Right club
Pauline Hanson’s One Nation is on the rise, rattling a hollowed-out Coalition as it braces for another rupture — this time from the right.
John Howard’s 11-year stint in the Lodge was driven by his ability to keep the Coalition’s “broad church”, both moderates and conservatives, singing from the same hymn sheet.
Two decades on, the moderates have been wiped out. The teal wave crashed through inner-city Liberal heartland in 2022, followed three years later by a Labor sweep that evicted them from cities across the country.
Rather than reviving the broad church, Opposition Leader Sussan Ley is now forced to consolidate a party room that is proportionately more conservative and more regional.
Even among those still standing, there are fears of a third rupture: an exodus from the Coalition’s right flank. And there’s good reason. Polling conducted by DemosAU, provided exclusively to Capital Brief, provides MPs with grim reading.
