Secret code gets its claws into Canberra

Four wolf claw marks have started appearing on Liberal and Labor office windows around Parliament House. What does it all mean?

Claws for thought: Liberal senator James Paterson.

A secret code has started appearing on office windows around Parliament House. It’s a small sticker — four wolf claw marks on a clear background.

Strewth has spied it stuck outside the suites of Liberal lower house members Andrew Hastie, Tim Wilson and Phillip Thompson, Liberal senator James Paterson and Labor senator Kimberley Kitching. The group jokingly calls itself “The Wolverines”, a reference to the 1984 flick Red Dawn where high school football stars Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen stop a Soviet invasion of the US. Formed last year, the bipartisan Canberra Wolverines communicate (with many a wolf emoji) via encrypted WhatsApp messages. Their aim? To speak out against China’s expanding power.

‘You’re in the wolf pack? Me too.’ ... Anthony Byrne and Andrew Hastie make their point in the House of Representatives chamber at Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: Kym Smith

Another wolf pack member is Labor backbencher Anthony Byrne — nicknamed “The Undertaker” and often spotted around the building wearing a trench coat. Byrne’s too discreet to display his allegiances with a sticker but he took on Britain’s Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab last month over the UK’s decision to include Huawei in its 5G rollout.

Kimberley Kitching takes time out from wolf pack duties to enjoy the Tabcorp marquee during the Melbourne Cup carnival at Flemington last year. Picture: Aaron Francis

The others have been slowly ramping up their anti-red state rhetoric. Hastie, Wilson, Paterson and Kitching made public statements calling on Boris Johnson to ban the Chinese telco.

Hastie is a former SAS captain, chairman of the powerful Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, and has written opinion pieces about the need for Western democracies to use “political warfare” against authoritarian regimes.

He and Kitching founded the Parliamentary Friends of Democracy. Hastie and Paterson were denied visas to China last year after expressing concern over the Communist Party’s influence at universities and human rights abuses of Uighurs. And Wilson travelled to Hong Kong last year to support pro-democracy protesters. Strewth has been assured the Wolverine stickers were personally financed by Hastie and Kitching, and not made in China. They were purchased from the People’s Republic of Melbourne.

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Labor digs coal

Labor frontbencher Mark Butler made a surprise appearance at Wednesday night’s cocktail party thrown by the Parliamentary Friends of Resources (also known as the Parliamentary Friends of Coal) with Santos chief Kevin Gallagher and former Labor resources minister Martin Ferguson.

Mark Butler during Question Time. Picture: AAP

Butler was spotted by Strewth’s spies walking towards the event, hosted by his factional frontbench rival Joel Fitzgibbon (who is also one of the ringleaders of Labor’s so-called “Otis Group”) and Liberal MP Craig Kelly. When asked if he was going to the coal love-in, Butler replied that it wasn’t to celebrate resources but instead to talk about carbon capture and storage. But when Butler arrived at the private dining room, the Labor lefty was informed they were one and the same, so he quickly hightailed it out of there — only to return a short time later for the speeches.

Despite being on opposite ends of the opposition’s philosophical debate on how to balance climate change and resources, Fitzgibbon gave Butler a shout-out for attending. We spied more Labor than Coalition MPs in the room, including Left members Graham Perrett and Terri Butler.

The highlight of the night came during the end of Fitz’s 10-minute speech centred on “turning down the heat” on the climate debate. “The Prime Minister believes we need to act on climate change. Anthony Albanese believes we need to act on climate change. Mark Butler certainly does. I do. (Resources Minister) Keith Pitt does. And I think Craig Kelly does too.” There was a pause as Kelly called out “Sorry?”, to big laughs. “He tries,” Fitz concluded.

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On a roll

Finally, a thought from this column’s former owner James Jeffrey (now a speech writer for Labor leader Albanese) on the the loo roll situation: “Is hoarding toilet paper anal retentive?” We’ve even seen people selling a 10-pack of three-ply Quilton on eBay for $120. Another listing on Gumtree has 16 embossed rolls of Sorbent listed for an insane $1600. The seller says: “I was asking for $150 per roll but have brought it down to $100 per roll, come on that’s cheap. It’s silky white, won’t be after use.”

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— James Jeffrey (@James_Jeffrey) March 4, 2020

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