Australian WI: Malcolm Fraser Calls A Snap Election In 1982

What if in 1982, Coalition PM Malcolm Fraser called a snap election while Bill hayden was still Labor leader and the party was divided? Would he have won? If so, what would be the effects? What if?

EDIT: PoD being that Fraser doesn't get a back injury late 1982.
 
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What if in 1982, Coalition PM Malcolm Fraser called a snap election while Bill hayden was still Labor leader and the party was divided? Would he have won? If so, what would be the effects? What if?

Malcolm Fraser would win the snap election, but he would lose a few seats to the Labor Party. In fact, I'm not sure if you knew about this, but Malcolm Fraser was aware of Bill Hayden's ructioning of the Labor Party and would've called a snap election, if he hadn't suffered a back injury.

If you get rid of the back injury, then Malcolm Fraser would of definitely called the snap election to get another term.

Now, if he can patch the 1980s recession and try to avoid leadership challenges, is more difficult to determine.

I do not know much about Australian politics other than the two main parties.
 
Malcolm Fraser would win the snap election, but he would lose a few seats to the Labor Party. In fact, I'm not sure if you knew about this, but Malcolm Fraser was aware of Bill Hayden's ructioning of the Labor Party and would've called a snap election, if he hadn't suffered a back injury.

If you get rid of the back injury, then Malcolm Fraser would of definitely called the snap election to get another term.

Now, if he can patch the 1980s recession and try to avoid leadership challenges, is more difficult to determine.

I do not know much about Australian politics other than the two main parties.

Oh yes, I just forgot to add it has the PoD. I think Fraser would win narrowly, though given how close the TPP was in 1980, Labor would likely win that. Hawke would become leader, so maybe voters will opt for change at the next election. If not then when the 1990s come along and another recession, voters will probably opt for Labor and liberalisation, though there are lots of butterflies. I'm sure others know more than me on this and can help. Any ideas?
 
The year 1982 started with the retirement of former Prime Minister McMahan which saw Labor win his former seat of Lowe in a by-election. A month later the second largest state elected a labor government for the first time in 27 years. A month later the smallest state elected a Liberal government which may have given a morale boost to the Prime Minister but that meant that the decision to dam or not dam the Franklin river was now a headache for the Liberal Party. During this time the opinion polls had the Labor opposition ahead of the Liberal/National Country Government. The second half of the year saw the release of preliminary reports on the Royal Commission into the Painters and Dockers Union that implicated friends of the Federal Government in paying bribes to Unionists. Further to this it was revealed that companies headed by friends of the Government were stripping assets in what became known as Bottom of the Harbour Tax schemes to avoid paying tax. None of this was good news for the Government and the polls reflected this. While it is true that the Labor opposition changed leaders on the first day to the 1983 election campaign the reason was to guarantee a better chance of victory. In short I don't see a window of opportunity wide enough to guarantee Malcolm Fraser victory, I could actually see him having to answer questions about tax avoidance and corruption and trying to persuade the voters that his reasons for going early had nothing to do with heading off further revelations but in actual fact to avoid having to face Bob Hawke in 1983.
 
Fraser may well just hang on, but it would've been a very close run election. Personally though I think Hayden would have won, with a tiny majority 63-65 seats. Based on the Flinders by-election swing of 2%, a 2% swing to the ALP at a federal election would give Hayden about 65 seats.
Of course with a majority like that Hayden is going to want to call a snap election as soon as the polls go his way, as well as hoping Peacock-Howard back stab eachother like OTL.
But if the polls don't start to go Hayden's way, and it looks like Labor could lose power after only one term then its not unlikely that Hawke would launch a leadership challenge (and probably win). An earlier Rudd-Abbott parallel.
 
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