Federal election 2025: Anthony Albanese announces election for May 3, Peter Dutton slams attack comments

“Ready to go?... You bet, born ready,” an upbeat Anthony Albanese joked with reporters as he ended the shadow campaign and launched the real one.

Australians will go to the polls in five weeks, on May 3 and both sides are saying their choice has never been clearer.

“This election is a choice between Labor’s plan to keep building or Peter Dutton’s promise to cut,” the Prime Minister said.

“Your job, your wages, your child’s education and, importantly as well, this thing here, your Medicare card. They’re all in your hands because only Labor has the plan to make you better off over the next three years.

“Only Labor is acting on the cost of living. Only a vote for Labor will keep your wages growing, take 20 per cent off your student debt and cut tax again and again for every taxpayer next year and the year after.

“The world today is an uncertain place, but I am absolutely certain of this, now is not the time for cutting and wrecking, for aiming low, punching down or looking back. This is a time for building.”

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, standing in Liberal Party headquarters in Brisbane, said Australians had to ask themselves if they were better off than three years ago.

“Because of Labor’s bad decisions, Australians are doing it tough and they need help. Worse still, for many, they’re losing hope for their future,” he said.

“Our team is united, experienced and ready for the responsibility of governing Australia.

“Our plan will deliver a stronger economy with low inflation and affordable homes in safer communities; a stronger, safer, better Australia.

“When it comes to the economy, inflation, energy, housing and security, Labor has simply failed to deliver and, unfortunately, Mr Albanese is too weak and Labor is too incompetent to fix the problems that they’ve created and that are facing our country today.”

The Prime Minister visited Governor-General Sam Mostyn early Friday morning, less than 12 hours after Mr Dutton outlined the Coalition’s election pitch in his Budget in reply speech.

Mr Albanese focused on health as the central plank of his pitch to the Australian public, twice brandishing his Medicare card as he promised a better, brighter future.

The Government has $12.5 billion on the table for more bulk billing, cheaper medicines, urgent care clinics and other health-related measures.

Mr Dutton has matched most of these and added promises to double the number of subsidised psychology appointments people can get and $400 million for youth mental health.

He put energy at the heart of his offerings on Thursday night, unveiling a new east coast gas reservation policy aimed at driving down power prices.

“Energy is the economy. Everything that we see before us, the plastics, the cars we drive in, the hospitals we rely on, the phones, the chargers, everything relies on energy in our system,” he said on Friday morning.

“If energy is unaffordable and if it’s unreliable, then it’s a disaster for the economy. And you can’t have economic growth without baseload power.”

The party is also promising to build nuclear power at seven sites, but they aren’t expected to come online until close to 2040 on the most optimistic time frames.

“Peter Dutton needs to find $600 billion to pay for nuclear reactors … that money has to come from somewhere,” Mr Albanese said.

“Everything in Peter Dutton’s record tells us that he will start by cutting Medicare and he won’t stop there. He will cut everything except your taxes.

“No one will get any power from the Liberals’ nuclear reactors for two decades but every Australian will get the bill right away. Because when Peter Dutton cuts, Australians pay.”

In terms of immediate cost of living help, Labor is pitting its $5-a-week tax cuts and $150 power bill rebates against the Coalition’s one-year cut to petrol excise set to save motorists about $14 a week.

The Coalition has vowed to repeal the tax cuts as its top priority if elected.

“We have to act responsibly, and we can’t pretend that we’ve got limitless money. Governments only have taxpayers’ money, and it needs to be spent efficiently,” Mr Dutton explained when asked why the party of lower taxes would be pledging increases.

Mr Albanese said he intended both to lead a majority government and serve a full term as prime minister.

“We live in the greatest country on Earth, and we do not need to copy from any other nation to make Australia even better and stronger,” he said.

Labor has pointed to its opponents’ policies that appear to copy from the Donald Trump playbook, including the “are you better off” question, cuts to the public service and migration, and some culture wars.

But asked directly whether he was saying Mr Dutton was cribbing from Donald Trump, Mr Albanese said people could make their own minds up.

“We need the Australian way. The Australian way is that we look after each other, is that we’re a country that in the language that we use with each other – fair dinkum, fair go, they’re part of the Australian lexicon,” he said.

He went on to speak emotionally about how the late media mogul Kerry Packer, his mother and himself after a car accident a couple of years ago had all been treated in the same hospital in Sydney.

“On that evening, I was in the same room that my mum was in when, as an invalid pensioner, she got taken up the road after having an aneurysm and she never left RPA, but she got the same care that Kerry Packer got,” he said.

“They’re the Australian values. That’s what I’ll fight for.”

Mr Dutton labelled the Trump comparisons a “sledgeathon” by the Prime Minister.

“You can expect the personal sledges. I’m not interested in that. I’m interested in our positive plan … to help Australians deal with the cost of living crisis that Labor’s created,” he said.