Bishop rules out challenge for leadership

Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop. Photo / AP

Assurance looks likely to secure Abbott’s position in short term.

Feverish leadership speculation came to a head yesterday when Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop told Tony Abbott at a Cabinet meeting she was not after his job.

"I am not campaigning for the job of Prime Minister," Bishop told the meeting, AAP said. "I am not ringing the backbench asking for support. I am not counting any numbers. I will not challenge the leader."

The move appears likely to secure Abbott's position - in the short term. But it's unlikely the Government's leadership tensions have evaporated.

Bishop earlier rebuffed a demand by Abbott that she rule out challenging him for the Liberal leadership, it was reported. With leadership speculation still raging yesterday despite Abbott's defiant speech to the National Press Club on Monday, one Coalition MP quoted ministers as saying that relations between the Prime Minister and his Foreign Minister had become "untenable".

Another told News Corp: "Julie Bishop and Tony Abbott now have a Gillard-Rudd-like relationship. It can't go on like this."

As the Sydney Morning Herald pointed out after Bishop's statement, "a commitment not to challenge does not rule her out from running if a leadership ballot is declared and all positions are open".

Abbott's speech - in which he made it clear he would not stand down, despite poor polls and a stunning Coalition reversal in Queensland - evoked a mixed response among backbenchers agitating for change.

Both Bishop and Malcolm Turnbull, the most credible candidates for a challenge, have kept a low profile since the leadership murmurings were sparked by Abbott's bizarre decision to knight Prince Philip on Australia Day.

However, both Abbott and Bishop yesterday declined to rebut a Sky News report that, during a private meeting on Sunday, she refused to give him an assurance that she had no plans to challenge him. Abbott evaded the question three times, telling Channel Seven "people find all that 'insider Canberra stuff' so boring".

Ian Macfarlane, Abbott's respected Industry Minister, urged Bishop to clear the air, adding that Turnbull had assured him he would not challenge Abbott - although others questioned whether that was the case.

Two former Liberal luminaries, Peter Costello and Peter Reith, did little to help Abbott's cause, with Costello writing a scathing column blaming federal Liberals for the Queensland result, and Reith questioning Abbott's assertion that it was up to voters, and not his colleagues, to choose the prime minister.

Scott Morrison, the third potential leadership candidate, pledged on Monday night not to challenge Abbott, while Christopher Pyne - whom some reportedly see as a "Plan B" conservative alternative to Turnbull - denied that he had been "sounded out" by backbenchers. And as an email from Liberal MP Andrew Nikolic urging colleagues to "knuckle down ... and not become the rabble we defeated" was leaked to the Australian Financial Review, the Independent senator Jacqui Lambie predicted Abbott's imminent demise. "If these blokes have any common sense, and want to move forward with half a chance of winning the next election, they'll get rid of him immediately," she said.

Administrator faces crisis

Three months into the job, Northern Territory Administrator John Hardy finds himself confronted by a constitutional crisis. Effectively the governor of the NT, Hardy may be called upon to resolve a standoff between Chief Minister Adam Giles, who insists he remains leader, and Willem Westra van Holthe, who declared himself head of the Country Liberals government after a party-room coup late on Monday night.
Hardy says it is up to Parliament to resolve the matter, but when asked if he had the power to call an election, he said: "I'll have to read up on that myself."
Constitutional law specialist Ken Parish said: "... we don't know who the leader is, or if either of them could command a majority."

- AAP