Libs ‘must be for forgotten people’, says Tony Abbott

Former PM Tony Abbott says the Liberal Party must return to Menzian values and not let factions dominate an insiders’ party at the expense of members.

Former prime minister Tony Abbott. Picture: Justin Lloyd

Tony Abbott says the Liberal Party no longer respects its membership and looks like “an insiders’ club” with factions dominating the party’s organisational wing and stifling the rights and voices of local members.

“There’s no doubt that the party could do with more members,” the former prime minister said in an interview for a new edition of a biography of Robert Menzies. “But that’s partly a function of the party not respecting the members it has.

“All too often, the party looks like an insiders’ club that wants to keep outsiders – everyday citizens who normally vote Liberal and respect the party of Menzies and (John) Howard – at arm’s length,”

“The way the NSW party has rorted its own rules to freeze the membership out of preselections is nothing short of scandalous.

“If the existing members can’t be trusted to get preselections right, (then) appeal for more members – don’t override the ones you have.”

Mr Abbott said the modern version of Menzies’ “forgotten people” – first articulated in a May 1942 broadcast – are now small business owners and those who work a trade, and the Liberal Party should continue to represent their interests and aspirations.

“I think it’s closer than ever to representing Menzies’ ‘forgotten people’, or their modern equivalents, the small business people, the tradies, the people who ‘have a go’ and want the government to respect their efforts, all the people who aspire to do better but who don’t have powerful backers or the resources to be indifferent to government policy,” he said.

He stressed that Menzies remained of “educative and inspirational value” to modern Liberals and argued his “We Believe” statement of the party’s purpose and philosophy should be recited at the start of all party gatherings.

Mr Abbott said there were clear lessons for the modern party to learn from Menzies, its principal founder, in how he led it in both opposition and government.

“He understood the importance of party unity and he also understood the importance of a strong coalition with the National (Country) Party.

“These are enduring lessons that all successful leaders must heed.”

Steering a middle course on the party’s philosophy, Mr Abbott said the Liberal Party should continue to respect liberal and conservative views, and articulate mainstream values.

“Like most leaders, he said a lot at different times, some of which, taken out of context, can be used to portray him as other than who and what he was,” Mr Abbott said.

“Conservatism isn’t reactionary, although sometimes it can be restorative.

“Taken as on the whole and over a long career, Menzies was an orthodox liberal-conservative, liberal on some things conservative on others but always in the party mainstream.”

Mr Abbott’s comments form part of a series of interviews with every living former Liberal prime minister included in a new preface to the second edition of the Menzies biography.

Mr Howard said the Liberal Party must resist calls to shift ­further to the right, arguing that it was best served by remaining a blend of liberal and con­servative views.

The biography, first published in 2019, includes a series of interviews Menzies gave in retirement that had not been revealed before and access to archival documents and family letters also not previously disclosed.

Troy Bramston’s Robert Menzies: The Art of Politics is republished by Scribe on August 15