But any irony involved in a coalition government that came to power pledging to scrap identity cards introducing a system of foreign residence permits will be lost as the political parties indulge in "a race to the bottom" over immigration.
In opposition O'Farrell said the Liberal/Nationals coalition would not approve the mine, but the application has been progressing with the planning assessment commission yet to make a decision on it.
Katherine Bavage is 28-year-old Lib Dem member Nick Clegg's departing message to Lib Dem conference was easy to anticipate: coalition may have been tough for the party but it remains right for the country.
The strongest elements of Clegg's speech measured by the applause were around this track record in coalition.
After three months of turbulent talks, and with cash reserves running perilously low, Greece's leftist-led coalition reshuffled its negotiating team on Monday.
According to Eurodad, the coalition of civil society groups that campaigns on debt, there have been 600 sovereign debt restructurings since the 1950s – with many governments, including Argentina for example, experiencing one wrenching write-off after another.
As a result, Letta's left-right coalition now has a stable majority that includes about 60 of Berlusconi's former supporters.
But it will be one strong strand in any argument to counter the really fundamental question of the pre-election period – whether a coalition produces the worst of all possible worlds.
Let Nick Clegg be clear: "The Liberal Democrats will add a heart to a Conservative government, and a brain to a Labour one!" Unfortunately, courage for the cowardly lion will be a casualty of any coalition agreement.
But even in the best case scenario, one of these policies would be driven to a remote forest location by some psychopathic coalition senior partner, then made to dig its own grave with a Lib Dem campaign pen.
A Labour-led coalition will lack legitimacy in England and, if it is governing from a clear second-place, it might be better to seek a second election than to first walk into power and then into oblivion.
