Key Points

Albanese visited the Governor-General, the representative of the British monarch in Australia, in the morning and asked her to initiate the formal process for an election to be held on May 3 to elect members of the 48th Parliament of Australia.

It sets up a five-week campaign that will pit Albanese and his governing Labor Party against Opposition leader Peter Dutton's Coalition of the Liberal and National parties, Xinhua news agency reported.

Speaking at a press conference at Parliament House after visiting Mostyn, Albanese said that voters would "choose the way forward" at the election.

"We cannot decide the challenges that we will face, but we can determine how we respond," he added.

"Your vote has never been more important," he said.

Opinion polls have indicated that the election is set to be a tight contest.

The 62-year-old's Albanese-led government released its annual budget earlier this week, courting votes with surprise tax cuts and a raft of other sweeteners.

Conservative leader Peter Dutton, 54, has pilloried Albanese, accusing him of "weak" leadership and stoking inflation through government largesse.

Dutton's signature policy is a $200 billion scheme to construct seven industrial-scale nuclear reactors, putting the brakes on the growth of renewable energy.

Polling shows economic concerns and the high cost of housing will dominate the contest.

Although inflation has eased under Albanese -- from 7.8 per cent in 2022 to 2.4 per cent in December -- many households are still struggling with high food, fuel, and power prices.

Major cities Sydney and Melbourne now rank among the 10 least-affordable housing markets in the world, according to the annual Demographia affordability index.

Australian politics has long been dominated by Albanese's left-leaning Labor Party and Dutton's right-leaning Liberals.

But growing disenchantment among voters has emboldened independents pushing for greater transparency and climate progress.

Polls suggest 10 or more unaligned crossbenchers could hold the balance of power -- making a rare minority government a distinct possibility.

The two major parties largely agree on defence and national security, committing Australia to an increasingly close military alliance with the US.

But they have differed over China in the past.

Albanese has upped engagement with key trading partner China and made a breakthrough trip to Beijing in 2023, the first Australian leader to visit in seven years.

The previous Conservative government was highly critical of China, igniting a trade war that cost Australia billions of dollars until subsiding late last year.

- IANS