MARK RILEY: Why an early election would be an act of plutonium-grade stupidity

There are about a dozen reasons why Anthony Albanese won’t call a double dissolution election this year.

Some of them are densely procedural. A couple are constitutional.

But the most compelling reason is purely political.

For this Government to pull on a DD the way it is tracking at the moment would be an act of plutonium-grade stupidity.

It would be taking a Rishi Sunak-sized risk.

Sunak called an early election in Britain in July. It started in the driving rain. It ended in tears.

Albanese’s electoral standing is nowhere near as dire as Sunak’s was.

And timing an election is always risky. But Albanese doesn’t need to magnify that risk exponentially by going early.

Newspoll put Labor’s primary at 32 earlier this month. That is not good. But it is far from fatal. The party’s primary at the 2022 election was only marginally higher at 32.6.

Another Newspoll is due on Monday. That could be telling. The Government hasn’t had a good month. It would be no surprise if voters were to give it another whack.

Still, that is no reason to call a double dissolution election either. Indeed, it is yet another reason not to.

Anthony Albanese’s plan for at least the past 18 months has been to go full term. He has said so many times.

Plenty of commentators haven’t believed him. That’s fair enough. Only a mug would believe everything a political leader says.

But we can believe Albanese on this.

Natalie Barr asked him on Sunrise on the morning after the May 14 Budget whether there would be another budget before the election.

“We’ll set a budget for March next year,” he said.

“The election’s due in 2025, and we’ll set out that timetable later in this year. You can’t have a budget and an election at the same time in May. So, we’ll have to make that adjustment — just as has occurred in the past.”

That told us everything we need to know about his election planning. The intention is to bring the Budget forward from May to March, load it up with lots of goodies then call an election in April for May so those goodies can be spread around on the campaign trail.

And “just as has occurred in the past”? That’s a reference to Scott Morrison’s campaign in 2019. He did all those things in that precise order. And he won.

There is another compelling reason for Albanese to laugh off all this DD speculation and go long. Time is his friend. And it’s a friendship he does not want to give up.

Beneath the froth and bubble of the daily political contest, there is still only one issue commanding the minds of average Australians. It’s the cost of living.

And the longer Albanese holds out for an election the greater the chances that those pressures will ease.

His entire electoral strategy has been predicated on a hope, bordering on a belief, that the economic balance will shift later this year and that an improvement in international activity will feed a steady domestic recovery.

The US Federal Reserve’s decision to cut official rates by half a percentage point early Thursday is the first concrete sign that things are about to change.

The Fed believes it is bringing inflation back under control and is now following other central banks around the world in easing rates.

That just builds more pressure on our Reserve Bank to follow. Michele Bullock has said the RBA does not intend to cut rates before Christmas.

But the markets don’t believe her. They’re predicting one cut by December and then another three next year to take a full percentage point off rates here.

One cut before a May election would have a significant impact on voters’ psychology.

Two would be massive.

It would ease pressures on the family budget and make average Australians feel better about themselves. And when people feel more comfortable and relaxed, they are less likely to whack the government.

That is what Albanese is waiting for and that’s why Australians have about as much chance of seeing a dodo as a DD this year.