This year’s ALP national conference, beginning August 17, promises to be somewhat feistier than its recent COVID-affected (and boring) predecessors.
Yet it’s unlikely to deliver a major embarrassment to the Albanese government. Issues like the Stage 3 tax cuts may irritate traditional Labor members, but there’s a general consensus that conference stoushes shouldn’t derail the government’s re-election agenda.
Unusually for a liberal democracy, where domestic affairs tend to dominate party politics, the loudest disagreements at the conference are likely to happen over foreign policy. Aid, refugees and Australia’s stance on the Israel-Palestine dispute have long been bugbears of the Labor Left.
