A COUPLE of years ago at around this time — late spring or early summer — we were awakened one morning by a knocking on the door at a little after 4.00am.
Living in a rural setting south of Swansea, it is not the time at which we expect visitors and certainly not invited or welcome visitors. I thus turned over and hoped it was a dream or a gust of wind against a loose board. But no, after further knocking, my wife insisted that I investigate — a command that had a ring of finality about it.
I struggled out of bed looking a tad dishevelled and feeling worse — notwithstanding the elegant shortie pyjamas I was sporting! — and found my way to the back door, turned on the outside light and peered out. The light revealed a young man in his early twenties, I would guess, in a very bedraggled state and with a forlorn look on his face. I could also see blood and grazes on his face, arms and hands along with blood on his clothing — not a lot of blood but sufficient for me to be concerned.
His mouth was moving but, not being able to hear what he was saying, I retrieved the house keys and opened the door — something my wife and others subsequently said that I should not have done because of the chance that he may have had compatriots hiding around a corner, waiting to purloin my pyjamas, my pennies and my pride. They were correct but, thankfully, the young man was alone.
After adjusting to the cloud of digested booze within which he was cocooned, I asked him who he was and what had happened. For purposes of this otherwise factual report I shall call him Donny. He said he came from an Eastern Shore suburb of Hobart, had been to a party in an adjacent suburb, had hitched a ride from others at the party to see a relative in the Sorell area, had been thrown out of the car by the other participants at some speed — which moved from 80kph down to 20kph as he sobered up — and here he was in Launceston. Or was it Richmond? I said it was neither. I told him he was on the East Coast, to which he responded with two words, one profane and the other indecent and both in common usage.
I explained that it was a banana to which he said “Oh, I don’t eat that stuff
We continued to talk while I found a cloth and hot water and proceeded to clean him up — face, arms, neck, legs. Donny was taking human shape again and his spirit also rallied. In the course of chatting I gathered that he was not in work at the time and his living arrangements were somewhat haphazard. Having cleaned and tidied him I got him a very large glass of orange juice which he drank with relish. I then passed him a banana in response to which he gave me an amazed look and asked “What’s that?” I explained that it was a banana to which he said “Oh, I don’t eat that stuff.” By this time the equability for which I am rightly famous — well, that’s nearly true — was deserting me and I explained that if he didn’t eat the banana I would do something unpleasant with it. To him. So I peeled the banana, handed it to him and he took it, ate it and declared “Jeez, thanks. They’re good aren’t they?” Clearly, Donny had never eaten a banana in his life nor, it seemed, even seen one.
It now being after 5.30am I raised the question of us parting company and, in response to his glance at my ute, I said that I did not propose to drive him anywhere, least of all to Swansea or Triabunna let alone Hobart. I added that I didn’t think he would qualify for an ambulance and thus the only alternative was for me to call the police. He was not overly impressed with this option but accepted it. He was quite sober by now and we chatted amiably until a police officer arrived at around 6.15am. The only sequel to the incident was that I did hear subsequently that Donny was not pushed out of a car but fell from a moving vehicle when sky-larking on the roof. The driver — one of his friends — chose not to stop and help him!
I have thought of Donny often since that night and wondered what has happened to him and what the future holds for him. I have reflected that I know all sorts of people from all walks of life — rich and poor, young and old, fit and crippled, brilliant and ordinary, black and white and in-between and most of the other computations one cares to consider — and yet I don’t think I have met anyone quite like Donny. He wasn’t stupid or offensive in any way; he wasn’t belligerent or sly. I would guess that, perhaps for want of greater parental support and more sensitive and astute guidance at school, he had drifted into an errant life style, more by accident than design. And of course that life style and the company he was keeping were possibly becoming entrenched. Perhaps he was already on the slippery slide to some nether world of petty crime and welfare as a way of life. Of course I am only speculating — and he was not complaining about his lot — but there was an air of resignation about him, perhaps an acceptance of opportunity having passed him by or being beyond his reach.
Donny was a first for me and thinking of him reminds me of a column by Greg Barns in The Mercury of 24 October. In that column Barns was rightly critical of the Tasmanian Government for wasting at least $200,000 on the Mary Donaldson saga by way of travel to and from Denmark, a gift of Tasmania Devils, fireworks and other acts of syrupy obeisance and misplaced generosity. He stressed the folly and tastelessness of this generosity by drawing attention to the simultaneous socio-economic tragedy that is the less publicised facet of Tasmanian life — crippling poverty and associated socio-economic alienation and dislocation.
Some of the figures merit restatement — average weekly earnings lower than any other state ($612 versus a national average of $757); 37.6% of households receiving some form of welfare payment; 86,000 Tasmanians worry about how to feed their families each day; and on it goes. It was a considered and timely piece.
However, the real worry in all this is that Greg Barns was canvassing only a microcosm of the state and national realities of poverty and distorted priorities. It was all he had the space for but the sad truth is that the rich-poor divide in Australia is probably as deep and wide as it has been for many decades. We are also awash in a sea of Dickensian dichotomies. Like a celebrated chef telling us recently on ABC television how to make a goat and lobster puree while many viewers have to suffice with a pie and sauce, at best. Why doesn’t the ABC come up with something that might help the other side of the divide, like the men who have been rationalised out of a job and are trying to survive with a wife and three or four children on very little money? Or are the latter best advised to take the bus across town and check out the rubbish bins of the million dollar babes of commerce who have retired from multi-million dollar salaries with multi-million dollar severance handouts and multi-million dollar pensions. Or perhaps ABC research reveals that the poor don’t watch or listen to the ABC anyway.
They can now toss a coin given that there is no substantive difference between the major parties
All the signs are that the divide between the relatively few rich and the relatively many poor will continue to widen notwithstanding that, thanks to the GST, the federal and state governments are allegedly awash with cash. They don’t mind spending our money on new ways to bet and on self-promotion and on battalions of minders and on fighting unwinable wars. All of that is OK because everything is OK until they have to go to the polls again. But, at least for the voters, the polls are no longer the challenge they once were. Why? Because they can now toss a coin given that there is no substantive difference between the major parties. Tweedledee and Tweedledum look the same, sound the same and behave the same. Like the aforementioned million dollar babes they too can look forward to handsome pensions to take them comfortably through the grey years. That is all fine if you have the cash but it is not nearly as heartening for those many who are critically dependent on adequate public health services, public transport and appropriately responsive welfare systems.
So, what happened to the Lucky Country which, as I best recall, was premised as much on cohesion as it was on comfort, affluence and optimism? But it did have its warnings and they are the chickens that have come home to roost. I truly believe that we face pressing social problems in the years and decades to come and that our leaders of the past couple of generations will be cursed for their lack of imagination, judgement and sensitivity to the plight of millions of compatriots. We are no longer a cohesive society. The rich-poor divide has become more entrenched and, with nearly 40% of Tasmanian families receiving some form of welfare payment every week, we shall be in an even more parlous state unless some new policy levers are pulled very hard very soon. Even if the socalled mainland states have only 30% of their families receiving some form of welfare, it still means the entire nation is in a mess.
So what plans do our governments have to address this problem in a substantive way and as one of urgency? I suspect that the answer is none. There seems to be no coherent national approach to this most fundamental of issues and nor is there any such plan in the states, individually or collectively. It is ludicrous in its callousness. We are an affluent country that sits idly by when about a third of the nation is doing it tough and in many, probably most, of those cases it is no fault of their own. Sure, there are some who, for one reason or another have brought misfortune upon themselves — for reasons of poor judgement, bad luck, ill-health, laziness, booze, criminal activity etc. — but not all of the welfare dependent, not nearly a third of the population, surely not anything like that.
The research, the media, the statistics, the anecdotal reports, the welfare agencies all, in their different ways from their different perspectives, tell us that we are indeed a torn society rather than a truly cohesive one. They tell us that there is a significant under-class of people who are at best treading water and at worst going backwards. We need to address this problem much more diligently. If we do not do so, future generations will curse us for our indolence, our selfishness and our lack of soul.
Related:
SAUL ESLAKE: Poverty in Tasmania
