Assassinated American activist Charlie Kirk has been lionised at the opening of a major conservative conference in Brisbane which has attracted Australia’s leading names on the political right.

In her first high-profile appearance since being dumped as opposition defence spokeswoman, Jacinta Nampijinpa Price began by referencing the slain MAGA influencer.

“To the family of Charlie Kirk, you have my respect and the respect of the audience today,” she said to robust applause at the CPAC forum.

CPAC attracted a number of the nation’s better known conservative figures. Photo: AAP 

“Let me hear you roar for Charlie and for freedom of speech.”

Kirk, a close ally of US President Donald Trump, was fatally shot at a university event in Utah last week.

He was well known across internet communities favoured by young conservative males.

Senator Bridget McKenzie also cited Kirk in her address, while fellow Nationals senator Matt Canavan told the audience he’d in fact personally invited Kirk to Brisbane for CPAC.

Senator Bridget McKenzie quoted Charlie Kirk during her speech. Photo: AAP

Former prime minister Tony Abbott took to the stage to apologise for his 2013 government’s failure to live up to expectations, lamenting Labour’s latest election win and drawing a line through net zero.

Australia’s commitment the absolute emissions reduction target “has to be dropped and the sooner the better”, he told the audience.

“Every time we have fought an election on climate and energy …. we have succeeded but every time we’ve simply mirrored Labor’s position, we’ve done badly, Abbott said.

“We have got to be against it.”

Abbott said he wanted to apologise for heading a government that should have been as good as his predecessor’s but instead of more of John Howard, the electorate got “Malcolm Fraser revisited”.

The sooner net zero is dispensed with the better, Tony Abbott told the CPAC forum. Photo: AAP

Putting forward his own reasons for the coalition’s disastrous 43-seat 2025 election tally, he argued that Peter Dutton failed to adequately campaign on his pro-nuclear policy.

“We did not campaign against Labor’s unrealised capital gains tax policy or wealth tax,” he added.

“Instead … we made the election a contest over who could give the biggest handout, a contest which the coalition is always bound to lose.”

Abbott urged his party to abandon “factional warlords” during a reformation as conservatives worry about bleeding voters to fringe far-right parties like One Nation.

Senator Price called for the Liberals to “prosecute the need for a profound cultural shift”, including against mass migration.

“I believe the Liberals can win public support to substantially lower migration,” Senator Price said.

“We just need to make families the focus of the migration debate.”

CPAC chair Warren Mundine, who has previously failed at Liberal pre-selection, called for conservative groups to band together to defeat progressive politics by preferencing and supporting each other.

Senator McKenzie said conservative parties had to “stop fighting amongst ourselves”.

“We tend to just bag each other out … the stakes are too high.”

CPAC director Andrew Cooper even floated the idea of a broad coalition that included One Nation so conservatives don’t “squabble over scraps, but form a vision where … one day we’ll be back in government”.

“That could involve, for example, a Liberal National coalition, and in the Senate, also a coalition with say One Nation,” he said to a cheering crowd.

“We need to unite, the conservative brand at the moment is in dire need of revival.”

—AAP