One Nation’s smashing victory in Farrer fires up the insurgent party, and casts fresh doubts over the future of the Liberal Party.

The result could not be a more devastating rebuff for Liberal leader Angus Taylor, who has been found wanting after only months in the job. This puts him under even more pressure for next week’s budget reply.

The result will raise more doubts about whether, or for how long, Taylor will survive as leader, given Andrew Hastie, a political freelancer, waits in the wings.

Taylor said after the result, “For too long, we have been a party of convenience, not of conviction, and that must change”, and again defaulted to his immigration lines. He repeated his slogan, “If the vote sprays, Labor stays”. In Farrer, it was less a matter of spraying as deserting.

One might say deposed Liberal leader Sussan Ley extracted her ultimate revenge in triggering the byelection. Once she announced she was quitting the seat, it was always potentially bad news for her successor and her party.

Ley, overseas and invisible for the campaign, re-emerged on Saturday night with a statement rejecting the argument Taylor has been making about the impact of the Coalition bust ups. She also declared: “On the day the leadership spilled in February, the new leader said the Liberal Party needed to ‘change........

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