But sadly for Labor the reset involved Chris Bowen who is the political magic pudding of Australian politics. He is the gift that just keeps on giving and this time it involved climate policy.

Poor housebound Mr Albanese would have been sending angry WhatsApp messages as he witnessed Chris Bowen and his deputy spokesman elucidate contradictory policies on Labor’s safeguard mechanism policy. Richard Marles helpfully added to the confusion by being unable to answer either way.

Weirdly, some of Labor’s high-profile shadow ministers seem to be also housebound. Where is Bill Shorten? What about Ed Husic and Tanya Plibersek?

Putting aside the above policy confusion, Labor’s safeguard policy will force 35 coal facilities here in Queensland to reduce emissions or purchase carbon credits, putting them at a major global disadvantage. This means fewer jobs and lower royalties to pay for schools and hospitals. That is bad for Queensland.

Writing of Richard Marles, he’s had a shocker of a week. Apart from not being across policy detail, news broke about one of his speeches.

Hear this: Labor’s Deputy Leader sends a proposed speech to Chinese diplomats prior to addressing Beijing in 2019. He praised China’s record on human rights saying they are a “force for good” and even credited Xi Jinping with being a “deeply impactful President”. Is this a man we can trust to defend Australia?

Labor’s Kristina Keneally can’t decide whether she supports the Morrison Government’s strong border protection policies which have stopped the boats and saved thousands of lives at sea. If Keneally and Labor don’t support temporary protection visas, they can’t support Operation Sovereign Borders.

While the failure of Labor politicians to be across their policy briefs should scare you, what curdles my milk are the above policies and their motivation.

Whether being weak on borders or attacking jobs in the resource sector, Labor knows it can only win with Green preferences.  That means the Greens will need to extract their pound of flesh in return for their support.

Finally but perhaps most importantly, it would be remiss of me to not wish Mr Albanese a speedy recovery from Covid. While we agree on very little, that is no excuse for a lack of civility on the campaign trail.

Queensland LNP  Senator James McGrath and his ALP counterpart Anthony Chisholm will bring an upper-house view to the election campaign every Thursday.