Albanese needs to cut down on word salads or he’s toast

If Labor can’t quickly get Anthony Albanese speaking clearly, instead of dishing up word salads, this government is toast, writes James Campbell.

In all the excitement of last week’s reshuffle it went almost unnoticed the government no longer has room for an Assistant Minister for the Republic.

In the release announcing his new ministry, Albo failed to mention the job – formerly held by Matt Thistlethwaite – had disappeared and he clearly had no intention of bringing it up at his press conference until a confused journalist asked: “Prime Minister, unless I’m wrong, it looks like you’ve axed the republic as a portfolio. Why have you done that and is that an admission that that was a bit of an indulgence and not realistic?”

Connoisseurs of Albo’s press conferences waited with bated breath.

How would our nation’s leader respond? An honest answer would have been: “Dropping the job is simply acknowledgment of the reality that, outside a few fanatics on either side, there is little public interest in changing our head of state”.

More diplomatically he could have said: “I understand it is disappointing to fans of a republic but after the divisions of the Voice referendum, the last thing the country needs is another fight over the constitution.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese Picture: Yothu Yindi Foundation/Nina Franova via NewsWire

Did he do either? Nah. He blamed Bill Shorten of course.

“Well, the portfolio was appointed first under the previous Labor leader, it’s something that I inherited. I said before I was elected Prime Minister, I intended to have one referendum, it’s the only thing I committed to. Previously the Labor Party went to elections committing to multiple referendums. At the moment the only person who’s committed to another referendum during the next term if he’s elected is Peter Dutton.”

Former Labor leader Bill Shorten. Picture: AAP Image/Jane Dempster

Federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

It was vintage Albo: Evasive, snippy, obsessed by his place in his party’s history and, above all else, almost meaningless to anyone who is not a Canberra politics superfan.

The changes he has made to the Home Affairs were similar. But he couldn’t explain them clearly.

“You’re making some assumptions there about the reason why Home Affairs was created, and there’s been a number of interesting articles about why Home Affairs was created and some consequences of it. What I’m doing is putting in place what I think are the appropriate structures for good governance. And no one who looks at the way that Home Affairs and Immigration has functioned over many years, and there have been three reviews looking at it … three reviews, all of which have been incredibly critical at the structures that were put in place and the performance under the previous government. So, we are responding in an appropriate way.”

Andrew Giles has been replaced as Immigration Minister. Picture: NewsWire/Martin Ollman

Similarly the simple question of why he has moved Andrew Giles produced this epic word salad: “That we had to do. W hat you do when there’s a reshuffle is that there is a change that then has a knock-on effect. The fact is that we have been a very stable government. I have noted some of the comments. I mean, again, Peter Dutton recently has been pretending there wasn’t a High Court decision. That was a High Court decision, notwithstanding some of the commentary that’s been made, which would have taken place regardless of who was in government and would have, because there is a separation of powers in this country between the High Court, the judiciary and the political system, it would have had to have been put in place. If people want to say that that can be dismissed, then we know where that leads. But it doesn’t lead in a good place in a democracy such as ours.”

I’ll put it out there: if they can’t quickly get him speaking clearly, this government is toast.

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