In some parts of the media and, indeed, of the Liberal Party, the issue of quotas for women continues to distract a wounded party in the wake of the federal election result.

The usual commentators seem to think getting more women elected is the solution to the Liberal Party’s woes. That underplays the challenge of the party getting anyone elected to Parliament. Moreover, it would be folly for a party to take advice from those who are never likely to vote for them.

Within the party, Charlotte Mortlock, founder of Hilma’s Network, has been doing the rounds of late, advocating for the party to adopt quotas for women. Her network aims to encourage and empower liberal-minded women; a worthy aim and one for which she should be congratulated. But encouraging women and mandating a quota for their preselection are two entirely different things.

Advocating for quotas is a confused position and one that is ultimately at odds with a core and explicit Liberal value. ‘Equal opportunity for all Australians’ is central to the Liberal philosophy and, really, is the antidote to the poison of identity politics that advocates instead for equality of outcome.

The trouble with quotas is that if they are diligently applied, sooner or later they will do what they’re designed to do and discriminate against someone on the basis of his or her gender. It’s simply a matter of logic and mathematics. That’s not equality of opportunity. No amount of huffing and puffing about getting more women into Parliament will get around the inherent discrimination. Then again, maybe it’s okay if it’s against a male. Especially if they’re pale and stale also…

Essentially, adopting quotas is to misdiagnose the problem. The problem for the Liberals at the previous election was not a lack of female candidates, it was a poorly run campaign that lacked conviction, changed policy on the run, and one which generally didn’t differentiate itself enough from Labor.

The evidence that voters are turned off from the Liberal Party because of a lack of women is flimsy, at best. Voters returned a Labor government with both a male leader and a male deputy leader. Tim Wilson won back the seat of Goldstein, defeating the female incumbent, yet in the neighbouring electorate, Amelia Hamer narrowly lost in Kooyong. Voting on the basis of gender might be important for a minority of voters but clearly it’s far more complex than that for the majority.

Well-formulated policies that address the key issues affecting the electorate, preselecting quality candidates of merit, and having the courage of conviction to argue the case in the face of inevitable fear campaigns seems like a simple but winning formula. Merit is not a dirty word. Dare I say it, the Liberal party needs to make merit great again.

If quotas were adopted by the Liberals, it’s easy to imagine a scenario where they would be abandoned for a male candidate of merit. The electorate of Kooyong provides a telling example. Former Treasurer and member for Kooyong, Josh Frydenberg, widely regarded as a future leader of the party, should he choose a comeback, would surely be favoured over a female candidate simply because of his experience and credentials. In the end, shouldn’t that be the paramount consideration – selecting someone who has the best chance of winning?

The idea that the Liberal Party must adhere to the modern doctrine of reflecting or ‘looking like’ their community is to give in to the superficial and, ultimately, deranging and dangerous politics of identity. Do people really vote for a candidate on the basis of his or her gender, much less, their skin colour, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, or any other infinite permutation of the foregoing? No, by and large, they don’t.

Admittedly, there are those who vote for someone purely because they like the look of them, or simply on the basis of the vibe. Peter Dutton suffered unfairly from his looks and perception, greatly played on by an effective scare campaign. Incidentally, it’s wearing more than a little thin that the left continues to get away with such personal criticism. More than anything, voters just want politicians they think can get on with the business of running the country. You know, those they perceive to have competence, merit.

They certainly won’t reward a party that doesn’t know what it stands for, or doesn’t have the courage to make the case for its values. And the values of Menzies’ Liberal Party are as sound and relevant today as they were when it was founded. Small government, individual freedom, free enterprise, and equality of opportunity. A party that neither believes there is any reason to preclude a person from parliament simply because she is a woman but nor does it believe that being a woman confers a special right to be there. That is, equality of opportunity.

Quite simply, a party that adopts quotas is a party that is Liberal in name only.