Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has decided to delay his wedding to fiancée Jodie Haydon.
While insiders predicted the PM, 61, would use his impending nuptials to win over undecided voters at the next federal election, it’s been revealed Mr Albanese will instead be dedicating his full attention to winning a second term.
The decision could come as a shock to those close to the couple as Ms Haydon has an elderly grandmother, 94, who is very eager to attend the event.
However, it’s understood Mr Albanese’s wedding to Ms Haydon, 45, was deemed too much of a distraction amid growing concerns of a close-call election, the Sydney Morning Herald.
They were also reportedly concerned about facing increased scrutiny so close to an election and worried Mr Albanese wouldn’t be able to fit their desired festivities into his schedule.
It’s likely the couple, who were engaged in February, will instead marry in the latter half of 2025.
Australia’s next federal election must be held by May, 2025, but Mr Albanese has repeatedly denied suggestions he would call an early election before the end of this year.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (right) has decided to delay his wedding to fiancée Jodie Haydon (left)
It’s understood Mr Albanese’s (pictured) wedding to Ms Haydon was deemed too much of a distraction amid growing concerns of a close-call election
The pair announced their engagement with a loved-up selfie on social media on February 15 – a day after Mr Albanese had proposed on Valentine’s Day.
‘She said yes,’ he wrote.
It is the first time an Australian Prime Minister has become engaged while in office.
In a joint statement, the couple said: ‘We are thrilled and excited to share this news and look forward to spending the rest of our lives together.’
‘We are so lucky to have found each other.’
The pair met in 2020 at a business dinner in Melbourne, when Mr Albanese asked the crowd if there were any fellow South Sydney fans present and finance worker Ms Haydon, who lives in his Grayndler electorate, shouted: ‘Up the Rabbitohs’.
He later introduced himself and they decided to go for a drink when they were back in Sydney.
He wooed his new girlfriend with a night out at the Young Henrys brewery in Newtown.
‘We had what I thought would just be a drink at Young Henrys in Newtown, and we got on really well. That’s how it started,’ he told Women’s Weekly.
Meeting Ms Haydon and finding love again is a far cry from New Years Day in 2019, when Mr Albanese’s wife Carmel Tebbutt, who he had been with him for 30 years and married to him for 19, told him she was leaving him.
‘It was a shock to me. We had had a lovely night together the night before – New Year’s Eve – so there was no warning at all,’ Mr Albanese said.
After going to Europe alone to catch up with friends, do some sightseeing and think about his marriage breakdown, he decided to come to terms with his ex-wife’s decision.
‘I was trying to understand what had happened with my relationship and it made me recognise that what I needed to do was not try to understand it but accept it,’ he said.
‘It happened, it was her decision, there was nothing I could do about it.’
Mr Albanese returned to Australia feeling renewed and worked hard on the 2019 election – which Labor’s Bill Shorten lost.
The Prime Minister decided ‘straight away’ that he would run for the nation’s top job.
Mr Albanese said he also knew he was certain about something else: that he wouldn’t find another woman because at that time Carmel was still very much ‘the love of my life’.
Australia’s next federal election must be held by May, 2025 (pictured, Opposition leader Peter Dutton)
Last year, Mr Albanese said of meeting ms Haydon: ‘It has been really important.
‘I have a very complex job that involves a lot of pressure and having someone to spend your life with, your personal life with, along with my son, is fantastic.’
‘I’ve been very lucky to find someone to spend time with and to have a terrific relationship with.’
