Liberals can rule again if they take a simple lesson from their defeat – but Taylor’s Trumpian plan strays from the light | Tom McIlroy

Taylor painted a grim picture of migration that fits more with his tenuous political position than the state of the country Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast When copies of the Liberal party’s review into Peter Dutton’s election defeat started being passed around in Canberra earlier this year, journalists could hardly believe what they were reading. Page after page detailed where the Coalition had gone badly wrong, in often blunt and headline-worthy language. It was not surprising Dutton and Liberal elders tried to keep the document secret. “The party’s capacity to thoughtlessly offend groups, including the Chinese, was … a widespread problem,” the review said on page 36. A few paragraphs down, a quote from a submission said campaigning to win multicultural voters was critical, and, “we will never be back in government until we understand it”. Almost as soon as the opposition leader, Angus Taylor, started talking about immigration this week, it felt as though he had ignored the review’s warnings and was bound to repeat some of Dutton’s mistakes. In trying to stop the tide of Coalition voters moving across to Pauline Hanson’s One Natio