It's official, Lions fans are not only good for the team but they are good for the economy and, more particularly, for the brewing industry.

The Australian Hotels Association (AHA) have heaped praise on the travelling army of red shirted Brits that have headed Down Under.

They praise them for their "exemplary behavoiur" (Shurely Shome Mishtake? Ed) and the boom they have brought to the Aussie tourist industry.

The hard working players may not have had much of an opportunity to see the sites or spend long hours down the boozer but the fans certainly have.

So much are bars, hotels, restaurants, airlines and other tourist attractions benefiting from the influx that the AHA say they would like to see more of them - not a sentiment the Wallaby side would subscribe to.

AHA national executive director Richard Mulcahy said: "These are high-spending, high-yielding tourists who are delivering a mid-winter boom to Australia`s tourism industry. Melbourne accommodation hotels enjoyed record occupancies over this last weekend, just as many Brisbane and Canberra properties have over the past week.

"With many older and high-income professionals in the touring parties, our current visitors have proved to be model tourists who are simply out to enjoy themselves in a responsible and sensible manner."

Sydney, Australia's most cosmopolitan city boasting plenty of 24 hour watering holes, is the next city set to be invaded by the tens of thousands of travelling supporters - watch out, here they come!

One group that have been lucky enough to combine a trip to Australia and take in a few Lions matches has been a 25-strong group of members of the British Parliament.

There have been scurrilous suggestions that the 21-day fact finding mission was something of a junket but Loughborouigh MP and Leicester fan Andy Reed, the Commons' side's stand off, insisted they were working harder than they usually would and had funded part of the cost of the trip, put at £15,000 a head, themselves.

One quick footnote to the above, however. It has been reported that Rob Howley and Richard Hill witnessed an altercation between rival fans in a Melbourne hotel during Pat Rafter's defeat in the Wimbledon's mens' singles yesterday.

A few choice words were heard and insults traded and it all went to show that, despite the rugby and the cricket, now and then the Aussies do lose and with it goes their legendary sense of humour.