Heat on Albanese after ‘writing off’ the first week

Anthony Albanese changes tactics, cuts short press conference amid continued grillings about his economic experience and approach.

Anthony Albanese has been warned he must bounce back strongly after the Easter long weekend to avoid a campaign slump, with senior Labor figures conceding his first week on the hustings was a “write-off”.

Boasting earlier this week that he would answer all questions from journalists and saying “I don’t run away from press conferences”, the Opposition Leader on Wednesday cut short his daily press conference in Melbourne after fielding 10 questions.

Mr Albanese also defended his economic credentials for a third straight day after he was forced to apologise on Monday for failing to name the unemployment rate and the official cash rate.

He insisted he had worked as an “economic policy adviser” in the Hawke government, declaring it “just a fact”, despite his parliamentary biography showing he worked as a research officer to Labor Left luminary Tom Uren.

Mr Uren, an internal critic of Hawke government economic policies, sat outside cabinet as ­territories and local government minister and assistant minister for community development and regional affairs when Mr Albanese worked with him in the 1980s.

“I was employed as an economic policy adviser to a minister in the Hawke government. That is not a surprise. That is just fact,” Mr Albanese said. “If you look at the relationship between Paul (Keating) and Tom, they had seats next to each other and they had a fantastic relationship.”

The Australian understands while there were no immediate plans to shake up his campaign team ahead of the May 21 election, Mr Albanese has faced internal criticism for failing to stay on message and taking too many questions at press conferences.

Mr Albanese will maintain his focus on health over the next 48 hours and tour GP clinic sites promoting his $135m plan to ease pressure on hospital emergency departments.

Campaigning in marginal NSW seats on Thursday, Mr Albanese will attempt to wrest back control as many Australians head off on their four-day Easter break. Senior Coalition strategists on Wednesday claimed internal polling showed a bounce to the government following Mr Albanese’s economic slip-up.

“That start has dented confidence in their ranks, and buoyed ours. There’s a long way to go in the campaign and undoubtedly slip-ups from both sides, but Scott Morrison is showing what a strong campaigner he is,” a senior Coalition source said.

In another sign of panic in Labor ranks, Australian Medical Association president Omar Khorshid told The Australian he had “no input” in Mr Albanese’s major health policy rolling out 50 Medicare urgent care clinics based in GP surgeries and community health centres.

Dr Khorshid slammed the ­policy on Wednesday and said it would do “little to relieve the hospital logjam”.

Following his response to the Prime Minister’s short and sharp press conference on Sunday, Mr Albanese was criticised by Labor figures for fielding too many questions.

After Mr Albanese’s speech to the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation on Wednesday, Labor campaign organisers considered whether to even hold a press conference and told journalists there would only be an opportunity for a quick door stop. This decision was reversed during the campaign rally and Mr Albanese’s advisers agreed to a short press conference.

The Labor leader’s press conferences had previously run for at least 30 minutes, longer than Mr Morrison’s.

Mr Albanese was also forced to respond to the backlash from social services groups after opposition assistant treasury spokesman Andrew Leigh revealed Labor had dropped intentions to undertake a review of the JobSeeker payment.

Mr Albanese said the party had not “dumped” plans to review the JobSeeker rate, currently $642.70 a fortnight, but conceded it wouldn’t happen in Labor’s first budget. “We haven’t dumped anything. What we have said is we don’t have a plan to increase the allowance in our first budget,” he said.