Michael McGuire: Federal election is looming, Anthony Albanese is finally waking up
Labor has woken its leader and set a couple of moderate policies on the table – so politicians must be gearing up for the federal election, writes Michael McGuire.
Opinion
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Labor leader Anthony Albanese appears to have emerged from his Rip Van Winkle stage, although that legendary sleepyhead was only unconscious for 20 years. It sometimes feels like Albanese has been in his political coma for far longer.
Albanese’s relative resurgence is the most obvious sign that the country is now moving into full-on campaign mode. And you have to look at Albanese for that indication because Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s default mode is campaign.
Morrison was at it again on the weekend, taking a lap around Bathurst. This is the same guy who earlier this year was adamant that sport and politics shouldn’t mix. But that was when a sporting body took a moderate political position, rather than a pollie looking to gain a sporting advantage.
But back to Albanese.
The Labor leader came out with a couple of policies over the weekend.
Nothing too earth-shaking mind you. A moderate lifting, from the government’s level, of emission targets to be achieved by 2030 and free education at TAFE.
Labor has now set an emissions reduction target of 43 per cent by 2030, which is less aspirational than the 45 per cent it took to the 2019 election, but higher than government’s 26-38 per cent ambition. The other election promise was a $1.2bn plan to create an extra 65,000 university and TAFE places.
Morrison quickly jumped through the gears of fear on Labor’s climate-change policy. “Vote Labor, you vote Greens’’. Which, of course is matched by Labor’s “vote Liberal, get Barnaby Joyce’’ rhetoric – which has some currency after the Nationals leader stopped Morrison from increasing the government’s own emissions targets before the COP 26 climate change conference in Glasgow.
Labor’s approach to next year’s election will be markedly different from the last one it ran under Bill Shorten. Then Labor unleashed a swag of contentious policies on an unsuspecting electorate and had as its prime salesman Shorten. It was a poor mix and Labor conclusively lost the argument, especially in Queensland and Western Australia.
Labor won’t be making the same mistake again on policy. As the winding back of emissions targets illustrates, it’s going to be a lot more cautious and a lot more careful this time around.
But its major problem is still the salesman.
Albanese lacks the authority, confidence and credibility of the best leaders. He comes across as your ideal back-up, the loyal number two or three. He’s the supporting cast, not the main attraction. He’s the Goose to someone else’s Maverick.
One thing in Albanese’s favour is that Morrison is a much more well-known figure than he was in 2019. Back then he was still mostly unknown, so he created a character that was designed to calm and comfort people. He ran a policy-light campaign and continued that into government.
But he’s had a lot of skin taken off him since 2019. Morrison’s shocking handling of bushfires, the treatment of women, the early stages of vaccination, his loose relationship with the truth and his government’s litany of scandals including Robodebt, sports rorts, and carpark rorts, among many others, have left him a much-reduced figure.
In that light, Morrison’s public encouragement of former NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian to run for parliament while still being investigated by the NSW ICAC is both perplexing and completely on-brand. Morrison’s claim that Berejiklian was “done over’’ by a “kangaroo court’’ is ridiculous.
The former premier is being investigated for not declaring a conflict of interest when she sent tens of millions of dollars to the electorate of her secret boyfriend, the remarkably dodgy Daryl Maguire.
Morrison’s undermining of the NSW ICAC may, of course, be linked to his inability to deliver a promised federal ICAC.
Labor holds a comfortable lead in the polls presently but the reality is the election is either side’s to win or lose. The result will no doubt be a grubby, filthy campaign with more fear campaigns than substantial policy discussions.
The question for voters may not be so much “who do I vote for?” but “what have we done to deserve these two?”