AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR:

For the first time in the history of The Bug’s Australian of the Year Award (below) a group of people has been shortlisted for the accolade for 2023.  

Chair of the award judging panel, The Bug’s finance and investment columnist Morrie Bezzle, said he and his fellow judges had drafted a shortlist of award finalists with the winner to be announced on Australinvasion Day on 26 January.

Speaking briefly to reporters outside the District Court in Brisbane before appearing on a range of charges under various consumer protection laws, Mr Bezzle (below) revealed Australia’s “sovereign citizens” were in the running for the Australian of the Year Award.

“I and the other judges unanimously agreed that sovereign citizens deserve to be on the shortlist,” Mr Bezzle said.

“They are selfless individuals who are doing our great nation proud. Boys and girls across the country should look up to them as role models.

“For a start they don’t recognise governments or their laws so they make zero demands on taxpayers.

“They may send their kids to state schools but they voluntarily make annual donations for each one equivalent to what might otherwise be their school fees.

“It’s the same when they use a public hospital. Before they are discharged they willingly pay full price for all the services they received as a patient.

“ Notably in the recent spate of floods and bushfires around our nation, not a single sovereign citizen has called on government-funded police, SES crews or fire brigades for help.

“In fact I understand when an SES crew turns up to their burning or flooded house they shoo them away, saying they don’t recognise the crew’s legitimacy so they can’t take advantage of their lifesaving services.

“And even sovereign citizens who drive through flooded creeks in defiance of the ‘if it’s flooded, forget it’ campaign – and they’re most likely to do it – always repay in full the often huge costs incurred by swift-water rescue teams which, incidentally, they themselves don’t call or request.

“For being such exemplary Aussies they deserve as a group to be considered for the 2023 Australian of the Year Award,” Mr Bezzle said.

The Bug approached a “sovereign citizen” at an anti-gravity rally in Brisbane (main picture) to test reaction to the shortlisting of him and his fellow activists for the AOTY Award.

However, he refused to be interviewed and would not supply even his own name when asked for it.

“Do your own research,” he said before walking away.

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