Aussie tourist locusts

 I have just come across a newspaper article that got me into a lot of trouble in January 1976 during a visit to Australia, my homeland. I had written it out of a sense of frustration experienced by my wife and I as Aussies living in London. It was submitted under one of my pen names which I thought would be safe enough, but the Melbourne Herald published it with this intro:

This report is from a former Melbourne journalist now working in London. His name is not published to protect him from his many Australia friends and relations

The article began with this heading and these words:

THE ART OF DODGING THE AWFUL OCKER

THE prediction that half-a-million extra Australian tourists will descend on London in the next 12 months as a result of the new cheap fares is not being greeted in London with unreserved enthusiasm.

 I don’t begrudge my fellow Australians from paying a visit to the Old Country.

 But why do they all seem to end up at our house?

The trouble with this is that all my friends and family members immediately knew that the author had to be me because of the form of the introduction. So did the guilty persons. Consequently, there was a huge amount of flak from the guilty visitors as well as a number of our entirely innocent friends and family. To say there was embarrassment all round is an understatement. 

Anyway, to risk a renewal of the grief, the Melbourne Herald article is here: