The Buck at the moment is very confused. It has been hovering around Canberra for some time ready to stop at the person responsible for the insulation debacle. But each time the stop sign is about to appear it keeps getting passed on to someone else.

You can’t blame the Buck for being a bit miffed. The home insulation scheme is the stuff-up of the century but there’s no government co-operation in identifying the person it should stop at to perform its solemn public duty of apportioning the blame.

Kevin’s office is a designated Buck no-stopping zone and anyway it is inconceivable that the Buck should stop with him when all he did was go through the roof at all those experts who told him that the insulation scheme was a lemon. He had determined that nothing was going to stop it electrifying the nation.

Wayne has taken some credit for the stimulus package but there’s no chance the insulation stimulus Buck will stop with him. He is far too expert at passing it. He’s still lauded for his brilliant pass to Godwin Grech during the Utegate scandal.

Peter Garrett is the most obvious place for the Buck to stop. All it would take is his resignation or a tap on the shoulder from Kevin. In fact the Buck has already been as far as his office door before it was passed to the shonky installers.

The Buck however decided it was illogical to stop with a few installers when the scheme was a complete national disaster and they were only picking up the bucks eagerly passed on by the government.

Peter Garrett was warned twenty-odd times the scheme had hair-raising implications but for some reason he failed to feel anything.

Peter’s department apparently hadn’t got the faintest idea about administering a scheme of such complexity. It never occurred to them that battmen could also be robbin’.

Some experts blame John Howard for the scheme’s failure and believe the Buck should stop with him. However the Buck has its pride and having failed to stop with him so many times before it is reluctant to face further humiliation.

It’s true the Buck has also taken more than a passing interest in stopping with Stephen Conroy. Its interest has been attracted by the national broadband network, Telstra, handouts to television stations and jobs for the boys. The Buck recognises a trainwreck when it sees one and calculates how it can meet the driver at a mutually convenient stop.

Unfortunately the Buck can’t stop of its own volition or at the behest of Tony Abbott. Only an admission, a resignation or a firing constitutes a valid stop sign. Buck passing in Canberra has become such a consummate skill that the Wallabies coaching staff are taking an interest.

So while Credit is regularly taken by Kevin & Co for the stimulus package, the insulation stimulus Buck is still being passed around. But the Buck knows political insulation has a strict use-by date so as it passes from person to person it is reassured in the knowledge it will eventually stop with somebody.