Alan Jones offers cheeriest cheerio for Michael Daley

Among all the happy faces on Saturday night it was hard to go past Alan Jones’s.

As Gladys Berejiklian hailed NSW as “a state in which someone with a long surname — and a woman — can be premier”, we imagine that somewhere, Annastacia Palaszczuk was nodding sagely. Among all the happy faces on Saturday night — Berejiklian’s family; Liberal Party president Nick Greiner; John Howard, who frankly looks stoked wherever he goes these days; Scott Morrison, who looked like he was savouring the experience of being at a happy election party; anyone pondering Mark Latham’s looming reunion with parliamentary privilege — it was hard to go past Alan Jones’s. It was barely a handful of days ago that Jones was listening to Labor leader Michael Daley promising, if elected, to sack him and the rest of the SCG Trust board with an amusingly curt “thanks for your service”. Roll forward to Saturday night and Jones, looking like the cat that had inherited a dairy, addressed the camera directly: “To you, Michael Daley, I have one observation: thank you for your service.” It was certainly jollier than federal election night, where Jonesy spent a solid spell barking at Malcolm Turnbull to leave home and face the music.

One more for the road

Evidently feeling he hadn’t quite fulfilled his clanger quota for the month, Daley managed to get one more into his concession speech: “My wonderful hardworking deputy, Penny Sharpe. You’re an absolute trouper. Penny is certainly an ornament to the party.” Even one of his own troops, Jodi McKay, was moved to throw shade from her perch on the ABC’s election panel: “Michael’s speech was very gracious, although I think he called Penny an ornament. I wasn’t so sure about that.”

Product differentiation

There were gentle efforts to put in some distance yesterday.

Journo: “Is the Coalition worried about the National Party losing federal seats given what happened in NSW?”

Kelly O’Dwyer: “I will leave the National Party to comment about the National Party.”

Bill Shorten managed something akin to mental ambidexterity.

Journo: “Michael Daley’s comments about Asians were damaging there in the last week. Does that leave your party with a lasting problem in that state?”

Shorten: “No. I’ve spoken to Michael Daley. He’s the first to acknowledge that his comments were wrong and I’ve certainly said that to him. I think he paid a price for that. More generally, when it comes to tolerance and diversity, I think, again, it just highlights the importance of the mainstream parties putting the extremists last. Again, I say to Mr Morrison: put the country first, put One Nation and like-minded parties last.”

(Points to The Sydney Morning Herald for delivering a headline in verse form: “Regardless of why Labor lost, Daley’s video was racist — and it cost.” We’re fairly confident, though, Shorten was not cracking a Tassie joke here.

Journo: “Is it time the AFL gave Tasmania a clear answer? Should they stop stringing Tasmania along?”

Shorten: “I think Tasmanians are in two minds.”

Into the back of the net

For the benefit of any political parties desperately seeking inspiration on how to lift their games, we present this email from the coach of an inner-Sydney boys’ soccer team to the parents of the players: “I have been told from various parents that five players will leave at the end of the season. This is totally fine but why wait till the end of the season when you can leave right now and vacate for other talented boys … Also, I’m very disappointed at the constant negativity in regards to some of the players’ physicality towards each other. In the real professional football world in which I spent (a long time) overseas, do you all honestly think that players don’t kick the crap out of each other in training.” There follows a brief recounting of the time some soccer star stood over him, demanding he get up so he could “punch my head in”. On he goes: “I want a very competitive environment which will produce professional footballers not ballerinas.” Truly, ballerinas have to be a lot tougher. “Thirdly, since all this ‘too aggressive’ complaints started the boys’ intensity and performance has dropped by 30/40 per cent which now infuriates me … Now if this environment is too aggressive, then obviously ‘real’ elite football is not for your son and you should consider changing clubs tomorrow. Also, I’m very annoyed how parents are talking about other boys in a disgusting manner. Please don’t bitch anymore and if you’re unhappy, please request a clearance which will be granted immediately …” What lifts it all into the realm of the magical is that the boys on the team are 10 years old.

[e-mail]