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Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.

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Speaker 1: It's Wednesday, February nineteen. Race for an April election. That's

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Speaker 1: the call from our chief political correspondent. As householders and

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Speaker 1: businesses react to the Reserve Bank's first cash rate decision

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Speaker 1: of twenty twenty five, As widely predicted by economists, the

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Speaker 1: Bank has cut the official cash rate by twenty five

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Speaker 1: basis points today. Jeff Chambers on what to expect next.

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Speaker 2: The Board decided today to cut the cash rate by

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Speaker 2: twenty five basis points to four point one percent. The

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Speaker 2: cash rate has been at four point three five percent

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Speaker 2: since November twenty twenty three.

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Speaker 1: There it is the announ the Federal government, and everyone

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Speaker 1: with a mortgage or hoping to have one has been sweating.

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Speaker 1: On Tuesday was the Reserve Bank Board's first meeting of

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty five, and its decision will shape the future

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Speaker 1: of all Australians, especially Anthony Albanezi and Peter Dutton. Ever

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Speaker 1: since the COVID nineteen pandemic swept the world in twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty and then the world slowly got out from under

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Speaker 1: the Dona to survey the wreckage it's been quite the adventure.

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Speaker 1: The Reserve Bank has highing constraints for the first time

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Speaker 1: in eleven and a half years, up zero point two

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Speaker 1: five percent.

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Speaker 3: The new the.

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Speaker 4: Nation's cost of living crisis will get worse before it

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Speaker 4: gets better.

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Speaker 2: This is the fastest trajectory in terms of interest rate

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Speaker 2: increases since the early nineteen ninety.

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Speaker 1: More than one million ossies continue to suffer mortgage stress

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Speaker 1: every single day man Ifair, another rate rise could send

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Speaker 1: them to the war a twelve year high of four

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Speaker 1: point three five percent.

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Speaker 4: I think that the government will definitely call an election

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Speaker 4: in coming weeks.

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Speaker 1: Jeff Chambers is the Australian's chief political correspondent.

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Speaker 4: And I think there's two clear options now, which is

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Speaker 4: April five and April twelve. Well, he was put to

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Speaker 4: me in that last parliamentary sitting week that there was

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Speaker 4: a less than ten percent chance of a March twenty

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Speaker 4: five budget.

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Speaker 3: With a rate cut.

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Speaker 4: That means that they feel like they're some momentum and

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Speaker 4: the way they're going to view it and frame it

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Speaker 4: is that all that pain has peaked at a crescendo

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Speaker 4: and now it's coming down. So I believe that in

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Speaker 4: the coming couple of weeks or so towards the March

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Speaker 4: eighth West Australia election, possibly the day after the WA election.

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Speaker 4: It would be an interesting move if he were to

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Speaker 4: go a week before, but we're talking about for an

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Speaker 4: April five or an April twelve election. He would have

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Speaker 4: to go either in that last week of the WA

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Speaker 4: election or he will go immediately after. And as everyone knows,

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Speaker 4: that expectation is that Roger Cook will win comfortably in

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Speaker 4: Western Australia, and no doubt Anthony Aberanezi would like to

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Speaker 4: ride off the back of both a WA labor win

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Speaker 4: and an RBA cut.

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Speaker 1: Every time Treasurer Jim Chalmers talks about the Reserve Bank,

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Speaker 1: he calls it the Independent Reserve Bank. That's code for

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Speaker 1: don't blame us for whatever they've done now. But that

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Speaker 1: nuance is likely lost on mortgage holders and renters desperate

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Speaker 1: for some relief.

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Speaker 4: I don't think that punters know the ins and outs

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Speaker 4: of the RBA or what inflation means.

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Speaker 3: They just know from the bills that.

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Speaker 4: They're paying every week and the increases of their copying

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Speaker 4: on everything that something's got to give. And this is

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Speaker 4: the real danger zone for Anthony Alberanesi heading into a

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Speaker 4: tid election campaign window where you've got this RBA meeting

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Speaker 4: and then you've got one more where we'll hear the

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Speaker 4: results of that on April fools Day, April one, and

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Speaker 4: then that's it. You've only got two RBA meetings in

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Speaker 4: this zone towards an election.

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Speaker 3: That has to be called by May seventeen.

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Speaker 1: Coming up. First term governments usually have good will behind

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Speaker 1: them at the second election. It's the honeymoon effect. So

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Speaker 1: where did Anthony Albanesi's momentum go? In twenty twenty two,

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Speaker 1: when Anthony Albanzi was elected and got on the stage

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Speaker 1: for his victory speech, inflation was already taking off like

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Speaker 1: a rocket out of the COVID nineteen pandemic. But on

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Speaker 1: that election night, the first thing he said was about

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Speaker 1: the Ularu statement from the heart. In hindsight, Jeff, did

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Speaker 1: Albanesi lose an opportunity there?

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Speaker 4: I think that's well established with hindsight, looking back and

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Speaker 4: knowing what we know now. Was an example of hubrious

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Speaker 4: and overconfidence. After winning government with the lowest primary vote

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Speaker 4: labor primary vote in almost one hundred years, and with

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Speaker 4: a really slim.

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Speaker 3: Majority, it just didn't read the room of what was

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Speaker 3: going on out in Australia and where things were going.

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Speaker 4: I think it was obvious even back then that the

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Speaker 4: energy system and energy prices were teetering in a disastrous

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Speaker 4: sort of area, that the Ukraine War was not going

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Speaker 4: to end quickly, and then it would take years, not months,

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Speaker 4: to bring inflation back into the target band of between

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Speaker 4: two to three percent. These were all realities back then

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Speaker 4: and there should have been known entities. And for the

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Speaker 4: Prime Minister or the government now suggests that maybe they

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Speaker 4: didn't know that these things were coming down the line.

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Speaker 4: I just don't think that's believable, and I think it's

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Speaker 4: now fairly accepted that the Prime minister's decision to proceed

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Speaker 4: with the voice referendum was the turning point in the

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Speaker 4: government's standing and his own personal standings, just plunging into

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Speaker 4: this potentially election losing territory.

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Speaker 1: In theory, Jeff, there's going to be a Jim Chalmers

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Speaker 1: mini budget on March twenty five. Flights and rooms have

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Speaker 1: been booked, but if an election is called, it won't

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Speaker 1: go ahead. Obviously, if the government did delay that election

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Speaker 1: call and hold the mini budget, what would we expect.

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Speaker 4: I think that they have provision for cost of living relief.

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Speaker 4: We've seen a raft of announcements in recent times which

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Speaker 4: are more focused towards voter cohorts, so cutting student debt,

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Speaker 4: paying cash incentives for young tradey apprentices. But we're going

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Speaker 4: to see from both Anthony Alberanez and Peter Dunton a

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Speaker 4: raft of new cost of living policies, targeted temporary policies

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Speaker 4: which they've held back, and they've held that back for

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Speaker 4: the campaign proper. You've got labor trying to cast off

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Speaker 4: previous labor big spends and their management of the economy.

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Speaker 4: They're under a lot of pressure about government spending and bureaucracies,

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Speaker 4: but that pressure is just as much on Peter Dunton

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Speaker 4: and Angus Taylor because we really haven't seen much in

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Speaker 4: the way of economic policy. They've made lots of promises

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Speaker 4: around making the tax system fairer, driving efficiencies across the

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Speaker 4: public service, but they also caveat that with we need

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Speaker 4: to get in and we need to see the books

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Speaker 4: to know how far we can go. So I think

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Speaker 4: that is a challenge where Peter Dutton cannot just make

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Speaker 4: big spending proposals and they still carry the baggage of

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Speaker 4: the COVID pandemic. Rightly or wrongly, the way Labor framed

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Speaker 4: up the coalition was that they spent too much and

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Speaker 4: the programs that were put in place weren't targeted enough.

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Speaker 4: I think that's been proven to be false across most areas,

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Speaker 4: because the evidence is that the Australian economy bounced back

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Speaker 4: much faster and stronger than other Western economies. But of course, yeah,

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Speaker 4: for both the Albanezi and Peter Dutton, the level of spending,

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Speaker 4: the type of spending is going to come under enormous scrutiny.

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Speaker 4: And at the end of the day, for households and businesses,

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Speaker 4: they want things that are tangible that are actually going

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Speaker 4: to make a difference. And a lot of policies we're seeing,

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Speaker 4: whether it's housing or cost of living, it doesn't really

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Speaker 4: touch the sides. And I think is there that courage

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Speaker 4: from either side of politics to really take on some

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Speaker 4: bold economic reform, red tape reform, and I think that's

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Speaker 4: where the rubber hits the road.

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Speaker 1: Jeff Chambers is The Australian's chief political correspondent. Jeff and

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Speaker 1: our team in Canberra have all the scoops and the

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