Federal election results 2025 LIVE updates: Parliament to sit in July; New ministers emerge as PM vows to ‘deliver a better nation’; Taylor, Ley in Libs leadership race; Price silent on deputy tilt

Labor’s first caucus meeting after the election is being held in Canberra. Earlier, we brought you the first images of the prime minister’s address to his party’s MPs.

Our photographers James Brickwood and Alex Ellinghausen, who have been bringing you images throughout the election campaign, have also snapped these photos of new and old faces in the caucus.

Good afternoon, and thanks for reading the live news blog.

I’m Cassandra Morgan, taking over until this evening as the fallout from Saturday’s federal election continues. If you’re just joining us, here’s a look at what we’ve been covering today.

• Angus Taylor has formally announced his bid for the leadership of the Liberal Party, as he says it needs to be rebuilt with more robust debate.
• Labor’s caucus meeting in Canberra has confirmed the party’s frontbench along the lines expected after factional meetings on Thursday.
• Jacinta Nampijnpa Price has called an Aboriginal activist a “nobody” in the lobby of an Adelaide hotel, after defecting from the Nationals to the Liberals yesterday.
• Independent Monique Ryan is now more than 700 votes ahead of Amelia Hamer in the seat of Kooyong.
• In Bendigo, it appears Labor’s Lisa Chesters has retained the seat, while other seats – including Monash, Flinders, Bradfield, Bullwinkel, Longman – are still too close to call.
• Foreign Minister Penny Wong has called for Labor’s resounding election victory to mark a turning point in the way Australian politicians debate divisive foreign policy issues, as she argued both the Coalition and Greens paid an electoral cost for their stance on the war in Gaza.
• The Liberal Party will meet to elect a new leader on Tuesday, as deputy leader Sussan Ley and Taylor vie for the top job.

Keep following the national news blog with us into this evening.

Chalmers signalled this week that his focus for the coming three years would be on ways to make the economy work more efficiently. Now we have an idea of where he’s likely to look at first.

The Productivity Commission this morning called for public submissions on possible reforms to occupational licensing and international standards.

In terms of occupational licensing – think of the different licences needed for tradespeople to work between states – the commission is asking which jobs would be best-suited to a national licensing scheme.

This idea of a national licensing scheme is the holy grail of economists and businesses, but past efforts to put one in place have struggled. The commission estimates reform in this space would deliver a $10.3 billion boost to the economy.

On international standards, the commission is looking at where current Australian regulations should be brought into line with those operating overseas. It admits that in some cases, there is good reason for differences, but again, it notes work that suggests alignment on consumer product safety standards would save Australian businesses about $500 million a year.

Submissions to the commission are due by June 6.

The Labor caucus meeting has confirmed the Labor frontbench along the lines expected after factional meetings on Thursday.

Two members of the Right, Sam Rae and Daniel Mulino, will rise into the ministry. A member of the Left, Jess Walsh, will also rise into the ministry.

The caucus also confirmed two key appointments: Milton Dick will have support to continue as Speaker of the House. Sue Lines will continue as President of the Senate.

Taylor has formally announced his bid for the leadership of the Liberal Party, confirming his candidacy in a statement.

Taylor said it was “not a decision [he’s] taken lightly”, but that he was putting his name forward “with conviction” after discussions with colleagues.

“We need to show the country that we’re serious about aspiration, opportunity, and backing Australians to get ahead,” he said.

Taylor said renewed policy in key areas of economic management, national security, aspiration and private sector job creation and opportunity wouldn’t be enough.

“We also need to rebuild the party itself,” he said.

“We must bring in new talent that reflects modern Australia – especially more women.”

Earlier today, Ley also revealed her candidacy, setting up a two-way contest between her and Taylor.

Taylor’s confirmation also comes the day after Price defected from the Nationals to the Liberal party room, amid expectations she would run as Taylor’s deputy.

Labor’s Peter Khalil has hung on to the northern Melbourne seat of Wills ahead of Greens candidate Samantha Ratnam.

As our reporter Clay Lucas writes in our Victoria’s hot seats blog, pre-polling in Wills was relentless. Lucas writes:

I was at the Brunswick booth every day bar one, and never visited on a day that Khalil and Ratnam were absent.

And while pre-poll in Brunswick was always a theatre of democracy, sometimes it was also farce.

Take Romeo, a One Nation volunteer, wandering the line with an Australian flag and sometimes, inexplicably, an Italian one too. He would chant “One flag, One Nation”. Could there be a suburb in Australia less welcoming to such sentiment than Brunswick?

A man in a Collingwood jumper – notably Indigenous player Bobby Hill’s number 23 – pelted him with eggs. Romeo shrugged it off, but a couple of days later when he told me someone had threatened to shoot him, he went home, fashioned two metal plates into an ad hoc bulletproof jacket he placed over his shirt, then returned to the booth.

One Nation’s candidate got a 1 per cent swing, reaching 3.5 per cent. So it appears there’s room for everyone in Australian democracy – even in Brunswick.

Read more here.

As flagged earlier, it now appears that Labor’s Lisa Chesters has retained the seat of Bendigo.

Chesters, the local member since 2013, has faced a huge campaign from the Nationals’ Andrew Lethlean with many in the junior Coalition party believing they could snatch the seat.

Lethlean has gone close, and during some parts of the count, he had got a lead of more than 800 votes.

But as some key booths have come in, Chesters has stretched a lead out beyond 2000 votes.
There are about 5600 outstanding postal, declaration and absentee votes. Chesters has made some ground as late postals come in, while absentees are expected to favour her.

Chesters’ likely victory means Labor now has 91 of the House of Representatives’ 150 seats.

Parliament will meet at the end of July so the federal government can put its legislation to the new Senate, delaying the agenda for several weeks later than planned.

Albanese set out the timing ahead of the first Labor caucus meeting since the election in a live televised speech.

These were his first public remarks about his intentions on the timing of parliament. The senators elected on May 3 will take their office after July 1, in the usual rules of the upper house, so the timing means the existing Senate will not meet again.

Albanese confirmed that the first bill to be put to the new parliament would be Labor’s election promise to cut student debts by 20 per cent.