Opposition Leader Sussan Ley and her deputy, Ted O’Brien. Ley wants to attract more women to her side of parliament. Photo Sussan Ley Facebook.
New Liberal leader Sussan Ley wants to lead a party with more women and fewer captain’s calls than was the case under her predecessor, Peter Dutton.
Addressing the media after her party room win on Tuesday (13 May), Ms Ley said there were many take-home lessons to be had from the recent federal election that massively reduced the Coalition’s representation in parliament.
One of them was the need to appeal to more female voters and to attract more women to the party’s ranks.
“I want to say right here and now we need more women in our party,” she said.
“We need more women in the organisation, and we need more women in this party room.
“Had we done better at the last election, we would have outstanding women in the party room.
“Our fortunes when it comes to electoral defeat, unfortunately, mean we lose strong women.”
She is not entertaining any notion that her election as the first woman to lead the federal Liberal Party is a characteristic of the ‘glass cliff’ in which women are placed in top jobs only when there’s little hope of them succeeding.
“I don’t accept that,” Ms Ley said.
“I do say it sends a signal to the women of Australia that the Liberal Party has elected its first woman leader, but my agenda is much more than that.
“It’s about connecting with women and listening to where we went wrong.
“I will say one of the hallmarks of my style as deputy leader and work in parliament for the time I have been here has always been consultation and a strong work ethic, but always listening carefully to what people say.”
On that point, the new leader stressed she would not be surprising her colleagues with captain’s calls and policy-on-the-run.
Those tactics were a hallmark of Mr Dutton’s leadership, with policy positions announced without even his shadow ministry being aware beforehand.
That practice led to a number of backflips and apologies during the election campaign and ultimately contributed largely to a poorly run campaign.
“I will say this – my shadow cabinet will include people who did support me in this room this morning, and people who did not,” Ms Ley said.
“[There will be] no captain’s calls. We would work through every single policy issue, canvass the different views, and take the time to get it right.
“You might hear me saying, ‘take the time to get it right’ quite a lot … because that’s really important.
“Unsurprisingly, in our party, there are many different views, and we will listen and we will take the positions that we need to at the appropriate time.”
While she insists there is no one reason why Australia rejected the Coalition at the 3 May federal election, Ms Ley agreed that a loud message had been delivered to the party.
“There were reasons that each of us individually will reflect on because of the conversations we’ve had,” she said.
“I don’t want to say there was a particular one, two or three reasons, but when I say that we have to meet modern Australia where they are, I think that gives some sense of the listening that we need to do.”
Meanwhile, Anthony Albanese held his first meeting with his new frontbench, telling his ministers it was important for the government to “repay the faith and trust” that had been placed in it with the re-election for a second term.
“What’s clear is that we represent the largest caucus of Labor members in Australian history since federation,” the Prime Minister said.
“And that’s because of the discipline and focus that we showed in our first term. We had a clear plan.
“We set about focusing on the issues that were close to people.
“We understood that we governed in really difficult global economic times and we were focused on cost-of-living relief whilst getting that downward pressure on inflation, whilst continuing to provide better services in health, in education.
“Dealing with the decade of neglect when it comes to climate change and the decade of neglect when it comes to building housing and increasing housing supply.
“We put forward a positive agenda in the election campaign. Our job is to go through every single one of our commitments and deliver on them.”
Original Article published by Chris Johnson on Region Canberra.
