Tony Abbott will restore full cabinet rule

MALCOLM Turnbull says an Abbott government will operate a Westminster cabinet system with the PM 'first among equals'.

Malcolm Turnbull

FORMER Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull says an Abbott government will operate a Westminster cabinet system, with the prime minister "first among equals", and shun the presidential model followed by Kevin Rudd in office.

In an interview with The Weekend Australian, Mr Turnbull pledged to work in a team relationship with Tony Abbott and made it clear that proper cabinet decision-making would be critical in an Abbott government.

"Tony has made it clear, and I thoroughly endorse this, that the next Coalition government will be a traditional Westminster cabinet government," Mr Turnbull said.

"Decisions will be taken collectively. We are not electing a president. There is no president Tony. Tony Abbott will be the prime minister. He will be, as all prime ministers are in Westminster systems, first among equals.

"Now that is absolutely critical. We are not running a personality cult here."

From a practical point of view, he said, "and we saw this with Kevin Rudd in particular, you cannot run a federal government from the prime minister's office.

"What happened with Kevin, as we know, is that because he was doing that, decisions just weren't being taken."

Mr Turnbull said he and the Opposition Leader would "authentically be a team", and if people voted for Mr Abbott at this year's election then "I'm part of the team" in office.

The comments reveal the growing Abbott-Turnbull mutual self-interest but also Mr Turnbull's determination to hold Mr Abbott to his word on full collective decision-making in office.

He intends to play an influential role at the cabinet table in an Abbott government.

The message from these comments is Mr Turnbull's stake in the way an Abbott government functions and his ambition to ensure the cabinet delivers quality public policy.

Pressed on the leadership, Mr Turnbull said he received "hundreds of emails every week" that said he should be prime minister, but he added "the chances of me leading the party again are very, very low".

Asked whether he was in politics for the long haul, Mr Turnbull said: "Yes, subject to health, fate and all those things."

Mr Abbott and Mr Turnbull will soon come together to launch the Coalition's broadband policy. As communications spokesman, Mr Turnbull said the message on the NBN was that "we will complete it sooner, cheaper, and as a consequence, it will be more affordable".

Mr Turnbull warned the "first thing" he would do with the NBN as minister would be to publish an analysis "of how much it will cost in terms of time and dollars to complete the network under the current strategy".

"I predict people will be very shocked," he said. "I believe the truth will be very ugly. I want everyone to understand what this Labor government has done."

Significantly, Mr Turnbull said he believed he could get "the NBN sorted out and on the right track between 12 and 24 months."

The unspoken implication is he may be ready for another job before the end of Mr Abbott's first term. Mr Turnbull said Labor had made Mr Rudd a presidential figure in his 2007 election victory.

"We have a different culture in our party," he said.

"We have to present ourselves, very much, as a team."