The prime minister needs his mojo back

“Oh, I voiced it very strongly, don’t worry,” he said when asked if he had voiced disagreement with Smith.

“Dean Smith’s expressed regret to me. I’ve spoken with him in very strong terms, and fortunately this person didn’t get out.

“Dean, I think had been influenced by a lot of the church leaders and others, including the father who had pleaded on behalf of their son who had been the offender, but he made a mistake.”

He then defended Smith’s ongoing tenure in the party and on the frontbench.

“He’s a very decent person, but he’s made a mistake and importantly, he’s owned up to it.”

Around the same time, Albanese was being given the rounds of the kitchen by 3AW veteran talkback host Neil Mitchell during what was Mitchell’s last show.

Mitchell reminded Albanese that he had been elected promising to restore civility to political discourse because voters had “conflict fatigue”.

Yet, his ministers were running around at that very moment accusing Dutton of being a “protector of paedophiles” because he refused to support a rushed bill placing tighter restrictions on the released detainees.

(The Coalition contended the bill was not tough enough because it did not include preventative detention powers, which were subsequently bolted on.)

It was an absurd charge to level at Dutton, given his well-known abhorrence of violence against women and children stemming from his days as a Queensland policeman. It only served to highlight the pressure Labor was feeling at the time.

Put aside the fact that the “Dutton protects paedophiles” talking point was probably distributed from the prime minister’s office, Albanese, unlike Dutton, took no responsibility for what his ministers were saying.

“I’m accountable for what I say,” he said.

The High Court detainee saga, which took a month to resolve, highlighted the broader malaise which has afflicted the prime minister since the defeat of the Voice referendum in mid-October.

For a bloke, who in opposition, frequently accused Scott Morrison of going missing when things went awry, the prime minister has pretty much gone to ground over the last month-and-a-half.

Other than standing up when he has no choice, such as in Parliament, or doing the mandatory press conference after national cabinet or when a foreign dignitary visits, the PM has not done a Canberra press conference of substance for ages, and certainly not one to address the political car crash caused by the detainee decision.

As one Liberal said, if Morrison was still in power, the challenge would be to shut him up. John Howard, when his back was against the wall, would routinely find a reason for an all-in press conference if only to get back in control of the narrative. Julia Gillard, too.

While there is much to be said for proper cabinet government and ministerial autonomy, leadership also matters. Leaving it up to the treasurer, defence minister, the NDIS minister or Uncle Tom Cobley, as articulate as they all are, to lead the defence, has added to the perception that the government is leaderless at the moment.

Adopting an approach of hoping it will all go away fuels this. The last few weeks reminds one of the period in late 2009 when the Rudd government was struggling as a group of asylum seekers rescued from sea refused to leave the customs vessel Oceanic Viking unless it took them to Australia.

Day after day, Rudd refused to defend himself in Parliament as the government was battered over its inability to break the impasse.

When asked why, one of his senior advisers said: “Because we want to keep it out of the news”. The Oceanic Viking was the beginning of the end for Rudd.

That is not the case for Albanese, there is no talk about leadership, but there is frustration at the PM and his office.

It’s not manufactured. The government has slumped in the polls and the Liberals keep calling the prime minister “weak” and detached because that’s what is coming up in the focus groups.

“They’re not angry with him, not yet, it’s not like Morrison,” said one senior Liberal.

“But they’re off him. He’s not who they thought he was.”

At the same time, Dutton, is just boringly rock solid. There is nothing ambivalent, confected or mysterious about him. He may be a long way off from being popular enough to win office, but conviction is an enormous attribute in politics, even if people don’t necessarily agree with you.

More so, as one of his colleagues said: “He’s not crackers like Abbott, there’ll be no Prince Philip knighthood shit or anything like that.”

The government has managed to salvage some capital in the dying days of parliament. The deal with the states to rescue the NDIS (and the budget) is of enormous consequence but now needs to be implemented.

The cost of living continues to bedevil and this week, Treasurer Jim Chalmers gave notice there would be more in that space in the lead-up to the May budget next year (which is also the lead-up to the next election).

Malcolm Turnbull used to tell probing journalists that “just because you don’t know the plan, doesn’t mean we haven’t got one”.

Presumably, this government has a plan to come out swinging in the new year. It just needs the PM to regain his mojo, be more judicious about his overseas travel, drop the “DJ Albo” schtick, and to remember that voters want their prime minister to be of them, not like them.

At the moment, they feel he is neither.