COALITION HAS IT ALL REVERSED

TURNBULL Government MPs are in a world of pain, trying to figure how to save themselves after Saturday’s by-elections disaster. But they’re asking their questions in the wrong order — starting with whether to keep Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister.

Sure, at least most MPs do realise changes must be made after losing all five by-elections. They can’t go on like this when a third of Coalition voters in the marginal Queensland seat of Longman deserted them.

But to save themselves, the Liberals must not make exactly the mistake they seem to be making. They seem to have decided the last question first — to keep Turnbull as leader — and are working out what new policies he must sell.

That is crazy. Surely, the first question should be what new policies the Liberals need to attract the voters in the seats they most need to win — particularly in Queensland and outer Sydney.

The leader must be able to fight for the new policies with conviction, because the sanctimonious media pack will try to murder the Liberals for cutting immigration and going soft on the warming scare.

The Liberals should welcome that, because only a brawl will wake voters to the fact the government has changed direction. But the Liberals will lose that brawl if their leader fights without heart, embarrassed to defend policies he once opposed.

So who would best fight for the new direction? Turnbull? Really?