Christmas might be a time of love and joy but for Labor Senator Sam Dastyari and his former fling, the Greens, the silly season may end up being more dysfunctional than family friendly.
In the spirit of pollies getting social, Senator Dastyari on Wednesday released via Facebook a spoof trailer with the almost accurate caption: "BEST. CHRISTMAS. MOVIE. EVER." (As one commenter reminded us, everyone knows Love Actually is the best Christmas movie ever).
The 32-year-old Senator shines in his breakthrough role, telling a story of "love and betrayal" between Dastyari and Greens Leader Richard Di Natale.
It is, indeed, the only Christmas film you need to see this year.
The film, which features a cracking soundtrack with artists including The Golden Girls theme song and Drake's Hotline Bling, and an oh-so-serious voice over introducing a story of "trust betrayed and co-operation crushed", takes aim at the Greens' recent deal with the coalition over tax transparency.
The deal, described by Labour Senator Doug Cameron as "on the side of Lucifer," will give Aussies access to tax info on 280 big private corporations with over $2 million in revenue, but 500 to 600 companies will avoid forced disclosure as they fall below the new threshold.
Dastyari called it as he saw it a Senate speech laden with innuendo.
"It takes one night, one night for the greens to go limp," he said.
"You can't even call it a one night stand, because there's three parties involved, there's the Greens, there's the Nats, there's the Libs -- I think in the Greens they call that group love -- and what they've done here is sold out for a cheap, quickie deal done dirty on the table of the treasurer."
Di Natale has defended the Greens' stance as true to the pragmatic approach he promised when he took over the leadership from Christine Milne in May this year.
“I said when I took on this job I want to get some outcomes here. The easiest thing for us to do would have been to shout from the sidelines and to have said this government isn’t serious about multinational tax avoidance, when we had the opportunity to do something about it,” Di Natale said.
“We would have walked away today, multinationals would have had another year where they would not have published their accounts, we would have got nothing. We would have continued with our campaign but from the sidelines. What we have got is an outcome.”