For all the carping by the opposition, Labor is under no obligation whatsoever to foreshadow budget initiatives ahead of the papers being released next month. The annual “ruling it in or out” game that journalists like to play with politicians ahead of the federal budget is pointless and a little puerile.

At least, that would be a reasonable approach if every government MP was using the same playbook. Plenty are going off script. And the party is — stop us if you’ve heard this before — tying itself in knots.

Labor hasn’t announced if it will dip into superannuation savings on the path to returning to surplus. It may well do so on May 14 when Wayne Swan hands down the budget. Interest groups have begun pre-emptive strikes, Tony Abbott has joined the chorus, and now the backbenchers who have done so much to destabilise Julia Gillard’s leadership are again taking internal horse-trading public. Simon Crean’s televised pleading in recent days is almost as unhelpful to Labor’s cause as calling a leadership spill without a viable alternative candidate.

As Gillard has pointed out, superannuation is a Labor issue — so why is she letting her own MPs hit her over the head with it? Why has a Labor positive again become such a negative? Why is Labor having a debate it doesn’t (at least yet) need to have?

The Prime Minister may have reaffirmed her leadership in the ballot-that-wasn’t, but the backbench — stacked with disgruntled plotters — is still out of control. It will be Gillard’s inability to silence or sack them that will cost her the job.