National security dominates second week of election campaign
In a week of ups and downs for both major parties, one issue managed to cut through the election spin and that was how Australia should respond to an increased military presence by China in the Pacific.
The first Leaders Debate and a COVID catastrophe for Labor rounded out a busy second week on the campaign trail. Catch up on all the major announcements in this week’s Election Wrap.
In this edition:
- Who went where: Leader’s diary
- Coalition’s foreign policy credentials challenged
- Labor pivots as Albo struck down with COVID
Who went where: Leaders’ diary
The PM started the week in Western Australia, making up for lost time after he was shut out of the state for the better part of the last two years due to COVID border restrictions.
He made a brief stop in Adelaide to campaign in the seat of Boothby before making his way to Brisbane for the Leaders Debate on Wednesday evening.
The PM then spent the next two days with colleagues and candidates in marginal inner and outer Brisbane seats including Longman, Petrie, Bonner, Blair and Forde.
He was back in NSW for the weekend and on the hustings in the crucial Central Coast region with a voter-friendly plan to upgrade community fishing, boating and camping facilities.
The Leader of the Opposition spent Sunday night and the beginning of week two of the campaign at Byron Bay’s Bluesfest – a decision that may have cost him more than a few boo’s from the local, mask-less crowd.
Albanese’s campaign set up camp in Brisbane until the Leaders Debate on Wednesday, as the Leader spent three days with candidates fighting for marginal Brisbane seats and with factional colleague and frontbencher Terri Butler, who is facing a major challenge from the Greens in her inner-city seat of Griffith.
The Labor bus then rolled into NSW, where Albanese visited an aged care facility in the seat of Gilmore just hours before testing positive to COVID ahead of a scheduled flight to WA.
He will lead the Opposition’s campaign from isolation until mid-next week, a predicament the Labor camp had workshopped and prepped for given Albanese had yet to contract the virus more than two years into the pandemic.
Coalition’s foreign policy credentials challenged
The Coalition has sought to position this election as a battle between the two major parties on their defence and national security resolve, and this week’s news the Solomon Islands had signed a regional security pact with China certainly put national security squarely on the agenda.
In WA spruiking defence industry jobs and border protection, the PM hoped to convince voters only the Coalition could be trusted to build the sovereign capability Australia needs as our strategic environment shifts. Targeting marginal seats in WA like Swan, an inner-city Perth seat where the incumbent Liberal MP Steve Irons is retiring, the Coalition campaign also unveiled a major commitment to the mining industry and policies to tackle housing affordability.
But by Tuesday evening, the Government’s foreign policy prowess was being questioned when news of the China-Solomon Islands deal broke. Labor quickly seized on the opportunity and said the Coalition had failed in their goal to influence regional stability in the Pacific.
Wednesday’s Leaders Debate, televised only on Sky News and arguably not widely watched by key swinging voters, saw the PM defend his Government’s record on integrity, the NDIS and aged care. With both leaders apparently playing it safe to avoid making headline-grabbing controversial comments, there was little substantive policy debate.
Over the next two days in south east Queensland, the PM targeted several marginal seats with local commitments to upgrade telecommunications infrastructure and deliver more defence industry jobs. In Blair, an outer-Brisbane seat with a large defence community, he made a commitment to deliver 14 new veteran wellbeing centres, including at least four new centres in Queensland.
The Coalition rounded out the week with a somewhat vague commitment to deliver lower taxes, attempting to steer the narrative back to the Government’s record on employment and economic growth since the start of the pandemic.
Labor pivots as Albo struck down with COVID
The Labor campaign’s decision to spend three full days in Brisbane ahead of the Leaders Debate on Wednesday reveals just how focused the party is on securing some of the Coalition’s marginal seats north of the border.
Albanese and his Queensland frontbench team toured flood-fatigued areas of Brisbane and promised more action on disaster relief if in government. His shadow NDIS minister Bill Shorten announced Labor’s commitments on the NDIS, and the Leader of the Opposition used his daily press conferences to keep the pressure on the Government about a national anti-corruption commission.
Labor forced the Government to back down on any proposed industrial relations reform on Wednesday, visiting a freight and logistics business in the seat of Forde just outside Brisbane to highlight their priority issue of insecure work and low wages growth.
The Coalition’s backdown over changes to the ‘better off overall test’ took the heat out of Labor’s attack just ahead of the Leaders Debate that evening.
On his last day before heading into COVID isolation, Albanese was on the Central Coast to campaign on manufacturing jobs and Labor’s aged care plan, before the campaign was picked up by senior frontbenchers including campaign spokesman and Western Sydney MP Jason Clare and Deputy Leader Richard Marles.
While the PM and the Coalition campaign will be hoping to capitalise on the Leader of the Opposition’s forced absence from the campaign trail, Labor’s best efforts are being spent to highlight the depth of talent in their shadow ministerial team. As voters tend to tune in to the first and last weeks of an election campaign, the leader’s absence has come at perhaps the best time for Labor.
Shadow Foreign Minister Penny Wong and senior members of the Labor team were still highlighting the Government’s failures over the Solomon Islands agreement over the weekend. They wrapped up week two with an announcement about Labor’s plan for First Nations health, and an Anzac Day-eve pledge to bolster veterans’ services and care.