A permission structure has been crafted for Liberals to ditch the first woman to lead the federal party room before she has even had a year in the role.
Since the day Sussan Ley narrowly secured the leadership over conservative rival Angus Taylor, her detractors have framed her removal as a matter of “when”, not “if”.
The implosion of the Coalition, bleak polling and a host of other internal woes have done nothing but accelerate the timeline of what has always been painted as an inevitable challenge.
But don’t be fooled that this was a foregone conclusion.
Ley’s demise will be the product of a carefully curated narrative that selectively amplifies inflection points throughout her short tenure.
Not all the criticisms are without foundation.
Ley, and those whose advice she relies upon, have come up short during many early tests.
She is far from a perfect leader, but when Ley eventually faces a spill challenge instigated by Taylor’s backers, it will not be because she made avoidable mistakes.
Since the day Sussan Ley narrowly secured the leadership over conservative rival Angus Taylor, her detractors have framed her removal as a matter of “when” not “if”. (ABC News: Matt Roberts)
Judgement in question
To justify her removal, Ley’s detractors will look to build a picture of accumulative failures of judgement.
Individually, the transgressions might be relatively minor, but collectively, they will be used to build a stronger narrative about a leader consistently perceived to make the wrong calls.
Things like her attempt to tear down Anthony Albanese for wearing a Joy Division T-shirt on the basis fandom of the seminal 80s post-punk band amounted to tacit antisemitism.
Many Liberals were deeply embarrassed by Ley’s criticism of the prime minister’s sartorial choices, with few publicly backing her attack.
That misstep was soon followed by another, with Ley again left all but friendless when she demanded Kevin Rudd be recalled as Australia’s Ambassador to the US because President Donald Trump had proclaimed his dislike for the former PM.
Then came the more consequential display of political misjudgement this summer, when Ley relentlessly campaigned for the early return of parliament to respond to the Bondi terror attack.
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Though no Liberal can lay claim to having predicted the calamitous outcome of that decision for the Coalition, many believe Ley should have foreseen the obvious political wedges set by Albanese.
“Albo may think he is a genius at putting opponents in cul-de-sacs, but Sussan has made driving into them an art form,” one conservative Liberal said.
Internal authority woes from the start
When Ley narrowly secured the leadership over Taylor in May, she promised her party room she would do things differently.
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Backbench committees were formed to feed policy ideas into the shadow cabinet and Ley pledged to properly consider the advice of her team.
She tasked energy and climate change spokesman Dan Tehan with developing a policy process for tackling one of the most divisive issues in her party room — net zero.
Before Tehan could so much as say the phrase, “small modular nuclear reactor”, the Nationals decided to scrap the emissions target.
The farce of a cobbled-together Liberal policy that followed became just the first of many moments where Ley’s grip on authority would slip.
Setting aside her constant critics, it’s the candid private commentary of some of her staunchest supporters that hits hardest.
Moderates fear a further lurch to the right under a conservative leader like Taylor or Andrew Hastie would be the final death knell to the Liberals’ eroding status as the natural party of government in Australia.
These are the same Liberals who face almost-certain demotion under a right faction leader looking to promote from within their own supporters.
So they have every reason for wanting Ley to succeed.
“She’s moved away from who she was going to be,” one moderate Liberal said.
“The modern direction she pitched for the party has been drawn back into the old ways.
“But it’s not surprising when you look at the right (faction) guys in the leadership team around her.”
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Not all the reasons Liberals will cite for ousting Ley are as complex.
The dismal opinion polls speak for themselves.
With One Nation’s primary vote surging and Ley’s personal preferred prime minister ranking hitting subterranean lows, the numbers are terminal.
“‘Sussan sucks and she can’t win’ is basically the right’s pitch,” one conservative Liberal admits.
Political analysis that matters
It is, of course, ridiculous to posit that Ley is solely responsible for the Liberals’ current woes.
Even some of her biggest detractors at least have the self-awareness to sheepishly admit she was never seriously given a chance to succeed.
At the best of times, rebuilding trust and connection with voters who have just resoundingly rejected you is a Herculean task.
Try getting cut through when you’re dealing with frontbenchers who make disparaging remarks about Indian Australians, or quit over a non-existent immigration policy.
Not to mention the disgruntled backbenchers lobbing political bombs in the media and a junior Coalition partner seemingly hell-bent on undermining your authority and policy processes at every turn.
“She never had any free space,” one Liberal moderate and supporter of Ley said.
But when it comes time for a delegation of disaffected Liberals to front up to Ley’s office and advise that she has lost the majority support of the party room, they’ll argue the fault is all hers.
Critical shift in Coalition split talks
When Ley first accepted the frontbench resignations of the three Nationals senators who crossed the floor on hate laws, one of the first people to publicly back her call was former prime minister John Howard.
As a widely respected Liberal luminary within the party, his comments that Ley had no other choice but to act to preserve the sanctity of shadow cabinet solidarity was initially reassuring.
Ley’s decisions were broadly supported in the days after the Coalition split that followed.
Liberals universally felt Nationals leader David Littleproud had seriously overstepped in making the removal of Sussan Ley a condition for the two parties reuniting. (ABC News: Matt Roberts)
Liberals universally felt Nationals leader David Littleproud had seriously overstepped in making the removal of Ley a condition for the two parties reuniting.
It was stark then that barely two weeks later, Howard made another public intervention.
This time essentially urging Ley to put all that pesky business of shadow cabinet solidarity and the attack on her leadership aside in favour of a hasty reunion.
Conservative Liberals in the party room are agitated about what they perceive to be an unwillingness by Ley to meaningfully seek a resumption of the Coalition agreement.
They fear an entrenched split will make life difficult for Taylor when he assumes the leadership.
Backers of Taylor were initially frustrated at Hastie’s efforts to capitalise on the chaos of the split to accelerate a spill against Ley.
Now, it could be the very excuse they use to instigate a challenge in the next week.
Taylor himself has consistently urged colleagues that Ley deserves longer in the role.
But all the signs show she was never going to be afforded the luxury of time.