“Having listened to the strength of feeling from our customers and the broader community, I will withdraw Kmart’s application for early trading on Anzac Day. I got this one wrong and on behalf of Kmart, I apologise,” Mr Russo said. Nice one then Mr Russo!

Federal Veterans Affairs Minister Alan Griffin had said Anzac Day was an occasion for remembering those who fought and died for their country, not for shopping and he is so correct. Anzac Day is a very important day in Australia, on par with Australia Day in January, and to think that this store could not go one day without making a profit is annoying to say the least. We don’t shop on Anzac Day, we remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

In  Australia you can insure yourself for private health care, in the UK you simply have to pay for it. It is not out of the range of many people despite the costs involved – what you need to do is create a health savings account for yourself which will pay for a private hospital and your choice of doctor. It could be well worth it in the long run considering the waiting lists right now – and the risk of contracting one of those deadly infections that are endemic in the public hospitals.

The scheme was introduced and made compulsory by former NSW premier Bob Carr in 2002 in order to cover home owners against poor or incomplete building work, but despite having collected over $225million in premiums insurance companies have paid out just $16million in claims. This is well below the usual premium-to-claim ratio of 65 to 80 per cent for consumer protection insurance. The scheme has been declared a rip off and claims of mismanagement have been fired at the State Govt by the Office of Fair Trading.

Even though insurance companies have greedily taken enormous profits from the consumers, the scheme in turn has been notoriously difficult to claim from with many who have gone bankrupt trying to claim for money to repair their homes. Another legacy of Bob Carr – a complete and utter failure for the people.

I hate them!!!

My reasons are many but basically because the people who use them everywhere they go are rude, inconsiderate to those around them and plain ignorant. Fortunately a growing number of people agree with me to the extent that one business owner in Australia is now refusing to serve those customers who come into her shop yapping loudly into their mobiles.

Sam Hansen runs a Bakers Delight franchise (a specialty bread shop) and is so fed up with trying to serve rude people who cannot put their calls on hold for 3 minutes that she has placed a sign up informing customers that they will not be served whilst they are talking on their blasted phones.

Now we are not referring to doctors taking vital calls or police, etc – these are people yapping on about nothing at all (and they always yell don’t they?) and annoying everyone else around them. Ms Hansen is fed up with greeting a customer only to be snapped at with “Do you mind, I am on the phone!” …

So she is doing what I would do…going on to the next customer and ignoring the ignoramus with the phone. This is what should be done – mobiles do have a place and purpose but people should keep them, and their inane conversations, to themselves.

I hope this catches on everywhere.

Up until recently A$200 would buy you about roughly half, or just over, in euros. For example, $300 would get you about 160 euros. Today, as I write, Mums $250 buys just 126 euros!

Definitely NOT good.

Also, most of are always finding ourselves scratching for a few extra dollars/pounds to get us through to pay day – have you ever considered that all those odd and ends lying around the house and attic could be just the ticket to getting that extra cash…?

An enterprising group of Australian’s got together and started Rentoid which is a website where you don’t sell all that stuff you want – but don’t need – but rather rent it out to those who do. It has really caught on and so long as you follow the guidelines you can pretty much rent out anything on the site – it’s a great idea particularly for those people who cannot afford the larger rental companies for things such as fridges, TV’s etc.

The then Federal Treasurer, Peter Costello, urged Australian couples to have ‘ one baby for your husband, one for your wife and one for the country’. From the 1st July 2004 each couple was paid a lump sum amount of $3000 for each child born; the amount has since risen to it’s current payment of $4000 per child born and after July the amount will increase to $5000. Of course you can imagine how this went over – extremely well.

The lump sum payment is intended to ease the initial costs of having a baby in the first weeks and months but, of course, many parents have not exactly spent the small fortune on the child – in fact it has been acknowledged that the sale of luxury items such as plasma TV’s went through the roof after the introduction of this windfall. You can just imagine. And also there is the other side of the coin…the Govt has been criticised for encouraging teenage females to fall pregnant in order to get the cash; this in fact has been happening as it was only too obvious that it would. The Govt now has determined to pay mothers, 18 years and under, the lump sum in fortnightly instalments to take the temptation out of the equation.

There is currently a heated debate raging around this entire issue. Should the cash payment instead be converted to food vouchers; utility vouchers and possibly investment incentives in order to stop greedy parents spending the money on themselves rather than the child itself. And do not forget it will soon be five thousand dollars – have a baby each year and you really start to profit. As a good number of single females have chosen to do…

Drug addicted mothers too have been found to be buying drugs with the cash; alcoholic parents are drinking the money rather than buying food and clothing for the baby – handing such a large sum of instant cash to people who are not in the position to be responsible with it really has just exacerbated these already common social ill’s.

Personally I think it is a ridiculous amount of cash to pay out for one baby; it should be ‘capped’ for sure i.e. no more payments after the second claim; not too long ago the third prize in the NSW State Lottery was $5000 if that puts it into perspective. That’s an awful lot of third prize lottery winners! the thing is millions of parents, like myself, managed pre-2004 to raise our kids without this much money being thrown at us all at once – and that also mean’t we didn’t have the luxury shopping sprees that new Mum’s now have when they get out of hospital.

But the new Labour Govt, while it decides how to best deal with the future handling of this payment and will hardly scrap it (it’s one hell of a vote winner), it must come up with a better scheme to ensure that those babies born end up benefiting from the allowance…rather than the proprietors of electrical goods stores and Gucci boutiques.

“I think we have an inflationary challenge on our hands and that requires restraint from all sections of Australia, from corporations to unions and government.”

The triple dose of bad news means battling families mortgaged to the hilt face higher loan payments, increased grocery, petrol and living expenses - and may now have negative equity in their home, where the loan exceeds the value of their property.

Sounds like stuff we all heard in the 80’s and early 90’s…

For the first time in 11 years though rates are set to climb to 6.75 per cent, an all time high for many years. But will this be enough to bring down inflation?. Many experts and top economists think not, with most predicting at least two more rate rises next year before any change in the inflation climate is detected. Rates may even peak at 9 per cent. While this may spell disaster for many people the answer may lie in refinancing their mortgages.

The best thing to do would be to consult a mortgage broker asap and find what options are available. Until inflation comes under control the average homeowner should take all precautions to protect themselves should those rates climb further towards those dreaded ‘double figures’ once again.