Strewth: Gone to the togs

Eric Abetz has been able to return to the all-important task of conjuring troubling mental images out of thin air.

Now that he has finished hectoring Indonesia on social media, senator Eric Abetz has been able to return to the all-important task of conjuring troubling mental images out of thin air. In the afterglow (such as it was) of Senate question time yesterday, Abetz got to work. And as per usual, we recommend letting Abetz’s voice — in all its singsong, BA Santamaria-ish lilt — sound in your head as you read. “The cynical use of older Australians by the Australian Labor Party is to be condemned,” he began. “The simple fact is that, under the previous Labor government, there was no home care approval list. So that of which the Labor Party complain is something they never thought of in government and never implemented, which as a result meant that senior Australians were left in the dark and subjected to unbearable delays in assessment and home care support. When quoting statistics, it’s a bit like skimpy bathers: what they show is interesting; what they hide is vital. And what senator (Helen) Polley’s speech has done is hide that which is vital.” What springs to mind here? Red budgie smugglers, or a Borat-style mankini? Either way, Polley was not enthralled and lodged a protest: “I rise on a point of order, madam Deputy President. That was a totally disrespectful analysis. Senator Abetz’s pathetic attempt …” For better or worse this was shut down by the Senate Deputy President, allowing Abetz to provide Polley with the opportunity to shun the reticence oppositions traditionally display about showing anything that carries even the faintest whiff of pre-election hubris.

Abetz: “You know you’ve got them between the eyes when they make an absolutely vacuous point of order such as that.”

Polley: “We’ll see who has it between the eyes at the next election.”

Wood, if he could

Meanwhile, Labor senator Murray Watt pressed on with another ongoing quest, drilling down into the enigma that is the government’s big stick energy. “My question is to the minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator (Mathias) Cormann. In an interview on Sky Tuesday with D avid Speers, the minister couldn’t explain the government’s policy to break up power companies, which he described as ‘putting on the table the big stick’ … What exactly is the big stick and exactly when will it be used?” Cormann (who, by the by, has just appeared in the latest Pollywood movie production: a beautifully lit, artfully composed video of him buying two shirts) endeavoured to bat this away: “I’m always bemused when I hear Labor senators selectively quote from a very important interview.” Arise Penny Wong: “The minister may complain about selective quoting, but the quote was his. He was the one that talked about putting on the table the big stick. The question goes to: what was he talking about?” When this proved fruitless Wong had another shot: “He talks about a stick. He says it’s big. We’re just asking what it is.” On and on it meandered until Watt was moved to plaintively note: “I’m still not clearer on what the big stick is.” It’s times such as this that Strewth’s brain tends to fill with the voice of the narrator from Monkey: “The beginning of wisdom is to say, ‘I don’t know’.”

Prism break

Meanwhile Bill Shorten was out engaging with the fourth estate.

Journo: “Do you think that Australia’s diplomatic relationship with China has turned a corner? Are you encouraged by what appears to be a thawing of the relationship?”

Shorten: “Our relationship with China is very important. This government’s been a bit of an absentee landlord in terms of the administration of our relationship with China. I’ve made it very clear a future Labor government will not view China through the prism of worst-case scenarios.”

Surely time for Sam Dastyari to clear his dance card. Though we could be overextrapolating.

Query free

Some of Shorten’s troops also gave press conferences but were clearly so comprehensive, no answers were required. There was Joel Fitzgibbon: “If there’s any questions, happy to take them. All good? Thanks very much.” And his Senate colleague Jenny McAllister: “Any questions?” Her transcript then goes straight to the large-font finality of “ENDS”.

As efficient as all this was, it’s still more enriching when there are questions. One more time for good measure let us salute the sublime moment this week when Scott Morrison was asked about Israel embassy plans (a topic on which Paul Keating’s old mate Mahathir Mohamad has since weighed in.)

PM: “We’ll be dealing with it over the next little while.”

Journo: “Can you define a ‘little while’ for us, Prime Minister?”

PM: “It’s a little and a while.”

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