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Opposition leader Angus Taylor will attempt to resurrect his political fortunes over parliament’s winter break by crisscrossing the country to visit battleground seats while Liberal MP Andrew Hastie sharpens his own strategy for tackling One Nation.
After the Coalition spent the week grappling with dismal polling that showed its vote continuing decline, Taylor was dealt a fresh blow on Thursday night when the former state Liberal police minister David Elliott called on him to resign over his associations with Dallas McInerney, who is being probed in a NSW corruption inquiry.
A spokesperson for Taylor said: “Any suggestion that the leader is connected to these matters is entirely without foundation and should not be inferred.”
But it will be another unwelcome distraction for the Liberals, many of whom were this week already frustrated that colleagues were drawing attention to the party’s struggles rather than those of voters.
Several MPs were privately concerned about Taylor’s leadership last week after he gave a bungled answer on multiculturalism in a culture war debate started by Pauline Hanson. However, the prevailing view was that the party could not afford to entertain leadership speculation while its standing with voters remains so precarious.
Taylor was among those cautioning MPs to be disciplined during a joint party room meeting on Tuesday, and encouraged them to go home over the winter break focused on selling the party’s message.
The opposition leader will seek to regain ground with a campaign-style blitz of every state and territory throughout the five-week winter recess, visiting small businesses and holding community forums in battleground seats.
Liberal Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price defended Taylor’s leadership in an interview with Sky News on Thursday.
“I think he’s doing a great job, he’s a very bloody intelligent bloke, and when people do get to meet him face to face, I think they will understand the fact that he is about this country’s future,” she said.
“He needs to get out and see Australians … so they realise that for themselves.”
Twin polls published on Sunday showed the Coalition had failed to capitalise on the backlash to Labor’s budget and a stall in One Nation’s momentum for the first time since the minor party’s surge.
Hastie, who has emerged as one of the Coalition’s strongest critics of Hanson’s party, on Thursday vowed to contest the next election amid competing views within the opposition about how best to tackle the surge of One Nation.
Hastie denied suggestions he was reconsidering his future, after this masthead reported he could leave the party if he felt abandoned in his fight with Hanson.
He said on Thursday morning that was “not at all” on the cards. “I intend to contest the next election as a Liberal,” he said.
The Liberal MP, who has been clear about his own leadership aspirations, was recently forced to ramp up personal security as he comes head-to-head with Hanson and her backers.
He has faced an onslaught of online abuse and was identified for security upgrades at his home and electorate office after giving evidence in accused war criminal Ben Roberts-Smith’s defamation action against this masthead.
Hastie believes the campaign is being fuelled by One Nation and its supporters, according to multiple sources present at a recent Coalition party room meeting. Hanson has been a vocal advocate for Roberts-Smith, who has been charged with five counts of war crime murder. Roberts-Smith has consistently denied wrongdoing.
Hanson’s chief of staff, James Ashby, has suggested One Nation has a strong membership base in Hastie’s West Australian electorate of Canning, and that the party will run a strong candidate against him at the next election.
Hastie last week told his colleagues he would rather be “taken out in a box than bend the knee to One Nation”, while Taylor has avoided taking on the minor party so directly.
Asked about the internal split over how best to grapple with the rise of the minor party, Hastie said the Liberals needed to focus on addressing the anger of the Australian people and “delivering centre-right government”.
“There are members of the Coalition who are facing a two-front war. And I think it’s important that we campaign as strong as we can to defeat Labor, and if people want to try and knock us out on the right, well, they need to be dealt with as well.”
Hastie told 2GB on Thursday that he wanted to win back people who had started giving their support to One Nation.
“If I’m getting attacked by Pauline Hanson and James Ashby and Barnaby Joyce, then it looks weak to not respond. Weakness is provocative,” he said.
“So I want to see the Liberal Party strong again, and that’s what I’m working with, and that’s why I’m supporting Angus Taylor as our leader.”
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Brittany Busch is a federal politics reporter for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email.
Natassia Chrysanthos is Federal Political Correspondent. She has previously reported on immigration, health, social issues and the NDIS from Parliament House in Canberra.Connect via X or email.From our partners
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