In which there can be no escaping a determined Caterist in search of a taxpayer-funded grant ...

It was this marvellous reptile splash that had the pond rolling Jaffas down the aisle and making sure once again that no News Corp journalist had access to its mobile phone ...

The pond will leave it to others to recount the many ways that private firms have shown how much they care and how careful they are,  because the google splash made things a little clearer ...

Lordy lordy long absent lordy, could the Caterists have had a learning opportunity?

Might they have learned that it was politicians stupidly trying to save money that sent an unprepared bunch of bureaucrats off into the arms of private firm IBM to produce a monstrous cock-up, which in turn led to a tissue of lies about China - celebrated last night on Media Watch here - and an abject failure by the ABC news department, no matter how they might dress up their inept reporting?

The pond spent many happy hours shouting at the TV screen showing the ABC's news reporting.

And the result of all this? Well the pond doesn't dare report on the gossip doing the rounds about the current response rate, but if things don't get better, they'll be doing a paper chase in six months time ...

Meanwhile, if you want some idea of what actually happened, head off to Peter Martin's Code Red: How the Bureau of Statistics bungled the 2016 census.

Sadly for the pond, it's routinely left with Caterist bilge and stew, but that's the pond's lot, so please sir, we'd like more taxpayer-grant-funded gruel ...

What are we to make of the ineffable stupidity of the Caterists?

The pond seems to recall that it was documentary film-maker who returned to the UK snarling "this is what happens when you leave Cockneys out in the sun."

But there you go, and next we await the Caterist breakdown of News Corp journalists that work and perhaps even live within a CBD?

What would be the point, apart from ineffable stupidity?

Well back on topic, as a bit of a counter-balance, the pond thought it might note that on the very same day, the reptiles of Oz were slowly catching up on some other matters in relation to the census bungle:

Sweet absent lord, what happened to the Caterist explaining how it was all the fault of the government, and private firms did it so much better ... because private ...

Uh huh, and so back to another hearty dose of ineffable stupidity and meaningless statistics and Cockneys - or at least pink-cheeked English people left out in the sun too long. Can we turn him over now?

At that point, the bit about Facebook (throw in Facebook if you like or YouTube comments or whatever) being more accountable and responsive had the pond pounding the floor to stop the laughter.

Who is this goose, how much do they donate to the Menzies Research Centre? Does it match what the government mugs hand out by way of taxpayer grants so that the mug might traduce them ...

It felt the right moment to return to the rest of that IBM story featured this day by the reptiles:

Well in all this, the one thing that the pond knows for certain is that it is all the fault of the government and there is absolutely no reason to look at other governments, and certainly not governments of European countries, a region which is notoriously decadent and prone to the European disease, and simply doesn't have the first clue about agile and innovative.

After all ...

You can google the rest if you like, and so the pond is supremely, sublimely confident that th=here is absolute no way - it's a dead cert - that the Caterists would turn to Europe for examples on how to do things ...

Sheesh, the pond always gets it every which way possible ...

Here's the Caterists citing Europe and being quite cheerful about the benefits of a unique identifying number, the thing which led the ABS down into its field of pain ... because they could see a way to monetize their services even more and thereby to get the efficiency dividend and the politicians off their neck ...

Well the stopped clock speaks the truth twice a day and that's the last time the pond will use the word 'monetize' for a while, because at some point the government will have to work out a way to make its services and access easily available to its users (the pond will wash out the mouth of any public servant who dares say 'client' or 'customer') ...

And so to a cartoon because too long in the company of a Caterist leaves the pond gasping for air, oxygen and a dose of humour ... and more soothing Wilcox here ...

And when you're on a roll ...