Malcolm Turnbull has resigned as communications minister and will challenge Tony Abbott for the Liberal Party leadership
Communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull has resigned from cabinet and will challenge Tony Abbott for the Liberal leadership.
Turnbull told reporters on Monday afternoon that he asked the prime minister to arrange a meeting of the Liberal Party room to enable a leadership ballot.
"A little while ago I met with the prime minister and advised him that I would be challenging him for the leadership of the Liberal Party," he said.
Turnbull said the prime minister has not been capable of providing the economic leadership and confidence that the nation needs.
"We are living as Australians in the most exciting tims. The big economic changes that we are living through here and around the world offer enormous challenges and enormous opportunities.
"We need a different style of leadership ... that explains those challenges and how to seize the opportunities. A style of leadership that respects the people's intelligence, that explains these complex issues, and then sets out the course of action we believe we should take and makes a case for it.
"We need advocacy, not slogans, we need to respect the intelligence of the Australian people," Turnbull said.
If Abbott remains the prime minister, opposition leader Bill Shorten will succeed in unseating the government, Turnbull said.
"We have a hugely talented team here in the parliament. Our values of free enterprise, of individual initiative, of freedom, this is what you need to be a successful agile economy in 2015.
"What we have not succeeded in doing is translating those values into the policies and the ideas that will excite the Australian people and encourage them to believe and understand that we have a vision for their future," he said.
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