Who would have foreseen that the publication of Malcolm Turnbull's memoirs would have led to the immediate outbreak of a Liberal Party culture war? Well, everyone.
Already the unauthorised distribution of A Bigger Picture, an e-book, which has been circulating political circles over the weekend, has dragged Prime Minister Scott Morrison's office into the controversy with an advisor targeted by lawyers acting for Turnbull and his publisher Sandy Grant.
Mathias Cormann, Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison at a joint press conference in 2018.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Meanwhile, angry conservatives on the NSW Liberal executive this weekend appear to have lobbed a bomb in the direction of the ex-PM and his supporters among the party's moderate faction. They want him expelled.
A note circulated by Right-faction aligned member Christian Ellis to others on the state executive reads: "I intend to move for the immediate expulsion of Malcolm Turnbull from the Liberal Party. On top of this, as he may no longer be a member, I will move for a lifetime ban to be imposed on him."
Ellis, for the record, was an adviser during the Turnbull government and until recently worked on Macquarie Street for Finance Minister Damien Tudehope. "This is not a motion of vengeance or spite. His membership needs to be terminated because if he continues to keep attacking the party as a member, or connected in any way, he damages the party brand," he writes. "It is also important that we remain consistent as an executive, using previous decisions like those against Ross Cameron for less egregious comments."
The Right, the smallest faction on the executive, is particularly aggrieved by Turnbull's characterisation of Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton as someone who would do "enormous damage to the social fabric of Australia" if he became prime minister and of other criticisms about Morrison and Health Minister Greg Hunt.
Cameron, a former Liberal MP, was banned from party membership in 2017 after accusing Premier Gladys Berejiklian of seeking to "destroy" a preselection reform movement championed by many in the Right.