Labour party won the Australian general election last Saturday. Its leader, Anthony Albanese, was swiftly sworn in as prime minister.
This process would normally have taken several days, but Albanese was in a hurry to represent Australia at the Quad meeting in Tokyo.
What does a new leadership in Australia mean for Southeast Asia?
The win by Albanese, or Albo, will have a positive effect on the region.
Australia is an important regional player, but it has stopped embracing the role.
The consequences are visible in the Solomon Islands, where China signed at security agreement with the government of Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare.
It was not always the case with former prime minister Scott Morrison's Liberal-National coalition.
In geopolitics and neighbourly relations, the tenure of former prime minister Malcom Turnbull, also from the Liberal party, looks like it belonged to another era.
Turnbull invited Asean leaders to Sydney in 2018, and the outcome was the groundbreaking Sydney Declaration.
This was supposed to pave the way for an ambitious and transformative relationship.
It touched on all dimensions of bilateral policymaking, from security, with extensive coverage of ensuring an open and free Southeast Asia, to economic development, trade and people-to-people relationships.
It highlighted the importance of upholding the principles of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, but also laid the foundations for a prosperous common future through a multifaceted partnership.
While Australia was granted the status of strategic partner with Asean in 2014, it was only in November 2020 that it decided to hold annual leaders' meetings.
It is not that the Morrison government was absent from engaging Southeast Asia. After all, the region is key for the prosperity of Australia.
The document Why Asean Matters: Our Shared Prosperity explains the rationale: "Our A$101 billion two-way trade with Asean in 2020 exceeded our trade with Japan or the United States. Our two-way investment with Asean in 2020 was more than A$242 billion."
Australia is also playing a key role in post-pandemic recovery, and its policy, the Partnerships for Recovery: Australia's Covid-19 Development Response, is an important contribution to support the Asia-Pacific in building forward better.
This commitment envisions "A$623.2 million to support vaccine access and health security in the Pacific and Southeast Asia" on top of a A$500 million package announced by Morrison in 2020.
It is based on the premise that "our neighbours are particularly vulnerable to the health and economic impacts of the pandemic" and that "the growth, openness and stability of the Indo-Pacific, which has underpinned Australia's prosperity and security for decades, is at risk".
Yet, in all these years, the determination to engage Southeast Asia at the highest levels and with the highest ambition was missing or too weakened to provide outcomes that would have allowed a shift from words to real deeds.
That's why the election of Albanese could offer new momentum to boost ties. With the Labor victory, a renewal will come in international affairs.
Senator Penny Wong, an experienced member of parliament and formerly shadow ministry for foreign affairs, was nominated as Canberra's foreign minister.
No doubt, there will be a lot of changes in how Canberra lead its foreign affairs.
Albanese will not only increase resources for Southeast Asia, but he also promised to appoint a special representative for Asean.
This can be a game-changer. We can imagine how the Albanese administration will try to embrace its neighbours.
In a recent debate, Wong said: "Anthony Albanese and Labor have a plan, a responsible plan for a better future.
"A Pacific policy to ensure we secure our region. Stepping up in Southeast Asia to rebuild trust and meet challenges together, shared challenges together, including additional ODA (overseas development aid)".
Certainly the official Australian representation to Asean will be strengthened with more diplomats placed in Jakarta to step up Canberra's role in the region.
Albanese might also be able to tone down the inflammatory rhetoric between Beijing and Canberra, though he will have to be careful not to appear too weak and conciliatory with China.
At the same time, we could imagine a Labor government trying to enrich and diversify the focus of the Quad with more pillars of cooperation, ensuring also a stronger peoplep-to-people dimension.
In short, a change of administration in Canberra could offer a good chance for Asean leaders to reassert their vision for cooperation with Australia and build the next chapters of the Sydney Declaration.
A new version of the declaration could lead Southeast Asia towards a new common prosperity based on more equal partnerships.
The writer focuses on civic engagement, youth development, SDGs and regional integration in the context of Asia Pacific
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times