Responding to poor opinion polls and declining confidence in his government, Labor’s Anthony Albanese used a recent podcast interview to liken himself to former Liberal PM John Howard. 

It’s a man he once despised when Albo started out on his political career as a callow young left-wing powerbroker in the Labor Party.

‘Do you remember a fellow called John Howard? Have a look at where he was before the ’98 poll, the ’01 poll, the ’04 poll… he was always behind except on election day,’ Albanese claimed on the podcast ‘Neil Mitchell Asks Why’.

Not wanting to fact check the PM too closely, he’s wrong when making that claim.

Howard was behind until late in the campaign against Mark Latham in 2004, but took polling leads over his political opponents prior to election day in both 1998 and 2001.

As Mark Twain once said, never let the facts get in the way of a good story. 

Nonetheless, Albo’s point is that Howard was the master of the political comeback, a feat the current PM hopes to emulate at least once in the months ahead. 

To achieve three election wins (as Howard did) seems rather less likely. 

A recent Resolve poll has Labor trailing the Coalition 45-55 percent on the two party vote. Newspoll and Freshwater polls also have Labor trailing, but by smaller margins.

Perhaps the more accurate former Liberal PM to compare Albo with is Scott Morrison, the man he vanquished in 2022.

Morrison’s net satisfaction rating plummeted from its Covid heights to nearly minus 20 before the election he lost three years ago. 

Albanese’s initial honeymoon saw his approval rating reach similar stratospheric heights to Morrison’s, before dropping at a similarly rapid rate, to a net satisfaction rating of minus 21 according to the most recent Newspoll.

That, of course, is a less edifying comparison, so I am not surprised Albo is avoiding making it. But the slide in personal support Morrison faced in the final 12 months of his prime ministership is eerily similar to Albo’s loss of support when the graphs are placed side by side.

Not that Albo always would have so proudly sought to compare himself to Howard the way he is attempting to do now.

Our current PM entered parliament at the 1996 election when Howard first became PM. Then Labor opposition leader Kim Beazley quickly deployed Albo as one of his backbench attack dogs, targeting Howard with personal attacks not unlike the barbs Albo is now trying to make stick against Peter Dutton.

Seeking to reverse the usual ‘battler made good formula’ that Howard as PM enjoyed, Albo labelled him a class traitor shortly after Howard took the top job… for his move from the inner-west of Sydney as a child in the 1940s and 50s across the harbour to find a seat in parliament way back in the 1970s.

‘He certainly would not be comfortable living in the inner-west of Sydney anymore’, Albo said.

Fast forward to today and the PM is facing his own fair share of barbs for moving away from his working class roots: purchasing a $4.3m waterfront holiday home on the Central Coast is just one example.

One of the PM’s colleagues, when contacted by Daily Mail Australia, found his boss’s attempted comparison to Howard interesting for different reasons.

He pointed out that Howard won in 1998 by fighting for ‘serious reforms, whether you agreed with them or not’. 

‘What have we done?’ Albo’s colleague asked. 

The Labor MP also claimed Howard’s 2001 victory was built on ‘tough national security credentials, which is hardly our strength especially with everything going on domestically at the moment’.

The MP was referring to the growing instances of anti-Semitism around the nation.

Despite the doubters in Labor’s ranks, and despite the failures of the Albanese government to enact meaningful reforms during its first term in power, this scribe remains convinced an Albo comeback is in the offing.

I am predicting a narrow Labor victory, despite Albo’s poor track record as a campaigner and despite the current polling quagmire. 

Albeit as a re-elected minority government dependent on Greens support. Why? Because no first-term government has lost a re-election attempt since 1931, and Labor can win this year’s election by sandbagging key marginal seats with a national two party vote as low as 48 per cent.