Tony Abbott has attempted to paper over Coalition divisions on same-sex marriage by declaring it was “fair” to take the issue out of the hands of politicians and have a population-wide vote within three years of the next election.

But the prime minister faced fresh criticism from the Victorian Liberal leader, Matthew Guy, who called for MPs to be granted a free vote in the parliament and said he was not surprised that Australians were “utterly sick of federal politics”.

The federal education minister, Christopher Pyne, also stood by his view that the Liberal party should have made its own decision about its stance before the Nationals were involved, although he predicted Abbott’s proposal to have a plebiscite might achieve the result marriage equality supporters wanted.



Abbott praised his colleagues for having a “very decent and respectful” debate, despite criticism from Liberal moderates including Malcolm Turnbull that the distant plebiscite would create a long-running distraction from the government’s economic agenda and a free vote would have resolved the issue quickly.



On Wednesday the prime minister came under attack during parliamentary question time from a Labor party determined to cast Abbott as being stuck in the past and intent on blocking his ministers from following their conscience.

The prime minister again played down the prospect of the forthcoming cross-party marriage equality bill proceeding to a vote on the floor of the parliament, but confirmed frontbenchers would be bound to oppose it in any division.

“Unlike members oppose I don’t run a Stalinist party,” Abbott said, attempting to criticise the Labor party for expelling backbench dissidents.



“Members opposite have these Stalinist rules but backbench members of the Coalition always have a conscience vote ... members of the executive, as usual, as always, are bound by the policy of the government.”

Dean Smith, an openly gay West Australian Liberal senator, signalled he would exercise his right as a backbencher to cross the floor to support marriage equality if a private member’s bill came before the Senate.



He told Fairfax Media it was not defensible in contemporary Australian society “for the state to deny proper and equal recognition of a marriage between two consenting adults, simply based on their sexuality”.



Abbott called a snap meeting of the Liberal and National parties on Tuesday to jointly decide whether the maintain the Coalition’s binding opposition to same-sex marriage, and the majority decided to keep the status quo.



The inclusion of the socially conservative Nationals angered Pyne, who likened it to “branch stacking” at a regular Liberal party meeting on Tuesday. In several interviews on Wednesday, the leader of the house stood by his view that the Liberals should have made their own decision.

But it turned out that a free vote in this term of parliament would not have had majority support even if it had been a Liberals-only decision.

Guy joined the fray on Wednesday, adding his voice to the criticism of Abbott for not allowing the Liberal party to consider its own stance.



The Victorian Liberal leader said: “My party is founded on the basis of giving people the right to vote on their conscience. The National party is a separate party. They should decide their policy initiatives, in government or opposition, in their own party room, and the Liberal party decides their own.”

Guy said Liberal MPs should be granted a free vote on same-sex marriage.

“People who feel that members should be bound on matters of conscience by a party vote, well they need to go back and look at the rationale on which our party was founded by Robert Menzies,” Guy said.



“It wasn’t one of binding votes – it was one of conscience. We should be proud of that and members should be able to exercise that, full stop.”

The Labor leader, Bill Shorten, asked in question time how the prime minister could “claim to lead the party of the individual when he will not allow individual members of his party to exercise a free vote on marriage equality”.



Abbott replied that about 90 Coalition members had their say when the matter “was discussed by our party room in a very decent and respectful way for fully six hours yesterday”.

“By a very strong majority, essentially by two to one, we decided to confirm our existing position, the position that we took to the election that marriage was between a man and a woman for this term of parliament,” he said.

“Our strong disposition is to go into the next election with a commitment to put this to the people ... so going into the next election there will be two parties with very different positions. Members opposite will want the politicians to decide; this government wants the people to decide.

“Over there, they want the politicians’ choice, over here we want the people’s choice, and what could be fairer than leaving this to the people of Australia?”

Turnbull, the communications minister and a supporter of same-sex marriage, questioned Abbott’s political strategy in proposing a plebiscite after the next election, due in 2016.

“One of the attractions of a free vote is that it would have meant the matter would have been resolved in this parliament one way or another in a couple of weeks,” the former Liberal leader said.

“The reason I haven’t advocated a plebiscite after the next election is that it would mean, it will mean, that this issue is a live issue all the way up to the next election and, indeed, at the next election and, if we are returned to office, it will be a very live issue in the lead-up to the plebiscite itself.”

The environment minister, Greg Hunt, who argued in the party room for MPs to be granted a free vote, said people should now embrace the plebiscite plan.

“Yes, I had a particular preference and that didn’t come about, but as a member of parliament, as somebody who is engaged in these public debates, I’m actually deeply appreciative and genuinely delighted at the prospect that the Australian people, every Australian person, can have a vote. This is in essence a national free vote,” Hunt told Sky News.

Pyne noted that while about a third of the backbench supported a free vote, the support rose to about a half among frontbenchers.

He said he supported a free vote but he was not sure that such a decision would have prompted the passage of the cross-party bill championed by the Liberal MP Warren Entsch.

Pyne told 2GB he was not confident there was a majority on the floor of the House of Representatives, so a plebiscite “might achieve the result that marriage equality proponents want”.

The Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese said people elected their representatives to make decisions, and Abbott had come up with a “last-minute” compromise to give the appearance of action.

Albanese told 2GB he was concerned a plebiscite carried “the danger of a really divisive public debate that vilifies people for who they are”.