MELBOURNE

UNABLE TO EMULATE Argentina any more, because that South American state appears to have woken up to the shambolic policies it has been pursuing for decades, the Australian state of Victoria has been advised, instead, to follow the path of another South American disaster, Venezuela, if it is to continue its own economic decline, and to adopt Spanish as its language, just to cement the chaos that should follow in its wake.

A secret report by the Basket Case Economies Forum, a lunatic think tank based in Zimbabwe, has urged the Victorian Labor Government not only to continue on the road it has chosen, but to dial up the speed of its economic decline: “It should increase its crippling debt tenfold, drive every business it can from the state, employ the entire population to work for the state and raise taxes to 95%.

“Then they can call on the Federal Government to bail them out,” the final line of the report says.

The report, entitled TOO STUPID TO FAIL, insists that Victoria is in a unique position in having Canberra to bail it out of its debts.

“This is the kind of country-wrecking wealth transfer that BCEF likes to see,” the report says. “Victoria is a shining light among the debt-defying economies of the world. Right now it is just trying to be like Venezuela, but when it dives below Afghanistan and Somalia, and places like them, then prizes are on the table. If there is a table left, of course.”