Give me back the Australia I left

Lawyers and food ... SRA moves from a "rules-based"  to an "outcomes" approach ... Leverhulme left Australia 18 years ago ... He made a brief sentimental return to these shores and wondered what happened to the old Oz   

Menus in pubs today proudly display their jewels in hyphenated-words.

You are offered dazzling options: British char-grilled, farm-assured beef; southern-fried-style chicken strips; six hand-carved whole onion rings or hand-battered fish and chips (which sounds like the chef has clobbered the cod) and an entire dish of gluten-free ingredients.

And the Solicitors Regulation Authority has caught this rather attractive bug. Has anyone ever properly recognised the link between food and lawyers?

The sexy new subject beloved of the SRA is outcomes-focused regulation and the language which accompanies it requires all the skills of the most cunning of linguists.

In a delightful new document, the leadership has welcomed a new approach to the spanking of solicitors.

The changes, it says, "present new challenges both to ensure that our regulatory approach does not, unnecessarily, stifle positive business development and competition" (does this mean a blind eye to a spot of money-laundering by the big shops?), but "our approach to regulation cannot, and should not, stay static in such a rapidly developing environment". 

The document even has a section on Risk Appetite. It looks remarkably similar to the seminal thesis by Van Kleef and others entitled, "Perceptions of Food Risk Management among Key Stakeholders."

So what does this all mean? The SRA could not be more explicit.

"We are clear that a rules-based approach to regulation is inappropriate in such a changing environment. Given our primary responsibility to regulate in the public interest and in the interests of consumers, a rules-based approach creates a focus on strict compliance with the rules rather than on the primary aim of achieving positive outcomes for clients." 

It won't be long before the courts will be adopting the same far-sighted approach.

A typical plea on drug-trafficking will be: "Technically, my Lord the cannabis plantation was on his property and technically, he did water it but there were many people in the industry who had invested in a decent crop-outcome." 

*   *   *

Australia is no longer the country I left 18 years ago.

On a recent trip, I noticed that what used to be a cringe is now a crow. People know their worth, which is the main topic of conversation in bars. But they also know their way around a bewildering array of coffee-options.

I used to put the cockiness down to the Sydney Olympics, where kids started to brag when we won.

Memories of the old Oz

This trend led to the applauding of unforced errors at Wimbledon. Now the smugness appears to come from the general feeling that there is plenty of dosh in the air.

The telly is terribly American. The breakfast shows are indistinguishable from each other.

There's always big-haired auto cutie with a rictus smile who has mastered the descending stress on her last syllable - a style pioneered by Maxine McHugh.

She engages in witless banter with a Gerry Gee Doll, who throws now and again to a smaller version of himself in an odd location - a cheeky fellow cooking sausages who tells you the weather will be sunny all over yet again; except in Hobart.

Many of the professional classes look as they do in London: thin, grey and slightly ravenous males and women with black suits and tightened hair to give them the formidable air and the permanently raised eyebrow.

You see the odd barrister highlighting a brief in a coffee shop. Others seem to be straight from Chancery Lane as they bounce up and down Phillip Street looking busy in that curious "carrot-arsed" gait.

The Banjo nailed it over 120 years ago.

And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me
As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste,
With their eager eyes and greedy, and their stunted forms and weedy,
For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste. 

I found a wonderful didgeridoo player with a throbbing stomach at Circular Quay, who implores you to sit with him, and noticed that nearly 40 percent of the people on buses and trains have Asian faces.

The politicians are beyond the pale. Laurie Oakes, who I can't believe is still around, but who looks exactly the same, said the peoples' representatives were dull and hypocritical, and he's right.

Not humanJulia Gillard and Kevin Rudd are not human - they've been programmed and speak an unattractive language which turns nouns into verbs and often invokes Mrs Malaprop.

The PM to her mother: 

"Mum, we need to engage in a genuine dialogue about the significant impacts we are seeking to put in place in terms the dishwasher-reloading situation."

Rudd has a Sandy Stone app in his brain: "Go and have a Bex and a lie down and a nice cup of tea."

Tony Abbott is that annoying kid at school who always had his hand up in class and who loved packing the cricket kit.

But they shine amid many embarrassing MHRs and senators who appear on the box trying to string a sentence together.

The three year parliamentary term causes endless instability and leadership speculation. Single issue candidates hold the country to ransom.

Power has turned the heads of the once well-meaning Green movement. The Greens are, in part, products of disaffection with the major parties but as far as I could tell they are loathed by lower-middle class Australians.

There is no-one with ideas or humour or colourful words like Gough Whitlam, Jim Killen or, dare I say it, Paul Keating. The politicians take everything, particularly themselves, extremely seriously.

Yet people are still open and friendly and the service in bars and restaurants is cheerful and fast.

Shops, which are plentiful and interesting, have witty names like "Love Is Blinds" and "Thai Riffic".

Australia feels comfortable - prosperous even - but it's bloody expensive. You wonder how people afford $550,000 for a grotty little two bedroom flat in Randwick.

Perhaps the playwright David Williamson was right when he said Australians were living it up on an expensive cruise, but oblivious as to where they were heading.

On the subject of boats, the politicians are obsessed with them. Coming from England where there's hardly room to swing a cat, one wonders why a massive empty country can't accommodate a few thousand hardy souls. It would probably do us good.

But forgive the cynicism of my observations - Australians are still the most blessed people on the planet. The only trouble is they now know it.