Opinion: When Anthony Albanese is most likely to call next election

There are around 16 plausible Saturdays for a 2024 election, but this is Anthony Albanese’s sweet spot, writes Paul Williams.

The chatter in Canberra is that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is planning an early election – perhaps even this year.

It all began over a leaked text message from his chief of staff referencing how the government was entering an election year. To be fair, any time after May this year – some 10 weeks from now – puts us within 12 months of the next scheduled federal election and, therefore, within a year of an election.

But note Albo didn’t dismiss early election talk as total hogwash, but merely as a “bit of a beat-up”.

Perhaps the Prime Minister has at least considered an early poll. Either way, I would urge Albo to pull the election trigger far earlier than May 2025.

The earliest constitutionally allowable date for a House of Representatives and half-Senate election is August 3 – a little over four months from now. Omitting the two footy final weekends in late September and early October, there are around 16 plausible Saturdays for a 2024 election.

But Albo’s sweet spot is for an election somewhere between November 2 and December 7. Why? There are several key reasons.

First, Labor cannot afford to lose any more federal seats or Senate votes in Queensland, where the party is clearly on the nose. If Albo waits till after the October 26 state election, Queensland voters – having vented their spleen on state Labor – might be just a little kinder to federal Labor.

Second, a small economic window will appear in late 2024 where the cost of living will fall sharply before unemployment really spikes. Inflation was almost at 8 per cent in 2022, and is now about 4 per cent. By Christmas, it could be just 3 per cent. But unemployment is already nudging up – currently on 4.1 per cent – and could easily soar above 5 per cent by May, 2025. Albo simply cannot wait to be hammered by the unemployment bogey that has killed so many Australian governments.

Third, late 2024 will also be an interest rate sweet spot, with some economists predicting at least two, and perhaps three, rate cuts before Christmas. Any government that can relieve housing pressures is likely to be rewarded. Add that to this week’s news that, for the first time in two years, wages are now growing faster than prices, and we just might see the cost-of-living genie squeezed back into the bottle.

Fourth, the second half of 2024 is when voters will feel the benefit of the revised stage-three tax cuts. With 84 per cent of Australian workers now getting a bigger cut than they would have under the Morrison model, it’s easy to see why just 16 per cent of voters opposed Albanese’s revamp.

Indeed, even three-quarters of Coalition voters supported Albo’s tweaking. Little wonder Opposition Leader Peter Dutton got out of Labor’s way.

And that leads me to a fifth reason for an early poll: act before Dutton finds his mojo. While it’s true Dutton has shown more energy as Liberal leader than most thought possible, it’s becoming increasingly clear the Opposition Leader is firing blindly into the air.

What has been Dutton’s major contribution to public policy this year? A focus on a broken Labor promise rather than the benefits revised tax cuts will bring to the folks struggling even in his own electorate. The energy Dutton wasted on that dead-end argument is evidenced in one poll’s finding that 65 per cent of Australians don’t care about a broken political promise if it brings economic relief.

Then there’s his call for a Woolies boycott, and his pledge to repeal Labor’s very popular Right to Disconnect laws. Does Peter even talk to anyone outside the LNP bubble?

Last, and despite huge economic and foreign policy challenges, Labor has had a good run in the opinion polls. Of the 15 surveys published this year, Labor has beaten the Coalition on the after-preference vote in 13, tied in one, and lost only one. But that good fortune can’t last, especially when unemployment begins to rise in 2025.

And, no, Labor will not lose the Dunkley by-election on March 2. Safely sheltered by a 6.3 per cent margin, Dunkley voters – like so many others outside Queensland – have warmed to the tax cuts, but not to Dutton.

Finally, would a 2024 federal election be such an inconvenience to voters? Of course not, especially when we remember the average federal parliamentary term in Australia since 1901 has been just Two-and-a-half years.

For Albo, then, just three words are germane: hot, iron, strike.

Paul Williams in an associate professor at Griffith University

Originally published as Opinion: When Anthony Albanese is most likely to call next election