Could Australia’s answer to Corbyn become PM?

While the main electoral attraction of the moment is the French presidential showdown between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, it is not the only significant election underway in the western world.

On 21 May, Australia goes to the polls. The contest is between the nominally centre-right coalition of the Liberal and National parties led by prime minister Scott Morrison, and the Australian Labor party led by a long-term, socialist left-wing MP, Anthony Albanese.

On the face of it, Morrison should be re-elected on his record. In his three-year term, he has seen Australia through natural disasters, including the massive bushfires affecting the south-east of the country in 2019 and early 2020, and just now floods inundating large parts of New South Wales and Queensland. More particularly, Morrison presided over a national Covid response which – although it turned Australia into a hermit kingdom for the best part of two years – kept Covid infections exceptionally low compared to the UK and Europe.