Polls have opened in Australia’s general election, with high costs of living and a shortage of housing major issues in the campaign.
Around half the eligible ballots have already been cast, but not counted, since early and postal voting began on April 22.
Australia is among the few countries where voting is compulsory, a system that leans toward creating centrist governments. At the last election in 2022, 90 per cent of eligible voters cast ballots.
People vote in Australia’s general election in the city of Newcastle. (Photo: Roni Bintang/Getty Images)Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Labor Party is seeking a second three-year term.
His opponent, conservative opposition leader Peter Dutton, wants to become the first political leader to oust a first-term government since 1931.
The election is taking place against a backdrop of what both sides of politics describe as a cost of living crisis.
Annual inflation peaked at 7.8 per cent, a year after Labor was elected in 2022.
The rate has been raised a dozen times since then, peaking at 4.35 per cent in November 2023.
Both campaigns have focused on Australia’s changing demographics. The election is the first in Australia in which Baby Boomers, born between the end of World War II and 1964, are outnumbered by younger voters.
Both campaigns promised policies to help first-home buyers buy into a property market that is too expensive for many.
A major point of difference is energy. The opposition has promised to build seven government-funded nuclear power plants across Australia that would begin generating electricity from 2035.
Labor plans to have 82% of Australia’s energy grid powered by renewables including solar and wind turbines by 2030 and to rely less on gas.
With Associated Press
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