Opposition Leader Sussan Ley has left the door open to scrapping a key climate target with the coalition to review its energy policy.
Reuniting with the Nationals after their shock split, Ms Ley sought to draw a line through the coalition’s election loss as she unveiled a new-look shadow cabinet.
Yet despite putting on a united front with Nationals leader David Littleproud, uncertainty lingers over key policies including the coalition’s commitment to net-zero emissions by 2050.
Mr Littleproud’s leadership was contested over the rural party’s adoption of the target.
Pressed on her position on net zero, Ms Ley said the coalition will look at energy policy “as a whole going forward”.
“We have to play, as a country, our part in the global response to climate change … but we have to make sure that we don’t do it at any cost,” she told reporters in Canberra.
The Nationals briefly quit the partnership as the party battled to have four key policies retained, including dropping a federal ban on nuclear power.
Ms Ley said the agreement on dumping the ban was a first step, with further development on nuclear policy to come.
A pledge to build seven nuclear power plants across Australia formed the centrepiece of the coalition’s doomed election pitch.
Mr Littleproud demoted former deputy prime ministers Michael McCormack and Barnaby Joyce after the pair had publicly criticised his decision to break up the coalition.
The Nationals leader denied personal issues were behind his choices for the party’s six spots in the shadow cabinet.
His claim the party was undergoing “generational change” was mocked by Mr Joyce.
“That’s ridiculous. It’s personality and politics,” he told ABC News, blasting net zero as “atrocious” for the nation.
On the Liberal side Victorian senator Jane Hume, who oversaw the coalition’s unpopular work-from-home policy, was dumped from the shadow ministry entirely along with conservatives Sarah Henderson and Claire Chandler.
No women have been assigned key economic portfolios, with a number of senior female members losing their roles.
Women in all voter age groups preferred Labor over the Liberals at the federal election, and the new opposition leader Ms Ley pledges to do the work to win them back.
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