Sussan Ley has emerged as the new leader of the Liberal Party.
She won the ballot for the leadership against her main challenger, Angus Taylor.
Ley becomes the first female leader of the Liberal Party and first female Opposition Leader in Australian history.
So, who is Sussan Ley?
Early life
Ley was born in 1961 in Nigeria, where her father was working for British intelligence agency MI6. Her family moved to a farm near Toowoomba when she was 13.
She told The Australian in 2015 that she had added an extra ‘s’ to her first name in her late teens, based on a “numerology theory that if you add the numbers that match the letters in your name you can change your personality.”
After school, she got her pilot’s licence, and worked on sheep and cattle farms. Later on, she earned qualifications in economics, tax, and accounting.
Politics
Ley has been in Federal Parliament since 2001, representing the south-west NSW regional seat of Farrer.
Farrer is a large electorate bordering Victoria and South Australia, taking in towns including Albury, Griffith, and Deniliquin.
In 2001, she narrowly won the seat in a tight contest against the National Party.
In her first speech to the House of Representatives, she identified the “growing communication gap between the city and country” as a key issue, vowing to bridge it through stronger connections.
Ley climbed through the Liberal Party ranks after John Howard’s 2007 election defeat.
She served in various shadow portfolios including housing, women, and Assistant Treasurer during the Rudd-Gillard years.
When the Coalition won office in 2013, Ley was initially appointed as Assistant Education Minister in then-Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s government.
Minister
In 2014, Ley became the second woman to join Abbott’s cabinet when she was promoted to Health Minister.
At the time, the only other female cabinet minister was Deputy Liberal Leader Julie Bishop.
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She remained within the senior ministerial ranks throughout most of Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull, and Scott Morrison’s tenures.
Her last role in the Federal Government was Environment Minister between 2019 and 2022.
Controversy
In 2017, Ley stepped down as Health Minister in the Turnbull Government after she bought a nearly $800,000 property on the Gold Coast during a taxpayer-funded trip.
At the time, she said it was an impulse buy. A finance department review found she had used a government car to attend an auction.
Ley paid back more than $5,200 in invoices for the trip and “other travel that she felt might be considered more personal in nature”.
Deputy leader
After the Coalition’s 2022 election defeat, Ley became Deputy Liberal Leader under Peter Dutton.
She also took on the shadow portfolios of women, skills, training, and small business.
Ley has spent the past few years advocating for an open economy with fewer regulations.
She’s also supported more female representation in the Liberal Party, telling TDA in January she wanted to see “more women preselected”.
Leader
The Coalition saw a landslide defeat at last Saturday’s election, with leader Peter Dutton losing his own Brisbane-based seat.
Ley nominated to become leader, saying “women and younger Australians feel neglected by the Liberal Party,” promising to bring renewal to her party’s diminished ranks.
She won the leadership ballot against her main challenger, Angus Taylor, who was the Shadow Treasurer in the last Parliament.
Ley won the Liberal leadership ballot 29 votes to 25. As part of the Coalition agreement, she will become leader of the Opposition, the first ever woman to do so.
While Julia Gillard was Australia’s first female Prime Minister and leader of a federal party, she was never the Opposition Leader.
Ley’s deputy is Queensland-based MP Ted O’Brien, who previously held the shadow climate and energy portfolio.
He was largely tasked with promoting the Coalition’s nuclear policy in the run up to polling day.
