The PR Blog

It is not often that a hero can also be a larrikin and vice versa. But John " Scotty " Simpson was such a man. A deserter who found himself thrust into the horror of Gallipoli instead of implementing his plan to jump ship in England  

John Simpson Kirkpatrick was an Englishman of Scottish parentage who wanted to get away from his wife.... so he joined the Merchant Navy in 1909. In 1910 he deserted from his ship when it was docked at Newcastle in Australia. He led an itinerant lifestyle as a cane cutter, coal miner and various jobs on coastal merchant ships. He also became a left wing activist with The Industrial Workers of the World. Hardly the stuff of heroes.  

But he went on to become a hero. 

They say that things aren't what they used to be. One area where that is particularly true is children.

As a lad of a mere 90 years young, I look back on my own childhood and think that I was fairly spirited and independent, in thought and in action.

But I am a pussycat in comparison to one young Australian boy named Lennie. Yes, I remember when kids were tough. But this boy makes me humble.

Over recent years, ANZAC Day was subsumed by the Coronavirus lockdown and we were denied the right to celebrate it and honour our Diggers in the usual way by government decree.

As the day approaches it looks like this year it may be subsumed again by the furore of The Voice.

Either way, I expect that we will still get the usual collection of the bearded unwashed telling us how wrong we were/are for participating in any war because we should be celebrating peace.

These angry shots are not the first, nor will they be the last salvos we ordinary grateful citizens will be subjected to by this ignorant element in our society. Ignore them and roll with the punches.

City food supplies cannot survive without reliable refrigeration at every level, from farms to retail stores. But green propagandists continue to inflict lethal damage to our electricity industry – it has become dangerously unreliable and dreadfully expensive.

This will produce unreliable and expensive food supplies.

Their intrusive green energy infrastructure is also nibbling away at our grasslands and farms, thus reducing their capacity to produce food. And their bushfire mismanagement favours destructive wildfires.

Over the centuries, we have learned so much about the strength of the human spirit. That incredible ability to triumph over adversity, whether it be physical, emotional or mental agony... or all three at once.

As Easter is uppermost in our thoughts, so too is the concept of war. That conflict that drives us to delve deep and draw upon reserves that we often did not know we had. 

Some time ago I had occasion to watch a movie called " The Ideal Palace. " It was based on the true story of a man in France, Joseph Cheval, (19 April 1836 – 19 August 1924) who built a " palace ' for his daughter, Alice. 

I dedicate this article to the women who fought, died and tragically were lost.

Alongside the brave men who did the same.

I dedicate it to the women who kept the wheels turning on the farms and in the mines and in the factories and in the family homes.

There is great equality in life and in death. But nowhere as great as in the love we feel in our hearts.