Former Minister for Defence Peter Dutton has been elected to the Liberal leadership unopposed. Finally.

He was the man Australian conservatives wanted to see crowned all the way back in the Liberal leadership spill of 2018, when public pressure and a monsoon of failed opinion polls heralded the demise of Malcolm ‘I tried to join the Labor Party first’ Turnbull. On that occasion, the Liberal moderates practised a little sleight of hand, shuffling then-Treasurer Scott Morrison into the leadership to the utter confusion of the Australian people.

What’s done is done. Peter Dutton is now Leader of the Opposition and has three years to restore the Liberal Party in the eyes of the public.

To do that, he is going to need a mop to clean away the few remaining ‘wets’ that managed to cling onto their seats.

The moderates are, naturally, underwhelmed that Dutton has claimed the leadership. It has been claimed that Dutton will be a ‘hard sell’ in Victoria, but to be fair, ‘going Woke’ in state politics has all-but erased the Liberal Party in Victoria and Western Australia.

Dutton has taken the path of Menzies, and used his first speech to proclaim that his policies will be aimed at the ‘forgotten Australians’ in suburbia. No doubt this will involve the Liberals attempting to snaffle up some of Labor’s disaffected heartland that are sure to be even more disaffected by the time three years of Teal-coloured power bills come in.

‘I do think they are the forgotten people,’ said Dutton. ‘I do think those people, and small businesses and microbusinesses, feel the system is against them.’

His assurance that the Liberal Party will no longer be ‘Labor Lite’ has upset the Left. If there is one thing you have to give social media credit for, it is sensing a political predator in the water. If Dutton really does take the Liberal Party back to the conservatism of the Howard era, Labor and the Greens know they’ll be in for a serious battle.

‘The next three years under Labor is going to be tough for the Australian people. Already, they are breaking promises and foreshadowing policy shifts. They were not ready to govern and we are already seeing their inexperience on display.’

When questioned on Climate Change, Dutton shifted quickly to the cost of fuel and electricity before adding that Australia needed a future in manufacturing. This is a good sign for Coalition policies.

Dutton also promised to remain strong on China. Given that members of the Labor Party have snuck away on secret trips and at least one Premier tried to sign up to the debt-trap diplomacy of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Australia is going to need one reliable voice in Parliament opposing the creep of communism and its influence.

‘I have had the benefit of the briefings in the National Security Committee and obviously at the high-level in some circumstances as Defence Minister. The issue of China under President Xi is the biggest issue our country will face in our lifetimes. That’s the reality. That’s the assessment of the Americans. That’s the assessment of the British, of the Japanese, of the Indians, and it is our assessment as well. I will support policies which help to defend our country.’

Less promising is the news that David Littleproud won his leadership battle against Barnaby Joyce. The Nationals represent a demographic victimised by Climate Change policies that seek to over-tax, over-regulate, and outright destroy rural and agricultural industries. To retain that vote, the Nationals needed a leader who would fight against the billionaires’ paradise of Net Zero. Instead, Littleproud is one of its biggest supporters, immediately pledging to uphold the party’s Net Zero commitment.

The Nationals might as well toss their seats in the bin now. If Dutton lets Littleproud be his ‘green wing’ in the Coalition, the plan to restore the Coalition to power will fail.

If Dutton does not come out and pledge to restore the rights and liberties lost during the pandemic – including a plan to outlaw discrimination based upon vaccination status – he will fail.

Littleproud said that, ‘Lurching to the left or lurching right, it’s using common sense and being in the sensible centre. That’s where you win elections, not chasing extremities.’

As far as the once-loved Coalition goes – the nostalgic Coalition that blue-ribbon voters remember – it was a party that could define ‘women’ and defend their rights, would never destroy businesses or support state-sanctioned discrimination, would not hand public money to renewables billionaires or pass legislation to punish the agricultural community, and they certainly wouldn’t let Australia’s children be brainwashed into the apocalyptic and racist doctrine of imported Marxism.

The Liberal Party does need to step right, if only to find the centre that used to win elections.