Polls have closed and counting has begun in the April Fools’ Day by-election in Aston, which is shaping up as no laughing matter for Peter Dutton.
The vote has been labelled a de-facto judgement on his Liberal leadership, while Anthony Albanese has positioned Labor as the underdog, constantly referring to the fact a governing party hasn’t won a seat off the opposition at a by-election in over 100 years.
To underline the claim, the Prime Minister had a few choice words to say about his opposite number after grabbing a democracy sausage topped with BBQ sauce at a polling booth in the east Melbourne electorate on Saturday.
“The opposition under Peter Dutton are just sitting there saying ‘no’. They’ve become the observers rather than the participants in our national parliament,” he told reporters at the primary school.
Aston is held by the Liberals on a slim 2.8 per cent margin after former minister and outgoing member Alan Tudge suffered a large swing against him at the 2022 election.
Mr Albanese has claimed anything less than a massive majority for the Liberals would be an indictment on Mr Dutton’s leadership.
On Saturday, the opposition leader told reporters that many factors influenced the result in the federal election.
Liberal candidate’s new address
Former Melbourne City councillor and barrister Roshena Campbell is fighting to keep the seat for the Liberals, focusing her campaign on the increasing cost of living and local infrastructure.
“The opportunity in the election today is to send a very clear message to Labor that they shouldn’t be cutting local road funding, and they shouldn’t be abandoning this community,” Mr Dutton said.
He revealed Ms Campbell had moved into the electorate after previously living in Melbourne’s inner city suburb of Brunswick.
“Her first act was to move into Aston, because she wants to raise her children here and wants to be a champion for this local community,” he said.
“So she demonstrated commitment from day one to Aston and I’m confident that the people of Aston will repay that today.”
Labor’s candidate Mary Doyle is a breast cancer survivor and former unionist who failed to take the seat at the last election.
She told AAP the Albanese government is making a difference for households doing it tough due to the rising cost of living through measures like cheaper childcare and cutting the cost of prescription medication.
The result could go down to the wire and there are growing concerns about voter turnout, prompting the Prime Minister to remind people to cast a ballot no matter their preference.
Shrunken turnout
About 110,000 people are enrolled to vote in the by-election but just over 23,000 had voted by Friday, compared with 35,055 at the same time before the 2022 election.
Almost 18,000 postal applications had been received but any outstanding postal votes are not due back for another 13 days.
“Just to remind people, voting is compulsory,” Mr Albanese said on Saturday.
“The truth is the vote is down substantially, the pre-poll voting, and people need to get out there and have their democratic say today.
“No matter who they are voting for, people should vote.”
After the NSW state election, the Liberal-Nationals coalition no longer hold government at federal, state or territory level anywhere on the Australian mainland.
Other candidates for the seat are project manager Angelica Di Camillo (Greens), software engineer Owen Miller (Fusion) and libertarian Maya Tesa (independent).
-AAP
