Farrer – Australia 2025

The previous member for Groom (Ian MacFarlaine) tried to join the Nats party room but that was vetoed by the Queensland LNP, on the basis that the Liberals held it prior to the merger.

The National Party has never held Herbert, its always been a Liberal-Labor contest for the past 80 years.

Nats beating Ley here in 2028 if the coalition doesnt reform

I don’t think Sussan Ley will last the whole term as the Opposition Leader. She’s might be another Brendan Nelson with a posioned challice. Hey, I might be wrong come 2028.

totally agree @Votante i’ll be surprised if even she lasts a year personally.

Couldnt agree more @Nicholas and Nimalan! Hardline Conservative liberals should move to the Nats. Jacinta price would move back. Nats should hold seats like Herbert , Groom, O’Connor and Wright. Then we have a liberal party and a conservative party. Liberals can win back their inner city heartlands. Nats can give Liberals confidence and supply in a minority government.

The LNP have to demerge at least federally now. I assume the Nats will want to run in more seats in 2028 regardless of whether the Coalition is back and running. This would mean labor held targets like Leichhardt. Wouldnt make sense for one LNP candidate to run and then choose whether they are a Liberal or National after being elected…

Would be hilarious if Ley became the federal version of Annastacia Palaszscuk.

@Up the dragons, sounds very similar to the Reform Party of Canada which splitted off from the Progressive Conservative Party and helped Liberal Party of Canada win a comfortable majority of a decade until they remerged to back into what is now known as the Conservative Party of Canada.

Bumbalo, the only difference is that Newman was elected in a landslide initially whereas albanese only won a narrow victory before the subsequent 2025 landslide. As a result, albanese already has experience as PM and whilst he will probably be bolder in his second term, he is unlikely to go all out and aggressively target his opponents like the Newman LNP government.

Albanese in his second term would probably be like Daniel Andrews or mark McGowan in their second terms once they won landslide victories.

@Nicholas, you raise some interesting points. I agree with your suggestion that the conservative wing of the Liberal Party splits and joins the Nats, leaving the more centrist members to remain in the Liberal Party. After all, that is what the party name suggests is in the tin, so to speak.

I certainly wish such a split would happen in the ACT, as the Opposition Party there appears to be anathema to the majority of voters with conservatives involved.

As for the idea of a grand coalition, I actually think that your second suggestion is more likely than the first one. If the Liberal dog (pardon the expression, I mean no offence) is no longer wagged by the National tail, and the share of the two-party vote keeps falling, then yes, it may be the only way to get to a majority.

@Real Talk, I agree about Herbert. Definitely should be a Liberal seat. Townsville is a city of over 200,000 people.

Also Groom is a Liberal seat because it is centred around Toowoomba, another city of over 100,000 people. Same goes for Leichhardt with Cairns (though it’s now a Labor seat).

Federally the Nationals aren’t as strong in WA which is why Durack and O’Connor aren’t Nationals seats. The Nationals barely even exist in South Australia which is why they don’t hold Barker or Grey. In Tassie they quite literally don’t exist anymore which is why Braddon elects Liberals (Bass, Franklin and Lyons include urban fringes; Bass includes most of Launceston, Franklin includes the outer eastern, southern and western suburbs of Hobart and Lyons includes the outer northern suburbs of Hobart).

@ NP
I agree that Toowomba is a city but it is very socially conservative it voted no for SSM despite being non-ethnic. Townsville has a lot of Nationalism/Populism. ONP is strong there there is a large military base voted strongly no for the Voice. So maybe regional cities such as this are better represented by Nats. I would love to see a revival of SA Nats so people like Alex Antic and Nicole Flint can join that party. Leichardt has been represented by Nats before but Cairns is a more progressive city that Townsville. Barker is very right wing seat so better for Nats to hold it.

Agree Nimalan, the Nationals are probably better off becoming a version of the Greens being a separate political party not permanently joined to the corresponding major party (Labor).

The Greens have a well-defined base of support, mostly in the inner-city districts where voters are younger and working in ‘lower paid’ roles (primarily tertiary students). This is also true for the Nationals, whose base of support is in rural districts with voters who are older and working in blue collar, primary industries.

Labor generally maintains its own identity separate from the Greens and both parties will only back each other when they share a common goal. This is also true for the Liberals and Nationals, as the Liberals would be better off reforming to what modern Labor is (moving towards the centre and leaving the controversial social aspects like opposition to net zero being the sole domain of the Nationals).

The libs would end up in much the same ideological space as labor if they do that, there wouldn’t be much distinguishing them. Labor today is really more the party of Menzies than Chifley, so a more centrist liberal party would need some way to distinguish themselves from that.

@ Clarinet of Communists
A more centrist Liberal party will be socially centrist but can be more economically right wing than now for example look at an increase in GST etc. As Yoh An pointed out the Greens have become the left flank of Labor more socially and economically progressive than Labor
The Nats can be more socially conservative and economically interventionist

there will be another coalition agreement especailly once the conservatives take back control of the leadership another carrot for them to dangle in from of prospective voters inside the party. young will get a vote now and gisele may not end up having a vote plus reynolds and hughes are on borrowed time. im hopinhg andrew hastie gives it a tllt and i magin he woud win. i reckon he should do a ticket with tim wilson which would help him win over moderates

it makes no sense for the libs to be seperate from the nats at a federal level because then they have to run against the nats in seats the nats control and they would be wasting resources they could be spending elsewhere

I think if the Liberal moves fully moves to the centre though it might cause mass resignation among rank-and-file members and there will be a massive campaign to encourage Conservative Liberal Voters to drop their support for Libs by (Sky-After-Dark Commentators, IPA, Advance Australia, Conservative Influencers etc ) as a view of betrayal.

Agree Nimalan, a centrist Liberal party would be in the mould of that led by the recent NSW Liberal Premiers or Malcolm Turnbull. It would support or be ambivalent about social issues like LGBT rights and climate change, but also be fiscally conservative supporting lower taxes, red tape reduction, government efficiency in contrast to Labor.

Andrew Hastie mentioned it wasn’t his time given his commitment to his young family and the commutes from WA (and in an interview also mentioned his success in defending his seat was being very much a local MP, something he wouldn’t be able to dedicate as much time to were he to become leader). I still expect him to lead the Liberals some day, but it may be quite awhile till then.

I have wondered a bit if given many want the Liberals to be economically liberal and socially agnostic (a sticking point for many Liberals to want to ditch culture wars), why there isn’t a question of rebranding officially, where the Nationals were to become the “Conservative or National Conservative/Conservative National” Party – aka an Australian Tory party would not just be about rural/regional interests, but conservatism more broadly (and less so agrarian socialism), mirroring the UK with the Tories and Liberal Democrats (go back over 100 years and the Liberals in the UK were once a party of government). Yes, it was attempted by Cory Bernardi before, but it did not have the heft and backing that the Nationals or Liberals currently have, as diminished as they are (speaking of which, I haven’t heard about Bernardi in quite awhile).

@wl he did state he does want to be leader one day but stated he didnt want to put his hand up this time around. and also theres the fact that there was talk that whoever won this time would only be temporary leader while thei libs got their house in order

Agree WL – the Australian Democrats tried to be like the Lib Dems in the UK, but they faded as a party. Perhaps the best situation is the conservative members of the Liberal Party join with the Nationals to form a conservative led LNP party, whilst the moderates join forces with the teal independents to form a new Liberal Democrat type of party.

Under this situation, this new ‘Liberal Democrat’ party would be a third centrist force that could form a coalition with either the LNP or Labor, depending on numbers and what type of policies both major parties offer.

as a liberal voter and albury resident i am not inspired by sussan ley as leader of the party

@ John
Did you move across border from an Indi. Would you be a willing to have a Nationals member instead of Susan Ley?

@ WL
I think Socially agnostic is probably the best path forward for the Libs. They can allow a conscience vote on Abortion, Trans issues. I think it is the best word. I do think Andrew Hastie is more traditional conservative. The question is is he willing to do a deal with the moderate faction over climate and value the teal seats. He went to a private school in Wentworth do he does understand the culture of the Teal seats.

i moved about 2 years ago. i dont think the nats would win in farrer. but i dont have any problem with her personally i just dont think shes the righ person to lead the party in the long term or to the next election. but i knew she would beat angus taylor because he had simply alienated too any people in his party. i didnt want either choice that they offered up. for that reason im throwing my support behind andrew hastie.

@ Yoh An
Agree socially Agnostic what WL mentioned is probably the best word i can think of. They should have both people of faith and Athiests as well. I would like Labor to be longer term more socially agnostic as well and win the most non religious seat in the country-Kingston and the most religious seat- Werriwa.

One of the things not mentioned often enough is that conservatism and liberalism are two distinct political philosophies that were traditionally in opposition to each other. Until the arrival of Labour as a major force in the 20’s, UK politics was split between the Conservatives and the Liberals (and their predecessors the Whigs). Even up to the mid 80’s a much diminished Liberal party was still a minor force in UK politics (I tend to think after the merger the SDP rather than the Liberals have dominated the party). Meaning, it does make sense for the to coalition split and more formal liberal and conservative parties.

However, it obviously won’t happen like that, the Nationals in particular would need a decade to build out the party infrastructure/donor base in urban and (more particularly) suburban areas.

The “centrist” Liberal Party described by Nimalan and Yoh An is exactly what I have in mind – less socially conservative, but more fiscally conservative. Such a party would not be “Labor lite”. I dare say the Liberal Party in its current form has become rather “Labor lite” on economics.

@ Nicholas
Further to your point current Liberal stategy is to become “DLP Lite” and win seats such as Calwell, state seat of Greenvale etc. Areas of social conservativism (especially Religious) but economically left wing. When the WA branch of the Nats joined with the state DLP in 1974 to form the National Alliance it was their biggest ever mistake and it would take til 2010 for the WA Nats to win a federal seat so i think Libs morphing into DLP will be the next diaster.

Not a Christian, though I wonder what appeal a leader who changed her name to a form that is numerologically more advantageous would have for serious Christians?
Perhaps there aren’t enough left for it to matter?

Interestingly, the teal or local Voices candidate won all booths in Sussan Ley’s hometown of Albury. She even beat Ley on primary votes at some booths in Albury. It’s not a huge surprise since there is normally a strong primary vote for Labor and the Greens.

@Gympie

The character of a political candidate is always an afterthought for Evangelicals. It is only ever an issue when they’ve already decided they don’t like the candidate.

Her name change isn’t a huge deal-breaker of an issue.

@Votante, Ley won one booth in Albury, which was Table Top. It’s an outer semi-rural suburb but it’s still in the City of Albury. However even there it was close (50.3% Liberal TCP). Plus the Lavington PPVC was close (50.9% independent TCP). The Liberals did win every booth in Griffith however.