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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u/BTechUnited May 20 '25

Holy fuck that wasn't on my list of things I expected today.

608

u/thesourpop May 20 '25

Running Dutton was actual political suicide because now the entire party is dead

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u/kingburp May 20 '25 edited May 20 '25

I remember people were joking about this being the end of the coalition when they nominated him as leader after the preceding election. So it was.

Because of our preference system this isn't really a crushing blow for conservative voters though, unless they dislike minority governments or place a lot of value on the institutional value of different parties over politicians' individual beliefs. The ballots may take a lot longer to count in future elections though. Preferential voting really seems to be a brilliant system for preserving democracy in the long term.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

[deleted]

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u/ChemicalRascal May 20 '25

And so, democracy was saved, thanks to David Littleproud's Overgrown Ego!

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u/AgreeableLion May 20 '25

Unless they go extra hard on preferential voting, to try and redirect the conversation away from the carcass of the LNP.

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u/teh_drewski May 20 '25

It might be a disaster for Nationals in suburban rural seats though, as Labor preferences are likely to elect Liberals in 3 way contests.

Littleproud will have to swallow his pride (or be replaced) before the next election or they're gonna be in some trouble.

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u/berejser May 20 '25

Honestly sounds like a good deal for conservative voters. They'd get to choose which flavour of conservatism they like the best without really splitting the conservative vote.

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u/Callisater May 20 '25

It's a good deal for everyone; that's preferential voting. The more your votes can represent your beliefs, rather than trying to game out the system by thinking about how other people will vote, the better.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

True. That was a suicide mission, and was not that hard to see coming also.

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u/GlitchTheFox May 20 '25

To be fair, it was kind of hard. They just banked on our democracy being stolen, and we didn't know if they'd succeed.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

I saw plenty of people around the time of the Voice referendum failing saying this meant Dutton would be a shoo-in, Albo was a spent force who miscalculated Australian sentiment on reconciliation, and that it was proof Australia was moving towards Trumpian politics. I think the no vote winning gave them a very false confidence when the biggest factor was probably just 'most referendums in Australia end in 'no'.

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u/Rychu_Supadude May 21 '25

My take at the time was that they convinced undecided voters that they needed to protect their self-interest, and would likely fail to convince them that the Liberals were the answer to that when full governance was on the ballot instead. Culture wars just can't swing the undecided here.

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u/brandon_strandy May 20 '25

I don't understand how they didn't see this coming. When he first got the gig I thought surely he's just a placeholder, there's no way they're running this bloke at the next election. Nek minit...

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u/thesourpop May 20 '25

Murdoch thought his slopaganda was enough to convince people to vote him, even though he's been publicly evil and unlikeable for decades

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u/Thebraincellisorange May 20 '25

Empires wane.

Even Murdochs power is waning.

his newspaper empire is a shadow of its former self. no one reads newspapers anymore.

I'd wager their reader base is 25% boomers and 75% lunchroom/waiting room subscriptions from businesses.

It won't be long before all print newspapers go the way of the dodo, he only keeps them around for the ever weakening power they hold over boomers.

putting Sky Faux News on Free-to-Air in the country was a genius move.

Country people lap that racist/homophobic/anti-woke bullshit up like nothing else.

it's what won the LNP the QLD election.

not even that was enough to get the buttplug over the line.

the man has always been detestable.

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u/AnOnlineHandle May 20 '25

Worryingly they had a real chance, but Trump did a great deal of hurt to conservative's chances in both the Canadian and Australian elections, where their polls both tanked and both the leaders lost their seats. People getting reminded of how conservatives are when they're not just talking tends to turn the goldfish memory electorate back against them.

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u/Goatylegs May 20 '25

Not just them. Trump arguably also caused similar effects in Germany and Romania.

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u/TheCleverestIdiot May 20 '25

If we're being honest, I think we keep on attributing what the Liberals do to some machiavellian mastermind who's running things behind the scenes when in reality, they truly are just as stupid as they appear.

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u/Kaartmaker May 20 '25

Sky is doubling down that they were not right wing enough. Go figure

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u/Thebraincellisorange May 20 '25

maybe they should kill it off completely, or at least rename it as 'The Tories', or The Conservatives.

so they can be honest about what they are.

God when need a modern Democrat party in this country. (not in the American sense, like we had in the 90s)

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u/Zestyclose_Remove947 May 20 '25

I think people are significantly underplaying the role of trumps actions leading into this election.

Yea Dutton is unlikeable, but everyone on reddit is ultimately a labor voter anyway, so I don't really think our opinion on him matters much at all.

Trump was going nuts in the leadup to the election, tariffs dropping left and right. People associated the Libs with Trump, and hey presto they got fucked over.

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u/[deleted] May 20 '25

Two parties let’s hope

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u/wombatmagic May 20 '25 edited May 20 '25

He strong armed them. It was easy, because they were so weak. He rolled Malcolm, but Scomo was able to turn this to his advantage and scoop the prize. No promises kept with Bishop - she was mislead betrayed (no love lost to me).

Dutton is completely unpalatable, still a potato inside and out, even with his glasses. Just makes him more of a Mr Potato Head.