Sunday, December 6, 2009

No third party please

The Bradfield and Higgins by elections were good news for the Liberals and Tony Abbott, despite the recent upheavals and being targeted by the government for their anti-ETS stand they won the seats comfortably.  Which hopefully will help kill the formation of another political party:

But with Mr Turnbull biding his time on the backbench, after losing the leadership ballot 42-41, some are also urging him to establish a new "third force" political party, an idea they say he canvassed privately before becoming Opposition leader.

While Mr Turnbull yesterday described any such plans as "science fiction", colleagues say he raised the idea only three years ago with the idea that it would be free-market, pro-republic and committed to fighting climate change.

Those he spoke to say Mr Turnbull saw this as one way of finally getting rid of the conservative Right of the Liberal Party, which eventually pushed him out of the leadership over the climate change issue, installing Mr Abbott in his place.

Former Liberal leader John Hewson publicly backed the idea this week.

Chris Joye, a leading investment banker and former professional colleague of Mr Turnbull's who also worked with him at Goldman Sachs and sat with him on the previous government's Home Ownership Task Force, this week used his blog to promote the new party idea.

That it has the support of  John Hewson should tip anyone off its rubbish. How would a third party work in the Australian system? You would get a few people in the Senate but thats about it. It would be the Australian Democrats all over again. The Liberal Party is the home of both the Conservative and Classical Liberal forces in Australian politics.  It requires both groups to work together and a leader who can unite them. Clearly Malcolm Turnbull was not that man. The party rank and file were up in arms over the ETS. Is Tony Abbott that person? Well, we will see. 

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