Labor walks tightrope in new age of politics

Younger voters like the Indigenous voice to parliament but they also like voting for the Greens. Anthony Albanese, you have a demographic timebomb on your doorstep.

Younger voters favour a Yes vote, older voters are strongly supporting the No campaign. Whatever the result, it will be delivered by age, writes Peter van Onselen. Picture: Getty Images

Demographic variables almost always play an important role from one election to the next. The growing divide between older and younger Australians may yet be the defining feature of the coming decades. It could also develop this way internationally, as ageing populations learn to grapple with policy implications of a shrinking working-age population. Western countries are particularly exposed on this front, but so is China.

In Australia, age-based demographic divides will cause heightened tensions because of our dependence on income taxes, unless that situation is substantially attended to, which the current government shows no serious signs of doing. Addressing it requires targeting older Australians with new taxes to offset declining income tax collections. For example, with higher consumption taxes, or via changes to superannuation or how the family home is treated. These are difficult changes to make without alienating older voters, who are living longer and therefore voting for longer. And the large demographic bubble that is baby boomers is now hitting retirement age. But doing nothing risks an electoral backlash from younger, working-age voters who increasingly bear the fiscal burden of the nation. Younger generations are also struggling to break into the housing market.

The Australian Election Study has tracked electoral behaviour for over 35 years. At the 2004 election the Coalition secured support from more younger Australians than Labor, a consequence of the poor showing by the opposition nationally. It was a first for the Howard government, which had grown used to generating the lion’s share of support among older voters. Just three years later and John Howard was removed from power with a groundswell of Labor support from younger voters, coupled with lost support among so-called Howard battlers because of the WorkChoices legislation introduced after the 2004 victory.

Generational change to Kevin Rudd and a promise to abolish WorkChoices, coupled with consecutive interest rate rises over the preceding three years, played important roles in Howard’s defeat. Remember this last point as we count down to the next federal election. If Peter Dutton is to become the first opposition leader to defeat a one-term government since 1931 rising rates will play a pivotal role. But he’ll need support from younger voters, which conservative leaders struggle to get.

For that to happen the newly minted opposition will need to regain the economic confidence of the electorate, an advantage that dramatically slipped away during the Morrison years. Rightly or wrongly, the Howard government built up a reservoir of trust on economic management, across demographic cohorts, which the last Coalition government also benefited from. But tripling the debt and delivering a litany of budget deficits, with few examples of meaningful economic reform, notwithstanding the pandemic, punctured the positive perception.

A surplus of trust managing the economy is a powerful way for the new Labor government to start its time in office, but the signs are there that older Australians in particular are losing confidence. Anti-business industrial relations reforms – a major topic this week – coupled with stubbornly high inflation aren’t being met with policy innovation or dramatic belt-tightening to ease the pressure. Anaemic economic growth was announced this week. At just 0.4 per cent for the latest quarter the only thing saving us from recession is population growth built on the back of sky-high migration.

But relying on immigration to prop up the economy lends itself to the growing generational divide coming our way, and Labor might find itself losing support among younger voters if it doesn’t find a solution to topics like housing shortages. Even if the Greens are where these voters initially turn, instead of the opposition.

This week’s Newspoll was significant in that it was the first time since the last election that the Coalition’s primary vote edged ahead of Labor’s. To be sure, the government still holds a handsome lead on the two-party vote, courtesy of Greens preferences. But it is a sign the electoral contest will tighten. The Albanese government is already nearly halfway into its term.

Newspoll also highlighted that Anthony Albanese’s honeymoon is over, which could also have implications for the referendum. The stratospheric positive net satisfaction ratings he enjoyed in the aftermath of the election have morphed into a net negative rating on the latest numbers. While Dutton fares worse than the PM on this measure, opposition leaders usually do. The Yes campaign for an Indigenous voice had hoped Albanese’s previously strong personal ratings would lift overall support for a cause he is championing. Now they might be better off hiding from view a PM with a net dissatisfaction rating, lest he drags support for change down.

The polling numbers on the voice amplify the age-based demographic divide defining the political era we are all about to live through. Younger voters favour a Yes vote, older voters are strongly supporting the No campaign. Whatever the result, it will be delivered by age.

The political party disproportionately generating aged-based support right now is the Greens, unsurprisingly from younger voters worried about the environment they will need to live with for longer than the rest of us. No wonder the Greens’ policy is to support lowering the voting age from 18 to 16. Doing so could see them rise as a third major party, potentially forcing Labor into coalition with them to form majority government, the way Liberals do with the Nationals. But the major party cartel will work to ensure lowering the voting age never happens, because both majors would suffer.

The divide between older and younger voters plays out with regard to size-of-government questions, climate change activism and what to do about housing. Solutions are sought. Gone are the days when Robert Menzies could dismiss a question, “whatcha gonna do about ’ousing?” by replying “I’d put an ‘h’ in front of it”. The Greens are tapping into the issues young voters worry about, without needing to implement their responses. They can be virtuous on the crossbench without ever having to take responsibility for the viability of what’s announced.

Albanese knows the Greens well, having faced challenges in his inner-city electoral backyard. But holding them off as a local member is one thing. Doing so as an incumbent leader is quite another. The Greens will position themselves as a protest-vote party and could deny Labor an outright majority even if the teal vote doesn’t return to the Liberal fold. The government is lucky two of its most vulnerable seats are held by the PM and high-profile frontbencher Tanya Plibersek. When either or both retire, the Greens will count themselves a strong chance of picking the seats up. Not that Albo or Tanya are planning to retire anytime soon.

Peter van Onselen is a professor of politics and public policy at the University of Western Australia and Griffith University.