Malcolm Turnbull has ensured Barnaby Joyce will “never be shifted” as Nationals leader and his position has “cemented”, say supporters rallying around the deputy prime minister.

As the prime minister attempted to calm tempers by walking back some of his comments on Joyce, publicly declaring he had not “sought in any way to influence the deliberations in the National party” or “made any criticism of the National party”, he stood by his criticism of the Nationals leader’s behaviour in having an extramarital affair.

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But in what one Nationals source said “was the worst breakdown in Liberal-National relations since Joh [Bjelke-Petersen] decided to declare war on the entire southern end”, Turnbull’s decision to publicly intervene in the affair has ensured Joyce’s survival.

“He has no idea what he has done,” one said. “He has just shown he has no idea about the culture of the National party. Even those who don’t like Barnaby as the leader will stand by him now. All Turnbull has managed to do is damage his own leadership.”

Q&A Why can't Malcolm Turnbull sack Barnaby Joyce? Show Hide Barnaby Joyce is not a member of Malcolm Turnbull's Liberal party, he is the leader of the National party, which governs in coalition with the Liberals. In the same way that the prime minister could not sack the leader of the Labor party, he has no power to force the Nationals to change their leader. There is a coalition agreement between the leaders about the terms of their political partnership. The agreement is secret, but one of its cornerstones is that the leader of the National party will be deputy prime minister when the Coalition is in government and therefore acting prime minister in the absence of the PM. Turnbull could remove Joyce from the position of deputy prime minister by ending the Coalition between Liberals and Nationals. However, because the two parties combined only have a one-seat majority over Labor in the House of Representatives, that would be risky. Photograph: Michael Masters/Getty Images AsiaPac

With the notoriously parochial Nationals MPs returning to their electorates on Friday, all were reticent to put their names to comments. Most want to use the weekend to gauge constituents’ mood and feelings on the matter.

But following Joyce’s unprecedented news conference responding to Turnbull’s public and unexpected criticism, including his direction that the deputy PM should use his coming personal leave to “reflect on his position”, the message from his party became one of “us against them”.

“Malcolm Turnbull’s electorate is in Wentworth. He hasn’t had to spend long stretches of time away from Lucy. He’s a millionaire. He doesn’t know the normal pressures which can impact relationships. So to come out and then tell us what to do …

“I don’t think it’s Barnaby’s future which anyone needs to worry about.”

While the party remained supportive of its leader, there was a caveat that if Nationals constituents had shifted their views on Joyce, some of his backing could shift too.

Turnbull also faced criticism from within his own ranks. The conservative MP Kevin Andrews publicly advised the prime minister to cancel his trip to the US to stay at home and “sort this out”.

“What I believe is two things: stop all this commentary in public, it is not helpful, and please, gentlemen, sit down and sort this out,” he told Sky News.

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“That is what the Australian people want to see, it is certainly what Liberal and National party members want and it’s what our supporters want as well. If we don’t do this, what we’ll find is in a few months time, or a year’s time that Labor will sweep into office because we haven’t been able to talk about the good things that we have been doing.

“If our leadership can’t do that at this stage, well then, we should be thinking about the leadership of our respective parties.”

Labor has largely shied away from commenting on what social media has labelled Turnbull’s “bonk ban” and has instead maintained pressure on Joyce over whether he abused his position or public office during his new relationship.

But the public war of words between Joyce and Turnbull opened up a new line of attack for the opposition leader, Bill Shorten, who on Friday reiterated calls for Joyce to be sacked.

“It’s never been his private life which we have been commenting about, it’s the use of his office, it’s the use of public privilege for private gain,” he said from Melbourne.

“It’s the awarding of better paid jobs. It’s giving mates government contracts through the departments that are administered by the minister. Mr Turnbull knows what the problem is.

“For the sake of our democratic system, for the sake of the Australian people, it’s time to sack Barnaby Joyce.”

The Treasurer, Scott Morrison, was sent out late on Friday afternoon in an attempt to hose down the escalating tensions between the Coalition leaders, claiming it was an attempt to “set standards as leaders like that occurs in other parts of the economy”.

“Let’s look at it, let’s take a step back, what the prime minister said yesterday was not a reflection on the National party or anything like that, what the prime minister did yesterday was say Australian political standards have to rise, it has to match what is happening elsewhere,” he told Sky.

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“These are standards in 2018 that should be in Australian politics and as he said yesterday they probably should have been there for a while, and he is the first prime minister to actually front up to that, own it and say this is my standard.”

The minister Kelly O’Dwyer was sent to ABC radio to declare there is “no crisis” and, despite Joyce confirming the relationship needed work during his news conference, she said there was no rift between the leaders.

Turnbull leaves for the US early next week, and Joyce is slated for personal leave at the same time.

Both leaders are expected to meet publicly at the parliamentary sitting later this month, when Labor MPs are likely to prosecute the issue further in Senate estimates hearings.