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Have Australians learnt from past elections or will they repeat costly blunders? [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-04-14
If history repeats, Anthony Albanese’s Labor Government in Australia will soon be returned with a reduced majority. But will it repeat?
The poll on 3rd May will be the 31st federal election since the Second World War. The progressive Labor Party has won 11, while the conservative Coalition has won 19.
First term governments – like Albanese’s – have sought re-election seven times over that period, and have won every time. While that looks promising for Labor, the victories have varied dramatically.
Only once has a first term administration increased its majority at its first test. That was Bob Hawke’s popular reformist government which gained seven more House of Representatives seats in 1984, increasing its majority to 82 of the 148 seats. No other first-termers have fared as well.
Prime ministers who lost seats but retained comfortable working majorities were Ben Chifley (Labor) in 1946, Bob Menzies (Coalition) in 1951, Malcolm Fraser (Coalition) in 1977 and John Howard (Coalition) in 1998.
PMs whose losses reduced them to a slender majority were Gough Whitlam (Labor) in 1974 and Malcolm Turnbull (Coalition) in 2016. Whitlam lost the federal election 19 months later. Turnbull was dumped by his own party two years later and replaced by Scott Morrison.
Julia Gillard (Labor) in 2010 lost 11 seats, reducing her caucus to just 72 in the 150-seat House. This forced an unlikely alliance with conservative independents – which turned out, in the end, to have been an effective administration.
Grave predictions fulfilled – every time
Less widely understood is what happened in Australia after the last three elections which an incumbent Labor administration fought and lost. In every case, the election campaign focused primarily on economic competence, as assessed by perceived past performance.
In all of these, the media played a dominant role in convincing a significant slice of the electorate to believe the opposite of the truth.
And all of these, bar none, the winning conservative government performed vastly worse in virtually all economic outcomes.
After Fraser defeated Whitlam in 1975
The Whitlam years saw the arrival of Rupert Murdoch as a malignant force in Australian politics. Lies and distortions by his “reporters” seemed not only tolerated but encouraged. Reportage of all issues – the budget, economic growth, the jobless and interest rates – were routinely falsified.
Hence the progressive Whitlam Government was beaten by Malcolm Fraser’s Coalition, despite its three budget surpluses, strong employment and generally sound outcomes.
Thereafter, under Fraser’s hapless Treasurer John Howard, the economy deteriorated badly with negative growth in nine quarters, and three recessions. Howard posted record budget deficits four times. Home loan interest soared above 13%, much higher than Whitlam’s peak of 10.38%. The jobless rose from below 4% during the Whitlam years to 9.9% at the 1983 election. See chart below.
Australia’s jobless has been stable and low under Albanese’s Labor Government. Chart courtesy Independent Australia.
John Howard defeated Paul Keating in 1996
Economic management was also critical in 1996 when Opposition Leader John Howard campaigned on “the total failure of Labor’s economic management over the last 13 years”.
Once again, on the variables the Coalition identified as Labor failures, their performance subsequently turned out much worse. The surge in growth and job numbers Keating started did, however, continue, although real wages declined, as shown by the reduced share of gross national income going to workers and the increased slice to profits. See chart below.
The share of national income has shifted decisively in favour of workers under Labor. Chart courtesy Independent Australia.
Tax rules and rates were changed in favour of the rich, encouraging wealthy Australians to buy second homes, thus starting the current intractable housing crunch.
Worse, hundreds of billions in assets were sold off, some for a fraction of their worth, and most proceeds squandered. Instead of closing the 2006-07 year with net investments of around $600 billion, they had saved a puny $24.3 billion.
Tony Abbott defeated Kevin Rudd in 2013
Abbott’s victory followed a frenzied campaign dominated by malicious media lies about "Gillard's massive and growing debt" ..."debt spiralling out of control" ... a "debt time bomb" ... "budget emergency" ... "skyrocketing debt" ...“a debt spiral, deeper and deeper” and “budget in freefall”.
In reality, Labor’s debt was essential during the global financial crisis and was actually lower relative to GDP than the debt incurred by Menzies, Fraser and Hawke in calmer times. It ranked third-lowest among the 36 members of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Tragically, the Coalition, which promised immediate and continuing budget surpluses, abandoned Labor’s policies and then delivered disastrous deficits and deepening debt every year. Australia’s global rankings tumbled.
Over the five years from 2015 to 2019, pre-Covid, all-well-managed economies generated budget surpluses. Countries which produced five surpluses in those five years included New Zealand, Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Belarus, Kuwait and Luxembourg. Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden, Czechia, Malta, Lithuania, Bulgaria and even Greece generated four. Another bunch of countries managed three.
Australia, in stark contrast, was one of the conspicuous loser economies which did not generate a single surplus – even under the most benign global conditions in fifty years.
Now fast forward to the last two years.
Of all those countries, only four have generated two surpluses – because conditions have been far tougher.
They were Denmark, Norway, Kuwait – and Albanese’s Australia.
Labor Prime minister Anthony Albanese faces right wing Coalition leader Peter Dutton at the election on 3 May 2025.
Overall evaluation
Analyses over time in journals – academic and popular, local and foreign – show Labor manages Australia’s economy far better, and nearly always surges up all global rankings.
As to what we can expect if the Coalition wins, we must listen to what they are blaming Labor for today. Whatever that is, the Coalition will perform particularly disastrously in that area.
If history repeats.
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