Your new parliament

By Allen Myers Step right this way, ladies and gentlemen, and I'll introduce you to your new parliament. In here is the House of Representatives. Let's start with the opposition. It's easier to deal with them, because there are so few. In fact, it's a question whether there are enough of them to make a Super League rugby team — although Super League doesn't really need any more losers. Still, the opposition does have some well-known, well-loved figures. The quiet one over there is Ben Chifley, who's been exhumed to make up the numbers in a factional battle. Then there's Gareth Gareth-Evans, the well-known friend of powerful friends, whoever they may be. And that balloon-like figure floating in and out of the chamber, as though he can't decide whether he belongs here or not, is Basil Beastly. He has a great responsibility in the party's marginal seats strategy — he specialises in taking safe seats and turning them into marginals. That likely looking lad pushing his way towards the front of the opposition is Martin Effword. He's considered a potential future prime minister because of his ties to the unions — any Labor prime minister of course has to keep the unions well tied. The government members stretch from that slightly squishy patch there around to the right — further, further to the right, around there — all the way to those wags in the white hoods, Bubby Katzenjammer (National, Qld) and Bumpkin Bughouse (Parochial, Qld). Not all of the government side are here yet: truth is, some didn't really expect to win, and they're doing some crash courses in subjects like leadership, constitutional government and how to tie shoelaces. The leader of the government, of course, is the prime menzies, John Kermit. PM Kermit is proud of his record as a battler: he first entered parliament at the age of 11, which fortunately allowed him to get through the 1960s, '70s, '80s and '90s without being corrupted — or even wakened most of the time. Over there, the one resting his knuckles on the floor, is Deputy Prime Menzies Dim Basher. He's a surprisingly sensitive, "new age"-influenced politician. Like Prince Charles, he talks to trees. Just this morning, journalists heard him say, "Get outta the bloody way!" to a stand of 400-year-old rainforest as he drove his four-tread drive recreational vehicle through it. The treasurer is well known among those of you who never forget a smirk. Abbott Costello has been seen smirking on more television screens than any politician in history, in every case on the occasion of someone else being in pain. His many qualifications for the post of treasurer include a lifetime of toadying to those with money. In the same vein is Popeye Strewth. He was a natural for minister for industrial relations, because nearly all of his relations own industries. Other notable figures on the government side include Miss Piggy Leeder, who was expected to be minister for privatisation until the PM decided to privatise everything and realised that the minister for everything should be his own worthy self. Now, if you want to step this way, we can have a quick look at the Senate. It is very much like the House of Representatives, but not so much so. One difference is that it includes some members not from the major parties. This defect was created by the foundering fathers (and mothers, but there weren't any), who accidentally created in the Senate a voting system in which 38% of primary votes doesn't produce an absolute majority. The new government is expected to work on this. These members who are part of neither the government nor the opposition sit on the cross benches, so called because those who sit there are very angry with each other for taking each other's votes. And on the very cross benches you can see Senator Bent Halfdeener (Holy Alliance, Tasmania). The government will need his support in the Senate and so may do a deal to back his program. It calls for the abolition of consenting adults by the year 2000, which would be quite compatible with the Coalition's own intentions.