Sinecure

Sinecure (pronounced sahy-ni-kyoor or sin-i-kyoor)

(1) An office or paid position requiring little or no work, often one with no formal duties (historically sometimes as sinecure post).

(2) An ecclesiastical benefice without cure of souls (a clerical appointment to which no spiritual or pastoral charge was attached (obsolete)).

(3) Figuratively, something having the appearance of functionality without being of any actual use or purpose.

1655–1665: From the Medieval Latin phrase beneficium sine cūrā (a benefice granted without cure of souls (care of parishioners), the construct being benefices + sine (without) + cūra (care).  The construct of the Latin benefium (beneficent) was bene- (well, good) +‎ -ficus (the suffix denoting making) + -ium.  The –ium suffix (used most often to form adjectives) was applied as (1) a nominal suffix (2) a substantivisation of its neuter forms and (3) as an adjectival suffix.  It was associated with the formation of abstract nouns, sometimes denoting offices and groups, a linguistic practice which has long fallen from fashion.  In the New Latin, it was the standard suffix appended when forming names for chemical elements.  The derived forms include sinecureship, sinecurism, sinecural & sinecurist; the noun plural is sinecures.

The sinecure was a creation of medieval ecclesiastical law and referred to a situation in which the rector (with an emolument) of a parish neither resided in nor undertook the liturgical and pastoral functions of a cleric in the benefice but had a vicar serving under him, endowed and charged with the cure (pastoral care) of the parishioners.  From this the secular world borrowed the word to refer to an office or appointment which yields a revenue to the incumbent, but makes little or no demand upon their time or attention.  In ecclesiastical usage a sinecure was (1) a benefice of pecuniary value, a rectory, or vicarage, in which there is neither church nor population, (2) a benefice in which the rector receives the tithes, though the cure of souls, legally and ecclesiastically, belongs to some clerk or (3) a benefice in which there are both rector and vicar, in which case the duty commonly rests with the vicar, and the rectory is called a sinecure; but no church in which there is but one incumbent is properly a sinecure.  Presumably to avoid any clerical rorting of the system, as a technical point, ecclesiastical law noted that were a church to cease to exist or a parish become destitute of parishioners, a sinecure would not be created because the incumbent remained under obligation to perform divine service if the church should be rebuilt or the parish become inhabited.

Sinecures were for centuries a feature of the operation of Church and State in England and, as a useful form of patronage (and sometimes blatant corruption), they lasted until abolished by parliament in 1840.  They’d any way by then substantially fallen into disuse, few existing after the reform acts of the 1830s although they remained a favorite of novelists who enjoyed the possibilities their absurdity offered as a literary device, Anthony Trollope (1815–1882) in Barchester Towers (1857) memorably recounting the tale of the prebendary Dr Vesey Stanhope who spent a dozen years in Italy recovering from a sore throat, his time absorbed in catching butterflies.  Although sinecures vanished from ecclesiastical law, they remained an aspect of ecclesiastical life, under-employed clerics sometimes the subject of the same acerbic comments indolent tenured professors attract in campus fiction. 

In politics, sinecures evolved along three forks.  The first was as a formal device to allow political formations to coalesce, sinecures (the most obvious of which is the seemingly mysterious “minister without portfolio”) handy appointments when the need existed to pad out a ministry to fulfil the agreements entered into to form the coalitions necessary to secure a majority.  The second use of sinecures some claim are actually a form of corruption.  There are appointments made for base political reasons such as a means of disposing of someone suddenly inconvenient or as payment for political favors; such “jobs for the boys” (a few of which are “given” to women and the gender-neutral form “jobs for mates” is now preferred) are an integral part of modern politics.  In the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW), one premier was actually compelled to resign after an enquiry found one such appointment constituted corruption (a finding later overturned but many found the somewhat expanded definition of what actually constituted corruption to be compellingly convincing).  The sinecure also has a technical use in the operation of the UK parliament.  For historical reasons, members are not allowed to resign from the House of Commons but nor are members allowed simultaneously to hold what is termed “an office of profit under the Crown” and the conflictual interaction of these two provisions provide the mechanism by which a member may depart, the hollow shell of an ancient sinecure maintained for the purpose; once a member is appointed to the sinecure, their seat in parliament is declared vacant.

John Barilaro (b 1971) member of the NSW Legislative Assembly (Monaro) 2011-2021; cabinet minister 2014-2021 and Leader of the National Party (ex-Country Party) and thus deputy premier of NSW 2016-2021).  Mr Barilaro is pictured here with his family, May 2020.

In June 2022, Dominic Perrottet (b 1982, premier of NSW (Liberal) since 2021) announced the appointment of former deputy premier John Barilaro as NSW trade commissioner to the Americas, based in the US.  Responding to criticism this was another case of "jobs for mates", Mr Perrottet said Mr Bartilaro’s background and experience made him ideal for the role and he’d been selected not by the government but by recruitment firm NGS Global which conducted a "rigorous global talent search".  He was “…by far the most outstanding candidate" Mr Perrottet added.  Mr Barilaro seemed to agree, saying he would “…continue to build on what had already been achieved”.  One achievement of note was that the position of trade commissioner (believed to include an annual salary of Aus$400,000 and an expense account of a further Aus$100,000) was created while Mr Barilaro while a member of the NSW government although he insists this was entirely an inititive of the NSW Treasury.

Whether Mr Barilaro's appointment should be thought an example of horizontal or vertical integration attracted some interest but it certainly provides inspiration for politicians pondering their retirement planning (a task some suspect constitutes the bulk of most parliamentary careers): (1) create a number of highly paid statutory appointments (ie in the gift of a minister with no need to advertise the vacancy), (2) ensure the jobs don't require any skills or qualifications, (3) make sure at least some are based in a pleasant city in a first-world country, (4) design a job description that is vague and has no measure of success or failure & (5) arrange one's own appointment to the most desirable (methods will vary according to factional arrangements, favors owed etc).  Some probably consider this a plan B retirement scheme but it can be a lower-profile alternative to plan A which is (1) do some deal by which public assets are (sold, leased or in some advantageous way) made available to a corporation, individual, national entity etc & (2) do so in secret exchange for a lucrative (and especially undemanding) sinecure after retirement from politics.           

The reaction to the premier’s statement does illustrate the way the perception of a job can be changed according to circumstances of the appointment.  A job such as a trade commissioner would nominally be regarded as a conventional public service role, had it been filled by someone with an appropriate academic background or experience in trade or foreign relations but if given to an ex-politician, it can look like a sinecure, a nice retirement package with no expectation that KPIs or any of the other fashionable metrics of performance measurement will be much analyzed, either in New York or Sydney.

Still, Mr Barilaro has shown a flair for media management which would be handy in any foray into international relations.  In October 2021 he announced his separation from his wife of 26 years and it later transpired he was in a relationship with his former media adviser, such couplings apparently a bit of a National Party thing.  A few weeks later he concluded his valedictory speech in the NSW Parliament with the words "…one piece of advice: Be kind to each other. If we have learned anything over the past two years it is to be kind to each other."

On 30 June, following interesting revelations at a parliamentary enquiry convened to examine the processes which secured his appointment, Mr Barilaro announced he would not be taking the job.  "It is clear that my taking up this role is now not tenable with the amount of media attention this appointment has gained." he said in a written statement, adding "I believe my appointment will continue to be a distraction and not allow this important role to achieve what it was designed to do, and thus my decision."  In conclusion, he stated "I stress, that I have always maintained that I followed the process and look forward to the results of the review."

To the extent possible, he followed the politician's three-step playbook of how to try to extricate one's self from a tricky situation of one's own making: (1) blame the unfair media coverage, (2) assert there's been no wrong-doing but to avoid becoming a distraction for the party (usually expressed as "the government", "the state" etc) I am (withdrawing, resigning, standing aside etc) & (3) I am looking forward to spending more time with my family.  In the circumstances, he chose not to invoke step (3), that perhaps a bit much, even for Mr Barilaro.  The parliamentary enquiry however remains afoot (as does an internal review which may have a different agenda) and its findings should make interesting reading, students of the manufacture of sausages expected to be amused, if not surprised.

Ambassador

Ambassador (pronounced am-bas-uh-dawr)

(1) A diplomatic official of the highest rank, sent by one sovereign or state to another as its resident representative (ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary).

(2) A diplomatic official of the highest rank sent by a government to represent it on a temporary mission, as for negotiating a treaty.

(3) A diplomatic official serving as permanent head of a country's mission to the United Nations or some other international organization.

(4) An authorized messenger or representative.

(5) A term for a corporate representative, often the public face(s) of the company, mush favoured by fashion houses etc.

1325-1375: From the Middle English ambassadore, from the Anglo-Norman ambassadeur & ambassateur, from the Old Italian ambassatore (ambassador in the dialectal Italian), from the Old Occitan ambaisador (ambassador), a derivative of ambaissa (service, mission, errand), from the Medieval Latin ambasiator, from the andbahti (service, function), from the Proto-Germanic ambahtiją (service, office), a derivative of the Proto-Germanic ambahtaz (servant), from the Gaulish ambaxtos (servant) which was the source also of the Classical Latin ambactus (vassal, servant, dependent).  The early Proto-Celtic ambaxtos (servant), was from the primitive Indo-European ambhi (drive around), from ambi- (around) + ag- (to drive).  The adjective ambassadorial (of or belonging to an ambassador) dates from 1759.

The spellings ambassador and embassador were used indiscriminately until the nineteenth century, the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) curiously continuing, well into the twentieth century, to insist the later was the preferred form in US English long after it had there been abandoned everywhere except in the halls of the State Department.  In diplomatic use, the US government had an interesting history of nomenclature, neither sending nor accrediting foreign ambassadors, having only “ministers”.  The reason for this lies in the origins of the United States as a revolutionary state freeing itself from monarchical tyranny; it thus insisted only on ministers who represented states, not ambassadors who historically were the personal emissaries of sovereigns.  Functionally there was no difference and not infrequently, in in casual use ministers were styled as ambassadors with neither offence or declaration of war following and, having made the political point for a century, after 1893, every minister became instead an ambassador.

Diplomatic ranks since 1961

Margaret Qualley (b 1994), Venice Film Festival, August 2019, Brand Ambassador for French fashion house Chanel.

Diplomatic rank is the system of professional and social rank used in the world of diplomacy and international relations. A diplomat's rank determines many ceremonial details, such as the order of precedence at official processions, the seat at the table at state dinners, the person to whom diplomatic credentials should be presented and the title by which they should be addressed.

The current system of diplomatic ranks was established by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations (1961) and the modern ranks are a simplified version of the more elaborate system established by the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815).  There are now three senior ranks, two of which remain in use:

Ambassador. An ambassador is a head of mission who is accredited to the receiving country's head of state. They head a diplomatic mission known as an embassy, which is usually headquartered in a chancery in the receiving state's capital, often clustered with others is what’s often styled a “diplomatic quarter”, a feature of town-planning especially associated with cities where physical security is a concern.  A papal nuncio is considered to have ambassadorial rank, and they preside over a nunciature and often, in predominantly Roman Catholic countries are, ex officio, appointed dean of the diplomatic corps.  Between Commonwealth countries, high commissioners are exchanged; they preside over a high commission and enjoy the same diplomatic rank as an ambassador.

Minister. A Minister is a head of mission who is accredited to the receiving country's head of state. A Minister heads a legation rather than an embassy. However, the last legations were upgraded to embassies in the late 1960s, and the rank of Minister is now obsolete.  An envoy or an internuncio was also considered to have the rank of Minister; they’re now granted status ad-hoc but tend to be regarded as being on the level of consular appointments.

None of this should be confused with the long and tangled history of the resident minister, appointments sometimes political, sometimes diplomatic and sometime administrative.  At different times and in different places, it’s meant different things, used essentially to mean whatever the immediate situation demanded and, being outside any formal rules or conventions of diplomacy, flexibility was possible.

A chargé d'affaires en pied (usually styled as chargé d'affairs in everyday use) is a permanent head of mission, accredited by his country's foreign minister to the receiving nation's foreign minister, in cases where the two governments have not reached an agreement to exchange ambassadors.  A chargé d'affaires ad interim is a diplomat who temporarily heads a diplomatic mission in the absence of an ambassador.

A variety of titles exist beneath the formal three such as counsellor, first secretary, second secretary, third secretary, attaché and assistant attaché.  The actual roles discharged vary, indeed, some of these jobs are actually covers for spies or other political operatives and, just as ambassadorships are used often as a rewards for helpful services (such as large campaign donations) or as a temptingly lucrative sinecure to get a potential rival out of the country, the lower appointments have been a dumping ground for troublesome public servants when, for whatever reason, they can’t be sacked.  The diplomatic appointment also determines the description of the architecture.  An ambassador works from (and usually lives in) an embassy where other diplomats (except Commonwealth high commissioners who operate from high commissions) tend to be housed in consulates.  Like ambassador and embassador, the terms ambassy and embassy used to be interchangeable but in each case one prevailed and the other went extinct.  Etymology has no explanation for either case except it was just a pattern of use which emerged and that’s how English evolves.

The word embassy evolved in another way.  It now, institutionally and architecturally, refers to something permanent but, until the late nineteenth century was more often a temporary mission and described a delegation which would return home when its business concluded.  The history is reflected in some terms still used in diplomacy such as "Head of Mission".

Uncle Otto and nephew Eric

Uncle Otto, saluting, Paris 1940.

Because the Third Reich never concluded a peace treaty with Vichy France, diplomatic recognition was not possible so no ambassador was accredited.  However, there was a de-facto ambassador, Hitler appointing Otto Abetz (1903-1958) to the German Embassy in Paris in November 1940, a post he held until July 1944 when diplomatic conditions changed a bit.  As the letters patent made clear, he acted with full ambassadorial authority.  In July 1949 a French court handed Abetz a twenty-year sentence for crimes against humanity; released in 1954, he died in 1958 in a traffic accident on the Cologne-Ruhr autobahn and there are conspiracy theorists who suspect the death was an "assassination".

Nephew Eric, taking tea, Canberra 2018.

Otto Abetz was the great uncle of Eric Abetz (b 1958; Liberal Party senator for Tasmania, Australia 1994-2022, member of the Tasmanian House of assembly since 2024).  Because of the coincidence of one being born in the same year death visited the other, there was speculation about the transmigration of uncle Otto’s soul to nephew Eric.  Spiritualists however generally agree this would have been impossible because the senator was born on 25 January 1958, his old Nazi relative living until 5 May the same year.  Transmigration was known also as metempsychosis and was an idea most associated in the West with pre-Ancient (archaic) Greece but which may (perhaps concurrently) have origins in Egypt and India.

The American Motors Corporation (AMC) Ambassador was produced in eight generations between 1957-1974 although the name had since 1927 been used by a company which would become part of the ultimately doomed AMC (American Motors Corporation) conglomerate.  Emblematic of AMC's unsuccessful attempt to compete with Detroit's big three (General Motors (GM), Ford and Chrysler), the Ambassador was in those years offered variously as an intermediate and full-sized car and this unfortunately culminated it's largest ever iteration being sold as the first oil crisis struck in 1973; the universe shifted and the Ambassador was axed in little more than year.  One footnote in the story is that in 1968, AMC's advertising made much of the Ambassador being the only car in the world, except those from Rolls-Royce, which fitted air-conditioning as standard equipment.  That was a bit of a fudge in that at the time a number of European manufacturers fitted air-conditioning (optional in Europe) to all of at least some of the models they shipped to the US but technically, AMC was correct.

Lindsay Logan, nueva embajadora de Allbirds (the new Allbirds ambassador), possibly on a Wednesday.

In 2022, Allbirds appointed Lindsay Lohan as an ambassador for its "Unexpected Athlete" campaign, focusing on her for the new limited edition of its most successful running shoe to date, the Tree Flyer.  The promotional video issued for the announcement was nicely scripted, beginning with Ms Lohan’s perhaps superfluous admission that as an ambassador for running “I am a little unexpected" before working in a few references to her career in film (showing again a rare sense of comedic timing), fondness for peanut butter cookies and the odd social media faux-pas, many of which she's over the years embraced.  The feature shoe is the "Lux Pink" which includes no plastics.  As a well-known car driver and frequent flyer who has for years lived in an air-conditioned cocoon in Dubai, it’s not clear how far up the chart of conspicuous consumption Ms Lohan has stamped her environmental footprint but US-based footwear and apparel company Allbirds claims its design, production & distribution processes are designed to make its products as eco-friendly as possible.  It is a certified “B Corporation”, a system of private certification of for-profit companies of their "social and environmental performance" conferred by B Lab, a non-profit organization which aims to provide consumers with a reliable way to distinguish the genuinely environmentally active from those which cynically “greenwash”.

Lindsay Lohan, Allbirds “Unexpected Athlete Ambassador”.

Epiphenomenon

Epiphenomenon (pronounced ep-uh-fuh-nom-uh-non or ep-uh-fuh-nom-uh-nuhn)

(1) In medicine, unexpected or atypical symptom or complication arising during the course of a disease (ie something historically or literally not connected to the disease).

(2) An activity, process, or state that is the result of another; a by-product, a consequence.

(3) In philosophy and psychology, a mental process or state that is an incidental by-product of physiological events in the brain or nervous system.

1706: The construct was epi- + phenomenon.  The epi- prefix was from the Ancient Greek ἐπί (epí) (on top of; in addition to (in a special use in chemistry, it denotes an epimeric form)).  Phenomenon was from the Late Latin phaenomenon (appearance), from the Latin phaenomenon (attested only in the plural form phaenomena), from the Ancient Greek φαινόμενον (phainómenon) (that which appears in one’s view; appearance; phenomenon), a noun use of the neuter singular form of φαινόμενος (phainómenos), the present middle or passive participle of φαίνω (phaínō) (to cause to appear; to reveal, show, uncover; to expound), from the primitive Indo-European beh- (to glow with light, to shine).  The alternative forms are epiphaenomenon (rare and apparently used only by some pathology journals and epiphænomenon (extinct except when cited in historic texts).  Epiphenomenon, epiphenomenalist & epiphenomenalism are nouns, epiphenomenalize is a verb, epiphenomenal, epiphenomenological & epiphenomenalistic are adjectives, and epiphenomenally & epiphenomenalistically are adverbs; the noun plural is epiphenomena or epiphenomenons.  A need to coin the nouns epiphenomenalization & epiphenomenalizationism seems not to have arisen but there’s still time.

In psychology an epiphenomenon is defined as a mere by-product of a process that has no effect on the process itself and within the discipline is most often used to refer to mental events considered as products of brain processes, the idea explored being the matter of an event secondary or incidental to another primary phenomenon (ie something that occurs as a byproduct or consequence of something else, without having any causal influence on the primary phenomenon).  In the abstract, consciousness or subjective experience is seen as an epiphenomenon of the brain's activity, meaning that it does not play an active role in influencing or causing physical events.  In both the clinical sciences and philosophy, the concept is often applied to a construct of pain, the argument being that the subjective experience of pain is an epiphenomenon of neural processes that are primarily responsible for generating behavioral responses to potential threats or injuries; the conscious experience of pain not directly contributing to behavior but instead accompanying it.  That doesn’t imply mental events are not real, just that they are not real in the sense of biological states and events.

In medicine, the word is used to describe symptoms or complications not directly causative of the relevant disease but occurring as a result of the underlying condition.  For example a patient suffering a chronic autoimmune disease may for a number of reasons be afflicted with inflammation in the joints and the casual relationship between the two is direct.  However, were the patient to react to the inflammation by lapsing into depression, this would be regarded as epiphenomenal because the symptoms are not the primary cause of the disease but arising as a consequence of the physiological and psychological impacts of living with a chronic illness.

Historians and social scientists use the word in the tradition of behaviorism.  In his controversial best-seller Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust (1996), then Harvard academic Daniel Jonah Goldhagen (b 1959) argued the “eliminationist antisemitism” which characterized the Nazi state (1933-1945) and culminated in the genocide of the Holocaust was not a product merely of the particular circumstances of the Third Reich but instead of a centuries-old virulent form of antisemitism which was uniquely and specifically German.  His point too was it was something almost endemic among non-Jewish Germans which necessitated him constructing a framework to explain the bulk of what criticism by Germans there was of the persecution of Jews.  This he did by suggesting the criticism… “was overwhelmingly directed at but certain aspects of the persecution [and] was epiphenomenal… in the sense that the criticism did not emanate from (and therefore does not signify) Germans’ departure from the two fundamental bedrock features relevant to the fate of the Jews at the hands of the Germans during the Nazi period, namely eliminationist antisemitism and its practical consequences”.  Goldhagen’s internal logic was of course perfect but it’s easy to see why the work was so controversial.  A best seller, it was well reviewed although there were professional historians who found fault with the scholarship and identified a number of technical issues but the author wasn’t discouraged and has in the years since published extensively in the same vein.

The word is not part of the Western legal vocabulary but it is related to the concepts of causation and foreseeability, both essential elements in determining liability in matters of negligence, their interaction a relatively recent development in common law.  For liability to be found, there must be (1) a causal relationship between the negligence and the injury suffered and (2) it must have been reasonably foreseeable that the negligent act might cause the injury suffered.  There’s no mathematical test to determine these things and each case is decided on the basis of the facts presented and even then a judge might find one way, their decision might be reversed 2-1 on appeal and then decided finally 4-3 by the highest appellate court.  So the scorecard of eleven eminent legal minds working with the same facts, in the same tradition can be 6-5 but that’s how the common law evolves.

Known as "The Twisted Tower", the the 28-storey PwC building in Midland, Johannesburg, South Africa, was designed by LYT Architecture.

Of late, causation, reasonable foreseeability and the epiphenomenological have been on the minds of some conspiracy theorists pondering revelations one of the arms of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC, one of the “Big Four” accounting companies (the others KPMG, EY & Deloitte) while acting as consultants to the Australian government in the development of legislation designed to ensure certain multi-national corporations would no longer be able to avoid paying tax on revenue generated within Australia, passed the relevant information to the PwC arm which was consulting with those very companies to design the legal and accounting mechanisms to avoid paying tax.  For PwC, this synergy (vertical integration taken to its logical conclusion) was an extraordinary example of efficiency and apparently a type of high-dollar insider trading which, depending on the chain of events, could disclose all sorts of potential wrongdoing, the obvious conflict of interest perhaps the least serious if it can be proven any involved personally gained from improper conduct.  That will play out, perhaps over years, but what intrigues the conspiracy theorists is whether it was reasonable foreseeable that if one hires the company working for the corporations one wishes to prevent avoiding tax and asks them to help develop a tax code to ensure that tax is paid, that the consultants might be tempted to exchange facts.  In other words, given that such a thing would appear to be reasonably foreseeable, what were the motives of the politicians in putting temptation in the way of PwC?  Theories have included (1) an ideological commitment to support global capitalism in ensuring big corporations pay as little tax as possible while appear to make every attempt to pursue them and (2) it being an example of crony-capitalism whereby politicians ensure big corporations aren’t too troubled by taxes in exchange for a nice sinecure upon retirement from the tiresome business of politics.  The cover of course would be the construct that the ongoing ability of multi-nationals to avoid tax would be something epiphenomenological rather than the reasonably foreseeable consequence of hiring the same accountancy firm as that hired by the multi-nationals.  There has been much muttering about Dracula & the blood-bank but after all, Dracula will do what Dracula does and the more interesting matter is the thoughts of those who thought it a good idea to hand him the keys.

Watched approvingly by comrade Joseph Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) and Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946; Nazi foreign minister 1938-1945), comrade Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986; Soviet foreign minister 1939-1949 & 1953-1956) signs the Nazi-Soviet Pact with its secret protocol, Moscow, August 1939 (left) and Dr HV Evatt (1894–1965; Australian attorney-general & foreign minister 1941-1949, and leader of opposition 1951-1960) with Winston Churchill (1975-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955), Downing Street, London, May 1942 (right).

Perhaps also of interest is that PwC has dozens of contracts with the Australian Department of Defence, generating in excess of Aus$200 million in revenue for the company.  There may be reasons that situation should anyway be reviewed but following recent revelations, the fact that PwC operates in the People's Republic of China (PRC) adds a layer of concern.  As the sharing of confidential information about tax matters indicates, whatever claims PwC make about the robustness of their "Chinese walls", it is clear that in at least some cases, once data is in the hands of PwC, there's no guarantee it will be kept confidential.  Whether PwC has contracts with the Chinese military might be an interesting question to ask but even if it does not, few would doubt that were the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to ask PwC to obtain what they could, cooperation would be forthcoming.  PwC make much of their operation being a collection of "independent" entities but given the company is often as opaque as the CCP, people should make of that what they will.  Still, when asked during Senate Estimates (a process whereby senators can ask questions of ministers and senior public servants) if he still had sufficient confidence in PwC for them to remain as his department's internal auditors (ie advising him, inter-alia, on matters of governance), the head of the Treasury indicated he was on the basis that PwC auditors has assured him of their integrity.  It recalled the moment in October 1955 when Dr HV Evatt, then leader of the opposition, informed the house all members could be assured a certain Russian document about spying was a forgery because he'd written to the Soviet foreign minister to ask and comrade Molotov had replied confirming it was.  Those reporting the exchange were either too polite to draw the comparison or, as seems the case with journalists these days, lacked knowledge of anything which happened more than ten years ago.

Laurel

Laurel (pronounced lawruhl or lor-uhl)

(1) A small European evergreen tree, Laurus nobilis, of the Lauraceae family, having dark, glossy green leaves (known also as the bay tree or sweet bay).  Trees & shrubs belonging to (or resembling) the natural order Lauraceae are said to be lauraceous.  When used as an adjective (not in the strict botanical sense), the comparative is more lauraceous, the superlative most lauraceous.

(2) Any tree of the genus Laurus.

(3) In general use, any of various similar trees or shrubs, as the mountain laurel or the great rhododendron.

(4) The foliage of the laurel as an emblem of victory or distinction.

(5) A branch or wreath of laurel foliage.

(6) In the plural (laurels or victory laurels), an award conferred (literally or figuratively) as an honor for achievement in some field or activity.

(7) An English gold coin minted in 1619, so called because the king's head was crowned with laurel.

(8) In many color charts, a green of a darker hue.

(9) To adorn or enwreathe with laurel.

(10) To honor with marks of distinction.

(11) A female given name (there have been rare instances of male use, including as a "second name" referencing some relative).

1250–1300: A dissimilated variant of the Middle English laurer (laurel), from the Anglo-Norman, from the twelfth century Old French laurier & lorier (bay tree; laurel tree), the construct being lor (bay) + -ier, from the Medieval Latin laurārius, from the Latin laurus (laurel tree), thought related to the Greek daphne (laurel), probably from a pre-Indo-European Mediterranean language.  The French suffix -ier was from the Middle French -ier & -er, from the Old French, from the Latin -ārium, the accusative of -ārius.  It was used to form the names of trees, ships, jobs etc.  The second -r- in the Middle English laurer changed to -l- by process of dissimilation.  Laurel & laureate are nouns & verbs, laureateship & laurustinus are nouns, laureled & laurelled are verbs & adjectives and lauriferous & lauraceous are adjectives; the noun plural is laurels.

Lindsay Lohan fridge magnet by Alexanton.  Laurel Hollow is an incorporated village in Nassau County on the North Shore of Long Island, New York, within the Town of Oyster Bay (where Theodore Roosevelt (TR, 1858–1919; POTUS 1901-1909) died).

The use to describe an emblem of victory or of distinction (hence the phrase “to rest on one’s laurels” (the original form was “repose upon”)) dates from 1831.  The phrase is now used used in the cautionary sense “don’t rest on your laurels”, a warning not to rely on a reputation gained through past successes but instead continue to strive and improve.  The companion phrase “look to your laurels” is an idiomatic expression (known in Antiquity) meaning one needs to be vigilant and attentive to one's accomplishments, skills or position because there will be those eager to surpass or outshine you.  Like “don’t rest on your laurels”, it stresses the importance of maintaining one’s competitive edge.  It was a bay leaf from a laurel shrub that Πυθία (Pythia, priestess of Pythian Apollo at Delphi) chewed during her prophetic trances.

Sirens and the Night (1865) by William Edward Frost (1810-1877).

Although most associated with women (the feminine variants including Laura, Lauren, Lori and Lorraine), Laurel is a unisex given name.  It was related to the German Lorelie and in Germanic mythology there were several tales of the lovely maiden Lorelei (luring rock) who lived upon a rock in the River Rhine.  She lured fishermen to their deaths by singing songs of such beauty they couldn't resist, a variation of the stories of the Sirens in Greek mythology.  The Sirens were legendarily beautiful but deadly creatures who used their lyrical and earthly charms to lure sailors to their death.  Attracted by their enchanting music and voices, the intrigued seafarers would sail too close to the rocky coast of the Siren’s island and be shipwrecked, there to suffer a worse fate still at the hands of the hungry Sirens.  In Homer's Odyssey (an epic poem from perhaps as long ago as the eighth century BC), it was Odysseus who most famously escaped the sirens.  Longing to hear their songs but, forewarned by Circe and having no wish to be shipwrecked and devoured, he had his sailors fill their ears with beeswax, rendering them deaf.  Then, he ordered he be tied to the mast, telling his crew that whatever he said, they were not to release him but instead tighten the knots, not cutting the bonds until the ship had sailed far from the coast.  Of course, approaching the rocks, he heard the lovely voices and implored the crew to release him but they followed their skipper’s orders, not setting him free until the danger had passed.  Some writers claimed the Sirens were doomed to die if a man heard their singing and escaped and, as Odysseus sailed off, they flung themselves into the waters and drowned but, among the myths, that was not always their fate.  Not untypically for the myths of Antiquity, the Sirens are said to have had many homes.  The Romans said they lived on some small islands called Sirenum scopuli while later authors place them variously on the islands of Anthemoessa, on Cape Pelorum, on the islands of the Sirenuse, near Paestum, or in Capreae.  All were places with rocky coasts and tall cliffs and thus for ships potentially lethal places although the fate of sailors was more gruesome, the Sirens devouring them.  The Argonauts sailed close to the Sirens, but, using the same principle as “radio jamming” in the twentieth century, Orpheus sang as long as the crew was within earshot of them (“drowning out their signal”), so none were lured (except the unfortunate Butes, carried away by Aphrodite after he fell victim).

#metoo: Apolo persiguiendo a Dafne (Apollo chasing Daphne (circa 1637)), oil on canvas by Theodoor van Thulden (1606–1669) after Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640), Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid.

The feminine proper name Daphne was from the Greek daphne (laurel, bay tree) and in mythology was the name of a nymph.  Etymologists conclude the word is related to the Latin laurus (laurel) although the mechanism has been lost in time.  In Greek mythology, Δάφνη (Daphne), daughter of the River Ladon (and sometimes of the Thessalian River Peneus), was a nymph with whom the God Apollo fell in love; he was provoked by Cupid, having disputed with him the power of his darts which Apollo, the recent conqueror of the Python, belittled.  When he pursued her to the banks of the Peneus, she was saved from being ravished by the god who transformed her into a Laurel tree, the origin of Apollo being so often depicted crowned with laurel leaves.  None of the writers from Antiquity seem ever to have pondered whether the nymph, had she been offered time to consider the choice between being ravished by a Greek god or becoming eternally arboreous, might have preferred to permit a slice be cut from the loaf.  While at the time not of much consolation to the unfortunate Daphne, Apollo ordained that the laurels should be the prize for poets and victors and, being, at least briefly, a sentimental chap, Apollo adopted the laurel as his favorite tree so there’s that.  The site of temples and a stadium, the Grove of Daphne was a pleasure resort of renowned natural beauty, dedicated to Apollo and located near Antioch.  

Apollo and Daphne (1622-1625), sculpture in white Carrara marble by Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598–1680), Galleria Borghese, Rome.

Being a Greek myth, there are of course variants in the tales and in a Laconian version, Daphne was the daughter of Amyclas who spent her days among the mountains where she was a favourite of Artemis.  From afar, Leucippus fell in love with her and, disguising himself as a girl, joined her companions.  Daphne became fond of him (thinking him a her), but Apollo became jealous and vowing to expose his trickery, inspired Daphne and her companions with a wish to bathe.  Leucippus, obviously, hesitated to remove his clothing, but his companions forcibly undressed him and, feeling betrayed upon discovering his identity, they attacked him, his life saved only by the gods rendering him invisible.  At this point, Apollo dashed to try to seize Daphne but she ran off and in answer to her prayer, Zeus turned her into a laurel.  Latter-day interpretations of Daphne's fate have differed.  While her name lives on as a tragic hero (the girl who gave up her life rather than succumb to a sexual assault) some feminists have criticized the notion that a victim of such a crime should be transformed into something silent and thus uncomplaining.

Audrey Hepburn (1929–1993) in a “laurel leaves” hat designed by Hubert de Givenchy (1927–2018), photograph by Howell Conant (1916–1999), Switzerland, February 1962.

As an adjective, laureate (crowned with laurels as a mark of distinction) dates from the late fourteenth century and the earliest reference was to poets of particular distinction, from the Latin laureatus (crowned with laurel), from laurea (laurel crown; emblematic of victory or distinction in poetry), from the feminine laureus (of laurel).  The first known use of Laureat poete is in Geoffrey Chaucer’s (circa 1344-1400) Canterbury Tales (1387-1400) in reference to Scholar and poet of early Renaissance Italy, Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca (1304–1374), and it was used in Middle English of Greek fabulist Aesop (circa 620–564 BC) and, by the early fifteenth century of Chaucer himself.

In English the inverted form “poet laureate” was in imitation of Latin word order and although used informally since the early 1400s, the evidence suggests the first appointed by the state was probably (and perhaps posthumously) Ben Jonson (circa 1572–circa 1637) in 1638 although the first for whom the letters patent remain extant was John Dryden (1631–1700).  In the UK, the position of poet laureate is an honorary office in the gift of the sovereign but in these days, appointed on the advice of the prime minister; because few prime-ministers know much of poetry, they too take advice on the matter; in that, it's similar to the appointment of bishops, most prime ministers knowing as little of religion.  Curiously, although the office is not un-remunerated, the government describes it still as an “honorary appointment”, the advantage of that being summary dismissal is a simpler process should the poet start writing material unpleasing to the party in power.  It may be more correct to call it a kind of sinecure because while the expectation is the appointee will compose verse to mark moments of national significance, such things are not defined and nor are aspects such as frequency or length.  So it’s one of those “gentlemen’s agreements” which, as late as the 1950s was still a feature of the way the establishment ran the UK.  That would have extended also to Dame Carol Ann Duffy (b 1955, poet laureate 2009-2019), thus far the only woman appointed (she had the benefit of ticking several boxes for Gordon Brown (b 1951; prime minister of the UK 2007-2010): Scottish; female; lesbian).  Just for once, Gordon's stars aligned.

Opportunity missed: Dylan Thomas (1914–1953, left) and his wife Caitlin Thomas (née Macnamara; 1913-1994, right) in the bar of Brown’s Hotel, Laugharne, Wales, 1938.

For his laureateship, Dryden's was paid an annual fee of Stg£200, the inclusion in 1630 by the doomed Charles I (1600–1649; King of England, Scotland & Ireland 1625-1649) of an annual “butt of Canary wine”, later converted into the monetary equivalent.  A butt of wine (known also as “a pipe”) had a volume of 105 imperial gallons (126 US gallons, 477 litres) and was part of the English standardized “Cask Measurement System” regulating trade in liquids between brewers, distillers, merchants and shippers.  All graduations of the defined sizes of wooden barrels were fractions of the largest standard cask (the “tun” (210 imperial gallons (252 US gallons, 954 litres)) with a butt a half-tun and a “hogshead” half a butt (52 imperial gallons (63 US gallons, 238 litres)).  However, being English, the system was complicated by a butt of ale or beer being defined as 108 imperial gallons (130 US gallons, 491 litres).  As a unit of measurement the butt was the origin of the slang term “buttload”.  The tradition of the “butt of Canary wine” was revived on the request of Ted Hughes (1930–1998; poet laureate 1984-1998) who received 720 bottles of sherry.  Being Irish, the poet Brendan Behan (1923-1964) wouldn't have been created poet laureate but the government avoided a significant charges against the exchequer by not appointing Dylan Thomas for whom 720 bottles of anything would likely not have proved sufficient.

Barack Obama (b 1961; POTUS 2009-2017, Nobel Peace Prize laureate 2009).  The peace prize is awarded by a committee elected by the Norwegian Stortinget (parliament); it summarized the basis of their decision being President Obama's: “...extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”  Those skilled in deconstruction concluded the true rationale was “He is not George W. Bush” (George XLIII, b 1946; POTUS 2001-2009)).

The poet laureate's annual payment is now “Stg£5,750 and a barrel of sherry” so it’s good gig considering there are no set hours and only the vaguest KPIs (key performance indicators).  There was a time when a poet laureate was an exalted figure but these days there’s less interest and the best remembered probably still is Ted Hughes (1930–1998; poet laureate 1984-2008) and that less for his oeuvre than calls by feminists to boycott his works because he had Sylvia Plath’s (1932-1963) “blood on his quill”.  The noun laureate came into existence in the 1520s, either as an evolution from the adjective or through a mistaken reading and laureateship has been in use since 1732.  In modern use, laureate is most frequently applied to Nobel prize winners, a use that began in 1947; while many of the Nobel laureates have been outstanding figures in their field, there have been a few about as undeserving as some of the less distinguished British poets laureate.  Of the 21 who have held the office, serious critics seem to rate only Dryden, William Wordsworth (1770–1850; poet laureate 1843-1850) and Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892; poet laureate 1850-1892) as first-rate poets.

The laurel appeared in Hymn to Proserpine (1866), a poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–1909) exploring atheism, a theme to which he would on occasion return as he developed in verse his increasingly strident opposition to Christianity in general and stifling Victorian morality particularly.  Nominated every year between 1903 and 1909 for the Nobel Prize in Literature, his name was on the list in 1893 presented to Victoria (1819–1901; Queen of the UK 1837-1901) as the replacement for Tennyson as Poet Laureate but the queen vetoed him “on moral grounds” although it’s not known if she’d read or merely been told about his works discussing sado-masochism and lesbian longings.  Swinburne was of a figure of the post-Romantic disillusionment and a part of the sceptical tradition that would emerge in the nineteenth century to grow to a critical mass in the twentieth; even if not familiar with his most “disturbing” verse, Hymn to Proserpine, an address to Proserpina (in Rome, the goddess of the Underworld), lamenting that the rise of Christianity had displaced the pagan goddess and her pantheon, would alone have been enough to incur royal disapprobation.

Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean; the world has
   grown grey from Thy breath;
We have drunken of things Lethean, and fed on the
   fullness of death.
Laurel is green for a season, and love is sweet for a day;
But love grows bitter with treason, and laurel outlives
   not May.

The meaning is that both romantic love and artistic fame are fleeting, fragile, and bound to fade, the work a pagan perspective rejecting the idea of eternal life or permanent earthly glory.  In saying “Laurel is green for a season”, the leaves exist in their traditional symbolic role celebrating poetic glory, victory and cultural achievement but as “Love is sweet for a day”, while human affection can briefly be thrillingly intense, notoriously is it brief and transitory.  Just as “love grows bitter with treason” with relationships easily and often turned toxic by a betrayal or shift in faith, the “laurel outlives not May” and like spring flowers, fame dies quickly when the cultural season shifts and fashions change.  Nothing lasts forever and even the highest artistic achievements will one day dissolve into nothingness: Man can write his will across the heavens but those stars will soon dim and fall.  Swinburne found comfort not in an afterlife, but in the total, final darkness granted by Proserpine, the goddess of death.  Charmingly, Christians and pagans alike would both concur with the scriptural “Vanity, vanity, vanity of vanity of vanities, all is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:2) although each would draw different conclusions, the former in eternal life, the latter in peaceful oblivion.  As a footnote, Hymn to Proserpine includes cross-rhyme (known also as an interlaced rhyme) a device occurring in long couplets, the device operating on words in the middle of each line (here “season” and “treason”).