Albanese is striking a blow for the battlers, but has he blown it?

A move to save shoppers $4 billion a year would normally get people talking about how the big idea could add some cash to every wallet in the country – and why it took so long for politicians in Canberra to wake up to the opportunity. Anthony Albanese and his cabinet colleagues expected that kind of attention when they went public with a plan to ban all debit card surcharges, those small fees on millions of transactions that add up to billions.

But this was not a normal week. The prime minister bought a $4.3 million sea-cliff house, and Australian politics slammed to a halt. The political class had a collective WTF moment as everyone checked the photos of the ocean views.

Anthony Albanese and the house he has bought at Copacabana on the NSW Central Coast.Credit: Domain, Alex Ellinghausen

Yes, it was a personal decision, but it jabbed the raw nerves of an angry electorate. It poked the anxiety about the cost of living, the frustration with the housing crisis and the deep suspicion that politicians are really out for themselves when they talk about the privilege of high office. It touched all that as well as the national obsession with ritzy homes and gleaming bathrooms.

More on the clifftop home later. But what of those government ideas that are meant to save voters some money? Lost in the noise was the fact Labor was steadily tightening the screws on companies that try to get between shoppers and their wallets.

The plan to cut surcharges should be treated as a promise. Treasurer Jim Chalmers is waiting for a review by the Reserve Bank to be sure about how far the ban can go, but the intention is to scrap the extra fees as long as they can be removed without hurting small businesses. (After all, shops and restaurants only charge the fees because they lack the power to challenge the banks.) Labor has locked in on this.

It is about time political leaders hardened up on the companies that separate workers from their hard-earned. The digital age promised a frictionless economy, only for companies to figure out countless ways to put tollgates along the internet. It’s sclerotic. The way we pay is now choked with scams, surcharges and shysters taking a cut of our money.

Labor did not move on surcharges in isolation. It has been steadily revealing new measures to protect consumers since the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission took Coles and Woolworths to court on September 23 to accuse them of misleading customers by raising prices before offering a “discount” that isn’t real. The supermarkets say they are helping customers, not dudding them. Now it is up to the Federal Court to decide.

Albanese and Chalmers made a new move on pricing each day for about a week. These included merger law reform to make it harder for big companies to limit competition, then $30 million for the ACCC to investigate dodgy pricing. One day after the surcharge decision, they announced new measures to ban unfair trading practices.

There is real money at stake because Australians are constantly paying higher prices because of these unfair tactics. The Labor policy would ban subscription traps that make it almost impossible to cancel an ongoing fee, or “drip pricing” that adds surprise fees to the list price. Another target is dynamic pricing where companies adjust the price in real time as customers flock online – which explains how tickets to an Oasis concert in Britain surged from about $300 to $700 in minutes, leaving customers feeling bruised.

Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones was working on the dynamic pricing changes as far back as August last year, when Treasury issued a consultation paper on the concept, yet the move seemed to come out of the blue this week. The media “drop” made it look like an afterthought – or even policy on the run.

So what’s happening? Labor has decided that policies have more impact as a series of news items rather than a single big package. They may be deluded, but that is the strategy. Labor thinks the ideas resonate with voters even if they do not make the front pages each day.

The Labor hard-heads say their qualitative polling backs the strategy. In focus groups last week, for instance, voters tended to know what the government was doing on the cost of living. This was in western Sydney and regional NSW in a week when much of the media – especially the conservative media – was focused overwhelmingly on the anniversary of the October 7 terrorist attack and the war in the Middle East.

The key takeaway was that voters remembered the Labor policies on household costs, as well as the action against the supermarkets, despite the blizzard of news on other fronts. “They’re deluged with information, and so they screen out what doesn’t affect them,” says one Labor source who saw the research.

This is what gives some of the government insiders a sense of confidence despite the common verdict – in this column last week and elsewhere in the media – that their messages are not cutting through to voters. The contest on policy has barely begun because Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has so few policies to offer. Right now, says one minister, the debate is about Labor versus perfection. Closer to the election, however, it will be about Albanese v Dutton.

Nobody can be sure if voters will remember Labor’s new moves on unfair pricing and surcharges, but the card crackdown certainly gained traction on social media. The fees we pay to use our own cash are a definite talking point – just not as big a talking point as the prime minister’s new home on the sea cliff at Copacabana, on the NSW Central Coast.

Albanese has plenty of defenders who do not want to dwell on his dwelling. Some think the Copacabana drama is a media beat-up and Albanese is entitled to privacy. But some caucus members are genuinely frustrated that he put himself above his colleagues – because they all pay the price if he makes it harder to lift Labor out of its slump.

The prime minister’s home purchase is a jarring moment that starts chatter about his political nous. That does not make it the same as Scott Morrison’s decision to holiday in Hawaii or Tony Abbott’s decision to restore knighthoods.

In flying to Hawaii during a summer of terrible bushfires, Morrison did not merely take a private holiday but engaged in a deception because the public was not told he was out of the country and not at work. The political consequences were dire for good reason.

When Abbott gave a knighthood to Prince Philip in early 2015, he made a government decision that followed his surprising edict, one year earlier, to restore knights and dames. This was not about his private life. The backlash was strongest from within his own party room.

Albanese has fumbled and will pay for the mistake, although the price will not be known until election day. He has not misled anyone and has not made a government decision. It is a private matter, even if it raises questions for his colleagues about his judgment. In the meantime, some of the Labor insiders are taking heart from the research that suggests voters remember how the government is acting on the cost of living. Albanese just made an election victory harder, but not impossible.

David Crowe is chief political correspondent.