LEAD ARTICLE – DECEMBER 2019

Christmas Greetings – What Do They Mean?

Our Christmas celebrations have started already and the big day is only a week or so away. Despite the shopping crowds not being as frenetic as usual, parking is still costly and difficult, shop assistants are not always friendly and prices don’t seem to accurately reflect the economy.

Whilst it can be a joyous time, society witnesses a dramatic increase in domestic violence, road traffic accidents appear to be more frequent, sporting and leisure injuries occur and inevitably, there will be a rush to the plaintiff lawyers in the first quarter of 2020.

I often wonder who is liable. The perpetrators of domestic violence have often been subjected to similar treatment in their formative years. Actions are obviously accompanied by responsibility but poor role models who share in the architectural design faults usually escape unscathed.

Сhild suffering from quarrels between parents in the family at home

The increase in road traffic accidents presumably relates to the increased number of vehicles on our roads, the imbibition of alcohol and drugs and the impatience associated with hot, sticky weather. Although vehicle safety has improved, so have travelling speeds increased. Road trauma literature suggests that the injury spectrum is not diminishing in either extent or severity.

Sporting and leisure time activities can be particularly devastating. I have a life-long friend who is a quadriplegic. We met in 1982 when he was a 17 year old farm student from Essex in the United Kingdom. He took a shallow dive into Lake McKenzie just on sundown on the Australia Day long weekend. His quadriplegia has been permanent, with obvious serious sequelae affecting him and his family ever since.

As I genuinely wish you all well and am not intending to cast a veil of doom, society should realise that Christmas is not always what it is intended to be.