“Tough luck!   The CES regulations require you to be prepared to walk up to two hundred minutes a day, if need be, before you can knock back a job on the lame excuse that it is too far for you to walk.”

“But I’ve got bad kidneys!” insisted Chris.

“The CES regulations don’t say anything about making allowances for bad health.   In fact, they do say that you have to be ‘fit and able to work’ before you are eligible to receive employment benefits.   If you are not ‘fit and able to work’ then you have been receiving the dole under false pretences, for the last four and a half years, and could be liable to repay every cent that you have received.”

“But you can’t do that!” shouted Chris, knocking over the three-legged stool as he staggered to his feet.

“Just watch me, sport!” said Juchster.   “All right then what is it to be, the Hyde Road job, or the bum’s rush?”

“But it’s too far for me to walk!” shouted Chris.   He heard his voice echoing around the building, and knew that he should try to calm down.

“Then it’s the bum’s rush,” said Juchster.   “Fine by me.”

“I don’t intend to take this crap lying down,” shouted Chris.   He was aware that the people in the other booths and at the front counter had stopped talking to listen to him.   “I’ll take you to court!”

“Why don’t you get Galbally?” suggested Juchster.   “He only charges a couple of thousand dollars a day.”

Chris moved round the desk, grabbed hold of Juchster’s tie and dragged him to his feet, then said, “Well, maybe you won’t be so smug with a mouthful of broken teeth!”

Trying his best to keep the quiver out of his voice, Juchster said, “Calm down, doing your block isn’t going to help anyone.”

Holding onto Juchster’s tie with one hand, while waving the other hand menacingly in front of Juchster’s face, Chris said, “Well, it certainly won’t help you, that’s for sure!”

“Look, just to show you what a fair man I am … ” Juchster said, desperately rummaging through the papers on top of his desk with one hand, “I’ll give you one of these.”   Having located a thin pad of yellow foolscap forms, he tore off one of the forms and held it out toward Chris.