Tools Down Everyone Let's Go To The Pub Because At The End Of The Day, It's All Just A Big Club And You're Not Invited

ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

It's Friday afternoon finally and like everyone else, our politicians and media professionals are down the pub bumping knees and trading laughs like normal people.

Somewhere in Canberra, the sun is shining and the pints of Rockhopper IPAs are flowing. In the July apricity, we have Pauline and Albo chatting about how many newspapers they've sold between them this week. Former soldier Ben Roberts-Smith and Karl Stefanovic are discussing the finer points of pig shooting. Angus Taylor is listening in. Ben shares anecdotes of him and the lads shooting brumbies from a Blackhawk years ago coming back from a mountain troop exercise and how funny that was. Angus nods along and eventually concedes shooting brumbies is OK, as long as you're going to eat them. Karl pipes up and says horse is actually good eating. Ben disagrees.

Barnaby has finished his Penfolds longneck. He turns to Penny Wong, who tells him to order an Uber before the wheels fall off. She then orders hot chips for the table. Barnaby gets up and does a perfect handstand against the beer garden's London Plane Tree to prove his sobriety. Everyone is impressed, except Karl, who sack-whacks him just a bit too hard. He crumbles in a heap in the wet leaves.

Gina Rinehart and Simon Holmes a Court were inside, playing online pokies on Gina's iPad Pro, eating the complimentary Lamingtons and complaining about their being no Swan on tap anywhere in Canberra. There's talk of going to the casino later so they can slap the Real McCoy.

Watching this from afar was bar manager Tom Smith, who noticed the credit card attached to the table's bar tab had a strange name on it.

"It was an American Express with 'The Australian Taxpayer' on it," he said.

"And they've racked up a huge bill, too."

More to come.