Marriage equality has been at the forefront in the final two weeks of the marathon election campaign – but it's wearing down the Coalition.
On Friday morning, one of the prime minister's most senior advisers was overheard telling a journalist that Turnbull's campaign thought the travelling press had "run out of questions" when the focus had turned sharply to the marriage equality plebiscite.
Marriage equality was buzzing along quietly this election, the warring policies of the Coalition's plebiscite and Labor's parliamentary vote set down.
And then, in the second last week of the campaign, things started to ramp up. Malcolm Turnbull called Bill Shorten's argument against the plebiscite – namely, that it will open the door to homophobia – a "scare campaign", on Darwin radio station Mix 104.9.