In his hometown of Sydney, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull already faces an image problem. It's almost a year to the day since Peta Credlin dropped the moniker "Mr Harbourside mansion" on the PM, a sobriquet that has irked Turnbull both because it has stuck, and because it is true.
After all, Turnbull's Point Piper pad isn't even your run-of-the-mill mansion. The Turnbulls purchased Le Gai Soleil – "the gay sun" - in 1994 for $5.4 million. It's now worth 10 times that much.
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Malcolm Turnbull on Melbourne Tram
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull speaks with commuters during a tram ride in Melbourne.
Previous owners include Sydney socialite Klara Saunders, wife of the late Westfield director John Saunders. Another previous owner was a man named Alan Bond, who bought Le Gai Soleil in 1979.
If the prime minister had an image problem in Sydney, the past week has exacerbated his woes in Melbourne.
Turnbull stands accused of failing to honour an "asset recycling" agreement with the Abbott government.
Under that deal, the Commonwealth promised to hand over 15 per cent of any public assets that were sold, provided the money was reinvested in infrastructure. Victoria sold a lease on the Port of Melbourne for $9.7 billion in September last year. Victoria says it is entitled to $1.45 billion, and has earmarked that money for regional rail upgrades.
"It's time for Canberra to stop the games," declared Treasurer Tim Pallas, saying Victorians were being "short-changed".
Victorian premier Daniel Andrews accused the PM of not knowing where Victoria was.
The Victorians seem to have a point – the state lags the rest of the nation in terms of proportion of federal infrastructure spend – but Turnbull soon hit back.
Amid the furore, the PM ventured on Seven's Sunrise program, where the following bizarre exchange with David Koch ensued:
Kochie: "OK, so you still love Victoria?"
Turnbull: "We adore Victoria. Love Victoria."
Kochie:Â "OK."
Turnbull: "Love Victoria. Marvellous Melbourne."Â
Kochie: "You love everyone, we know."
Turnbull:Â "I love trams."
It was an exchange that summed up Turnbull's image problem. After all, Richie Benaud was probably the last Australian to have been able to use the word "marvellous" and get away with it. But Benaud was unique. The former Test captain was so universally admired he also got away with wearing a beige suit for 30 years.
No-one else has used the term "marvellous Melbourne" in about a century. There was a documentary called Marvellous Melbourne. It was released in 1910.
But, according to some Victorian Liberals, Turnbull's Melbourne woes were actually encapsulated in his last sentence: "I love trams".
If the prime minister's view of Sydney is defined by his Harbour view, his perspective of Melbourne is constrained by the city's tram network, which extends from the corporate headquarters along Collins Street through to the Liberal Party's rich benefactors of Toorak, Deepdene, Malvern and Kew.
"Can someone please show the PM's office an overlay of marginal [federal] seats on these rail projects," opined one senior Victorian Liberal. "Last time I checked, there was no tram to Corangamite."
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