The Sketch: End is nigh but there’s still blows to be landed

The Coalition’s socially distanced joint partyroom meeting in the Great Hall at Parliament House on Tuesday. Picture: Sean Davey

Nature is healing — boom microphones are back! Great timing given the current brou-ha-ha over words.

It was just over five years ago when Peter Dutton famously shared a Pacific island-themed global warming gag with then prime minister Tony ­Abbott about how “time doesn’t mean anything when you’re about to have water lapping at your door”.

Social Services Minister Scott Morrison alerted the jovial pair to the large object attached to a 3m pole by pointing out: “There’s a boom (microphone) up there.” Time moved quickly then, with smiles evaporating and Kiribati president Anote Tong suggesting the Home Affairs Minister “search his own soul”.

Skip to Tuesday morn, when another boom mic snuck up behind the now Prime Minister and his deputy having a yarn in the Great Hall. The media had been invited into the partyroom to document the PM’s santa-tized end-of-year missive and, naturally, ears picked up when they spotted the private conversation.

But ScoMo’s radar was switched to stunned silence and he clammed up faster than a Labor pollie after accidentally stumbling into The Australian’s press gallery office. (Hello, Pat Conroy.)

The Prime Minister didn’t need any extra amplification to get his point across in question time. After fumbling twice in two minutes over names, Morrison turned on Jim Chalmers.

“I’m terribly, sorry, I mispronounced the shadow treasurer’s name. That must be such an ­offence to him. He is so precious,” Morrison said. “This is the same shadow treasurer who when he was a member cried in Kevin Rudd’s office. We know how sensitive he is.”

A perfect segue to the PM’s written Kevin 747 correction, over which he became a tad sensitive.

“The interjection that has come from the Leader of the ­Opposition is why didn’t I come in here? Because I was chairing the national security committee of cabinet,” Morrison bellowed.

“And I’m happy to apologise to Mr Rudd, but I tell you what, when it comes to the great things said in offence of Mr Rudd, the Liberal Party cannot compete with those opposite. The member for Watson accused him of chaos, lacking temperament and an inability to make decisions. The member for Gorton accused him of treachery! If anyone owes Kevin Rudd an apology …”

Anthony Albanese objected: “While I would be quite happy to have a debate with the Prime Minister about loyalty to people when in office as prime minister, this is not relevant. This is about as relevant as when he stabbed Malcolm Turnbull!”

Bill Shorten laughed, as Stephen Jones added from the Labor backbench: “Give us a hug, Scotty, we’re ambitious for you.”

Yet, Morrison continued. “I understand the Leader of the Opposition’s affection for Mr Rudd because he has the Rudd force field around him in the protections that were put in place to keep this Leader of the Opposition in his job.” An unparliamentary remark the PM withdrew.

Labor’s Graham Perrett summed up the end-of-year rowdiness: “A very rare event in 2020, school kids in the gallery for question time. Surely our students have suffered enough this year.”