English
Noun
government stroke
- AU slang The deliberately slow pace of work supposed to be typical of government workers. (Reference: w:Australian Broadcasting Commission|Australian Broadcasting Commission w:Radio National|Radio National Lingua Franca program, 24 August 2002 1.)
#: 1991: Why not just leave things as they are and say, "We are going to run this government organisation efficiently; we are going to make sure that the government stroke has disappeared, that the managers are on the ball and that the customers get good service". — Donald Bowman, New South Wales Legislative Assembly, 2nd December 1991 2
- AU slang obsolete In the days when Australia was a penal colony, the work required from a convict on each day. This was measured in terms of a job to be completed, eg. a certain amount of land to be cleared, rather than as hours to be worked. (Reference: w:Robert Hughes (critic)|Robert Hughes, w:The Fatal Shore|The Fatal Shore, 1987, paperback 1996 ISBN 1-86046-150-6.)
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