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Barnaby Thomas Gerard Joyce (born 17 April 1967) is an Australian politician who served as the deputy prime minister of Australia and the leader of the National Party from 2016 to 2018 and from 2021 to 2022. Now a member of One Nation, he has been the member of parliament (MP) for the New South Wales division of New England since 2013. Joyce previously held various ministerial positions in the Abbott, Turnbull, and Morrison governments.

Joyce was born in Tamworth, New South Wales, and graduated from the University of New England. He was elected to the Senate for Queensland at the 2004 federal election, and became the National Party's Senate leader in 2008. At the 2013 election, he transferred to the House of Representatives, winning the rural seat of New England in New South Wales. In 2013, Joyce replaced Nigel Scullion as deputy leader of the National Party. He succeeded Warren Truss as party leader and deputy prime minister in 2016.

During the 2017–18 Australian parliamentary eligibility crisis, Joyce was confirmed to be a dual citizen of New Zealand, which is forbidden for parliamentarians under section 44 of the Constitution of Australia. In October 2017, the High Court of Australia ruled that he had been ineligible to be a candidate for the House of Representatives at the time of the 2016 election. He re-entered parliament in December 2017 after winning the New England by-election. Joyce resigned from the National Party to join One Nation in 2025, holding one of two seats held by the party, the other held by David Farley, who was elected at the 2026 Farrer by-election.

Early life and career

Barnaby Thomas Gerard Joyce was born on 17 April 1967 at Tamworth Base Hospital in Tamworth, New South Wales, to James Joyce (1924–2022) and Beryl Joyce (née Roche; 1930–2020), both of whom were farmers. His father, a World War II veteran, was born in Dunedin, New Zealand, and migrated to Australia in 1947. His paternal grandfather, John P. Joyce, was a career soldier who participated in the Gallipoli Campaign of World War I, including the landing at Anzac Cove. Joyce was raised in a Catholic family, as one of six children on a sheep and cattle property about 60 km (37 mi) north-east at Danglemah near Woolbrook.

Joyce attended Woolbrook Public School, boarded at Saint Ignatius' College, Riverview in Sydney, and graduated from the University of New England (UNE) Armidale with a Bachelor of Financial Administration in 1989.

Joyce met Natalie Abberfield at UNE. They married in 1993. After graduating, Joyce moved around northern New South Wales and Queensland as a farm worker, nightclub bouncer, and banker. From 1991 to 2005, Joyce worked in the accounting profession, and founded his own accountancy firm, Barnaby Joyce & Co., in St George, Queensland in 1999. He is a fellow of CPA Australia. From 1996 to 2001, Joyce served in the Royal Queensland Regiment of the Australian Army Reserve.

Senator for Queensland (2005–2013)

In the 2004 Australian federal election, Joyce was elected to the Senate representing Queensland and the National Party. His term ran from 1 July 2005 until 30 June 2011. He was re-elected at the 2010 election as a member of the Liberal National Party, which was formed by a merger of the Queensland divisions of the two non-Labor parties.

Before taking his seat in July 2005, Joyce said that the government should not take his support for granted. As a senator, he crossed the floor nineteen times during the term of the Howard government. Joyce initially expressed misgivings about the government's proposed sale of Telstra, the partially state-owned telecommunications company; nevertheless, Joyce voted in favour of the sale a few months later in September 2005. This led the Labor Party to label Joyce "Backdown Barney" and "Barnaby Rubble" in an acrimonious parliamentary debate. As the Telstra Sale Legislation had been pursued by the lower house in prior parliamentary sessions with no assistance package for regional Australia, Joyce was later credited with holding out until the multi-billion dollar assistance package was negotiated and delivered.

Joyce opposed the free provision of the Gardasil vaccine.

In May 2006, after a one-month visit to Antarctica as a member of the External Territories Committee, Joyce promoted mining there, banned under the Antarctic Treaty, and stated that other nations did not recognise Australia's 42 per cent claim over Antarctica. The proposal was roundly condemned by Federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell, Labor Opposition spokesman Anthony Albanese and others.

Crossing the floor

As a Senator, Joyce used the threat of crossing the floor to extract concessions from his own government on various issues, most notably in relation to the sale of Telstra. He crossed the floor 28 times and there was a perception that he was a "maverick" and someone not beholden to the Liberals. The They Vote For You website, which monitors the voting patterns of federal politicians, records that Joyce has "rebelled" against the party whip in 1.1% of divisions.

The following table lists the legislation on which Joyce has crossed the floor, but does not include motions.

Leader of the Nationals in the Senate

In September 2008, after replacing Nigel Scullion as Leader of the Nationals in the Senate, Joyce stated that his party in the upper house would no longer necessarily vote with their Liberal counterparts in the upper house, which opened up another possible avenue for the Labor government to pass legislation. Joyce gained the majority support of the five Nationals (including one Country Liberal Party) senators through Fiona Nash and John Williams. The takeover was not expected nor revealed to the party until after it took place. Joyce remained leader of his party despite the Queensland divisions of the Liberal and National parties merging into the Liberal National Party of Queensland in July 2008.

In 2009, when then opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull decided that the Coalition would support the Rudd government's emissions trading scheme (ETS), Joyce as Nationals Senate leader helped trigger the rebellion within Coalition ranks against it.

The Coalition's issues with the ETS would lead to Turnbull being replaced as Liberal leader by Tony Abbott.

In February 2010, Joyce as shadow finance minister declared that Australia was "going to hock to our eyeballs to people overseas" and was "getting to a point where we can't repay it". This led to a response from the Governor of the Reserve Bank, Glenn Stevens, that he had "yet to meet a finance minister who has ever mused any possibility about debt default of his own country" and that there were "few things less likely than Australia defaulting on its sovereign debt".

Joyce's time as Shadow Finance Minister was fraught with difficulties which also infamously saw him confusing trillions with billions in his first appearance as Shadow Finance Minister at the National Press Club and became the source of ridicule by the Government.

There were calls from within the Coalition that Joyce be removed from the finance portfolio as they saw it as a distraction in their attacks on the government which was having problems with the insulation scheme.

Joyce lasted as Shadow Finance Minister for three months from December 2009 to March 2010 when Abbott moved him to Regional Development, Infrastructure and Water.

In the 2010 election Joyce was re-elected to parliament on the LNP ticket with senators George Brandis and Brett Mason, and Joyce got more below the line votes than above the line votes. He was reappointed to the Shadow Ministry with his portfolio renamed as Regional Development, Local Government and Water as well as remaining as leader of the Nationals in the Senate.

Abbott and Turnbull governments (2013–2018)

Move to House of Representatives

In April 2013 Joyce won the Nationals preselection for the House of Representatives seat of New England in New South Wales for the September…