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For weeks, Australians have been waiting to find out what date they will be heading to the polls.
And
for weeks, unsuspecting Australians have been subjected to countless
political advertisements spruiking various government infrastructure
packages, tax cut promises and school makeovers.
Speculation had been rife that Prime Minister Scott Morrison would visit the Governor-General on Sunday, to dissolve Parliament and call a general election.
But Sunday came and went, effectively taking the prospect of a May 11 election with it.
The Opposition has accused the Government of deliberately delaying the poll so it can dip into the public purse for its advertising campaigns.
But the Government insists all of its spending has been above-board.
So what are the rules governing advertisements during an election campaign?
Caretaker mode = advertising freeze
Once the election is officially called, the government is forced into caretaker mode.
The Department of Finance then reviews all the advertising campaigns, before recommending which ones should be continued or deferred.
If the Government wishes to continue any campaigns, the Special Minister of State needs to secure approval from the Opposition.
And that means any campaigns that seek to highlight government achievements or address contentious issues are discontinued, to avoid a particular party gaining advantage on the back of taxpayer funds.
So will we see any government ads?
The short answer is yes.While you will no longer be watching, seeing or hearing advertising campaigns heralding government projects or policies, you will still see campaigns that are of an operational nature, like Defence Force recruiting or public health advertisements.
What about social media?
Election campaigns — and life — were much simpler in the days prior to social media platforms.When a government is in caretaker mode, there are very strict rules about what its agencies can post on platforms like Facebook and Twitter.
They must check the wording of any posts to ensure they cannot be interpreted as promoting a Government policy.
They are also required to review the settings of their platform to ensure third parties do not post political content on their sites.
To keep it simple, some agencies disable comments on Facebook, or post a notice that they are operating in a caretaker period and cannot respond to political statements.
And the rules are not just for agencies, either.
Individual public servants need to be careful, too.
They are expected to ensure any social media posts do not compromise their ability to perform their duties in an impartial way.
How much have these ads cost?
Here's where it gets slightly more complicated.Labor has pointed to tender contracts which indicate the Government has spent almost $137 million of taxpayer funds on advertising and market research since the beginning of the year.
That's more than $1 million a day.
But the government has dismissed those figures, saying tender contracts are not indicative of total spend, and the number is likely to be less than that.
So far, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg and Prime Minister Scott Morrison have all refused to answer questions about the advertising spend.
So it's unknown whether we'll be provided with the exact figure in Senate Estimates this week, or if we'll be left in the dark ahead of casting our votes.
When will the election be called?
At this stage the likely dates are May 18 or May 25, although the Australian Electoral Commission has indicated the later date will make life slightly harder for them, as they will have less time to meet the constitutional deadline.For his part, the Prime Minister continues to hold firm on his statement that the election will be called in April, and held in May.
The last possible date he can call the election, if it's to be held on May 25, is April 22.
So if you're annoyed by political advertising, you're in for a long week or two.
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