Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has promised a bold economic agenda to shift the conversation in his battle with One Nation, as he mulls a major tax announcement in his budget-in-reply speech on Thursday.
In a closed-door pep talk to disappointed Coalition staffers two days after a byelection thrashing, the under-pressure leader asked for unity and discipline at a perilous moment for the party.
“It will be a positive economic agenda that we’ll be campaigning on at the next election,” one party source said of Taylor’s pitch, describing the speech as a “bit of a rah, rah”.
Liberal MPs believed the party would poll in the high teens rather than the 12.3 per cent primary vote the party secured. The Nationals were polling in the low single digits about the time Matt Canavan took the leadership from David Littleproud, but the party won nearly 10 per cent of first-preference votes.
Another source noted that Taylor could hold fire on new pledges this week if his office decided to focus on Labor breaking promises on tax rather than offering alternatives. Some in the party are pushing for a policy to drastically cut company tax for smaller firms to draw the nation’s army of small businesses into a campaign for the opposition.
Others want Taylor to address Australia’s high rates of income tax, or push states to wean off stamp duty with GST reform. Taylor will reveal in his budget response new details of his hardline immigration policy to tie home-building to migration, but MPs are keen on new policies outside the immigration terrain dominated by Pauline Hanson.
Housing spokesman Andrew Bragg was blunt in his analysis of the opposition’s policy failings. He said the party “deserved to be” in its position, had done “no serious policy work for about a decade” since Scott Morrison’s personal income tax cuts, and suggested Tony Abbott’s likely installation as party president would hurt the Coalition with younger voters.
“If we don’t get going on policy formulation, we’re going to be dead,” he said.
Both Coalition parties, which had held the regional seat of Farrer since its creation 77 years ago, were smashed at the polls on Saturday by One Nation, when candidate David Farley won 39 per cent of the primary vote.
Liberal MPs have baulked at the prospect of joining forces with One Nation after the minor party’s landslide byelection win, as Labor heaps pressure on the opposition by suggesting it will be forced to unite with Hanson’s party.
Barnaby Joyce declared on Monday he did not want One Nation to join the Coalition, but said the opposition would have “no option” but to cooperate with the minor party if it kept surging.
“We don’t want your ministries. Keep your ministries and your salaries. We are not going to be constricted by cabinet solidarity,” Joyce told Nine’s Today show.
The former deputy prime minister and ex-Nationals leader said his party would “go for government” after a One Nation MP was elected to the House of Representatives for the first time. But Joyce said he was also a realist.
“We’ll offer supply and confidence on policy outcomes [to the opposition]. That is not a coalition.”
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson agreed on Monday that this would be the best approach.
“If they have more numbers than me, they can form a government with my numbers. I’m quite happy to do that,” Hanson said.
“I don’t want the ministerial position because I’m not going to be the tail on the dog, just wagging, and nothing happens. Because they’ve done that for the National Party. That’s why the National Party haven’t been able to really represent the rural and regional areas of state to the best of their ability.”
Senior members of the shadow cabinet gave dead bat answers on Sunday when asked whether they would join forces with One Nation, seeking to avoid an internal dispute on to handle One Nation.
Asked about previous comments on the prospect of a deal, which were interpreted in some quarters as opening the door to a right-wing coalition, Wilson made clear he had “no interest” in the idea.
“I have never, ever, ever, and never, ever, ever, will make such a statement in favour of such an alignment,” he told reporters in Canberra.
Labor sharpened its attacks against its conservative opponents on Monday, slamming One Nation’s voting record on cost-of-living measures.
“If [Barnaby Joyce] tries to campaign and win in Western Sydney, we will be there to remind Western Sydney residents that One Nation has voted against every single bit of cost-of-living relief we’ve provided,” Environment Minister Murray Watt said.
The prime minister said the Liberal and Nationals parties had made a “big mistake legitimising One Nation”.
“In adopting many of their policies, being a lighter version of them, and then following that up by giving them preferences [in the Farrer byelection], they were saying, effectively, that it was OK to vote for One Nation rather than the traditional conservative party,” Anthony Albanese told Radio National.
Labor did not run a candidate in the Farrer byelection.
Go deeper on One Nation’s huge win
- Rob Harris in Farrer: It took Pauline Hanson 30 years, and she’s only just getting started
- James Massola’s analysis: This is no ordinary victory — it’s a political earthquake
- History made: This seat has been held by the Coalition for all of its 77 years. Not anymore
- Full results: Every polling booth, every candidate across Farrer
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Brittany Buschis a federal politics reporter for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald.Connect viaemail.
Paul Sakkalis Chief Political Correspondent. He previously covered Victorian politics and won a Walkley award and the 2025 Press Gallery Journalist of the Year. Contact him securely on Signal @paulsakkal.14.Connect viaXoremail.
