Former senator Hollie Hughes has gone on a verbal rampage to defend Opposition leader Sussan Ley, accusing “the boys” who want her job of using prominent female colleagues in their efforts to undermine her.

Hughes this week resigned from the Liberal Party, saying as she no longer had the ability to support Ley in the party room, she believed she could best support her from outside the party.

She lashed out at Ley’s critics. “To be honest, I threw up in my mouth a little bit when I saw that big right-wing conservative group walking into the net zero meeting together [on Wednesday last week].

"And they shove [forward] three women, one who no one’s ever heard of, and two who are being used, quite frankly, by the boys who want a challenge but don’t have the gumption to go out and say anything themselves.

"So [they] are pushing Sarah and Jacinta out there to make these undermining comments to Sussan and I just, I think it’s disgusting.”

The three women who headed the conservative group going into the meeting were Sarah Henderson, Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Jessica Collins. Angus Taylor and Andrew Hastie, who both aspire to the leadership, were directly behind them.

Hughes is a long time friend of Ley. She is also a fierce opponent of Taylor, who successfully promoted Collins in a NSW preselection battle before the last election. Hughes was relegated to an unwinnable position on the Liberal Senate ticket.

Price hit back at the suggestion she was being used,

“It’s always been the argument by raging lefties […] that I can’t think for myself, that I have to be used by others,” she said.

“Just because we were walking down the hallway, in front of our colleagues, somehow we’re being used”. It was a “ridiculous notion,” she said, adding that Hughes was “clearly bitter”.

Ley described Hughes as “a dear friend” but sought to avoid being drawn further into the controversy.

Meanwhile Ley, while on a round of selling the opposition’s energy policy, is continuing to try to get ahead of her critics by flagging positions on other issues. She has said she will soon release an immigration policy. On Thursday she will deliver an address on defence.