I believe it should be three totally new faces for a fresh start. There is a lot of talent on Labor’s side. Claire O’Neill is highly qualified and lovely to look at. Jim Chalmers is another pretty face with a well qualified cv as Dr Chalmers. There are many others. To go up against ScoMo and his disorganised and unengaged ghosts will take strength to withstand the usual abuse from LNP. Albo may have been promised this for a long time but I suspect it is a mistake not to dip into the huge talent pool and come up with three fresh young faces.

Senate results so far

https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/federal/2019/results/senate

I would love to see Anthony Albanese be successful. He is going to have a hard road to travel after all the abuse the Labour Party have had in the past from the Murdoch press and Clive Palmer, not to mention that two faced git Scott Morrison.  

Shorten said the task of rebuilding the party would be "one for the next leader of the Labor Party"..and in my opinion that will take some time. I am sure Albanese is a nice human being but not leader material. Actually I don’t think we have any “leaders” in either party. I do like Tanya P a lot..but she knows her limits and I am glad she’s out of the running. 

The ALP did not get it “wrong”..the truth is, they did not get it right in the first place. Shorten revealed too much, too soon..they had no concrete plans (not to say the LNP is any better). Hinting that you will make people poorer before you are even elected, scared off even many of the rusted on Labor voters, when there was no need to. His plans for franking credits and negative gearing does not affect most people..so why bring it up before an election?  With hindsight, perhaps he wishes he had waited.. then only those who were affected would have been up in arms.

Labor were up front with the electorate about what they planned to do. The LNP were not open about their plans so we are now left with uncertainty. My hunch is they will raise the gst very soon to 15% which will affect most retirees and pensioners much more than franking credits and negative gearing would have. What is most disappointing is that so many people did not seem to care about the danger of climate change. We have only a few years left before we reach the tipping point and face extinction along with most life on this planet. I know 3 couples who stood to lose a lot from the franking credit policy but they voted Labor regardless because they care about the future for their children, grand children and the planet. 

It’s disheartening to see conservatives still garbaging Labor and potential leaders. You won the election, chose your man to lead us in spite of his brandishing a big lump of coal in parliament and supporting Adani (and Clive Palmer’s big coal interests). Let Labor choose their leader unhindered to get on with providing decent opposition. If Albanese is the new leader that’s ok because he has a strong sense of social justice which will be sorely needed to argue against injustice, greed and social division which may worsen over the next 3 years.

Although Labor lost the "unlosable" election because of policies and maybe because of some personalities, the main point that was indisputable was that they gave a united front. The last thing Labor needs right now is infighting and as Albanese was the rank and file choice, although overruled by the parliamentary party, and he wants to stand then there should be no other candidate. At least then, Labor's rebuilding will start with on outward show of solidarity.

There have been some rumblings about Albanese being too far left but Labor is a consensus party and the leader is required to adopt the policies of the party. So, having a leader with ideas that are too far one way or the other are an irrelevance. Albanese has carefully cultivated the media over the years, is popular with all sides of the political spectrum and presents an acceptable choice as Labor leader IMHO.

Oh well, onwards and upwards for some ... meanwhile, back to basics for others.

Albo is a popular bloke. But seeing as Labor is in tatters - only time will tell if he can bring it back to where it once was.

Representing the worker, the battler and of course the pensioner. Seemed to me that this hasnt been evident for a long time.

Not since they fell under the influence of these Greens who are really on the nose here - they lost many of their previous supporters.

Even CMFEU Union men were handing out how to vote Liberal cards in Qld reported on TV.

Can Albo fix it is the question on most lips. Not unless he dumps the Greens

I think the LNP will be delighted if Albos wins Labor's top job as its more of the same old same old.

Chalmers was reportedly the architect of the Franking Credit policy that saw self funded retirees turn on Labor in droves

I would be interested to see who else they have got, a fresh face (and policies) is needed not recycled wannabes

There have been a couple of women's names thrown up. Regardless of who they choose as leader, I think Penny Wong has had far too much imput. Penny and her mates at the CFMMEU, which should be deregulated, must be sent packing. 

Very interesting article today by Joe Hildebrand, on News.com.au website, with 10 reasons why Labor lost the supposedly unlosable election.

Its probably the best and accurate 10 reasons I have heard yet on why most, including himself, got the result so wrong

Posted 12 minutes ago

Victorian MP Richard Marles is likely to become the Labor deputy leader.

By the time of the next election in 2022, Labor will have been in Opposition for 23 of the last 29 years. Miserable.

Labor, fluffed around with restoring penalty rates and wage subsidies to childcare workers, but it completely and utterly ignored what voters wanted to hear and that is how to grow the economy faster. A large majority of voters judge the Coalition to be better managers of the economy than Labor. This is despite the facts of GDP so that's a revelation.

Climate change isn’t the number one issue facing Australians, although the media did their best to force feed voters. To most Aussies climate change is happening but we are not a big polluter, so it can go on the back burner. I don’t agree with that myself because if all small polluters were put in the one basket, it would make up a heavy load. Anyway, it did Labor no good carrying on about climate change and electric cars, middle Australia didn’t want to hear this at this point.

Some of the policies Labor took to the election especially around negative gearing and franking credits were the right policy to help bring the budget back to balance, but, they pushed it too soon and were too aggressive and too complex. Shorten set himself up for a fight with the baby boomers and he got it.

Bill Shorten was the wrong leader. Tough to say but the public see him as boring and lacked personality. On the other hand and IMHO, it’s not that voters love Scott Morrison, they just can’t stand Shorten. If the ALP does not pull up its socks and work hard to change their image, then they can forget about winning the next election.

the sooner Di Natali is gone the better too!!