The game is up for pair
IT was like one of those push and shove ‘blues’ on the footpath outside the local pub … so, no wonder the defamation spat that sometimesTownsville resident and former Yabulu nickel refinery owner Clive Palmer and Western Australia Premier Mark Mcgowan brought against each other ended with all the stutter and sputter of a dud firecracker.
Quickly, a bit of background:
Palmer has to pay Mcgowan $20,000 and Mcgowan has to pay Palmer $5000.
It was one of those “she said, he said” sort of go-nowhere stories.
The most interesting part was what justice Michael Lee said in summing up that still has everyone scratching their head.
He told the court “the game was not worth the candle”.
This made everyone dozing off to sleep wake up with start and say “what in tarnation did he mean by that”?
Like soothsayers sifting through chicken gizzards to see what the future holds, a lot of people are still dissecting the words to try and work out what justice Lee meant.
Surely he meant that the flame was not worth the candle and not the game was not worth the candle?
The flame being the publicity given to the case and the candle being the weak, loss-loss payout delivered to both parties?
Nope, it’s not that at all. Apologies to justice Lee who happened to be right on the money.
A scurry around the online dictionary reveals that “the game is not worth the candle” means that the return from an activity or enterprise does not warrant the time, money or effort required”.
See who can be the first person to
squeeze it into a Letter to the Editor. Perhaps the interminable wrangling over the Hells Gate dam might get a guernsey?