Anthony Albanese‘s ex-wife Carmel Tebbutt has continued to support her former husband during his election campaign by handing out flyers for one of his frontbenchers at a polling booth.
Ms Tebbutt wore matching blue pants and a jacket along with a red scarf- the Labor Party’s signature colour – outside Carlton South Public School, in Sydney‘s south, on Saturday.
The former deputy premier of NSW cradled a stack of flyers endorsing ALP candidate Linda Burney in the seat of Barton – which is next door to Mr Albanese’s seat of Grayndler in Sydney’s inner-south – while she mingled with voters.
Her show of support came as her former husband spent the morning with his new partner Jodie Haydon at a polling booth at Carnegie Primary School in Melbourne.
Anthony Albanese ‘s ex-wife Carmel Tebbutt has continued to support her former husband during his election campaign by handing out flyers at a polling booth
Ms Tebbutt wore matching blue pants and a jacket along with a red scarf – the Labor Party’s signature colour – outside Carlton South Public School, in Sydney’s south, on Saturday
Her show of support came as her former husband spent the morning with his new partner Jodie Haydon at a polling booth at Carnegie Primary School in Melbourne
Mr Albanese was in town to support Higgins Labor candidate Michelle Ananda-Rajah.
Excited supporters crowded around him with several of them offering their pet dogs for him to hold.
The Opposition leader smiled ear to ear as he held an adorable cavoodle in his arms while a gushing Ms Haydon patted the animal.
Ms Tebbutt has been supporting Mr Albanese throughout his election campaign, even minding her former husband’s beloved cavoodle Toto, three years after she suddenly walked out on their marriage.
The 58-year-old was seen taking Toto for a run near her home in Sydney‘s inner-west on Tuesday, while the Labor leader was on the hustings in Perth.
Asked if Ms Tebbutt supported his bid to lead the country, Mr Albanese told Daily Mail Australia, ‘Absolutely she does’.
‘She’s out there campaigning for me to be prime minister,’ he said.
A fit-looking Ms Tebbutt took Toto for a jog around the neighbourhood on Tuesday morning before heading back home.
Mr Albanese and Ms Tebbutt have a son Nathan who turned 21 last December and stays at both their houses. The pair jointly organised his birthday party.
The former deputy premier of NSW cradled a stack of flyers endorsing Barton ALP candidate Linda Burney while she mingled with voters
Mr Albanese hit it off with supporters with several of them eager for him to hold their pet dogs
The Opposition leader was in Melbourne to throw his support behind Higgins candidate Michelle Ananda-Rajah
‘It was a really good night, ‘Mr Albanese said. ‘We both spoke at the 21st. It was a good occasion.
‘I have a fantastic relationship with my son, which is great. He’s terrific.’
Ms Tebbutt, who is CEO of the NSW Mental Health Co-ordinating Council, was providing assistance to Mr Albanese as he continued to criss-cross the nation ahead of Saturday’s poll.
Mr Albanese said their relationship was ‘fine’.
‘She’s looking after Toto at the moment,’ he Albanese said. ‘She’s been helping in very practical ways. We talk regularly about what Nathan’s doing, or the dog.’
Mr Albanese has spoken of being blindsided when Ms Tebbutt ended their 19-year marriage – and 30-year relationship – on New Year’s Day in 2019.
‘It was a life-changing thing because it wasn’t expected,’ the 59-year-old told Daily Mail Australia last Friday.
Mr Albanese has spoken of being blindsided when Ms Tebbutt ended their 30-year relationship on New Year’s Day in 2019. ‘It was a life changing thing because it wasn’t expected,’ the 59-year-old Daily Mail Australia last Friday
Ms Tebbutt, who is CEO of the NSW Mental Health Co-ordinating Council, was providing practical assistance to Mr Albanese ahead of Saturday’s poll. ‘She’s looking after Toto at the moment,’ Mr Albanese said
Toto has featured regularly during the election campaign, and kept Mr Albanese company when he was trapped in his inner-west home after contracting Covid. Mr Albanese shared a snap on social media of himself with Toto and campaign draft speeches in April
‘So it was a shock and I found it quite personally traumatic because I didn’t understand it.
‘What I had to come to terms with was I needed to accept it rather than understand it. And I did that. Real life is complex and things get thrown at you.’
Mr Albanese is now in a relationship with 43-year-old First State Super finance worker Jodie Haydon, who he met more than 12 months after Ms Tebbutt left him.
The couple appears relaxed and happy together but Albanese won’t use words like love publicly.
‘I think successful personal relationships are ones that are personal,’ he said. ‘But I consider myself to be very fortunate to be in a relationship with Jodie.
‘She works fulltime but she’s been able to spend time on the campaign trail and that’s been very good for me, as has Nathan spent time on the campaign trail as well.’
Anthony Albanese’s ex-wife Carmel Tebbutt is actively campaigning for him to become prime minister, three years after she suddenly walked out on their 19-year marriage. She is pictured walking his cavoodle Toto near her home in Sydney’s inner-west on Tuesday
Mr Albanese is now in a relationship with 43-year-old First State Super finance worker Jodie Haydon, who he met at a conference in Melbourne in March 2020. The couple, pictured in April, appears relaxed and happy together but Albanese won’t use words like love publicly
Mr Albanese and Ms Tebbutt met in Young Labor during the late 1980s.
Ms Tebbutt was the state’s first female deputy premier and held the position under Nathan Rees and Kristina Keneally from 2008 to 2011.
She was a Member of the Upper House from 1998 until being elected the Member for Marrickville in 2005 and retired from politics in 2015.
Mr Albanese has said he ‘didn’t see it coming’ when his wife told him their marriage was over four months before the 2019 election in which Scott Morrison beat then Opposition Leader Bill Shorten.
‘I didn’t see it as ending,’ he told Karl Stefanovic in March this year. ‘We’d spent Christmas together, I thought we would end our life together. That was the vision that I had.’
Asked if Ms Tebbutt supported his bid to lead the country, Mr Albanese told Daily Mail Australia, ‘Absolutely she does’. ‘She’s out there campaigning for me to be prime minister,’ he said
Nathan had just completed his HSC and turned 18 when the split occurred.
‘It’s made for a difficult period,’ Mr Albanese told the ABC. ‘I certainly will always, always remember New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day for that momentous event in my life.’
‘It was a really tough period and that’s the truth and I’ve acknowledged that.
‘I think part of going through a difficult period and coming out the other end is acknowledging that you’re going through it. I found it very tough. The relationship was 30 years old.’
In March 2019 Mr Albanese took three weeks off work and visited London and Portugal – a trip he credited with helping him heal after the break-up.
‘I needed to stop trying to understand it and just accept it and accept that it was a decision that had been made and she was moving on with her life in a different direction and I needed to do the same,’ he has said.
Mr Albanese and Ms Tebbutt have a son Nathan who turned 21 last December and shares time between their homes. ‘I have a fantastic relationship with my son, which is great,’ Mr Albanese said. ‘He’s terrific.’ Father and son are pictured together on May 1
‘You can tie yourself in knots trying to understand someone else’s decisions and thought processes.’
In March 2020, Mr Albanese attended a dinner event in Melbourne where he met his future partner Ms Haydon.
The avid South Sydney Rabbitohs supporter took to the stage and addressed the guests. ‘I said there’s always a random Souths supporter in the room and she yelled out, ‘Yep, me. Go the rabbits’,’ he said.
Mr Albanese said he was making his way around the function introducing himself to other guests when he met Ms Haydon.
‘It turned out she lives in the inner-west of Sydney and we had a fair bit in common,’ he said.
‘I think successful personal relationships are ones that are personal,’ Mr Albanese said of his relationship with Ms Haydon. ‘ ‘She works fulltime but she’s been able to spend time on the campaign trail and that’s been very good for me.’ The couple is pictured in Brisbane last week
‘She suggested we might like to catch up so we caught up for a beer basically and we found that we got on pretty well.
‘We caught up for a beer a few weeks later and things went from there. It’s nice to have someone to spend time with.’
Mr Albanese told The Australian Women’s Weekly in February he was ‘protective’ of his relationship with Ms Haydon.
‘I’m the one running for public office,’ he said.
‘Jodie has to put up with… if we’re out having dinner, put up with people coming up and photos and all of that. But it’s part of the deal, it’s part of who I am.’
The Labor leader uploaded a photo to Twitter of Toto on April 29 after he left Covid isolation and while doing a live cross with ABC. It was swiftly deleted as it showed Mr Albanese’s mobile phone number on a tag on Toto’s collar
Toto has featured regularly during the election campaign, and kept Mr Albanese company while he was trapped in his inner-west home after contracting Covid-19.
Mr Albanese shared a snap on social media of himself with Toto in April.
‘Working on my campaign launch speech with my iso companion, Toto. #isoday2’ he tweeted from the kitchen table of his home.
Toto was clad in a bandanna with the words ‘ALBO’ written across it.
The day he was allowed to return to campaigning Mr Albanese shared another image of Toto watching on as he did live television interviews with the ABC and Today.
That picture had to be swiftly deleted because it clearly showed the prime ministerial hopeful’s mobile phone number on a tag on Toto’s collar.
Mr Albanese and Ms Tebbutt met in Young Labor during the late 1980s. Ms Tebbutt was the state’s first female deputy premier and held the position under Nathan Rees and Kristina Keneally from 2008 to 2011