Folklaw went in search of some kind of meaning for this coincidence, and turned up some curious but rather useless facts. The first uninspiring piece of trivia comes from BabiesOnline.com, where we learned that the name “Susan” means “lily” and is a diminutive of “Susannah”. More interesting, however, was the website pointed out that “in the apocryphal Book of Tobit, Susannah was a woman of courage who defended herself against a wrongful accusation”. The accusation was one of adultery, although Folklaw wishes to stress that no imputation is intended to be drawn from that (maybe there’s virtue to be found in dropping the suffix “nah”).

There is also the Whitney Houston song My Name is not Susan which we thought might be an appropriate anthem for those who missed out on the appointment this time around, particularly given that it contains the lyrics “don’t want to hear about Susan/she’s got nothing on me”.

Perhaps the Attorney-General Philip Ruddock just likes the name. Folklaw’s publisher seems to have a similar preference for “Mel”, which can be very confusing at times.