"We're not going to blink."
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That was the message from bleary-eyed Andrews' government officials on Friday morning, 24 hours into their final push to get their contentious "right to die" legislation through the Victorian Parliament's lower house.
By 10am everyone on Spring Street was wondering when Robert Clark might finally close his eyes, or at least stop talking.
But it looked like the Liberal member for Box Hill might have to be carried out of the place, rather than give an inch as the Parliament pored, line by line, over the 160 clauses in the legislation.
All around him, the state's pollies yawned, nodded off, placed heavy heads in hands and generally looked mightily unimpressed.
Sleep deprivation can do funny things to people of course, but the proponents of the bill weren't laughing as the sun rose on the fourth day of this debate.
"I'm like the walking dead," a senior minister confided.
The Greens reckoned that Clark, ably supported by his Coalition colleagues Murray Thompson and Graham Watt - the man in black - were filibustering the night away.
It's not a real filibuster of course, the refuseniks have fair-and-square amendments, but the effect is just the same.
But if Clark's stamina is something to see, he met his match in Health Minister Jill Hennessy, still on her feet and batting away the many, many objections of Clark and his Coalition colleagues.
Hennessy even managed to get through the long night and gruelling morning without calling anybody a 'see you next Tuesday', not publicly anyway.
But it's not over yet.
Premier Daniel Andrews during the long, long debate. Photo: AAP
Former speaker-turned Liberal backbencher Christine Fyffe on Friday morning. Photo: Justin McManus