“We want the Liberal Party to do better,” Littleproud said. “The reality is if you’re focused on yourself, the Australian people won’t be focused on you.”
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Election reviewer and former senator Nick Minchin – who interviewed Dutton for the review in July alongside former NSW minister Pru Goward – confirmed they talked to Dutton about the party’s defence policy and did not deny Dutton scrutinised Hastie’s role as defence spokesman. The defence policy, announced late and with little detail, was criticised when it was released 10 days before the election.
Minchin declined to divulge details of the conversation with Dutton but played down Dutton’s critique of Hastie.
“Peter avoided direct criticism of his shadow ministers in the course of his discussion with us,” Minchin told this masthead.
“We discussed inter alia the defence policy and the policy formulation process generally.”
Dutton has not disputed this masthead’s report despite being contacted by several journalists on Monday.
In his interview over the party’s historic loss under his leadership, Dutton was scathing about Hastie’s performance.
“It was inconceivable to Dutton and his senior colleagues that Hastie effectively went on strike during the last term,” said one source who is familiar with Dutton’s submissions, but not authorised to speak publicly.
“Someone who should have been a powerful voice in the media tearing strips off Labor was absent, scared to do media, or lazy.”
Credit: Matt Golding
The former leader also criticised Hastie’s policy development, pushing Hastie to reject Dutton’s claims and argue that defence policy failures were the fault of the opposition leader’s office.
Senator Jane Hume also weighed in on Sky on Monday, calling on colleagues to keep their counsel.
“As a former election reviewer myself, I know it’s really important for those submissions that we retain their confidentiality to ensure people can feel candid.”
Hume said it was “preposterous” to blame any one figure for the historic loss, saying it was “never one person or one issue”.
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Deputy Liberal leader Ted O’Brien has backed Ley’s version of events in her feud with Hastie, claiming on Nine’s Today show on Monday that Hastie never raised his gripes with Ley before quitting the frontbench.
O’Brien said that “my understanding is there was no discussion about the immigration portfolio … at all”.
“If he believes he can make a better contribution from the backbench, it’s absolutely his right to do so. And I’m not going to criticise that,” he said.
Former prime minister Scott Morrison has urged the party to rally behind Ley and her economic message, outlined in a recent speech in which she flagged support for fiscal restraint.
“Do we want to have an economy that’s actually driven by the hard work and enterprise of Australians and Australian businesses and enterprises, or do we want to have an Australian economy that is basically enabled by the rest of the government?” he said.
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