David Shoebridge elected as new leader of the Greens, vows to ‘replace Labor’

New Greens leader David Shoebridge insists the Greens are looking to “replace Labor” and challenge to form government.

The NSW senator was unveiled as leader at a press conference in Sydney on Wednesday after winning a secret ballot, defeating fellow NSW senator Mehreen Faruqi.

He replaces Senator Larissa Waters as leader, after she announced she would be stepping down for health reasons.

Shoebridge ran on a joint ticket with Steph Hodgins-May of Victoria, and also defeated South Australian Senator Sarah-Hanson Young.

Speaking in Sydney, Shoebridge said Australians were unhappy with the political status quo and vowed to seize the moment for the party.

“It takes building a mass movement around the country, connecting that mass movement to politics, and saying to people again, you can have hope in politics, that politicians aren’t just here to deliver for their corporate donors, or some US tech billionaire,” Shoebridge claimed.

“We will deliver that hope, this is the moment for the Greens to fill that vacuum.”

He claimed the rise of One Nation was down to Labor “creating the circumstances” that allowed its support to grow, but used the minor party as an example that the Greens could build a support base that could challenge for power.

“We are not here to make the Labor Party any better, the Greens are here to replace them,” he vowed, saying politics needed to move away from a rhetoric of “hate, division and fear”.

“I hope we can come together to actually make jobs and opportunity for each other. This is the message we’re giving, but it starts with recognising and feeling that,” Shoebridge said.

Shoebridge was previously a member of the NSW Legislative Council for 12 years, before making the move to federal politics in 2022.

Waters had led the party since May last year, when former leader Adam Bandt lost his seat of Melbourne at the election.

However, she announced that she would leave her post as leader and take a temporary leave of absence from parliament after her private battle with chronic kidney disease took a “downturn”.

“I need to be honest with myself about not being invincible,” she said in a statement posted to social media on Monday night.

“My doctors have been clear: my prospects for recovery are good, but the best path forward means a slower pace of life than leading a political party allows.”

She clarified she would return to her role as senator as soon as she returned from her leave.

New deputy leader Hodgins-May said Australians were feeling cost-of-living pain and claimed the Greens was the party that provided the answers.

“We have families who are desperate to secure housing, we have families who can’t afford to send their children to childcare,” she said.

“It does not have to be this way in a wealthy country like Australia.”

Heading into last year’s election, the Greens had four seats in the lower house, but they lost three of them; one in Melbourne and two in inner-Brisbane.

Their representation in the Senate remained unchanged, but shortly after the election, Dorinda Cox from WA defected to Labor, leaving them with 10 seats in the upper house.