Federal election 2025: Characters out and about as election day frenzy starts
The thrills and spills of election day continue to unfold, as millions of Aussies queue to cast their ballots, and pick up a democracy sausage and some cakes along the way.
Both Anthony Albanese and his opponent Peter Dutton were out early on Saturday making last-ditch pleas with punters to vote them into power.
The prime minister was spotted at his first voting centre in Box Hill North, in outer suburban Melbourne, where Labor is attempting to wrestle control of the seat of Menzies for the first time.
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Mr Dutton started his Saturday visiting an old friend in the once blue-ribbon seat of Goldstein, handing out how-to-vote cards at a cafe in Brighton, in Melbourne’s inner southeast.
The Opposition Leader had a cup of tea with Liberal candidate Tim Wilson, who was rolled at the 2022 election by teal independent MP Zoe Daniel.
Ms Daniel geared up for her rematch by casting her ballot at Hampton Primary School, where she was met by some particularly enthusiastic fans including one who found a way to show her support using some jazzy nail polish art.
Mr Albanese started the morning at the MCG making a series of somewhat-witty, football-related gags during interviews with television networks.
They ranged from it being “game day” and “grand final day” to being in the “fourth quarter” and trying to “kick goals”, adding he’d “left nothing on the field” in the election campaign.
The Prime Minister will hope his football metaphors hold him in better stead than his opponent’s kicking ability, having bloodied a cameraman with a shanked drop punt early in the campaign.
He was at the MCG a cool 12 hours before Saturday’s blockbuster clash between Collingwood and Geelong, where an expected crowd of more than 80,000 people will pay little-to-no attention to the vote count.
A chilly, 14C morning in Sydney meant most voters opted for long pants and jumpers, although some had other ideas.
Fresh from a morning dip in Australia’s most famous beach, a few punters strolled into a polling centre near Bondi Beach in nothing but budgie smugglers to cast their ballots.
Overseas, Australians can vote at 111 locations across 83 countries, the most polling places ever set up abroad.
New polling locations have been set up in Male, in the Maldives, along with Kolkata, India and Koror, Palau.
The biggest overseas polling booths are in London, New York, Berlin and Hong Kong, with the smallest in Nauru, Accra and Rarotonga.
