Election 2022: Blooper just a bump on a long road to The Lodge

Labor leader Anthony Albanese in South Melbourne on Tuesday. Picture: Toby Zerna

Long election campaigns can be dangerous for incumbents and challengers alike.

After Bob Hawke’s historic win from opposition in 1983, his decision to go early and long in December 1984 demonstrated he was human after all. In 2016 a tortuously long campaign cost Malcolm Turnbull 14 seats and arguably his leadership.

Having set a long campaign, Scott Morrison no doubt believes time is on his side. Anthony Albanese is good, very good, but he’s untested on the big election stage.

Morrison will have calculated that every additional campaign day is an opportunity for an Albanese stumble.

Day one of the campaign no doubt left him feeling vindicated. Albanese’s memory lapse and failure to produce the numbers journalists were asking for was bad, there can be no argument, but to suggest it was fatal is wrong.

There have been some big election campaign bloopers over the years, some memorable, some not. John Hewson’s infamous 1993 attempt to explain how his proposed GST would impact on the price of a birthday cake falls into the former category. The irony is he seemed to know exactly how the cake would be taxed and that was part of the problem – the explanation was necessarily far too complex.

Under the Alan Jones blowtorch in the lead-up to the 2016 campaign, Labor’s Chris Bowen couldn’t identify income tax thresholds, something an aspiring treasurer might be expected to know. It was a big story but ran for just 24 hours.

By contrast, Bowen’s 2019 gaffe was most memorable. When the Treasury spokesman of the day instructs people who don’t like his proposed tax changes not to vote for them, they are likely to accept the invitation. And they did, in spades. An extraordinary number of voters were aware of Bowen’s arrogant challenge, as the election result confirms.

Albanese’s day-one mistake will quickly make its way to the benign column. Morrison will work hard to keep it alive, as you would expect, but a few days on, while a high number of punters will know there was a stumble, few will be able to provide the detail of it.

One thing Albanese won’t forget is the distraction his error provided from the revelation about negotiations for taxpayers to fund a large payout to former – or not so former – minister Alan Tudge’s ex-staffer Rachelle Miller.

Few prime ministers have been so lucky to have such a timely distraction during an election campaign.

Morrison is too smart to underestimate someone of Albanese’s political skill and cunning, and he won’t. Asking the electorate to extend the Coalition’s period in power well into a second decade is fraught with difficulty.

There remains a moderate mood for change and more than likely, enough will vote for change to put Albanese in The Lodge, despite his nervous start.

After a decade in office, the Coalition probably has too much weight in its saddle to win this race.

Most will agree on one thing: we need a winner. At this important point in our history – in the wake of a pandemic and in the face of a rapidly changing geostrategic environment – we need to put someone in charge.

This is no time for a hung parliament and therefore it’s not a good time to be turning to minor parties or extreme candidates.

Back a horse that can win, not one just there to run interference.