“Hi, I’m Dan”, Victoria’s Opposition Leader Daniel Andrews tells voters in Labor’s first major election-year TV advertisement.
Dan? Not Daniel?
For nearly four years, the Coalition has tried to exploit the Labor Party leader’s lack of public recognition, calling him “Andrew Daniels” and “Daniel who?”
But it seems the man who wants to be Victoria’s next Premier has undergone a makeover in recent weeks, adopting the more matey “Dan”.
The ALP is testdriving “Dan” and if the public warms to him, the party may order a new batch of posters.
Like aspiring political leaders before him – think of our Prime Minister and his ever-present daughters – Dan has recruited his family into the campaign, with the latest TV pitch featuring his daughter Grace.
In the ad, playing across primetime TV, Dan is standing by the Yarra, accompanied by an uplifting piano tune, and is shown pushing his smiling children on swings at the local playground. He tells voters that Grace asked why people were saying nasty things about dad on TV.
“It is like school, sometime kids say nasty things about you to take attention away from themselves,” Dan tells us.
It’s all part of a broader push to soften his image. While posters stamp the alternative leader of Victoria as Daniel, he wants you to get to know him as Dan, the family man.
One Labor MP suggested that “Dan” is friendlier than “Daniel”.
Strategists have used research to establish that Dan needs a story, one removed from the world of politics, where he has spent the majority of his adult life.
Polls have Andrews trailing the Premier in the preferred leader stakes, despite Labor’s overall lead.
Party insiders and colleagues laugh off suggestions there has been a deliberate re-naming of the leader, saying he has always been known as Dan to close friends and colleagues.
Others say there’s always been a push to call the Opposition Leader Dan, but it just hasn’t taken root.
The next challenge is to loosen Dan up on the hustings for the cameras.
Premier Denis Napthine has shown his willingness to embrace a stunt, be it sitting on a toy truck at a sod-turning for the new Monash Children’s Hospital, wobbling on a scooter down Frankston’s main street, or throwing a discus when he clearly has no ability.
Now its Dan’s turn to step into the spotlight and turn on a little more electoral charisma.
