Hastie pulls out but Liberal leadership battle remains in flux

The battle over the Liberal leadership took a dramatic turn late on Friday when Andrew Hastie announced he was pulling out.

His surprise announcement came just a day after a meeting between Hastie and the other aspirant – defence spokesman Angus Taylor – over who should challenge Sussan Ley, ended in stalemate.

Hastie’s action has brought more clarity to the path ahead. At the same time, it has also left it uncertain, at least in the short term.

Will Taylor, who now has a clear run as conservative candidate, move quickly to bring on a spill? Or will he delay? He’s recently been against an early move but now Hastie is out of the way, his thinking may change.

And it will obviously also be a matter of whether he is confident of his numbers. It may be that even some of the conservatives in the party will believe Ley should be given more time.

Taylor ran Ley close after the election. Her failure to cut through has cost her support since then. On the other hand, some Liberals not tied in tightly to either camp may be unimpressed by the recent disrespectful treatment of her by the jostling aspirants. The numbers could be fluid just now.

Party sources did not have a firm take, after the Hastie announcement, on whether things would move quickly, or whether the embattled leader might get a reprieve.

Much could depend on the reactions coming from members of the parliamentary party – already reeling from the fast moving crisis – over the weekend, ahead of the resumption of parliament on Tuesday.

There is a regular Liberal Party meeting on Tuesday. That would be an unfortunate day for a spill if there was an interest rate rise.

Hastie’s retreat follows Thursday’s debacle, when the two aspirants and their conservative factional backers were captured on camera arriving for their Melbourne meeting. It was the worst of looks – a gaggle of men, not a woman to be seen, plotting to overthrow a female leader, before they went on to a memorial for a female former Liberal MP, Katie Allen.

Leadership struggles are always messy but the optics of this one are worse than most.

Sometime after the meeting, Hastie decided he didn’t have the numbers. It is unfortunate he hadn’t been able to come to this conclusion before the Thursday scenes.

He’d been pushed by a group of supporters, and set things up for a challenge, including with a newspaper story saying his wife was OK with him becoming leader (which would take him away a lot from his young family). He overreached – a comment on his poor judgement.

He said in his statement: “Over the past few weeks there has been speculation about the future leadership of the Liberal Party.

"I’ve previously stated that I would welcome the opportunity to serve my party and our country as leader of the Liberal Party.

"But having consulted with colleagues over the past week, and respecting their honest feedback to me, it is clear that I do not have the support needed to become leader of the Liberal Party.

"On this basis, I wish to make it clear I will not be contesting the leadership of the Liberal Party.

"Australia faces massive issues. I have made it my single focus to campaign on critical issues including immigration and energy, and I have no intention of stopping that.”

A cynic might read this as saying while he won’t be running for leader he will continue to make trouble.

Apart from immediate party sentiment, what happens now will be affected by the opinion polls that will come this weekend. One would have to think they would be bad for Ley.

If there were an early ballot and Taylor won, he would come to the leadership when the government is vulnerable on the economy. This week’s inflation numbers were bad. Even if there were not an interest rate rise next week, one would be on the horizon.

Taylor’s natural ground is economics, so that could give him a good start although, it should be noted, he had trouble as shadow treasurer performing against Jim Chalmers last term.

If the conservatives decide not to move quickly against Ley, that buys her extra time, but it is doubtful she would be able to put it to long-term use. Apart from the pressure from the polls, the Taylor forces and the media would ensure she was always living on borrowed time.

But the nature of Ley is that even under the worst of political circumstances she holds her nerve, trying to keep the wolves at bay, one day after another.

The “wolves” of course are not just in the Liberal ranks. Ley is also trying to deal with the Nationals, who shattered the Coalition last week. She would like to put the team together again, without giving ground over the issue of shadow cabinet solidarity that triggered the breach.

On Friday she allocated to Liberal shadow ministers the portfolio responsibilities given up by the Nationals when they split.

This is only a temporary arrangement, she said. It gives a window for a Nationals rethink. Once things are set in stone, it would be harder to bring the Coalition back together – which some Liberals and some Nationals want to do and others, in both parties, don’t want to happen.

If there is no move for reconciliation, Ley says she will announce a new full shadow ministry in a week, elevating Liberal backbenchers to permanently fill vacancies.

That’s of course assuming she is there in a week.