Conservative rural politician Michael McCormack is Australia's new deputy PM after scandal-hit Barnaby Joyce resigned

Former deputy prime minister was forced to resign amid claims of sexual harassment and controversy over an affair with a now-pregnant former aide

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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack. Photo: EPA

Published: 11:58am, 26 Feb 2018Updated: 11:00pm, 26 Feb 2018

The junior partner in Australia’s coalition government elected as its new leader on Monday a former newspaper editor who takes over as deputy prime minister after an embarrassing sex scandal threatened a decades-old conservative alliance.

Michael McCormack was chosen in a party-room ballot to replace Barnaby Joyce as the leader of the rural-based National Party after Joyce, who campaigned on family values, resigned over an extramarital affair with his former media secretary.

Joyce is expecting a child with his former staff member and has left his marriage of 24 years. He resisted weeks of pressure to quit but said on Friday he would resign as party leader after a new allegation of sexual harassment emerged.

Under the terms of the coalition deal with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s centre-right Liberal Party, the leader of the Nationals automatically becomes deputy prime minister.

The drawn-out saga over Joyce’s extramarital affair had threatened to fracture the alliance between the Liberals and Nationals that has been in place for almost 100 years.

Barnaby Joyce, Australia's former deputy PM. File photo: Reuters

McCormack won the party-room vote over a single challenger, George Christensen, who had proposed breaking the alliance with the Nationals’ senior partner.