But Albanese wields a dead hand in the face of surging inflation

Labor likes to regularly remind voters that it inherited sky-high inflation from the Coalition and has seen a significant fall in the CPI. This is true. This is also history. It now has its own rise in inflation, resulting from deep and long-term policy failures.

Fixing the energy and housing problem is difficult, and the interest groups trying to prevent it from being fixed are powerful. They include many people within the Labor Party. But yesterday’s inflation figures should ring alarm bells that the complacency and lack of reform ambition that has characterized Labor since its massive election victory (in fact since 2022) must be abandoned as soon as possible, otherwise the economy and Labour’s seemingly unassailable political position will be in real trouble.