Voting has opened in Australia’s eastern states as major party leaders make a final pitch to undecided voters and polling tips a change of government.
At ballot boxes on Saturday, votes will be cast for 1203 candidates across the 151 seats in the House of Representatives.
With polls suggesting Australia is likely to get its sixth prime minister in nine years, Mr Albanese told the ABC outside Melbourne’s iconic MCG on Saturday morning Labor was kicking with the wind at its back.
“The fourth quarter is what matters and I hope to finish ahead when the siren sounds,” he said.
The opposition leader said he aimed to form a majority government, with a minimum target as low as the coalition’s thin 76-seat grasp on Parliament House during its term.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s Liberal-National government heads into the election holding 75 seats, having lost the WA seat of Stirling in a redistribution.
Labor starts with 68 seats, plus notionally the new Victorian seat of Hawke.
The major parties will need 76 seats for a majority in the lower house.
In the Senate, there are 421 candidates vying for 40 seats across the states and territories.
When 6pm rolls around, the ballots of more than 17 million voters will start to be counted, including those of more than five million people who voted early.
In Sydney’s northern beaches, the Liberal Party’s Jason Falinski told Sky News there was “no doubt” his party was the underdog.
Across the harbour, Labor’s Matt Thistlethwaite said the race would go down to the wire but he was confident.
The so-called ‘teal’ independents also made their pitch with Kylea Tink, running to usurp moderate Liberal Trent Zimmerman in North Sydney, saying her volunteers were outnumbering those of mainstream parties.
“I’m really excited people in North Sydney want politics done differently,” she told Nine.
Allegra Spender, who is facing off against Liberal Dave Sharma in Wentworth, promised to be a voice for her electorate’s values “every single time”.
Opinion polls are averaging 53.5 per cent to Labor on a two-party preferred basis, according to The Poll Bludger website, which if reflected at the ballot box would result in 83 seats for the ALP.
The latest Newspoll, in the Australian, shows Labor holding a 53-47 lead despite a two point drop in the party’s primary vote to 36 per cent.
Mr Morrison, who campaigned in Perth on Friday, said the election would be close.
“Australians weigh up their decision very, very carefully,” the Liberal leader said.
“What Australians will be wanting to know is what certainty and security can they have going forward for them and their families?”
Mr Albanese – who campaigned in South Australia, Tasmania and Victoria on Friday – said many people who had voted Liberal all their lives were now walking away from the party.
“There’s three more years of the same, or there’s myself, who wants to bring the country together, who wants to be inclusive, who wants to end the division,” he said.
The campaign has focused on cost of living, economic management, national security, a federal integrity commission, climate and equality and safety for women.
Mr Albanese stumbled on economic questions in the first week of the campaign, playing into the hands of the coalition’s attack over his inexperience.
Mr Morrison’s economic credentials took a hit with a rise in the cash rate and the latest wages figures coming in well below inflation, while he sought to remodel his personal “bulldozer” style of leadership.
Closely watched will be the success of the teal independents, who have run a well-funded campaign on climate change, integrity and women’s safety across a number of Liberal-held seats.
Defeat for Labor will be the fourth successive loss and mean the ALP has won majority government only once in the past 10 elections.
If Mr Morrison wins, he will be the first incumbent prime minister to win two elections in a row since John Howard in 2004.
The Liberal campaign has targeted the seats of Hughes, Gilmore, Parramatta, Hunter (NSW), Lyons (Tasmania), Corangamite (Victoria) and Lingiari (NT).
Labor has in its sights the seats of Pearce, Hasluck, Swan (WA), Chisholm and Hawke (Victoria), Bass and Braddon (Tasmania), Brisbane, Longman, Leichhardt and Ryan (Queensland), Boothby (SA), Reid, Bennelong and Robertson (NSW).
Election day also marks the 60th anniversary of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander citizens being granted the right to vote in federal elections.
