Fighting on: Tony Abbott the Exiled Hero isn't going anywhere

Extract from ABC The Drum

Opinion

By Annabel Crabb

Posted about 5 hours ago

Photo: Ideological guerrilla warfare is what Tony Abbott is best at. (AAP: Alan Porritt, file photo)

The former prime minister was born for the thrill of leading a band of underestimated traditionalists against a vast left-wing conspiracy of Greens, unions and Point Piper pinot-gris-guzzlers, writes Annabel Crabb.

Tony Abbott's one-man conclave on his own future broke up last night after four long months of deliberations. A puff of blue smoke! Hearts soared among the decimated Coalition soldiers of the Resistance, as they gathered in their makeshift camps and slapped each other on the back.
Tony Abbott! Staying and fighting! And with enough of the old razzle-dazzle to continue his tradition of giving everyone something to splutter about at Australia Day barbecues!
The grizzled ranks of the Resistance will endure their citizenship ceremonies this year cheered by the knowledge that the Coalition will yet maintain a corner in which marriage is for a man and a woman, climate science is shonky, and it is perfectly all right to tell a public servant that she has piercing eyes.
For months now, the Resistance has sustained indignity after indignity: the summary liberation of its key lieutenants to spend more time with their families; the careful unpeeling of various Abbottian initiatives including knights and dames; the stratospheric public popularity of Malcolm Turnbull; the exploding-cigar theatre of Ian Macfarlane's attempt to defect to the Nationals; and of course the vicious targeting of conservative MPs and senators by a newly resurgent Liberal moderate wing.
Not that the latter could possibly prove surprising to any of them; after all, last year's Nationals-led pogrom in Queensland of Liberal MPs who supported same-sex marriage (Warren Entsch, Wyatt Roy, Teresa Gambaro and so on) was interrupted only by the untimely demise of Tony Abbott. To the victor go the spoils. It's a nasty business.
But the retention of Tony Abbott, Exiled Hero, is an important psychological peg.
For the man himself, the decision has upsides and downsides.
One upside is that he no longer has to think of something else to do. This is a fairly significant upside, as in all the months of speculation about his future, no-one has managed to paint a convincing picture of what life might contain, post-politics, for this unusually political creature.
Journalism? Not well-paid enough, probably. The corporate world? Not even Mr Abbott's most loyal chums consider this to be a live possibility. Speaking circuit? Much was made of this option by adoring conservative writers, though Mr Abbott's "Rivers of Blood" speech for the Margaret Thatcher Lecture didn't seem to set anyone on fire, particularly, and really, if you wanted a tried and true conservative Australian former PM to thump the tub, you'd probably go for someone a little longer of eyebrow and term-in-office, if you know what I mean.
Staying on as the Member for Warringah, a post he has held now for nearly 22 years, demands very little creative thought beyond drafting a plausible motivation for staying.
(Mr Abbott plumped for "working with Mike Baird to ensure that the Warringah Peninsula gets better transport links to the rest of Sydney", which - while not quite so risible as Bronwyn Bishop's "I am needed in the fight against ISIL" - probably needs work as a comprehensive raison d'etre.)
One quite serious downside of the decision is that Mr Abbott will be blamed for anything that goes wrong from here on in. Tax reform comes a cropper? Senate continues to be obstreperous? Grumblings about the Prime Minister? The Member for Warringah will be pinged for everything and watched extremely closely for any sign of insurrection, though thank God his lack of enthusiasm for Twitter relieves the fourth estate from the obligation to read the Tweeleaves as vigilantly as we did when it was Malcolm Turnbull lurking in the wings.
But none of these pros or cons stack up in any way against the real significance of this decision, which is that Tony Abbott has now returned to the job at which he really excels: Leader of the Opposition.
Granted, it's an internal role. But ideological guerrilla warfare, the thrill of leading a band of underestimated traditionalists against a vast left-wing conspiracy of Greens, unions and Point Piper pinot-gris-guzzlers? It's what Tony Abbott was born for. It's what he's best at. And right now, he's probably in a position to give the Prime Minister more grief than the actual Leader of the Opposition, which is kind of weird in an election year.
Are there any upsides in this for the Prime Minister? Apart from having a handy whipping-boy to blame for everything?
Well - the existence of a vocal right wing in the party does offer Mr Turnbull ideological cover. One of the complications of Being Malcolm Turnbull is that for a long time he has been the dream leadership candidate for everyone to the left of Peter Dutton. Thrust finally into the role as Prime Minister, he thus faces a delicate expectations-management task, not only of his own colleagues but of those Australians who casually assumed that a Turnbull prime ministership would be a nonstop parade of gay marriage and favourite bus routes.
On one side, the Prime Minister is policed by the right wing of his own party. On the other, the Greens in the Senate. If nothing else, they create an excellent argument for keeping to the middle of the road.
Annabel Crabb is the ABC's chief online political writer. She tweets at @annabelcrabb.