PM bounds around nation in week two

Like a ping-pong ball, Malcolm Turnbull has bounced across the nation, jetting from Sydney to Perth to Darwin to Cairns, back to Sydney and onto Tasmania.

So far he's outdistanced Bill Shorten, if not the number of events.

At most stops, there's a single well-choreographed event with cash for splashing.

The standout event of the PM's week was a "politics in the pub" event in Darwin.

It was a wholly good-natured occasion, lacking any whiff of beer on the floor or blood in the air.

While Turnbull didn't get a completely free ride - there was a tough question about the drug ice - some patrons suggested he might have copped a more robust reception at one of Darwin's less genteel watering holes.

Perhaps unable to come up with a suitably crocodile-themed front page for the PM's visit, the ever-irreverent NT News instead trumpeted: "The circus is in town" complete with images of Turnbull and Shorten in clown outfits.

It was a a tad unfair. The Labor leader wasn't in town and the circus bit referred to petty politicking.

Here's the back story: unlike every other capital city, Darwin has never had a PET scanner, requiring cancer patients to venture south for crucial diagnostic scanning.

Both sides have promised one for years and Turnbull planned to cough up the necessary $15 million.

Labor's health spokeswoman Catherine King arrived in town the day before, also to promise a scanner but with faster delivery.

Coalition MP Natasha Griggs beat her to the punch, not only gazumping Labor but also her boss.

That left Turnbull with no scanner to announce, and only the chance to chat amiably with some patients.

Labor got its own back midweek when Shorten stood next to a crook bit of road on Sydney's southwest and pledged $150 million to fix it.

Turnbull was planning to make a near-identical announcement, maybe even on the same spot.

Rather than tread in Shorten's footsteps, the PM instead visited a factory making big white chemical tanks.

But in the end, despite having traversed the country in the first fortnight, the PM had his campaign swamped by something outside his control - the AFP NBN raids.

Maybe he shouldn't have knocked back the wine tasting at Wyong on Saturday morning.