Liberal MPs have warned the party is at the end of its tether when it comes to intervening in markets as they reluctantly approved legislation that allows the government to fix power prices and force energy companies to sell assets.

Following a robust meeting of a backbench energy committee on Monday in which there was significant opposition to the "big stick" legislation, the Coalition party room waved through the bill on Tuesday on the condition that if there were any changes made in the Senate, the backbench would have the final say on whether to accept them.

This assurance, sought by Liberal MP Tim Wilson, was to guard against demands by the Senate crossbench to extend the powers of forced divestment beyond the energy sector – at which the bill is aimed – to other areas of market concentration, such as supermarkets and petrol.

The general view is that we look forward to being Liberals again. — Liberal backbencher

The flare up came a week after a similar backlash against legislation to implement a key election promise of Scott Morrison, a First Home Loan Deposit Scheme in which the government would underwrite up to 15 per cent of the value of a loan.

Both this and the big stick bill were deemed an affront to Liberal Party economic philosophy but approved on the basis they were election promises and that some changes had been made to the big stick bill to soften it.