Excerpt: Once the natural party of government, the Liberal–National Coalition has become a federation of feuding tribes. Factional decay, Murdoch’s fading megaphone and a tone-deaf leadership culture have left it stranded between yesterday’s media and tomorrow’s electorate.
It used to be easy to spot the federal opposition. It wore a blue rosette, spoke in clipped tones, and knew which Canberra clubs served a decent cutlet after Question Time. Now, across the chamber, you don’t see an alternative government at all. You see a family reunion where everyone’s brought a grudge.
So is there still a genuine opposition in Australia, or just a bundle of Liberal and National tribes fighting to the death to be last one standing? The evidence points to the latter. What remains of the Coalition is consumed by factional war, an obsession with control rather than renewal, and a brand that no longer speaks to the suburbs that once sustained it. Add to that the fading power of the Murdoch press and an attention economy that has made traditional politics sound like an old record, and you have the anatomy of decline.
Factions first, policy last
The Coalition still carries the title of Opposition, but it behaves more like a party in opposition to itself. After the 2025 election loss, the Liberals chose Sussan Ley as leader. It was an historic choice, but also a fragile one. Ley’s main job, as the ABC reported, was to “unite a party after a bruising election result.” That unity is still theoretical.
Inside the party room, moderates and the National Right glare across a gulf of distrust. The Nationals threaten to walk whenever the Liberals sneeze. The Coalition once claimed to represent a broad church. Now it resembles a congregation locked in a vestry arguing over the collection plate.
The Howard legacy: control at any cost
Much of this chaos traces back to John Howard. He built a fortress and called it stability. His centralised, presidential style rewarded loyalty and punished ambition. For a while it worked, but it left a party allergic to fresh air.
Howard’s method was to neutralise rivals rather than nurture successors. Later leaders copied the trick. Mathias Cormann, once seen as leadership material, was quietly removed from contention and sent off to Paris to head the OECD. It was efficient, and it left no one capable of challenging the hierarchy.
By the time Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison had finished trading knives, the Liberals had lost the habit of argument. They had mastered only survival. The result is a political culture that prizes control over imagination.
The vanishing Liberal brand
The Liberal Party once spoke for the middle-class mainstream: suburban professionals, small business owners and “doctors’ wives.” Now it struggles to hold their attention.
In 2022, community independents seized blue-ribbon seats once considered untouchable. In 2025, the Liberals clawed back one or two, but the drift is structural, not cyclical. Educated, urban voters now expect credible climate policy, integrity in government and a tone that matches modern Australia. The Liberals still sound like a Rotary Club from 1987. They seem mystified that their former base has moved house.
The Nationals’ long goodbye
Out in the regions, the Nationals are living through their own slow extinction. Rural populations are ageing. Young people are leaving for cities. Farms are consolidating, services have moved to regional hubs, and mining towns rise and fall like dust storms.
The party that once saw itself as the permanent voice of the bush is now talking mostly to itself. Demographic reality has narrowed its map and shrunk its muscle. The rural leg of the Coalition is collapsing just as the urban leg is rotting, leaving the partnership limping towards irrelevance.
The Murdoch lobby still shouts, but no longer decides
For half a century, the Coalition could rely on the Murdoch press as an unofficial campaign arm. The Australian, the Daily Telegraph, Sky News and the Herald Sun operated like a political party without candidates. When elections loomed, the whole apparatus went into overdrive for the Liberals and Nationals. It still does.
Yet the megaphone no longer reaches the crowd. Print circulation has collapsed, and even digital growth cannot replace the authority once carried by front pages. The Australian boasts of rising online readership, but it is largely preaching to the converted. The thunder still rolls, yet the lightning strikes elsewhere.
Australians under forty rarely see a newspaper. They wake to feeds curated by algorithms. TikTok, Instagram and YouTube now shape opinion far more effectively than editorials. The Murdoch lobby remains noisy, but it is no longer the decider. It is a powerful echo chamber shouting in a shrinking room.
The attention economy and the new silence
The modern information landscape is hostile territory for old political machines, especially conservative ones that value hierarchy and patience. The attention economy rewards outrage, brevity and novelty. It punishes long speeches and detailed policy.
Young Australians are not disengaged; they are simply elsewhere. They join movements, follow creators and crowd-fund causes. Party branches, with their minutes and motions, look slow and joyless by comparison. The Coalition’s culture, still shaped by the blokey, Sydney-centric swagger of the Abbott to Morrison years, is hopelessly out of tune with this reality.
The party that once claimed to represent aspiration now seems bored by the aspirations of anyone under fifty. In an era when authenticity counts more than authority, its default setting of scorn and certainty reads as arrogance.
The women who left, and why they won’t return
The Liberal heartland once relied on professional women who valued fiscal restraint and competence. That quiet army of “doctors’ wives” has deserted. They were alienated by a party tone that treated climate concern as hysteria and women’s safety as a public-relations issue.
The rise of the teals was no passing fad. It was the political expression of educated women’s impatience. Even where some teal seats fell back in 2025, the movement reshaped expectations. These voters have found alternatives, and the Liberals have not offered them a reason to come back.
Opposition or autopsy?
Put it all together and the picture is bleak. The Coalition still occupies its benches but it does not occupy the national imagination. It issues statements instead of ideas.
Under Ley, leadership remains fragile. Moderates and hardliners continue their ritual standoff. Policy on climate, energy and industry is cloudy. The electoral map is unkind, and the culture narrower than the country it wants to govern.
Even the once-reliable media advantage has faded. The Murdoch lobby continues to rally behind the Coalition at every election, but the audience has migrated. The megaphone works fine; it’s just that fewer Australians are listening.
What revival would require
A genuine revival would need a political miracle and a cultural transplant. Four changes are essential.
- Rebuild the talent base. Stop recycling the same names and start recruiting people who reflect modern Australia.
- Treat climate policy as economic strategy, not as a wedge. Every serious investor already does.
- Address the gender problem honestly. A female leader helps, but not if the culture beneath remains unchanged.
- Speak the language of the real world. Concise, factual messages must travel on digital platforms where voters actually are. A splash in The Australian will no longer move a single seat.
Each reform would offend a different faction or donor, which is why none have happened. But without them, the Coalition will remain a ghost organisation trading on muscle memory.
The verdict
There is still a federal opposition, but it is hollow. It looks like an opposition and sounds like one, yet rarely behaves like one. What is left of the Coalition sits between the ruins of yesterday’s media order and the noise of tomorrow’s algorithm.
Howard built control. Abbott built resentment. Turnbull built confusion. Morrison built spin. Peter Dutton built fear. Sussan Ley inherits the mess and a map of diminishing blue.
Until the Coalition rediscovers the courage to argue for the future instead of protecting the past, the answer to the old question will remain the same.
Whither the Coalition? It will wither.
Coda: The Ley Exhibition – Coalition’s Top Ten Bum Notes
Determined to make it up to Peter Dutton for being missing in action during the Coalition’s catastrophic and incoherent campaign, Sussan Ley is planning a curated exhibition: “The Coalition’s Top Ten Bum Notes.” It promises to be an unforgettable survey of political dissonance. Among the exhibits:
- The Abbott Overture: a brass section playing “Stop the Boats” on a loop until your ears bleed.
- The Turnbull Fugue: a delicate melody of innovation drowned out by a conservative drum solo.
- The Morrison Medley: a Pentecostal rock ballad performed in multiple keys simultaneously, with a Hawaiian ukulele solo.
- The Dutton Dirge: heavy percussion, minor key, lyrics about fear of the future.
- The Joyce Polka: a tipsy two-step around every scandal, performed with a megaphone and no rhythm.
- The Littleproud Lament: an elegy for outback seats that no longer exist, accompanied by a lone banjo.
- The Birmingham Bridge: a piece so cautious it never quite starts.
- The Ley Reprise: cheerful backing vocals for a song no one remembers writing.
- The Cormann Concerto: a farewell movement played in OECD time, with champagne and tax breaks.
- The Howard Anthem: a nostalgic finale that insists everything was better in 1999, even the music.
The exhibition is free, though donations of policy ideas are gratefully accepted. Critics say it could be the most coherent performance the Coalition has produced in years.
This article was originally published on URBAN WRONSKI WRITES
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The term doctor’s wives has sexist connotations, especially when two of the Teal Independents are, wait for it, doctors. Educated voters do want a credible policy on climate change, not the denial of a man on whom an Oxford Rhodes Scholarship was wasted! The Liberal Party has two choices, modernise or perish into oblivion.
Thanks, an appropriate summary I believe.
As for the Murdoch press, you are correct – the young men and women I work with have no interest in paper “news” of any sort, let alone the rubbish that that organisation publishes.
Disclaimer – I’m a grumpy old bastard who has voted on the left for 50 years.
Andrew Hastie is seen as the future of the Liberal Party and while Sussan rants about Albo’s choice of T-Shirts the backroom boys (and it remains the domain of the boys) are planning the coupe.
Whether he runs with Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price remains to be seen, she has proved divisive and probably can’t advance her career from the senate where her seat in the NT is very much in doubt so she would need a safe Lower House seat to survive: she also has a defamation action against her which could prove costly. I don’t think the electorate would countenance another Liberal being bailed out by the Party to avoid disqualification.
The array of talent is thin to say the least, Tim Wilson is ambitious and may step forward as a deputy if he can hold his seat:Ted O’Brien is seen as a bit dodgy and Michaelia Cash, what can you say about Micky?
Angus Taylor will be in the mix and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Jane Hume back in the shadow ministry.
The next federal election will be held on or before 20 May 2028 so anticipate a Hastie coup probably mid 2026 to give the new team time to imprint their message and expect a big push from News Corp and SKY. Sussan will of course get a cushy ambassadorship should the Hastie Libs get up.
I wish they would wither then blow away as dust. I reckon the following pretty well sums up how we feel about the LNP.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfOW9QrLs0o
Australian conservatism stinks and the smell of eventual death became noticeable from Jack Howard’s days. My old classmate was a deficient, narrow, retarded social and economic thinker, let alone having no real political skills himself as he relied on accepting enticing advice from nobodies behind, that rotten executive class of advisors who deliver for paying donors and influential patrons. Howard doomed the conservatives by insisting on boneheaded refusal to think, to accept, to concede. Knowing nothing about anything Howard posed as Trumpish, an all-knowing brilliant saviour and patron for everyone and everything. What a farce, a sham. The cast of this ongoing stinker has been dismally poor, with incapable bullshit replacing knowledge and experience and duty. B Joyce at least suits as a clown or jester, but I’m not laughing at this shameful shithead. He is a disgrace to us all.
There is so little talent there, because it is not required. Shitshows are enough with amateur actors not convincing anyone much, And the threat of Murdoch scum and scheming hovers, extracting bitterness and frustration from unthinking whiners. This nation needs a big mirror check, and teal candidates have contributed to some little improvement. Meanwhile, brainless, insolent, divisive conservatism crawls onwards…
Such an excellent and thought provoking essay, DavidThe coalition have had more than their share of time in the sun and need a complete change of modus operandi
Such a joy to read! Clever, correct, comedic commentary is so rare these days so rises up to entertain, truth-tell and sum up a disappearing part in democracy that deserves its demise.
Thank you David for composing such readable, enjoyable English written to inform.
Fabulous.
I doubt it can be topped!
Nice play on words, David. The essay could, of course, have been called ‘Wither the Coalition?’ Jane Hume’s fashioning herself a necklace out of a Minties wrapper – given that typically it’s a child’s activity, not an adult’s – during the Senate’s Question Time last Wednesday would seem to be symbolic of the infantilism and loss of sense of purpose that characterises the current opposition.
Cool Pete
I should have used that term in inverted commas.
The phrase “doctors’ wives” is politically inappropriate for several reasons:
It’s outdated and sexist; it assumes women’s political identity derives from their husbands’ professions rather than their own agency, education, or work. Many of these voters are themselves doctors, lawyers, academics or other professionals.
It misreads the demographic; the swing voters in affluent inner-city electorates (like Kooyong, Wentworth, North Sydney) include both women and men across various professional backgrounds. They’re often tertiary-educated knowledge workers with progressive social values who’ve abandoned the Liberals over climate inaction and integrity issues.
It’s dismissive; the term trivialises legitimate political concerns about climate policy, corruption, women’s rights, and government accountability by reducing them to the supposedly frivolous preoccupations of privileged housewives.
It obscures real analysis; these seats represent a genuine ideological shift among educated, urban professionals who once formed the Liberal Party’s base. Writing them off as “doctors’ wives” prevents understanding why the party is haemorrhaging its traditional moderate support to independents and Labor.
The phenomenon is better described as the rise of “teal independents” or the defection of “small-l liberals”; terms that actually capture the political realignment without the patronising gender stereotyping
Canguro
You’re absolutely right, “Wither the Coalition?” would’ve worked better to spell out my double entendre capturing both their destination and their decay.
The Minties wrapper moment is perfect symbolism, isn’t it? While serious policy questions were being debated, there’s Hume literally playing with lollies like a bored schoolkid at the back of the classroom. It’s not just infantile; it’s contemptuous of the Senate itself, those whom she is meant to represent and the serious business of holding government to account.
The Coalition seems utterly bereft of ideas or vision beyond negativity and culture war stunts. They’ve regressed from governing party to petulant opposition that can’t even be bothered to engage seriously with the work at hand. The Minties incident perfectly encapsulates their intellectual bankruptcy; fidgeting with confectionery while the nation’s business goes on around them.
You’ve captured something essential about Leys’s nominal opposition: they’ve mistaken schoolyard mockery and performative tantrums for actual opposition. The necklace-making speaks to a deeper loss of purpose; they simply don’t know what they’re for anymore, only what they’re against.
Cheers,
Urban
Long may the moron coalition continue to tear themselves apart. I can almost see Gina shifting over to ON at this rate.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/what-barnaby-joyce-really-wants-from-one-nation-20251029-p5n6c0.html
Abbie,
Thank you so much for your generous words; they’ve genuinely made my day. There’s nothing quite like knowing your writing has connected with someone, especially when they take the time to say so.
Your comment about “clever, correct, comedic commentary” being rare these days really resonates. I do worry that we’re losing the art of political satire that actually bites; the kind that makes you laugh and wince simultaneously because it’s struck a nerve of truth. When satire works, it’s because it’s doing the hard yards of research and analysis first, then finding that perfect angle that makes the absurd visible.
I’m particularly pleased you found it readable and enjoyable. That’s always the tightrope walk, isn’t it? Maintaining rigour and substance while keeping things lively enough that people actually want to read to the end. Too much earnestness and you lose your audience; too much flourish and you sacrifice credibility. Getting that balance right; when it happens; feels like a small victory.
As for “can it be topped” – well, that’s very kind, but there’s always another political fiasco brewing in this country! The material, sadly, never runs dry. Always better writers than yourself.
Thank you again for taking the time to write. Comments like yours remind me why I do this, and they genuinely fuel the next piece. Here’s to holding the bastards accountable with a bit of style.
Warm regards,
David
Ley is saddled with the mess Morrison and Dutton left, let alone Joyce and some of the other comedians there.
And her own refusal to get relevant; “real”.
I thought the conservatives were consigned to back of beyond after Rudd, but Labor squandered that chance on factional in-fighting.
The Tories got a second chance, but like good conservatives elsewhere, “neither forgot, nor learned”.
I hope their refusals of relevance see them consigned to the dumpster of history.
Ley is saddled with the mess Morrison and Dutton left, let alone Joyce and some of the other comedians there.
And her own refusal to get relevant; “real”.
I thought the conservatives were consigned to back of beyond after Rudd, but Labor squandered that chance on factional in-fighting.
The Tories got a second chance, but like good conservatives elsewhere, “neither forgot, nor learned”.
I hope their refusals of relevance see them consigned to the dumpster of history.
The link below attests to the dishonest, disreputable and deceitful machinations that our Leader of the Opposition will go to when pressured by the most devious lobby group that has ever befouled the halls of Parliament House, Canberra.
How can she be trusted? How can she be a leader when she is so unreliable? Gender is not the issue here – it is a matter of questionable integrity. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/M8hhKOAgEY4
For thr Libs to reboot, ditto Nats, redevelop genuine grass roots branch membership, allow input into policy development and develop policy in house to ensure that it’s informed and grounded.
Avoid appealing to a declining and ageing skip base, corporate interests and complacently relying on RW MSM and social media influencers promoting white Christian nationalism and ‘segregation economics’.
Like the US GOP and UK Tories, there is an urgent need to exit the ecosystem of Murdoch, fossil fueled Koch and white Oz nostalgia of Tanton Networks.
The LNP seems utterly determined to jump into the Bottomless Pit of Irrelevancy and Stupidity never to be seen or heard of again.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/nationals-vote-to-abandon-net-zero-mandate-20251031-p5n6wk.html
I thought the para on Howard’s legacy at the core of the article, this starting in the eighties fued between the soc-lib wets and Friedmanite dries,who were loudly supported by the likes of IPA and Paddy MAguiness, Judith Sloan and the Kemp brothers.
Will the community independents ever form some sort of working group with leading spokespeople which will be able to act as a policy-making body. Independents by their nature do not appear able to become a cohesive opposition group, let alone form government, which leaves us with the last remnants of the coalition still promoting their outmoded ideas