Clare's Eighteenth

Last night was Clare's (youngest's) eighteenth birthday party. I do not have photos yet. If any turn out well, I might put a few up.

It was nice.

It was a James Bond Casino Royale evening. Helen (eldest) arranged for some of her friends to act as croupiers. They all dressed up. We had a proper poker table, black jack and roulette.

On arrival, along the red carpet - my wife who has a genius for small touches arranged this - each guest was given a packet of imitation money to exchange for chips. Then Helen with Jenny, a friend, gave them a cocktail.

We had to watch this a bit. One guest was allergic to pineapple juice. So she had to be looked after separately. Then some did not drink. This is Sydney, so we had to take into account both religious and family prohibitions. Then, too, we did not want anybody drunk.

Again, this is Sydney where getting smashed is a right of passage among some. Eldest, who works as a barmaid just up the road, handled this very well. People could get as many drinks as they wanted. But she used half shots, thus spacing the drinking out. Some girls brought in their own, but there were no problems.

I wore a white tux to fit in. The first part of the evening was spent in taking as many photos as possible. The second part in playing black jack.

At various times I wandered outside for a smoke, taking to the two security guys. This is another feature of modern Sydney. You really do need security - and it costs - because if you get 2-3 people SMSing party details it build like a chain letter.

I enjoyed my chats. The chief security bloke was a Malaysian Chinese from Ipoh, a town that I knew. The second a Lebanese of Muslim faith who, while now a pharmacist, still helped his friend out from time to time. I fear that that I was a bit inquisitive with the second, since I am presently trying to find out things about the the Lebanese community in Australia since the lunch at Fatima's.

Towards the end, and this will please Neil (Ninglun), I watched the second half of Australia-Wales in the Rugby with a group.

Why will this please Neil? Well, Neil taught at Sydney Boys High and wrote a post on Sydney Boy's High and Rugby.

Neil, three of the group including Clare's current friend play Rugby with Sydney Boy's High, none in the first, so there you are. The fact that I played for TAS (The Armidale School) against High provided an immediate link. There are some YouTube videos on matches this year between the two schools: I should post them.

And, Neil, you are clearly remembered!

Imperial cities, global cities at a time of change

Monday this week (16 September 2007) there was a very interesting article by James Button in the Sydney Morning Herald, Winds of change create a very different Britain, that created a focus for a number of things that I have been thinking about.

James's opening paragraph reads:

A huge experiment is under way in Britain, one not all the locals like, though it seems to be doing many of them good. It is the transformation of the country into one of the most open, globalised nations in the world.

Now I do not think that James is necessarily right here for reasons that I will explain in a moment. But first his analysis.

Migration and Demographic Change

James begins by pointing to British migration statistics, statistics that I found quite fascinating because of the scale.

Last year, a record 574,000 people moved to Britain, nearly 1 per cent of the population. Australia, by contrast, took a bit over 130,000 migrants - 0.65 per cent of its population. These numbers do not count the 600,000 workers from Eastern Europe who have arrived since 2004.

This immigration is offset to a degree by record emigration. Last year, a reported 385,000 people left the country for good. One in ten Britons now lives abroad, a figure twice as large proportionally as the Australian equivalent. Nearly 700,000 Britons live in France, 800,000 in Spain, 1.3 million in Australia.

Migration and emigration together suggest a net gain of 189,000. Then there are the many short term workers entering the country adding to the population movements. To put these figures in full perspective, in 2005-2006 there were 131,593 migrants to Australia, 63,740 Australians migrated, for a net gain of 63,740. I do not have figures for those on working visas.

If we dig below the raw data for the UK, we find a number of interesting trends.

The British economy has been growing rapidly. In 1997, British per capita GDP (Gross Domestic Product) was the lowest in the G7, now G8. Today it is second. This growth makes it a magnet for migrants, especially from Eastern Europe.

But, and as evidenced by the posts on the demography matters blog, Europe in general, Eastern Europe in particular, has an aging population. This has led to competition for workers.

In Poland, somewhere between one and two million mainly young, well educated workers have left the country in the recent past. To meet resulting labour shortages - the Ministry of Labor estimates that the country needs 500,000 foreign workers annually to meet labor demand gaps - the Polish government is facilitating entry in the country for immigrant workers from Ukraine, Russia and Belarus. But these countries have their own problems.

The population of the Ukraine has been in decline since 1992. The Ukranian economy has been growing quite rapidly, so there are labor shortages. Russia, too, is experiencing population decline and is targeting worked from both the CIS and former communist states.

Without going into a full demographic analysis, underlying James Button's story is a complex pattern of mass migration with winners and losers. The UK is a winner. Poland and Ukraine are losers, as is Germany which faces population decline marked by migration of the educated young, part offset by major intake of guest workers.

The Rise of London

James Button talks about winds of change brought about by economic liberalisation creating a very different Britain, an open globalised nation. This is deceptive. We should really be talking about the rise of London for, as James also notes, London is becoming a kind of city state. Sydney is the Australian equivalent.

London, like Rome before it, has long been an imperial city drawing wealth not just from the Brittish Isles, but also from what was a vast empire. When I was born, London's population was greater than all of Australia.

London retains it's imperial position. But now the city is morphing into something more akin to Venice, a city that draws its wealth from commerce independent of the ruled hinterland. In some ways, there are now two UK's, London and the rest.

According to James Button, over the next ten years, 80 per cent of immigrants to the UK are expected to go to London, where a third of the population is already non-white. By contrast, the figure in the rest of the country is only about 8 per cent, about the same as the Australian average.

Just as has already happened in to some degree in New Zealand with Auckland, London will become a very different entity from the rest of the country. I suppose that you could say that that has always been the case at one level. However, there has always been a cultural and historical continuity that is likely to survive, at best, in an attenuated form.

Lessons for Australia

Those who read this blog will know that I am not worried at a personal level by ethnic diversity. Far from it.

But I am fascinated by what the change process means for our future.

At present, and to a degree by luck, Australia is still in the same position as the UK in its immediate region.

In an aging world of increasing mobility and competition for the best people, Australia can still attract people. But that attraction is, I think, declining.

Further, and as is happening in many countries in Europe, the proportion of young, bright, Australians leaving continues to increase. While, as James Button says, the proportion of Australians living abroad is lower than the UK, it is increasing at a fast rate.

Again as is happening in Europe, we are increasingly dependent upon migrant workers to fill gaps. I think that this will continue to increase.

But while I can plot things on straight statistical trends, I cannot say what the actual outcome will be. I suppose my best guess at present would be this.

In a world of global cities, I think that Sydney is our one chance of a global city. Sydney is already different from the rest of the country, and will become more so. This will happen anyway.

But what I don't know is whether that city can be more than a regional centre, an Auckland to Australia, but small in importance on a global scale.

In a world of global people movements, we know that the Pacific, Chinese, Indian and ASEAN influence will increase. We do not know whether Australia can retain sufficient drawing power to get its share of the best people in the global village. My best guess would be yes, but that is as much a hope as a rational aspiration.

So in all this, I do not know. But my thanks to James Button for extending my thinking.

The Poetry of Mary Gilmore - The Saturday Tub

Each Friday Neil (Ninglun) writes about an Australian poem or poems. I have fallen into the habit of writing a companion piece where I know something about the poet.

This Friday Neil featured two poems by Dame Mary Gilmore (1865-1962), a writer I know a little about. As always, please read Neil's post first.

As Neil noted, Mary Gilmore occupies a special post in Australian history, general as well as literary. You can find out more about her life from the short Australian Dictionary of Biography entry.

Neil notes that she was a Utopian then a Communist just about all her life, but paradoxically became a Dame of the British Empire (1937) and has her face on our currency. As part of the paradox, her friendships extended well beyond the notional left. One was my grandfather, David Drummond.

I do not know when they met. I do know that Mary Gilmore was an inveterate letter writer who was always looking for support for her causes and who, understandably, wanted to promote her writing. I think that they first met when David Drummond became NSW Minister for Public Instruction (Education), a role he was to hold throughout most of the 1930s.

They wrote often. I remember one of my Aunts talking about a visit to see Mary Gilmore in the little flat she had in Kings Cross.

In 1948 Angus & Robertson published Mary Gilmore's Selected Verses. Drummond wrote to her to say how much one poem, The Saturday Tub, had 'hit him'.

The poem is a nostalgic look at childhood. The writer, dreaming back by the fire, is thrown

... back where I used to be,

in eighteen hundred and something three,

Still in my place for the old bath tub,

Flannel and soap, a rub-a-dub-dub!

Standing in a line by the fire, the children take their turn

To stand in tub the size of a churn,

It was, 'where's the flannel?" and, "Mind the soap!"

Slither and slide, and scuffle and grope

Then, bath finished,

When each little shirt went over each head,

"Gentle Jesus" and "Our Father" said

It was "quick with a kiss!" and "Now they run!

And off into bed with you, everyone!"

The warmth, happiness and security in the poem is unmistakable.

For Mary Gilmore, the poem probably related to her early childhood on the farm. For David Drummond whose later childhood was neither happy nor secure, I think that the poem 'hit him' because it reminded him of the early days on the little farm at Liverpool outside Sydney.

In September 1895 (Drummond was then five), his mother's aunt wrote to his father:

.. we were so delighted to hear that you and your darling boys are well ... and oh we were so pleased to get a letter each from them ... and to hear that they help their father on the farm - and little David will have to look over you all ... tell David that he is to let us know what is the name of his kitten in your next letter.

So, to return to Neil's theme, here we have a woman who in many ways encapsulated what was called the old left position in Australian thought, but whose friendships could reach across the divides to a Country Party politician from the New England populist tradition, the tradition from I still write.

If I had to chose a single word to summarise the common element that united them, that word would be the word I used in the title of my post on David Drummond's early life, David Henry Drummond and the Importance of Compassion.

A sense of compassion was central to both.

A Need for Personal Reassurance

When I was young and often miserable, I thought that I was the only one in the world who experienced such feelings of insecurity, of confusion, of self-doubt. Even now when I know better I can still drop into the slough, looking at other people as though they are secure, certain.

The reality is that we are all insecure and uncertain to some degree. That is why the personal attack can hurt so much because it damages our sense of self-esteem.

In some ways, there are two Jims.

The personal Jim is still introverted and sometimes shy and uncertain. The professional outward Jim has learned to present as somewhat extroverted, can clearly separate personal from the professional, is not phased by criticism or alternative views expressed within a professional frame.

Sometimes the barriers between the two Jims fray under pressure. When that happens, the old personal Jim can suddenly become dominant, making it hard to cope.

Blogging is a funny mixture because this blog is the personal Jim, but still able to apply the professional frame so that I do not get upset by criticism or by alternative views.

I was reminded of the difference between the two Jims this week by a simple thing. On the one day, I got two compliments for work well done. I just blossomed.

In turn, this got me thinking. We all need reassurance, re-affirmation that we are valuable as individuals. This holds for even the most apparently certain person. So I reminded myself of the need to provide this.

This does not mean bull-shitting. Most people can recognise insincerity. As I see it, it simply means being interested, treating the views and concerns of others as important.

APEC Washup - a failure in manners leads to a lost opportunity

Andrew Scipione, the new Chief Commissioner, said tactics were clearly defined and practised. "That's the way that we do business in NSW now."

No comments Jim??... interesting when the truth comes out hey... He was a twit and deserved everything he got.... not news worthy the truth is it????

These two quotes encapsulate one of the problems (as I see it) presently facing Australia.

The first quote is a response by the NSW Police Commissioner to criticism of APEC security. So far as he is concerned, we can lump it or like it. Yes, Mr Scipione, that is the way we do business in NSW now.

The second is quote is a response to the story I put up on the arrest of Mr McLeay. This led to a comment from an apparent eye-witness. Do read it because it provides a different perspective. When I did not respond properly - I could not because my internet was down - it lead to the second comment.

Now when you have read you eye witness account, ask yourself this.

Assume that everything in the account was right, and we cannot assume that. Did this warrant the treatment, including a longish period in jail without being able to contact a lawyer? Did he deserve everything he got? I find this hard to believe.

In the heading to this post I said in summary that a failure in manners had led to a lost opportunity.

Before going on, let me make my own position clear.

First, I was very glad that Australia got to host APEC. This gave us a chance to showcase the country.

Secondly, I fully accepted that there were security issues at two levels. The first lay in the need to protect the meeting from the nut-case fringe of the anti-globalisation protesters. The second lay in the terrorist threat to some at least of the global leaders.

Thirdly, I accept that the police had a difficult job.

All this said, to my mind APEC was an failure because it failed to deliver the expected benefits. The vision of Australia that was beamed around the world was that of police, of control, of trouble.

And none of this was necessary. To my mind, the failure here comes back to one of manners and tolerance.

I said in a recent post that I was perhaps old fashioned, a tag that I was beginning to wear with some pride. Thinking about it since, old fashioned is a tag that I actually wear with great pride. I do not think that I am alone here. Recently I have noticed a growing re-emphasis on manners, on rules for interaction between people.

Manners does not mean being insincere. It does not mean bull shitting. It does mean recognising that civilised life requires courtesy, respect, the willingness to accept minor inconveniences for the benefit of others.

My objections to the universal contemptuous use of the word punter is an example of my growing objection to lack of manners, as is my increasing inclusion of the word "Mr" as compared to the universal final or family name.

I have been testing some of this. I have deliberately adopted old fashioned manners at work. Holding the door open. Asking people how they feel, and then following up if they give a an answer that suggests that they have nor been well, have a problem. Letting people into traffic.

The results have been fantastic. People brighten up, respond.

How does all this relate to APEC? Simply, I feel that in our obsession with security and control we forgot about manners.

In my my post following the Chaser's stunt I suggested that the authorities had adopted the wrong approach.

My starting point was that they should have focused on our role as hosts in making people welcome to our country. We should all have been encouraged to welcome the APEC delegates. I concluded that because they put everything into a security frame, they destroyed the chance to make APEC a public celebration in the way the Olympics were.

That post was written as the main meeting was about to get underway. I think that subsequent events reinforced my argument.

To head off the obvious response, of course the Olympics were different. This was a very different event with different problems. But I think that it remains true that the way in which we did things was flawed.

One simple example. The heavy handed and authoritarian approach created the climate for the Chaser's stunt. As a result, I suspect that the lasting memory of this APEC will be the security precautions on one side, the Chaser stunt on the other.

Video on the stunt is now up on the Chaser's site.

Delay in Posting

My computer system has been down for the last 48 hours. Very frustrating.

I had a major part completed post on Judith Wright. I will bring this up later. Now I want to respond to some other things in new posts.

APEC Security in Action

Photo: Police arrest Greg McLeay

Popping out of the office to have yum cha can be a dangerous business in APEC Sydney. In the words of Mrs McLeay:

"The children are traumatised. We spent the night sleeping together on the sofa. How does walking to yum cha with your 11-year-old son end up with 22-hours in jail and no access to a lawyer?"

You will find the story here. I begin to think that I was very lucky not to get arrested when I approached the police to find out what the reason for delay was, how to get home.

It appears that Mr McLeay was not the only one to strike trouble with APEC security.

According to Laurie Oakes, Opposition Leader Rudd almost did not make it to the Opera House lunch for Russian president Vladimir Putin at which he was to support Mr Howard’s speech of welcome.

Mr Oakes reports that Mr Rudd's Commonwealth car was turned back at three entry points to the secure zone, even though he and all members of his party — including the driver — had appropriate passes.

The Labor leader was told his car could not get past the checkpoints because it was not part of a motorcade!

Eventually Mr Rudd got out, walked through a check point, and set off on foot along Macquarie Street. Realising that he had no hope of getting to the lunch on time that way, Mr Rudd finally got a lift from friendly Sydney cop.

I cannot comment on the detail of these cases because I do not know all the facts. I in response to a ninemsn on-line question "Are police being too harsh on APEC protestors?", the no vote is presently 25,982 to a yes vote of 14,481.

I wonder what the response would be to an alternative question, "Are the APEC security precautions over the top?" I would like to think that the majority of Australians would answer yes. If not, we have a problem in that we are accepting what has happened as a new benchmark for appropriate security enforcement action.

Postscript

Never let it be said that Australians lack a sense of humour. Cartoonists and photographers both have been having a field day.

I goggled at one photo and then roared with laughter. As youngest said, only the Chasers would go into enough detail in their stunt to have a car with the number plate MUFTI!

Postscript two

I see that Neil has put up a post on this issue. Now I know that Neil does not like Miranda, and I also find some of her comments objectionable, but the fact that this (the arrest of Greg McLeay) happened to one of her close friends means that the matter will get continuing coverage.

This may be unfair in regard to others who do not have the same linkages, the German tourist who had his film siezed comes to mind, but it is important in providing protection for the rest of us. And we do need this.

Postscript three

I had not intended to add such a fast third postscript, but I was struck by the traffic patterns on this blog. Of the last twenty search engine referrals, 14 have been searches on Greg McLeay. I haven't seen this before with quite this intensity. This topic is hot!

Postscript four

This unbelievable. While the blogosphere has yet to really pick the matter up, I have been refreshing the vistor page every few minutes. Hit after hit on Greg McLeay. Today's traffic is already the highest this week. I am trying to cook lunch. I will check again in a little while.

Blog Traffic as at 8 September

I am waiting for the free to air rugby to come on, Australia v Japan. During the week traffic on one blog sneaked past 10,000 vistors without me noticing. So I thought that I would record core traffic figures for benchmark purposes. So visits by blog:

• Personal Reflections - 16,381
• Managing the Professional Services Firm - 10,036
• New England, Australia - 8,130
• Regional Living Australia - 4,824
• Management Perspectives - 3,819
• New England's History - 400
• Total - 43,050

Poor old New England's History. This is meant to be a consolidation blog, drawing together historical material from other posts for further review. But I never get time to consolidate!

Australia won 91-3.

End of the broken years - Is Australia at the next change point?

My last post expressed my confusion in struggling with some of my daughters' studies. That post and the discussion it created have crystallised a key issue in my mind - is Australia at the next change point?

Legal Eagle wrote an interesting post on the increasing tendency of women to use their husband's name, a trend causing acute distress among high water mark feminists. They interpret it as a rise in conservatism, a return to outmoded values. I see it in a different way, a symbol of something new.

Here I must state two qualifications up front. The remarks that follow are based on a narrow sample. Further, they are not an argument for or against changes, simply observations about changes.

Australia has been through a fundamental social revolution. Today's young people are the outcome of that revolution. They have accepted, internalised, some elements of that revolution, rejected others.

Today's young are the most educated generation in Australia's history. The proportion going to year twelve, to university, is the highest on record. Whatever the weaknesses of our education system, this is the most educated and articulate generation Australia has ever known.

This is also a generation that has internalised three key social changes.

The first is gender equality. The battle fought by the feminists and by their Australian bodies such as the Women's Electoral Lobby has been won, even if the outcomes have been not quite what was expected.

The second is sexual tolerance. This generation does not suffer the angst about sex and sexual proclivities that marked previous generations. The battle fought by those seeking tolerance for different sexual orientations has been won.

The third is the end of sectarian divides. This generation has little time for the religious divides that used to mark Australian life.

But while these social changes have been internalised, these are also the children of what I call the broken years.

Broken, first, because of the rise in the Australian divorce rate after the introduction of the Family Law Act. Everyone in this generation has either experienced or knows someone who has experienced the turmoil of family break-up. Experienced not as individuals fighting with their partners, but as the victims of family collapse.

Broken, second, because of the changes in the Australian workplace. This generation has seen parents, or parents of friends, go through all the changes associated with workplace change.

This experience with the broken years has had a number of effects.

The first is that this group has absolutely no expectation that their relationship with any employer will be long term. Jobs are a means to an end, not an end in themselves.

The second is the creation of an intensely tribal or group culture. If you cannot rely on your employer, your family, you have to rely on your friends. Perhaps paradoxically, where functioning families exist, these kids are very pro-family, wishing to retain close links long after previous generations would have gone their own ways.

The third is that this group has very little respect for authority. Respect has to be earned and re-earned on an individual basis, not awarded because of position.

Again paradoxically, this can be a conservative generation. Conservative does not mean voting for Mr Howard. This generation does not fit easily into traditional moulds. Rather, conservative means building stability into your own world. In this sense, I suspect that this is the most conservative generation in Australia's history.

This is also a technology generation. However, technology is a means to an end, not an end in itself, something to be used.

Technology is the underpinning of everything this group does. Mobile technology in particular is central. It links the tribal group across time and space.

This group actually thinks in terms of friends for life, something very alien to their parents, but far closer to the village life of the past. Now, however, you can remain in touch no matter how far you move. The village is an electronic village.

I do not know how these things will play out. I do know that it will be interesting to watch.

A State of Intellectual Confusion

I am confused. Very confused. I cannot help my daughters in their studies.

I first found this problem while they were at school.

Maths was different. So were English and Art. And other subjects. A core problem was that the frames - the intellectual structures - used to define the subjects had changed. So what I knew was meaningless so far as my daughters were concerned unless I could relate it to the frames. And I could not because I did not know them.

Now I have a new problem. And this relates to university studies.

Eldest asked me to look at her essay in development studies. I think that it is okay, certainly better in some ways than I could have written at her age. Yet it is also - at least as I see it - deficient.

During the week I talked to one of my colleagues who is doing development studies at Sydney. The unit she is doing at the moment appears full of values, poorly taught, with little intellectual rigour. Helen's course at the University of New South Wales is better measured simply by the degree to which it can engage her in an intellectual sense. Yet I struggle with both.

I did development economics, not development studies. But my studies were informed by my study of history and prehistory. Later there was my work as a professional economist and public servant where I was directly concerned with development issues.

When I did development economics the core question was to how to raise standards of living. Without this, nothing else had meaning. There were whole schools of thought discussing this issue. Today the position appears very different with a focus on social issues. Raising standards of living appears a sideline issue.

So when I read Helen's essay tonight, I did not know what to say. The essay focused on the import substitution school in development. There was some good stuff in it. But there was limited recognition of the historical debate in economics that has raged around this topic, little about the conceptual underpinnings developed in the past, nor (for that matter) much about the actual experiences of countries including Australia that have gone the import substitution path . Essentially we had an essay that addressed an economics topic without, in some ways, reference to economics.

Helen wanted me to give an assessment as to how well she might do. Depending on the structure of the course, the content, and the attitudes of examiners, her potential mark would appear to range all the way from very high to a bare pass. I suspect that were I to write on the same topic in the same course I might well fail, because my arguments would be just too far outside what appears to be the accepted frame.

There is a bigger issue in all this, one that links to my musings on the history of Australian and New Zealand thought. What are the current intellectual structures? How did they develop?

I can follow this in public administration, for example, because I have been in contact with the system, have studied it and written about it. So I can trace changes over time.

But when I come up against something like development studies I cannot. There is an apparent discontinuity. All very confusing.

The Chasers - 'For gorsake, stop laughing: this is serious!'"

A little while ago I ran a story starting with Australia's most famous cartoon and its caption. Dear me, this really does apply to the Chasers APEC stunt. This arguably is serious, but I could not help laughing.

The blogosphere is already running strong on the stunt. But I thought that I might make a brief comment for the benefit of international readers.

The Chaser is a satirical program on ABC TV that has achieved something approaching cult status. If you follow the link you will get a feel for it. The program is in the long irreverent Australian tradition going back to Norman Gunston and well before.

In this case, the program organised a fake motorcade and penetrated the secure area almost to the hotel where President Bush was staying before they were all stopped and arrested. Maybe they should not have done this, but thousands of Australians are laughing.

The piece that I wrote expressing my anger at the inconvenience created by the police in one case has been far more widely reported than I would have expected, including a reference on Club Troppo. For that reason, let me outline the basic mistakes that I think the authorities have made in regard to APEC.

The core mistake lay in treating APEC as first and foremost a security exercise. Yes, it is a security exercise, but this emphasis was fundamentally wrong. Instead, the authorities should have done three things.

First, they should have focused on our role as hosts in making people welcome to our country. We should all have been encouraged to welcome the APEC delegates.

Secondly, they should have explained far more about the practical problems. Note I say practical, not security. By the end of today, there will have been some 120 motorcades in Sydney. Australians are not dumb. Obviously this creates problems. So they should have spent far more time asking for public help, giving us practical information.

Then they should have focused on security. But only as a last issue. Because they (and especially the NSW Government) put everything into a security frame, they destroyed the chance to make APEC a public celebration in the way the Olympics were.

The more I think about it, the more I am astonished at just how badly the authorities stuffed up. We did not have to have this outcome.

Australia's remarkable economic performance - the need to avoid hubris

Unexpectedly, the GDP figures for the June quarter suggested that Australian economic growth has accelerated again, with June quarter on June quarter growth (seasonally adjusted) of 4.3 per cent. I say unexpectedly because many of us expected weaker figures.

This is a remarkable performance, with sixteen years of sustained growth since the bottom of the last recession in 1991. The nearest twentieth century equivalent was the period after the second world war, although this included some significant downturns. Further, the average percentage growth this time is, I think, higher that it was in that earlier period.

A few numbers to put the whole thing in context.

In 1991-1992, Australia's GDP was around $A417 billion. Commonwealth Government receipts were $A92,966 billion, 0r 22.3 per cent of GDP.

In 2005-2006, GDP reached $A960 billion. It has now passed a trillion dollars. Commonwealth Government receipts were $A221,834 billion, or 23.1 per cent of GDP.

These simple numbers show two things.

First, even adjusting for inflation (I have not done this), Australia's GDP has more than doubled during the period. Our growth has not been as fast as, say, China's, but it has still been very substantial.

Secondly, Commonwealth Government revenues have grown even faster, taking a bigger share of a bigger GDP. Quite simply, the Feds have had money coming out of their ears.

I don't want to comment on the economics in all this. Instead, I thought that I would make a few broader comments.

First, we need to avoid hubris.

Few Australians remember that twenty years ago Australia was seen by many in Asia as the sick man of Asia. Fat, wealthy, slow and in decline. This is, I think, no longer true. But we have been very lucky in many ways.

A very large number of Australians - all those who have entered the workforce since 1991 - have never experienced an economic downturn. I have, and it's not pleasant.

In 1990 the consulting marketplace collapsed, down 30 per cent in one year, the first major decline the sector had ever experienced. We had been on a strong growth path. Over the first three months of 1990 our monthly fees dropped by seventy per cent. We bled and bled.

My point in all this is the need to avoid arrogance, to recognise that we have had a degree of luck, that there will be hard times again.

This leads to my second point, the need to help more people share in the prosperity so that the benefits are more widely spread. During this growth phase, the proportion of Australian wealth held by the top 5 per cent of the population has grown far faster than GDP. The gap between rich and poor has widened, then widened again.

This links to the arrogance point.

Talking to people and listening to politicians and the media I get the strong impression that many Australians have become more censorious, less tolerant, of those not as well off as they. I can do it, why can't they?

A little humility might help here. It is actually relatively easy to make money in boom times if you have assets and/or particular skills. It remains very hard to break out of the poverty trap if you have no assets, few skills or simply experience bad luck. One of my worries is that economic downturn will lead to an explosion in the numbers of the disadvantaged.

I have not written a lot on social policy. However, I have been doing some work in this area so perhaps should share some of my thoughts. As in a number of other policy areas that I have written about, my feeling is that social policy needs new approaches if we are to to make real progress.