With less than a fortnight to go, the major parties are just now getting around to launching their campaigns, which might raise the question: what have we all been doing since 9 May then?
Labor’s official launch was on Sunday, and the Liberals’ is slated for next week, while the latest Newspoll shows the two parties neck-and-neck on a two-party-preferred basis, with 46% preferring Malcolm Turnbull as PM and 31% favouring Bill Shorten.
The opposition are staking a claim to Medicare as the issue that gets them over the line. On Sunday the Coalition ditched the idea of outsourcing the Medicare payments system in order to head off Labor’s attack about privatisation, a centrepiece of its campaign launch.
Mathias Cormann, the Coalition’s campaign spokesman, denied that this was a retreat forced by Labor and said Turnbull had ruled out privatising Medicare, but not improving the service.
New signage? Pretty quick on the Medicare draw @LiberalAus? #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/CXsIKYiVPM
— Katharine Murphy (@murpharoo) June 20, 2016
Labor’s deputy leader, Tanya Plibersek, was sceptical about that promise, pointing to the Abbott/Turnbull governments’ history of cuts. “If you look at their record rather than what the PM’s saying 12 days out from an election, people understand that it’s only Labor that will protect Medicare.”
Penny Wong added: “The best guide to future behaviour is past behaviour.”
Turnbull – who was by all accounts quite ill today – accused Labor of running an “extraordinarily dishonest scare campaign” over Medicare’s future under the Coalition, naming it “the biggest lie of the campaign”.
“The way they have sought to frighten people, particularly older Australians, is really shameful.
“I want to be very clear. Medicare will never ever be privatised. Medicare will never be sold.”
What hysterical stunt would Shorten possibly pull next, asked Scott Morrison, the treasurer, before going on to offer some suggestions: “He’s going to chain himself to the Opera House, or say we will sell the Harbour Bridge?
This is how ridiculous and pathetic Labor’s campaign has become. They are desperate, shouty, panicked and have no economic plan.
Penny on the block
Wong, Labor’s campaign spokeswoman, also faced questions over whether Labor would block the Coalition’s bill to enable a plebiscite on same-sex marriage. A Labor PM would present a bill to make marriage equality law to the House of Representatives, she said.
Wong said no one had seen the Coalition’s bill yet, and any suggestion that Labor would attempt to sabotage it was a bid to distract from Turnbull’s “capitulation” on the issue: “[There’s] no bill yet somehow they want to talk about what happens after the election.”
#faketradie: so many questions
The Coalition has been roundly derided for its new television ad, which shows a genial tradie who “just wants to get ahead with an investment property” urging those of like mind to “stick with the current mob for a while”.
(He also defends his bank, because if there’s one thing the common man loves more than the Liberal party, it’s the banks.)
Twitter cast aspersions on the tradie’s authenticity with #faketradie, which was trending on Sunday night. Someone that awkward could never be an actor, right? But what about all those workplace safety risks?
Clobber me with a dingo, what's that galah Shorten up to? Stick with the tried and true blue. #faketradie #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/5W5tsUbec5
— Patrick Alexander (@zpxlng) June 19, 2016
Is that a Rolex #FakeTradie is wearing?
— Dr Misty-Eyed (@ChristineEwing7) June 19, 2016
#faketradie urges LNP to stick with his ad for a little while
— Bernard Keane (@BernardKeane) June 19, 2016
Hello I'm Troy McClure. You may remember me from "Which battalion were you in on the war on jobs?" #faketradie pic.twitter.com/jcK65UwTId
— Stephen Murray (@smurray38) June 19, 2016
Time for Australia to vote: who was more believable? Doggy Depp vs #faketradie pic.twitter.com/QKq3YIgDNo
— Nic Healey (@dr_nic) June 20, 2016
The ad garnered the seal of approval from the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, which has been leading the charge for “dank memes” this election.
#faketradie is the best meme to come out of this election, absolutely inspired stuff from Malc and co. https://t.co/HPofwUSlMj
— The AMWU (@theamwu) June 19, 2016
And, praise be, @FakeTradie was free, which is God’s way of telling you He wants a parody account. Twitter said: thy will be done.
I'm tired of people questioning my credentials. I'm as genuine as an Eddie MCGuire apology and a Malcolm Turnbull promise.
— Fake Tradie (@FakeTradie) June 20, 2016
Shorten said the tradie had to be an actor: “The problem with the Liberal ad is exactly the same problem with Mr Turnbull - Australians can spot a fake when they see one.”
But a Liberal spokesman said the man was “real, unlike Mr Shorten’s claims about Medicare” – also that the party was “very pleased that people are talking about this ad”, which must be a half-truth.
Actual tradies responded to the clip in an amusing video for Junkee: “He’s not a tradie. What’s he doing drinking coffee on the job?”
But whether Turnbull’s tradie is real, fake, or a confection of the internet is a bit beside the point, writes Van Badham: “Someone needs to tell him that if he’s worried about blue collar jobs, the last thing he should consider is voting for more non-solutions from this mob.”
Best of Bowers
Bill Shorten at the National Catholic Education Commission conference in Perth.
Further reading
• Barnaby pulls ahead as Windsor takes a tumble (The Australian) A special Newspoll reveals Barnaby Joyce leads by 51% to 49% in the seat of New England, with rival Tony Windsor suffering a sharp eight-point fall in his primary vote.
In New England, trees would rather uproot themselves then be seen supporting a Greens candidate. #ausvotes #auspol pic.twitter.com/dNuPqxW5v9
— Barnaby Joyce (@Barnaby_Joyce) June 20, 2016
• Polling day sausage sizzle goes global (Fairfax) “An election day is not complete without a burnt sausage in bread smothered in a condiment of your choice” – no matter where in the world you are, apparently. (On that note: Google’s new interactive map knows which polling booths are also offering sausage sizzles and cake stalls.)
And also ...
In his 43-year career, Paul Stevenson has worked in the aftermath of the Bali bombings and the Boxing Day tsunami but says nothing he witnessed was as bad as the treatment of asylum seekers on Nauru and Manus.
A Guardian Australia exclusive by David Marr and Ben Doherty.
Offshore detention is reprehensible. Don't vote for any party that condones this shit pic.twitter.com/VmBRKltoa3
— Emily Mulligan (@emilycmulligan) June 20, 2016
And if today was a pop song ...
We haven’t heard directly from Jimmy Barnes on #faketradie just yet, but it’s a fair bet you could take this as a comment.
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