Sussan Penelope Ley (; born 14 December 1961) is an Australian retired politician who served as the leader of the Opposition from 2025 to 2026, holding office as the 16th leader of the Liberal Party. She was the member of Parliament (MP) for the New South Wales division of Farrer from 2001 to 2026, and served as a minister in the Abbott, Turnbull, and Morrison governments.
Born into an English family in Nigeria, Ley grew up in the Trucial States (now the United Arab Emirates) and England, before moving to Australia as a teenager. Prior to entering politics, she worked as a commercial pilot, farmer and public servant based in Albury. She was elected to the House of Representatives at the 2001 federal election, winning the regional New South Wales seat of Farrer. Ley was appointed parliamentary secretary by John Howard in 2004, serving until the Coalition's defeat at the 2007 election. After the election, she held positions in the Nelson, Turnbull, and Abbott shadow ministries.
After the Liberal–National Coalition's victory at the 2013 election, Ley was appointed Assistant Minister for Education by Tony Abbott, later joining the cabinet in 2014 as Minister for Health and Minister for Sport. She continued to serve in the cabinet until January 2017, resigning amid a scandal regarding her travel expenses. She would return to the ministry in August 2018 after Scott Morrison succeeded Malcolm Turnbull as prime minister, becoming an assistant minister and later returning to cabinet in 2019 as Minister for the Environment, remaining in this position until the Coalition's defeat at the 2022 election.
Ley was elected unopposed as deputy leader of the Liberal Party under Peter Dutton after the 2022 defeat. After Dutton lost his seat in the Coalition's landslide defeat at the 2025 election, she was elected Liberal leader at a leadership election, becoming leader of the Opposition as the first woman in Australian history to hold either position. In her tenth month as leader in 2026, she was ousted by Angus Taylor in a leadership spill; she subsequently retired from politics, triggering a by-election in her seat of Farrer.
During her tenure as leader of the Liberal Party, Ley presided over unprecedented political conflicts, including two dissolutions of the Liberal–National Coalition within a year—the first such instances since 1987, historically low polling results for both the Liberal Party and the broader Coalition, and the Opposition's response to the legislative changes introduced by the Albanese government following the Bondi Beach shooting including gun law reform, strengthening of hate speech and antisemitism laws, and immigration measures.
Early life and education Susan Penelope Braybrooks was born the daughter of English parents, Edgar Hosken Braybrooks and Angela Mary Braybrooks (née Weston), on 14 December 1961 in Kano, Northern Region, Federation of Nigeria. Her family moved to the Trucial States (United Arab Emirates) when she was one year old, where her father worked as a British intelligence officer. They lived first in Qatar, then Sharjah, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and lastly Al Ain. Her father worked with the sheikhs who ruled the states at that time. Ley attended boarding school in England until she was 13 years old, when her family migrated to Australia.
Ley's parents purchased a hobby farm in Toowoomba, Queensland, but quickly sold it due to a crash in beef prices. They then moved to Canberra, where her father worked for the Australian Federal Police (AFP). Ley attended Campbell High School and Dickson College in Canberra for her secondary schooling. Ley initially said she changed her name from Susan to Sussan after reading about numerology some time after leaving school, although in a 2025 interview she said that, as a rebellious teenager, she added the extra "s" to annoy her family.
After marrying and settling on her husband's family farm outside Tallangatta in north-east Victoria and having three children, Ley started studying economics part-time at La Trobe University. She then became employed at the Australian Taxation Office at Albury as director of technical training from 1995 to 2001. While working there, she did a master's degree in tax law, and, in 2000, a master of accountancy at Charles Sturt University. Her grandfather was a Church of England minister in England and she attended an Anglican church in Albury. She has also worked as a commercial pilot and shearers' cook.
Political career Ley joined the Liberal Party's Tallangatta branch in 1994. She was elected to the House of Representatives at the 2001 election, winning the New South Wales seat of Farrer for the Liberal Party following the retirement of former National Party leader and deputy prime minister Tim Fischer, beating the Nationals candidate by 206 votes. At the time of her election she was living across the border in Old Tallangatta, Victoria, and had recently lost Liberal preselection for the Victorian seat of Indi to Sophie Mirabella. She campaigned in "a large caravan, brightly painted in Liberal blue".
Howard government (2001–2007)
In the Howard government, Ley was appointed Parliamentary Secretary (Children and Youth Affairs) in October 2004 and Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry in January 2006.
Opposition (2007–2013)
Following the 2007 election, Ley was appointed Shadow Minister for Housing and Shadow Minister for Status of Women by Opposition Leader, Dr Brendan Nelson, moving to Shadow Minister for Customs and Justice when Malcolm Turnbull became Opposition Leader in September 2008.
When Tony Abbott became Opposition Leader in December 2009 she was given the portfolio of Shadow Assistant Treasurer and was moved to Shadow Minister for Employment Participation and Shadow Minister for Childcare and Early Childhood Learning after the 2010 election.
Abbott and Turnbull governments (2013–2018)
In September 2013, following the Coalition's victory at the 2013 federal election, Ley was appointed Assistant Minister for Education in the Abbott government, with responsibility for childcare. Following a ministerial reshuffle, she was promoted to cabinet in December 2014 as Minister for Health and Minister for Sport. She was also made Minister for Aged Care in September 2015 following the replacement of Tony Abbott with Malcolm Turnbull.
In January 2017, an examination of Ley's expenditure claims and travel entitlements revealed she had purchased an apartment on the Gold Coast, close to the business premises of her partner, for $795,000 while on official business in Queensland. Ley defended the purchase, saying her work in the Gold Coast was legitimate, that all travel had been within the rules for entitlements, and that the purchase of the apartment "was not planned nor anticipated" (a claim which was widely derided). On 8 January, Ley released a statement acknowledging that the purchase had changed the context of her travel, and undertaking to repay the government for the cost of the trip in question as well as three others. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Ley had made 27 taxpayer-funded trips to the Gold Coast in recent years.
On 9 January 2017, Ley announced that she would stand aside from her ministerial portfolios until an investigation into her travel expenses was completed by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. She announced that she would not be making her diaries public. On 13 January 2017, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull announced that Ley had resigned from the ministry. Greg Hunt was appointed as Ley's replacement as the Minister for Health and Sport, and Ken Wyatt was appointed Assistant Minister for Health and Minister for Indigenous Health and Aged Care, both with effect from 24 January 2017.
Morrison government (2018–2022)
During the 2018 Liberal leadership spills, Ley reportedly voted for Peter Dutton against Malcolm Turnbull in the first vote. She subsequently signed the petition requesting to hold a further party meeting to determine the leadership of the Liberal party, and again voted for Dutton against Scott Morrison in the second spill days later, which saw Morrison replace Turnbull as prime minister. On 26 August 2018, Ley was appointed Assistant Minister for Regional Development and Territories in the Morrison government. In May 2019, following the party's victory at the 2019 election, she replaced Melissa Price as Minister for the Environment.
In March 2022, Ley successfully appealed a Federal Court ruling that she had a "duty of care to children to consider climate change harm when approving coal mines". Also in March 2022, Ley approved a Coalition decision to scrap 176 out of 185 recovery plans designed to prevent the extinction of threatened species and habitats, including the Tasmanian devil. This was despite a government call for feedback, which received 6701 responses, all disagreeing with the proposed removal of the recovery plans.
Opposition (2022–2025)
Following the Coalition's defeat at the 2022 election, it was reported that Ley would be a candidate to replace Josh Frydenberg as deputy leader of the party, following his electoral defeat. Ley was elected unopposed on 30 May 2022. In July 2022, Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek accused Ley, the former Environment Minister, of hiding a document that was handed to the coalition government in December 2021, ahead of the 2022 Australian federal election. The document outlined the poor and declining health of the Australian ecosystem. "It tells a story of crisis and decline in Australia's environment [and] of a decade of government inaction and wilful ignorance," Ms Plibersek said.
In August 2022, ahead of the Jobs and Skills Summit of Australia, Ley falsely stated that no one in the world is making an electric ute. "We know we're not going to have electric vehicles tomorrow," Ms Ley said. "And no one in the world is making an electric ute, by the way, and even if they were it would be unaffordable." After commentators pointed out that electric utes were already in production, a spokesperson for Ms Ley said that Ms Ley meant that, "EV utes are not yet commercially available in Australia and even if EV utes arrived here overnight, cost-effective models — which invariably have lower distance ranges — are not yet suitable for practical use in rural and regional Australia."
In March 2023, Ley dressed up as Tina Turner in Parliament to raise money for cancer. In February 2024, on the eve of the 2024 Dunkley by-election, Ley posted a tweet linking a crime incident in Frankston to "foreign criminals". Victoria Police had charged an immigration detainee but later dropped the charges after a case of mistaken identity. Speaking after the police bungle was revealed, a spokesperson for Ms Ley told the ABC the deputy leader stood by her comments completely, suggesting it spoke to the broader issue of how the government had handled the release of the detainees into the community. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said it was "extraordinary" that Ley had refused to delete her tweet.
Leader of the Opposition (2025–2026)
Incumbent party leader Peter Dutton lost re-election for his seat of Dickson at the 2025 federal election, making Ley the acting leader of the Liberal Party. She also became the longest-serving Coalition MP at the election. Ley won the subsequent party leadership election by 29 votes to 25, defeating conservative opponent Angus Taylor. Ley is the first woman elected to lead the Liberals, the Coalition, or serve as the leader of the Opposition at the federal level in Australia. At 63, Ley was the oldest first-time leader of the Opposition since Arthur Calwell in 1960.