Peter Dutton and Anthony Albanese go head to head this Saturday in the Australian federal election.
This Saturday, Australians will vote for who will lead their country for the next three years.
Will it be the current Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, who faces the challenge of becoming the first PM to be re-elected since John Howard?
He’s been a member of Parliament for Grayndler since 1996, leader of the Labor Party since 2019, and went on to become the 31st Australian Prime Minister. He promised “No one held back, and no one left behind,” a mantra he said would define his Government.
Albanese fell out of favour with the public when, in 2023, he championed “The Voice” referendum — a chance for the country’s First Nation peoples to be recognised in the constitution and have a parliamentary advisory board. It failed, along with it, the public’s love affair with the boy from humble beginnings.
When he first entered Parliament in the late 1990s, he said: “I will be satisfied if I can be remembered as someone who will stand up for the interests of my electorate, for working class people, for the labour movement, and for our progressive advancement as a nation into the next century”.
Or will the vote go to former cop Peter Dutton? Since becoming an MP in 2001, the now-leader of the Liberal Party has held several portfolios, serving under several Prime Ministers.
As Immigration and Home Affairs Minister, Dutton was responsible for changes to the country’s migration laws, which subsequently led to New Zealanders being deported based on certain “character grounds”.
In his maiden speech, he vowed to fight for the “forgotten people” who were “fed up with the boisterous minority and the politically correct”.
ABC News political reporter Claudia Long told The Front Page that New Zealanders pathways to citizenship will be protected regardless of who wins.
“The Coalition has actually adopted a policy that Labor put in place in 2023, which is about getting citizenship in Australia easier for Kiwis. So, you get it after four years as a permanent resident in Australia, with very few exceptions.
“When Labor introduced that, the Coalition was highly critical... they said they were concerned that increased migration of people from New Zealand to Australia would exacerbate the housing shortage here.
“But, they’ve changed their tune on that... they’ve now said that they will not reverse what the Albanese Government did. So, that permanent residency to citizenship pathway for New Zealanders is going to stay as it is now, no matter which party ends up forming a Government.”
The pair faced off for the final time in a debate before Australians cast their vote. In it, Dutton singled out China as the “biggest threat to Australia’s national security”.
“I think it’s an interesting choice from Peter Dutton to go there... The Liberals are fighting really hard to win a seat called Bennelong, which is on the North Shore in Sydney. It’s the seat that used to belong to John Howard.
“It’s got a really substantial Chinese population and used to be a safe Liberal seat. At the last election, following the Morrison Government’s rhetoric on China, there was a huge swing among Chinese Australian voters in that seat against the Coalition,” Long said.
Another late election tipping point has come in the form of something called a “Welcome to Country”. It’s an address made by a First Nations elder of the land where an event is held. Dutton has said it’s “overdone,” while Albanese has defended the tradition.
“Sometimes they’ll speak about the land that you’re on. They might tell you about its history, about their people, and their relationship to that land,” Long said.
On Anzac Day, Melbourne’s dawn service has interrupted by heckling led by a prominent Neo-Nazi during a Welcome to Country ceremony. A small group of people shouted as Bunurong and Gunditjmara man Mark Brown delivered his address to the 50,000 people gathered.
“That was really horrible. I think any reasonable person would agree that was a horrible thing to do,” Long said.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about the campaign trail, what the deal with independents is, and when we should expect to know who Australia’s next Prime Minister is.
The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. The podcast is presented by Chelsea Daniels, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in world news and crime/justice reporting who joined NZME in 2016.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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