‘You are always better the second time around’: former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott hints at ambition to return

Australia’s former prime Minister Tony Abbott on Tuesday hinted he still held leadership ambitions as his replacement struggles to turn around the government’s disastrous opinion polling.

Abbott dropped the hint while launching a book by a former bitter political opponent Pauline Hanson, who leads the anti-Islam, anti-immigration and pro-President Donald Trump minor party, One Nation.

Hanson was voted out of Parliament after a single three-year term in 1998. But the pair have put their animosity behind them since Hanson was elected to the Senate in 2016.

Abbott, who remains a government lawmaker outside the cabinet, praised One Nation’s three senators for helping the ruling conservative coalition pass legislation through the upper chamber where the government does not hold a majority of seats.

“If I may say so Pauline, adversity has made you a better, deeper person, and you are certainly confirmation of that old adage that you are always better the second time around,” Abbott told the book launch.

Asked later if the same adage applied to him, Abbott replied: “That’s an entirely hypothetical question and I couldn’t possibly comment.”