Australia news live: Ley urges Liberals to accept Farrer loss to One Nation with ‘humility’, saying ‘voters never get it wrong’

Some more on the statement from Sussan Ley, who resigned as member for Farrer after she was dumped as opposition leader.

double quotation markServing the people of Farrer for 25 years, having been endorsed by locals at nine elections, was the privilege of my professional life. I know David (Farley) will feel that same sense of honour and responsibility.

Until tonight, at every one of 30 elections since 1949, through difficult and challenging circumstances, it has been held without exception by the Liberal and National parties. It would be an error to reduce both the scale and significance of tonight’s defeat to a Coalition split which occurred months ago, or to misattribute it to the date the vote was held.

I urge the Liberal leadership to accept this result with humility because the voters never get it wrong. On the day the leadership spilled in February, the new leaders said the Liberal Party needed to ‘change or die’. Three months later, the result in Farrer demonstrates that statement to be far truer today than it ever was then.