The federal Labor caucus could endorse as many as a dozen women for the frontbench and shadow parliamentary secretary roles when it meets in Canberra on Monday.
Former health minister Tanya Plibersek is set to be elected deputy leader to Bill Shorten, who was declared the winner of an historic ballot of grassroots and caucus members at the weekend.
Shorten says women will feature on the front bench, in contrast to Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s decision to appoint only one woman to his cabinet.
“I reject the assumption that merit is more located in the brains of men than women,” he told Sky News on Monday.
The new opposition leader is expected to make diversity a key issue as Labor seeks to broaden its membership base and range of candidates and develop new policies.
During the campaign for the Labor leadership, Shorten called on the party to do more to achieve the target of 40 per cent female candidates in winnable seats and flagged the possibility of quotas for indigenous candidates.
While many former ministers are set to be returned to shadow ministry roles, several lost their seats and a number have retired or indicated they won’t accept a frontbench role.
Shorten said former prime minister Kevin Rudd had not expressed an interest in nominating.
One of Labor’s first challenges will be to fight Abbott’s carbon price repeal legislation, which will be the first agenda item for the parliament.
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“(Mr Abbott) has a mandate to form a government of Australia, but there is nothing in Australian democracy that says that Labor has to be a rubber stamp for every coalition proposition,” Shorten told Fairfax Radio.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt said it would be an “early test” for the new Labor leader.
Australian Greens leader Christine Milne urged Mr Shorten to hold his ground on carbon pricing, saying “the writing is on the wall” regarding climate change, with extreme fires, floods, droughts and heatwaves.
“Tony Abbott may have a mandate to lead the government of the nation, but he doesn’t have one to stand by and watch it swelter and burn,” she said.
