Anthony Albanese’s travel blitz raises talk of early election
Anthony Albanese is running an election-style campaign blitz focused on sandbagging key Labor seats, fuelling speculation he could head to the polls earlier than May next year.
Anthony Albanese is running an election-style campaign blitz focused on sandbagging key Labor seats, fuelling speculation the government could head to the polls earlier than next year’s scheduled election.
The Prime Minister, who will mark the second anniversary of his 2022 election victory on Tuesday, said the May 2025 election date was the “anticipated” timing and again prosecuted the case for four-year terms.
Since the government’s overhaul of stage-three tax cuts on January 25, travel itineraries of Mr Albanese and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton reveal that Labor is adopting a defensive posture as it moves to defend battleground seats to shield its slim majority.
Following Labor’s political reset over summer when Mr Albanese revamped Scott Morrison’s tax plan, the 61-year-old has visited 43 electorates across all states and territories excluding the ACT. Of the electorates visited, 29 are held by Labor, including the battleground seats of Richmond, McEwen, Lyons, Dobell, Robertson, Blair, Solomon, Lingiari, Reid, Gilmore and Swan.
Ahead of last Tuesday’s budget, Mr Albanese unveiled multi-billion-dollar education, infrastructure, manufacturing, mining, defence and cost-of-living packages during visits to Queensland, Western Australia, the Northern Territory, Victoria, South Australia and NSW.
Since launching the summer blitz, Mr Albanese has ramped-up his domestic travel schedule.
Recent analysis by The Australian revealed that no first-term government since the war – including Robert Menzies’ government – has improved on their seats at the next election.
In a bid to reverse historical trends, Labor strategists have opted for a defensive posture, with multiple visits to the NSW Central Coast and Hunter Region, Darwin and Alice Springs, Perth and Melbourne to protect gains achieved at the 2022 election.
Mr Dutton’s outer-suburban and regions strategy is aimed at ALP seats such as McEwen, Corangamite, Aston and Dunkley in Victoria, Lyons in Tasmania, Paterson, Dobell, Robertson and Gilmore in NSW, Boothby in South Australia and Blair in Queensland.
The top two targets for Greens leader Adam Bandt are the Labor-held seats of Richmond in northern NSW and Macnamara in Melbourne.
While not as intensive as Mr Albanese’s diary, which included two visits to independent MP Andrew Gee’s western NSW seat of Calare, Mr Dutton’s travel itinerary since January 25 includes stops in all states and territories.
Labor and Coalition strategists are closely monitoring Australian Electoral Commission redistributions in NSW, Victoria and WA. The AEC’s NSW, Victoria and WA determinations are due by October 10, October 17 and September 24. Labor state and territory governments in the Northern Territory, ACT and Queensland face elections on August 24, October 19 and October 26.
The Australian understands that Mr Albanese is seriously considering early election options, with Labor planning a massive advertising spend spruiking the revamped stage three-tax cuts, which commence from July 1.
Asked on Monday about an early election, Mr Albanese said “it’ll be when it’s scheduled (May 2025) … well, that is the anticipated date”.
“I think that three years is too short. I just wish that it was four years. Every state government and territory has four years. The federal government has three,” Mr Albanese said. With a referendum required to extend terms, Mr Albanese said “referendums are pretty hard”.
Ahead of parliament returning next Tuesday, the Prime Minister will continue his nationwide blitz alongside Jim Chalmers this week to sell what could be Labor’s final pre-election budget.
“I’ll be (in Brisbane) on Thursday and Friday. It will be, I think, my sixth visit to Queensland in the last seven weeks. I always enjoy coming to Queensland,” he said.
Speaking in Beenleigh on Monday, in the southeast Queensland LNP-held seat of Forde, Mr Dutton urged voters struggling under cost-of-living pressures to “elect a Coalition government at the next election”.
After pledging to slash migration and free-up housing in his budget-reply speech last week, Mr Dutton said Labor had “forgotten about people in the suburbs and in regional areas”.
Amid speculation of a mid-year ministerial reshuffle to freshen-up his line-up and shift underperforming ministers, Mr Albanese accused Mr Dutton of failing to “come up with a single costed policy”.
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