AlliF

Funnily enough, when we did our citizenship pledge last Australia day the govt/council people were queuing up to congratulate us afterwards and the first guy in line said to me all smug, "well you won't have to bat for England in the cricket now" Wiped the smile off his face when i said I wouldnt anyway cos I was scottish. Then he repeated his line to my hubby behind me who said I'm scottish, and cricket is rubbish. I think he stopped using that line after that...

aries

I'm a Brit and got every answer correct . . . but then after 52 years in Oz I should

fish.01

Vilification, rather than fluff piece?


"It is interesting that applicants from the UK, and particularly New Zealand, perform less well than those from similarly developed and wealthy countries," Prof Sendziuk said.

"It is possible that they do not study enough because they feel that they can rely on their background knowledge of Australia, which is a fair-enough assessment given the level of cultural exchange that already exists between Australia and these places.

"It is also possible that they take the test a bit lightly - knowing that they are likely to achieve a pass mark even without much study."


Your beat up of the story is far worse than the story...you should work in newspapers

chris955

Yes how awful they only averaged 95%, being journalists they probably dont know that it means 95 out of 100. Unfortunately these sad little jabs at the British are all too common and quite frankly pathetic. The average Brit scored around 3% less than the highest scoring country, wow.

scrubbedexpat020

Seriously, Australians don't do to well on this test, which undermines the cultural advantage theory? I don't subscribe to the built-in advantage of being a Brit - load of nonsense! We're talking about a test of 20 questions. A good memory will suffice, irrespective of nationality.

The real story is about Aussie performance relative to migrants, not the "poor" performance of Brits and Kiwis. BTW, I understand they got the Kiwi number wrong.

Yes, it was a fluff piece. But, what was the motivation? Let's have a laugh at the Brits' expense, even though the evidence is not there.

You must be Australian! I bet you know the second verse of the national anthem.

KJCherokee

It has a second verse? Why?

carolinephillips

The test is more a check to make sure you are literate and have a good vocabulary, and some knowledge of what a democracy means. If you don't have good English skills then it is far harder to answer.

fish.01

If the motivation was ridicule would they really have printed a line saying the difference was "fair enough" ? The journalist controls the quotes printed.

Real hatchet jobs are sometimes done on Brits in Aussie papers and Aussies in British papers. I would suggest a@@hole journalists exist everywhere and I have observed people who only notice it one way often end up becoming part of the problem when they retaliate with their own tripe (not you) worthy of one of the trash columns...Aussies and Brits alike.

scrubbedexpat020

That was one academic saying that, not the journalist. But, I still don't agree with the cultural relevance - rubbish! The academic must be desperate to get in the paper to be associated with this story.

Pathetic article with pathetic statements.

fish.01

Yes, it is standard practice to look for an angle on a story and then get a quote from an "expert" to substantiate your angle. Given the quote was not malicious the motivation wasn't either as the journalist chooses the expert and the quotes. Sure the article was fluff and possibly wrong in its conclusions but hardly malicious...it has nothing on the actually malicious stories printed in British and Australian papers.

BadgeIsBack

I've just read the article, and actually all it is saying is that Kiwis and Britons score lower. The only point being that maybe they should score higher - but don't - (and of course, why should they?)

We can read that the exam clearly rewards people who have mugged up on salient points of popular Australian History, and not just those with Anglo ties, or from English speaking backgrounds. And people applying for the test get some help as to what comes up in the 'paper'.

I take back what I said. It's just light journalism, not awful journalism; no big deal. I was under the impression that this article was some sort of crass finger pointing 'Aha!'. I don't think it is. So now we will have to rely on a cricket joke.

BadgeIsBack

Agreed - it's just a factual article. Anything, it's just assuming that Anglo people should do well in tests - which undermines the work of other migrants. I did think that even a tabloid paper would not try such a stunt. Leave it to the cricket.

KJCherokee

The test consists of 20 questions drawn from a total pool of about 300-400. some require knowledge of fairly esoteric subjects (e.g. the Torres Strait Islander flag which has only existed since 1992 - who knows what it looks like, let alone what the black lines represent?). So an average of 95% means that on average a group of people got one question wrong - not a bad average in my opinion.

chris955

Agreed, total nonsense, a total non story. It is sad that sections of the Aussie media find they almost need to take pot shots at the UK, it shows incredible insecurity. I see very very little about Australia in the media here and it is usually very positive.

Zen10

It's only natural though, given their history. The way Australians are insecure about Brits is the same way Brits are insecure about Americans.