The Sketch: well-heeled Bishop in focus as Kelly puts the boot in

Julie Bishop’s $1700 shoes. Picture: Gary Ramage

Amid yesterday’s condolence motions for George HW Bush was an important reminder: be nice to the person who takes your place at the top, no matter how much you wish you were still there.

“George Bush and Bill Clinton fought a bruising campaign in 1992,” Scott Morrison said reflectively. “Yet Mr Clinton arrived in the Oval Office to find a letter from his predecessor, which said, ‘You will be our president when you read this note. Your success now is our country’s success.’”

While this could have doubled as a hint to ScoMo’s predecessor, it’s a shame he didn’t make it to Bush’s next sentence: “I am rooting hard for you.”

Then again, some stuff goes awry in translation.

Craig Kelly makes a point. Picture: Kym Smith

From here, question time schlepped through the afterglow of Malcolm Turnbull’s latest oar insertion, through the badlands of encryption, and returned in various ways to foreign leaders

There was even one seated on the floor of the house: Tuvalu PM Enele Sopoaga. Julie Bishop paid his delegation a visit and they all looked pleased. (For those who like to stay abreast of such things, Bishop was wearing a $1700 pair of Yves Saint Laurent’s Opyum sandals with heels that look like a Y, S and L welded together. It was ­arguably the most exciting fashion moment there since Labor’s Luke Gosling wore a safari suit as part of some broader point.)

Then there were digs at Morrison’s G20 encounters with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who’d conspicuously carried her ScoMo briefing notes, and US President Donald Trump, who’d expressed mild curiosity as to Turnbull’s fate. But Morrison had plenty of time on the plane back from Buenos Aires to prepare for such waggishness and it almost showed: “Everybody on this side of the house is going to work incredibly hard to the next election to ­ensure the rest of the world never knows who the leader of the Labor Party is.”

Despite this, and the high-­fiving atmosphere on the crossbench, it was a relatively subdued question time. Even Labor’s delicate dance with hubris had a bump earlier in the day in the form of a protest non-vote from its MP Emma Husar.

Sensing things needed a boost, Tony Burke made use of a ­possum-stirring technicality previously used on backbenchers Ken O’Dowd and Barnaby Joyce and put a question to man of the ­mo­ment, ­backbencher Craig Kelly.

Christopher Pyne tried putting a stop to this mischief — surely battle-hardened reflex rather than party-pooping — but Labor cries of “Release Kelly!” won the day

Given Kelly was involved in a shouty exchange with a mayor in his electorate the day before — a contretemps allegedly packing more “prick” than a hedgehog convention — his vocal cords were in good shape. Putting the “shot” into “earshot”, he embarked on a rolling explosion at Labor, the crux of which was: “YOU DON’T CARE!” Putting to one side the danger he’d be perceived as greedy, Burke asked for Kelly’s time to be extended.

Afterwards, Agriculture Minister David Littleproud launched a bold experiment in sounding calm and focused and not at all mad.

It came as a revelation.