It took just nine months for the Liberal Party to turn on its first female leader. After months of internal agitation and sliding polls, a spill motion was called and by the end of it, Susan Lee was out replaced by a man many Conservatives had wanted all along, Angus Taylor.
It is the greatest honor of my life to be elected as the leader of the Liberal Party.
Taylor, a former energy minister and standard bearer for the party's right, has promised discipline, economic clarity, and a return to what he calls call liberal values, where culture wars aren't a distraction, they're the strategy.
Our nation must be defended because our history, our culture, our values are worth celebrating and defending.
For some, it's a reset. For others, it's a signal that internal battles are far from over. I'm Daniel James and you're listening to seven am today Political editor us dot com dot areu samanthemated and how the spill unfolded. Whether this puts the coalition in a stronger position than it was at the start of the week. It's that day, February fourteen, Sam, thanks so much for joining us. Many will see this as another moderate liberal woman being forced
out of the parliament by conservative men. How will that play, especially with female voters.
Look, I think it absolutely depends on the color of your stripes. So there will absolutely be probably people from the left and particularly people in the Labor Party and maybe even in the left of the Liberal Party. I think we call them moderates these days, who will think that she didn't get a fair go. But obviously people in the Liberal Party and the more conservative strain of that party, they assert that this is not about a
gender at all. It is about performs and about merit, and it is about values according to them as well, because they just don't think that Susan Lee was basically conservative enough that she didn't represent their values, and that is why they argue that there's been this movement towards one nation.
So they argue that she's.
Not strong enough, she's not right wing enough, and that was why she went down in flames. And of course there's been this interesting side show which has been either organic and or organized depending on who you believe, that you've had this absolute role call of women lining up to attack Susan Lee. So they used to use that term handbag hit squad which is obviously rather pejorative. But if bag hit squads exist, there's been a really gnali one in the Liberal Party this week.
The Liberal Party is crying out for change. We're at a critical juncture right now, Susan Lee. Now I know that the best days for our country and for the Liberal Party are ahead of us.
Hard work starts today to make sure that we.
We just couldn't go on like this time is of the essence.
We are in a critical moment right now.
We are losing members.
I can't tell you.
What have you been hearing from Angus Taylor's supporters were broughtly in terms of what they think he can bring to the leadership that Susan Lee wasn't able to bring well.
Strength for a start, And I think that it's quite possible that Angus Taylor will enjoy a lot more loyalty and less disunity than Susan Lee has experienced, because there's almost this sense now of having you know, created a lot of buzz and a lot of agro around the scenes that people are now sort of saying, oh, right, we've got to put that all back in the box now. Now we've got to behave ourselves because we've got a new leader, so I think that they think that Angus
Taylor will be a conservative. That's where he comes from in the party. He's already held a press conference on Friday where he's been talking about a crackdown on immigration.
We'll stand for an immigration policy that puts the interests of Australians first and puts Australian values at the center of that policy. If someone doesn't subscribe to our core beliefs, the door must be shut.
And of course he wants to get on the front foot in relation to income taxes as well, so he's acknowledged that that was a big stuff up at the last election of going to an election with higher taxes than the Labor Party.
I'm particularly conscious that we got some big calls wrong, especially on personal income tax and it won't.
Happen again now.
Obviously there's a whole story about what went on behind the scenes with that, and he argues that he was pushing Peter Dutton to do more. But the bottom line is that's what happened when he was in charge of the Treasury portfolio of the Liberal Party, and he's accepted that that was a big stuff up and he says it's not going to happen again.
When we look at Taylor's pitch during his speech on Friday, did it come across to you as though it was different enough from what Peter Dutton took to the last election.
Look, I think that there are definitely similarities, Like, there's no doubt about that. Interestingly, I think that if you actually have a look at the people that worked most closely with Peter Dutton, whether it is Angst Taylor or indeed Andrew Hasty, there were some real differences of opinion there.
You know.
I mean, I think that it's almost a bit counterintuitive because Peter Dutton looks like this big burley Queensland copper. But I think a lot of people thought that he wasn't brave enough. You know that he talked the talk when it came to being conservative, but he didn't always
walk the walk. And you know, I mean they find it sort of absolutely astonishing that they went to an election with this bizarre policy of not embracing income tax cuts but having sort of this temporary, you know, fuel excise tax cut in there, whatever you want to say to it at the time. I think that the proof is in the election it didn't work and they really want to go back to core values for the Liberal.
Party, which is always going to be about.
Lower taxes, home ownership and sometimes about a pretty tough approach to immigration.
Talking of immigration, Tony Abbott was quick to pop his head up on morning television once the spill had been declared.
He is going to restore Australian stand of living and he is going to protect the Australian way of life.
Anger Sturing. His speech seemed to be singing from the same hymn book.
The first priority of the Liberal Party now under my leadership will be to restore our standard of living and protect our way of life.
So my question is can we expect a newly energized to salt when it comes to the culture wars from the coalition, particularly when it comes to immigration.
Well, I think we can expect more flags.
I'm reliably informed that Susan Lee had four of them behind our last week, and Angus Taylor and Jane him had six, So that's a two flag upgrade there that they had. Once again, it depends on where you sit in this debate. For conservatives, they believe that the values debate is quite important right and they always have and I think that they always will. So whether that's about education where they have a big culture war about back to basics, literacy and unracy, getting what they regard as
you know, dodgy lefty propaganda, possibly involving Bluey. I'm being a bit facetious, but you know, like this is a real thing. There is quite a good deal of evidence that culture wars sometimes can really work.
John Howard. There's a lot of culture wars over.
The times, and a lot of them were pretty successful politically, and conservatives would argue that it goes beyond the raw politics of you know, electoral arithmetic. I mean they think that these things are important that if you're going to be the government, you want to change the country, and so you've got to have your values front and center.
Coming up the mountain Angus needs to climb to save his own party. Sam Angus Taylor has been around for a while, but not many people would know a great deal about him. So what is it about his track record that we should know as he takes the leadership of the Liberal Party.
Well, he does look like the liberal MP from Central Casting, you know, I mean, he's got the arm. Williams he's got that kind of regional rural background.
He went to a boarding school.
He probably has a Cocca Spaniel or a Labrador. I have a Coccer Spaniel, so I'm not being disparaging of people with Cocka Spaniels. I like Cocka Spaniels a great deal. But he went off to Sydney University. I think he studied law there. He was a Rhodes scholar, so he's obviously good at some form of sport and forgive me, I don't even know which one it was. And then he's gone off to a British university and I think he did a master's in philosophy, so he's not stupid.
Although Malcolm Turnbull rather unkindly, stay very unkindly, described Hi as an idiot.
He's always here to help Malcolm.
Yeah, he's always here to help.
And Malcolm basically said, which was probably his most brutal attack that he said that Rhodes scholarships are a dime a dozen, anyone can get them.
A lot of people say about Angus Taylor is he is the best qualified idiot they've ever met. I mean, this is a tough thing to say, but what they're saying is this guy's got all these degrees. He's got all of these qualifications. Is Rhodes Scholet Mind you, there are a dime a dozen Look at me and Tony Abbott.
So his wife is a barrister. She's super interesting. They've got four children.
You know, they live a life that is both in the city, in Sydney, but in regional Australia as well. He's obviously made a bit of money over his time. I mean, I don't think he's a bazillionaire, but he's not short of a a quid either, And you know, I think that you never know, it could turn out to be more interesting than people are suspecting.
Now that he's later, his task is to appeal to city voters to win back women, young people, while also having to keep the nationals happy and fend off a stampeding one nation in the regions. Some of that might be possible, Sam, But is all of it possible?
Well, I guess we're going to find out.
I mean, you'd have to sort of suppose that given the enormous majority that the Prime Minister has that that would be pretty difficult to peg back in one election. That said, I mean, we didn't really expect what happened to happen in this election, Like it's a pretty surprising thing that I've never seen before, the idea that you can be on a primary vote with the three in front of it and end up with a majority like that.
So there's some wild sort of things going on. I suspect that angers could be a little bit more likable than people suspect. You know, Angus Taylor is clearly like a gen X person, right, and those sort of male gen X voters, they're exactly the ones that are going to one nation.
Now.
I don't think necessarily that he fits that bill because he's obviously quite a wealthy, middle class, highly educated individual with did I mention a very interesting wife, So he doesn't necessarily fit that bill. But I think that he's you know, he's a younger generation of leaders than we've had in the past. To be fair, Peter Dutton was also gen xer, but you know, different generation to Tony Abbott and obviously a different generation to John Howard.
Finally, Sam we started the week with a split coalition and Susan Lee as the leader of the Liberal Party. Now the Libs and the Nats are back together and Nagus Taylor is in charge. Does all of that put them in a better or worse spot than they started the week with?
Look, I think at one hundred percent puts them in a better spot. Like, I don't have any doubt of that. They've got a new team. They're going to get an enormous amount of free meat out of that. You're going to have Jane Him Angus Taylor on all the programs. There's going to be spreads in the newspaper. It's going to be a new Dawn. How long that new door will last for, I don't know. But I also suspect that Angus Taylor is going to be more sympatico with
David Little Proud. I mean, I think that David Little Proud gave Susan Lee a really rough time, not a lot of loyalty at all. And you know, I mean like the poor woman, like you know, I mean literally her I always remember that her mother had literally died, and David Little Prowd's giving these interviews going.
Well, I mean, you know, I try to be really sensitive.
I went around like her mother's died, so you know, went to the town where she lived, like her mother has died.
Anyway, I just need to make it clear to the listener that that wasn't actually David Little Proud speaking. It was just you're doing an impersonation of David Little Prowd.
Sorry, that's right, you know, but it was just like, oh my god, this poor woman. And then she's been trying to sort of hold this crew together. She has been really undermined. It has been really tough. And you know, for I don't usually say this, but you know, she's on the old pension scheme. She's been in parliament for twenty five years. I can't help but think, my god, she's earned it. She has earned having a massively outrageous parliamentary pension and going off into the sunset and hanging
out with their grandchildren. Now that to one side, yes, I do think that the Liberal Party is in a better place. I think they're going to get a lot of free media. I think that there is obviously the opportunity in that to make mistakes and go on Sunrise, gone to GB and say something stupid. I did enjoy,
not that I'm all suggesting it was stupid. Jane Hume saying at the press conference, which was asked about migration that not only some of her best friends, but in fact her partner is Greek and her brother in Lawa's Chinese.
My partner is Greek, my brother in LAWA is Chinese. Of course, it's part of all Australians. So when we say we want to talk to all Australians, that includes everybody.
We are not discriminating one section or another. That's what other parties do, what we do.
So there could be more exciting thrills and spills of that nature from Jane Hume because she sometimes says interesting things and sometimes you'd have to say.
Rather ill advised things.
But bottom line is yes, I think that they are absolutely in a better place at the end of the week than they were and I think that Angus Taylor will probably enjoy more loyalty than Susan Lee ever did.
Sam fantastic, great move, well done and thanks for joining us.
Thank you, it has been a big week.
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