LAST night's budget reply speech by opposition leader Anthony Albanese was a rare chance for the ALP to take the political focus in a parliamentary term that has the Coalition government in a strong position as we approach the halfway point of a nominal three-year term.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison's victory election victory on May 18, 2019, seems a veritable age ago. Such is Mr Morrison's grip on power - with Treasurer Josh Frydenberg as a leader-in-waiting - that there is growing speculation of an early election to be held sometime next year.
Such sentiments can disappear, of course, as quickly as they arise, but Mr Morrison has matured as a leader, and his political successes are erasing the early criticisms of him as "Scotty from marketing".
Half a year after his "miracle" election win, Mr Morrison was still on shaky ground thanks to his poor handling of the bushfire season.
Since then, however, his government's handling of the COVID-19 crisis has been remarkably adroit: so much so that Mr Albanese and his Labor colleagues have been reduced to arguing the details, but not the direction, of the government's coronavirus response.
Mr Albanese criticised the government last night on childcare and manufacturing, but he has had little room to complain about the broad response to COVID because the Coalition has turned to the same sorts of pump-priming Keynesian economics that Labor would have used had it been in power.
Labor's vision for manufacturing would no doubt bolster the Hunter's existing industrial base, and its determination to rebuild the TAFE system is also welcome. But both require an election victory to carry any real weight.
That is, of course, unless the Coalition government comes to a similar conclusion, and uses its own purchasing powers to help revive our substantially shrunken manufacturing sector.
There is no doubt that the Hunter Region has the ability to carry out substantial advanced manufacturing projects.
Our history shows that.
At the same time, however, we should continue to buy internationally if that proves the best value for money.
Coronavirus could yet hamper global trade for years to come, but it will eventually be beaten.
Whatever manufacturing stance we adopt, it needs to serve us in good times as well as bad.
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