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Former prime minister Tony Abbott has lashed the "sneaky, underhanded" leaking of polling data that suggested he was set to lose his seat of Warringah in the 2016 election - until Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull intervened. And Mr Abbott has effectively confirmed the authenticity of the polling data, while saying that just three people had access to the information at the time - himself, Mr Turnbull and campaign boss Tony Nutt. The Australian Financial Review reported on Thursday that, 10 days before the July 2 election, the Liberal Party polled 400 people in Mr Abbott's seat and found he could lose his seat to independent James Mathison, Labor or Nick Xenophon Team candidate Marie Rowland. The worst case scenario suggested by the polling was that Mr Abbott could lose to Labor by 57 per cent to 43 per cent - prompting Mr Turnbull and the Liberal Party to step in with a robocall to voters in the seat and a mail-out to households. In the end, Mr Abbott won Warringah with 61.5 per cent of the two-candidate-preferred vote, a decline of 4 per cent. The leaking of the polling data has reignited tensions in the Liberal Party and raised questions about who, nine months later, subsequently gained access to the polling data and leaked it to damage Mr Abbott. On Thursday, Mr Abbott told the Nine Network he had always known "it was going to be a tough campaign in Warringah, we weren't complacent, we never are, we got a good result". "I do want to make this point: the sneaky, underhand business of leaking needs to stop, it really does need to stop. It is absolutely corrosive of trust," he said. "The polling in question was very, very closely held. I had it, Tony Nutt had it, the Prime Minister had it and I'm just very disappointed that someone has chosen to put it out there for self-serving reasons. "We had a very strong local campaign, a very strong local campaign against a very, very strong field of challenges and in the end we got a great result and I'm grateful to everyone from the Prime Minister down for their efforts." Defence Industry Minister Christopher Pyne said Mr Turnbull had been very popular during the 2016 election campaign and that "I'm not surprised he was used extensively in the Warringah campaign". The polling was "old news, it's from last July" and people should move on, he added. "Malcolm Turnbull was saving all of our seats, as he was a very popular figure … he would have been very popular in that particular part of Sydney." Follow us on Facebook Follow James Massola on Facebook

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