The deadly political question voters are asking themselves about Albanese

There is clear evidence showing the Albanese government is in a worse position than it was almost three years ago – and that voters think the same about their lives and livelihoods. With only nine weeks to go before an election must be called, the PM’s future is at a tipping point.

With an election coming up, Labor is in trouble on the wrong issues and in the wrong areas at the wrong time. Collage: Frank Ling.

The future of the Albanese government is at a tipping point. With only nine weeks to go from this weekend before an election must be called, what was once an assumed comfortable election victory has turned into the real prospect of minority government and a growing fear there could even be a historic loss for a first-term government. Labor is in trouble on the wrong issues and in the wrong areas at the wrong time.

There is clear electoral evidence, public polling and hard-headed analysis that show the Albanese government is in a worse position than it was almost three years ago and that voters think the same about their lives and livelihoods.

The deadly political question “Are you better off now than you were three years ago?” is being asked, and the answer is a fatal, emphatic “No”.

This is particularly the case in Labor strongholds in the outer suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne as well as regional Australia, particularly Queensland and Western Australia.

Noisy protests against a prime ministerial visit to the Illawarra Labor stronghold seat of Whitlam because of anger at Chris Bowen’s renewable energy plans and the imposition of a former Greens’ candidate as the ALP candidate to replace the retiring MP Stephen Jones is evidence of how entrenched the anger is in what should be a safe Labor seat.

It is also clear Labor’s national campaign blitz early last month – spending or promising to spend billions of dollars on everything from roads to ports – has not changed the dire outlook.

Anthony Albanese won the 2022 election brandishing a $2 coin, promising help with the cost of living and using Scott Morrison’s unpopularity. Going into this election he has lost the coin, voter concern about the cost of living has more than doubled and Peter Dutton is at level pegging as preferred prime minister, with more people thinking he will win the election.

With parliament moving into a five-week break lasting until the budget sitting, there is potential for a combination of pent-up disillusionment with Labor and growing support for the Coalition to trigger a significant shift in sentiment across the board and alter the outcome.

There may be signs of the possibility of such a tsunami but it hasn’t happened yet and a minority Labor government remains the likeliest outcome whether an earlier election is called and the budget is dumped or not.

The question of when an election is called – late March, early April or mid-May – is almost immaterial in the time left, although the campaign itself becomes more important.

There are significant events that could influence public opinion and campaigning, such as the Reserve Bank’s meeting on Tuesday to decide on interest rates (and the next meeting on April 1); the March 8 West Australian election; the March 12 deadline for Donald Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminium; and the scheduled budget on March 25.

The Prime Minister has incumbency and history on his side while the Opposition Leader has momentum and positive expectations on his.

Albanese, with a majority of two seats going into the polls, has a clear advantage over Dutton, who has to win between 18 and 21 seats to form government. As well, Labor has positive historical precedent of no first-term government not being sworn in after the next election since James Scullin’s loss in 1931.

But, in an extraordinary turnaround since May 2022, the Labor government has gone from confidently talking about a two-term agenda, deriding an “unelectable” Dutton and concentrating on a history-making referendum for Indigenous Australians, to the general acceptance of slipping into minority government, facing an ascendant Liberal leader and avoiding references to the failed referendum.

Albanese does not accept the view that Labor is destined to become a minority government and confidently predicts victory because the Coalition “has nothing” to offer, and a low-risk, limited policy approach, which is what Albanese took to the 2022 election, can work against an old government but not against a first-term government.

But polling and election results such as the huge swing against Labor in the Victorian state by-election of Werribee and Labor’s election loss in Queensland show Labor is in trouble everywhere because of the long-term effect of inflation and rising prices of essential goods and services.

The rising cost of living won Labor the 2022 election and will decide the next.

In parliament on Thursday, Albanese responded to Coalition questions about crises in cost of living, housing and energy, declaring: “We want standards of living to rise, not fall, which is why we have done the hard yards to decrease inflation, to increase wages while having … unemployment lower on average than any government over the last 50 years.

“We know that people have been under pressure but that is why we have taken action. What is extraordinary is that if the opposition had got their way, Australians would have been on average $7200 worse off. Make no mistake – if they have their way, Australians will be worse off and Australians will have to pay.”

Dutton’s parliamentary riposte on Thursday was: “This government is so far out of touch it really is living in a parallel universe.

“This government’s core business is that it will do whatever it can to win the votes of Greens supporters in the inner city. It has decided to put the interest of the Green voter ahead of the interests of the people in the suburbs and regions.”

Opposition Treasury spokesman Angus Taylor says Australians feel increasingly disenfranchised by a government “that is detached from their economic realities, a regulatory system that stifles ambition and a political class that has failed to champion their interests”.

Arguing that people aspire to be able to earn more and have lower costs rather than short-term rebates and that Australia’s “enterprising culture has been increasingly replaced by a system that prioritises big government, big Australia, bureaucratic control, risk aversion and corporate virtue-signalling over enterprise, hard work and economic mobility”, Taylor says “inflation is the thief in the night for aspiration, eroding the purchasing power of working Australians while entrenching economic privilege for those who already hold wealth”.

Certainly the considerable swing against Labor in the Werribee by-election and the Greens’ loss to the Liberals in the Prahran by-election suggest people in the outer suburbs are listening more to the Coalition’s strategic arguments on economic management than to Labor’s political tactics, giveaways and spending.

SEC Newgate polling on the mood of the nation this week found that concern about the cost of living rated at 70 per cent more than double any other concern, including housing affordability, crime, healthcare, climate change and interest rates, and that level of concern had more than doubled since Labor’s election in 2022.

RedBridge polling chief Kos Samaras found that after the Victorian by-elections last weekend Labor’s primary support in the mortgage-belt outer suburbs of Melbourne had collapsed to just 27 per cent and there was a “growing schism between the well-off, whose support Labor increasingly depends on, and the so-called ‘invisible Australians’ who are fed up with being ignored and are actively looking for another political home”.

RedBridge found the Coalition vote in the outer suburbs “has climbed from 40 per cent in November to 46 per cent in February, a clear sign that disillusioned voters are willing to vote for Dutton”.

But Labor faces a host of other challenges beyond the priority of cost of living, including economic management, housing, immigration, national security, law and order, and antagonism from Jewish voters that will affect Labor electorates nationally, regionally and individually.

Dutton has pursued the Albanese government over a failure to address the surge of anti-Semitism in Australia since the Hamas terror attacks on October 7, 2023, and on Thursday said Labor had failed its first priority to keep Australians safe and left Jews feeling “disenfranchised” and fearful.

Peter Dutton has pursued the Albanese government over a failure to address the surge of anti-Semitism in Australia since October 7, 2023. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

While the concentration of Jewish votes in a handful of seats, now mostly Climate 200-held electorates, won’t have a direct impact on Labor’s vote or chances in electorates such as Goldstein in Melbourne and Wentworth in Sydney, the conflation of the issue of attacks on Jews and synagogues with wider concerns about youth crime and street violence is a much bigger problem for Labor.

Again, polling has demonstrated that the issue of crime is higher now in national polling than ever and reflects deep concerns in Queensland and the Northern Territory. The SEC Newgate poll showed crime, at almost 20 per cent, the No.3 concern after cost of living and housing affordability. As an issue, crime has more than doubled in voters’ minds since the 2022 election.

The political problem for Labor is that the Coalition rates above the government in the handling of key issues such as cost of living, economic management, national security, immigration, and law and order.

Even the areas of traditional Labor strength – health and climate change – are becoming contestable for the Coalition, which all combines to undermine Albanese’s central campaign accusing Dutton of making people worse off, cutting services and undermining Medicare if he becomes prime minister.

Combined with national polling putting the Coalition in front of Labor 51 per cent to 49 per cent on a two-party-preferred basis, the ALP with a lower primary vote than it got at the 2022 election, Dutton improving as preferred prime minister and the Coalition ahead on handling issues of voters’ concerns, a Labor attack based on Dutton’s personality and cost-of-living relief is looking thin.

With all the valedictory speeches of retiring MPs delivered in this last week of parliament and an atmosphere of school end of term there is a great expectation that Albanese will call an election for the end of March or beginning of April to avoid a budget and cash in on an RBA rate cut if there is one.

But Albanese may decide that despite the risk of things getting worse economically and politically it is more in his interest not to depend on anything outside his control – such as a rate cut – and instead continue with the attack on Dutton, a lack of Coalition policy and more handouts as cost relief.