ABC aside, Turnbull turns support away

THE rise of Malcolm Turnbull saw an immediate drop in Liberal Party membership despite claims to the contrary.

The co-host of the ABC’s Q&A program may have ­received a gushing welcome from 7.30 Report presenter Leigh Sales and Radio Nat-ional’s Fran Kelly last week but hard-core, long-term Liberal supporters have not been ­impressed. Neither presenter did former Prime Minister Tony Abbott any favours but both cooed and purred like a pair of blushing schoolgirls when they obliged Turnbull with obsequious interviews. “Can I just say to you, this is a very important role that you have to play as one of our leading journalists and broadcast-ers setting an example for everyone else,” Turnbull soothed as he played along with one of the Coalition’s most consistent critics. Pandering to the enemy may be a cunning strategy, but heartland Liberals have long realised the inherent anti-conservative bias at the core of the taxpayer-funded national broadcaster and realise that if the ABC is in Turnbull’s corner, they want a leader who stands for their values, not for the ABC’s extreme Green/Left, pro-people smuggler client, pro-anthropogenic global warming, pro-homosexual marriage propaganda. Turnbull started losing Liberal conservatives when he failed to explain why it was necessary to knife a sitting prime minister with a truly ­enviable record of political and policy achievements and he continued to lose them when he backtracked on his promise not to change fundamental policies. His embrace of the UN via Foreign Minister Julie Bishop’s enthusiasm for toadying to the jumped-up dictators who have the numbers, and the histor-ically corrupt and bloated ­bureaucracy, rankles, as does his signalling of policy changes. Those who have long provided the backbone of the Liberal Party are expressing their frustration that their dedicated support apparently counts for nothing as the Member for Wentworth courts Leftist media elites. The angry Liberals and former Liberals are seeking new homes where they hope the leadership will better represent their views. Some are going to the Nationals inspired by their demand for a written 10-point agreement with Turnbull ­before agreeing to remain in the Coalition and with the tacit understanding that there will be a change in Nationals leadership. Turnbull underestimates the level of distrust toward him within the Nationals at his peril and did himself no favours by including only ­Nationals leader Warren Truss in his economic talkfest on Thursday. The other group attracting disaffected conservatives is the nascent Australian Liberty Alliance Party which will officially be launched on October 20 by Dutch politician Geert Wilders, if the government overcomes its reluctance to admit advocates of free speech. While comparisons will ­inevitably be made with Pauline Hanson’s One Nation because of its strong anti-Islamist stance, the ALA has what appears to be a fairly professional structure and has put forward a wide-ranging 20-point suite of policies unlike Hanson’s narrowly focused and operationally dysfunct-ional group. It will undoubtedly attract a high sneer quotient from the commentariat at the Fairfax media and the taxpayer-funded ABC when its presence becomes too large to ignore but the low-key organisation has already created waves on social media and through word of mouth. The party, so far, is being cautious. After Turnbull’s coup it received more than 800,000 hits on its websites but as an official warned, this may mean that some ­individuals repeatedly clicked on the address and is most probably unrepresentative of the actual number of people who viewed the site. However, it has been overwhelmed by the interest shown so far and while it has a paid-up membership of around 740, its staff lacks the resources to respond to all the inquiries received. In a form letter sent to followers, organisers said they knew that “most supporters are neither racists, nationalists nor religious fundamentalists, but genuinely concerned about the future of our country”. They firmly reject joining forces with parties centred on any controversial individuals, or parties with religious themes or nationalistic and racist agendas. The most contentious policy is its pledge to stop the ­Islamisation of Australia and make the claim that Islam is not merely a religion but a “totalitarian ideology with global aspirations”. “Islam uses the religious element as a means to project itself onto non-Islamic societies, which is manifest in the historical and ongoing expansion of Islam,” it says in its manifesto. “Islam does not accept the separation of religion from state, but seeks dominance over all aspects of human life and society. “ Whereas we see religion as part of life, Islam sees life as part of the religion. No other religious ideology in our time has both the doctrinal aspiration as well as the economic and demographic muscle to impose itself globally.” “It is our core policy that all attempts to impose Islam’s theocracy and Sharia law on our liberal society must be stopped by democratic means, before the demographic, economic and socio-political realities make a peaceful solution impossible.” Pollster Mark Textor last month dismissed the numbers leaving the Liberal Party stating that: “The qualitative evidence is they don’t matter. The sum of a more centrist ­approach outweighs any alleged marginal loss of so-called base voters.” It may be that only the angriest voices are being heard and that Turnbull has attracted new support to the Liberals but, if so, his soft-Left support group has yet to put its money where its mouth is.