Guy the Friday Mash Superfly was on a wall in Tony’s office when he met with Joe Hockey and Andrew Robb to discuss Coalition economic policy. Here is his unexpurgated account of the discussion.

‘Make my day’ exclaimed Tony ‘Fancy Julia thinking she can win the argument with me on economic policy’

‘She’s delusional’ said Joe ‘The only reason the economy is still in good shape is that Howard and Costello left so much money in the bank even she and Wayne haven’t managed to spend it all yet’

‘The only economics Julia understands’ said Andrew ‘is that if he works tax him, if he’s rich soak him and if he declares a profit form an alliance with the Greens to super-tax him’

‘I hear Julia’s planning to clean up her economic mess through money laundering’ said Tony

‘Do you think it’s time we released our economic policy?’ asked Joe

‘Are you mad?’ responded Tony ‘You can only make my day by discussing Julia’s economic policies not mine’

‘But we’ve already claimed we’re going to make savings of sixty billion’ said Andrew

‘I’ve announced seventy billion’ said Joe

‘And I’ve already said fifty billion’ said Tony ‘like we agreed last week. Why the hell can’t you two get your facts straight?’

‘Because it’s obvious you don’t know dick about the economy’ said Joe ‘and we’re doing our best to cover for you’

‘I don’t have to know anything about the economy’ said Tony ‘to understand that you two know as much about it as Mark Latham knows about leading the Labor Party’

‘I’m going to declare a surplus during our first year in office’ said Joe

‘No you’re not’ said Andrew ‘because I’ve announced we’ll declare one as soon as possible’

‘Give it a break’ said Tony ‘Compared with you two clowns my economic credentials look like Gina Rinehart’s bank balance’

‘But Tony’ said Joe ‘surely it’s time we came up with an economic policy’

‘Don’t you financial philistines realise’ said Tony ‘that if we produce an economic policy Julia will be able to slag us off as much as we’re slagging her’

‘Bust surely’ said Andrew ‘it would be an advantage if the three of us agreed on a single economic policy’

‘I could never lower my standards sufficiently’ said Tony ‘to agree an economic policy with you two’

‘Do you think we should get help from someone?’ asked Joe

‘Well I suppose if we get in a real mess’ said Tony ‘there’s always Malcolm. But the trouble is he’s not prepared to lower his standards sufficiently to agree an economic policy with me’