Andrew Hastie has announced that he is pulling out of the Liberal leadership race.
It comes just a day after he met with powerbrokers including conservative rival Angus Taylor at Senator James Paterson’s home in Melbourne.
In a statement released on Friday afternoon, Hastie, 43, said ‘having consulted with colleagues over the past week and respecting their honest feedback to me, it is clear that I do not have the support needed to become leader of the Liberal Party.
‘On this basis, I wish to make it clear I will not be contesting the leadership of the Liberal Party.
‘Australia faces massive issues. I have made it my single focus to campaign on critical issues including immigration and energy and I have no intention of stopping that.
‘Right now, we have a Prime Minister who is leading us into a national decline where both our security and economic prosperity have been compromised.
‘That compromise and failure of our Prime Minister is having a real impact on families right across Australia.
‘I believe that those families and our country are best served by a strong Coalition government, and I will work every day to make my party the very best version of itself. I won’t be making any further statements on this matter.’
Senior Liberal MP Andrew Hastie (pictured) has pulled out of the Liberal leadership race
Opposition Leader Sussan Ley’s rivals, Hastie and Angus Taylor held a secret breakfast meeting on Thursday morning, held in Melbourne hours before a colleague’s funeral.
The pair met to discuss the future of the Liberal leadership at the newly purchased $2.5million home of Ley loyalist, Senator James Paterson.
It is not clear if Paterson was acting as peacemaker, powerbroker or kingmaker with his presence.
He told ABC Radio National on Thursday: ‘You can assume that I continue to support Sussan’.
The breakfast summit added fresh fuel to speculation about an imminent Liberal leadership showdown and came just hours before the memorial service for former MP Dr Katie Allen.
Ley flew to Melbourne with a cluster of senior allies on Thursday to farewell Dr Allen, a paediatrician and Higgins MP, who died last month after she was diagnosed with a rare cancer.
Before the service, The Australian newspaper captured photos of Hastie, a former SAS captain and WA MP, arriving at Paterson’s home accompanied by Opposition home affairs spokesman Jonathon Duniam and WA Senator Matt O’Sullivan.
Taylor, the defence spokesman and former energy minister, arrived alone around 40 minutes later.
Hastie and Liberal MP Angus Taylor had met on Thursday to discuss the future of their party’s leadership, with rumours swirling around a possible contest against Sussan Ley
With Hastie pulling out of a potential leadership race on Friday, attention turns to whether Taylor could gather support to contest Ley’s position.
The state of play in the Liberal Party
Conservatives have previously been firmly in Camp Hastie, but several moderates insist they ‘won’t touch him’.
Taylor supporters had said those floating votes were theirs for the taking.
Hastie’s biggest handicap was said to be his record on Baby Priya’s Law.
Many Liberals remain uneasy about his past criticism of the legislation which guarantees paid parental leave for parents of stillborn or deceased infants.
Senator Jane Hume – a key voice in the leadership debate – was especially scathing, publicly expressing her horror that colleagues like Hastie had politicised the issue.
There was also growing anxiety that elevating Hastie would hand Labor a ready‑made culture‑war attack line, a re‑run of the abortion scare campaign deployed against David Crisafulli and Queensland’s LNP in 2024.
Despite her moderate pedigree, Hume hasn’t ruled out backing an alternative to Ley.
Angus Taylor (pictured) is pitching himself as a more ‘traditional’ conservative leader
Speaking to Sky News on Thursday, she said that while she supported Ley’s handling of the Bondi Beach terror attack, the Opposition Leader had ‘failed to cut through’ and turn it into meaningful voter support.
Moderate figures remain largely behind Ley, believing she may avoid a challenge altogether if her opponents continue to fight over who should run.
While they concede the party’s polling has slipped under her leadership, they argue that another round of instability would only accelerate the slide toward irrelevance.
However Ley’s critics argue the party’s position is so dire, any change would be better than the status quo.
Skeptics caution that Taylor may not be the saviour some imagine, and dumping the first woman to lead the Liberal Party could spark a backlash far worse than the current internal unrest.
Taylor’s critics say he may not ‘stick the landing’ if he takes the leadership, and could further erode female support for the party.
His backers are from the party’s traditional conservative wing, including NSW Senator Jess Collins and Cook MP Simon Kennedy – seen as Howard-era conservatives, in contrast to Hastie’s populist style, which Taylor’s camp has argued can also appeal to moderates.
Deputy Leader Ted O’Brien is publicly brushing off the drama, declaring he doesn’t expect any challenge when Parliament resumes next week.
‘I don’t think it’s going to happen,’ he told Sky News on Thursday.
O’Brien said colleagues had praised Ley for her ‘strength and dignity’ in handling Labor’s hate speech laws in parliament and the fallout with the National Party that split the Coalition.
