“This is a great day today”, Turnbull told a press conference in Sydney after opposition Labor leader Bill Shorten conceded defeat in the July 2 federal election.
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Turnbull’s victory speech came hours after the leader of the center-left opposition Labor Party Bill Shorten rang the premier to concede his party would not be able to form a government.
The government is on track to be re-elected with a narrow majority of 1-3 seats, while votes will continue to be counted in the remaining close races next week.
Multimillionaire former banker and lawyer Malcolm Turnbull has clung to power in Australia, but the tech-savvy grandfather dubbed “Mr Harbourside Mansion” won only a begrudging victory with voters.
Mr. Turnbull declared victory on Sunday after results showed his Liberal-National coalition was on pace for a slim minority government.
But it should secure at least 74, and also has the support of three independent and minor party politicians – Cathy McGowan, Andrew Wilkie and Bob Katter – guaranteeing budget supply and confidence.
The coalition has so far gained 42 percent of public support, election results with 79.6 percent of votes counted suggest while Labor Party has gained just 35 percent.
His party has lost a significant number of seats – it began the campaign with 90 – and is smarting from what was supposed to be a comfortable win on July 2.
Turnbull had dissolved both houses of the parliament in May and called for snap elections, confident that his ruling coalition would clinch an outright win.
With five lower house seats still in the balance, Turnbull will have to wait several days more to appoint his cabinet and return to government, but he is already battling sniping from within his own ranks.
76 seats are needed to form a government without the need of post-election coalition. The agency said Australia needs “more forceful fiscal policy decisions” to reign in debt and believes such tough measures could be postponed by the new Parliament.
An unnamed coalition MP told The Australian: “His theory was to win and win comfortably so the conservatives would all have to kneel at the altar of Malcolm Turnbull; well, I think someone else will be kneeling at the conservative altar now”.
“It would be prudent for Malcolm Turnbull not to repeat the mistakes made by Tony Abbott where the repeal of the carbon and mining taxes were implemented first, while leaving surprise spending cuts to be rejected by the Senate”, the institute’s executive director Ben Oquist said.
Even if Turnbull manages to hang onto his job, he has a slew of problems to contend with.
Turnbull had insisted that restoring a construction union watchdog was a key plank of the government’s economic plan and he used two bills on the issue, which were blocked by the Senate, to trigger a double-dissolution election.
“There will always be crossbenchers in the Senate”, Mr Turnbull said. “That’s what I will be looking at”, she said.
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Shorten also said it was time Australia considered ditching its pencil and paper voting system for a speedier electronic version. “I hope for our nation’s sake the coalition does a good job; I hope they run a good government”.
