As federal parliament began its last sitting week for 2025, those around Sussan Ley were confident her fragile leadership would survive into next year. There was no sign there’d be a challenge on Tuesday morning, when the last Liberal Party meeting for the year was scheduled (although the cautious always hedge their bets).

This was despite Sunday’s Newspoll, showing Labor with a two party lead of 58-42, and the Coalition on 24%.

The poll holds clues about why Ley is likely to survive the year, as well as to just how difficult the road ahead is for her.

When people were asked who they preferred as opposition leader, Ley was on 21%, Andrew Hastie 15%, Angus Taylor 9%, Tim Wilson 6%, and Ted O'Brien (who is deputy) on 3%, A massive 46% were in the “don’t know”) category.

The poll suggests that noise matters. One of Ley’s key tactics has been to fill as much of the media space as she can. Last week, after the Coalition’s controversial decision to dump net zero, Ley had more than 40 media appearances. She has extraordinary stamina.

All this activity hasn’t yet........

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