If the Liberal marriage is over, what happens next?

A Liberal trying to explain massive swings in his party’s heartland, likened Malcolm Turnbull’s dumping to the fight that ends a marriage. So where does the party go from here, asks James Campbell.

Attempting to explain the massive swings against their party on Saturday in heartland seats of Hawthorn, Kew, Brighton, Sandringham, and Malvern, a Liberal likened the dumping of Malcolm Turnbull to the fight that ends a marriage.

Looking back from the perspective of the Family Court it’s clear the couple had been drifting apart for a long time and the row that finally brought it to a head was just the final straw.

In that sense Saturday both was and wasn’t’ “about Turnbull”.

Just as in Wentworth, the former PM’s dumping simply crystallised feelings that had been building for a while between the Liberals and their now ex-voters.

LIBERAL CRISIS TALKS TRIGGER DEEP DIVISIONS IN CANBERRA

VICTORIAN STATE ELECTION: HOW EACH UNDECIDED SEAT STANDS

So where does the party go from here?

If they were in Opposition in Canberra you could argue would be nothing wrong with the so-called conservatives and the so-called moderates having it out amongst themselves and coming back to us when they have decided where they stand on climate change, religious freedom, and a raft of other social policies they need come to agreement on.

Some will argue they should have a crack at seeing how well they go with a full-throated Trumpian populist pitch to the Australian people.

Others will suggest that they need to dump the “nasty party” image and head down a modernisation path as the UK Conservatives did ten years ago under David Cameron.

The problem is they’re in Government, with an election roughly six months away.

Whether the Liberals need to have an argument about what their party stands for is beside the point. They would be punching on in the tumbril on the way to the electoral guillotine.

The most important thing between now and next May is not to do anything that makes this defeat even worse.

And it is going to be bad.

[e-mail]