Election date dependent on Budget as punters stress on cost of living | Samantha Maiden

The Coalition is putting its money on Labor going all out to avoid having to bringing down another Budget, writes Samantha Maiden.

As the clock ticks towards an election, the Coalition is convinced that the last thing the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his Treasurer Jim Chalmers want is another budget.

Buoyed by the fall and rise of US President Donald Trump after just one term of the Biden administration, there is cautious confidence in Liberal Party ranks.

“I think this is turning and I think there is going to be a near revolution that comes with the Trump administration,’’ Mr Dutton said this week.

“In relation to a lot of the woke issues that might be fashionable in universities and at the ABC that just aren’t cutting it around kitchen tables at the moment where people can’t pay their bills.

“They can’t pay their mortgage, their insurance has gone up, their grocery bill has gone up – they just see a government with the wrong priorities.”

Suddenly, the prospect of a Peter Dutton victory is not the pipe dream it might have seemed three years ago, although it would involve picking up a record number of seats – nearly 20 – which is a tall order.

Prime Minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese and Treasurer of Australia, the Hon Dr Jim Chalmers MP will want the election to be before the Budget is passed down. Picture: Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images

Cost of living is central to that dream and the anxiety voters naturally feel about the economy, rent rises and interest rates.

If the Coalition is right, that provides some big clues in terms of when the election will be called because the Prime Minister will want to avoid handing down a budget before he goes to the polls.

If they are wrong, we could be waiting a little longer for an election.

With a budget marked in the calendar for March 25, the Prime Minister needs to call an election before that date to dodge the budget bullet.

And that still means that all roads, at this stage, still lead to calling an election straight after the WA election on March 8, for a federal election to be held on April 12.

But is there a counter argument that leaves the door open to a May election? Does the assumption that another budget is bad for the Albanese Government hold true?

Some Labor strategists think so. They point to the fact that the forecast deficit in the pre-Christmas mid year economic outlook (MYEFO) was predicated on an iron ore price of $60 a tonne by the first quarter of 2025.

But that iron ore price is still at $100 and because of the falling dollar, volume is going up. Unemployment benefits expenditure is also lower than expected which is boosting tax revenue because, unsurprisingly enough, people who earn more are taxed more.

That leaves the door slightly ajar for a surprise third surplus. Or at least a smaller deficit or more money to spend on election sweeteners.

The Treasurer’s office has pushed back over that idea, dampening expectations. They assert the numbers are looking better, but not enough to deliver a third surplus.

Economist Chris Richardson of Access Economics agrees.

“It would be smaller, but it would likely still be a deficit,’’ he says. “The reason it would be smaller has nothing to do with governments and political decisions, and so that it’s just the Australian dollar went down, so that the deficit went down.”

Regardless of what the PM decides, the Treasurer and his department have to prepare for all possibilities including a budget.

And don’t forget that even if the Prime Minister does pull the trigger on an election for April and scuttles the budget, the Pre-election Fiscal Outlook document (PEFO) still has to be released within 10 days of the writs being issued.

The purpose of the PEFO is to provide updated information on the economic and fiscal outlook. The PEFO does not include the impact of election commitments that do not constitute decisions of government and that are costed separately during the election campaign.

In layman’s language, it’s not a political document like the budget. It’s a document prepared by public servants.

There might be reasons why the government would want that, which would leave the door open to an election on May 3, 10 or 17.

Originally published as Election date dependent on Budget as punters stress on cost of living | Samantha Maiden