Cyclone Alfred looms ahead of Anthony Albanese’s federal election call

As Tropical Cyclone Alfred bears down on Queensland, Anthony Albanese has another challenge ahead of calling the federal election.

Labor is finalising preparations that pave the way for Anthony Albanese to call the election this weekend, as Peter Dutton argues an early poll would show the federal government has no “good news” on the economy.

The Prime Minister can wait no later than Monday to call an April 12 election, which has long been the favoured option to avoid delivering a federal budget this month, while also navigating public holidays for Easter and Anzac Day.

Mr Albanese has repeatedly said his intention was to govern a full three-year term, but several Labor sources said it was widely felt a mid-April poll was close enough to the actual cut off date of May 17.

As Tropical Cyclone Alfred bears down on the southeast Queensland in what would be the first time such a storm has struck the populous region in 50 years, Mr Albanese was expected to arrive in Brisbane on Tuesday night as the city prepares for the worst.

A Labor source said there was not yet “serious talk” of the cyclone causing a delay in any plans to call the election this Sunday, but the situation was being “closely watched”.

The release of new National Accounts data, which will provide an update on the economy for the last quarter of 2024, on Wednesday is expected to further fuel speculation Labor will seek to avoid handing down a budget due on March 25.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is heading to Brisbane. Picture: Nikki Short

Labor sources insisted there has been no final decision on whether to deliver a full budget, provide an earlier update or rely on the Pre-election Economic Financial Outlook (PEFO) to outline the state of the nation’s finances before the poll.

Pre-empting that the government will call the election early, Mr Dutton on Tuesday argued this was because Mr Albanese “doesn’t have any good news in the budget”.

“I think Australians will see that as a sign from a Prime Minister who doesn’t want to tell the Australian public the true, dire picture of what the economic outlook is for our country,” he said.

But Treasurer Jim Chalmers said despite what was expected to be “soft” economic figures in the National Accounts data, there was cause to be “increasingly confident about our economy in 2025”.

“There are good reasons to believe that the Australian economy is starting to turn a corner,” he said.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers is opitimistic about the National Accounts data. Picture: NewsWire / John Gass

“We’ve got inflation down, we’ve got wages up, we’ve kept unemployment low, we’ve paid down a lot of Liberal debt and now interest rates have started to come down as well.”

In anticipation of an early election call, Labor staff have begun settling into campaign headquarters in Sydney’s CBD, while the Coalition have set up camp in Parramatta in the city’s west.

Both parties have begun last minute organisational activities like registering media to travel on campaign buses, and the finer points of debates between Mr Albanese and Opposition leader, Mr Dutton, are being negotiated.

Liberal federal director Andrew Hirst on Monday sending a letter to ALP national secretary Paul Erickson saying the opposition would be comfortable with four debates in total.

These include a Sky News/Daily Telegraph people’s forum in Sydney hosted by Sky’s Kieran Gilbert, a debate hosted by Channel Nine moderated by Karl Stefanovic or Allison Langdon, a Channel 7 debate in Perth hosted by Mark Riley, and an ABC debate in Western Sydney moderated by David Speers.

Originally published as Cyclone Alfred looms ahead of Anthony Albanese’s federal election call