{"id":534255,"date":"2026-03-11T23:01:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T23:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/534255\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T23:01:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T23:01:08","slug":"from-roommates-to-rivals-how-matt-canavans-history-with-barnaby-joyce-could-help-him-defeat-one-nation-national-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/534255\/","title":{"rendered":"From roommates to rivals: how Matt Canavan\u2019s history with Barnaby Joyce could help him defeat One Nation | National party"},"content":{"rendered":"

During the 2010 federal election campaign, Matt Canavan and his new boss Barnaby Joyce<\/a> found themselves booked in a tiny hotel room with a pair of single beds a mere half-a-metre apart. The young political staffer had forgotten to call his wife, Andrea, that night, so decided to text her instead.<\/p>\n

\u201cHi babe, love you lots miss you,\u201d the message read.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt least, I thought it went to my wife,\u201d Canavan recounted in his maiden speech<\/a> to the Senate in 2014.<\/p>\n

\u201cInstead I had been texting Barnaby so much it went to him by mistake.\u201d<\/p>\n

Almost inseparable for more than a decade-and-a-half until Joyce\u2019s defection to One Nation<\/a> in December, Canavan is now charged with combating his one-time political mentor and his new party after being installed as Nationals leader on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\"MattMatt Canavan says we need \u2018more Australian everything\u2019 in first speech as Nationals leader \u2013 video<\/p>\n

In selecting the straight-talking, pro-coal, \u201canti-woke\u201d religious conservative from Queensland as their official flag bearer, the Nationals have decided that if the party is to survive, it must lurch further to the populist right.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to have more Australian everything. We need to manifest a hyper-Australia,\u201d a pumped-up Canavan told his first press conference as leader, after defeating Kevin Hogan and Bridget McKenzie in a party room vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need more Australian babies. We need more Australian humour, more Australian jokes, more Australian barbecues, sometimes often fuelled by fossil fuels.\u201d<\/p>\n

From Marxist to influential senator<\/p>\n

Canavan, 45, charted an unusual path to become the first federal minister born in the 1980s and now the 16th leader of the federal Nationals.<\/p>\n

A self-proclaimed Marxist<\/a> during his days at the University of Queensland, he worked at the Productivity Commission \u2013 a cog in the Canberra bureaucracy he would come to loathe \u2013 before stepping into the world of politics.<\/p>\n

Staring at his computer one day, the then public servant cold-called the office of Tony Abbott asking if it needed an economist. It didn\u2019t \u2013 but a maverick Nationals senator from Queensland did.<\/p>\n

Canavan and Joyce would strike up a 15-year alliance that would permanently disrupt and reshape the conservative side of politics in Australia, dragging the Coalition<\/a> further to the right \u2013 particularly on climate and energy policy.<\/p>\n

Elected to parliament in 2013, Canavan was elevated to cabinet as the minister for resources just three years later, forcing the then prime minister Malcolm Turnbull to contend with another climate change sceptic within his senior ranks as he attempted to land an emissions reduction policy.<\/p>\n

Sign up: AU Breaking News email<\/a><\/p>\n

Speaking on Wednesday prior to the Nationals leadership vote, Turnbull recounted how Canavan, Joyce and others once lobbied him to fund a chain of coal-fired power stations across the country.<\/p>\n

After explaining the economic irrationality of the idea, Turnbull said the rump of Nationals remained unconvinced.<\/p>\n

Turnbull said McKenzie, then the Nationals deputy leader, hung back after the meeting and explained her colleagues\u2019 mindset.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe said, \u2018You know, PM, the numbers are fine, but they\u2019re not going to persuade them \u2026 they\u2019re not actually interested in the economics. It\u2019s religion for them,\u2019\u201d Turnbull recalled of the private conversation.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd that\u2019s basically the problem. They are unshackled from reality.\u201d<\/p>\n

After briefly resigning from cabinet in 2017 after being caught up in the dual citizenship saga<\/a>, Canavan permanently stood down from the frontbench<\/a> in 2020 to support Joyce\u2019s failed bid to reclaim the leadership.<\/p>\n

Where others recede into obscurity on the backbench, Canavan\u2019s influence only grew with the unrestrained freedom to peddle his rightwing agenda.<\/p>\n

An uncomfortable economic partner for the Liberals<\/p>\n

After the town of Orange in regional New South Wales was covered in snow in June 2021, Canavan posted his thoughts to Twitter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cClimate change,\u201d he wrote above a news article headlined \u201cSydney set for coldest day in 25 years while Orange blanketed in snow\u201d.<\/p>\n

The social media post encapsulated the essence of Canavan\u2019s political brand; unashamed climate denialism, provocatively expressed, usually online, and with little regard for his colleagues (much less the planet).<\/p>\n

Canavan interviewed in front of a screen with the words \u2018Build coal power stations\u2019 during the 2022 election campaign. Photograph: Afternoon Briefing\/ABC<\/p>\n

In the middle of the 2022 election campaign, just months after Scott Morrison signed the Coalition up to net zero emissions by 2050, Canavan went on ABC television and declared the target was \u201csort of dead\u201d.<\/p>\n

He conducted the interview in front of a black screen with the words \u201cBuild coal power stations\u201d.<\/p>\n

Liberal MPs who lost their seat in 2022 \u2013 including to teal independents in heartland electorates \u2013 apportion far more blame to Canavan and Joyce than Morrison for the political disaster that ended their careers.<\/p>\n

Canavan intensified his anti-net zero campaign after the 2025 election, capitalising on an internal Nationals review process to push his party \u2013 and ultimately the Liberals \u2013 to junk the Morrison-era goal.<\/p>\n

He was then instrumental in the Nationals\u2019 decision to oppose hate speech laws drafted after the Bondi massacre, which blew up the Coalition for a second time in eight months.<\/p>\n

The two cases helped crystallise a view for many Coalition MPs that it was Canavan \u2013 not David Littleproud \u2013 who was actually in charge of the Nationals.<\/p>\n

After that was formalised just after 10.30am on Wednesday, some of the surviving city-based Liberals worried what further damage Canavan could cause their party\u2019s already tarnished brand.<\/p>\n

Installing Canavan may stem the bleeding to One Nation in regional areas and prevent the rumoured defection of Colin Boyce and Llew O\u2019Brien, but Liberals fear it won\u2019t aid their prospects<\/a> of returning to power.<\/p>\n

Canavan during Senate debate on the bill to amend the Marriage Act in 2017. Photograph: Mike Bowers\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Along with his obsession with curtailing climate action, Canavan holds deeply conservative social views, opposing same-sex marriage<\/a> and abortion and backing Donald Trump\u2019s move<\/a> to only recognise the male and female sexes.<\/p>\n

His criticism of the US\u2019s \u201cregime change war\u201d<\/a> in Iran conflicts with the Coalition\u2019s official stance but echoes the isolationist strain that runs through the Make America Great Again (Maga) movement.<\/p>\n

An opponent of vaccine mandates and the social media age ban, Canavan\u2019s closest ideological allies have often been those on the far-right fringes \u2013 including Alex Antic and Ralph Babet.<\/p>\n

His economic outlook will sit uncomfortably with the Liberals.<\/p>\n

Interventionist and hostile towards big business, his views on tax, industry subsidies and welfare are light years away from those of the opposition leader, Angus Taylor, and shadow treasurer, Tim Wilson.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis [Canavan\u2019s] views might resonate in regional Queensland but we have to be an option for all Australia \u2013 not just an option for a narrow group,\u201d one Liberal MP told Guardian Australia.<\/p>\n

Another Liberal joked that even the One Nation leader, Pauline Hanson, was more moderate that Canavan.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe does not play well in the suburbs. The few remaining Liberal suburban seats will be under even more pressure, given the inevitable policies Canavan will demand,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

Canavan unsuccessfully challenged Littleproud for the leadership after the 2025 election, when Labor and Anthony Albanese appeared to still be the Nationals\u2019 primary opponent.<\/p>\n

Nine months on, the Nationals are fighting a different battle. And when a \u201cbuggered\u201d Littleproud unexpectedly resigned on Tuesday afternoon, the party was bound to turn to the colleague who understands the enemy better than anyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"During the 2010 federal election campaign, Matt Canavan and his new boss Barnaby Joyce found themselves booked in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534256,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-534255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=534255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534255\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=534255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=534255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=534255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}