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Flat White

CPAC: our chance to fight bad ideas, not each other

4 October 2022

4:00 AM

4 October 2022

4:00 AM

Bundjalung, Gumbaynggirr, Yuin, and Australian man Nyunggai Warren Mundine emerged at the weekend leading what is likely to become the most important political movement in Australia.

As someone from a tribal culture, who better as chairman of the Conservative Political Action Conference than Mundine to bring the disparate and sometimes warring tribes of Australian conservatism together?

Imagine the media coverage if a ‘First Nations’ person ended up leading a movement of Australia’s socialist and cultural Marxist tribes. He, she, or ‘they’ would be feted.

But don’t expect the Woke-left to celebrate this ‘First Nations’ man’s success. They prescribe only one acceptable political course for indigenous people. Sound racist? It is.

From humble beginnings and surviving vicious attacks from the political and media establishment, CPAC at the weekend showed it has arrived on the Australian political scene, drawing one thousand people from throughout the nation.

Where Cory Bernardi failed with his Australian Conservatives political party, CPAC may well succeed as an umbrella for conservative minor parties, advocacy groups, think tanks, and those fighting the good fight within the Liberal Party.

In a world gone nuts, it was a chance for mainstream people to certify their sanity.

There is no climate crisis, there are only two genders, speech must be free, globalist totalitarianism resisted, budgets balanced and other ‘far right’ ideas were discussed over two days at Sydney’s International Convention Centre.

From overseas guests like Brexit architect Nigel Farage to former Queensland Liberal National Party Senator Amanda Stoker, the message was clear.

Conservatives must speak up.

‘Conservative cowardice’, the failure of the Morrison government to address the indoctrination of children through the Woke national curriculum, and the Coalition’s embrace of the economic suicide note that is Net Zero were identified as issues for urgent remedy.

When an urbane and measured statesman like former Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson is warning ‘the time is short’ for Australia, alarm bells should be ringing.


‘We need urgently to rediscover the model of servant leadership that Queen Elizabeth showed,’ Anderson said in a pre-recorded video message to CPAC.

‘We need to rediscover citizenship. We can’t leave it to others. The time is too late for the indulgence of cynicism.’

And this is exactly what Mundine and his ‘slave’ Andrew Cooper, a key driver of CPAC Australia, are providing.

That’s why it was disappointing to see some in the crowd boo former Senator Nick Minchin when he said the Liberal Party did not need to change.

Minchin, whose conservative credentials are impeccable, may not have been at all the sessions.

Concern about the Liberal Party’s ability as a group unit to fight for the family, against the climate cult, and for free speech was high in the audience.

Example after example of ‘conservative cowardice’ (Nigel Farage’s phrase) and Liberal ‘bedwetting’ (Sky News Australia’s Rowan Dean) was highlighted all weekend.

While obviously appreciative of the brave Liberal voices at CPAC – Amanda Stoker, Senator Matt Canavan, Senator Alex Antic, Menzies Research Institute head Nick Cater, and former Liberal candidate Mundine himself, frustration with the Liberal Party as an institution was at boiling point.

While Minchin rightly meant the Liberals’ values did not need to change, the audience heard him say ‘the Liberal Party did not need to change’.

Everyone in the room knew that the Liberal Party, as a group, no longer fights its values – for the things Canavan, Stoker, and Antic are fighting for.

The crowd had been geed up by One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts, who gave a passionate but partisan address criticising CPAC for being ‘LPAC’ – the ‘L’ standing for Liberal.

That was unfair given the wide range of conservatives given a platform at CPAC, including Roberts’ NSW Upper House compatriot from One Nation Mark Latham.

Conservatives booing conservatives is not a good look and it would be a disaster for CPAC Australia under Mundine’s leadership to die at birth.

Everyone knows the Woke-left has invaded every sphere of Australian society including the Liberal Party.

Just as the Liberals at CPAC put forward their view that the best way to fight back is to join the Liberals, Roberts and other minor party players are just as entitled to encourage people to join their parties.

Personally, I believe a both/and strategy is needed. Sadly, Labor is so far down the Woke path it is irredeemable anytime soon.

As we saw at CPAC, the Liberals still have conservative fighters in their ranks. They may be marginalised, but they are there and they must be supported.

The cause must be the cause.

But while ever Liberal Premiers and party leaders are not sustaining a public fight for the conservative values the nation needs, there will be minor parties from the centre-right like One Nation, Family First, Liberal Democrats, and others.

The beauty of Mundine’s project is he brought the tribes together so conservatives could see over two glorious days that we are not alone and there is far more that unites us than divides us.

The overriding theme of CPAC Australia 2022 was that conservatives need to start fighting.

Just not each other.

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