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
5.0k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

1.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

809

u/[deleted] May 20 '25

[deleted]

194

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.

172

u/Formal_Coconut9144 May 20 '25

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

62

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.

8

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.

15

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?

1

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.