2007 Australian federal election
A federal election was held in Australia on 24 November 2007. All 150 seats in the House of Representatives and 40 of the seats in the 76-member Senate were up for election. The election featured a 39-day campaign, with 13.6 million Australians enrolled to vote.
The centre-left Australian Labor Party opposition, led by Kevin Rudd and deputy leader Julia Gillard, defeated the incumbent centre-right Coalition government, led by Liberal Party leader and Prime Minister, John Howard, and Nationals leader and Deputy Prime Minister, Mark Vaile, by a landslide. The election marked the end of the 11-year-long Howard-led Liberal–National Coalition government that had been in power since the 1996 election. Howard lost his own seat, becoming the first sitting Australian Prime Minister to lose his seat in nearly 80 years. This election also marked the start of the six-year Rudd–Gillard Labor government.
Future Prime Minister Scott Morrison, future opposition leader Bill Shorten, and future Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles entered parliament at this election. This would be the last time the Labor Party would win a majority at the federal level until 2022. This remains the most recent election in which both major parties won over 40% of first preference votes. It would also be the last time the Labor Party was ahead of the Liberal–National Coalition in first preference vote until 2025.
Rudd became the third Labor leader after World War II to lead the party to victory from opposition, after Gough Whitlam in 1972, Bob Hawke in 1983, and before most recently Anthony Albanese in 2022. Although the Coalition was defeated, the results in Western Australia bucked the national trend. While there was a swing against the Liberal Party and to the Labor Party, which allowed Labor to gain the seat of Hasluck from the Liberals, the Liberals managed to gain the seats of Cowan and Swan from Labor.
Key dates
- Prorogation of 41st Parliament: 12 noon, 15 October
- Dissolution of House of Representatives: 12 noon, 17 October
- Issue of electoral writs: 17 October
- Close of rolls : 8 p.m., 17 October
- Close of rolls : 8 p.m., 23 October
- Close of nominations: 12 noon, 1 November
- Declaration of nominations: 12 noon, 2 November
- Polling Day: 24 November
- Territory senators begin their terms: 24 November 2007
- Return of writs: 21 December
- First meeting of the 42nd Parliament: 12 February 2008
- New state senators begin their terms: 1 July 2008
The prime minister of the day chooses the election date and requests the governor-general to dissolve the House and issue the writs for the election. On 14 October, John Howard gained the agreement of the governor-general, Major-General Michael Jeffery, to dissolve the House of Representatives and hold a general election for the House and half the Senate on 24 November 2007.
During the last term of parliament before the 2007 election, the deadline for new voter enrolment was brought forward from 7 working days after the issue of the writ to the same day. When the election was announced, the writ was not issued the next day, but on the following Wednesday. This kept the roll open for three days, during which 77,000 enrolment additions were processed.
Pre-election issues
Roy Morgan polling in June 2007 reported WorkChoices was a reason for Labor party support, and a fear of union dominance and support for Coalition economic management policy as the biggest reasons behind the Coalition vote. Several big business organisations, including the Australian Industry Group, declined a request from the Prime Minister to run advertisements to counter the union-funded campaign. The share of voters concerned about industrial relations grew from 31 per cent to 53 per cent in the two years to June 2006, with around three-fifths of voters backing Labor's ability to handle the issue over the Liberal Party.A Newspoll released in June 2006 reported health and Medicare were the most important issue for voters; 83 per cent of respondents rated it "very important". Other key issues included education, the economy, the environment and national security. Taxation and interest rates, key issues in previous campaigns, were rated very important by 54 per cent and 51 per cent respectively. Immigration, a key issue in 2001, scored 43 per cent. The poll showed that voters considered Labor marginally better-placed to handle health and education, and gave the government strong backing on the economy and national security.
Kevin Rudd promised Labor would introduce a greenhouse gas emission reduction target of 60 per cent by 2050, ratify the Kyoto protocol and introduce a mandatory renewable energy target of 20 per cent by 2020. The Howard government reiterated their position of not ratifying the Kyoto protocol, setting "voluntary aspirational emission reduction targets" and introducing a carbon emissions trading scheme by 2012.
Labor pledged a $4.7 billion fibre-to-the-node broadband network.
On 7 June in a speech promoting the government's handling of the economy, Treasurer Peter Costello recalled the learner driver slogan of the 2004 election: "This is like a highly engineered racing car and I tell you what, I wouldn't be putting an L-plate driver in the cockpit at the moment". August 2007 saw, for the first time during an election campaign, a 0.25-point interest-rate rise to 6.5 per cent by the Reserve Bank, the sixth rise since the last election in 2004. Labor used the news to argue that the Coalition could not be trusted to keep interest rates low, while Costello argued that interest rates would be higher under Labor. In November 2007 interest rates were raised for the sixth time since the 2004 election, to a 10-year high of 6.75 per cent. In response to Labor criticism of the government on the rate rises, Howard stated in August 2007 " can scour every transcript, and I will make them available, of every interview that I gave during that election campaign and he will find no such commitment." In late September, Sudanese Australian Liep Gony was murdered by two white assailants. Initial off-the-record statements by police officers falsely attributed the murder to gang violence, leading to a press and political storm around so-called African gangs. During this period, Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews criticised Sudanese Australians on various occasions for "not fitting in" and suggested they were disposed towards "un-Australian" violence. As a result of this discourse, the government decided to cut the percentage of refugee visas given to Africans from 70% to 30%.
The Queensland Labor Premier, Anna Bligh, described Andrews' criticism of Sudanese as "disturbing". She said: "It has been a long time since I have heard such a pure form of racism out of the mouth of any Australian politician." Labor politician Tony Burke branded Andrews' decision as "incompetent". However, Andrew's actions were applauded by the former One Nation politician, Pauline Hanson. Andrews was accused of helping to fuel assaults of Sudanese. During the controversy one criticism was that Andrews justified his decision based on "concerns raised by the community", however no official report or inquest has been tendered, leading to the conclusion that any 'concerns' were both unofficial, undocumented and possibly belonging to a racially intolerant minority. Andrews defended the system of having refugee quotas against the opinion expressed that intakes of refugees should be variated on the basis of global needs ." In October 2007, Howard "admitted breaking a promise to keep interest rates at record lows". During the 2004 campaign, Howard was also cited as giving the same promise, personally, on radio. Inflation figures released on 24 October indicated underlying inflation was higher than expected, which resulted in seven of eight financial companies believing there will be an interest rate rise when the reserve bank met in the middle of November, the first during an election campaign.
Rudd advocated four-year fixed terms for federal parliaments if elected. Howard supported four-year terms but opposed fixed election dates. Any change would require approval by referendum. In mid-October, Howard said that if re-elected, the government would hold a referendum on the inclusion a statement of reconciliation in the preamble of the constitution.
Election campaign
Week 1
On 14 October, Howard announced a 24 November election. The Coalition had been trailing Labor in the polls since 2006, and most pundits predicted that Howard would not be re-elected. ABC Online election analyst Antony Green noted the Coalition's numbers were similar to what Labor had polled before losing power in 1996.File:Kevin07.jpg|thumb|Kevin Rudd campaigning with Labor candidate Kerry Rea in Bonner on 21 September 2007.
Howard's theme concentrated on leadership, stating that the nation "does not need new leadership, it does not need old leadership. It needs the right leadership" He said his government would strive to achieve full employment, which he argued was less likely under Kevin Rudd. In response, Rudd also concentrated on leadership, outlining his case for "new leadership". He argued that the government had 'lost touch' with the electorate, and that the Labor Party was best suited to deal with challenges that lie ahead.
A Galaxy poll showed a Labor 53–47 per cent Coalition two-party-preferred result, with a 2 per cent gap on primaries, and ACNielsen polling reported a 2 per cent swing to the Coalition, reducing Labor's lead to 54–46. Rudd dropped 5 per cent as preferred prime minister. A Newspoll sampling 1,700 voters taken over the weekend prior to the leaders' debate reported a swing to Labor, increasing their two-party-preferred lead to 58 per cent, a rise of 2 points. Labor's primary vote increased 3 points to 51 per cent, and the Liberals decreased by 2 points to 34 per cent. Rudd extended his lead by 2 points to 50 per cent, with Howard down by 2 points to 37 per cent.
On the first full day of the campaign, Howard and Costello announced a 'major restructuring of the income tax system' with tax cuts worth $35 billion over three years and a tax cut "goal" for the next five years. A few days later, Rudd released his policy which supported the reform measures, however offered education and health tax rebates instead of immediate cuts to the top rate as proposed by the Liberal Party, with a slower progression for the top rate.
The Liberals slogan, "go for growth" was launched after announcing the largest tax cut in Australian history. Media and political commentators questioned the suitability of the slogan in the context of rising inflation and interest rates.
During the latter part of the week union influence over the ALP was questioned after the launch of the Liberal party's first campaign ads. Labor responded with commercials attacking the Liberals' campaign as 'smears', which was disputed by John Howard. One of the Liberal Party election commercials was corrected after it incorrectly said Wayne Swan and Craig Emerson had previously been union officials.