The only thing saving him is the refusal of the Shearer-sceptics to coalesce around a single alternative.
The blokish, more conservative MPs can't yet bring themselves to back deputy leader Grant Robertson.
The anti-Cunliffe group may have been expanded by his disloyalty at the time of last year's annual conference although, to be fair, he has been keeping his head down and playing the team game in recent months.
Former union boss and party president Andrew Little has not set the world alight, nor gathered a salon of close supporters and he is seen as unready.
In extremis, that could all change, of course.
The prospect of electoral defeat and a third term on the opposition benches can focus the mind wonderfully.
But at times it feels as if the rival factions are in some macabre version of the movie Weekend at Bernie's lugging around a political corpse because they are afraid to let go of one arm in case he falls over and the other side grabs power.
Meanwhile, everyone talks of a hoped- for improvement ahead, the need for him to lift his game and how he is a really nice guy, but the clock is ticking loudly.
Rumours have seeded the idea of an unofficial notice period - a two-month countdown or a 90-day probation period to the November 1 party conference. But the issue may have to be brought to a head sooner than that.
David "Bernie" Shearer; will it catch on?
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