The 50-year-old’s stealth candidacy reflected aspirations he has had since he entered parliament in 2007, representing the Sydney seat of Cook – the site of Australia’s last race riots.

The son of a policeman, Morrison – known as “ScoMo” – becomes Australia’s seventh prime minister in 11 years, replacing a man who became the latest in a long line of leaders knifed in the back by their allies.

His supporters point to his success with the immigration portfolio from 2013-14, where he implemented the controversial “Operation Sovereign Borders” to stop asylum seekers arriving in Australia by boat.

They were either sent back to where they had come from or transferred to remote Pacific island camps.

He even he took his message directly to the refugees on Manus and Nauru in a controversial video.

“There are new rules in place under this government so I urge you to think carefully about your next decision and to make a decision to get on with the rest of your life and to not remain here and take the option to go back to the country from which you’ve originally come,” he told the asylum seekers.

Malcolm Turnbull out, Scott Morrison in as Australian prime minister

“If you choose not to go home then you will spend a very, very long time here,” he told them.

The policy was credited with eliminating seaborne arrivals.

But it also attracted fierce criticism, fuelled by Morrison’s refusal to release details of the military operations to turn back boats, sometimes to countries with dodgy human rights records.

Conditions in the camps on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea and on Nauru were slammed by rights groups, with some asylum seekers languishing there for years.

Critics questioned how the man in charge reconciled his worn-on-the-sleeve Christian faith with his uncompromising immigration stance.

Born May 13, 1968 in the beachside Sydney suburb of Bronte, Scott John Morrison was the younger of two sons, whose parents ran church youth programmes.

Morrison himself was an active church member, and met his wife Jenny as a young teenager through the church. The pair married when he was 21.

It took 18 years and multiple rounds of IVF before the first of two children was born, and Morrison dedicated his maiden parliamentary speech to his daughter Abbey Rose.

Morrison worked in the tourism sector at home and in New Zealand before being selected to contest the seat of Cook in 2007.

He credited his win to the “most significant influences on my life – my family and my faith”.

In his first speech to parliament, Morrison said: “So what values do I derive from my faith? My answer comes from Jeremiah, chapter 9:24: I am the Lord who exercises loving kindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things, declares the Lord.”

After serving as shadow immigration minister, Morrison moved straight into the government job when the Liberal Party took power in 2013.

A short stint in the social services portfolio followed, before he took over the treasury when Turnbull became leader in September 2015.

Morrison presided over Australia’s economy as the government sought to return the budget to surplus and simultaneously cut personal income and small business taxes.

On social issues, Morrison has stood to the right of the more moderate Turnbull, and opposed the legalisation of same-sex marriage last year.

But he has also tried to soften his image, appearing on a cooking-with-politicians series that airs on national broadcaster ABC.

Additional reporting by Associated Press and The Guardian