Former defense minister Peter Dutton is set to become leader of the Liberal Party with former environment minister Sussan Ley as his deputy.
Both MPs are expected to stand unopposed for their posts when the Liberals meet in Parliament in Canberra on Monday.
Queensland Liberal MP Stuart Robert said on Monday morning the couple would be elected by the party hall.
“Peter Dutton will be the chef and Sussan Ley will be sworn in by the village hall without contest,” he told Nine’s Today.
“(I’m) super happy with the party room and the management team we’re bringing.”
Ms Ley and Mr Dutton both entered the Federal Parliament in 2001 when they were elected to represent Farrer’s NSW regional seat and Dickson’s suburban Brisbane electorate respectively.
Mr Dutton has taken up the challenge of Labor candidate Ali France to retain Dickson in this year’s federal election.
He is set to become the first Queenslander to lead the Liberals and has pledged to reunite the party after it lost up to 20 seats.
The election wipe cost former federal treasurer and deputy Liberal Party leader Josh Frydenberg – who had often been seen as Scott Morrison’s natural successor – his Kooyong seat.
After becoming the party’s next leader and confirming he would stand for the job, Mr Dutton sought to reposition himself in the minds of voters.
The former police officer said Australians would regard him as a badass because of the portfolios he had held in the coalition government, including home affairs and more recently defence.
“Most people have only seen this side of me,” he wrote on Facebook.
“I hope that now, leaving such difficult portfolios, Australian audiences can see the rest of my character. The side that my family, friends and colleagues see.
Queensland LNP Senator Gerard Rennick told media waiting in Parliament on Monday morning that “Peter is a very nice guy, he is very polite”.
“I think a lot of the image has actually been portrayed by people on the left…I think the image that he has to kind of soften, I don’t think it’s really just the everything,” he said.
Outgoing Home Secretary Karen Andrews said Mr Dutton was ‘the only person who can lead us into the future’.
Ms Andrews said she believed Mr Dutton and Ms Ley would be a ‘great team’ who could help the Liberals win back the six seats they lost to ‘teal’ independents on May 21.
“I think what you will see from the new management is that they will be very involved in the community. We’re already starting to see that behind the scenes,” she said.
Former North Sydney MP Trent Zimmerman, who lost his seat due to the teal wave, said the Liberal opposition should support Labour’s short-term emissions reduction target of 43% by 2030.
“The opposition…must recognize that having a sensible approach to climate change has to be at the top of the list,” he told ABC radio.
“I think that would be the sensible thing to do. I think that’s the democratic thing to do. And I think it would be an important signal that the Liberal Party recognized that climate change was a factor in so many seats. »
The Nationals will hold a separate ballot for leadership when they meet in the village hall on Monday, as the party usually does after an election.
Nationals deputy leader David Littleproud and Victorian MP Darren Chester are both expected to challenge Barnaby Joyce for the top job.