From Labor people who at least hoped that Mr Turnbull might be the kind of Liberal leader who would be more centre than right. And from Liberal friends who were unhappy about the dumping of an elected Prime Minister in his first term, but at least hoped Turnbull would bring stability.

But disappointing seems to be Mr Turnbull’s style. And nothing brought this word to the fore in the last few weeks than his disgraceful attack on Labor leader Bill Shorten in Parliament. It was an attempted character assassination the likes of which we haven’t seen for a long time. It was personal, it was brutal, it was disrespectful – and not just to Mr Shorten.

Bizarrely, Mr Turnbull’s main criticism seemed to be that Bill Shorten had befriended wealthy business people in Melbourne during his time as a union leader and politician. Shock horror – he’d even sat down with billionaires!  

Now if a Labor leader refused to talk to billionaires and business people, then that would be something to criticise – and I would be the first to do it.  If we are to make sure that we get more and better jobs with better conditions for working people, then those of us on the Labor side need to understand and communicate with businesses big and small. Bob Hawke did this and got results – and he remains to this day a great model of a Labor Prime Minister!

But Turnbull went even further by directly criticising Shorten’s relationship with the family of the late Dick Pratt of Visy Cardboard fame – which, by the way, is a big employer in Tumut in our electorate of Eden-Monaro.  

Bringing the Pratts into his tirade did Turnbull no credit at all, and was met with a rare public response from Dick Pratt’s widow, Jeanne, who said: “Bill was married to the daughter of our closest friends, Julian and Felicity Beale, and he was like a member of the family”.  

If Mr Turnbull is worried about his position as leader of the Liberal Party, he should try to implement good policy instead of attacking his opponents.

Disappointing.