Dead reckoning

The spectacle of the 2025 election needs little retelling. Labor came out leagues ahead, the Coalition fell miles behind, and Australians were poised to believe relief was a-coming. While their victory gave them the security to govern, the Albanese government is now in danger of mistaking that security for good governance and falling into a pattern of complacency, especially when it comes to addressing the daily struggles of Australian voters.

Governments carry blame for conditions beyond their control in the same way they claim credit for gains their predecessors secured — Howard benefiting from the economic recovery and reforms he inherited from Hawke and Keating, for example. The arrangement is unfair, yes, but so is politics conducted at arm’s length from household budgets. Home ownership, a larger family and a modest annual holiday were reasonable and attainable aspirations only a generation ago. Now, they have become aspirations out of reach. And government explanations for why life is now so expensive do little to make life more tolerable.

Freshwater polling of 1,000 eligible voters conducted in September records a -12% approval rating for the government, as well as -10% approval for Mr Albanese. These figures sit a long way from a forecast of defeat, yet they are shining a light on the growing gap between the public mood and the size of Labor’s majority.

A wide parliamentary margin can erode a government’s political judgement by encouraging it to dismiss valid public frustration, take support for granted or pursue policies (like the social media ban) without sufficient scrutiny or concern. And a diminished opposition does more than give the government extra room for movement; it weakens the pressure to explain and defend its decisions.

This is how governments lose sight of their mandate: by exercising the power voters gave them while paying less attention to the everyday burdens of those very same voters.

Take the May Budget, for example, when the government passed on an advisory body’s long-running recommendation for substantial rises to JobSeeker. Take Veterans’ Affairs Minister Matt Keogh turning down a request to meet the veterans campaigning against the Budget’s $5,000 cap on allied health payments; it was later abandoned following severe public backlash. And take Albanese’s 2025 radio interview, in which he blamed Senate delays for the Housing Australia Future Fund’s failure to deliver a single completed home.

These responses suggest a government quicker to defend its own position than confront known realities: they’re falling short.

During his 2025 victory speech, Albanese made a “solemn pledge” not to forget or take for granted the trust Australians had placed in Labor at the polls. With 64% of voters now begging for cost-of-living relief and 42% now calling for action on housing affordability, that solemn pledge now rings markedly hollow.

Yes, economic growth, investment, employment and sound public finances matter. Gains on those measures count for very little, however, when households are cutting spending, delaying children and abandoning plans for a home deposit. Labor’s majority gives it room to change course before the next election and set a new mandate that does more for everyday voters.

If Labor continues to hold fast, tinkering at the margins as cost-of-living pressures mount, the party risks entering 2028 having lost more ground than once expected, while leaving voters worse off than before.