A war of words has broken out between Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and his predecessor, Tony Abbott.
Mr Turnbull blamed Mr Abbott for his government's poor poll ratings at the weekend.
The Australian's latest Newspoll showed his coalition trailing Labor by 10 percentage points.
Last week, Mr Abbott hit out at the government, warning it was drifting to defeat at the next election.
He said conservatives would desert the Liberal-National Coalition for the One Nation party unless it shunted to the right.
Mr Turnbull said the "sad" comments were designed to hurt the government.
- ABC