Paul Bongiorno

Columnist for The Saturday Paper and regular ABC Nightlife commentator, veteran political journalist. His views contestable but his own.

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Articles

The spoils of defeat

1 week ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

SHARE Copy Link Bluesky Facebook X LinkedIn In politics, it is easy to misread a victory or a loss. It is only the subsequent election that can prove whether that judgement was correct or not. This reality was further complicated in this election by the fact it came so soon after a referendum with a very different outcome. The way both major parties interpreted the majority “No” vote in the 2023 Voice to Parliament referendum had a significant bearing on this campaign.
Littleproud comes before a fall

2 weeks ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

Fresh from the papal inauguration in Rome, and after Leo XIV blessed the prime minister’s late mother’s rosary beads at his request, Anthony Albanese could be excused for thinking God is on his side. Much has landed for Labor this week, from further evidence inflation has been tamed, to the Australian Electoral Commission confirming the electoral landscape has a historically distinctive red glow about it, to the Coalition imploding when the Liberals and Nationals split.
The spoils of war

3 weeks ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

SHARE Copy Link Bluesky Facebook X LinkedIn Anthony Albanese, speaking in the prime minister’s courtyard on Monday, proudly proclaimed the “largest ALP caucus in history since Federation”. It was, he said, brimming with “capacity, talent and energy in both the House of Representatives and the Senate”. Albanese’s success at the May 3 election has given him unparalleled authority over the government and the party.
What Albanese can learn from Caesar

1 month ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

Famously, Julius Caesar boasted of how he came, he saw and he conquered, but on his return to Rome, in the midst of the ceremonial triumph, a slave reminded him he was dust and to dust he would return. Anthony Albanese would do well to reflect on this ancient wisdom, even though he defied political gravity to establish himself in the pantheon of conquering Labor heroes. Governing parties tend to lose seats at their second election; Albanese’s feat is a remarkable defiance of this tradition.
Voters poised to hit the eject Dutton

1 month ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

On Saturday, we will find out if it is possible for a major party to run a very poor campaign and still win an election. The likelihood of Peter Dutton pulling off this feat seems remote. He would need a bigger miracle than his predecessor Scott Morrison managed in 2019. That election result still haunts the Labor Party, consoles the Liberals and makes pundits nervous. There are, however, significant differences between that campaign and what is happening now.
It’s all over bar the voting

1 month ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

SHARE Copy Link Bluesky Facebook X LinkedIn A trifecta of unmissable interruptions has made Peter Dutton’s task of winning the election in just seven days’ time a seemingly impossible mission. If the Easter holiday break followed by the Anzac Day holiday weren’t already obstacles to the late run home on which the Liberals were counting, the death on Monday of Pope Francis threw another giant spanner in the works.
Election hatches battened down

1 month ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

Labor has entered the Easter holiday period with the wind in its sails, although insiders worry that the break may allow the Coalition to right its flailing campaign. These concerns are based more on memories of shock losses in the recent past than on any evidence that the Dutton opposition can lift its game dramatically in the final two weeks before the election. The nervousness is akin to the post-traumatic stress disorder the party suffered after the 2019 election defeat.
How to blow up a campaign in two easy steps

1 month ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

All elections turn on competence in political and economic management. Undermine voters’ confidence in either – or, worse, both – and the chances of success are seriously diminished. That is the situation Peter Dutton finds himself in at the end of the second week of the campaign. It is hard to recall an opposition leader in the past three decades so unceremoniously abandoning a key policy just one week into an election campaign.
Dutton off to a poor start

2 months ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

There is not a politician in the country who isn’t nervous about May 3, but there are growing concerns in the Coalition in particular about its disheartening start to the campaign. Peter Dutton, who has mostly managed not to make the opposition the issue, has been caught wanting as the spotlight turns on him as the alternative prime minister. No longer is the election a referendum on Labor’s incumbency. It is now a stark choice between Dutton’s prescriptions and Anthony Albanese’s.
The election campaign begins in earnest

2 months ago | thesaturdaypaper.com.au | Paul Bongiorno

Jim Chalmers insisted in the budget lock-up news conference that his fourth effort was primarily about economics and not politics, a claim that didn’t really convince his audience. As Paul Keating was wont to do, the treasurer insisted good economics is always good politics. Winning that argument, of course, largely depends on your politics. The economy, though stuck in anaemic growth, is growing.