In a typically spirited performance, Malcolm Turnbull tonight declared he is committed to addressing climate change and dared his party opponents to blast him out of the leadership.
Turnbull was confident, even aggressive, in his determination to stare down his critics, whose ranks have dramatically swelled this evening to include Tony Abbott and several junior frontbenchers. He declared that he was in politics to make a difference and climate change was a key issue for this and subsequent generations.
He also indicated that Nick Minchin and Eric Abetz have resigned but indicated they will continue in their Senate leadership positions until the Senate completes its current session. Critically, Turnbull indicated Minchin had agreed to implement this week’s partyroom decision to back a CPRS deal with the Government, although Minchin may back a move to defer passage of the CPRS bills until next week
There is now a race against time for the Government to pass its CPRS before Malcolm Turnbull is brought down by his internal enemies, with Anthony Albanese indicating this evening that the Government had agreed a deal with Turnbull and the Liberals to pass the CPRS by 3.45pm Friday. That timetable, however, looks unlikely to be met.
The crisis, which surely has destroyed Turnbull’s leadership if not tonight then over the next few days, brought out the best in him. He delivered a rousing address to the press conference expressing his determination to ensure that the Coalition did not enter an election opposing action on climate change.
The contrast with a hesitant Tony Abbott, who at his afternoon press conference refused to even state that he would stand against Turnbull or that today’s events were about the Liberal leadership, was stark.
Nevertheless, sheer bravado will no longer be enough to save Turnbull. A small number of moderate supporters joined Turnbull in the partyroom for the press conference, compared to the large number who crammed in on Tuesday night to cheer him on when he declared victory in the partyroom debate.
At one stage while speaking, Turnbull complained his lectern was falling apart. Party moderates will be desperately hoping it wasn’t symbolic.
41 Comments
How many leaders will the Liberal party have before the next election? How many before the next Liberal PM after John Howard?
Turnbull’s press conference performance was impressive and indicated his personal resilience. He showed that, despite all the weaknesses of style and temperament, he was the best person to rescue and modernise the Liberal Party and save it from troglodytic irrelevance.
The focus by individuals within the L&NP on the ETS has delivered climate change, as the focus for the coming election. The fact that the coalition has imploded due to preasure from the deniers shows how impressive Rudd is politically. Last weeks attack on Bolt et al, got under the skin of the deniers. Those members of the public opposed to the ETS were able have an impact on Coalition internal politics and amazingly cause members of the opposition not only to blink but to knife each other for all to see.
Yes an impressive performance but to late. The 2010 election is now a referendum on climate change. The upcoming bi-elections will be interesting too
Malcolm went into this with a “back me or sack me” attitude, and to bastardize an expression from Thatcher, the bull is not for turning.
Speaking of by-elections, the question is how long would Turnbull sit on a back bench before quitting politics altogether?
Turnball won my respect tonight!
I think he’s in the wrong party, I’m wishing he’d do a deal with Rudd, move over to the ALP, and take a few others with him. Then the Liberals can be left to Abbott & the loony sceptics!
Turnbull’s best bet may be to survive until the ETS is voted through, and then be dumped.
Whoever leads the Coalition to the next election will be decimated. Turnbull may be able to emerge leader of a much smaller Opposition after next years election, and remake the party. There will be even fewer Nats by then, so little point of forming a Coalition.
A progressive Liberal Party may have a hope in 2013. An Abbott Liberal Party (false advertising if ever I heard it) does not. By the way, where is David Oldfield now?
Turnbull reminds me of Whitlam at the moment: crash through or crash.
It’s extraordinary how much the unrepresentative, undemocratic Senate dominates our national political crises.
The core issue here is Kevin Rudd and Penny Wong trying to push through a behemoth of a piece of legislation, incurring untold economic and workforce losses on the Australian public without giving the Senate an appropriate amount of time to fully investigate all of the issues. All Rudd and Wong are interested is in having a climate change “Excalibur” to take with them to Copenhagen proclaiming themselves as the saviour with the solution to the planet’s global warming needs.
Unfortuately, Malcolm decided to back this power grab from the ALP instead of giving due process and scrutiny the chance to assess this horrible piece of legislation. There is no doubt that an ETS of some description has validity and would be useful to help reduce dependence on carbon and make the developed world more sustainable in the process.
Malcolm could have supported an ETS and been proactive in campaigning for action on climate change but not made the mistake of supporting the ALP so strongly and swiftly as he did.
The CPRS will not have anything close to an impact or effect on the true environmental problem we face. The ALP want a 5-15% reduction. The Greens want 40%. That level of reduction is starting to have an impact. What’s more, the cost to business will be astronomical even with the concessions made for them and the compensation given. All this will do is increase the cost burden on everyday Australians with no real impact on climate change.
I have to admit that my respect for Turnbull has risen considerably in light of recent events. The amended ETS is a failure in my book, and I’d personally prefer it didn’t pass, but I admire Turnbull’s temerity in sticking to his guns and pushing it through with every resource at his disposal.
This is most likely his final act as opposition leader, if not his final political act. I can’t see him moving gracefully to the back benches if Abbott gets the numbers, and it seems highly improbable he’d be offered, or accept, a shadow cabinet appointment under that slimy wingnut. I can’t help but feel it could be the last moment of relevance for the coalition. I wish I felt better about that than I do.
He wants two things that are totally incompatible. Regardless of the ETS issue, Turnbull wants to act unilaterally,-and he wants to remain leader.
It won’t happen. He cannot have both.
He’ll be toppled, and Abbott will take over. Great!!!
That should leave them in opposition for a good wee whiley!
I think Malcomes done the party a huge favour- By not folding to the skeptics and allowing the ETS bill to pass he has prevented a the possible double disolution which would have done significantly more damage than the current mess. With the full senate election the minor parties would have a far greater opportunity to pick up extra seats than at a regular election, as support erodes from the two majors while they slide away from their traditional base. The greens stand to gain from disaffected ‘young left’ and environmentally conscience, both young and old, who feel Labour has abandoned the fervor of that long ago campaigne. While the National party, with the rock-star Senator Joyce, the champion of climate change skeptics, will pick up those who see the scheme as waste of time and more imoportantly, economic advantage. Oil, gas and coal dominate the Australian economy and are responsable carrying use through the recession, more importantly, these industries are in areas of Australia that have a long Nationals-voting tradition. The support of these industies will carry the Nationals to greater prominance the way the sheep once carried the rest of Australia on its back.
Is it possible we are witnessing the break-up of the Liberal party? The level of hatred and vitriol that’s being expressed so publicly suggests that this is possible.
…and for all you Queenslanders…where does this leave the LNP?
I’ve said before that when Turnbull entered politics he found himself a stranger in a strange land. It’s been my feeling since he became Opposition leader, and we saw the real Malcolm emerge, that he’s a fish out of water looking for an honorable way to exit the situation and swim away.
Nailing his colours to the ETS mast and essentially daring his detractors to sack him, allows him to hoist himself with his own petard and land outside of Canberra with the public remembering him as the “good guy” who was assassinated by the climate skeptics.
If that’s not his strategy, then it ought to be.
The ocean is calling, Malcolm.
Stole his seat in parliament from another member of his party, why should this vestige of the old Liberal “born to rule” crowd get any cooperation from his colleagues, or any sympathy from the rest of us?
This may not be the end of Turnbull…rather the beginning. The last few days have shown how scary the Liberal Party really is. I have been a Liberal supporter for a long time…yes, even voted for JWH last time, and even shook hands with him during a chance encounter in Sydney. Nevertheless, the way the primitives in the Liberal Party have carried-on (their rhetoric reminds me of Pauline Hanson), has opened my eyes. We need a third-force in politics – forget the monarchist dinasours like Tuckey, Minchin, Abbott (and the latter is a Rhodes Scolar???) – and also the loony left who always want to make us feel miserable (so aptly played during the recent Wharf Review). I know a lot of Labor people (friends and clients) who really respect Turnbull and see his talent. It’s a pity that the aristocracy on Sydney’s North Shore don’t. Malcolm – please stay – you have a lot to offer us, and you will make a fine first President of the Federal Republic of Australia.
Even if he chooses to hunker down and fight, and wins a challenge from Abbott, I don’t think Turnbull can survive over the short to medium term with so many enemies now publicly berating his leadership style. The Libs want blood over this so he’d be continually under criticism and challenge, and every challenge results in a chink in the armor until a fatal blow is struck.
The Libs have painted themselves into a corner now and are damned electorally if they do or they don’t.
Gotta agree with Gibbot that Turnbull’s shown some steel over a principle in staring down the troglodytes in his fractious party. And likewise, this legislation is no one’s ideal. But just look at the political landscape and try to imagine what type of machine could have possibly traversed it and not fallen off a cliff, got bogged in the marshes, or swept away by the reactionary currents? It’s not the mechanism we ideally wanted, but it’s the only one that could have managed to get across the impasses.
Sad, but true.
It’s funny how some liberals rang John Howard for advice when all this man has done has left them a legacy of weakness. Where is the selfless teamwork, the strong policies, the depth of commitment to what they do, to their party and to each other. I would imagine it was never there and the whole thing was run on the cult of personalty and political cunning.
Ironically leadership wasn’t John Howards strong point but I don’t think anyone noticed.
The house of cards has fallen down.
The core issue here is Kevin Rudd and Penny Wong trying to push through a behemoth of a piece of legislation, incurring untold economic and workforce losses on the Australian public without giving the Senate an appropriate amount of time to fully investigate all of the issues.
Arsebiscuits. This is the second time the legislation has been in the senate, and each amendment has been agreed with the Libs.
This ‘ideological war’ being played out is a clear sign the Liberal Party still carries with it the ghost of Howard’s policies past.
Why people bother to listen to ‘irrelevant’ politicians like Bronwyn Bishop, Nick Minchin and Wilson Tuckey is beyond me. As for Abbott, could readers please inform me what position is he supporting today?
If Turnbull is removed, the next leader, without modernising the Liberal Party, will hand the Party another major electoral defeat as most Australian’s what action on climate change. Turnbull clearly has political short comings, but that’s what makes him a perfect ‘change agent’, in that he’s not an institutionalised member of the Party.
If retained, Turnbull with the support of the Executive, need to actively manage succession planning and generational change of some MPs that are not contributing to the future of Australia, the Liberal party or the global environment.
Never before have so many owed so much to so few. No, I’m not talking about the Battle of Britain when a country faced an evil existential threat although the situation is eerily similar. What I am eluding to is the very small number of people who have stuck to their philosophical guns for the past seven years. These people who after researching all the science diligently over many thousands of hours and spending thousands of dollars of their own money, have always maintained that “Man-Made Climate Change” is a myth. They have been vilified, abused and marginalised.
I am used to encountering people who are unaware that they are unaware. But perhaps in an enlightened country we should defer to greater wisdom and higher authority for our own good.
Whoever leads the Liberal Party must take a stand. As a wise sage once said…”If you don’t stand for something you will fall for anything !”
P.S. In a series of photos from the early 1930’s in Stalinist Russia, the peasants are shown being led to the gallows. Their faces and demeanour show resignation, sadness and apathy. They have been broken and have given up. They are automatons who accept the hangman’s noose and submit to their fate. Mass suicide by brainwashed consent.
“Australians are not brainwashed and browbeaten ! How dare you say that !”
We will see what unfolds…
AdamNeira, you forgot to mention Hitler!
Remember, you only get points for mentioning Hitler whenever you don’t have anything intelligent to say, but would like scare some semi-literates into thinking that fascism is just around the corner.
“but would like scare “…
???
Me-looki-long-time at your post. No makee sense…
Do you speak Pidgin ?
This is real high drama – all us poli-tragics are thoroughly enjoying it.
If Turnbull does get rolled, will he stick around to play or will he pack his ball and go home. He could cross the floor and join the ALP in government. hehe
And when is the Higgins and Bradfield by-elections? How is this going to play out for them?
“…They are automatons who accept the hangman’s noose and submit to their fate…”
And it looks like “Christopher Dunne” is leading from the front.
How hilarious that one could laud Turnbull for his principles yet in the same breath openly mock and disparage someone else who is prepared to stand by theirs.
Has your obvious confusion been influenced and excaerbated by your gullibility on climate?
Joni, Can’t say I’m enjoying it. It’s like being in Category 5 cyclone. Exhilarating at times but basically very scary as you wonder at Nature’s power. At least with a cyclone you know that it’s going away soon. Can’t say that about the flat-earthers of the Coalition.
Turnball has inherited Howard’s party and is paying a reasonable price for it. I guarantee if he crashes through or crashes* he is going to be up there as one of the names that brought the conservatives into the 22nd century (albeit spectacularly coughing and spluttering).
Any leader that follows him will be tempered by this episode big time. I personally think he will survive, a trenchant desire to lead and strong views are what the liberals need, though they don’t realise it. CPRS is only one policy alignment they have to deal with, they’ve still got to eek out an effective niche against labour which has become increasingly the middle ground to right of politics. This is political evolution in progress here folks. Liberals 2.0.
* thanks Bullmore’s Ghost for that one
MPM you wouldn’t know a principle if it fell on you.
I admire Malcolm Turnbull for sticking to his principles, but sadly that won’t be enough to hold on to the leadership. Kevin Rudd gave plumb jobs to Brendan Nelson and Peter Costello. I am sure he’d be happy to find something for Malcolm Turnbull too.
The fact is, the world has changed. Turnbull is acknowledging that shift, but unfortunately, many from his party are not.
It’s certainly admirable for Abbott to stand by his party principles, but when those principles conflict with all humanity—the very future of human beings—it’s simply time to reexamine those principles. We cannot continue to put our short-term comfort ahead of our long-term survival.
Turnbull has recognised this and will be rewarded in the polls, regardless of the internal party politics.
I’d vote for third party led by Turnbull. I don’t think he’d win (m)any seats but he’d definitely have my vote.
I think Turnbull lost it with Godwin Grech, and has gained it back with the ETS.
The policy is a dog, and the Liberal Party is a dog’s breakfast. But Turnbull is in there swinging and I think it’s a hell of sight.
Without knowing the mechanics/mistakes that were made, I see a leader with his back against the wall who rallied and made a final charge.
I hope we haven’t seen the last of him in Australian politics.
The CRPS not only does far too little far too late, it costs the people of Australia billions, and it locks us into having to `compensate’ the polluters even more if one day we decide to make the real cuts which are necessary.
The Liberals who support the CPRS are NOT thinking of future generations and taking action on climate change, they are just supporting Labor’s spin and locking us in to failure.
And the Liberal amendments just ensure that we do less but that it costs more to do so.
The one thing that ALL the Liberal and Labor politicians have in common is that to them climate change is just a political issue, and their prime concern is keeping the polluters happy.
We are pretty much stuffed when the vast majority of the population have been taken in by the spin – either the spin that climate change is not a threat, or the spin that the CRPTS is part of the solution.
What load of hogwash – all of this newly discovered respect for Turnbull!!
He’s just trying to scrape out anything he can to pretend that he’s the hero of the day, from the barrel he built for himself!! He negotiated with his Party and they all made it quite clear that all they agreed to was for there to be “negotiation – and that’s all”. Then he went on to proclaim, time and again, that the Libs were negotiating “in good faith”, when everyone (including the Government) must have known that he had pushed as far as he could, and managed only to achieve agreement for “negotiation”, but not a vote for CPRS!
He thought he could pull it off and the Government, who did negotiate “in good faith” made a deal on that basis. So he’s not only bungled it’s passage in his own Party, but in the Senate too! To suggest that he’s standing by his principles and sticking to his commitments is way off the mark. His ambition led him to take the risk of taking a position within his Party and it seems to have been the wrong one.
Of course, Senators Wong and Evans still have every right to go ahead and accuse the Libs of welsching out of the deal. Irrespective of what Turnball got agreement for, the other Libs played along anyway, and were today even making out they they were the ones who wanted to “get on” with the vote, while Penny Wong was “fillibustering”!!!
So, now it seems that Hockey is the front runner for a challenge and today it’s reported he’s been twittering his mates soliciting opinions on ETS/CPRS.
Good grief! This from a front bencher and supposed supporter of Turnbull.
Is there no end to the duplicity of politicians?
I’d long ago formed the opinion that good ol’ Joe is a vacuous twit. The Liberal party deserves the leaders it gets.
I doubt very much that Hockey will stand against Turnbull. He will only stand if Turnbull steps down, which will happen once the hogs get airborn. It will be Turnbull vs Abbot and my moneys on Turnbull, although Tuesday is eons away given have fast things have moved over the last few days.
So how does that work?
Abbott vs Turnbull: result for Turnbull.
Jolly Joe vs Turnbull?
… or …
Abbott vs Turnbull: result for Abbott.
Party pressure on Abbott to resign. He hands over the reins to Jolly Joe?
^ Between those leadership polls I had some comments within angle brackets, but they were removed when I posted, so evidently don’t use “” for comments. So here is take two:
So how does that work?
Abbott vs Turnbull: result for Turnbull.
Party pressure on Turnbull to resign. He doesn’t. Yet another leadership challenge is launched.
Jolly Joe vs Turnbull?
… or …
Abbott vs Turnbull: result for Abbott.
Libs are decimated at next Fed election.
Party pressure on Abbott to resign. He hands over the reins to Jolly Joe?
Don’t completely give up on Abbott. He can compromise – if it wasn’t for him stepping in and removing a very stupid health policy every doctor in the country would be voting Labour.
Then again there did have to be a law specificly passed later to tell him the stop putting on the fake morality he never exhibited anywhere else and get off his arse and do his job.
The result of the visit to JWH by Hockey shows who’s pulling some of the strings.
The scenarios put up by Kerry’s ghost are all a serious possibility.
Two things that have amazed ne over the past two weeks, McFarlane, one time resources Minister close to business said on 4corners he’s convinced that GW is a reality & sitting here listening to ‘Inside business’ Alan is saying an international ETS will happen and Origin Energy are saying it won’t be bad for them.
I think Hockey will take the advice of Howard whatever it was, I think the advice was, do not to run yet, and that the last three lines Of Bullmore’s post will play out of the next decade
will play read it the way