It is easy to forget the greatest prime ministerial advocate for Canberra in this city's history was arguably the greatest Liberal of them all. Sir Robert Menzies loved this place and transformed it over the decades he and his family lived here.
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He appreciated the need of a strong and accountable public service, treated departmental secretaries and junior officers with unfailing respect, and was determined to make the national capital a jewel in the Australian crown.
It was on his watch that Walter and Marion's vision of a central lake came to fruition. The National Library and the National Gallery were conceived under his stewardship.
Why then have Menzies' heirs and successors developed such an antipathy towards the polity in which he invested so much money, time and hope in more recent decades?
Some within the Nationals, and Barnaby Joyce immediately springs to mind, seem to view this community as a parasitic growth on the body politic which can be pillaged at will in order to distribute largesse to conservative-leaning regional electorates.
It will be a long time before the former deputy prime minister's disastrous relocation of the APVMA to his own electorate as part of a period of "peak pork barrelling" by the LNP last decade is forgotten - or forgiven - in this community.
Heaven only knows what would have happened to other equally important government services currently based in Canberra in the event the Coalition had won a fourth term in 2022.
During their nine years in government a succession of Liberal prime ministers presided over massive cuts to the Australian Public Service, significant reductions in real funding to almost every national institution, with the exception of the Australian War Memorial, the massive deployment of "yes minister, whatever you say minister" consultants in place of seeking fearless and independent advice from with the APS and the inevitable disasters that followed.
While "robodebt" was arguably the most egregious example of how bad things can get when the government of the day politicises senior appointments it was far from being an exception or an outlier.
Numerous scandals and snafus within Defence, border protection and the like also spring to mind.
The latest proof that a future Coalition government would immediately start dismantling the many reforms the Albanese government is putting into place in order to reinstate the APS as a cornerstone of good government came during Peter Dutton's reshuffle during the week.
While much of what he announced involved little more than relocating some uninspiring - and under-performing - square pegs from one round hole to another, ears pricked up at the news South Australian MP James Stevens was to become an assistant spokesman to the role of "government waste reduction".
"The [Albanese] government is spending an additional $209 billion in its recent budgets, employing an additional 10,000 public servants in Canberra," Mr Dutton said.
That is rather rich coming from a leader who helped preside over the hollowing out of the APS during his time in high office and who was a senior member of a government that managed to blow $20.8 billion on consultants in its final year in power.
The Coalition has not learnt from past mistakes and still fails to comprehend the importance of having a strong - and independent - public service able to provide high quality and apolitical advice.
Mr Dutton is mistaken if he thinks he can "Canberra bash" his way to The Lodge. "Slash and burn" is not a policy, it's just another three word slogan.
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Responsibility for election comment is taken by John-Paul Moloney of 121 Marcus Clarke Street, Canberra. Published by Federal Capital Press of Australia Pty Ltd.
