Get paid 70k to lie on a beach

Time is ticking for potential applicants who now have just 36 days left to apply for a job which has labelled itself as ‘the best job in the world’.

The job description matches no other. The successful applicant must live on Hamilton Island in the Whitsundays, Australia for six months.

They will earn a very healthy £69,000 for doing so and in return they must take part in activities such as diving, snorkelling and sailing and then report back to the Queensland tourism offices while making a weekly travel blog about their experiences there.

The chosen contender for the job will be provided with a luxurious three bedroom apartment on Hamilton Island, over looking the sea. The flat has a fantastic view of the sea and surrounding beaches, and comes with an outdoor hot tub.

As if this weren’t enough, the applicant’s flights will be paid for. A chosen friend or family member’s flights will also be paid for and they too can live in the apartment described free of charge.

What is the catch? There is no catch to this job, but by advertising such a dreamy job, the island reef tourism board have created a media frenzy about the post and has been labelled as ‘the biggest PR stunt ever’ by one Australian newspaper.

There are currently over 2,000 applicants and another 10,000 hopefuls are expected to apply.

Applicants’ auditions can be viewed on You Tube. Some have gone to extreme measures to try and persuade the judges that they should be the chosen one. One woman from Australia has tattooed their slogan on her arm, and another man from Texas in the USA has told them that he will do laundry for all Australian habitants if he wins.

Judges will fly 11 shortlisted applicants out to the Hamilton Island for an interview in May, and the job will commence as of this July.

The End of the Twirlies

Until January this year, you may have found a group of over-60s waiting together outside the tube or at the bus stops just before 9AM on any weekday morning. This group of people call themselves the ‘twirlies’ as they are ‘tooearly’ to make use of their freedom passes which only grant them no-charge travel after 9am. However, this is soon to change as a 24-hour Elderly Freedom Pass is to be put into use as of 12 January, 2009.

The freedom pass was introduced in 1921, when only blind service-men could use transport free of charge. The ‘qualifications’ one needed to gain a freedom pass changed over the years, and in 1974, free travel was granted to pensioners. For women, this was at the age of 60, and for men, 65. In the summer of 2003, the pension age for men reduced to 60 and remained the same for women.

The twirlies have existed for quite a while, as the 9AM start on the freedom pass has existed since the introduction of the freedom pass for over 60s in 1974. The idea behind the 9am freedom pass is that elderly people can now be punctual for their early hospital appointments. However, over 60 professionals have been using their free passes to travel to work as well, something that one professional, David Hanger, 63, does not believe should happen:

“If someone is over 60 is travelling before 9AM they are probably going to work, and if they are going to work, they can probably afford to pay the bus fare.”

However, David does take full advantage of his freedom pass, as do the majority of over 60 professionals. David says that there seems to be a camaraderie between the twirlies says David, “When there’s only a couple of minutes to go, and you realise there’s a couple of other people of the same age waiting outside the tube station, one of them will often ask me, ‘Are you a twirlie as well sir?’”

David is happy though that he will now be able to travel 24 hours a day around London, “It’s wonderful being released, it takes away the embarrassment of five old people waiting for a bus!”