A recurrent theme in the avidly-watched Games of Thrones is ‘winter is coming’.

This has been interpreted to mean various things, mostly catastrophic.

In Canberra, as parliamentarians breathing sighs of relief exit the national capital for their long winter recess, the signs of spring are feebly, tentatively, but unmistakeably becoming evident.

This is not just seasonal spring, though as the last autumn leaves fall from bare-branched trees, tightly furled buds are appearing on those same bare branches and Canberrans remind each other that the winter solstice has come and gone.