Gender Malaise in the Liberal Party: a chronic condition needs systemic treatment

by Jennifer Muir, WEL National Coordinating Committee

When Sussan Ley became the first woman to lead the Liberal Party in May 2025, it was framed as a breakthrough. When she was removed less than a year later, it was framed as politics as usual. It is neither. It is a warning.

For decades, the Women’s Electoral Lobby has argued that representation is not symbolic. It is democratic infrastructure. Who holds power shapes which priorities are funded, which rights are defended and whose voices are heard.

The Liberal Party cannot claim it lacks capable women. Since its inception it has produced formidable, intelligent and effective women across federal and state politics. That legacy should be honoured and built upon. Instead, it has too often been sidelined. Talent is not the issue. Structure is.

Women are 50.7 per cent of Australia’s population. Yet in the Liberal Party’s federal ranks, women remain significantly underrepresented, particularly in the House of Representatives. Six of 18 Liberal MPs in the House are women. This is not a pipeline problem. It is a design choice.

The Party regularly says it “needs more women”. But wanting is not reform. Rhetoric does not dismantle gatekeeping. Informal ‘merit’ systems, shaped by factional power and longstanding networks, reproduce the same outcomes. Without intervention, culture protects itself.

The evidence is clear. Parties that adopt quotas and measurable targets shift their numbers. The Australian Labor Party’s quota system has changed its parliamentary gender balance over time. Globally, structural mechanisms deliver structural change. Waiting for organic evolution does not.

The Senate shows what is possible: 10 of 21 Liberal Senators are women. Merit has not been diluted. Governance has not collapsed. The sky does not fall when women enter the room.

Representation also requires breadth, not tokenism. The One Nation has a female leader in Pauline Hanson. Yet it has not succeeded in building significant representation of other women within its ranks. A single woman at the top does not constitute gender equality. It signals deeper cultural and structural barriers that fail to align with the diversity of Australian women or the broader community’s priorities.

Democracies are not at their best when they do not reflect the people they serve. When parliaments do not mirror the gender composition and lived realities of the community, policy priorities skew. Economic security, safety, care, health and equality are not peripheral concerns. They are central to national wellbeing.

The appointment of Jane Hume as Deputy Leader demonstrates that capable women exist across the political spectrum. The question is whether systems will sustain them.

Equal representation is not a favour to women. It is a democratic standard. It requires transparent preselection processes, enforceable targets and cultural accountability. Without structural reform, individual women will continue to be treated as exceptions rather than the norm.

Australia deserves political parties that reflect its people and represent their priorities. Anything less diminishes our democracy.