Talk about exquisitely bad timing. On Friday, the federal Liberal Party’s latest leadership spill – a mere nine months after the last one – showed the ability of the members of the federal parliamentary party to lose their heads when all about were keeping theirs.
The result, as history recorded, was Angus Taylor defeating leader Sussan Ley 34-17.
That was all happening in the morning. But while the shell-shocked members said goodbye to the party’s first federal female leader, an email plopped into their inboxes from party president John Olsen, a former premier of South Australia. He had other things on his mind.
Not, as party insiders might expect, the release of the post-mortem into the Liberals’ disastrous 2025 federal election campaign which has sat in the vault for a long time.