Sussan Ley has just been bailed up at the launch of the K-Mart Christmas Giving Tree appeal at parliament. Here is what she had to say about the Nationals decision:

Well, I always said that the Nationals would come to their decision in their party room and the Liberals would similarly come to our decision in our party room. But our joint energy working group has done an incredibly sound job up until this point in time, it’s continuing, and we can look forward to a Liberal Party energy position and then a coming together as a Coalition.

Q: Is it disappointing they’ve gazumped that joint energy group that’s been working for so long on this?

Ley:

Not at all. They’re entitled – as their own party – to arrive at their own position. And David Littleproud made that clear yesterday. And we had a very convivial conversation about next steps in a process.

I’m looking forward to the work that will happen between now and the Liberal Party’s position becoming known, and then us sitting down together as two mature parties developing something that takes the fight up to the Labor Party. Because while a lot of your questions are about process and personnel, for me it is really about one thing and that is the train wreck energy policy of this government.

The fact that we’ve just seen the Kmart wishing tree – in my home state of New South Wales, half of all people are going to experience financial stress this Christmas. One of the reasons is because electricity prices have gone up 40 percent.

So we need a government that is backing in our people with affordable, reliable energy and that’s clearly not the case.