Anthony Albanese must balance expectations with reality
76 seats needed for a majority
14
Still to call
71.03% counted
Updated May 23, 2022, 3.25am
The opening moments of the Anthony Albanese era began with the incoming Prime Minister telling his raucous supporters to “dial it down” so he could tell Australians how he would govern.
Albanese was conscious from the start, as soon as he took the stage for his victory speech on Saturday night, that he had to appeal to people far beyond the crowd of true believers in front of him.
Anthony Albanese begins his time as Prime Minister knowing he must reach more people than those who voted for Labor.Alex Ellinghausen
“Can we have order, please?” he said at one point. “I intend to run an orderly government and it starts here. So behave.”
It was not an easy message for members of the Labor faithful who were fuelled by the sheer exuberance of triumph and a drink or three.
But it was a revealing approach for a man who has taken his party out of opposition and into power – a rare feat on either side of politics – and now has to manage the hopes of his loyal followers.
Albanese cannot deliver everything they want. No Labor leader ever can. Expectations are always too great when progressive parties sweep into office.
“For a left-wing party in power, its most serious antagonist is always its own past propaganda,” wrote George Orwell on the last pages of his final notebook. It was true in 1950 and is true today.
Can a party that once treated climate change as the greatest moral challenge of our times satisfy supporters with a 43 per cent cut to greenhouse gas emissions by 2030? Can a party that promised higher wages satisfy workers by holding an employment summit? Can a leader who vowed to create more manufacturing jobs actually do that?
A close look at the Albanese agenda shows he has kept his promises in check even when his rhetoric has soared.
Albanese has bristled at the repeated claim that he was a small target in this campaign. It is true that his softly persuasive catchphrase of “safe change” was deliberately cautious but also true that calling the policies “small” was and is unfair.
On climate, for instance, the gulf between Labor and the Coalition was not measured merely by the gap between their 43 per cent and 26 per cent targets. Albanese took the risk of endorsing a mechanism with an implicit price on carbon by modifying the existing “safeguard mechanism” to put an obligation on big companies to cut their emissions. This is a serious difference to the Coalition approach of spending taxpayer money to subsidise those same companies.
While the Greens and the independents will push for higher targets, Albanese witnessed the cost to Labor more than a decade ago when it did a deal with the Greens on a carbon price. Political history will tell him to avoid another deal.
On integrity, Labor advances a far more powerful commission to investigate corruption with a model that matches the calls from expert groups like the Centre for Public Integrity and Transparency International, as well as the open letter from 31 former judges last week. It is a significant commitment.
On gender equity, Albanese promises to act on all recommendations of the Respect@Work report and place a positive duty on employers to prevent discrimination. Whether this is a “small” undertaking or not might depend on whether someone has ever suffered discrimination. The key point is that Albanese goes where Morrison would not.
On the minimum wage, Labor pledges to ask the Fair Work Commission to increase the base pay for workers. Albanese says he “absolutely” supports a 5.1 per cent increase but made sure to add that this does not apply to millions of workers whose award rates are linked to the minimum wage. He has clearly raised expectations, however, and must find ways to increase real wages.
On childcare, the Labor policy is concrete and deliverable: a $5.1 billion outlay on greater subsidies to lower the cost for families. Expect it to be one of the first items on the agenda.
Expectations are low on other fronts. State premiers want at least $5 billion to shore up emergency departments in the recovery from the pandemic, but Albanese has merely promised to talk.
And economic reform? Albanese set out an agenda in a speech to the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the fourth week of the election campaign. He did not mention tax reform and has buried the Labor tax agenda from the last election, but he emphasised measures like childcare to expand the workforce.
This looks far too modest for economic hard-heads who want the incoming prime minister to put meat on the bones of his agenda, which he thinks should be able to lift wages and profits in tandem by boosting productivity. This is a key area where he has raised hopes while being vague about how he will deliver results.
Over and over, Albanese has said he wants to under-promise and over-deliver. He has been cautious with his commitments - too cautious, in fact, for many Labor supporters. Some have gone to the Greens for this very reason.
This might explain why Albanese has also talked about an agenda that could take two terms to put into effect, another way of urging people to be patient. If there is change under this government, it is likely to come slowly.
Orwell knew the danger for a progressive party leader in raising unrealistic expectations. Albanese seems to know it, too.