As federal polling day neared on May 3 2025, the ground was silent but the people of Australia stirred, some restless with fear, others hankering for a change of government. History favoured the incumbent. There had been no single-term governments nationally since the interwar years.
Deep in the bedrock of Australia’s political establishment, forces were building.
In 2022, despite his poor campaign, Anthony Albanese had been preferred, narrowly, by voters desperate to see the back of a dishonest Coalition government. He secured a very low primary vote (32.6%) and a majority of just two seats. A repeat of that uncertainty, as a sitting prime minister, might be politically fatal.
