“Onya Trev”. Proudly wears his gong for “Conga Lining”

Trevor St Barker is our man of the moment. 

He pays one million for a crappy old coal fired power station, then lobbies the federal government for squillions of federal money to keep the rotten stinking thing going, 

And the Feds cant give him enough. Being a Liberal donor might have a lot to do with it. 

We haven’t seen this much lobbying since Wilberforce put the kibosh on Slavery. 

But Trev aint doing nothing wrong, it’s perfectly legal, It’s just thats the way the lump of coal crumbles… 

All ministers wooed by the inescapable allure of coal and Trev’s lobbying cannot help themselves.

Bit like stacking the abc with your mates, the appeals tribunal with your mates and ensuring that your mates look after you. 

That’s mate-ship, reciprocity. We know the public don’t get a look in.  But they’re not mates, they’re just public. the Hoi polloi, the proletariat, the ‘Sneetches without stars’. 

Still, being a donor has its downside, you have to visit Melissa Price, Often… 

Melissa is the Environment Minister you have when there’s an environmental catastrophe. 

The PRICE is RIGHT! A telly tubby short of the environment

You cant find her. 

But occasionally when Trev comes knocking , she peeks out, looks outside, checks there’s no one in the corridor and lets him in, 

We aint  privy to what goes on behind closed doors, but we can assume that Trev gets the royal treatment. What’s the royal treatment? You may ask. 

PM hides his stiffy with CLEAN COAL.

That’s the treatment you get when one of you mates visit. You arrange the Chesterfield in a cosy way by the fake marble- stone fireplace. You offer him something from the top shelf. And as you allow your mate to be wooed by coal, you gaze wistfully at the lumps of coal delicately arranged on the mantelpiece, above the door, and over the jacuzzi. The jacuzzi you may ask? Yes indeed in a particularly cosy relationship the jacuzzi is on offer to those members of the constituency who like to see their coal being cleaned. It also helps them get intimate with the minister. But like lawyer X, it pays to get intimate. That way you can bone up on all the facts.   It’s a worship of sorts, and when the coal emerges sanctified from its bath, you know that it has been proven, is clean, and it’s right. 

Vales Point Power Station. “Rent seeking for dummies”.

Trev wants to make damn sure that whatever silly short term insulting to the electorate policy the coalition comes up with is looking after his interests. And why shouldn’t he? It’s a free country, and besides, Trev would be he first to tell you he worked bloody hard to get in line. Yes thats the other side of the budget, the budget preference conga line.  It works on the  principle, if you’re poor, you’re at the back, and if you’re really quite well off, (like Trev), you get to choose whether its a Rhumba or a Cha Cha. Melissa likes the Cha Cha, more upbeat for her policy announcements, but we reckon with a fair hunch, Trev would prefer the Tango, it’s more passionate. Cos deep down passionate men prefer Coal. 

It’s the same passion that the Tories yearn for in Brexit. To know that poor people are punished, and theres no progress without breaking eggs and omlette’s on anything other than stinking hubris. They say money “makes the world go round”.  The logic is inescapable, and it’s also quite dizzying. 

So dizzying we want to get off.

Hand us a lump of Coal Trev…..