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There was a time during his whirlwind round of TV interviews for breakfast on Thursday morning, hours after his return from Japan, when the new leader of the nation seemed to be still pinching himself.
“It was great when people start calling you prime minister and you realize you’re not looking for someone else, it’s actually you,” he told the Sunrise audience.
The momentary surprise at the elevation itself is not what we are used to hearing from national leaders, certainly not from a Morrison, Turnbull, Abbott or Rudd.
Anthony Albanese, with his partner Jodie Haydon, and now Secretary of State Penny Wong, in his winning election night speech at Canterbury-Hurlstone Park RSL Credit: Janie Barrett
Anthony Albanese is not at all normal, anyone who comes to the helm of the Australian Labor Party could be described as ordinary, but in these early days, at least, it seems more normal than the recent career of prime ministers.
In the course of a tortuous six-week election campaign, there were quiet skeptics within their own ranks who worried they would fail. The first stumbles shook his team; others were concerned that the party’s modest political offer was too meager.
There is now a growing belief among Labor members that Albanese’s status as a “man” could become a basic strength for the Prime Minister.
Lachlan Harris, a former senior employee of Kevin Rudd, was concerned about Labor’s small-goal strategy in the election.
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But he says “the authenticity of the Albanian, his approach to politics in a more organic, raw and self-assured way, could serve him incredibly well in the prime minister’s office.”
“We’ve had an era of hyperprofessional, hyper-scripted, and politically predictable politicians on both sides,” Harris says. “It’s a break with that. Its deep, permanent authenticity and real empathy for the people … is its greatest political asset and you can build a prime minister around that.”
Tony Burke, who served in the Rudd and Gillard governments alongside Albanese for six years and is in line to become cabinet minister, predicts that “there will never be another Bob Hawke, but Anthony is the most next we will see a Hawke in both leadership style and authenticity.
Albanese’s start in the first job was literally flying, and he left to meet with the leaders of the other Quad nations (the United States, Japan, and India) a few hours after be sworn in on Monday.
His performance in Tokyo, closely watched by colleagues, the media, heads of utilities, business leaders and Australia’s “friends” (and certainly enemies) abroad – has been more than credible.
“The timing couldn’t have been better,” says a retired staff member, adding that few newly elected leaders have a chance to establish themselves so quickly on the world stage.
On other fronts, the new government is also moving fast, although the full ministry (which will be confirmed after a caucus meeting next week) has not yet been sworn in.
New Foreign Minister Penny Wong has been sent to the Pacific to try to prevent further regional security incursions by Beijing. Albanese has instructed his department to prepare a presentation to the Fair Labor Commission to ensure that the lowest workers do not “go backwards” (although there will be no specified figure, despite their apparent endorsement of an increase 5.1% during the campaign). .
A good start: Albanian Prime Minister with US President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the Quad Leaders Summit in Tokyo on Tuesday. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
On Friday, in a symbolically important decision, it was announced that Murugappan suffered the family of asylum seekers could return to the town of Biloela in Queensland. Steps are being taken to create an anti-corruption commission and maintain faith with Indigenous Australians by adopting the Uluru Declaration from the heart.
Albanese speaks of “respect” for his opponents, saying, “I want to change the way politics works in this country. I want it to be more inclusive,” and said he hopes to get along better with Peter Dutton, who will soon be named leader. liberal, not Scott Morrison, in particular, he reprimanded Tanya Plibersek for comparing Dutton to Voldemort, the villain in the Harry Potter series (for which he quickly apologized).
Former ministerial colleague Craig Emerson says that “there will be the theater of parliament, but he does not like what has happened. [under the former government] which is ‘We find a group in the community that we can vilify and get some votes out of it’: it has a set of genuine and cherished values, fundamentally the value of decency ”.
However, we must not underestimate the difficult challenges ahead. Labor must be rebuilt from a historically low primary vote of 32 per cent.
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Despite Albanese’s campaign promise of a “better future,” incoming treasurer Jim Chalmers looks more like a prophet of death, warning that “the fiscal situation we are inheriting is terrible.”
Joining the sad queue of economic challenges are rising energy prices for households and small businesses, the inflation spiral, spectacular deficits, real wages that are not yet up to date with the cost of living and the threat of further interest rate hikes.
Australian Industry Group chief Innes Willox says it will be “natural for an incoming government to blame an outgoing government for all these problems. [But] Realistically, the guilt game lasts about six months before people say, “Okay, but what have you done about it”?
Willox says all of his organization’s dealings with Albanese have been “positive, open and consultative” and that the industry has taken special note of several speeches in which the Labor leader has said that for his party to succeed, it needs strong relationships with the business community.
“There’s no reason not to expect a strong, collaborative relationship … and strong lines of communication,” Willox told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. But he warned of “potential failures” over labor relations and the reorientation of the migration program to address the country’s “massive shortage of labor and skills.”
Albanese’s immediate political challenge will be to withstand pressure to increase Labor’s carbon emissions target by 2030 in the face of increased electoral support for the Greens and Green Green independents in previous Liberal seats. in Sydney and Melbourne, for which harder action on the climate. it is a cardinal question.
Labor seems to be on track to get 76 or 77 seats in the lower house, which gives it a narrow majority, but the Senate will probably need the support of an expanded 12-Greens cohort in the event of clashes with the coalition. .
Albanese said on Friday he would treat the Greens and the Senate “with respect”. But it is deepening its party’s goal of reducing Australia’s emissions by 43% by 2030, despite warnings from climate scientists around the world that more urgent action is needed.
Bob Carr, the former Labor Prime Minister of NSW and Foreign Minister under Kevin Rudd, says that “it is not beyond the ingenuity of the Albanian cabinet to push the limits of climate action. For example, in the l electric vehicle or in partnership with enlightened farmers, they must surgically remove Morrison’s crackpot subsidies for carbon from the budget, and [subsidies] by the big white whale of carbon capture and storage that doesn’t work anywhere. ”
Emerson says it would be “completely unlikely” for Albanese to change the climate agenda that led to the election. “He will not say, ‘We said one thing before the election, but now we have won you over, we have deceived you, and we will do something else.’
Massive step change
For information on how the 59-year-old will act as Prime Minister, the Herald and The Age analyzed the views of a number of Labor experts who worked alongside him during his years as a government minister. Rudd and Gillard and later. the opposition bank.
The rise to the prime minister represents a big change, even for someone with Albanian’s long experience. “Going from a ministerial office to the PMO (Prime Minister’s office) is like moving from level 3 to level 50,” says a former employee. “It’s the scope of what you have to find, the input of the media, stakeholders, agencies, cabinet ministers and then the caucus, you’re really at that apex.”
During Rudd’s years, Albanese was seen to have acted consistently within the government. “There were people who only considered themselves GSD ministers, like Get Shit Done, and he was definitely one of them,” says a former informant.
Back in 2008: Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, Treasurer Wayne Swan, Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Anthony Albanese as Minister of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. Credit: Andrew Meares
However, another questioned whether staying for years with portfolios he knew well suggested some degree of political curiosity.
When Labor lost government in 2013, he had spent six years as Minister of Infrastructure and Transport (although he was also responsible for the end of regional development, local government and communications). He could have chosen portfolios when he joined the opposition, but he was left with infrastructure and transportation.
During the campaign, doubts arose about his ability to ingest and command a brief quickly, although critics give him the benefit of the doubt at this early stage. He has seemed inflexible during the days since his ascension.
Greg Combet, who …