Generally Tony Abbott's words have shed little light on how he would govern in practical terms (by design, no doubt) but in today's speech at the Institute of Public Affairs, Abbott's view is clear: he stands with Andrew Bolt, Alan Jones, Gina Rinehart and the big media proprietors against any form of media regulation.
The speech is a stale collection of bogey-words and phrases ("thought police", "political correctness enforcement agency"); false equivalences ("If it's all right for David Marr to upset conservative Christians, why is it not all right for Bolt to upset activist Aborigines?"); and straw-man arguments against media regulations which haven't even been proposed.
Abbott uses 'free speech' as his banner to march under. In Australia, strictly speaking, there is no such thing. The right to free speech is limited by laws against religious, sexual and racial vilification, for instance. And relevant to the Bolt case, which seems to animate Abbott in particular, free speech does not include publishing lies that racially offend, as was found to be the case by the court.
But this is mere detail, right?