Fascinating news from a university in Canberra this week reporting on a survey that gauged the attitudes of Australia’s workers facing the galloping reality of unemployment at the hands of such job-junkers as driverless vehicles, receptionless supermarkets and the online ordering of everything retail.
According to the university’s learned researchers, the doomed workforce is surprisingly chipper about the future with a strong majority cosy in the belief that it will never happen to them!
“Data shows 55 per cent of people are ‘not concerned at all’ they might lose their job…” the revelatory story goes.
But ever the punctilious pedant, PS-sssst! has swooped on the commentary to nit pick the finding, concentrating as usual on the pernickity, petty, puny and paltry and promoting the pessimism of perplexing pandemonium by panning the premise pertaining to the proposal.
In this case it’s the panned premise is the university’s use of the term “Data shows…”
When PS-sssst! went to school, ‘data’, was the plural noun for datum and could only ‘show’ the information.
It’s surprising that a university’s datum gathering didn’t reveal this.
It just goes to show!
Pun-demonium
It’s been a little while since they adorned the pages of PS-sssst! but the generously gifted writers at the Federal Department of Agriculture and Water Resources (which is happily hinged to the swinging abbreviation DAWR!) have been at it again, soliciting the skilful for their wars with words and skipping past the solecisms to treat the merry media to wise and waggish witticisms.
The Department’s latest pun drum draws attention to the all-Australian annual culinary competition which uncovers the nation’s number one fish and chip shop.
Urging the country’s fishy chippers to cast votes for their favourite Chiporium, the dour DAWR drollsters headlined their formal announcement with the very clever “Nothing Flakey about finding Australia’s best fish and chips” cheekily following up with the equally apposite appeal: “Whether you prefer grilled, battered or crumbed, voting will be hotly contested.”
Voting in the competition can be made at this PS News link but only until 15 September, which, according to DAWR isn’t very far away.
“There’s no time to ‘mullet’ over!” they battered us with!
Serving USA!
To the giant democracy of the United States now where its leadership has seemingly been entrusted to a businessman and the Public Service seems to be having trouble keeping up.
But, as always, PS News and PS-sssst! are hot on the case, uncovering what could be a business like core indicator of the PS malaise.
“My Family is a huge fan of the Public Service,” the business-oriented President has been attributed as saying, “Except it’s spelt wrong.”
“It should be spelt: Public Serve Us!”
Many a true word spoken in jest!
Remorseless reward
To Rama Gaind’s regular runaway rendition of a generous giveaway good Samaritan now with yet another fabulous free prize to be won, simply by reading and remembering Rama’s DVD review!
This week the prize is a copy of the action-packed made-for-TV movie Jesse Stone: No Remorse starring Tom Selleck and Kathy Baker.
To win the DVD, all Rama asked you to do was identify the year the film was first released (it was 2010) and then have your entry the first to emerge from the PS News Barrel of Booty.
And that’s exactly what Patricia S from the Australian Taxation Office in Queensland did and it was enough to make her the winner.
Congratulations Patricia and thanks to all who took part. The prize DVD will be on the way to its new home soon.
In the meantime if you fancy your chance to be one of Rama’s winners, simply follow this link to this week’s giveaway and give it a go. It’s free, it’s fun and someone has to win, so it may as well be you.
Best wishes to all who do.
Growing steady
And finally, the PS News family has just kept growing in July with new subscription records set in four States, one Territory and the Federal PS to take the national total to a first ever 192,000-plus .
Leading the movers in the States were NSW, Victoria, WA and South Australia, all of whom reached first ever high figures, as did the Northern Territory and Commonwealth with the Federal subscriber list now 71,384, a remarkable 46.9 per cent of the 152,095 workforce.
As always we are humbled and daunted at the same time to be serving such an audience and we can only promise to keep serving the Public Service and hope we sometimes get it right.
So a heartfelt Thank You to each and every one of our cherished readers and a pledge that we will continue to honour the unique trust you’ve extended to us to play a part in your workplace and in your careers.
As we’ve said on more than one happy occasion in the past: we’ll keep writing PS News if you keep reading it.
Next stop: 200,000!
For the record, July’s subscription lists were NSW 26,382; Victoria 25,861; Tasmania 15,110; Queensland 15,110; ACT 14,930; WA 12,744; South Australia 9,245 and Northern Territory 1,043
Till next week……
