In one of the most sustained and savaging critical attacks on the Government since the recent Federal election, Liberal Opposition leader Tony Abbott said yesterday that Julia Gillard’s gumment was shit and he don’t like it.

“They’re shit, and I don’t like them”, Mr. Abbott told Parliament during Question Time yesterday.

“They’re not stopping stuff, they’re not stopping enough stuff, you’ve got all this stuff going unstopped, and they’re not stopping it”, Mr. Abbott continued, “What’s the point in a gumment that doesn’t stop stuff, that’s what gumment’s are for, to stop stuff, and if we were the gumment, and we should’ve been the gumment, all this unstopped stuff that’s going on would’ve been stopped and stopped by us.”

Prime Minister Gillard rejected Mr. Abbott’s claims, stating, “If you’re looking for a government that’s going to stop stuff, we’re the government that’ll do it, and we’ve stopped so much stuff recently I couldn’t begin to shake a stick at the stuff we’ve stopped, and we’re going to continue to stop more stuff, because that’s precisely the stuff we’re stopping that the people want stopped. Mr. Abbott couldn’t stop a chicken from crossing the road.”

Mr. Abbott hit back at that claim by stating, “I wouldn’t start a chicken crossing the road Mr. Speaker, I wouldn’t even think of having a chicken cross the road unless I was absolutely, positively 100% sure that that chicken could get across the road without the need to stop halfway over, unlike the Labor Party, unlike the Labor Party, the government here who are shoving chickens across random roads at the drop of a willy-nilly hat without the slightest concern, Mr. Speaker, without the slightest concern at either the short or long term consequences of all these chickens, all these chickens, all these chickens, Mr. Speaker, all these chickens, chickens on our roads, Mr. Speaker, chickens on our roads.”

Ms. Gillard responded, “I absolutely, categorically reject the Opposition Leader’s baseless assertions about all these chickens, Mr. Speaker, chickens, Mr. Abbott is deliberately attempting to mislead this Parliament.”

And thus it continued in that vein for a time, a time that seemed to stretch for an infinite passage, a brook of babbling riches, and it weaved and it swayed and it wended its way down that cobbled path of joyous debate, it tootled its way down that merry little road, with a “Hey! Nonny-nonny!” and “Hi-di, Hi-di-ho!”, and at the end of the day, when they’ve lightened their loads, our parliamentary dwarves, off to their offices they go, singing, “Hi-ho, hi-ho, it’s off to work we go …”

And the next day?

They’ll come back. And they’ll do the same thing, all over again. Again and again and again and again and again and again.

And again.

Aren’t we lucky?