Concetta Fierravanti-Wells calls for LNP to split to counter One Nation

Senator Fierravanti-Wells said the LNP was bleeding votes to One Nation and voiced concern about Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives.

Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells.

NSW Liberal frontbencher Concetta Fierravanti-Wells has called on the LNP to “split” after outgoing senator and former attorney-general George Brandis said the 2008 merger was helping far-right parties.

The intervention from Senator Fierravanti-Wells — who also warned that some traditional Liberal supporters were concerned the party was moving too far to the left — was swiftly condemned by some of her Queensland colleagues.

Queensland senator and a former deputy director of the Liberal Party, James McGrath, said “any suggestion of a demerger is batshit crazy”.

“I don’t comment on NSW Liberal issues and I would politely ask Connie to exercise the same with respect to the Queensland LNP,” he said.

LNP MP Scott Buchholz, who holds the seat of Wright, south of Brisbane, said the LNP merger had been successful in driving membership and boosting funds. He said returning to separate Liberal and National parties would not solve any problems.

“If you’ve lost your last 10 games of football and you’ve lost them because during the week the players are eating KFC and the coach is rolling up to the game pissed, can I suggest there is a certain inevitability about what the 11th game outcome looks like,” he said. “Changing the colour of your jersey is not going to make a skerrick of difference.”

Maverick LNP MP George Christensen said he supported the LNP merger because it spelt the end of three-cornered contests in state elections but argued there were “challenges around the image of the LNP in the bush, principally because the L-word is seen as city-centric”.

Speaking on Sky News, Senator Fierravanti-Wells argued the LNP was bleeding votes to One Nation and voiced concern about the impact of Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives movement. “I think it’s important that the LNP do now split and leave it to the National Party to work more assiduously on the more conservative end of the spectrum and leave it to the Liberal Party to work the more moderate end of the spectrum.”