MARK RILEY: Matt Canavan may be the Nationals’ last chance to avoid political extinction

Matt Canavan is the coal crusader with solar panels on his roof.

He is the former Marxist who now preaches from the book of hyper-nationalist conservatism.

He is the committed Christian who wants to green-light off-colour jokes around the barbie.

Matt Canavan is the former Productivity Commission economist who now supports forgoing $7 billion in tax revenue a year on income splitting.

He is the former chief of staff to Barnaby Joyce, who now wants to drive a staff into the populist voter base Joyce has stolen from his old party.

He is the nomadic backbencher who has crossed the floor against his party’s positions on so many occasions he has worn a groove in the carpet but now promises to not only toe the party line but nail his feet to it.

Matt Canavan is a political enigma.

And he is exactly the person the Nationals need to prevent them from following the dinosaurs into extinction.

That is not overstating the enormity of what Australia’s party of agrarian conservatism is confronting.

The Nationals are facing an electoral emergency.

They had to break the glass.

When they did, Matt Canavan emerged.

David Littleproud told Australia on Tuesday that he was “buggered” as Nationals leader.

And he was right. In more than one way.

He was physically tired. That was obvious. And he was also tired of leading.

But his leadership was also “buggered” in another sense.

And only he was the cause of that.

Littleproud’s erraticism since the election had detonated two catastrophic bust-ups with the Liberals that had turned both parties into electoral laughing stocks.

Country voters had stuck with the Nationals through thick and thin, but even they couldn’t back a party suffering from the political version of mad cow disease.

They watched in bemusement as Littleproud threw open the farm gates of the Nationals’ heartland and allowed Pauline Hanson and One Nation to merrily storm in.

Littleproud blamed everyone except himself for his decision to stand down this week.

But here’s the truth of the matter.

He had led the Nationals to the edge of a cliff. They were staring into the abyss.

The latest polling for the by-election in Sussan Ley’s former seat of Farrer has the Nationals at just 5 per cent. One Nation is leading at 29 per cent.

That is almost six times the Nationals’ support — in the seat once the kingdom of former Nationals leader Tim Fischer.

That is beyond disastrous. And that is why David Littleproud was really buggered.

There is a delicious irony, though, in that Littleproud’s downfall has been brought about by the by-election for the Liberal leader whose own downfall he accelerated.

Stepping down just weeks before that perilous vote, though, was one heck of a hospital pass for Canavan.

Having your party’s backside dragged through the electoral mud isn’t the friendliest of welcomes.

Littleproud should have remained leader until after the Farrer by-election, taken his lumps and then stood down.

That would have been the honourable thing to do.

Many may think this unfair. But what are we to make of a politician who says he is “too buggered” to lead, but apparently not too buggered to stay on as member for one of the country’s largest electorates and not too buggered to seek a frontbench role for himself under the new leadership?

One thing he did bugger up is the party’s standing. That is now something for Canavan to correct.

The indications thus far are good.

Canavan has narrowed his sights directly onto Hanson and his old boss, Joyce.

They might lead One Nation but he’s offering a “hyper-Australianism” that will trump that. Or, maybe, Donald Trump it.

His Coalition arrangement with Angus Taylor will be based on the traditional division of responsibilities adapted to suit a contemporary electoral landscape of disillusionment and intolerance.

Canavan will fiercely express the Nationals’ ideological independence to win back conservative voters in the bush while Taylor prosecutes centre-right solutions in the cities to encourage a return of the Liberals’ urban electoral base.

“Sometimes we’ll disagree,” Canavan conceded.

“But the main thing is to talk and communicate.”

There is much for them to talk about. Particularly on policy. The Coalition hasn’t had much of that — at least not in a formal sense — since throwing it all up in the air after the election disaster.

Now is the time to rebuild, realign and announce those new positions in a detailed, orderly way.

Voters are, for the time being, listening to the coal crusader with solar panels and the farm boy turned management consultant, wondering what makes them tick.

They should use this time wisely to tell them.

Mark Riley is the Seven Network’s political editor