There's an eerie feel around Parliament House.
The weather isn't helping: it's wet, foggy and grey.
Canberra has become a byword for politics in Australia, but on day one of the election campaign, it feels like a ghost town. The action is everywhere but here as leaders, the media and their huge entourages are out on the hustings.
But in a quiet, dignified ceremony, something very significant happened here - the business of dissolving the 44th Parliament.
It was conducted by Mark Fraser, the official secretary to the Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove.
He read out the proclamation that reminded us why both the House of Representatives and the Senate are being dissolved, the Senate twice rejecting the bills to set up the Australian Building and Construction Commission and Registered Organisations.
It bears the signatures of Sir Peter, Malcolm Turnbull, Mr Fraser and the Clerks of the Senate and House of Representatives.
Australia is now under what's called the caretaker conventions.
It means the ordinary business of government and administration go on, but no big decisions are made except in consultation with the opposition.
The conventions are that the government avoids:
- Making major policy decisions that are likely to commit an incoming government
- Making significant appointments
- Entering major contracts or undertakings
There are also rules around advertising, ministers accessing departmental information and how to address correspondence. It's all laid out here.
The clerks of the House of Representatives and the Senate are wonderful repositories of information about the arcane rules of this place and no question is too basic or silly for them.
Though unlike most of us who walk these halls, they prefer to go about their work quietly and with as little attention as possible.
I had one of those very basic question for the House of Representatives clerk this morning - Is the prime minister still the prime minister under caretaker mode or is he "Liberal leader"?
The advice I received was unequivocal.
A minister is a minister until a new ministry is sworn in. So, because all the normal titles apply throughout the campaign, SBS World News will be addressing Mr Turnbull as the prime minister and Bill Shorten as the opposition leader.
On Sunday, after Mr Turnbull visited Sir Peter to ask for the parliament to be dissolved, the Governor-General released the exchange of letters between the pair.
They got me thinking that no matter your political allegiance, no matter if you think this double-dissolution has been a political construct, no matter how many times you may groan over the next eight weeks at hearing about "jobs and growth", "mums and dads" or "schools and hospitals" (and that will happen), there's something to be said that in our country, parliaments are dissolved and elections are called with an exchange of letters and the stroke of a pen, not a coup or an army or, God forbid, a bullet.
I'll make a note to remind myself of that on day 49 of this 56-day campaign.
