And a very large tree in Canberra is starting to look very shaky indeed.

After a single but eventful term, the Coalition was turfed from office in Victoria, despite a healthy budget and the endorsement of both the state's major newspapers.

Federally, the Abbott government has endured a horrendous end to 2014, with infighting, bad polling and confused messages coming from senior ministers.

Compared to the above examples, Will Hodgman's administration finishes the year looking as solid as a rock - relatively - but they would be foolish in the extreme if they didn't take a few lessons on board.

The first, and it's amazing that this message needs to be repeated, is that disunity is death.

After punishing Labor for Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd's internal warring, voters would be bemused to see Tony Abbott's senior ministers leaking against one another and the prime minister's office.

Similarly, the nobbling of Ted Baillieu and the elevation of Denis Napthine without a clear public explanation seriously hindered the Victorian Liberals in the last two years.

Fortunately for Will Hodgman, his team has largely been united and disciplined thus far.

But it only takes a couple of murmurs to upset that harmony.

And complaints over the government's cuts to teachers and nurses will make some internal criticism look mighty tempting.

Secondly, voters in Victoria were also unimpressed with the appearance of a government with little to do, which is a bad look in a sluggish economy.

The Tasmanian government does not have a big agenda in 2015 and a few more ideas from his cabinet should be made public and taken on.

Finally, the failures of the Napthine and Abbott governments to communicate their reasons for major decisions and policy directions left both flustered and the electorate confused and unimpressed.

In the federal government's case, the mistakes are numerous - if university deregulation is so crucial, then why wasn't it raised during six years of opposition?

If GP co-payments are essential to ensuring the sustainability of Medicare, then why is the money being sent off to an over-the-horizon research fund, rather than being reinvested into the health system?

And the biggest problem for Tony Abbott, trying to convince voters that the need to repair the budget overrides just about all other election commitments.

It is here where Mr Abbott's difficulties can be most instructive for Mr Hodgman.

The public seem to have rejected Joe Hockey's budget as unfair in its scope and containing unnecessary cuts.

The government's loss of this fight has rendered it unable to gain much ground on this or any other policy fight.

At a state level, the public's mood about cuts in the aftermath of the pay freeze failure is a little harder to gauge, but the early signs are that it looks to be a bruising contest for the government.

It has also fired up an opposition that was fairly lacklustre for the first few months of the new government.

Cutting teachers and nurses is a difficult sell, so expect plenty of reminders from Treasurer Peter Gutwein about the necessity of the budget repair task in the early months of 2015.

If they've listened and learned, then Mr Hodgman's tree should stand beyond 2018.