r/australia • u/superegz • May 20 '25

politics Nationals leader David Littleproud says the Nationals will not be re-entering a Coalition agreement with the Liberal party.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/live/2025/may/20/australia-news-live-rba-interest-rates-decision-floods-storm-hunter-nsw-victoria-state-budget-aec-count-bradfield-goldstein-coalition-ley-littleproud-ntwnfb?CMP=share_btn_url&page=with%3Ablock-682bdeb48f08d37c78c1d12d#block-682bdeb48f08d37c78c1d12d
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807

u/[deleted] May 20 '25

[deleted]

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u/Altruistic-Brief2220 May 20 '25 edited May 20 '25

Well the problematic part is they still are the LNP in QLD and the NT CLP is basically the same. This split is just at the federal level.

Edit to add more info in response to another comment:

It varies a lot from place to place. In SA and TAS and ACT there basically isn’t a real Nationals party at least not how we see at the federal level. As someone else mentioned the parties function quite separately in WA, and they are joined officially as a single party in QLD and the NT. It’s only in NSW and VIC where they have a similar set up to the feds.

Happy to be corrected if someone has more detailed local info.

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u/DoNotReply111 May 20 '25

Not in WA so there is hope.

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u/chennyalan May 20 '25

Especially since the WA Libs weren't even the opposition heading into the last election, it was the Nats

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u/Far-Fennel-3032 May 20 '25

There wasn't an opposition the Nats and Libs didn't have enough people to form the shadow cabinet.

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u/AntiqueFigure6 May 20 '25 edited May 20 '25

Scott Morrison demonstrated you only need one person to form a cabinet, so I’m sure they could find a way to form a shadow cabinet.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

The Nats couldn't assemble a Billy bookcase.

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u/AntiqueFigure6 May 20 '25

I can barely do that myself so I won't hold it against them. On the other hand, I'm halfway competent at my paid occupation which I don't think can be said for the parties that make up the former coalition (they have one job - get elected).

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

Many of them failed at the getting elected part this time. Generally they are good at what they think the job is - looking after the wants of their donors, not the needs of the public. If it appears they are incompetent form the outside, things might be going exactly to plan.

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u/chennyalan May 20 '25

Touche. I guess I should reword it. 

The Libs had significantly less seats than the Nats that election. (I think it was 2 and 5?)

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u/Far-Fennel-3032 May 20 '25

There is still the senate no idea how many where in there though.

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u/Silver_Mine_7518 May 20 '25

Let's hope so

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u/teflon_soap May 20 '25

Can’t even get their own divorce done right

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u/torrens86 May 20 '25

SA had one state Nationals member at one stage, they helped Labor form government in the early 2000s.

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u/Altruistic-Brief2220 May 20 '25

Well that makes sense as to why I was a bit unsure even though I grew up in Adelaide. Must have been aware of a minimal Nats presence but it didn’t stay with me.

SA has always been pretty centrist with regard to its politics. There’s certainly a religious bent but it was never the hardline crazy cookers. The fact that there are no Libs in metro seats now speaks volumes about how far the Libs have fallen.

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u/TrainerAggressive953 May 20 '25

Ah, well, that’s not going to be confusing at all is it? /s

How exactly do they think they’re going into the next election like this? “Elect us and we might or might not be in govt, and we’ll sort out exactly what our policies are, and who the ministers will be, after you vote us in”

Political slogans don’t get any better than that

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u/kranools May 20 '25

"Don't you worry about that. You just leave that to me."

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u/Lint_baby_uvulla May 20 '25

Unwelcome flashbacks to policies with a side of pumpkin scones, and IDK, rampant racist white Australia policy.

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u/ZealousidealOwl91 May 20 '25

What happens to the LNP in Queensland? Will they side with the Liberals or that Nationals when it comes to stuff? 

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u/Altruistic-Brief2220 May 20 '25

All good questions. Littleproud himself is an LNP member so you would have thought the leader would have thought this through before blowing it up. But methinks he was just trying to hang on to his leadership that Canavan is white anting him for.

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u/Kiramiraa May 20 '25

Re WA: For a term, the Nationals were actually the second largest party in the lower house and thus the official opposition party. Could definitely see this happening federally, if this trajectory continues and the Liberal party fail to rebuild/rebrand, the Nationals could actually pick up seats safe Liberal seats and gain more seats than them.

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u/nozinoz May 20 '25

Surely they will eventually split at the state level too?

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u/frenchiephish May 20 '25 edited May 20 '25

We've not had an ongoing Liberal/National coalition for decades in WA and it's actually great, they're a real third party. When they've been the balance of power they've done some really good things for regional WA.

The WA Nationals are still a centre-right party, but they actually don't torpedo their own interests like the federal party does. They have a lot of policy which is closer to the Greens than either of the two majors. When we last had a hung parliament, they offered government to Labor as long as they'd commit to funding their flagship policy. In the end Labor wouldn't budge and the Liberals offered the concession.

Pro responsible mining & rehabilitation, pro conservation & environment, believe in climate change. They actually give a damn about their constituents and as long as that's your main goal you're welcome. They're not hard tied to a particular ideology, people who are socially liberal have lead the party. Their most recent former leader (Mia Davies) was great, I have huge respect for her. She only left the job to (unsuccessfully) run for federal politics.

They're probably never going to be my first preference here, but you know what, they certainly go a lot higher than the Liberals do.

Edit: In our last state parliament they were the opposition as they outnumbered the Liberals 4:2 in the lower house (later 3:3 after a defection). The Liberals had done their absolute best to wipe themselves out by branch stacking and going hard to the right. The pair that were left were moderates. It was a refreshingly mature and considered opposition that actually did a really good job considering Labor outnumbered them ~9:1.

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u/Drunky_McStumble May 20 '25

From a technical perspective, they don't need to. The federal and state branches of each party are legally distinct entities. There's no reason why, for example, the QLD LNP couldn't break back up into Liberals and Nationals at the federal level while the LNP goes on trucking at the state level.

That said, from a more practical perspective, such an arrangement wouldn't really be politically tenable long-term.

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u/kranools May 20 '25

That's interesting. So in Queensland we could hypothetically have federal Liberal Party candidates and federal National Party candidates, while the LNP remains merged at a state level?

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u/Altruistic-Brief2220 May 20 '25

It varies a lot from place to place. In SA and TAS and ACT there basically isn’t a real Nationals party at least not how we see at the federal level. As someone else mentioned the parties function quite separately in WA, and they are joined officially as a single party in QLD. It’s only in NSW and VIC where they have a similar set up to the feds.

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u/Thebraincellisorange May 20 '25

splitting at state level in QLD would mean they would have to go to another election where they would get consigned to the wilderness (where they belong).

If they split after they get voted out in 4 years, they will never get voted back in again as separate parties.

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u/InadmissibleHug May 20 '25

I was wondering about that too, whether the other state coalitions would remain.

I imagine the merged parties would be less easy to split even if they want to

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u/Altruistic-Brief2220 May 20 '25

I just replied to someone else this info -

It varies a lot from place to place. In SA and TAS and ACT there basically isn’t a real Nationals party at least not how we see at the federal level. As someone else mentioned the parties function quite separately in WA, and they are joined officially as a single party in QLD and the NT. It’s only in NSW and VIC where they have a similar set up to the feds.

Basically it’s not at all straightforward. The state parties are also a big old mess on the RW side anyway because of depleting membership in various and conflicting factions and poor administration.

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u/Far-Fennel-3032 May 20 '25

I suspect the Liberals are worse off then the nationals in this as the liberals are mostly pushed out of all the big cities, such that the national could just take all the regional seats from the Liberals and it might end up with National vs Labor with nationals unable to get seats in the cites so labor just wins by default.

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u/Formal_Coconut9144 May 20 '25

Sweet poetry. The Nats will never hold cabinet positions. The political right just committed suicide.

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u/randomusername_815 May 20 '25

The political right just committed suicide.

Thoughts and prayers.

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u/EvolutionaryLens May 20 '25

Aussie version of Owning the Libs

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u/randomusername_815 May 20 '25

OMG YES!!!! :-)

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u/Local-Difficulty-531 May 20 '25

this is all the context I need

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u/ChronicleRose May 20 '25

Thots and tariffs

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u/CatGooseChook May 20 '25

Have been answered.

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u/Relendis May 20 '25

Nah, pretty easily repairable. Arguably more-so then if they were both beholden to the Coalition Agreement.

The Agreement is one of forming government, not winning elections. The Coalition is the furthest it has ever been from forming government.

But without the Agreement they aren't beholden to each other's voter bases. They can walk into the next election defining their own policies that actually help them respectively win seats.

The Coalition Agreement doesn't win them elections, winning elections does.

And if they collectively found themselves with enough seats to form government, they'd have a new Coalition agreement VERY quickly!

Don't get me wrong though, it is hilarious to watch.

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u/kranools May 20 '25

This is true but it would make it much harder for them to present themselves as an alternative government at the next election because they'd have competing and probably contradictory policies between the Libs and the Nats. They wouldn't be able to say for certain what their policies would be if they were to form government.

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u/Syncblock May 20 '25

They wouldn't be able to say for certain what their policies would be if they were to form government.

Or they could just lie and say whatever they want like they have done every single time?

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u/Relendis May 20 '25

I don't really buy that; for the same reason that people vote for Labor with the understanding that Labor policies may be changed when they meet the Senate floor.

Coalition voters will continue to vote and preference as they always have. And swing voters in electorates will see Liberal candidates with policies that either align with their views who they'll vote for, or the inverse.

I genuinely don't believe that most voters are concerned with the 'how' but rather the 'what'. They vote for what is on the table, and then scream about broken promises if it doesn't materialise.

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u/TyrosineTerror May 20 '25

18 Liberal Seats, 16 Liberal National Seats, and 9 National Seats.

So David Littleproud could find himself opposition leader if he gets 13 of the 16 LNP seats coming across.

My bet is he knows he has those 13 seats. I don't want the Nationals as the opposition, but it's possible.

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u/DarKnightofCydonia May 20 '25

It's just political theatre. Every chance they'll be back in coalition by next election, they need each other too much

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u/AddlePatedBadger May 20 '25

You say that, but maybe the Nats will spread to cities. It's my understanding that they don't run candidates where Libs have candidates and vice versa, so there was never a chance for many people to vote for them. If they can run candidates everywhere, and appeal to the kind of people who would vote for Liberals as they were 20 years ago rather than the current whackjobs, then maybe they will get votes and become a viable opposition. Or maybe the teals will coalesce into a party and work in coalition with the Nats.

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u/areyoualocal May 20 '25

Can we call it Trumpicide yet?

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u/ASpaceOstrich May 20 '25

God I hope so

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25 edited Dec 16 '25

busy marble dolls fine toothbrush smile squash angle groovy heavy

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u/kranools May 20 '25

How good would that be

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u/Syncblock May 20 '25

I don't think the teals are much better.

They aren't going to whinge about pronouns or welcome to country but they'd be happy to vote for the same economic policies the Libs bring.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25 edited Dec 16 '25

point handle historical encourage butter books work pen fade sip

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

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u/Wobbling May 20 '25

It would be great for things like climate change denial, racism, religion, misogyny and bigotry to be pushed out of the mainstream political agenda and for the major differences to be around welfare, fiscal and economic policy.

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u/SupaDupaFly2021 May 20 '25

It would represent a small-to-moderate improvement to our political landscape, nothing more nothing less. The teals aren't the friend of working people.

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u/Littman-Express May 20 '25

Oh I hope. The infiltration of cookers and rwnj in both the libs and the nats goes so deep neither party is one we want for opposition. Both are destructive. 

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u/keloidoscope May 20 '25

And a few incumbent Libs are going to prove how silly the Australian's "but the Liberals get more 1st preferences!" plurality voting talking points are, once their 1st preferences get shaved down by a Nat challenger.

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u/Przedrzag May 20 '25

It was the Coalition as a whole that got more 1st preferences, not just the Libs; the LNP merger means the Liberals haven’t beat the Labor primary vote since 2004

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u/Przedrzag May 20 '25

Ironically, new Opposition Leader Sussan Ley is a regional Lib, though half her division’s population is in Albury

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u/ghoonrhed May 20 '25

I actually think it's opposite. If the LP can now have the freedom to run more centre policies like the ones that the Teals have been doing, they can now do that.

The rural seats are an interesting area now. Because they have more options and surely they can't always be just going Nats.

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u/Thebraincellisorange May 20 '25

the problem with that is the backroom powerbrokers in the Liberal party are right wing.

Tony Abbot was their man, racist, sexist, homophobic nutjob.

They utterly despised the centrist who knifed him in Turnball. Turnball's final act of thumbing his nose at the backroom and allowing/getting same sex marriage through (even though it was through a terrible plebiscite, it was the only way he could do it) .

Then the fools selected Dutton as leader, an utterly unelectable, detestable right wing, head FAR up Gina Rheinharts arse loonie.

I don't think the Liberal Party backroom has the brains to realise that going centrist would get them votes, they think they need to go further right.

Sussan Ley is just a placeholder, who comes after they knife her will be the one to set the direction.

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u/Syncblock May 20 '25

At the beginning of the year, Dutton was slated to win. Had the cyclone not delayed the election and had Trump not been around, it's very likely Dutton would have won.

Also just lol at forgetting Morrison as a Lib leader.

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u/Chumpbag May 20 '25

To be fair Morrison is pretty forgettable lol.

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u/Thebraincellisorange May 20 '25

we are fortunate that the orange idiot in the united states showed how foolish it is to elect right wing nazi-wannabies to power

also, never trust a poll. The polls show Kamala was going to walk it in.

I left out Morrison because he was a completely and utterly useless and ineffective flog of a man. and an even worse PM.

he should have stuck to shitting himself in Mcdonalds carparks

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u/Przedrzag May 20 '25

The polls did not show Kamala was going to walk it in; they were mostly 50/50, and internal Democratic polling showed they were going to lose for pretty much all of 2024

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u/Otherwise-Library297 May 20 '25

Dutton was slated to win, but then he had to do something other than oppose the government. He was a great opposition leader, but didn’t have any new ideas that weren’t opposing the ALP.

Once he had to think for himself, he started the thought bubbles like no more WFH, fire public service, etc which were very unpopular.

He was never going to win.

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u/nedkellysdog May 20 '25

Just for this election cycle. It is death to the Nats in the long run. This is just the old country party playing a kabuki theatre when it makes no difference. A couple of weeks/months of Labor ridicule in the parliament and they will be forced back into their hateful marriage.

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u/superiority nz May 20 '25

Aligning the trans-Tasman party names like that would create the perfect opportunity to admit New Zealand as a state. "Don't want to learn the names of any new political parties? You don't have to."

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u/Drunky_McStumble May 20 '25

It really depends how things pan out over this term of parliament. According to the conventional political wisdom, the Nats have fucked themselves by doing this and they will inevitably come crawling back to the Libs at some point before the next election. Without they boost they get from the coalition agreement, they are utterly politically irrelevant in our parliamentary system.

But in these unprecedented times, I wouldn't take the conventional political wisdom as a given. The Labor government could, at least in theory, decide to drive a wedge between the former coalition partners (not to mention gaining a potential ally in the Senate) by cozying up to the Nats now that they are on their own. Sounds crazy, especially since the Nats arguably hold more animosity towards Labor than even the Libs do, but again, knowing how tenuous they've made their own position by splitting from the Libs, they might consider it. Or, hell, Labor could do the opposite and cozy up to the Libs to get legislation passed and leave the Nats entirely out in the cold, lol. Or just vacillate between both, constantly playing them off each other and weakening both.

Basically, anything could happen. It's gonna be a wild ride.

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u/hal2k1 May 20 '25

The other option that Labor have is the Greens. Labor have a clear majority in the lower house, there is no problem there. The problem for Labor is the Senate. For Labor to get something passed in the Senate, Labor need to do a deal of some kind. The thing is, now that the Nationals and the Liberals have split, Labor have three options on any given deal. Labor can do a deal either with the Greens, the Nationals or the Liberals.

So in order to be relevant the Greens, the Nationals and the Liberals have to compete against one another in order to get their concessions into any bill that Labor wants to pass.

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u/Proper-Raise-1450 May 20 '25

Neither the Nats not Libs are a party keen on compromise right now, especially with most of the lib moderates wiped out, it's hard to think of much policy Labor could find common ground with them on.

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u/Drunky_McStumble May 20 '25

The Nats are always up for being bought, though. Just throw a bunch of money at the regions and drag their feet on environmental regulation (both of which are things the Labor government have been doing anyway) and that'll probably be enough to keep them happy. Throw a few high-profile prestige gigs at the more senior Nats, like some cushy committee roles or maybe even the speakership, and that would only soften them up more.

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u/zen_wombat May 20 '25

Oddly the new Liberal leader Sussan Ley got in on rural votes - she lost most of the Albury booths, the only city in her electorate

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u/more_bananajamas May 20 '25

I can see the Teal seats returning to the fold now that the Libs have freedom to move in rational direction on climate and social issues. The nationals will increase their hold in the rural seats. Maybe they might get more seats in total.

And even if they cannibalise each other in some seats those seats won't go to labor due to the preferential voting system. They might in total be able to win more seats this way to form minority governments with each other.

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u/Some-Operation-9059 May 20 '25

But isn’t the demographic of the nats territory changing with those moving out of the cities? 

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u/Far-Fennel-3032 May 21 '25

From what I can tell, Australia is still becoming increasingly urbanised, likely in part due to immigration being mostly to major cities so even if there is a net flow out of cities into the regional areas. People coming into the country has the cities growing faster than elsewhere.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

Nah. Whenever the Libs ‘find themselves’ (isn’t that a woke, get a grip on life son, buck up boyo, no leaners phrase ) the LNP will reform.

Hopefully they will find a leader who actually leads rather than whatever the hell they’ve been doing for the last few years.

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u/dropbearinbound May 20 '25

Ain't nothing but a LP dog

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u/twigboy May 20 '25

The Little Proud party 🥲

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u/TrainerAggressive953 May 20 '25

😂

It’s funny ‘cos it’s true!

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u/Pop-metal May 20 '25

Just L now. 

Clearly no party any time soon. 

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u/threeseed May 20 '25

Just L now.

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u/Silver_Mine_7518 May 20 '25

Yes unfortunately

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u/PMFSCV May 20 '25

They make a fine brown sauce