Australia’s next prime minister, Anthony Albanese, who declared himself a member of the public, survived a serious car accident and resurrected the Labor Party to end nine years of Conservative rule.

“I thought this was the end,” Albanese told local radio, describing his hospitalization after an all-terrain vehicle used by a teenager crashed into his car last year.

At the time, the Labor Party was far behind Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s Conservatives in the polls.

Nicknamed “Albo” by his supporters, Albanese said his near-death experience gave him the energy to change everything.

At 59, he can say he has recovered on all fronts: he regained his health, consolidated his authority as party leader, and lost 18kg. His suits got smarter and he swapped his metal glasses for a black Mad Men model.

But above all, he succeeded in bringing the Labor Party back to power, thanks to the government’s criticism of the management of the covid-19 outbreak and the catastrophic fires of summer 2020.

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Albanese was first elected to parliament in 1996. In her first speech she thanked her mother, Maryanne Ellery, for raising her in difficult economic conditions in Sydney social housing.

A member of the Labor Party since high school, Albanese was the first member of his family to go to college. The employee says his background—he says—shapes his worldview.

“The fact that someone with my background can stand before you today hoping to be elected prime minister says a lot about this country,” he said early Saturday, voice muffled by emotion.

Albanese says that her Catholic mother decided to take her father’s surname even though she was not married or living together.

“I grew up thinking you were dead,” she said. “That says a lot about the oppression of women.”

to call dad

After the birth of their only child, Nathan, in 2000, Albanese decided to call his own father, Carlo Albanese, with the help of an old photograph. She met him in her hometown of Barletra, Italy, and reconciled with him before her death in 2014.

“It was nice to meet you at our last meeting,” the politician told ABC.

Labor has been head of government for just five years since Albanese was first elected to Parliament.

He served as Minister of Transport in Kevin Rudd’s government in 2007, and subsequently under Prime Minister Julia Gillard. And after the Labor Party’s defeat in the 2019 elections, he became the leader of the opposition.

During the campaign, when journalists were asked about the unemployment rate and interest rate of the Central Bank, he could not answer. A mistake he knows how to exploit: “Everyone will make a mistake in life. The real question is whether you learn from it. This government keeps repeating the same mistakes.”