I still think about those awful events in mid-September 2015 and the cruel fate which should never have befallen our 28th prime minister. Many will recall Tony Abbott’s poignant words during his final press conference in the top job, when he said, ‘I have rendered all, and I am proud of my service.’ So many Australians wish he’d had the opportunity to render more. Despite his tenure being unfairly cut short, it constitutes one of the finest contributions of Australian prime ministers in the modern era.

If Robert Menzies built the Liberal broad church and John Howard consolidated it, then Tony Abbott reinforced its relevance as a much-needed antidote to the chaos of a new era. In celebrating the 10th anniversary this month of the election of the Abbott government, I want to reflect on three characteristics of our 28th prime minister: The builder, the soldier and the thinker.

The builder

I describe Tony Abbott as a ‘builder’ because builders know what they want to create, and Tony had a clear vision for the government he wanted to build. In his 2013 campaign speech, Tony said, ‘Government’s job is rarely to tell people what to do; mostly, it’s to make it easier for people to make their own choices.’ ‘My vision for Australia,’ he went on to say, ‘is not that Big Brother government knows best; it’s that our country will best flourish when all of our citizens, individually and collectively, have the best chance to be their best selves.’ It was classic Abbott. During a dinner to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the National Press Club in 2014, Tony said, ‘The last thing people should want is someone else – even a prime minister – ​​dictating their lives and their dreams for them.’ How relevant is that today. He went on to say: ‘My vision for Australia is a country where every person is better able to realise his ​or her own vision.’

Indeed, 20 years earlier, in 1994, during his contest for preselection in Warringah, he said, ‘I believe in limited government and unlimited opportunity.’ We know Tony is a man of deep faith, but he is also a man who has deep faith in our country and our people. In his maiden speech in the House, he declared that, ‘We Australians are a great people with a great destiny.’ Tony made this remark because he possesses another quality of ‘the builder’ – he understands the ground he is working on. He understands our history and the modern Australian achievement. As he said, ‘Our Australian story should fill our hearts with pride and our eyes with tears. It is a story of the dispossessed and the outcast, redeemed through the innate goodness of humanity – a society challenged by nature, tested by war, enlarged by other cultures and blessed by such peace, prosperity and tolerance that we are now the envy of the earth.’ The third aspect of ‘the builder’, is that Tony set about doing much-needed repair work. He not only repaired the Liberal party after it tore itself apart following the 2007 election. Tony also repaired our country after the wrecking ball which was the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd era. He led a government that said what it meant – and meant what it said.

The soldier

What made Tony such an effective policymaker, parliamentarian, and leader was his willingness to be on the frontline in the battle of ideas – a soldier. Tony was a leader who uttered his convictions with absolute courage. He wasn’t afraid to go against the prevailing winds. He didn’t ‘live in fear of tomorrow’s headline’ or the vitriol of social media keyboard warriors. Naturally, he came from an Oxford boxing Blue.

Now, there were those in the commentariat who criticised Tony for his sayings, we’ve heard some of them tonight:‘Stop the boats’, ‘End the waste’, ‘Axe the tax’.

The point is, of course,that they weren’t just slogans.They were statements which encapsulated liberal-conservative principles and values.And most importantly, they were policies which delivered human dividends.

Tony Abbott thwarted the people smugglers, he prevented further deaths at sea, and he restored integrity to our migration program. Tony Abbott saved families, he saved them from a bad economic experience under Labor. He revived market confidence in repealing the carbon tax and the mining tax and he delivered the lowest small business taxes in 50 years. Tony Abbott unlocked national prosperity with much-needed budget repair, with three free trade agreements, with new infrastructure ventures, and by creating new jobs. He began the rebuild of our defence force, which had been handled so poorly by Labor to have the lowest level of spending in defence since 1938. That single decision, bearing in mind the period that we live in today and what we may face over the next decade, may become Tony’s most enduring legacy to this country.

In short, Tony Abbott course-corrected our country. The ‘soldier’ Tony Abbott was never one to command from the officers’ quarters behind the lines. He was there in the mud and dirt of the political trenches. He was the first to go over the top knowing his objective – and that is leadership.

The thinker

What made Tony a first-class leader was that he is a first-class thinker, one of the most intelligent people we could ever meet.In October 2014, Tony delivered the Sir Henry Parkes Oration. It may not be the most memorable speech of his prime ministership, but it is certainly one of the most masterful.

Tony pondered the difficult issue of federation reform and posed the question, ‘Are we prepared to have a rational discussion about who does what?’ On display were Tony’s sense of reason and his ability to make his audience reflect. Tony often said that as a journalist he was a frustrated politician; that as a politician he was, of course, a frustrated journalist; and that as a trainee priest, he was just frustrated! On show in that oration was a brilliant journalistic and political mind. On show was a man who believed it was the ‘solemn duty’ of all parliamentarians to ‘leave behind a greater nation’.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott had that wonderful ability to play gracefully with ideas, and he still does. Whether he is podcasting with the equally perceptive Peta Credlin. Whether he’s penning a piece for the Australian or The Speccie. Or whether he’s being interrogated by Sarah Ferguson.

Today, along with Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Warren Mundine, we owe much gratitude to Tony for his eloquent prosecution of the No case ahead of this referendum.

Tony, as we know, has achieved a very significant amount in a relatively short period of time. He calls me from time to time – not most days but every other day – with an idea about how he may re-enter the Parliament. He still has a burning passion to contribute to public life. I don’t think his days are over, but I believe very strongly that he, as a respected former prime minister, continues to grow each and every day in the public’s mind. Tony Abbott is a person of class and distinction. He is a great Liberal. All of us who were a part of the Abbott government should continue to be incredibly proud.

We are a strong party and we rebuild day by day because we look to the example of Tony Abbott and some of his predecessors. We can do it provided that we are a confident centre-right party with policies which reflect our Liberal values which are also, as I say, necessarily different from those of Labor. And provided we each play our part in being builders, soldiers and thinkers.