Ben Pobjie theguardian.com, Thursday 14 November 2013

'Electricity Bill', 'Typhoon Tony' – is this what we’ve got to look forward to in parliament from now on, a name-calling arms race? Here’s my suggestion for all parliamentarians: grow up

Tony Burke, opposition leader Bill Shorten, Tanya Plibersek and Chris Bowen are sworn in to the 44th parliament on 13 November 2013. Photograph: Kym Smith/Newspix

I’ve written before about the need for Australia to consider the importance of good manners. Now, of course parliament – where a brawl erupted yesterday after the new speaker allowed parliamentarians to call Bill Shorten "Electricity Bill" – is not exactly the same as a everyday face-to-face interactions, and a certain level of ferocity on the floor of the chamber is to be expected. But behavioural standards in our legislatures have nonetheless long been the subject of lament.

For myself, I’ve always thought what parliament needed was not just an improvement in manners, but a complete recalibration of behaviour to bring parliamentarians in line with what the rest of us generally call “reality”. Just a few minutes spent watching parliamentary proceedings will demonstrate that normal procedure is for every declaration by a member to be met by catcalls, hooting, sneers and guffaws from the opposite side. The basic hallmark of politeness – allowing a person who is speaking to finish without interruption, for example – is completely absent from the average MP’s worldview.

On the other hand, the greatest crime anyone can commit in the chamber is to call another member a liar. According to the rules of parliament, politicians do not lie and we mustn’t say they do, lest the Speaker come crashing down like an avalanche of justice. This is the bizarre paradox of parliament: it’s accepted that those who work there will behave like under-medicated six-year-olds and that it is their job to do so, but it is against the rules for anyone to describe anyone else accurately.

It would be nice if parliament could clean itself up a little and shift standards further in the direction of truth in debate and away from juvenile idiocy, but the opening of the 44th parliament has shown that, in depressingly predictable fashion, our elected leaders will instead do the opposite.

This is probably an indication of our new political climate. In recent past, to allow parliament to refer to a politician by a nickname would have been considered not only un-parliamentary, but nauseatingly cretinous. I mean really? “Electricity Bill”? Is this what we’ve got to look forward to, a government constantly snorting up its sleeves and pitching its jokes at a level unable to be appreciated by anyone between the ages of five and 90? It’s up there with “Juliar” in the annals of political epithets that make you assume whoever came up with it has an IQ below 70.

But the point isn’t how shudderingly awful the government is at puns. The point is that Bishop has now declared open season for such slings and arrows during parliamentary sittings, and so we are about to enter a name-calling arms race, in which all sides of politics dedicate themselves to finding better and stupider things to call their opponents. Christine Milne has already stated that if the government persists with “Electricity Bill”, she’s going to start calling the prime minister “Typhoon Tony”, a statement which can only make us say, what happened to you, Christine? You used to be cool.

So this is what we have to look forward to: the government will call Shorten Electricity Bill, and then the Greens will call Abbott Typhoon Tony, and then the government will call Milne Chris-Teeny Brain, and Labor will chip in and call Julie Bishop Ju-leech, and the government will call Tanya Plibersek Fake-Tan Ya, and Labor will call the treasurer Joke Hockey, and then suddenly Clive Palmer will yell out “Adam You-Oughtta-Be-Bandt!” and then Anthony Albanese will call Christopher Pyne a knobend, and then George Brandis will knee Doug Cameron in the groin and it’ll be on.

Here’s a suggestion: how about you just grow up a bit? I’m not asking you to act like statesmen – I realise that ship has sailed – but just to give reasonably convincing impressions of functional adults. I know the speaker won’t be enforcing this in any way, but maybe you all could take the lead yourselves? No kindergarten puns, no brain-damaged name-calling, no gibbering in the middle of others’ speeches, no obnoxious rehearsed backbench cheers, no leaping up and squawking “point of order” every time a minister opens their mouth as if there’s a noise-activated joy buzzer in your chair. Just be grown-ups for a while, and see how you like it, yeah?

Then you can start calling each other liars – once you’re mature enough to not call each other names, I reckon you’ll be ready to call each other what you are.

Australia, let's talk about manners ... again | Comment is free | theguardian.com