The Australian election is on Saturday (7 September), finally.
Julia Gillard announced the election way back on January 30. Since then Gillard has been deposed by Kevin Rudd and the election brought forward a week to September 7.
Polls have had opposition leader, Tony Abbott, leading all the way through the campaign, and his lead is getting larger.
There is no doubt that Abbott will win, and win with a majority government (Australia has had a minority government since 2010).
Polls have the current Labour government losing 14 seats. I think the results are likely to be much worse than that for Labour, with losses of over 20 seats.
The big question, though, is if the election will hand over control of the upper house to Mr. Abbott (say it right and it comes out Mister Rabbit). If it does, he will gain that control from July 2014, until then, the Green Party has the balance of power in the Senate. If he does not win control, Abbott has promised another election.
Where does this all leave the AUD?
Its been a good bet that Mr. Abbott will win the election for some time now. Its already in the market. The question of the upper house, though, is still there. Upper house results will not be known for days, maybe weeks after the election.
I’ve posted numerous times on the Aussie election – more at these links:
Australia election – Policies the Greens will block
Australian election – The Economist endorses current PM Rudd
Australia election: 2 weeks to go and polls swinging more towards the current opposition
