The Nationals have split from the Liberals with Australia’s two conservative political parties to stand on their own, rather than in a Coalition.
It marks just the third time the Coalition parties have gone their separate ways in the last 80 years after Peter Dutton led the parties to a landslide loss at the polls earlier this month.
Nationals leader David Littleproud revealed talks with Liberal leader Sussan Ley had broken down on Tuesday morning after disagreements over the Nationals’ support for nuclear power and supermarket divestiture powers.
‘Our party room has got to a position where we will not be re-entering a Coalition agreement with the Liberal Party after this election,’ he said.
‘What we have got to a position is that the National Party will sit alone on a principle basis.’
He said that the Nationals ‘remain committed to having the door open’ while the Liberal Party embarked on a ‘journey of rediscovery’.
Littleproud described it as the ‘hardest political decision’ of his life.
‘There is no animosity, no angst, no heat,’ he insisted.
Nationals leader David Littleproud (pictured alongise Nationals Deputy Leader Kevin Hogan and Nationals Senate Leader Bridget McKenzie) revealed talks between the two parties had broken down on Tuesday morning
He said that he believed that the new Liberal leader Sussan Ley would help the party ‘reinvent itself’ but said she needed time to work out the party’s future
He said that he believed that Ley would help the party ‘reinvent itself’.
‘I have faith in her. I actually think it is conceivable she can win the next election,’ he added.
But Littleproud insisted that the Liberal Party needed to decide its policy positions before they could renew the Coalition agreement.
‘Sussan Ley, I am still there and the door is still open but you need the time and space to know who you are and what you want to be,’ Littleproud added.
The Nationals boss, who saw off a leadership challenge from Senator Matt Canavan last week, said the main sticking points were around nuclear power, funding for regional infrastructure and supermarket divestiture powers.
The Nationals are proponents of nuclear power, insisting that net-zero targets cannot be met without it.
However, Ley has refused to guarantee the Liberals will continue to support the unpopular policy.
‘We look forward to what else we can do as a party and as part of an Opposition now that can shape the lives of regional Australians for the better,’ Littleproud said.
Littleproud (pictured) insisted that the Liberal Party needed to decide its policy positions before they could reach a possible agreement in the future
‘And those positions that we couldn’t get comfort around nuclear being a part of an energy grid into the future.’
Later on Tuesday afternoon, Ley fronted media to say she found the decision ‘disappointing’.
‘As Liberals, we respect their decision and commit to continue working collaboratively with them,’ Ley said in a statement.
‘The Liberal Party’s door remains open to The Nationals’ should they wish to rejoin the Coalition before the next election.’
Ley said the Nationals had ‘sought specific commitments on certain policies’, which she couldn’t give.’
‘Our approach (is) nothing adopted and nothing abandoned,’ she added.
Ley said she would unveil a shadow cabinet ministry made up of just Liberals in the coming days.
Littleproud was asked if he was willing to go to the next election alone if no agreement could be reached.
‘If we can’t get an agreement then that is the case,’ he responded, adding that the former Coalition partners would keep ‘lines of communication open’.
He also suggested that the Liberal Party hurt the Nationals vote.
‘My job is not to be a drag on their boat and I’ve got to say, I never saw a billboard, I never saw a piece of material from the Labor Party attacking me, or the National Party at the last election,’ Littleproud said.
‘The National Party didn’t drag anyone’s vote down in the capital city because we’re able to focus on the things that are important to us.’
Nationals Senate leader Bridget McKenzie said the split was a ‘very tough decision’.
‘We know that the Coalition has only been breached three other times in our history of our over a century of being, representing the nine million Australians that don’t live in capital cities,’ she said.
‘But, a reasonable request was put to a trusted partner and it was refused. Policies that we had fought for, that only a few weeks ago, we fought an election on.
‘Policies that in the main, rural and regional Australia backed.’
McKenzie then listed support for supermarket divestiture powers, which would break up the Coles-Woolworths duopoly, nuclear power and regional infrastructure funding as the ‘reasonable’ policies the Liberal party refused to give unequivocal backing to.
Meanwhile, Deputy Nationals Leader Kevin Hogan likened the historic split to an on-again, off-again romantic relationship.
‘We’ve all broken up in a relationship that’s been important to us, and more often than not, you get back together… with clearer clarity and focus on what the relationship was about and… how it is going to work even better,’ he said.
‘And that’s how I’m viewing this. I think that it is really important for the Coalition that that happen. We are always best as a country with a strong Coalition.’
There has been tension between the two former Coalition partners since the humiliating Labor landslide on May 3.
The situation was exacerbated when Senator Jacinta Price defected from the Nationals party room to sit with the Liberal party to run in a joint-ticket for the leadership with Angus Taylor.
After the former shadow treasurer was defeated, Price withdrew her hat from the ring.
The Coalition has only split three times in the last 100 years, with the last time occurring in 1987 over the ‘Joh for Canberra’ campaign, which pushed for Queensland National Party premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen to become Prime Minister.
Then, the two parties split for a matter of months before the rift healed after the 1987 federal election.
They also split after being defeated in the 1972 federal election but reunited ahead of the next election.
Littleproud insisted that Anthony Albanese was still ‘the enemy’.
But the Coalition’s split marks a major win for the Labor leader who will effectively be governing against a divided opposition.