Who is Sussan Ley? How a farmer’s wife and spy’s daughter became the Federal Opposition Leader

Sussan Ley’s ascension to Opposition Leader — and the first female leader of the Liberal Party — is the latest chapter in a storied life.

“My story is a migrant story. It’s a small-business story. It’s a rural Australia story. It’s a story about a mum and a family, and it is a modern Australian story,” she described in her inaugural press conference.

Born Susan Breybrooks in Nigeria to English parents, Ms Ley grew up in the United Arab Emirates where her intelligence officer father was posted. They later moved to England, where she attended boarding school before the family immigrated to Australia when she was a teenager.

Following a brief stint on a hobby farm in Toowoomba, the family moved to Canberra, where Ms Ley finished school.

As she approached her 20s, she added an extra “s” to her name after reading up about numerology.

She went on to work three jobs to self-fund her dream of becoming a pilot.

She gained her commercial pilot licence, but says her gender prevented her from a job at the major airlines. Instead, she bided her time working at an air-traffic control centre in Sydney until she moved to Thargomindah in south-west Queensland to work as an aerial stock musterer.

She later worked as a shearer’s cook, where she said she learned “the value of a hard day’s work”.

Ms Ley became a “farmer’s wife” and raised three children on her former husband’s farm in north-east Victoria. She enrolled in university in her 30s and completed three finance degrees, including a masters in tax law and a masters in accounting.

She became a Director at the Australian Taxation Office in Albury for six years before she entered politics in 2001.

After losing preselection in Indi, she took a crack at the rural NSW seat of Farrer after Nationals leader and deputy PM Tim Fischer retired, where she won a narrow victory in the rural seat.

“What I learnt was people wanted me to listen to what their lives were like, and I did. I wanted to represent them,” she said on Tuesday of her community.

“I knew that nobody in Canberra understood what life was like in the small, rural community where I came from. And that fired my determination to walk into the Government Party room in 2001.”

In the Abbott and Turnbull governments, Ms Ley served as minister for health, sport, and aged care. She resigned from the ministry in 2017 following a controversy over taxpayer-funded trips to the Gold Coast, including one where she took a ComCar to an auction for an apartment she subsequently purchased.

She was returned to the frontbench the following August when Scott Morrison became prime minister, and before the 2022 election was the environment minister.

“I am incredibly grateful for what the Liberal Party has given me, and everything that I am as I stand before you today is reflected by the Party that has been a part of over half of my adult life,” she said on Tuesday.

The mother of three — and grandmother of six — was re-licensed as a pilot last year, telling The Nightly at the time that she hoped to inspire more women to prioritise their dreams.

A former member of the Parliamentary Friends of Palestine and advocate for a two-state solution, Ms Ley on Tuesday said her views had “changed” since October 7, 2023.

“The hideous events of October the seventh in Gaza have changed my thinking on the entire subject. Having said that, I remain a steadfast friend of the Palestinian people,” she said.

Ms Ley has also previously opposed the live sheep trade, but on Tuesday reiterated that wasn’t her position anymore.

“It should continue. It is safe. It is reliable. And it meets the animal welfare standards that it should,” she said, reassuring farmers — most of whom are in WA — that her position remains the same.