Ley Leadership Under Scrutiny as Approval Drops, Hastie Speculation Emerges
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Opposition Leader Sussan Ley faces mounting pressure following a poll showing her approval rating has fallen to 30% compared to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s 40%, with speculation about a potential leadership challenge from Shadow Home Affairs Minister Andrew Hastie surfacing just one day after the Liberal Party finalized its contentious climate policy position.
The Australian newspaper reported Monday on internal discussions about replacing Ley, the Member for Farrer in New South Wales, with Hastie, the Member for Canning in Western Australia who also serves as Shadow Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, though coalition partner Nationals declined to weigh in on what they characterized as internal Liberal Party matters.
Nationals leader David Littleproud, the Member for Maranoa in Queensland who serves as Shadow Minister for Agriculture, deflected questions about Ley’s leadership tenure during a Sky News AM Agenda interview Monday, saying his party does not offer opinions on Liberal internal processes.
“I don’t enter into giving gratuitous advice on the Liberal Party,” Littleproud said. “I wouldn’t expect them to give gratuitous advice on the National Party. They’re their own sovereign party and they’ll have their own processes and work through.”
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The leadership speculation arrives at a particularly vulnerable moment for Ley, who navigated the coalition through a tortuous six-month internal debate over climate policy that culminated over the weekend with the Liberal and National parties agreeing to abandon the net zero 2050 emissions target.
That process, which generated significant media attention and raised questions about coalition unity, appears to have damaged Ley’s standing with voters according to polling conducted during the final week of climate policy deliberations from Monday through Thursday.
Littleproud suggested the polling results reflected the difficult process rather than the final policy outcomes, characterizing the week as one marked by uncertainty and public disagreement before the coalition reached its eventual position.
“I think it’s a reflection of the process that the Liberal Party was going through that week,” he said. “There was a lot of noise, a lot of commentary, a lot of colour and movement that the Liberal Party had to go through to get to their finalised position.”
When pressed on whether Ley deserved to remain as leader after steering the party through the climate policy negotiations, Littleproud again declined to offer direct support, instead praising her role in allowing the Nationals time to develop their position.
“Sussan’s brought her party,” he said. “She gave us the time and space to work through our processes.”
The Nationals leader emphasized that his party would support whoever leads the Liberal Party, citing the century-long coalition partnership between the two parties as enduring regardless of individual leaders.
“No matter who leads the Liberal Party, that they’ll have our support and we’ll be working hard with them to win the next election,” Littleproud said.
However, Littleproud’s careful avoidance of explicitly endorsing Ley’s continued leadership may itself signal coalition concerns about her electoral viability, particularly as the next federal election approaches within the coming months.
The leadership speculation comes amid broader coalition messaging challenges, with reports that some members want to shift public focus to migration policy rather than sustaining emphasis on the newly announced climate position.
Sky News host raised concerns that the coalition appeared unable to maintain unified messaging even one day after finalizing its climate policy, noting that migration discussions were already displacing energy and emissions coverage.
Littleproud defended the coalition’s right to present multiple policy alternatives across different areas, pushing back against suggestions that discussing migration represents a distraction from climate messaging.
“Why shouldn’t we come forward with alternative policies?” he said. “For too long we get criticised for not having policies, and then when we do, we’re talking about too many of them.”
The Nationals leader insisted the coalition would maintain “ruthless and relentless” focus on energy and climate policy while simultaneously developing migration reform proposals, describing both issues as legitimate areas for opposition policy development.
Ley’s vulnerability reflects broader Liberal Party challenges in metropolitan constituencies, particularly around Sydney where the party now holds just three seats in areas that historically represented coalition heartland.
Hastie, a former Special Air Service officer who entered parliament in 2015, represents a Western Australian seat and brings national security credentials that could differentiate him from Ley’s profile, though leadership transitions always carry political risks for opposition parties seeking to build momentum ahead of elections.
The Liberal Party has no formal mechanism for leadership challenges outside of party room meetings, meaning any transition would require either Ley’s resignation or a spill motion that could generate additional negative coverage and internal division.
Littleproud’s comments suggest the Nationals would accept either outcome, focusing instead on maintaining coalition unity and developing policy alternatives across multiple portfolios rather than involving themselves in Liberal leadership questions.
The polling damage to Ley’s approval rating comes despite her successfully navigating the coalition to a climate policy position after six months of negotiations, suggesting that the process itself may have undermined her leadership standing even as it produced the desired policy outcome.
Opposition parties historically struggle to maintain high approval ratings when governing parties hold power, making Ley’s 30% approval not necessarily catastrophic but concerning when compared to Albanese’s 40% rating, which provides the Prime Minister with a 10-percentage-point advantage.
The leadership speculation and polling results create additional pressure for Ley to demonstrate electoral competitiveness through effective prosecution of government vulnerabilities on cost of living, energy prices, and other issues where the coalition believes it can gain political advantage.
Littleproud’s refusal to explicitly endorse Ley while also declining to support her removal reflects the delicate position of coalition partners who must balance party sovereignty with collaborative governance requirements.
The Nationals leader’s emphasis on working with “whoever leads the Liberal Party” may provide Ley with some reassurance that a leadership change would not destabilize the broader coalition arrangement, though it offers little direct support for her continued tenure.
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