Australian Weekly Report

Dutton wants Australia ‘back on track’

If Prime Minister Anthony Albanese does go full term, this will be a long election campaign for Australian voters.

This week, it was the turn of Opposition Leader Peter Dutton to get in on the pre-election action, with a soft-launch of the Coalition’s campaign in Victoria. The choice of location was no accident, with Victoria a previously unhappy hunting ground for the Coalition, where they won only 11 of the state’s 39 seats at the 2022 election, but with an unpopular state government driving some anti-Labor sentiment in the state.

The Coalition’s campaign slogan of “Let’s Get Australia Back On Track” has Trumpian overtones of “Make America Great Again”, and Mr Dutton is presenting himself as the alternative to Mr Albanese, who he described as “one of our weakest prime ministers in history”. Polling has also picked up a voter perception of weakness around Mr Albanese, which the Coalition is no doubt keen to encourage.

There was little in the way of policy details on offer at the Coalition’s campaign rally, with Mr Dutton instead giving broad-brush strokes on major policy areas such as nuclear energy, housing, and immigration. Defence, health, regional Australia, and border security also got a mention, with further policies to be unveiled in the “coming days and weeks”.

The absence of detail is in keeping with previous Coalition announcements, and is in contrast to Labor, which has been keen to put numbers beside its policies as it rolls them out. However, the lack of detail does not appear to have been a negative for the Coalition, which has drawn level with Labor in opinion polls over the course of the term, despite its drip-feeding of details. The aversion to detail also suits a political environment where voters are more attuned to the “vibe”, rather than actual policy.

Labor has also had little success in attacking Mr Dutton’s suitability to lead the nation, and his personal credibility. The opposition leader, however, appears sensitive to the fact that voters know little of him beyond his role as an MP and former Queensland police officer. At the weekend’s launch, he sought to highlight his working class backstory and flesh out the details of his background.

For its part, Labor appears to be sticking to its line of attack on Mr Dutton that he is a divisive personality who lacks compassion and ideas. In the wake of the Coalition’s campaign rally, Mr Albanese said the opposition leader had built “a career on dividing people, and I want to bring the country together”.

“He’s never sought to bring people together, which is why his own party rejected him and elected Scott Morrison as leader, even though Scott Morrison had a very small base of support, because they understood that he represented a shift to a hard-right version of the Liberal Party,” he said.

Social Services Minister, Amanda Rishworth, said Mr Dutton was “back from leave with no real new ideas and no solutions”, accusing the opposition leader of wanting to cut funding for areas such as the pension, energy bill relief, and Medicare, all areas where voters will be sensitive given the impact of the high cost of living. Ms Rishworth has now taken over from Bill Shorten as Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme after Mr Shorten’s retirement from politics. Other changes in the minor cabinet reshuffle saw Katy Gallagher add Government Services to her role as Finance Minister, and Anne Aly, the Minister for Youth and Early Childhood Education, also become the Minister Assisting the Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Anika Wells, the Minister for Aged Care and Sport, will be promoted to the Cabinet.

Mr Dutton is also expected to announce a minor reshuffle of his team to replace retiring frontbenchers Simon Birmingham and Paul Fletcher.

This week, Mr Albanese visited Tasmania, another state where Labor is hoping to improve its fortunes. Labor holds two of the state’s five seats, but is hoping to improve its vote in Braddon and Bass, held by the Liberal Party on slim margins. The prime minister used the visit to highlight Labor’s A$3 billion funding boost to finish upgrades to the National Broadband Network. However, Mr Albanese was keen to shore up support in the Labor-held seat of Lyons, announcing more than A$10 million in funding for the South Brighton Development Precinct to help develop up to 600 more homes.

With 2025 a little over two weeks old, both Labor and the Coalition have already staked out their claims for government. For Labor it will be about building a new future, for the Coalition, it is about a course correction back to a previous direction. Meanwhile, both leaders are seeking to define their opponent in the eyes of the public. Mr Albanese wants voters to see Mr Dutton as a man devoid of ideas who only seeks to divide people for political gain. Mr Dutton wants to paint Mr Albanese as weak and ineffective.

In specific policy areas, Mr Dutton backed the need for gas in the energy transition, saying Labor was “trying to please inner-city Green voters with the renewables-only policy which has driven uncertainty into the market”. He said every serious commentator notes that gas will play a significant role in shoring up renewable energy.

The major announcements

National Broadband Network (Labor)

• Labor will fund the upgrade of Australia’s remaining national fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) network through an equity injection of up to A$3 billion.

Hobart infrastructure (Labor)

• More than A$10 million to upgrade two key pieces of community infrastructure in Hobart and surrounding regions.

Devonport CBD (Labor)

• A$6 million allocated to continue revitalisation of Devonport’s CBD, by delivering stage three of the Local Council’s Living City project.

Nowra Riverfront Precinct (Labor)

• A$5 million in funding for a new mixed-use hub that will reconnect Nowra city centre with the Shoalhaven River waterfront.

Crime Stoppers (Coalition)

• The Coalition will provide A$7.5 million over three years in additional funding to Crime Stoppers to expand its operations and protect more Australians from crime. Mr Dutton said the Coalition would “get Australia back on track by tackling the crime and anti-social behaviour that threatens the safety of our communities”.

Bruce Highway, Queensland (Labor)

• Mr Albanese announced A$7.2 billion in funding for Queensland’s Bruce Highway, with the federal government funding 80 per cent of the upgrades, and the state government contributing 20 per cent.

Community infrastructure, Queensland (Labor)

• Investing A$101.8 million in 10 Queensland housing projects under the government’s Housing Support Program.
• A$52 million investment made in the electorate of Kennedy by the prime minister, drawing from the Housing Support Package and Growing the Regions Fund.

Community infrastructure projects, Cairns and Far North Queensland (Labor)

• Almost A$25 million allocated through the Housing Support Program to boost social housing supply across the region.
• Seven projects will share in almost A$25 million from the Growing Regions Program, which provides funding for community infrastructure projects.

Housing and community infrastructure, Western Australia (Labor)

• A$200 million aimed at boosting the state’s regions.

What the polls say

YouGov’s January survey has the Coalition leading Labor 51-49 on a two-party preferred basis, an improvement of 0.5 per cent for the Coalition. This is despite Labor’s primary vote improving from 30 to 32 per cent, while the Coalition’s rose from 38 to 39 per cent.

Roy Morgan had earlier continued its run of delivering results significantly outside the consensus, putting the Coalition ahead of Labor 53-47 on a two-party preferred basis. However, this has tightened in Roy Morgan’s latest poll to 51.5 to 48.5, bringing it more into line with other polls such as YouGov.

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