The Liberal party must govern from the “sensible centre” and reject populist or reactionary politics, Malcolm Turnbull has said.

In comments to the party’s Victorian state council meeting in Melbourne on Saturday, Turnbull invoked Australia’s longest-serving prime minister, Robert Menzies, as the model for centrist Liberal governments.

The comments give comfort to moderate Liberal MPs and send a message that the party cannot be ruled only by the conservative wing.

However, it is unclear the extent to which Turnbull believes the party already occupies the “sensible centre” or if the speech is designed to mark a new course for his government, which inherited its positions on marriage equality and climate change from his conservative predecessor, Tony Abbott.

“[Menzies] knew that the future was in the sensible centre of Australian politics – not reactionary, but Liberal, proudly Liberal,” Turnbull said.

“But above all you build from the centre, bringing people together – and that is our commitment.”



In further comments from the speech reported by the Sunday Telegraph, Turnbull is said to have urged the party to reject populism and “the authoritarianism of both [the] left and right”.

“We reject the populism of Bill Shorten just as Menzies rejected populism in his era.”

Labor argues that Turnbull’s government is controlled by the conservative wing, as Turnbull has ruled out an emissions intensity scheme, a market mechanism to fight climate change, and has backed a national plebiscite to legalise equal marriage rather than hold a free vote, despite the Senate blocking the plebiscite plan.

This week the Turnbull attempted unsuccessfully to amend laws prohibiting racially discriminatory speech by replacing the prohibitions on “offending, insulting or humiliating” speech with a ban on speech that “harasses” people based on race.

Labor argues the reform puts the government out of step with mainstream multicultural Australia, and even the deputy prime minister, Barnaby Joyce, has said that the pursuit reforming section 18C should not be a priority for the government.

On Sunday Liberal MP Tim Wilson spoke approvingly of Turnbull’s speech, which he said “gave a clear Liberal vision for the 21st century: that we are defined by our values, but govern through the mainstream, sensible centre”.

“The prime minister has clearly rejected reactionary politics that leaves us to merely slow the harmful Labor/Greens vision for Australia,” he told Guardian Australia.

“Our enduring commitment to freedom comes from our trust in Australians, families and communities over Canberra.”

In comments to Guardian Australia in December Liberal senator, Dean Smith, a marriage equality advocate, has argued can reflect Australians’ conservative instincts without being “reactionary”, because Australians can embrace change “on their own terms and in their own time” when the case for change is made.

“Anyone that says to me, or advocates, that they want time to stand still or to go back into time … I treat with great caution,” he said.