Tony Abbott hangs on despite swing as he reflects on 'dumping' from top job
Former Prime Minister Tony Abbott has won his Sydney seat of Warringah, seeing off a challenge from the ALP's Andrew Woodward despite a nine per cent swing against him.
With more than half of the vote counted in the north Sydney electorate, Abbott is a certainty to retain with 62.08 per cent of the two party preferred result ahead of Woodward's 37.92 per cent.
Despite winning comfortably before preferences Abbott suffered an almost double digit swing against him in the safe Liberal seat.
The former PM has so far secured just over 32,000 votes. Woodward was the closest contender but still trailed by about 20,000 votes on first preference.
Independent candidate and television personality James Mathison's challenge to Mr Abbott failed to gain traction, with just 7,857 giving him their first preference.
The result comes after Abbott likened being dumped from his party's leadership to losing a spot on a football team, as he discussed the “different campaign” he would have ran had he still been leading the Coalition.
In a 7 News exclusive interview with broadcaster Alan Jones, Abbott said that every career had to end at some point, and drew on his early sporting life for an analogy.
“I’ve played in a lot of footy teams over the years,” he said. “From time to time, I’ve been dropped from first grade to second grade. You’ve just got to accept the selectors’ verdict, play as well as you can, and see what the future holds.”
"Every political career ends. And most political careers end in disappointment, one way or another. John Howard is now lauded as the greatest living Liberal. But that's not how people felt on the night of the election in 2007 when he lost his seat."
Abbott said if he was still in charge he would have focused on the savings mandate he attempted to introduce in 2014.
"My thinking back in September last year was that we should seek a mandate for serious savings," he said.
"That we should have another look at the measures that were blocked in the Senate and very overtly and explicitly and right up front go to the people and say, 'if we are going to have long term budget responsibility we need to embrace these difficult but necessary decisions'.”
The interview excerpt aired exclusively on Channel 7’s Sunrise on Saturday morning as voting booths opened around the country.
After Abbott was overthrown from the helm by Turnbull, he defended his position and remained adamant that he would have won the election if he was still in charge.
New research begs to differ, however, showing that Labor would win by a landslide against an Abbott-led Coalition.
When asked if he was hoping to be invited to join the frontbench of the new government pending a Turnbull win, Abbott said the decision was “entirely a matter for the Prime Minister”.
“I haven’t asked for it, I’m not expecting it, I’m hoping to be the member for Warringah after the election. There’s plenty of things I can do,” he said.
Earlier this week, Abbott criticised Turnbull’s lack of focus “big issues” such as national and border security.
The full interview will air on the 7 News special election broadcast from 5pm.
News break – July 2
