THE review of the Liberal’s Party’s 2025 federal election defeat has painted a grim picture overall, but makes positive mention of Flinders MP Zoe McKenzie’s performance defeating independent Ben Smith.
The confidential review, commissioned by the federal executive of the Liberal Party and authored by retired Liberal MPs Pru Goward and Nick Minchin, has been obtained by The News.
The report did not hold back, with the authors stating “Our recommendations cannot be put on the back burner or implemented over the course of five years. The party’s survival requires urgency, determination and unity”.
Submitters contributed numerous concerns including “about the Party’s future, particularly the fear the Party might collapse or disappear”.
The report had a heavy emphasis on the Liberal Party’s fear of Climate 200-backed independents they refer to as “Teals”.
The report mentioned words relating to “Teal” 56 times, far more than words relating to “Labor” which sat at 35 times.
Recommendation 13 of the report was that the “Teal” movement needs to be confronted head-on in electorates they contest.
“The Party needs the best possible intelligence on Teal candidates – their backgrounds, policies, previous statements etc – so that individual electorates can communicate the facts about Teal candidates to voters,” the report stated.
“Liberal campaigning in seats held or contested by Teal candidates must start as early as possible and emphasise community engagement.
“The best Liberal candidates in these seats will be the ones with the highest level of long-term community engagement.”
The report positively highlighted McKenzie’s result, among others, against “Teals” stating “Victorian Dan Tehan successfully fought off a Teal challenge in the rural seat of Wannon, as did Leon Rebello in McPherson, Ben Small in Forrest, Zoe McKenzie in Flinders and Angie Bell in Moncrieff, but these are a few bright spots in an otherwise gloomy outlook”.
McKenzie’s margin in the electorate fell from 6.7% before the 2025 poll to 2.3% after facing a well organised and well funded independent campaign from Smith. The CEO of Mornington Community Support Centre ended up second in the count, pipping Labor after a three-way complex count process, with McKenzie ultimately prevailing.
The report levelled criticism at Peter Dutton’s lack of appeal to voters and control over the campaign.
Recommendation one of the findings was “The Party must never again allow the Parliamentary Leader and Office to effectively run the campaign. Just as you should never be your own barrister in a court of law, the Parliamentary Leader must never be his own campaign director”.
On a personal level, the report stated that Peter Dutton “lacked appeal, especially to women, but his image was never successfully remade or addressed” and that “Careless remarks, such as Make Australia Great Again, and the creation of a shadow portfolio for government efficiency, reinforced the similarity with the US President”.
Addressing Labor, the report recommended the assembly of a “Red Team”; a group of experienced people to anticipate ALP campaign initiatives and responses to proposed Liberal initiatives and policies.
The report concluded that “The 2025 Federal Liberal campaign failure is widely considered to be the worst campaign the Party has ever fought. It was the result of an extraordinary combination of internal errors by the Parliamentary Party and the Party’s organisation, compounded by several adverse external factors”.
First published in the Mornington News – 10 March 2026
