I don’t agree with the mainstream media that the election campaign has been dull and boring, except when the media is carrying on about the campaign being so dull and boring. In fact, I have found it very interesting and I have learnt quite a few things over the last few weeks.

First, I am indebted to Bill Shorten for revealing the true objective of the campaign for aboriginal recognition in the constitution. As I suspected, it is not the one we have had presented to us over the last few years, along the lines of changing the constitution to recognise aboriginals and removing any vestiges of discrimination. The real objective, now revealed by Mr Shorten, is to have a treaty between Australia and the aboriginals, which means recognising each side to the treaty as a separate country. That is what a treaty is. Not only is it nonsense to suggest that a nation can have a treaty with itself, but a treaty would be utterly divisive of this country and its people, generate hostility towards the aboriginal people and set up the classic formula for endless litigation; make no mistake, armed with a treaty, the High Court will discover all sorts on implied rights and entitlements hidden from the rest of us.

Worse still, a treaty will be another milestone on the disastrous path our intelligentsia has embarked on towards demolishing one institutional structure after another; first it was the crown, then traditional marriage and the family, then national borders, and now, apparently, the nation itself. As there is so much to defend, there has never been a better time to be a conservative, so long as you realise what is under attack and do something about it. But it is great help in this work to be told by Mr Shorten that a treaty is the end objective of the aboriginal debate. Knowing this fact is already saving me an enormous amount of time as I do not have to read any more about it and, when we have the referendum, it will not even be necessary to read the question. In fact, I am coming around to the view that you should never read the question on a referendum or plebiscite, but just automatically vote ‘No’. It saves a lot of bother.

But, in a spirit of even-handedness, I am also indebted to Malcolm Turnbull for revealing the other objective of the aboriginal campaign. Yes, he told us the other day, the arrival of the First Fleet was an ‘invasion’. The Left has always had trouble shoe-horning the early British settlement into any definition of ‘invasion’: to have an invasion, you need a bigger army than the 247 marines who were sent here, not as an invading force, but to keep the convicts in line and provide protection for the settlement and who must have been the smallest invasion army in history. The marines certainly did not do much invading. So, as the Left always does, it has taken the word ‘invasion’, loaded with emotion as it is, and just kept repeating it until, as usual and covered in guilt, we give in and start using the word ourselves to give vent to our own emotions. The Prime Minister should have resisted the temptation to give official approval of yet another plank in the left wing agenda, but he seems unable or unwilling to reject them. The hypocrisy in using the word is what really annoys me; if there were an invasion in 1788, Australia must still be an invaded and occupied land to which we have no tenure. But no harbour-side mansions and no rolling acres of rural bliss descended from father to son are going to be handed back to the aboriginals. The official endorsement of the British settlement which is now on the record as an invasion will be a potent admission of liability when the writs for compensation start flying, as they will.

The next revelation I have had during the campaign is an appreciation of the true role of the Commonwealth Government, or at least how our leaders see it. I had thought that it was all set out in the constitution. But no. It seems now that the true role of the Commonwealth is to make grants to every netball club, every surf club from Cottesloe to Bondi and every tourist attraction from Puffing Billy to Cradle Mountain. No doubt these grants are welcomed by the local member and probably earn a few votes, as giving and receiving other peoples’ money is usually popular. But the damage they do is far greater; they diminish the role and responsibility of state governments and promote the false idea that there is a bottomless pit of taxpayers’ money and that all you have to do is ask for some during an election campaign. And it gets worse, as it is a rule of politics that every grant must be larger than its predecessor. If we really want to control government spending, we have to stop these tokenistic grants in their entirety.

The most recent thing I have learned during the campaign, something I learned from his appearance on Q &A, is just how good Malcolm Turnbull can be. He showed gravitas, a detailed knowledge of the detail of every portfolio far beyond what a PM could reasonably be expected to know and remember – and I could actually understand what he was saying. He even put the oleaginous Tony Jones back in his bottle a few times, something that was long overdue. Malcolm Turnbull will be elected PM on 2 July and will probably turn out to be a good one. It is a great shame he had to reach the Lodge by the route he chose. It is a greater shame that he seems continually drawn to tokenistic left wing causes, while he chases the mirage that, eventually, left wing voters will come to like him.

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