You might hear the clink of bottles into recycling bins this morning, the sounds of Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours pumping out of a tinny phone speaker and the occasional pleading howl into the wind.
The Coalition is going through a rough breakup.
As you will have surely read, the Nationals and the Liberal party are going their separate ways for the first time in 38 years, citing the long-held precedent regarding rats and sinking ships.
The split was triggered by the Nationals leader, David Littleproud – the politician who, more than any other currently in parliament, looks as if he’s about to ask you if you have any games on your phone.
Littleproud presented the new Liberal leader, Sussan Ley, with a list of four demands to keep the Coalition together, one of which being the continued support of nuclear power and a promise to build seven taxpayer-funded nuclear reactors, apparently believing that the previous election failure might have been because everyone liked that idea too much. Though, it is very in keeping with a nuclear Australia to keep a radioactive policy around because you have no idea how to safely dispose of it.
My favourite quote on the incident came from the Nationals Senate leader, Bridget McKenzie, who said “I’m genuinely blown away that we are prepared to do this for the right reasons.”
This feels true to me. I could imagine them doing this for petty reasons, perhaps even outwardly stupid reasons, but principles of any kind are so rare to find that part of you has to respect the move, provided it’s the part of you incapable of adding up numbers.
Still, it’s at least a stand to take. We believe in our principles and if we can’t get them done together then we will go ourselves and stand even less of a chance of getting them done.
You’d better give me what I want or I will shoot myself right in the foot.
The Liberal party was only given half an hour to prepare for the split to be announced to the press, hardly enough time to take the traditional post-breakup measures of booking a trip to Japan and flooding your Instagram stories with inspirational quotes about loyalty and finding your path in life.
As always, in the aftermath of any nasty split, friends are forced to take sides. John Howard emerged like the Ghost of Christmas Past to lash both parties for their misdeeds, and made sure to remark about the time that he almost split the Coalition because he was having so much success, and the Liberal party was going so well, and everyone loved him so much – does that help you? Can you relate to that?
Senator Matt Canavan, fresh from his own leadership challenge, was stood up on breakfast television by the deputy Liberal leader, Ted O’Brien. Later, O’Brien claimed the two were good friends and would happily appear together – an unfortunate misstep as “unwilling to appear with Matt Canavan” was the most relatable policy the Liberal had put forward in months.
Now, as with all breakups, you don’t want to say anything too harsh in case the couple gets back together in a few days. I will not speculate on rumours that the Liberals might start seeing that nice Teal party from work, even if they do seem to have a lot in common.
The only advice I will give is the traditional breakup advice. Take some time. Work on yourself. You certainly do need a lot of work, and the way things are going, you’ll have a lot of time in opposition.
• James Colley is a comedy writer from Sydney. His debut novel The Next Big Thing is out now
