Malcolm Turnbull is insisting the federal election will not be held until the first half of next year but he is creating the option of going earlier by requesting the state Liberal Party divisions to hurry up and finalise their preselections.

The Prime Minister has requested all preselections be finalised by June at the latest. A source said it was more about needing to get candidates in key seats, given Labor was well advanced in its preselections and virtually in campaign mode.

This week, while the Liberals squabbled over leadership, Labor leader Bill Shorten was in Perth where he toured about 10 seats, in some cases presenting new candidates to voters.

Malcolm Turnbull MP minister for communications. Monday 17th August 2015 photo Louie Douvis AFR Magazine Power Issue. AFR AFR Bumper Puff Abbott and Turnbull supplied

"I don't know if the election is 18 months away; hopefully it will be a bit sooner than that. You can't tell with the government these days, they are a bit of a mess," Mr Shorten said.

Now that South Australia, Queensland and Tasmania have had their state elections, Liberal divisions in those states have been given a hurry-up, although SA is awaiting the results of an electoral redistribution, the draft of which will be released on Friday. NSW was held up by a squabble over preselection rules while Victoria is now moving after a draft redistribution of seats was released last week. These will not be finalised until the middle of the year.