Outspoken Liberal senator Cory Bernardi has been accused of disrupting the government's agenda by seeking to water down the racial discrimination law.
However, the conservative senator believes nothing derails the government more than losing a vote in the House of Representatives.
The government suffered three defeats in parliament late on Thursday in the absence of some coalition members, the first time it has happened to a majority government in more than 50 years.
The debacle ended three chaotic days - the first sitting since the July 2 election.
"So I'm not going to suspend what's important to the Liberal party in favour of those people who can't even control the Liberal party in the lower house," Senator Bernardi told Sky News on Sunday.
Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese was manager of government business under the minority Gillard Labor government and never suffered such a humiliating defeat in the parliament.
"They couldn't survive three days, they lost control of the house," he said.
"It appeared that they disliked each other so much with their internals, they were racing for the door to get out of there."
He believes Malcolm Turnbull's coalition government could have as little as a year to run after last week's parliamentary performance.
"If Malcolm Turnbull thinks he is going to be defeated within his party room, then he will think about going to the people, rather than having what occurred to Tony Abbott happen to him," Mr Albanese said.
Senator Bernardi said his push to water down section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act isn't a proxy for changing the party's leadership but an opportunity for the Liberal party to reconnect with its base.
He has so far managed to secure the backing for change from all Liberal members in the Senate bar one.
Manager of opposition business Tony Burke said had Labor won the final motion seeking parliament's endorsement of a banking royal commission, it would have challenged the government's legitimacy.
House leader Christopher Pyne had referred to the fact the Menzies government had been defeated three times on the House of Representatives floor - enough to justify a government being terminated.
"If you've got a situation where both houses have resolved to do something, and the government doesn't take it to the governor-general, in those circumstances, you got a pretty big question over the extent to which the government is in fact holding the confidence of the parliament," he told ABC TV.
