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AI and misinformation in crosshairs of Labor's review of its landslide election win
Labor will use a review of its historic 3 May election victory to better prepare for cyber misinformation and artificial intelligence threats in future federal campaigns.
The party's national executive has appointed four people to lead a months-long review into the campaign, despite Labor winning 94 seats in the lower house and securing its biggest victory in decades.
Submissions from party members will be called for on Wednesday.
The former Victorian state secretary Chris Ford, Australian Services Union national secretary, Emeline Gaske, former Western Australian Labor official and 2022 election review co-chair, Lenda Oshalem, and former Albanese government staffer and consultant Moksha Watts will run the process.
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Due to be completed by the end of the year, its terms of reference include consideration of key Labor policies, communication and messaging, resonance with voter groups around the country, and pushback on attacks from Peter Dutton and the Coalition during the five-week campaign.
It will look at AI and other emerging risks, including misinformation, fragmentation of the electorate, cyber threats, and polling booth safety.
The review is also likely to guide Labor's contributions to future debates about electoral reform in parliament.
The review team is expected to examine trends in voting behaviour across local, state and national levels, as well as the trend toward increasing early voting, preference flows and demographic shifts around the country.
The ALP national secretary, Paul Erickson, the architect of Labor's victory, told Guardian Australia the formal process would help the Albanese government better prepare for the next poll, due sometime around May 2028.
'Labor's 2022 and 2025 campaigns benefited enormously from the work of our two previous campaign reviews,' he said.
'The challenges we face in three years' time will be different, and we will use this review to inform how we engage with the Australian public.'
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Dutton's campaign tanked with voters, reducing the Liberals and Nationals to just 43 seats. The former opposition leader lost his own Queensland electorate of Dickson and the Coalition will likely need at least two more terms in opposition to be competitive at an election.
Labor's review of its 2022 victory was led by Oshalem and former minister Greg Combet. It made 27 recommendations, including calling for a key focus on delivery of election commitments, reconnecting with working-class voters and countering the Greens.
Parliament's joint standing committee on electoral matters holds an inquiry into every federal election, and considers submissions from the major parties, members of the public and organisations including the Australian Electoral Commission.
The Labor MP Jerome Laxale, who represents the Sydney seat of Bennelong, is set to chair the committee in the new parliament.
The opposition leader, Sussan Ley, has commissioned two postmortem reviews to consider the Coalition's loss. The Liberal elders Nick Minchin and Pru Goward are assessing the Dutton defeat and a second review is considering the Liberal party's future structure.
