Hmmm.

The AFR is being openly gossipy about Tony Abbott and Peta Credlin:

This is going to be pretty hard for some of you to get your heads around, so I guess I better just tell it to you straight:
So, about that Margaret Thatcher lecture that Tony Abbott is delivering in London on Tuesday night – you know, the privately funded trip which, according to the former PM's office, he's being accompanied on with his wife, Margie Abbott?
If only the travelling party was really so conventional. See, there's also a villa in France, where, following the big speech, Abbott will be retiring  for a period of convalescence with his former chief of staff, Peta Credlin, his C-bombing advancer, Richard Dowdy, (aptly named) and his mysterious press office veteran, Nicole Chant.

And you thought Credlin joining the then PM (sans wife Margie, but avec daughter Frances Abbott) skiing at Perisher in July was a little unusual!

We wonder if Margie will be joining the French party or steering well clear? If we're all still talking about Ainsley Gotto nearly 50 years after she ran John Gorton's PMO, Abbott's Last Tango Near Paris will certainly be one for the history books.

I remarked at the time that the publicity given in an Abbott friendly News Ltd paper to Abbott and Credlin skiing together was rather unusual.   Now Fairfax is joining in.

Surely this latest piece should be the cause of some complaint if there is nothing to the Abbott/Credlin relationship?

Update:  I see that on Twitter, The Australian has tweeted that Credlin "became more like a first lady" (as noted in its linked story on the Abbott downfall.)  The full quote in the article:

If there was one overarching, final loyalty from the prime minister, it was to his chief of staff. She had become almost a first lady, accompanying Abbott to everything from private dinners at the New York home of Rupert Murdoch to private snow-skiing holidays with Abbott and his daughter Frances. The chief of staff was the one introduced to foreign leaders. She interrupted to answer questions others put to Abbott, ruled the strategy, and used her power and intellect to barricade his office against the outside. His colleagues came to see their relationship as impenetrable and toxic for the government. But Abbott had empowered Credlin and, in the end, it was Abbott’s call. He gave her free rein. He called his colleagues sexist for challenging her.

Sounds to me like subtle innuendo?  

I can't work out what is  going on here.   Is it that they are emboldened that Abbott or Credlin will not address the innuendo directly, because there is something to it?   And what about the spouses?   If this is just scurrilous gossip, why aren't they making their displeasure known?

I have said before, if something is going to be revealed about the Abbott Credlin relationship that has been known by journalists for years, people should be furious if it is only done now, after the "family man" campaign Abbott ran for years against Gillard (and, in a sense, Rudd, in the last election).