Feels like the last sitting week of the 47th Parliament

After spending three days in Canberra this week, I believe we just saw the last sitting of the 47th Parliament and we all need to prepare for an election in early 2025.

The Manager of Government Business in the Senate, the Hon Katy Gallagher, said that the Government was prepared to “sit through the night” to bring more than 36 bills before the Senate on the last sitting day of 2024. Senator Gallagher said, “If people want to sit through the night, we’re prepared to do that to get these bills done. If the vote’s no, the vote’s no. But we’re dealing with the bills.” While the initial motion was defeated, at the time of writing it appears that twenty bills or more will be passed before the Senate rises this week.

Negotiations on other contentious legislation have reached a fever pitch. The Prime Minister this week directly intervened to prevent any agreement with the Greens on environmental legislation reforms. The Greens are reported to have dropped their demand for a climate trigger. At the time of writing this post, the government was close to securing support for their Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill with the backing of the Coalition. They had already secured support from the Greens for the Help to Buy shared equity scheme for homeownership and Build to Rent tax incentives.

Clearing the decks for an election will give the Prime Minister options. That said, I suspect everyone is very much looking forward to taking a break over the Christmas period, before again turning their minds to the best time to hold an election. At this stage of the electoral cycle, there is no shortage of opinions on election timing, including as early as 22 February 2025. To hold an election on this day would mean that the election needs to be called on 12 January. Other election dates have also been canvassed, including for March (ruling out a March budget) or in April or May, after a March budget would be delivered. There are many factors that influence when the Prime Minister might call the election, but the most important factor will always be when he thinks his government has the best chance of winning.

The draft parliamentary sitting schedule has the Government handing down their fourth Budget on 25 March 2025. And it was reported again this week that the PM has advised his caucus to expect to be returned to government. While they are likely to be returned to government, albeit in minority, some on the Opposition benches see their chances at forming Government with the support of the crossbench increasing. There are certainly alternative views, with many expecting a Labor minority government as the more likely outcome or, less likely, the Coalition winning enough seats to be able to form government itself with support from the crossbench. Mathematically this is much more difficult but far from impossible.

In my view, whoever occupies the treasury benches in the 48th Parliament will need to be at the top of their game and use all of their negotiation skills to succeed, otherwise we will be going back to the polls well before 2028.