By announcing that he’ll withhold his support on legislation until the government acts to override state vaccine mandates, George Christensen has exposed the Coalition’s fragile position in the House of Representatives.

And that, depending on how you look at it, could be either a bad or good thing for the Prime Minister; maybe even something bad now but useful in the long term.

When the Coalition defied the polls and pundits (not the Spectator Australia, we hasten to add) and won the 2019 election the narrowness of the victory was overlooked amid the shock.

Now, with Craig Kelly on the crossbenches and Christensen withholding his vote, that position is clear for all to see. Scott Morrison needs the support of Labor, Adam Bandt or one of the independents to pass legislation.

The Prime Minister looks weak. The government looks impotent. What he has of an agenda is in disarray. Labor will make hay with the situation, aided and abetted by the MSM.

But… and here comes the glass half full part.

By exposing the weakness of the government’s position in the House of Representatives, Christensen may have just done Scott Morrison a favour.

He is demonstrating just how vulnerable the Coalition is to a protest vote in next year’s election.

And while there are plenty of people who don’t like Morrison, do they really want to elect Anthony Albanese at the election?

Yes, there’s a strong plague on both their houses mood at the moment, but as May 2022 gets closer and closer voters will be forced to consider the consequences of their choices.

A Labor government? A minority Labor government in thrall to the Greens?

Do conservatives — that’s conservatives, as opposed to habitual Liberal voters — really believe in the Trotskyite maxim that things need to get worse before they get better?

Because that’s not conservatism. It’s the political equivalent of self-harming so you can whinge about the pain.