Cory Bernardi insists he is not leaving the Liberal party but says he is intent on establishing a grassroots nationwide movement to unite disaffected conservative voters.



Bernardi told Guardian Australia on Wednesday he was not defecting but was focused on building an organisational movement, Australian Conservatives, in parallel with his parliamentary activity.

“My intention is to make the Liberal party stronger,” he said.

Given the febrile atmosphere inside the Coalition since the weekend election rebuff, the outspoken South Australian senator kicked off a flurry of speculation about a departure from the Liberals on Wednesday by publishing a new blog post declaring his intention to formalise a broad conservative moment “to help change politics and to give common sense a united voice.”

“The Australian people have spoken and basically said that neither side of politics is doing a good enough job to secure their trust. Accordingly they have parked their vote with minor parties and independents,” Bernardi said in his new blog.

“As of writing, over 1.7m votes were cast for right-of-centre or conservative parties rather than the Liberal party. From my perspective, that was the Liberal base expressing their unhappiness with past events.”

“Irrespective of the final election result, the clear mission now is to bring people together for the good of the country. That is going to take the formalisation of a broad conservative movement to help change politics and to give common sense a united voice.”

Bernardi called on disaffected conservative voters to register their interest at a website he has established: www.conservatives.org.au

On Sunday, Bernardi clearly telegraphed his intentions to rebuild conservatism, telling Guardian Australia a conservative revolution was required within the Liberal party to reset the broad policy direction “and if we don’t do that we’ve got a taste of the revolution waiting for us outside”.

“I’m saddened it’s come to this but I’ve tried to make clear the consequences of abandoning our core philosophy in favour of self-interest,” he said Sunday. “You can only kick people in the face so many times.”

Bernardi’s Conservative Leadership Foundation reregistered a number of domain names relating to a Conservative party in December 2014, including conservative.org.au, conservativeparty.com.au and conservativeparty.org.au.

In June, Bernardi told Guardian Australia the conservative party domains were first registered in 2009. “The party [domain] was registered back when the [Liberal] party was embroiled in ETS debate and there was a very real view it might split,” he said.

“[It] has just been updated over the years … Always good to keep things updated. [It] prevents other using them for negative purposes.”

“Some chap in Sydney is claiming to have started the Conservative party. Why would I allow him to use it to damage Liberals?”

According to a Fairfax Media report, Bernardi has had arm’s-length discussions with “preference whisperer” Glenn Druery about forming a conservative party.

Bernardi denies this.

Druery told Guardian Australia he hadn’t spoken to Bernardi or his office. He would not confirm or deny discussions with Bernardi’s associates and other conservative Liberals about the possibility of a new party.

Druery said: “I am aware that there is enormous discontent and dissatisfaction in the right of the Liberal party, blind Freddie can see that.”

“There is a group of conservatives who have been considering their future for a long time; the ascension of Malcolm Turnbull and the federal election result has consolidated their position.”

Asked why conservatives would countenance the move before the Coalition had confirmed it could govern with a stable majority, Druery said “for some individuals and groups, in my opinion, their social and religious convictions are more important than loyalty to political parties”.

“This could simply be a massive shot across the bows – for Malcolm Turnbull to pull back on many progressive, or so called progressive, reforms.

“I don’t know what they will do. It could be that this amounts to nothing apart from a warning.

“It could be that this is just posturing and deals are done behind the scenes to pull away from same-sex marriage and the plebiscite.

“Malcolm Turnbull is stuck between a conservative rock and progressive stone, he’s damned if does [such deals] and damned if he doesn’t.”