Hawke won the seat at the 1980 Election and was appointed as Shadow Minister for Industrial Relations, Employment and Youth Affairs by Opposition Leader Bill Hayden.

At the February 1983 Funeral of former Labor Prime Minister Frank Forde, Hayden was persuaded by colleagues to step down, leaving the way open for Hawke to assume leadership of the ALP.

[1] Long serving Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser announced an election that same day, with a date set for 5 March.

Hawke again led the party to the 1984 Election and was returned with a reduced majority, in an expanded House of Representatives: with Labor taking 82 seats to the Coalition's 66.

Rather than immediately initiating extensive reform programmes, Hawke announced that Fraser's pre-election concealment of the budget deficit meant that many of Labor's election commitments would have to be deferred.

[3] Hawke convinced the Labor caucus to divide the ministry into two tiers, with only the most important Ministers attending regular cabinet meetings.

[4] Hawke's enthusiasms were cigars, horse racing and sport whereas Keating preferred classical architecture, Mahler symphonies, and antique collecting.

While the impetus for economic reform largely came from Keating, Hawke took the role of reaching consensus and providing political guidance on what was electorally feasible and how best to sell it to the public.

The Socialist Left faction, as well as prominent Labor figure Barry Jones, offered severe criticism of a number of government decisions.

From 1983 to 1996, improved service provision, higher government transfer payments, and changes to the taxation system "either entirely offset, or at the very least substantially moderated, the increase in inequality of market incomes over the period".

We are thus talking about very major changes in the amount of assistance available to low-income working families with children.The Hawke government carried out a series of other measures during its time in office.

Upon taking office in 1983, a Community Employment Program was set up, providing a large number of work experience opportunities in the public and non-profit sectors.

Together with smaller programs such as the Community Youth Support scheme (CYSS), this played a major role in both alleviating and reversing the effects of the 1982 economic recession.

Some sole parents and unemployed persons benefited from other measures designed to reduce barriers to workforce participation, deal with their housing costs, and increase their incomes.

The rates of payment were also index-linked to inflation, while additional benchmarks were fixed to help achieve and maintain relativities with community earnings levels.

Other important social security initiatives introduced for the unemployed included the introduction of the New Employment Entry payment, while some administrative obstacles and income tests were relaxed.

Treasurer Keating was advised to tighten monetary policy, but, with forthcoming by-elections and a state election in New South Wales, the government opted to delay the potentially unpopular move, which would raise interest rates.

To court the green vote, environment minister Graham Richardson had placed restrictions on mining and logging which had a further detrimental effect on already rising unemployment.

David Barnett wrote in 1997 that Labor fiscal policy at this time "self-defeating as "with one hand it was imposing a monetary squeeze, while on the other it was encouraging spending with wage increases and tax cuts".

He said the Hawke-Keating government had increased the severity of the recession by initially encouraging the economy to boom post-stock crash as elections were approaching, which necessitated higher interest rates and tighter monetary policy than would otherwise have been necessary.

The new treasurer, John Kerin and deputy prime minister Brian Howe blamed Keating's 1990 economic policy for the poor state of the Australian economy.

[43] The government refused to fund the tall ship First Fleet Re-enactment Voyage which was staged on Sydney Harbour on Australia Day out of respect for Indigenous Australians.

[43] In 1985, the Hawke government officially returned ownership of Uluru (formerly known as Ayers Rock), with Governor General Sir Ninian Stephen presiding over the ceremony handing the title deeds to the local Pitjantjatjara people.

The transfer was done on the basis that a lease-back to the National Parks and Wildlife Service and joint management by members of the local Mutijulu community would be settled upon.

In addition, an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Capital Grants Program was established to construct and renovate school buildings in remote area communalities.

Bill Hayden was Minister for Foreign Affairs in the Hawke government from 1983, until his 1988 resignation from Parliament to take up the position of Governor General of Australia.

Hawke sought to raise Australia's international profile in the United States, the Soviet Union, China, Japan and south-east Asia and also took an interest in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.

Hawke unsuccessfully lobbied New Zealand Prime Minister David Lange to change the policy and the ANZUS Treaty faced its most serious test.

The Royal Australian Navy (RAN) provided vessels for the multi-national naval force, patrolling the Persian Gulf to enforce the UN sanctions.

[40] In 1990, a looming tight election saw a tough political operator, Graham Richardson, appointed Environment Minister, whose task it was to attract second-preference votes from the Australian Democrats and other environmental parties.