A trio of conservative columnists who were never really massive fans of Turnbull have used the Coalition’s poorer-than-expected showing this election to urge the Liberal party to dump their moderate leader.

Andrew Bolt was the first to call on Malcolm Turnbull to resign, in a stunning election-night spray on his blog (repeated on Sky News) that accused the Liberal leader of having “led the party to humiliation, stripped of both values and honour”. Whined Bolt:

“You assassinated a Liberal Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, who’d won an election by a huge margin.

“You promised to do even better than him.

“You then treated the Liberal base like dirt, smashing it with a huge super tax, refusing to speak to conservative journalists, repeatedly humiliating Abbott.

“You referred to the colonial settlement of Australia as an ‘invasion’ and even held an end-of-Ramadan meal with known Muslim bigots …

“And now look. Almost everything turned to ruin.”

 

This morning, he’s posted a public petition reiterating the demand on his blog, which readers have added their support to in the comments field.

Spectator Australia editor Rowan Dean has also made the same demand, saying Turnbull had “destroyed conservatism” on election night. The Herald Sun’s Terry McCrann has also used his column today to call on the Liberal Party to sack Turnbull.