In Australia, life's not really a beach

May 14, 2009, 7:47 GMT

Sydney - Migrants flock to Australia for the good life: the beach, the barbecue with family and friends, the enjoyment of the great outdoors.

At least, that's the tale the government tells. The reality, alas, is depressingly different.

For a start, leisure time is limited. Only in Japan, where a quarter of the labour force puts in more than 50 hours a week, are employees spending more time at work.

Around 20 per cent of Australians work more than 50 hours a week - twice as many as in Germany, France, Spain and Italy. Only 40 per cent take their full annual holiday entitlements and more than a third don't take any annual holidays at all.

Only in Japan and the United States are workers taking fewer holidays.

Those pictures in the brochures showing happy glass-in-hand folk gathered round the barbecue? Don't be fooled.

Australians spend 41 per cent of their leisure time watching television, the same proportion as in Britain, and a rate only exceeded by the people of the Japan, the United States and Mexico.

The latest Society at a Glance report put out by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) also explodes the myth that Australians are sporty types. The Spanish are twice as active - and the quotient for most European countries is higher than that for Australia.

But back to the barbecue.

The OECD figures show that entertaining family and friends takes up just 3 per cent of the average leisure time of Australians. Compare this with the sociable Turks, who spend 43 per cent of their time off in the company of family and friends.

Bob Cummins, a psychology professor at Melbourne's Deakin University, reckons a lot of work and precious little play is explained by Australia being a rich country.

'The extended family is much stronger in poorer countries,' said Cummins, president of the International Society for Quality of Life Studies. 'If they haven't got a monetary resource, they build a personal resource.'

So, if you are fed up with your life - if it seems all work and no play, and that sharing a meal with family and friends is a joy all too rare - move to Turkey rather than Australia.