After more than six years - in which three of the most mediocre Coalition governments in the nation's history have delivered no leadership, little hope and no vision for the future - the penny has finally dropped for at least for two in its ranks at the NSW state level. And not before time.
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NSW treasurer Dominic Perrottet has recognised it's time for state and federal governments "to break the emergency glass" and pursue major structural reforms in a bid to revive economic growth.
More importantly, he admitted interest rate reductions and the Morrison government's recent tax cut have not delivered the expected boost and "as a six-pack of prime ministers came and went over the past decade, the reform lever gathered dust".
It's hoped Perrottet included John Winston Howard in the "six-pack" reference, because Howard's last two terms were when the economic rot set in and the nation's woes began.
Failing to get the message when he was drummed from office, Howard is still there, oblivious to the real issues facing our people, and trying to assert his influence while Australians struggle through the downward economic spiral he started.
Don't believe the rubbish that it's all the dreaded unions' fault when their influence and numbers have slumped dramatically in the same period.
That's a story the lacklustre Labor Party needs to examine, along with how it managed to allow Bill Shorten to stay opposition leader for more than six years after politically assassinating two elected PMs, then being unable to get within cooee of winning the country's support in a single opinion poll.
The second Coalition MP to at least give some indication that he is listening outside the moribund party rooms is John Barilaro, who a fortnight ago said he would be prepared to "rip up" the Murray-Darling Basin plan. He said "we need to put people before the environment" and that at least, the state should be "pausing all water-sharing plans".
Giving Perrottet and Barilaro the benefit of the doubt that they are genuine and not just grandstanding after their government's years of neglect - particularly on water - how much longer before their federal colleagues realise this country is on its knees?
How much longer must we wait for competent MPs to be elected to our national and state parliaments to do something about water?
Federal Fenner MP Andrew Leigh, who should be made the Labor Party's new leader immediately, said a week ago: "Over the past generation, Australia has become more unequal. Earnings for the top tenth have risen three times faster than the bottom tenth. The pay of surgeons and barristers is leaping ahead of salespeople and baristas.
"The economy is generating fewer start-ups, our economy is not sufficiently diverse and research and development is well below many similar nations."
Perhaps Perrottet and Barilaro might enlighten the PM that his obsession with a surplus is, as the SMH's economics expert Ross Gittins said, greatly hurting the economy. And what is it about the fact that water, as a page-full of letter writers in the same newspaper wrote: "Water is the nation's most precious resource, not coal."
How much longer must we wait for competent MPs to be elected to our national and state parliaments to do something about water?
ABC Radio resourced a story through its Wagga office this week in which Anglican Bishop Donald Kirk said a more sensible use of water was needed. His Riverina diocese takes in the Darling, Lachlan, Murrumbidgee and Murray rivers.
The bishop said not only was there a current misallocation of water, but selling it to the highest bidder was not caring for people on the land who feed the nation.
At Griffith, about 150 people turned out for the Australian competition watchdog's inquiry into water trading, which the ABC Radio report said was held amid concerns that rich - this column describes them as voracious - corporates were forcing farmers out of the market.
Bishop Kirk called for people "to see water as a community resource, rather than a commodity for sale to the highest bidder". Every MP should be made to read this quote from the bishop: "Most of the farmers who live in this part of the world, unless they are selling an absolute premium crop, cannot afford to buy the water - it's too expensive. And if that's the case, we are not growing the food that we need to feed everybody."
Next column, we will examine the necessity to forge new parliamentary and leadership pathways.
