What today’s Libs get wrong about Menzies’ legacy
This may or may not happen but there is no doubt discussions are under way within the parliamentary party, among the organisation and members, and Liberal elders. In the Nationals, too. Most say the trigger point is likely to be after the next election, in anticipation of losing more seats or not regaining many. The talk is gathering pace.
It would not be the first time a major party, on the centre-right or centre-left, has divided with members breaking off to form new or join other parties. The centre-right has been fragmenting for years, with votes peeling off to Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party rebrand and the Liberal Democrats.
A formal split would be something entirely different, though.
The last major party split at the national level – there have been breakaways such as Steele Hall’s Liberal Movement in South Australia and Don Chipp’s Australian Democrats – was the Labor Party in 1955.
The Liberal Party, of course, was formed from the ashes of the United Australia Party in 1944.
The public response to the decision by the Liberal Party to abandon a commitment to the goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 is in.
Newspoll, published on Monday, shows the Coalition’s primary vote remains at its lowest in the poll – a dismal 24 per cent. Labor has skyrocketed to a two-party lead of 58 per cent to 42 per cent.
If anyone in Liberal ranks gets out the calculator to translate this to an election – let’s do it for them – it means that it is unlikely the party would hold any seats in metropolitan Australia. It would be all but wiped out. The party would be a veritable parliamentary rump, having lost even more seats to Labor, Greens and teals.
The decision to walk away from net zero – a goal that Sussan Ley, Ted O’Brien, Angus Taylor and David Littleproud advocated and defended at the past two elections – will do significant damage because it signals the party is not serious about tackling climate change. This, as I have argued, is the entry price for credibility in politics.
Not only do business and farming groups – traditional Coalition constituencies – support the goal of net zero with a policy pathway to achieve it by 2050, so does every state Liberal or Liberal-National Party leader. Why? They understand the politics of climate change and public demand to find workable policies to achieve it.
The Liberal Party too, under Scott Morrison and Josh Frydenberg as leader and deputy leader, recognised the science, accepted the net zero by 2050 goal and argued Australia’s share of global trade and investment would be at risk if it were seen to be out of step with global acceptance of it and concerted action to meet it.
It is telling that when NSW Liberal leader Mark Speakman resigned before he could be toppled last week, he cited “brand damage” done to his state party by federal counterparts.
With elections due next year in South Australia (March) and Victoria (November), and NSW in March 2027, state Liberals worry the party’s federal woes will poison their chances.
The Liberal Party’s challenge is much deeper than its backflips, contradictions and incoherence on climate change and energy policy or its anxiety over leadership, with several ambitious men eyeing the top job. The challenge is existential. This has long been denied by party leaders and elders even though it was starkly evident after the 2022 election and underscored by the 2025 election.
The party has almost entirely lost its suburban heartland. Seats the party held since the 1940s and 50s have been lost at recent elections. I’ve noted that seats held by every former Liberal leader other than Morrison’s Cook and Malcolm Fraser’s Wannon have been lost, illustrating the decline. Most Liberal members live in seats the party does not hold.
The earthquake through the party’s electoral geography was carved by teal MPs. All held their seats apart from Zoe Daniel, who lost to lucky Tim Wilson in Goldstein. The party cannot regain government without regaining teal seats yet it has done nothing to woo these voters back to the fold. Indeed, as a result, more seats could fall to teals, Labor and Greens.
This penetrates to a bigger problem: a demographic tidal wave heading for the party. The federal party’s past two election reviews have noted the loss of younger voters – millennials and Gen Z – along with women and migrants. The party resembles an old white man’s conservative party. But even those voters are shifting to the far-right One Nation, which is surging in the polls.
All of this – policy, ideology, constituency, members, strategy and leadership – has encouraged discussion about dividing into liberal and conservative parties, leaving open a three-way Coalition with the Nationals. There are fundamental differences about whether the Liberal Party should seek to occupy the centre ground, remaining a broad church, or move further to the right chasing One Nation.
The Labor Party is no stranger to splits, divisions and rats. The party, formed in 1891, officially split in 1916 over conscription during World War I, in 1931 over the policy response to the Depression and in 1955 over communist infiltration in its ranks. Leadership coupled with organisational and policy renewal were keys to its survival.
When Robert Menzies toiled to form the Liberal Party in 1944 from other parties and organisations, he emphasised that it be a “nationwide movement” with mass membership that supported “progress” and championed “great ideas”. He said it could not be “subservient” to the Country Party or merely a party of “reaction” pursuing policies of “negation”.
When I was writing a biography of Menzies a few years ago, I was struck by how long and hard it was to bring about a new party. Others tried and failed. It required all of Menzies’ talents of hard work, determination, conviction, advocacy and compromise.
Above all, Menzies argued, the party had to be “middle of the road” and “pragmatic and not dogmatic” to succeed.
It is a lesson Liberals should heed.
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As the Liberal Party is beset by rumours of an imminent leadership challenge, disagreements on fundamental policies and values, the loss of heartland seats and a generation of voters, and declining membership, there is persistent internal talk of a formal split between the party’s liberal and conservative wings.