Howes, Bolt in pre-court coffee. Why was Paul Howes, the AWU’s outspoken national secretary, having coffee yesterday morning with Herald Sun columnist and anti-union warrior Andrew Bolt? According to a spy: “I will not tell you what I overheard but if Greg Combet knew it, Howes would be very unhappy.”

Howes confirmed the chat to Crikey as Bolt was found guilty in court over racial vilification. Howes, of course, gave an Institute of Public Affairs speech in June where he declared “I have to own up to liking Bolt”. He said: “I have done media battle with him plenty of times and I know there is a real decency there, to which I would be proud to attest in any court.” Howes assures us he isn’t planning to write any more columns about Bolt’s case.

No break-up as far as we know. Yep, we’ve heard about the high-profile marriage break-up in Canberra circles. We don’t think it’s true, despite the almost daily gossip in our inbox.

Deal on paper at Young Labor. As we reported yesterday, the Young Labor conference last week has a three-year deal with its executive. A delegate offers some more insight:

“It was made because the Taliban broke a deal with the ShortCons (not sure what) but from there it pushed Shannon to go to the other states Right caucuses (mainly NSW and Queensland) to broker a deal. It’s the first time NSW signed anything onto paper with a deal showing how serious the Taliban tried to throw around any stability in the Right. South Australia joined at the last minute, but Michael was threatening their jobs at the same time at the SDA, but who wouldn’t be part of a winning deal? The three-year deal though means that Maxfield’s president, then I think Queensland then South Autralia get president, Victoria has senior vice pres for the next three years and junior pres is still being kinked out, but nevertheless the deal is on paper.”

Pokies a safe bet for bank man. Which prominent Big Four bank man was spotted in a Darwin pokies den yesterday? Our spy is convinced it was him and the grainy photo would suggest he’s right. Surely the executive salary is enough …

Pharmacists won’t be won over. Yesterday we reported on the deal between complementary medicine manufacturer Blackmores and the Pharmacy Guild that prompts pill pushers at the point of sale to up-sell Blackmores vitamins. Which only works if pharmacists actually take the advice on board, as one white coat reminded us:

“As a pharmacist of many years’ experience I can say that the majority of pharmacists take little notice of the computer-generated links between prescribed prescription medication and possible complementary nutritional adjunctive medication. This is because of reasons you highlighted in your article, being the lower level of scientific evidence used to justify the claims of the nutritional supplements. The claims may or may not be correct but most pharmacists are aware of this and are proud of their rigorous but pure scientific training and do not want to see their advice clouded for questionable mercenary gain.

“One other point is that only 5-10% of pharmacies would have this computer-generated linking between prescribed medication and nutritional supplements and then a lesser number of pharmacists would act on the suggestions. Again a media beat-up and I wonder what is driving the campaign. Pretty well 100% of pharmacy dispensing programs have proper warnings generated regarding possible interactions between prescribed medications which are all evidence based and are what we as pharmacists see as our real role in the community, i.e. a source of evidence-based medical advice as well as dispensing prescriptions.”

Tiger a flight risk? We’d like to think this is true. From the 3AW Rumour File this morning: “Caller ‘Flight Risk’ was applying for travel insurance recently and had to list any applicable risks. He says the provided list included Tiger Airways.”