Australia's former Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton has not ruled out challenging Malcolm Turnbull again for the Liberal Party leadership after the prime minister held on to the top job by 48 votes to 35 today.
Mr Dutton has told media in Canberra he decided to contest the ballot because he believed he was the best person to lead the Liberal Party to success at the next election.
"I respect the view of the party room and accept that outcome and I will do whatever I can now to make sure that we are in a position to win the next election and to make sure that Bill Shorten never becomes Prime Minister," he said.
Mr Turnbull had called the spill after a week of leadership speculation sparked by Liberals angry with his National Energy Guarantee.
The prime minister caved in to their demands to remove the Paris Agreement emissions reduction targets from the legislation, but it still wasn't enough.
The Australian Prime Minister made the comments after surviving a leadership challenge.
After Mr Turnbull called the spill, Mr Dutton put his hand up to challenge.
Mr Turnbull won the vote, but the narrow victory leaves him vulnerable to another challenge ahead of the next election.
Mr Dutton has resigned from the cabinet, leaving Mr Turnbull to consider a ministerial reshuffle.
Asked will he challenge for the leadership again, Mr Dutton said: It is not my job but having lost the ballot today, my job is to respect the view of the party room which I do.
"I will work every day to make sure that the Coalition is elected at the next election and I want to make sure that I support the Prime Minister and make sure that we support the policies of the government because ultimately I never ever want to see Bill Shorten as Prime Minister of this country because it would be a disaster."
Mr Dutton said his job from here "is to make sure I can prosecute the sort of messages that I have just spoken about and that is what I am focused on".
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