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I read an interesting transcript from a speech made by a chap called Andrew Metcalf.

Andrew Metcalf is the Secretary for the department of Immigration and Citizenship and he made his speech during an address at the Migration Institute of Australia 2007 conference last Friday.

The national conference, held on the 19th of October brought together Migration agents from both inside and outside of Australia.

His speech highlights a number of concerns which everyone looking to utilise the services of a registered migration agent should be aware of whilst doing their homework.

I don’t want to make anyone paranoid when it comes to choosing an agent but being honest some of his comments left me feeling pretty perplexed by some of the ‘going-ons’ within the industry. Continue Reading

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So you’ve decided to move to Australia. The sun shines, the sky is blue and Aussies speak a Language that we can all understand!

Ok, the first two points in that last statement are accurate but the latter may be stretching the truth just a little. Welcome to the amazing world of Australian slang words.

You see, Aussies love slang words. If they can have a slang word for anything they will and unfortunately for us folks new to this wonderful country your time will often be spent with a baffled look on your face whilst you stand there wondering if you should smile or give the person your talking to a swift slap!

Unfortunately, there’s often little clue to what the slang word means either. Continue Reading

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I love barbecues, even in the UK, during the one or two sunny days we got each year I always made an effort to chuck a couple of sausages on the barbecue which were duly burnt beyond all recognition.

I wasn’t alone either; I think it’s fair to say that in the UK the popularity of barbecues really is on the increase.

Even last summer (in the UK) when we had a run of oh, about 7 days of good weather, charcoal was selling like hot cakes and the smell of barbecued meat, and minor food poisoning filled the air.

I always fancied a really nice gas barbecue but I could never really justify the cost of something so pricy just to have it sat in the garage for over 360 days of the year.

Now we live in Australia however it’s a completely different story! Continue Reading

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I’ve noticed recently that quite a few folks have been hitting getting down under via search engines  using search terms such as Sky TV in Australia and How do I get SKY TV in Australia?

The only reason why I’d imagine Google and co are presenting  GDU in these results is because of the the article I wrote whilst back in the UK titled ‘How to cut your SKY TV costs in half’?

Within this article I basically wrote about how willing the folks at SKY were to offer us great deals when we told them we were going to cancel our subscription.

In hindsight there wasn’t  a lot the poor buggers could do really as we were moving to Australia for good, still it shows that they are willing to drop their proverbial pants to try and keep the business.

Anyway, to provide a slightly more useful article for those looking I thought I’d write an entry to really answer the question: Can you get SKY Satellite TV in Australia? Continue Reading

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I like beer! Ok, that’s it. I’ve admitted it!

Australia’s climate is very conducive to drinking vast quantities of alcohol and I have to say I’ve been downing litres of the stuff.

Centuries ago when I first started seeing the missus I was happy to have 1 or 2 bottles of Becks. Gee chuck in half a bottle of wine and I’d be legless.

Fast forward 10 years and I’m happy to drink between 4 – 6 bottles of beer a night. It’s not the weak stuff either, since arriving in Australia I’ve developed a taste for a pale ale called ‘Coopers‘. This stuff contains 6.3% alcohol so it’s fair to say it hits the spot!

I can’t actually remember the last time I didn’t have a drink. Chuck in the odd work do or the odd night the missus decides to have a glass of wine and I’m drinking to much. Continue Reading

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Since the birth of our little girl the missus has been busy (thanks honey ) completing all the necessary paper work to make sure she was legal.

This has included registering the birth and also completing the appropriate paperwork to apply for our baby bonus.

In Australia, parents of new babies born in Australia are paid a baby bonus. I’m not 100% to sure why the bonus is paid but I think in essence its there to encourage Aussies to ‘go forth and multiply’

Australia is probably as far removed from those countries suffering high population issues as you can get.

Unlike other developed countries, Australia’s population is still very low. At time of typing it stands at approx 20.4 Million and due to the mammoth size of the country theres plenty of room for many more.

Australia’s population density is only 2.6 people to each square kilometer. Compare this to the 246 per kilometer that the UK manages to squeeze in or China’s 636 people per square kilometer and you’ll get the idea. Continue Reading

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A little while ago I added a poll (which is displayed on the left hand side of every page) to the site to try and get an indication of where folks would be heading to once they move down under.

I’m not sure if the poll is a little bias towards Western Australia because that’s what I’m writing about most of the time and will therefore be the kind of stuff people might stumble upon when searching for Western Australia on the internet.

Still, at time of typing its good to see that its not all about Western Australia.

The rankings for most popular Australia destinations for new migrants (according to our extensive poll of 84 people ) are as follows:

1. Western Australia (yay!)
2. South Australia (that’ll be Adelaide then).
3. Queensland (aka Brisbane)
4. Victoria (Melbourne)
5. New South Wales (aka Sydney)
6. Northern Territory

Ok! Its only a bit of fun but the results are still kinda interesting. I’m surprised to see New South Wales down in fifth Spot but its good to see the West and South taking some healthy pickings of new migrants.

If you’ve not taken our poll yet then go ahead You’ll find it in the side bar to the left of this post. Continue Reading

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I’ve written quite a bit about the state of the Western Australian housing market of late.

According to a recent report published by the Real Estate Institute of Australia, paying weekly rent was now a major financial headache for many WA renters.

According to the report the average median rent for a three bedroom property in Perth during the June 2007 quarter was $300.00 per week.

Personally, compared to the $450 a week we’re paying for our four bedroom house in Kinross, I don’t think that’s bad, however this figure does account for 25.7% of the average earnings in Western Australia during the same period so it’s obviously going to be hitting some folks pretty hard.

The report goes onto say that weekly rents are now increasing at a much faster rate than the average weekly earnings in WA which isn’t going to make the whole housing situation any better. Continue Reading

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Back in January I casually noted that you won’t find a red-back spider or similar deadly critter hidden around every corner.

Now we’re into October I thought I’d never get around to meeting anything that could potentially kill me and if I’m being honest I was acting a little to laid back when I was sweeping out the dead fly carcases from the shed in our new house with my hand!

Well, I can now safely say it’s time to reset the deadly creature encounter counter as yesterday I came face to face with my first Australia red-back spider.

We’ve still not moved into our new house yet as we’ve decided to get ducted air conditioning and a new alarm system fitted before we move in. We’ve still been doing the odd job here and there though and yesterday I was up there with Junior watering the plants and cleaning the swimming pool filter (which I can assure you will be the subject of many future entries).

So, I’m stood there looking at the cleaning instructions for the filter and junior comes running on over me.

“Daddy, daddy, come here. You need to look at this!”

Now, being a 4 year old Junior is very good at really ‘bigging up’ things that he’s seen. I remember once I was up to my eyes in flat packed furniture when Junior came running up to me as he had to show me something amazing and it turned out to be a ……. moth! Continue Reading

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I’ve been writing blog entries and articles on this site since January 2006 and its getting to the stage where some of the more useful articles are getting buried deep in the archives.

To try and address this I’ve written a new popular articles page.

Within this page I’ve provided links to a number of articles which may prove particularly useful to folks at various stages of their journey down under.

The popular articles can also be accessed via the popular articles link on our main menu.

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It’s happened, we finally own our own bricks and mortar here in Australia.

We got the call from our conveyancers that the settlement had been completed just after lunchtime yesterday. What a relief that was!

We picked the keys up and it felt so great unlocking the door and setting foot in our very own home for the first time.

The in-laws who are over from Sydney helping the missus out, post caesarean section also came to have a look and gave it the big thumbs up!

I know at the time it was an absolute pain in the arse but despite the masses of forms that had to be filled in for both the mortgage docs and also the conveyancers we found the whole thing a pretty straight forward exercise. Continue Reading

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Well, the last 6 weeks of stress and form filling should culminate today in the settlement on our new home.

I know it should be a relatively straight forward process but it’ll still be really great to finally get the call telling us that we now own our own bricks and mortar here in Western Australia.

Since arriving here in Perth in November last year we’ve lived in Mindarie keys, the suburb of North Perth and Finally our current spot here in Kinross.

All have been pretty nice houses but because we were renting these properties you never could really call them home. Continue Reading

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Well, it’s been a while since I last wrote about the new house we are buying up in Quinns Rocks.

Despite being a little busy recently having a baby, things have been progressing well in the last few weeks. Forms have been filled in and duly returned back to our bank and conveyancers and we are still on track to ‘complete’ this coming Tuesday.

Today we have a final inspection. This is something a little alien to me as it’s not something that really happens back in the UK but like many things Aussie it makes perfect sense. Continue Reading

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The towns and cities in Australia by UK standards are pretty spotless.

Rubbish is kept to a minimum and there seems to be quite a large army of street cleaners that help keep the places looking nice and tidy.

This applies to the suburbs to. You don’t see blokes riding along on their ’super sucker 2000′ street vacuum cleaners but they must exist in some form as any rubbish spied on one day is quickly tidied away by the next.

An interesting sign appeared on our street the other day. It was erected by someone from the council and simply had ‘Junk Week’ written on it in big bold letters with some simple instruction advising the local residents to leave their junk out for collection. Continue Reading

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Well, its been 5 days now since Junior number 2 and the missus came home.

Although the missus had a cesarean section, she was thankfully able to come home after only two days.

Although Joondalup Hospital was great and the staff were friendly and efficient it still didn’t beat the comfort of your own home so it was really good to welcome the latest addition to our family back home.

The check-out procedure from the hospital was straight forward enough. The midwife completed the last bits of paperwork and we were free to go. When Junior was born in the UK we were escorted out of the hospital by one of the nurses so we didn’t become suspected child snatchers. Continue Reading

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Ok, so it’s not quite like a book review but I thought I should write down a few first impressions following the birth of our beautiful, gorgeous, gushingly perfect daughter yesterday

Two words :- Dogs bollocks!

Ok, that may not mean to much to our Amercian visitors but let me just say this, the quality of the care and facilities we have found in Australia compared to those experienced in the United Kingdom has been fantastic!

Sure, the Joondalup Health Campus is still a pretty new hospital but the people who work there have been fantastic.

Ironically, I’d say there were more English people working at the hospital in Joondalup then there was in Halifax in the Uk which is the hospital where Junior number one was born. Continue Reading

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