Federal election 2025: Key spokespeople, ad gurus and pollsters in Labor and Coalition campaigns revealed

Labor and the Coalition are finalising preparations on their election war-rooms, lining up top digital strategists and tapping the frontbenchers who will be front and centre of the campaign.

Paul Erickson, Labor’s national secretary and the Liberal Party’s federal director Andrew Hirst are finalising preparations for their campaign machinery with the firing gun on the election race expected possibly within the next fortnight.

Under the constitution, the Federal election must be held by May 17, but expectations are mounting that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will set an April 12 election date, with the call tipped to come in the days after the March 9 West Australian poll.

Polls are tight, with some predicting the Coalition could win, but Peter Dutton insists he remains the underdog with no party having lost government after one term since the Great Depression.

If Mr Albanese holds off until May he would overtake the number of days Labor’s political idol, former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam, held office.

With the Prime Minister and Opposition leader already blitzing marginal seats with their candidates in an unofficial campaign that’s been under way since the new year, The Nightly can reveal that the formal campaign infrastructure is being put in place on both sides.

The Nightly can also reveal that cabinet ministers Jason Clare and Katy Gallagher will once again be Labor’s frontline spokespeople.

The Opposition’s Home Affairs Minister James Paterson will make his debut as the Coalition’s campaign spokesman, a job previously performed by moderate Simon Birmingham, who has retired from politics.

Both Mr Paterson and Mr Clare are considered formidable communicators by their opponents. Mr Clare’s Question Time performances have earned him the nickname of “West Wing” among the Opposition frontbench who liken his snappy one-liners to those penned by screenwriter Aaron Sorkin.

New South Wales key battleground

Labor’s campaign headquarters will be once again based in central Sydney in Surry Hills, although at a different venue to the offices rented back in 2022.

But in a sign of the suburban-led strategy being deployed by the Coalition, the Opposition’s campaign headquarters will be based in Parramatta in Western Sydney.

“NSW and Victoria are just far more important than they’ve been in previous elections,” ABC election analyst Antony Green said.

“The Liberal party continue to have some high hopes for some seats in Western Sydney but their prospects are likely stronger in regional seats like Robertson, Paterson and Gilmore and Hunter.”

“They’ll be confident of regaining Bennelong and hopeful of a shot in Reid.”

Labor HQ was last based in Parramatta during the 2016 campaign.

The pollsters

Campbell White will again spearhead polling for Labor, having been the party’s campaign pollster since 2018.

His firm Pyxis Polling & Insights - named after the Pyxis Constellation in southern skies which represents a mariner’s compass - conducts Newspoll.

“Just as a mariner’s compass is vital to leading ships through stormy waters, Pyxis Polling and Insights provides the same services … navigating the shoals of public opinion and politics,” the firm’s website states.

Mike Turner, formerly of CrosbyTextor and co-founder of Freshwater Strategy, will return to run the Liberals’ polling.

But it is it uncertain if political strategist Isaac Levido, whose last campaign was the Tory wipeout in the UK, will be returning home to advise on the Coalition campaign.

The digital gurus

Both sides are recalling the creative advertising gurus they worked with on the last election.

Dee Madigan and her creative advertising agency Campaign Edge will advise Labor’s in-house operations on its digital advertising, after the party’s success in 2022, including scoring the ALP’s highest millennial vote since 2007, despite the party’s overall record-low vote share.

Campaign Edge said it produced more than 500 pieces of advertising, including highly targeted digital content last election and developed the orange and black and white images of former prime minister Scott Morrison who was swept from office in what was the Coalition’s worst-ever performance since 1949.

“We really are experts in the art of persuasion,” Madigan’s website boasts.

The Coalition has placed Kiwi digital guru Sean Topham, who is based at his firm’s London office in Mayfair, on standby to fly to Australia when the election is called.

Topham’s firm TG, which he founded with fellow Kiwi Ben Guerin, worked most recently on Christopher Luxon’s winning campaign in New Zealand, which relied heavily on TikTok.

Topham will be embedded in campaign headquarters in Parramatta but has already been helping craft a TikTok strategy for Mr Dutton that paints him as a serious leader discussing meaty policy issues such as housing.

Mr Dutton has already outpaced the Prime Minister in TikTok followers with nearly 28,800 compared to Mr Albanese’s 14,700 followers.

Mr Dutton is also enjoying far higher reach with 376,000 likes on the platform compared to just 130,000 likes for the PM.

But the official Labor account has more followers than the Liberals.

US President Donald Trump and the Reform party leader Nigel Farage in the UK have both credited TikTok with delivering them a surge in younger voters in the recent British and American elections.