ELLEN RANSLEY: As Labor loses traditional working class man vote, will Albo’s popularity with women be enough?

According to the polls, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has a man problem.

Young men, to be precise. According to the new AFR/Freshwater strategy poll analysis, men aged 18-34 are more inclined to lean to the right of the political divide and back in Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, while women in the same group are more left leaning.

In the same age bracket, there was a ten-point difference between men and women in preferring Mr Dutton as Prime Minister. His net approval rate among men aged 18-34 is minus six, compared to minus 22 for women of the same bracket.

While Newspoll found an even split between genders on support for the two major parties, the latest Resolve polling showed a significant slide in Labor’s support among men — down to 24 per cent compared to 42 per cent support for women.

Psephologist Kevin Bonham says a gender gap “of a few points” has existed for decades, and it’s always been standard for women to veer to the left while men track more conservative. But bringing age into the mix marks an interesting divergence.

“I found this AFR/ Freshwater analysis interesting because I haven’t seen this done in Australia before, trying to break down the figures by gender and age. This is something that got attention in the US because there was such a great gender divide among young voters,” he told The Nightly.

With a broad generational disenfranchisement of younger men playing out across the globe, and a growing gender divide in political ideology everywhere in young voters, pundits believe Mr Dutton’s tapping into his “hard man” image, and an acknowledgement of a broader trend, is working for him — as it did for Donald Trump.

Mr Trump won more than half of the young man vote in November, a feat he achieved in part by speaking directly to them in a three-hour podcast interview with Joe Rogan.

While Australia does not have a Rogan equivalent, Mr Dutton has tried to emulate this tactic in appearances with Aussie podcasters Sam Fricker and Mark Bouris in the last month.

He told Mr Bouris in a 90-minute interview that young men were feeling “disenfranchised and ostracised”, and were increasingly fed up with the state of progressive politics.

“And they’re saying, ‘Well, hang on, I have nothing but respect for women, and I would never treat my female friends differently than my male friends.’ But I’m being told that I’m some sort of ogre, or I have some belief structure which is true to that, which I know is, is, you know, what I hold in my heart,” he said.

“I think there’s just a point where people are fed up.

“They’re pushing back and saying, ‘well, why am I being overlooked at work for a job, you know, three jobs running when I’ve got, you know, a partner at home, and she’s decided to stay at home with three young kids, and I want a promotion at work so that I can help pay the bills at home’ and so I think all of that has morphed.”

Political experts say there’s a deeper problem afoot for Labor. Not only is it failing to convince young men to vote for them, but the men it traditionally had favour with are rapidly turning away — and that’s extending to women, as well.

Kos Samaras, director at Redbridge, said the men and women of the outer-suburbs and regions were “becoming a problem” for the Albanese Government.

“And that’s driven by the cost-of-living crisis and the perception that the Government has not done enough” he told The Nightly.

For decades, he notes, outer-urban regional men without a university degree have tended to vote for Labor, but hamstrung by cost-of-living and amid a global debate about masculinity, that is shifting.

Conversely, professional inner-city dwellers who have traditionally voted conservative are becoming increasingly progressive, but that sometimes steers them more towards the Greens.

“Similar to what we’re seeing across all western democracies, there is a historic flip occurring,” Mr Samaras said.

“It’s difficult to reverse these very substantial socio-economic trends, it will take a lot of work over a very long period of time to recouple these working-class lower incomes back to the left.”

As much of a challenge as it may be, Labor is trying to woo some of those voters back while also trying to keep more women from jumping ship. The Government spent much of Tuesday spruiking new analysis that shows Australian families have spent $2700 less on childcare in the last two and a half years because of Labor’s raft of childcare policies.

Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth said Labor’s policies like childcare were cutting through to female voters “because they make a real difference to peple’s lives”.

“Our Government is governing for all Australians, and our job is to support people with cost of living pressures, because we know people are under pressure,” she said.

“ We will see policies like our cheaper childcare policies having a real difference. I think many Australians will be looking at what is actually on offer and see that our Government is delivering real, practical cost of living relief, while setting our country up for the future.”

With the Coalition yet to roll out its full cost-of-living relief policy, Labor is leaning into what it has delivered in its first term and its governing-for-all approach as it seeks re-election.

But Mr Samaras said for the families — particularly the women — in the mortgage belt, Labor’s goal of universalising childcare would do little to help them.

“This helps if you’re planning to have a kid, but it doesn’t help if you have kids who are already at school,” he said of the childcare savings.

“So, this targets a very small group of people which is actually decreasing, we know that young women, a significant number are not planning to have children.”

Mr Dutton wouldn’t be drawn on whether he had a “woman problem” at a press conference on Tuesday, but said it was increasingly apparent the PM was the one struggling to keep the female vote.

“I think the reason why a lot of women are unhappy with the Prime Minister at the moment is because largely they are responsible for household budgets, for trying to make everything add up. People have a really difficult situation in their own lives at the moment,” he said.

“A Coalition Government will always be stronger in economic management, and that is of benefit to families.”

With the former cop leaning into his “hard man” label, Mr Samaras said voters would be receptive to any leader trying — and seemingly succeeding — to tap into community sentiment that the world is unpredictable.

“In unprecedented times of instability, Australia may want someone who is a strong leader. You may not like him, but that’s what he’s trying to tap into,” Mr Samaras said.