Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Aus.) the state of friendship.

1979

D. Maitland Breaking Out 322: That’s what I like — good old Aussie mateship.

1. (orig. Aus.) discounted rates made available to friends of the business/enterprise.

1980		Cordell et al. Versatility of Kinship 198: One of our friends can ‘get it for us wholesale,’ another will do the job at ‘mate’s rates’.
1999		G. Cowlishaw Rednecks, Eggheads and Blackfells 352: Tacit rules for nepotistic relations where a friend or relation is meant to charge ‘mates rates’.
2004		R. Birch Master of the Ceremonies 266: As a major Olympic sponsor, they were pretty pleased to discover that we were ordering large quantities without even asking for mate’s rates.
2007		J. Thorne Stacy 11: I bet she’s paying ‘mate’s rates’ though.

2. (N.Z.) payment in cash; no actual friendship need be involved.

1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 72/2: mate’s rates payment that may not involve the Inland Revenue department, usually for trade work, not necessarily involving mates.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].

a very unpopular individual.

1998		Guardian Year ’98 174: I think everyone else thought I was just a snob, but underneath I was hurting. A favourite remark was ‘Billy no mates’.
2009		ref. to 1990s) S. Dent What Made The Crocodile Cry? 153: As far as we know there was no single unfortunate Billy No Mates. The term originated in the early 1990s as a T-shirt slogan.
2017		Guardian 17 June 16/2: She is ‘cripplingly shy’ [...] ‘I was a total Nigel-No-Mates’.
2018		I. Welsh Dead Man’s Trousers 122: How pathetically nae-mates this sounding.
2022		Twitter 24 Mar. 🌐 [Boris Johnson solitary at NATO meeting] Boris No-Mates, all self-inflicted.

(Aus.) a generic term for an otherwise nameless individual, who may or may not be an actual stranger.

1985		B. Robinson Aussie Bull 33: ‘You’ve got enough troubles with her on your hands, old mate’ .
2003		Aus. Word Map n.p.: old mate Frequently used by adolescents when referring to a man known to them. ‘Old mate’ or ‘old matey’ is a substitute for using the man’s name. Interchangeable for ‘bloke,’ ‘guy’ or ‘fella’: I saw old mate about signing up for the footy team.
2003		Aus. Word Map n.p.: old mate [...] A stranger, someone you have just met. As a greeting ‘Gidday old mate’ as a referral ‘Ask old mate over there’.
2014		C. Greer in Ozwords 10 Apr. [internet] I have come across another Australian word recently in the hospitality trade. It is the word mate, which is being used in an interesting way in the compound term old mate. As an example, when a restaurant customer drops his fork on the floor, my manager will say to me: ‘Can you get old mate on table twelve a new fork?’ Another staff member will point someone out to me, saying: ‘Check out old mate standing by the bar’.