Question Time LIVE updates: Angus Taylor’s arrives for first question time as Liberal leader

Welcome to our live coverage of question time in the House of Representatives. My name is Nick Newling, I’ll be taking you through the afternoon’s proceedings.

This will be the first time Opposition Leader Angus Taylor will sit at the despatch box during question time, after he deposed Sussan Ley last month. Ley has since resigned.

You can watch a livestream of question time below, and follow along with our blog for updates.

Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has asked the first question of his tenure as Liberal leader, questioning Anthony Albanese on whether any government minister or staff have supported the issuing of Australian passports to IS “sympathisers”.

Taylor asked: “Prime minister, there are reports that at least 34 passports have recently been issued under this government to facilitate the return of individuals who left Australia to join ISIS. Can the PM confirm none of his ministers, nor any member of staff made representations to any relevant departments or agencies to support or expedite the issuing of Australian passports to sympathisers in Syria?”

Albanese took the chance to quote comments from former Liberal leader Peter Dutton that argued Australian citizens have “an entitlement and a right to come back to our country”. Albanese said the words were not his own, but from “that soft person” who led the opposition to last year’s election.

“We are not repatriating these people. We have made it clear,” Albanese said.

“The hypocrisy on this is extraordinary, given that 40 people came home on their watch, including not partners or relatives, including ISIS fighters.”

Before question time proper begins, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese welcomes Angus Taylor as the new opposition leader, and honours the work of the Liberal Party’s first female leader, Sussan Ley.

Here’s what he said:

It is a great honour to lead a major political party. I congratulate [Taylor] on becoming leader of the Liberal Party. In the other place [the Senate] is the deputy leader as well, I congratulate her.

I want to say I spoke with the former opposition leader, Sussan Ley, last week. I offered her the opportunity to give a valedictory speech to the House in which she served her community for a long time for 25 years but I respect her decision [not to]. It has been a difficult time for her.

Nevertheless, I think has shown grace and dignity as a result. She can take pride in the fact she represented the Farrer electorate for a quarter of a century.

She gave her community, our parliament and our nation her best.She will take her place in history as the first woman to lead the Liberal Party and nothing will take that away from her.

I wish her the best in whatever she does in the next chapter of her life.

Another sitting week is upon us, and Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has stood up at a doorstop interview in Parliament House.

He was spruiking his party’s attempt to criminalise NGOs and individuals helping repatriate Australian citizens with terror links, and clashed with a reporter over the details of his plan.

“We must shut the door to ISIS sympathisers,” Taylor said before snapping at a journalist who asked why other countries should be responsible for the Australian citizens if their own government refused to take responsibility for them.

“[Are you] an activist or a journalist, you need to make up your mind,” Taylor said.

Taylor also refused to distinguish between the Australian women who left for Syria to support the so-called caliphate, and the 23 children in the cohort seeking repatriation, despite repeated questions from reporters.

“This is a group who have gone to the Middle East to support ISIS. There is no ambiguity,” he said.

Welcome to our live coverage of question time in the House of Representatives. My name is Nick Newling, I’ll be taking you through the afternoon’s proceedings.

This will be the first time Opposition Leader Angus Taylor will sit at the despatch box during question time, after he deposed Sussan Ley last month. Ley has since resigned.

You can watch a livestream of question time below, and follow along with our blog for updates.