Bludger

Today, a bludger is chiefly Australian and New Zealand derogatory slang for someone who avoids work or does a bad job. It sometimes appears as a verb to bludge to shirk or skive off work. It dates in this sense from the late 19th century. It is thought to derive from ‘bludgeoner’ someone who wields a bludgeon or wooden club and typical of pimps who used such instruments to scare off anyone who bothered their prostitutes, pimps of course being the sort of people who would shirk real work. The word ‘bludger’, however, must have been imported from Britain because ‘bludger’ is cited in Britain in 1859 as slang for a low street thief who uses violence.