Election 2022: Logan’s hero Jim Chalmers ready to hold the purse strings

Jim Chalmers is nervous, and who can blame him?

On the final day of the campaign, Labor Treasury spokesman Jim Chalmers still found time to walk his son Jack, 3, to pre-school. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

Jim Chalmers is nervous, and who can blame him?

Within 24 hours, he should ­either be the most powerful figure in an Albanese government ­behind the new prime minister or contemplating the unthinkable for Labor: a second decade of thankless grind in opposition.

Whatever happens, it’s a sliding doors moment for the father of three from hardscrabble Logan City on the doorstep of Brisbane who aspires to be a treasurer “from the suburbs, of the suburbs and for the suburbs”.

“I think about that a lot,” Dr Chalmers said between the day­care drop-off on Friday for three-year-old Jack and launching into a frenetic final flurry of campaign appearances. “If you come back to … the unfolding story of Australia, we need to find a place for the outer suburbs in that story.

“I do think too often that part of the story is missed. We have got these great, big, prominent cities and these beautiful regional areas and provincial towns … but one of the reasons I got into this game is that I want to be a voice for ­communities like this one.”

If his side wins, Dr Chalmers, 44, will be the first treasurer since his friend and mentor Paul Keating to represent a postcode on Struggle Street rather than the leafier side of town. Weekly earnings in his largely working-class electorate of Rankin, based on the weatherboard expanse of Logan, south of Brisbane, sit $300 below the national median.

Dr Chalmers has lived there all his life, maintaining the connection even when he went off to university to earn a PhD in political science – his doctoral thesis was a study of Mr Keating’s prime ministership entitled Brawler Statesman – and he cut his teeth in Canberra as chief of staff to another Labor treasurer, Wayne Swan, during the ALP’s last, troubled stint in office under Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard.

The airy home he made with journalist wife Laura and the kids – Leo, 7, Annabel, 5, and little Jack – is around the corner from the house he grew up in; school friends populate the surrounding streets.

“The idea that there could be a treasurer from Logan means a lot to me,” he explained. “I think Paul had a sense of it because of where he came from in western Sydney. I wear my heart on my sleeve. I am emotional about my community.

“If I am about to do a big thing – release costings, release a policy, give a big speech – typically what I think of on the way to that is that I am speaking up for this community. I have always drawn a lot of strength from that.

“As a Logan kid born and bred, I do have a bit of a chip on my shoulder about the way the country is run and the sense that people like us shouldn’t be excluded from it.

“So if I did get the chance to sit around the cabinet table with ­Anthony and my colleagues, I would cherish the opportunity. I would never forget where I come from because it does matter to me that Logan City would have a voice at the cabinet table of Australia, and a prominent voice.”

Sure-footed campaign

Dr Chalmers won’t hazard a guess on the election outcome. The memories of 2019 when he was ALP campaign spokesman are still raw. With Labor’s ­ lead in our election day Newspoll narrowed, there’s no avoiding the question: could history repeat?

“We have done a lot of work here and around Australia which I think will hold us in good stead,” said Dr Chalmers, who had nearly five points shaved off his margin in Rankin last time. “But I’m nervous. We tried to learn the lessons of 2019 without obsessing about it. The big difference with this election is people have worked Scott Morrison out … I think they are tired of that kind of leadership.”

What’s certain is that a sure-footed performance on the hustings backstopping a gaffe-prone Anthony Albanese has done his own leadership prospects no harm at all. After the 2019 defeat, he was urged by senior figures in the Right, his faction, to run against Mr Albanese; he didn’t, and one by one the contenders dropped out.

“I think that was vindicated by how Anthony brought us together and put us in a position to win.”

He gets on personally with his opposite number, Josh Frydenberg, which is refreshing. The youngish-looking dads have more in common than you might think. Both trod the well-worn path from ministerial adviser to MP, then to the parliamentary frontbench, and each is seen as the future of his party. If Mr Frydenberg can hold off the challenge of teal independent Monique Ryan in his Melbourne seat of Kooyong, he will have his work cut out – as Treasurer of a returned Morrison government or potentially as the new leader of the opposition.

“I think … whoever is the treasurer after the weekend, they will be inheriting the trickiest set of economic circumstances a treasurer has inherited since the war,” said Dr Chalmers.

Ideally, he would be the ­“explainer in chief” on the economy, making it relevant to Australians – just like his hero, Mr Keating, did as treasurer under Bob Hawke. They spoke at least twice a week during the campaign and he ­deeply values the former PM’s advice. “I am lucky to have him as a friend,” Dr Chalmers said. “I heard him say when he was a kid he saw Churchill and said, ‘if that’s the game Churchill wants to be in, that’s the game I want to be in’. That’s how I feel about Paul.”

Defining challenges

But could he deliver the bitter medicine Mr Keating did with his 1986 wake-up call on the banana republic? The last treasurer who tried to do anything like that was Joe Hockey – and look what happened to him and Tony Abbott after they told Australians the ­sobering news in 2014 the nation was living beyond its means.

Asked if any treasurer today could have such a conversation with voters, Dr Chalmers said: “I think you can, and we have. We have been saying to people in an upfront way, ‘here are the defining challenges in our economy – inflation, real wages growth, debt – and here’s how we intend to start dealing with these issues, and they will take a while to deal with’.”

The one lead he won’t take from Mr Keating is to move the family to Canberra. “I couldn’t cut the cord with this community,” he said. “I think the connections with this community will make me a better treasurer and I wouldn’t trade that away lightly.”