Australia’s Main Opposition Party Ousts Leader on Poll Slump

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(Bloomberg) — Australia’s main opposition party elected former defense spokesman Angus Taylor as its new leader, dumping Sussan Ley just nine months after the Liberal party’s electoral rout and following further sharp declines in opinion polls.

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Liberal Party lawmakers in Canberra installed Taylor as their new leader on Friday by a vote of 34-17, according to Aaron Violi, the chief whip. The Liberal Party is the senior partner in the center-right coalition, making its leader the head of the opposition. The other member is the rural-based National party.

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Since the ruling Labor party’s sweeping re-election victory last May, the center-right opposition has been dogged by internal dissent, with the coalition collapsing and reforming twice and its support falling below that of the insurgent, hard-right One Nation Party.

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In his first comments after taking over the job, Taylor painted a grim picture of the challenge confronting the center-right alliance that has has governed Australia for almost two-thirds of the period since World War II.

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“I won’t mince words — the Liberal Party is in the worst position it has been since it was founded in 1944,” Taylor said after the vote. “If an election was held today our party may not exist by the end of it.”

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He pledged a manifesto to “restore our standard of living and protect our way of life,” saying he would make it easier for younger Australians to buy a home, without detailing any policies. He also called for an immigration policy that “puts the interests of Australians first and puts Australian values at the center” of the program.

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Taylor, who was accompanied by his new deputy, Senator Jane Hume, also called for lower taxes, an end to the “net zero” energy policy of the Labor government and said he aimed to create an environment where business would drive growth.

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The new Liberal leader spoke after his predecessor, the deposed Sussan Ley, told reporters she would be resigning from parliament in coming weeks, setting up a by-election that will be an early test of the new Liberal leadership.

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Hume was elected deputy after she defeated Ted O’Brien, who had served as Ley’s No. 2.

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Taylor, 59, is a former consultant at McKinsey & Co. and a Rhodes scholar with degrees in economics and law — although economics was his preferred pursuit. He is generally viewed as supporting conventional center-right economic policies of smaller government and pro-business policies.

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Still, he has also been subject to ridicule in the past. In 2019, Taylor was the talk of social media after he replied to his own Facebook post about his efforts to increase car parks at a train station in his electorate.

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“Fantastic. Great move. Well done Angus,” he wrote from his MP Facebook account on his own post.

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“Well done Angus” subsequently went viral in Australia.

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(Updates with Sussan Ley’s resignation and comments from Angus Taylor. An earlier version of this story was corrected.)

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