Why the PM’s Lodge wedding passes the pub test

From the moment Anthony Albanese and Jodie Haydon announced their engagement in February 2024, Australians have been in uncharted territory.

Albanese and Haydon are now officially official, having tied the knot at the prime minister’s residence, The Lodge, on Saturday while surrounded by family and friends on a windy late spring day in Canberra.

Albanese was already the first divorcee to be elected to Australia’s highest political office. Until Saturday, an Australian head of government had never got hitched while in office.

These might seem like minor details in Australia in 2025, but they are not.

It was only 15 years ago that then-prime minister Julia Gillard moved into The Lodge, unmarried, with first bloke Tim Mathieson. Then-opposition leader Tony Abbott thought nothing of demanding that Gillard make an “honest woman” of herself, politically speaking, over the carbon price.

Similarly, during the 2022 election campaign, then-prime minister Scott Morrison pointedly shared images of himself and wife Jenny on social media in which his wedding ring was prominently on display.

The images infuriated Labor campaigners, who believed they sent a deliberate message to faith communities: Morrison was a married family man and Albanese, separated from first wife Carmel Tebbutt a couple of years earlier, was not.

It didn’t stop Albanese being elected prime minister, perhaps because about one in three marriages end in divorce, but the slight was not forgotten.

So in 2025, do Australians even care that the prime minister is getting hitched?

When the couple first announced they were getting married, the Labor government was still licking its wounds after the defeat of the Voice to parliament proposal, and Albanese’s decision to break a promise and change the stage 3 tax cuts had landed (mostly) pretty well, but the Peter Dutton-led opposition was riding high and increasingly confident it would be a one-term opposition.

What a difference a couple of years can make. Albanese won a historic victory, Dutton lost not just the election but his own seat, and the Voice to parliament is – for most Australians – not much more than a distant memory.

The caravan moved on.

Similarly, most Australians – whatever their political persuasion – will wish the prime minister and his new bride the best and then move on.

Albanese has been careful not to make a big deal about the big day, keeping news of the event under wraps, while his office, citing federal police advice, has for the past week or so asked media organisations (including this one) to adhere to a blackout on news of the event ahead of time.

Almost certainly, a critic or three will raise questions about the cost of the ceremony to taxpayers and whether it was appropriate to be hosted at The Lodge.

It’s a reasonable question to ask, but the PM and his team are not fools.

While it might have been neater to get married at the Marrickville Bowling Club, or more spectacular to get married on the lawns of the prime minister’s Sydney Harbour residence, Kirribilli, The Lodge was likely chosen because of its high brick walls, ample security and because it is a relatively low-key venue.

The prime minister’s office, too, was ready with answers to questions about the cost to taxpayers for the relatively small affair.

Most Australians will be pleased for Albanese and Haydon and wish them well, and that is about as far as it will go, with summer holidays beckoning and the political year coming to an end.

It’s unlikely the wedding will figure in voters’ thinking in two-and-a-bit years’ time, when Australians next get to vote in a federal election.

Instead, and as always, voters will assess what Albanese has done for them while in office – and deliver their judgment accordingly.

Albanese was well aware this wedding had to pass the pub test, and by keeping it low-key, the Albanese-Haydon union has passed.

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