Federal election 2025: Anthony Albanese rides Budget into narrow lead, Newspoll shows

Anthony Albanese has jetted into Perth ahead of his first campaign appearance in WA on the back of a wave of improved polls, showing Labor improving its chances of a second term.

As the Prime Minister touched down on Sunday afternoon, a Newspoll from The Australian showed Labor had turned around a slowly sliding voter support, returning its primary vote to 33 per cent — the same level in 2022 when it won power.

The Coalition vote slipped to 37 per cent — its lowest for the year — from a high point of 39 per cent.

The post-Budget bump lifted Labor to a two-party preferred vote of 51 per cent over the Coalition’s 49 per cent, and is the first time in nine months the Government have been ahead of the Opposition.

The result would still produce a hung Parliament, but would have the Government closer to a majority in its own right.

Mr Albanese also recorded a rise in his net approval — after a week of a sales pitch over his Budget and officially calling the election on Friday — to -9 per cent.

Mr Dutton’s net approval dropped to -18 per cent.

But the Budget, where Labor handed down a $5 a week tax cut all Australians, was marked down by voters, with just 22 per cent believing it was good for the economy, compared to 32 per cent who felt it was bad.

Asked on whether they would be better off, just 16 per cent of voters thought their own budgets would be stronger in the next 12 months, compared with 35 per cent.

But voters also cast doubt on the Coalition, with 47 per cent believing the Liberals could not have delivered a better budget.

It came amid a flurry of election polls, with YouGov showing Labor on a 75 seats in a range of between 69 and 80 — putting them just short of forming power for a second term.

The YouGov model revealed Labor would lose five seats to the Opposition, but would win two seats back from the Greens and one from the Coalition.

Meanwhile, the Coalition would lose three seats, including the electorates belonging to Opposition housing spokesman Michael Sukkar and the party’s immigration spokesman Dan Tehan in Victoria.

Resolve’s Political Monitor reported the race was tied at 50 per cent for Labor and the Coalition, while Freshwater’s poll showed the Government improve its primary vote to 32 per cent.

Labor’s sharp turnaround comes after Mr Albanese launched straight from the budget into the election campaign, eager to capitalise on a perceived shift in the Government’s political fortunes.

The Prime Minister ended day three of the campaign in WA, where Labor needs to hang on to as many of the nine seats it won in 2022 as it can.

He started the day in Canberra, plugging a new crackdown on supermarkets “taking the piss” with consumers, and promising to outlaw price-gouging, targeting a key cost-of-living concern for voters in the lead up to May 3 election day.

The PM spent the morning of his second full day on the hustings meeting single mum Ren Kerr, her mother Filomena and her children Hawkins, 2, and Teilo, 11, to deliver his latest hip-pocket relief promise to bring down the price of groceries.

Filomena served the nation’s leader a generous spread of cheesecake, shortbread and stuffoli — a desert from her native Italy — but she revealed she cooks and bakes far less frequently now because of price rises.

“The supermarket is out of control,” she said, naming lasagne as more of a household treat than it used to be.

Standing in the family’s garden, the Mr Albanese joked that “my diet for the campaign has gone out the window this morning” before turning to the more serious concern of groceries inflation that has compounded the struggles of Australian households.

“We will make price gouging by Australian supermarkets illegal,” he said, pointing to similar action taken by the European Union and the UK.

If elected, Labor has pledged to form a taskforce to further investigate overseas laws and report back within six months to advise on an “excessive pricing regime” with recommendations on how to move forward.

The PM on Sunday also committed to adopting the proposals of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s inquiry into supermarkets, including recommendations on price transparency, promotions and loyalty programs.

The report, released earlier this month, was inconclusive about whether price gouging was taking place.

Asked directly if the Government’s plans would bring down the price of a weekly shop, Mr Albanese said, “it will definitely have an impact”, referring again to “overseas” experience in putting more pressure on supermarkets.

“To give you a definition, in the EU a price is unfair and excessive if, and to quote their law, it has no reasonable relation in the economic value of the product supply,” he said.

“And quite frankly, I got asked today by someone as well, how do you know what’s price gouging? Price gouging is when supermarkets are taking the piss off Australian consumers.”

Labor’s supermarket pledge is the latest pitch in a cost-of-living package it hopes will convince voters enough to return it to majority Government in a closely fought poll that is still too tight to call.

Mr Albanese said giving Australians “a fair go at the checkout” would build on a foundation of “tax cuts for every taxpayer, energy bill relief, cheaper childcare,” he said.

Finance Minister Katy Gallagher said Government was “responding where we can, making sure we get inflation down, creating jobs, getting wages going again. All of that has been part of our focus.”

But the Coalition took an early swipe at the Prime Minister for being afraid to stand up to supermarkets with his “insulting and disingenuous” review.

“You can do more reviews and change laws but unless there is a deterrent and a consequence for doing the wrong thing, then it’s business as usual for our supermarkets,” Nationals leader David Littleproud said.

Mr Littleproud said the Coalition’s own plan would impose tough new penalties with $2m on the spot fines and increased powers for the ACCC to conduct random audits of major supermarkets.

“Australians are hurting now and we can’t afford another three years of a talk-fest,” he said.