Give him a valium: parliamentary stoush over Paul Keating

Here’s another new normal first. Labor MP Peter Khalil is claiming responsibility for the OG virtual heckle, during a speech by Liberal MP Tim Wilson.

Another Paul Keating bon mot has been rehashed in parliament. Picture: Nikki Short

Here’s another new normal first. Labor MP Peter Khalil is claiming responsibility for the OG virtual heckle, during a speech by Liberal MP Tim Wilson. It started after Khalil, the member for Wills, rehashed his favourite Paul Keating insult to label Scott Morrison “all tip and no iceberg”.

Wilson: “I always admire somebody in 2020 quoting a prime minister dating back to 1993 because they’re relevant. As (assistant Minister Jane Hume) made the point, (Keating)’s been exhumed from the crypt in Potts Point over the past 48 hours in a Zegna suit and a Ferragamo tie, but that doesn’t — ”

Khalil: “He still looks better than you!”

Wilson: “That was an interjection online!”

Acting Speaker (Trent Zimmerman): “We can disconnect you, member for Wills.”

Wilson: “Charming! I’d like to thank the member for Wills for that disjoined contribution.”

Zimmerman: “The member for Scullin (Labor MP Andrew Giles) is suggesting permanently!”

The squabble continued to play out online, with Khalil delivering this final blow: “While I’m at it Tim, if you’re going to have a crack at PJK, expect a return serve because in the sartorial stakes, you’re all handkerchief, no suit; all show, no style; and all pomp, no ceremony”. We think everyone needs to log off.

I think I just made the first ever virtual interjection/heckle during a parliamentary speech (sound on)! I wasn’t going to let @TimWilsonMP have a dig at the great #PaulKeating unchallenged! #trailblazer #newnormal #Auspol pic.twitter.com/jfNAoXrvoL

— Peter Khalil MP (@PeterKhalilMP) September 1, 2020

Spot the eyebrow

“I just have a single request for the premiers tomorrow at national cabinet,” Nationals walking fan Matt Canavan pleaded. “And that is to take off the football jerseys and put on the Little Johnny (Howard) Australia tracksuit for a change.”

Green and gold star!

But Strewth’s quote of the week went to Labor’s member for Perth, Patrick Gorman: “The Prime Minister said we need to get out from under the doona and when it came to Clive Palmer’s High Court case, he used the withdrawal method.”

Bigger than all of us

Labor MP Mark Dreyfus created history last week when he appeared in parliament via video link with an Aboriginal flag behind him.

Dreyfus makes history.

Believe it or not, this is the first time the Aboriginal flag has appeared on the House of Reps floor.

We’re told Dreyfus was adamant both the Aboriginal and Australian flags were in shot — despite Speaker Tony Smith dictating only blank or Hansard book backgrounds were allowed — when he dialled in from his Mordialloc office, in locked-down Melbourne.

Tony Burke, the manager of opposition business, has been arguing for years that “the Australian flag, Aboriginal flag and Torres Strait Islander flag are all official flags under the Flags Act and should be flown within the House of Reps chamber”.

Tomorrow Labor will ask the Senate to establish an Inquiry to explore all options for freeing the Aboriginal flag. I hope we can count on the support of the Senate. It’s time for an open discussion. pic.twitter.com/sCNIiEpPuf

— Linda Burney MP (@LindaBurneyMP) September 2, 2020

Unrepresentative swill

Fun fact! Thursday was National Flag Day.

It’s 119 years since prime minister Edmund Barton announced the five joint winners in the design comp for a New Australian flag — Perth artist Annie Dorrington; 14-year-old Melbourne schoolboy Ivor Evans; 18-year-old optician apprentice Lesley Hawkins from Sydney; Melbourne architect Eggbert Nutall; and William Stevens, a first officer with the Union Steamship Company of New Zealand.

The nearly identical entries shared a £200 prize.

Elements of each were used to create the flag, which was flown for the first time over the dome of Melbourne’s Royal Exhibition Building on September 3, 1901.

September 3, 1901: Prime Minister Edmund Barton announced the winner of a design competition for a new Australian flag. The new flag was flown for the first time over the dome of Melbourne's Royal Exhibition Building. pic.twitter.com/lPr7nNOHJH

— Canberra Insider (@CanberraInsider) September 3, 2020

Do you slowly

It’s the pandemic country love song we had to have. Move over Victorian Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton. Perth comedian Chelsea Jones has released a music video dedicated to her favourite Rockingham hearthrob, simply titled Mark McGowan.

The raunchy lyrics include: “I’m going to head to Rockingham find myself a country man. When I do I’ll say, ‘Do you wanna pick me up go to the pub and then grab a kebab with me Mark McGowan? I’m in love, I’d do anything for ya and your hard, hard, hard … border’.”

There’s many a WA reference. “You’ve got the brains, you’ve got the rig, we’re sipping pints at the Swinging Pig. I think this man’s a keeper; he’s wearing the suit but still rocking the sneakers. And he’s my knight in shining armour whenever we’re together I’m not worried ‘bout Clive Palmer.”

Jones pinpoints that her “crush”on the WA Premier began when he gave the Easter bunny a special travel egg-emption. Which she references in the song while lying in bed next to a cardboard cut out of McGowan that she had made for $60 at Officeworks.

There’s not much else we can say about the song in this family paper. Except that Jones has sent her lyrical love letter to the 53-year-old Premier via his staff. We anticipate his response!

Faithful old dog

In case you missed it, our intrepid WA bureau chief Paige Taylor had this titbit in her recent front-page yarn about the WA Premier.

“When McGowan told reporters the AFL grand final was ‘not our main priority’, some took it to mean he did not care. ‘He’s a squash player from NSW who doesn’t want to risk his iron man image that he’s developed during the pandemic,’ one former senior government ­official said.”

For context — Marky Mark’s father, Dennis, owned a squash centre at Casino, NSW, where McGowan was a junior champion.

“I went to the national squash titles when I was 15,” he once disclosed. “I got beaten”.

Likes: long walks on the beach.

Can a souffle rise twice?

Finally, a snail mail fail tale sent in by Strewth reader Julie.

“On 6th August, I arranged for a small parcel of two balls of wool to be sent to a friend, from a little wool & craft shop around the corner,” she wrote. “The recipient received it on 27th August.”

It contained wool for slippers as a thank-you present to a woman who gifted Julie and her husband (now deceased) hand-knitted slippers in recent years.

“My friend lives in a Melbourne suburb some 35-40 minutes’ drive from me. Inquiries made of the shop owner, midway through this little saga, had her inform me that Melbourne parcels were now being diverted for sorting to Sydney, rather than Bendigo, as was the previous situation. What began as a simple gesture of thanks ended in frantic visits to her local post office by my friend.”

If only Daniel Andrews would let Julie walk more than 5km from her house!

Even at her youthful age of 75 years, Julie suspects she could have hand-delivered it quicker.

Meanwhile, Australia Post has scrapped $7m worth of bonuses for executives this year after it asked Melbourne staff to volunteer to deliver parcels for free.

Perhaps they could use it to resume normal service?

Who needs mail?

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