomes easier so long as you haven't over-borrowed too much. Your own savings plus capital gains allow you to think of a bigger place. You don't have to worry about moving, a constant issue with those renting. Now you can happily join the Sydney real estate game!   

Parkinson's law of government and associated matters part 2 - Mr Abbott's bludgeon

Continuing from Parkinson's law of government and associated matters part 1, I need to make an important qualification. To the degree I add value to the on-line discourse, it lies in large part in my ability to make objective comments. Crikey, to use an old Australian phrase, that's hard!

In my last post, I observed that the Australian Government's refugee policy had made relations with Djakarta somewhat fractious. That has continued: Tony Abbott warns Jakarta on refusal to accept asylum-seeker boats. Mr Abbott has a point on search and rescue zones, although I'm not sure of the wisdom of expressing it in just that way. This was an Indonesian reaction yesterday to the continuing stoush: RI rejects Australian dictated solutions on people smuggling.

I am not quite sure where we go from here. Presumably Australia can refuse to provide assistance in Indonesia's search and rescue zone, Indonesia can continue to refuse to accept boat people back. Indonesia can also retaliate in other ways. Beef imports, for example. In all, a bit of a mess.

Recruitment Blues

As part of the Government's attempts to reduce Commonwealth public service numbers to meet its 12,000 reduction target, the Commonwealth has limited intake of new graduates and announced that contractors will not have their contracts extended unless a very special case can be made. This affects the national research organisation CSIRO in particular.

Both freezes on recruitment and termination of contractors are fairly standard Australian governments' first stage responses to a stated desire to reduce the number of public servants. I say governments plural because it applies at all levels. Sadly, it doesn't work very well. This is not a political comment, merely an empirical observation.

The public service has to do a certain level of work determined by what government demands. Yes, with improved productivity fewer people can do more work, although this raises another set of issues. To my minds, the commonly expressed nostrums about public sector productivity and ways to improve it are just that, nostrums. Yes, if you cut functions you can cut staff. But otherwise the work has to go on and that means people.

Blunt, bludgeon cuts of this type have several effects beyond immediate morale and performance issues. If you cut entry level recruitment for long enough, gaps start opening up at the bottom of agencies. The pipeline that allows you to fill new higher level positions from within diminishes. This is compounded by restrictions on lateral recruitment. Normally, and this is why there are so many contractors, agencies fill urgent gaps on a temporary basis via the contractor marketplace. However, in this type of freeze, that's not possible for the contractors themselves are going.

Suddenly, the cut backs go critical. Agencies start telling Ministers they can't do things. They announce, as the Australian Bureau of Statistics did under the Howard Government, that key services are being withdrawn. Forced recruitment now begins.

In the past with limitations on lateral recruitment and especially contact staff, this manifested itself in an explosion in entry level recruitment. Today, it manifests especially as an explosion in the number of contractors since this gives a much faster fix. Now the base is being laid for the next round of cuts.

Interregnum

This post has proved remarkably difficult to finish because the swirling tide of events keeps overtaking my writing! Ms Gillard is selling her house in Melbourne, Mr Rudd has suddenly resigned from Parliament, the dispute with Indonesia continues (here, here) and the new Parliament looks just as fractious as the old despite the Prime Minister's somewhat quaintly expressed hope that everybody will turn over a new leaf.

Meanwhile, action and discussion on economic and other policy issues continues in the middle of some quite remarkable lecturing through the financial press. Events seem to have brought out the ideologue in all of us!

I admit defeat in terms of what I had wanted to do in this overview post. Instead, I am going to chunk the material into more bite size bits for future use. 

Parkinson's law of government and associated matters part 1

This morning the first of a two part round up of some of the events of the last week.

Refugee Policy

The now famous "press conference" with Australian Minister for Immigration Scott Morrison with Operation Sovereign Borders Commander, Lieutenant General Angus Campbell, was just plain embarrassing. I felt sorry for General Campbell. He didn't handle it well, but that's not his job. After the first question, he should have flicked it to the Minister since his inability to comment was set by political bounds.

Media resentment over the Sovereign Borders press rules has been growing for some time. Now the Abbott Government's attempts at media management have turned into the Government's first media disaster, with the media pack in full pursuit. Who would have thought that Indonesian sources including the Jakarta Post would become such an important source for domestic Australian news? If you want to control reporting, best make sure that you can actually control it! 

Meantime, the combination of refugee policy with the espionage dispute has made Canberra's relations with Djakarta somewhat fractious.

Lake Jabs

In response to my Lake Jabs post, inveterate fellow researcher kvd came up with a source for daily weather forecasts on the Antarctic lake. It appears that the weather is dry but cold. Digging further, kvd provided further proof for the accuracy of Godwin's Law. This states that  as an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.

In kvd's case, it took him two comments. The trigger was USN Operation Highjump (1946-47) during which Lake Jabs was photographed for the first time. What I didn't know nor, I suspect kavd, was the mythology that grew up round this expedition. Did US Navy battle UFOs protecting Nazi Antarctic sanctuary in 1947? is an example.

ACT BBQs and Parkinson's Law of Government

British naval historian C Northcote Parkinson articulated a number of useful laws. His best known, Parkinson's Law, is that work expands to fill the time available. Parkinson's law of boards states that boards will focus on things that they can understand regardless of important. To illustrate he compares discussion on a bike shed with a nuclear reactor. Parkinson's law of organisations suggests that organisations who build monuments are always past their peak. he gives the Roman Catholic Church and British navy as examples. 

I would offer a variant of Parkinson's Law. As the power of governments declines, they spend more time attempting to control and regulate the things that they think they can or, more often, the things that people think that they can. More and more this limits government to what we might call the social domain.  

Most time the citizenry just rolls over, it's all too hard. People cope as best they can by selectively deciding what to ignore, what to comply with, recognising that the volume of law and regulation has reached the point that no-one can actually comprehend the full range.  

Sometimes Government actions are just so silly people actually react. The ACT BBQ laws are a case in point. These articles from the Canberra Times will give you a feel:

• 3 November 2013 Charity barbies under fire
• 3 November 2013 No need to drag fund-raising barbies over coals
• 10 November 2013 Gas bottles: BBQ war's second front

I will leave you to read the stories to get a full feel, but this quote from the Canberra Times editorial will give you a feel:

TONGS will be quivering across the territory this weekend with news that the ACT government is involving itself in the barbecue business.

More specifically, the government has introduced regulations requiring those making money from regular barbecues to engage food safety officers and pay up to hundreds of dollars to train them before they are allowed to oversee the darkening of the first snag.

This became a bridge too far for it directly attacked all the voluntary groups from school P&Cs to Rotary Clubs making money from community BBQs. Now the ACT Government is engaged in a hasty backtrack.

Parkinson's Law of Government and the Abbott Administration

The still new Abbott Government has also been wrestling with Parkinson's Law of Government. Here I quote:

The Government is determined to deliver on its election commitment to reduce the cost of unnecessary and inefficient regulation on business and the community by at least $1 billion each year, every year.

Regulation won’t be the default position for government and will only be imposed where unavoidable.

Cabinet submissions will henceforth require regulatory impact statements that quantify the compliance costs imposed and matching compliance cost cuts where regulation is unavoidable.

Excessive, unnecessary regulation stifles productivity, investment and job creation and saps business confidence.

Over the last six years, more than 21,000 additional regulations were introduced, productivity declined and Australia fell in the global competitiveness rankings. There are currently more than 50,000 Acts and legislative instruments, many of which are a handbrake on Australia’s ability to get things done.

The Government’s new approach recognises that regulation has a cost. Responsibility for the deregulation agenda now sits with the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet to ensure there is a whole-of-government approach to this critical issue.

To further streamline government and reduce duplication, the Government will also abolish or rationalise 21 non-statutory bodies where activities are no longer needed or can be managed within existing departmental resources.

The abolition or merging of a number of advisory bodies at the one time has the advantage that it blunts the capacity of the supporters of any single body to mount a counter-attack. It is also cosmetically useful is in demonstrating action when more substantive action depends upon future work.

Something similar applies to the Treasurer's announcement that action was being taken on no less than 96 previously announced taxation measures that had yet to be legislated. I have given the link so that you can look at the initial detail provided. Some will proceed, some are cancelled, others are subject to further review.

In the tax case, some of the measures are minor, but others are substantive. We need to see more detail before making final judgements.

More broadly, to a degree at least, the Government appears to be attempting to use regulation to control regulation.  The requirement that cabinet submissions will henceforth need regulatory impact statements that quantify the compliance costs imposed falls in this case. As an aside, I don't understand the second part of this sentence: "and matching compliance cost cuts where regulation is unavoidable"; am I just tired?; perhaps someone can explain. It seems to mean that you can add a new compliance cost so long as you have an offsetting saving elswhere. 

I have long argued that proposals involving new regulations should be subject to some form of cost benefit analysis; Septic tanks, swimming pools and the burden of compliance is a recent repetition of a now well worn theme. In the end, action to reduce regulation and the associated compliance burden depends upon attitudes, not rules. Ministers and departments are the starting point in deciding what not to bring forward.

I may be wrong, but I think that the Abbott Government is too authoritarian, too deeply enmeshed in the current rules, risk and measurement based political and managerial climate, to do more than remove or amend rules in those areas where it has the strongest ideological stance in favour of reduction.

Tomorrow, among other things, budgets, bludgeons and a bit on the Australian male. 

 

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Lydia O'Neil's Dinkum Aussie

Ursh, a Facebook friend of mine, collects old books, particularly anything to do with Australia and the Australian Military.

Among her collection is a book of poetry published in Brisbane by Watson, Ferguson & Co. Ltd. in 1924 and written by Lydia M. D. O'Neil. The poems are about Lydia's travels around the world during WWI and her time in Brisbane and in particular the Wynnum, Manly and Lota areas of Brisbane.

I had not heard of Lydia O’Neil, so looked her up on the AustLit data base. I quote:

O'Neil's maiden name was Dunham. She was educated in Pennsylvania public schools in the United States and published short stories in American popular magazines from 1913 to 1934 with her peak output being 1918 and 1919. A story, 'Pennsylvania' also appeared in Stockman Stories (1913) and was originally published in the National Stockman and Farmer, a Pittsburgh publication. O'Neil lived in Brisbane, Queensland, during the early 1920's before moving to Killarney on the Darling Downs. She contributed poetry, fiction and magazine articles to Queensland and other Australian newspapers and journals including The Bulletin. H. A. Kellow's Queensland Poets (1930): 246 comments: 'The courageous poetry of Lydia O'Neil, devotee of the creed of Kipling and Noyes, braves its discipleship in Dinkum Aussie (slang for 'genuine Australian') and leaves no observance out. For Miss O'Neil loves to write of soldiers and sailors and other of the King's men, of bonny jackaroos, of lean brown men nursed in a lean brown land - Australians all;...She is a typical extraverted sensationist, viewing Port o' Spain, Hong Kong, Alaska, Norway, Bokhara, or Ning-Po-Fu! The romantic glamour of these places lies primarily in herself. And so everywhere she puts a brave face on the outside world; there is the will to make the beautiful and to see all things at their best, as that best is conditioned by the poet.' (Source: J.H. Hornibrook's Bibliography of Queensland Verse With Biographical Notes (1953): 58)

The book opens with Ursh’s favourite poem of all. I wonder how many modern Australian men would recognise this image of them?

DINKUM AUSSIE.

He is long, he is lean, he is wiry;
He is loose-limbed and carelessly hung;
He is quick on the flare-up and fiery;
He swears with an eloquent tongue.
He's at home on a horse or a camel;
He could sleep in the top of a tree;
He'll try anything twice, and again if it's nice,
For a dinkum Australian is he.

His skin is as brown as a gipsy's;
Like a gipsy he's thoroughly versed
In the lore of the high-stepping ponies;
He is blessed with a marvellous thirst.
He smokes cigarettes by the thousands;
He is happy-go-lucky and free;
Independent and shows it, and "don't care who knows it,"
For a thoroughbred Aussie is he.

His fingers were born to a rifle;
His long legs for marching were made;
He'll stand up to the world to a finish,
And go down, if he goes unafraid.
For he's lord of the earth and its master,
The mountains thereof, and the sea;
Don't dispute or forget it, or he'll make you regret it,
For a dinkum Australian is he.

In love as in war, he's a terror,
Whom nothing can daunt or dismay;
If he doesn't run after the sheilas,
He never, at least, runs away.
His eyes are brown blossoms of passion,
Gold-glinting, a glory to see;
Sparkling and sprightful, and wholly delightful,
For a red-blooded Aussie is he.

He may hail you in French or Egyptian,
As suits his immediate whim;
The slang of Port Said and Toowoomba
Alike are familiar to him.
For he's gone where his banners have beckoned,
And his tremulous drums made their plea,
And he's picked up the platter of half the world's chatter,
For a dinkum Australian is he.

Right down to his toes he's a gambler,
A sport to his very last breath;
He will laugh in the face of disaster,
Toss pennies or guineas with Death.
He puts not his trust in his princes,
But dare to asperse them, and see
With what personal feeling he'll send you far-reeling,
For a loyal Australian is he.

He is lovable, natural, forceful;
He is versatile, vivid, alert;
Audacious, courageous, resourceful,
Aspiring, inquiring, expert.
He's at home in the air or the water,
For a dinkum Australian is he;
And I've done some hard thinking, and I'll say without winking,
It's a dinkum Australian for me!

Australian life - bush toilet

Nowendoc is a little village a little off Thunderbolt's Way at the southern end of the New England Tablelands. Coming back from Armidale, I stopped to go to the loo. I had been there before, but initially couldn't see it. Then I realised that it had been landscaped! It's actually quite pretty.  

Electronic espionage - a bridge too far?

The repercussions from the Snowden affair roll on. This is current Australian coverage: here, here, here. This is Indonesian coverage from the Jakarta Globe: here, here.  The Jakarta Post does not appear to be covering the story, although I was interested to learn in passing that  Mt Toba may erupt again, while marriage registers are in short supply. I am easily distracted!

Whatever Mr Snowden's motives, he has done damage to Australia's relations with Indonesia and potentially other countries. All countries spy, while Australia's intelligence cooperation with the US is well known. The problem arises when you get caught doing it. That said, I am inclined to agree with the Indonesian Foreign Minister's reported comment that this isn't cricket.

I think that this is one of those examples of the because I can I will problem. The apparent blanket tapping of all messages and conversations is a very blunt instrument. I suspect that the angst we are seeing in response is not the normal somewhat formalised protestations associated with getting caught at doing something that all do, nor even concern at US technical capacity. Something far more personal is at work.

If you think about it, how would you like your personal conversations caught?

Say you are a political leader from any country. Your conversations cover a range of personal and political matters, express a range of emotions; love, lust, anger, your children's problems, your plots against a rival. Now you learn that that all that detail has been caught by a foreign spy agency. Someone is listening to your most trivial and human day to day responses. You feel outraged, but you may also feel fear that material may be misused or leaked. That, I think, is why the response has been so strong. The response is personal. not professional. This is a bridge too far.

Lake Jabs

I received a letter from a friend today. Just for her, this is Lake Jabs in the Antarctic.

Monday Forum - a miscellany

Early this morning finished a long piece on the outlook for the Australian economy in 2014. I still need to do a final edit check on that and another piece, I have my usual history column to finish Thursday, but otherwise I am free of the external deadlines that have bedeviled my blogging. So tonight I just want to meander across a few things. Nothing profound, just notes, for comment if you will.

The Turning

On 29 September in Sunday Essay - the Turning, I reported on my reactions to seeing the film based on the Tim Winton book of short stories. I hadn't read the book at the time, but a friend gave me a copy following the film. I know Ramana ordered a copy at the same time and had since read it; at some stage I would be interested in his reaction.

I started reading the book and then put it aside. I was reading it from both a professional (how does he write? What can I learn?) and personal viewpoint. It was the second that made me put it aside. Finally, I picked it up and finished it. I am glad that I did, although my personal reactions remain the same.

Winton writes well. Reading the book as a whole, he creates a world through the interlinked short stories.You need a good memory to remember all the links, but the impressions build connections. And yet as I read, I thought that with few exceptions I wouldn't like to meet these people.

Actually, that's not quite fair. More, I felt sorry for them and a little depressed. Perhaps a fuller post later.

Swimming pool Registration

On 10 October in Septic tanks, swimming pools and the burden of compliance I took a very jaundiced view of the latest legislation in NSW on swimming pools.  A conversation today reminded me just how hard it was to stop the creep of Government regulation relating to social issues. People generally agree that it's wrong, but as soon as a specific example comes up. defenders abound.

The NSW population is around 7.3 million,  Each  year some six kids die from swimming pool accidents. When I pointed this out and the high costs involved with the new regulations, the comment was that it's not just the few deaths, it's also those kids who suffer brain damage from near drowning. But what about all the kids who no longer have access to inflatable pools with a depth greater than 30cms? What about all those who rent in public or private housing?

The new legislation exposes landlords to an additional legal risk. The simplest thing is actually to ban pools of all types. You would think that ridicule would control of of the sillier manifestations of this type of nanny state, but it doesn't work that way. The desire to avoid harm to a few imposes costs on the many. Where are the Libertarians when you want them? Off worrying about compulsory voting! 

Why the WA Election mess says positive things

In an earlier post, I referred to the mess in the WA Senate counting where 1,375 votes went missing between the first count and the the recount. Such a small number to force a probable new Senate election, but the vote was very tight. Of course its highly embarrassing for the Electoral Commission, but it's actually a very positive for Australian democracy. Why?

1. It has never happened before to my knowledge, even with a small packet of votes.
2. The Electoral Commission itself discovered the error and made it public.
3. Legal mechanisms exist to  resolve the issue,

The honesty of electoral organisations is central to democracy. They are the umpire. This case shows Australian democracy is sound at the organisational core.

I was going to write more, but time is out. Other thoughts come later.    

A short story challenge

In response to a Facebook post of mine, John Coulter wrote:

My mum grew up in Thunderbolt country and stories abound. She saw a man come running out of hotel then another man shot him dead from the hotel then the dynamite in the hotel blew up.

This is you challenge, should you care to accept it.  How do we turn John's comment into a short story? What do you think actually happened? 

Postscript

To continue the meme, here are two comments.

kvd wrote:

The man running from the pub knew about the dynamite; the publican shot him in accordance with his published policy of "you must pay before exiting or I will shoot you".

As a small business owner, I sympathise with the publican.

Secondly, (and if I were me, I wouldn't raise this, however...)John's mum hanging about outside pubs is a bit of a worry, except of course if she was pursuing her normal means of gainful employment - which I would always encourage, provided she pays the appropriate GST and abides by all health regulations.

Sorry to be so short; needs several dozen vaguely related pictures to round it out.

Now John's mum is clearly not in that game. But you could meld it into the story. And I have a vision of the shot gun hanging behind the door of kvd's premises. Might be useful, too, in handling the borders - in this case cats and dogs.

Evan wrote:

So many possibilities.

John's mum masterminded the explosion in revenge for . . . and it was her son who was shot.

John's mum was the publican's wife and was having an affair with the man shot; they'd plotted to blow up the hotel to kill the publican and live off the insurance.

There would need to be scene setting.

The man running out of the hotel was the only person who had done a good turn for the person who planted the dynamite who planned to blow up himself and others.

Again, we need to keep John' mum out of it. But Evan has added to possible threads. Keep the threads, change the name.

Election update - recounts go on

In case you were wondering, the results of the last Australian Federal election have still to be finalised, with recounting continuing in the seat of Fairfax and for the WA Senate. Just thought that you would like to know!

Postscript

It appears that Clive Palmer has won the seat of Fairfax by just 53 votes! And in WA, the Australian Electoral Commission has lost a small but crucial packet of Senate votes, throwing the recount into confusion.

Postscript 2

The WA Senate counting mess continues to unfold. New election anyone?