Delcons, take a bow. You have saved Australia

They were ridiculed as ‘deluded conservatives’, or delcons for short, but those who wanted Malcolm Turnbull out of the top job knew voters wanted a government that makes their lives better, not worse, writes Peta Credlin.

Scott Morrison deserves every accolade and then some for his improbable come-from-behind win.

He fought the campaign with a professionalism that brought his political acumen to the fore but didn’t shelve his “everyman” authenticity; not an easy feat in this age of the party insider.

Along with the congratulating, and every bit of it justified, the Coalition needs to pay attention to how close Labor got, and how close they remain.

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For all of last weekend’s voter repudiation of Labor class-war hate, the margin is a handful of seats. That makes Labor very competitive, numerically at least, for next time.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison needs to pay attention to how close Labor came to winning the election. Picture: Adam Taylor/Prime Minister's Office

And with the new leader set to be Anthony Albanese, he’s a more dangerous opponent than his predecessor. With a personable style that’s likely to win over people where Bill Shorten could not, Albanese is deeply rooted in Labor’s left faction with a history of activism going back 40 years.

Managed adeptly, the second can nullify the first, but he’s not to be underestimated in the way that Labor underestimated Morrison, or indeed, the way Labor underestimated the Australian people.

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For months, it was conventional wisdom the Liberals had doomed themselves by toppling Malcolm Turnbull from the top job. Some journalists had even invented their own term of abuse for those Liberals who wanted Turnbull gone: “deluded conservatives”, or delcons for short.

‘Deluded conservatives’, or delcons for short, were ridiculed for wanting Malcolm Turnbull out of the top job. Picture: Dan Himbrechts/AAP

And it’s true that voters don’t like to see the PMs that they have elected removed by a cabal of MPs. In the end, though, what voters want most of all is a government that makes their lives better, not worse.

Hence the Australian people elected the party that had changed its leader and dumped bad policies; not the party that had kept its leader but promised policies that would turn their lives — and the country — upside down.

The revisionism is now over.

There is no way the Liberals would have won the election under Turnbull, or indeed his loyal deputy, “11 votes” Julie Bishop. At his only general election as leader, Turnbull lost 14 seats. Indeed, with only a one-seat majority to show for his efforts after squandering Tony Abbott’s landslide win, it was clear then the Turnbull experiment was a failure.

He limped on, failing to win a single seat in the Super Saturday by-elections, and annihilating the party’s supporter base to the point that Shorten looked unassailable.

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Look at the seats that won it for the Liberals, and there’s just no way Turnbull or Bishop would have been able to unite Morrison’s “Quiet Australians” — the overlooked and under-appreciated, taxpaying middle class who are not embarrassed about their aspiration to get ahead, their faith or their suburban outlook.

Labor leader contender and member for Grayndler Anthony Albanese is currently running unopposed for the Labor leadership. Picture: Dean Lewins/AAP

Indeed, where they had once sensed a sneer from Turnbull, or an eye-roll from Bishop, under Morrison — and the equally approachable and real Jenny — the voters who came home to the Coalition felt embraced by their own.

Gone now is any sense they’re not welcome in their own country; having been scolded by the noisy elites for refusing to decry Australia Day, the masculinity of our dads and brothers and sons, or to speak up for balance when it comes to dealing with climate policy, these Australians now have their voice back, and their country.

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Last weekend’s election result reinforced a political realignment which has been under way for some time: wealthy seats are increasingly vulnerable to the green-left while the much greater number of working-class seats are increasingly susceptible to the centre-right, provided the Liberals are led by someone (think John Howard, Abbott and now Morrison) who is more at home at the football than at a dinner party.

Turnbull was good at exciting people who would never vote Liberal, and had a following among the big-end-of-town types who think running a country or a political party is like running a business, but he utterly failed to understand the difference between mounting a boardroom coup and prosecuting a battle of ideas and values.

By wanting the Liberals to get closer to the Labor Party, Turnbull failed to expose the risks of Labor’s agenda.

With Morrison’s campaign cut-through, Labor’s big-tax, big-government, social engineering agenda has been laid bare, and Australians now understand the differences between the two major parties better than ever before.

Delcons, take a bow. By saving the government (and the Liberal Party), you’ve saved the country.

Watch Peta Credlin on Sky News, weeknights from 6pm.