The week in parliament: the theoretical impossibility of Tucker Carlson and nuclear tensions simmer in Coalition ranks

Tucker Carlson and Senator Ralph Babet missed cocktail hour after cameras were spotted setting up for the Parliament House event. Photograph: Lukas Coch/EPA

In Samuel Beckett’s play, Waiting for Godot, two characters spend their lives at a leafless tree awaiting the eponymous character they’ve never met but have heard much about.

Estragon and Vladimir wait by the tree discussing recent ills and troubles, neither knowing why they are there, forgotten by those they meet, yet incapable of moving on.

Godot never arrives. And so the play has been described as achieving “a theoretical impossibility” – in that nothing happens and yet people continue to watch.

The parliament saw its own adaptation of the 1953 play when numerous Coalition MPs arrived at what was billed as “an exclusive” cocktail event with far-right provocateur and journalist hater-in-chief Tucker Carlson.

Our spies spotted the Coalition’s Hollie Hughes, Alex Antic, Keith Pitt, Matt O’Sullivan, Terry Young, Jonno Duniam and Ross Cadell, as well as former Liberal turned independent Russell Broadbent and senior staff for Sussan Ley and David Littleproud milling around waiting for the man of the hour.

But Carlson, and the man who had invited them, Senator Ralph Babet, never appeared. At one point, Young and Cadell started yelling across the Parliament House event room reserved for the cocktail hour asking “have I missed him?” and “what’s going on”. Meanwhile, an annoyed Pitt was seen leaving after waiting 15 minutes. Some diehards lingered until it all became too desperate, and Waiting for Carlson reached its inevitable conclusion.

We are told that after the lunch event at the Hyatt, which Barnaby Joyce missed question time to attend, Carlson and Babet seemed to have had enough of pesky journalists, and decided not to show up after cameras were seen setting up for the Parliament House event.

Babet had invited parliamentarians and – ‘if there was room’ – senior staff to the event , but didn’t see the need to tell anyone it was cancelled. No doubt the liberal media is to blame.

Waiting for Carlson might have been a bust, but not so the Community Independents Project weekend convention.

About 1000 people from more than 125 electorates tuned into the two-day zoom conference to learn more about running independent political campaigns.

Climate 200 sizes up fresh seats

The community independent movement is mobilising, and Dan Tehan’s electorate of Wannon is on the hitlist. Alex Dyson, who ran against Tehan in 2019, and almost doubled his vote in 2022 to come second, is taking a third shot at the longtime Liberal MP.

Community independent supporters in the NSW mid-north community of Cowper are also aiming to topple the Nationals’ Pat Conaghan, after independent candidate Caz Heise gave him a fright in 2022.

Fundraising supergroup Climate 200 has announced the first round of campaigns it plans on supporting, with more to come – and you can expect to hear of more independent campaigns being announced in the coming weeks.

The teal independents in parliament have been sharing their experiences with those hoping to support independent campaigns, and no one is being particularly shy about the ultimate aim: like-minded independents holding the balance of power for a Labor government in the house and the Senate.

Nuclear unease simmers in Coalition ranks

Community independent campaigners think their job may have been made a little easier by the Coalition’s nuclear ‘policy’ which is still causing fissures of unease inside the Coalition, among longtime nuclear advocates and those less enthused.

Those who support nuclear aren’t happy because they think the policy “hasn’t been thought through” and may lead to the Coalition “squibbing” its “one chance”.

“If there are answers to all the questions, then we aren’t hearing them either,” one MP told us.

“But if you’re not actually planning on making it happen, then you don’t need answers, do you?”

Which makes sense when you consider what led up to the announcement.

But then that same attitude seems to be keeping some of the more moderate Coalition MPs – who would usually have a little to say about all of this – fairly quiet on the criticism front.

Is it easier to have the ‘debate’ when you believe it will never actually happen?

“Well, there is that,” one said. “You could make the point that there’s no use wasting capital on a pipe dream.”

Still, we are being told that there is a push to have the party “rally around Ted” [O’Brien] and support the idea. And given voters aren’t hating the idea, “you’re not going to see anyone break ranks”. The ‘yet’ seemed to be unspoken there.

Meanwhile, in Queensland …

Not breaking ranks, but not particularly thrilled with the Coalition nuclear chat is the Queensland state LNP which is in the midst of an election campaign. All indications are David Crisafulli and co will take power in the sunshine state for only the second time since 1998. But that doesn’t mean they’re looking for a fight. Crisafulli has made it clear that he has no plans to change the state’s nuclear ban under a government he leads, which makes selling the two nuclear reactors his federal counterparts have planned for Queensland a little awkward. Those in Crisafulli’s camp don’t think there is any harm in a state leader thumbing their nose at Canberra leaders, even when they are on the same side. “In fact you could say it’s even more of a bonus,” one LNP birdie told us.

Crisafulli’s plan from the outset has been to keep the LNP as close to the middle as possible, as a way to prove a moderate Coalition can win power. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t those in the federal team who are not a little frustrated at the way Crisafulli is leading their state arm. We’re told there was a bit of a running joke in the Coalition MP group chat about what the best election slogan for the Queensland LNP would be. The winning entry? ‘Who do you trust to best deliver Labor’s budget?’

Labor MP stumbles into a nest of Nats

Meanwhile, relations were much more friendly when Queensland Labor MP Graham Perrett inadvertently found himself a special guest at the recent NSW Nationals state conference. Perrett, along with the LNP’s Keith Pitt were in Wagga Wagga as part of their Public Works committee work, and found themselves staying at the same hotel as the Nats conference. The hotel was chosen at the recommendation of the local member, Michael McCormack, who, we’re told, enjoyed seeing Perrett’s face when he arrived to find himself surrounded by country green. Perrett told us that McCormack “is a great bloke” and he and his wife, Catherine, were “wonderful hosts” but “on the whole, the policies of the agrarian socialists I met were too leftwing for me”.