Coalition dares to dream about Peter Dutton as PM

Buoyed by positive polls and cost of living pain which has toppled governments abroad, Opposition MPs are increasingly murmuring about their chances ousting Labor after just one term.

Peter Dutton. left, and Anthony Albanese. Pictures: News Corp

Less than three years after the “white-hot rejection” of Scott Morrison, Coalition MPs are daring to dream – with a Christmas list of seats drawn up as they eye a once-unthinkable path back to government.

Liberal strategists say they have to win 21 seats to snatch a majority, with hit lists being drawn up over the lengthy summer break.

Already, Teal seats in Sydney have largely been written off – with the former blue ribbon strongholds instead replaced by traditional Labor areas in western Sydney as targets.

“Those seats where you’ve got real Australians working hard – Bennelong, Reid, Robertson, Parramatta, Dobell, Werriwa – (we’ll be targeting),” a Liberal MP said.

“It’s a target rich environment – there’s more in play than people thought.”

The Liberal Party thought it would be in the wilderness for a time after Scott Morrison’s defeat at the last election. Picture: Getty Images

Key on the Liberals’ hit list are ultra marginal seats like the south coast seat of Gilmore, held by Labor by just 0.2 per cent, and being contested by former Berejiklian Government Minister Andrew Constance.

Bennelong in Sydney’s north, held by Labor’s Jerome Laxale by just one per cent, is another target, while the Central Coast seat of Robertson (Labor, 2.3 per cent) is also in Liberal sights after it was lost in 2022.

The Coalition will also take aim at Lingiari in the Northern Territory (Labor, one per cent), while winning Aston (Labor, 3.6 per cent) and McEwen (Labor, 3.3 per cent) in Victoria are key steps in the road to victory.

The Liberals also hope to make gains in Western Australia such as Tagney (Labor, 2.4 per cent) while sandbagging the seats already held in the state.

“Western Australia, Victoria and NSW is where the heavy lifting is,” a Liberal MP said.

The chance of victory seems a far cry from when Anthony Albanese swept to power in 2022, when it seemed like battered Liberals and Nationals would have to settle for a long-term stint of watching Labor call the shots.

Andrew Constance is one of the key hopes for the Liberals. Picture: Richard Dobson

“My father rang me up and said to me, ‘a fair bit of your time as a politician will be in opposition’,” one Coalition MP said of a phone call he received in the aftermath of the bruising loss.

But buoyed by improved polling, as well as cost of living pain which has helped topple governments abroad, Opposition MPs are increasingly murmuring about their chances of throwing Labor out after just one-term.

They’ll be fighting against history, with the last single-term government coming when Labor Prime Minister James Scullin was turfed in 1932 after being buffeted by the Great Depression.

Almost 100 years later, Aussies are feeling a similar type of economic pain – with the latest Redbridge polling, released this week, painting a stark picture.

A year ago, more Australians thought Dutton was not ready to be Prime Minister, than those who did.

But in just 12 months, Dutton has converted enough voters that his overall favourability as PM is now a net positive.

By comparison, Albanese has steadily lost ground from his post-election high as preferred Prime Minister, across multiple polls.

Albanese ha lost ground as voters struggle with the cost of living. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

It’s why the Coalition – and the Liberals in particular – have united strongly behind the former Queensland cop.

“You’ve got to give people something to vote for,” one Liberal MP said, highlighting Dutton’s nuclear energy plan and opposition to The Voice as examples of strong leadership which could win them votes.

“That’s why he’s been happy to have the nuclear piece … even the under-16s social media ban, he’s been happy to go on the front foot with that.”

He said Dutton had been quick to bring in new blood, such as shadow home affairs spokesman James Paterson, while he had united a fractious Liberal Party.

He showed again earlier this year he was willing to take strong action on internal disunity and dysfunction, when the federal Liberals took over the unruly NSW division following their catastrophic local council nomination bungle.

It’s that leadership which has impressed many MPs left disenchanted after the Coalition’s damning results last election, when they lost 19 seats.

“It was brutal – the white-hot rejection of Morrison on the polling booths in 2022 was palpable,” another Liberal MP told The Telegraph.

“It’s amazing to see how that has turned around in two-and-a-half years.”

A long-time Liberal staffer added: “If you had of said we’d be this competitive so soon into opposition, I wouldn’t have believed you”.

Liberals say Dutton’s nuclear energy plan and opposition to the Voice has given people “something to vote for”. Picture: Adam Taylor

Labor, in the last fortnight of parliament for 2024, have gone after Dutton – with frontbenchers repeatedly using the phrase “reckless arrogance” when describing him.

The Prime Minister has also been quick to espouse his government’s economic management, in the hope it will cut through with voters.

“Inflation had a six in front of it and was rising when we came to office. Now it has a two in front of it, 2.8 per cent, and it’s falling,” Albanese said this week.

“We’ve created a million jobs on our watch, more than any Government since Federation began. We’ve got real wages increasing four quarters in a row, productivity lifting up, (and) business investment lifting up.”

But, according to Redbridge pollster Kos Samaras, if Labor can’t better sell those achievements, it’s headed to pain when voters hit the polls in the first half of 2025.

“Inflation is poison to incumbent governments,” he said.

“The economic crisis that people are having to confront at the moment in some parts of the country – largely the outer suburbs and the regions – is unprecedented.”

Mr Samaras said polling still indicated Labor was heading into minority government next year, which would likely force a deal with the Greens or an unruly crossbench.

Labor’s biggest fault, he said, was the exhaustion of their political capital – and the wave of goodwill Albanese and his new government had – pursuing the Voice referendum last year.

“Labor wins, it’s the end of the pandemic, and (the party) decides to embark in 2023 on a referendum, and spends all of it is political capital on that. It basically drained the tank,” he said.

“All the goodwill they were given in the polls, they blew it all on the referendum.”

Originally published as Coalition dares to dream about Peter Dutton as PM