Australian Federal Election Analysis

Australian Federal Election, 2013.

The 2013 federal election to resolute the members of the 44th Parliament of Australia happened on the 7th September . Competing in this election were two large rivalry parties. The centre-left Australian Labor Party led by Kevin Rudd, the elected head of government at the time and the opposition Tony Abbott, leader of the Liberal Party a centre right conservative party. To determine the head of government an election is held every 3 years. Government is formed in The House of Representatives. There are 150 members of parliament in the House of Representatives elected by Australians . To form government a political party needs to obtain 50% plus one vote. The results between the two political parties were shown

The record of government is a large factor. Elections represent the voter’s approval or disapproval of the government’s actions over a term in office. A term lasts three years and each prime minister is able to serve the maximum of two terms. Therefore, during the 2013 election Kevin Rudd, the incumbent was defending his second term in government against the opposition leader Tony Abbott. Voters are often encouraged to disregard political parties with the history of failure of major policies for, as it perceived weak leadership and disunity. Kevin Rudd had a history of a policy reversal in 2010. This policy was the emissions trading scheme also commonly known as the ‘Carbon Tax’ . Both Liberal and Labor have had a history of policy failures however due to Kevin Rudd’s recent failure. This exemplar of ‘weak’ leadership became more aware. Although this will subvert Rudd’s chance of re-election. For a re-election to occur government is meant to be seen as burnt out with no new ideas through the use of media. However during the 2013 election, the Liberal Party did not win this election. The Australian Labor Part lost government due to the history of error in the policies he created. The record of government was a large contributor to the results of the 2013

Both the strengths and weaknesses can be evident in each party. Some of the strengths in a political party include positive leadership and beneficial proceeding policies to the public. The weaknesses that can be found in a political party is the failure to develop a policy and leadership problems such as the multiple changes in a short period of time. However for a political party to win an election they will need to successfully identify the weaknesses of the existing government and create a better and more believable policy or to counteract policy issues as an electoral factor . Many political parties developed a strategy to try and achieve this. In 2013 the Australian Labor Party were the head of government. Therefore the Liberal party had to focus on the policies that the Australian Labor party created and offered to develop a better