Photo: AAP Image/Mick Tsikas
The Liberal–National Opposition is in a difficult parliamentary position. Still smarting from the worst result in Liberal Party history, they are not a live threat as an alternative government to a Labor Party that holds almost two in every three seats. Nor has the party distinguished itself on policy.
It’s not radical to say that Labor and the Coalition agree on more than they disagree on these days. That’s neoliberalism in a nutshell – both parties are tied to protecting the market and capital.
A recent discussion paper published by the Liberal Party has tried to diagnose what has gone wrong for the party, and how to reverse this downwards trend. And it would seem much of the party’s problems are demographic.
14 August marked a historic moment in Anthony Albanese’s professional career: he has now served longer as Prime Minister than Paul Keating, making him the 11th longest serving PM.
He will knock off a few more PMs before this term is through: he will overpass Ben Chifley on 30 October, Andrew Fisher on 17 March, and Alfred Deakin on 2 April.
The Australian Labor Party seems to have solved (at least for now) its historic problem with instability. Plagued by “faceless men” and splits in 1916, 1931, and 1955, the party long seemed on the verge of collapse in comparison to its opposition.
But with its large majority in the House of Representatives and the Liberal Party in a state of crisis, the ALP is more secure in federal government than it has been in decades.
And yet, the Albanese Government’s time in power has been marked by its lack of ambition.
You can see this lack of ambition when you compare Albanese’s time in office so far to previous Labor governments.
Though its time in office was short, the Gough Whitlam Government between 1972 to 1975 was one of the most ambitious federal governments in Australia’s history. Its only rivals are the Curtin-Chifley Labor Governments of 1941 to 1949.
In less than three years, the Whitlam Government introduced 697 bills: 254 in 1973, 229 in 1974, and 214 in 1975. The Senate rejected 93 of those bills – a record number that testifies both to the political resistance the Whitlam Government faced from the Liberal–Country coalition and the sheer quantity of legislation introduced in this short period.
Whitlam’s reforms covered almost every aspect of federal government activity and Australian life. In its time, the Whitlam Government:
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The Bob Hawke Government between 1983 to 1991 was similarly ambitious (albeit with a much more neoliberal edge than Whitlam). After its election in 1983, the Hawke Government:
It would be difficult to collate a list of similar significance of the Albanese Government’s achievements.
Albanese’s most ambitious project so far has been the 2023 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice referendum, which, despite its failure, was a genuine attempt to rewrite the Constitution in new terms that addressed Australia’s colonial history.
Otherwise, the Albanese Government has either tinkered at the edges of Australian society, such as amending the stage 3 tax cuts, along with negative gearing and the capital gains discount in the 2026-27 budget; or inherited the policies and frameworks of previous Coalition governments, including the AUKUS submarine deal and NDIS cuts.
The Albanese Government’s lack of ambition is striking given its context. Not only does it hold a large majority in the House of Representatives, with no effective Opposition to provide resistance, but there is a popular demand for the Commonwealth to do more. Despite the impression given by the commentariat, the Government’s amendments to the CGT discount and negative gearing were largely popular among Australians according to a recent Resolve Political Monitor Poll (even among home-owners).
It is possible that Albanese learned the wrong lessons from the failed 2023 Voice referendum. Rather than taking that failure as a sign that the Commonwealth should pursue future reform through parliament, as opposed to through the Constitution, the Albanese Government appears almost shell-shocked after that experience, and instead has dropped most of its more ambitious reforms from its agenda. Perhaps the 2026–27 Budget’s improvements to housing equality are a sign the Commonwealth has remembered it can govern.
