Abbott, Bishop to fight together to defeat leadership spill

"The first point to make is that they are perfectly entitled to call for this, but the next point to make is that they are asking the party room to vote out the people that the electorate voted in in September 2013.

"I want to make this very simple point. We are not the Labor party and we are not going to repeat the chaos and the instability of the Labor years.

"So I have spoken to deputy leader Julie Bishop and we will stand together in urging the party room to defeat this particular motion and in doing so, in defeating this motion, to vote in favor of the stability and the team that the people voted for at the election.

"We have a strong plan. It's the strong plan that I enunciated at the Press Club this week and we are determined to get on with it and we will."

After three federal MPs insisted Abbott did not have their full backing earlier in the week, the prime minister's statement on Friday led to a flurry of support from Liberal party members.

Assistant treasurer Josh Frydenberg said "it doesn't make sense to go down this path," while Tasmanian MP Andrew Nikolic said a spill "repeats the sort of behaviors that the Australian people explicitly repudiated at the 2013 election."