Anthony Albanese Set to Be Australia’s New PM After Vote

Australia is set to have a new prime minister with Labor leader Anthony Albanese ending nearly a decade of conservative rule Down Under. While votes are still being counted, Australia’s Labor Party has won 72 seats in the 151-seat House of Representatives, the ABC reported, and is within striking distance of achieving a 76-seat majority. It is expected that if the party falls short of 76 seats they will still be able to form a minority government with the support of Independent members. Prime Minister Scott Morrison said he had called Albanese to conceded defeat. “Tonight I have spoken to the leader of the opposition and the incoming prime minister Anthony Albanese, and I’ve congratulated him on his election victory,” he said in a televised speech. Morrison’s Liberal government has become increasingly unpopular with voters who have attacked its bungled COVID vaccine rollout and his decision in 2019 to take a family vacation to Hawaii, while Australia burned from one of its worst ever bushfire seasons. Albanese fought back tears as he gave a victory speech at the Canterbury Hurlstone Park RSL, where he appeared with his partner Jodie Haydon. “Tonight the Australian people have voted for change. I am humbled by this victory. And I am honored to be given the opportunity to serve as the 31st Prime Minister of Australia,” he said. In one of the election’s biggest shocks Treasurer Josh Frydenberg looks set to lose his blue-ribbon seat of Kooyong after a 10 percent swing to Independent Monique Ryan, a former director of neurology at the Royal Children’s Hospital.