The Australian Labor Party’s (ALP) popularity has dropped three points following Anthony Albanese’s budget response in parliament on Thursday, March 31.
In a Newspoll conducted by The Australian, the ALP is now sitting at 38 per cent with the Coalition climbing in favour by one point to 36 per cent.
The poll shows the Greens gaining the remaining two points from the ALP, leaving the third-largest party sitting at 10 per cent.
The Liberal National Party’s (LNP) budget focused largely on the cost of living for Australians, including tax cuts and business incentives in the hopes of bringing up the level of employment.
The ALP’s budget response was to put the primary focus on aged care and wage growth, however, the party faced criticism for lacking detail.
In an interview with Leigh Sales, Albanese defended his budget after Sales referred to it as “a lot of aspirational sentences”.
“I had half an hour. If I could have three hours I would go through the lot,” he said.
In his budget speech, Albanese said the LNP’s budget failed to address the issue of aged care, furthering the neglect of the sector, saying the Morrison government “had a decade to do something”.
He said he was “chilled by stories of unforgivable neglect – maggots in wounds, people going days without fresh air, a shower, or a change of clothes, stories of residents lying on the floor, crying out in pain, and nobody is there to help them.”
“It goes against everything we are as Australians,” Albanese said.
“And while our loved ones suffer, and their carers, mostly women, are underpaid and overworked, some of the operators running these places are doing very well.”
The opposition leader labelled the Coalition’s budget a band-aid fix that failed to plan for the long-term future of Australia, calling the budget a “bunch of last-minute, one-off handouts for problems that have been a decade in the making”.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has less than two weeks to call the official date of the election but has recently let slip it will be going ahead in May.
The official date is predicted to be either May 14 or 21.