The odd couple: Morrison and Andrews' 'bromance' promises a new political era

Surrounded by panicked Victorian Liberal MPs in the days following Labor's "Danslide" state election win, Scott Morrison offered his Canberra colleagues some sage advice.

Daniel Andrews, he told the room, had been re-elected because he was a premier who had promised to do things and had delivered on them.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Premier Daniel Andrews have developed a 'bromance'.Credit: AAP

And that, he said, was how he would run his campaign in the months ahead.

Some MPs in the meeting had rolled their eyes at their new Prime Minister's response, convinced that the act of knifing Malcolm Turnbull, and the bitter divisions which followed, had put their safe Liberal seats at risk.

Later that day, Morrison would be jeered by the opposition in Parliament when he likened the successful Andrews government to his own.

In the months since, the relationship between Morrison and Andrews has blossomed.

Daniel Andrews and Scott Morrison - during the annual Long Walk celebrations before the Dreamtime at the 'G clash - are the new "odd couple" of Australian politics.Credit: AAP

It's been dubbed a "bromance" in the inner circles but others see them more as the new "odd couple" of Australian politics.

"They respect and like each other," a source close to the Victorian Premier says.

Illustration: Matt GoldingCredit:

"It's developed into a really strong working relationship."

Last week amid a busy Canberra sitting schedule the pair ate alone in the Prime Minister's personal dining room. Braised beef short-rib was on the menu but they didn't touch the booze.

Morrison had sworn off the grog for the month as part of Dry July. Andrews joined him with his efforts.

Earlier that day the Victorian Premier had dropped off a bottle of Starward's award winning single-malt whisky from a Port Melbourne distillery as a gift.

The "working dinner" ran almost an hour over despite a handful of attempts from political staffers to wrap it up.

They spoke about gas supply, about TAFE and skills training and about infrastructure. The polarising East West Link project was put aside, with neither leader prepared to back down on their views.

One-on-one dinners between two public adversaries can often make overly efficient aides jumpy but they knew this meeting would potentially set the tone for things to come.

Both believe the next two years present a rare election-free window to serve their "getting stuff done" mantra.

The relationship has already been likened to that of John Howard and Steve Bracks, who despite their clear political differences, worked successfully through the Council of Australian Governments to achieve major reform.

Friday's COAG meeting in Cairns will be the first between state and territory leaders since Morrison's 'May Miracle', and Andrews, as the senior Labor premier in the room, will be critical to its success.

After years of toxicity, where Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull targeted Andrews at every turn, Morrison has dropped the attacks on his Victorian counterpart and promised a new line of communication. Both men know they need each other to achieve their promises.

The first signs of that came from Morrison during the federal election campaign despite a multi-million taxpayer-funded advertising campaign from Andrews against his government.

"I'll expect of course Premier Andrews to say things over the next few weeks," Morrison said when asked of the pair's capacity to work constructively.

"He will put on the red team shirt and he will say what the Labor Party expects him to say. But what I do know to be the case is that we are both professionals.

"We both understand the importance of delivering the infrastructure Victorians need."

While the relationship is as much about naked political ambition as it is convenience, people close to both men are quick to point out their similarities.

Both are "of the machine", with their careers prior to Parliament spent running their respective state political parties and election campaigns.

"Hacks trust each other," one Labor source said. "And hacks know how to make deals."

Others point out both have a similar "daggy suburban dad" persona and add that neither have to search for answers to questions.

Daniel Andrews' election win in November made Canberra take notice. Credit: AAP

"They both know what they believe in. You can't fake that and that's why both are regarded by voters as genuine," a Liberal strategist observed.

Andrews, like Morrison, has frustrated the Fourth Estate during his time in office by refusing to buy into a string of scandals which threatened his own government - from the controversial reform of Victoria's fire services to revelations hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars were used to pay for Labor campaigners called the "red shirts".

"Sometimes issues can be big on Spring Street, where our Parliament is, and they don't have a great deal of resonance on Main Street," he said at the time.

It's a more wordy, but similar sentiment, to Morrison's "Canberra bubble" dismissal of questions he doesn't particularly want to answer.

Andrews' electoral success in November, where he achieved an eight-seat swing in Labor's favour, made many around the country take notice.

Top of that list of things that intrigued outsiders was the hugely popular level-crossing removal program.

"There's not a government or opposition in the country which isn't searching for their own version of a level-crossing removal policy now," one Liberal said. "It's probably the cleverest thing I've seen from any government in a decade. It created jobs and made people's daily lives better. And they did it in one term."

The Morrison Government mimicked that approach with a pledge of hundreds of new car parks at suburban railway stations. It was dismissed by some as "parish pump" stuff but an election post-mortem from the Liberals indicates it resonated with voters.

Those on both sides of the political fence are now fascinated by what they view as the development of a "very strategic" relationship.

But as Morrison says: "We'll have our differences from time to time as you'd expect but we will get on with the job."