Our Prime Minister, Mr Albanese, enjoys dressing up incredibly divisive initiatives, ones that patently favour left to hard-left long-term outcomes, as though they were uncontentious, straightforward formalities or simple courtesies.  ‘Just the done thing, old boy. All part of bringing the country together and all that.’ He even manages to mouth such patently untrue whoppers in the most incredibly unctuous, Uriah Heepish way. It seems to be his favourite persona, Mr Nicey Two Shoes.

So first we have his s.128 Voice constitutional referendum, announced the very first moment he won office. The truth is that this is the most radical proposed constitutional change in our country’s history, and in substance one aiming for an outcome unique across the democratic world. The Voice is to get its own chapter in the constitution, the first such proposal in 44 previous constitutional referenda attempts. (How do you say, ‘Go ahead judges and be as activist as you can’? By creating a new chapter in the constitution.) It’s to apply to the executive as well as the legislature. (That was a bridge too far for Julian Leeser and Frank Brennan, until it wasn’t.) It does not explicitly limit the scope and reach of this new Voice body to matters solely related to Aboriginal peoples. At every junction Mr Nicey Nicey, ‘Nothing to See Here’ Albanese opted for the most aggressive, far-reaching, and in my view left-wing enabling choice he could. That’s the truth of the matter.

But the Albanese spin is that this is just a simple matter of politeness. It’s just part of a generous invitation to bring the country together. Don’t start worrying your pretty little heads, dear voters, about the myriad dangers of making amorphous, effectively unspecified changes to the world’s fourth- or fifth-oldest written constitution. Or going down the path of unequal citizenship and of empowering activist elites. Mr Nicey Nicey (who, alas, hasn’t had the time to read the background documents from the very same people bringing you this little gem) assures us it’s all just fine and dandy. And to help get it over the line he’s opted not to publicly fund both sides – a national first as regards contested constitutional referenda in this country.

That way his preferred Yes side, thanks to boatloads of disgraceful conduct by this country’s corporate elites in donating huge dollops of shareholders’ monies (not their own), will end up with 15 to 20 times more money to spend on the campaign than the No side. Heck, Albo’s even gamed the actual question on the ballot paper, misdirecting voters to look only over there at the recognition side of the equation and not here at the crucial issue of the Voice body itself.   As you read this Penn & Teller are dripping with envy at this masterclass in sleight of hand. Still, Albo assures us it’s just an exercise in bringing the country together and a matter of simple courtesy. Got that?

So how do you follow up that sort of brazen chutzpah if you’re Mr I’ll Be Nicey?  What’s another way in which our PM might be able to bring all Australians together (cue guitarist about to start strumming Kumbaya in the background) and unify the country? Never fear dear readers. Our PM has got it. He’ll break his word on holding a royal commission into the aftermath of the two-plus Covid years of lockdowns, thuggery, weaponised police brutality, nonsensical rules and the like and instead hold an enervated little version, a Covid-19 inquiry. This will bring the country together, n’est-ce pas? Better yet, he’ll staff this insipid little inquiry with three people – two of whom were throughout publicly and vocally on the record supporting these hard lockdowns (and the third being no sceptic I ever heard), even to the extent of backing the world’s harshest iteration of them in our state of Victoria.

Cards on the table. I was a lockdown sceptic from day one. I think that each and every one of my points made from day one against going down this lockdown path has been proven to be true – many kids will never recover from the school closures and have diminished lives, the trillion dollar costs will be paid back (if at all) by our grandkids, wealth will be transferred from young to old and from poor to rich, public sector will be fine, private sector small businesses crushed, oh and the lockdowns long term will cost more lives than they’ll save short term. (And that most definitely has proven to be the case as you can see by checking the data on cumulative excess deaths by looking at Sweden compared to every other OECD country going, including Australia: the Swedes are the lowest.) I put it as mildly as humanly possible for someone like me who still seethes with anger at what our useless politicians across the political spectrum did to us – not a one of whom took a pay cut of even a penny – when I say ‘this charade of a gamed little inquiry is not going to bring us together Prime Minister’. No lockdown sceptic will waste his or her time making a submission to this handpicked, gamed, group of three defenders of the status quo horrific decision-making.

But it gets worse. I am no defender of the Liberal party and of the former Morrison government over its appalling decisions during Covid. Wrong down the line. Sold out liberalism and freedom and values-based decision-making. But come off it, Mr Albanese! The terms of reference for this little charade explicitly exclude ‘actions taken unilaterally by state and territory governments’. Incredible. Because as bad as Morrison & co. were in empowering the Labor thugs at the state level it was Labor and the state premiers who really took heavy-handedness to a new level.

But Mr I’ll Be Nicey wants to exempt his Labor mates from criticism, even from this little kangaroo inquiry. In the name of bringing the country together and all. For the sake of unity, old chap. Couldn’t have anything to do with setting up a political hit job on the Libs (and yes, they deserve it but Labor deserves it more).

If, as he should, Dutton managed to fire all of his 25-year-old ‘moderate’ advisers the first thing he should do tomorrow morning is to announce there’ll be a proper royal commission (properly headed up) the day after he and the Coalition are elected – to keep Mr Albanese’s promise as it were, let the chips fall where they may. (The second thing Dutton should announce tomorrow, had he proper advisers, is that if the AEC doesn’t reconsider its decision that ticks will count in this Voice referendum but crosses will not – and it is dumb to take this to the courts as the judges lean 90 per cent to Yes – then a newly elected Coalition government’s second task will be to sack the lot of the AEC higher-ups for imposing a rule that doesn’t meet the pub test and that is patently biased, legal opinions and past practice be damned!  Both ticks and crosses count or neither.)

It’s time voters realised Mr. Albanese is one of the most divisive PMs ever and a man set on imposing a radical left agenda on this country. Mr Dutton needs to fight back and stop trying to accommodate even a little of this ‘I’ll Be Nicey’ agenda.