I’m in Australia for meetings after a similar round in New Zealand.

But there’s no escape from British party politics.

Two bits of relative trivia are running strongly in the press here – Ed Miliband’s late father and his supposed Marxist dislike of the UK, and Conservative party advisor Lynton Crosby, a straight-talking Australian, whose business interests are being attacked by Red Ed.

However, all that’s eclipsed by Prince Harry, a star at the spectacular 100th anniversary of the Royal Australian Navy. It was great that the most capable warship at the fleet review in Sydney harbour wasn’t an American battlewagon but our own HMS Daring. I hope the battalion of disgruntled ex-experts harrumphing from chintzy armchairs about the supposed relative decline of Britain’s Armed Forces takes note.

We’re fortunate in having PMs Tony Abbott and John Key in Australia and NZ who are, unlike some of their less thoughtful predecessors and a range of peppery contemporary political figures, keen to retain and strengthen ties with us.

Whilst Australasia sees its future primarily and logically with an emergent Asia Pacific and the US, it’s surely a ‘no-brainer’ for us to do what we can together working with the grain of historical, cultural and familial ties.

Britain as an outward facing, world-focus nation, with the prospect of a more mature and rational relationship with the EU after David Cameron’s 2017 referendum, will need to raise its eyes beyond Brussels. In my view Blair/Brown neglected our traditional friends in what Mr Abbott has called the Anglosphere, a term I like.

However, let’s not kid ourselves, part of the UK’s attraction as a 21st century partner for its cousins is as a user-friendly locus in the EU monolith – we’d be bonkers to ditch that.