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From Left field: Albanese and Corbyn and co

Labor leader will have to jettison hard-left policies he ­espoused for thirty years.

May 3, 2018 Instagram picture of Anthony Albanese with Jeremy Corbyn in the UK.
May 3, 2018 Instagram picture of Anthony Albanese with Jeremy Corbyn in the UK.

Labor’s leader in waiting Anthony Albanese will be forced to jettison the hard-left policies he has ­espoused for more than three decades, with former party heavyweights questioning his passion­ate stances on asylum-seekers, boat turnbacks and ­energy policy.

Mr Albanese, a democratic socialist from Sydney’s inner west who is set to assume the leadership unchallenged, has become close to far-left British Opposition Leader Jeremy Corbyn.

He has met with the fellow “Tory fighter” at least three times in the past 14 months.

In March last year, Mr Albanese posted on social media that he had caught up “again” with the British Labour leader, whose manifesto includes nationalising Britain’s energy and water network­s.

“Talking politics and progress — and a bit of cricket,” he wrote on Facebook above a photo with Mr Corbyn at the parliament.

Since throwing his hat into the ring to become Labor leader, Mr Albanese has pitched himself as an “inclusive” leader who is prepare­d to abandon class-war rhetoric to win over the ordinary voters in the suburbs who spurned the ALP at Saturday’s election.

But only three days before the poll he said Labor’s infrastructure funding would be paid by hitting the “top end of town”. And just a few years ago Mr ­Albanese defied Bill Shorten at Labor’s 2015 nation­al conference by voting against boat turnbacks.

Anthony Albanese gives a news conference in a laneway in Marrickville yesterday. Picture: AAP
Anthony Albanese gives a news conference in a laneway in Marrickville yesterday. Picture: AAP

“If people were in a boat, includin­g families and children, I myself couldn’t turn that around,” he said at the time.

Labor sources said yesterday it may be difficult for the knockabout MP to whitewash his decade­s-long history as a spear-thrower for Labor’s hard Left.

His former leader, Mark Latham — whose own tenure as Labor boss ended in spectacular fashion in 2005, and who now sits as a One Nation MP in the NSW upper house — said Mr Albanese had been on the “wrong side of history” in Labor’s policy ­debates for 30 years by veering too far to the Left.

He recalled Mr Albanese as a radical Young Labor member in the 1980s speaking out against the economic policies of the Hawke-Keating governments, including deregulation and tariff cuts.

It was about this time, also, that the firebrand student was suspended from the University of Sydney for his role in leading a protest that included breaking into the university’s clock tower and leading an occupation of the economics building.

One former senior Labor ministe­r, who declined to be named, said Mr Albanese had been too far to the Left on the timbe­r industry, asylum policy, energy policy, mining policy and on uranium ­exports to India.

“He used to call people from western Sydney rednecks,” the former minister said. “His record speaks for itself.” As a federal MP, Mr Albanese has never been afraid of an ­internal brawl, spearheading the Left’s strong backing for softer policies on asylum­-seekers and boat turnbacks.

 
 

In 2001, he spoke passionately against John Howard’s bill to stop the Tampa from delivering more than 400 asylum-seekers to Aust­ral­ia. “This is not a refugee crisis,” he said. “Four hundred people on a boat do not represent a crisis. This is a political crisis for us as a nation, which has been brought on by a desperate prime minister.”

Mr Latham recalled a shouting match in a Canberra restaurant, in front of Labor MP Joel Fitzgibbon, after the Tampa incident.

“Albo was telling me how heartless I was for supporting Howard’s policy,” he said. “It was (his position) to let the boats flow. He was (later) influential with (Kevin) Rudd on reopening the borders, there’s no doubt.”

Yet one former party heavyweight described Mr Albanese as “pragmatic”, and another said his political views had moderated over the years.

One senior Right faction source defended Mr Albanese: “In the past few years he’s demonstrated the ability to keep things mainstream.” NSW Labor’s general secretary Kaila Murnain said: “Albo will be a strong and unifying force as leader of our party and we are all excited and ready to take the fight to the Liberals and ­Nationals under his leadership.”

Mr Albanese said he wanted to return Labor to the pro-growth economic policies of the Hawke-Keating era, to reopen the door to business and abandon class-war politics.

He is promising to drop the anti-business rhetoric of Labor’s election campaign. “The language used was terrible … unions and employers have a common interest. Successful businesses are a precondition for employing more workers, and that is obvious.”

Additional reporting: Greg Brown

Read related topics:Anthony Albanese

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Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/from-left-field-albanese-and-corbyn-and-co/news-story/4b238fee6a5cad30f8eeb13a5a9d8794