MP says Scott Morrison and Mathias Cormann treating the public ‘like fools’ as government and opposition swap accusations over budget ‘black holes’. All the day’s campaign news with Gabrielle Chan
7.48am BST
I’m afraid technical issues have beaten us at about the same time the political day has slid to an end.
• Today, the political debate has been dominated by Coalition’s attempt to muddy Labor’s budget costings. The government was leaping off an old press release, from 5 May, which made its way to the Telegraph this morning. Then Scott Morrison and Mathias Cormann held a media conference at midday to rail against Labor’s plans for more debt and deficit. They went in with a figure of a $67bn blowout over four years, which extrapolated to 10 years produced a $200bn blowout. By the end of a bit of questioning, the figure had come down to $32bn. Tony Burke didn’t miss in his reply, saying they came in like helium balls and finished completely deflated.
6.27am BST
Back to Tony Burke. Because we can, in this lull.
He was making a couple more points.
We’ve got two parties here in this election campaign where both sides have major commitments that will cost the budget $50bn. The Turnbull government says that $50bn should be spent on tax cuts for big business. Labor says the $50bn should be spent on schools and on Medicare. These are the choices that are made.
When you look at tough decisions that people have shied away from for a very long time, that do make a long-term structural difference – superannuation reform and reform of negative gearing and capital gains tax do fit that bill. They are both measures that both sides of politics for more than a generation have let stand and been unwilling to confront, and we’ve had changes of government in each direction over that time.
6.09am BST
I’m told the Nova Peris replacement decision will most certainly go to ALP national executive. No captain’s picks on this one.
Names most mentioned include Malarndirri McCarthy, a former NT assembly member and journalist, and Marion Scrymgour, a former NT minister and deputy chief minister.
5.55am BST
Tony Burke is still going. He is cranky and he is one of those pollies that get very focused when he gets fired up.
What happened today in a media conference that started with so much arrogance and confidence and fell away into farce by the end, was simply an attempt by the government, by this Liberal government, to think they could get away with making up Labor policies, lying to the Australian people, and thought maybe, just maybe, nobody would notice.
Well, message to Scott Morrison and Mathias Cormann: people do notice. And Scott Morrison’s got more interviews to go later tonight. He can explain how they turned $224m into $19bn. He can explain why they deliberately inflate numbers from the Labor party. He can explain why fully costed policies get ignored, and they just go out and play their own games. The Australian people may be subject in the next few weeks to more lies like we saw in that media conference today.
5.50am BST
While Black Hole, The Musical, tapped-danced its way through the campaign day, the outgoing Reserve Bank governor, Glenn Stevens, has participated in a wide-ranging question and answer session with a business audience, one of his final acts as RBA governor.
There were several interesting reflections. Stevens warned that whoever wins the election on 2 July will have their budget work cut out for them. Stevens noted somewhat delicately that the budgetary situation will be OK if nothing goes wrong locally or in the world. But downturn or no downturn, whoever wins on 2 July faces “some years of quite hard repair work ahead”.
It’s the leader’s job to stand up and take the flak.
5.46am BST
Tony Burke:
We might remember when [Turnbull] became prime minister, he claimed he was going to respect the intelligence of the Australian people. Today his treasurer and his finance minister thought they could get away with treating the Australian people like fools. Today, his treasurer and his finance minister started out at the beginning of a media conference, all puffed up like helium balloons, and by the end of the media conference you’d watched the air run out of them completely.
5.44am BST
Tony Burke uses the example of foreign aid. Labor’s policy involves a commitment of $224m but Scott Morrison claimed its foreign aid commitment cost $19bn.
Can I give Liberals a hint, says Burke.
During the campaign, Liberal policies will be announced by the Liberal party, Labor policies will be announced by the Labor party.
5.40am BST
Tony Burke now, on the Scott Morrison-Mathias Cormann press conference.
We watched the two people meant to be in charge of accuracy for our nation basically blindfolded and throwing darts at the Labor party.
5.38am BST
Labor’s deputy leader, Tanya Plibersek, is doing a doorstop in Darwin. She says “it’s a bit rich” for Scott Morrison to talk about costings when
he refused to say in his budget how much his tax cuts would cost the budget.
5.33am BST
My guest tonight is the Treasurer Scott Morrison #abc730
5.31am BST
5.27am BST
5.10am BST
Former Labor senator Trish Crossin, who was bumped by Julia Gillard in favour of Nova Peris, has spoken to Joe Kelly at the Oz.
It was in chaos the minute Gillard terminated my career on the 21st of January 2013.
It was a misjudgment and it was a mistake because the process was at fault. There was a process in the branch which is a rank and file ballot and the members never get it wrong. The members know who you are and they know your commitment and they are also mindful of whether you are male or female, indigenous or non indigenous.
I think that’s for other people to judge, but I do believe that the first female indigenous parliament member needed to leave a legacy. And I don’t think this is the sort of legacy I’m referring to.
4.35am BST
One more thing out of the Penny Wong presser. She was asked about a federal corruption body and Labor’s view on it.
You might recall we did endorse or support the Senate inquiry to consider it. There have been a number of propositions around how you might strengthen your integrity framework in terms of Commonwealth legislation. We certainly are open to consideration of those and that’s one reason why we supported the inquiry.
4.30am BST
Wong is asked about Clive Palmer not contesting the Senate. Essentially she did not really worry about Palmer but she mentioned Pauline Hanson running for a Senate seat. Wong said there had been some commentary suggesting Hanson was in with a chance. Wong has spent a fair bit of time arguing against her views.
4.22am BST
Penny Wong is asked about Labor’s costings:
The first point is this – if you want to find out what Labor policies cost then it would be useful to talk to the Labor party and not to Mathias Cormann. It is the interesting how desperate this government is to talk about us rather than them. I suppose if you’re led by a man who used to believe in climate change and now is prepared to do whatever the climate sceptics want, you want to talk about anything other than what you really want to do. But how desperate are they to talk about us rather than them? I hope at some point Malcolm Turnbull will tell the Australian people what he believes in rather than what he says Bill Shorten wants to do.
4.19am BST
Wong turns to the Morrison-Cormann press conference.
She calls it a debacle, which began with one number and ended with another number.
He claims he didn’t know what was happening. Well, it’s simply beggars belief that Michael Yabsley knew about it but Arthur Sinodinos didn’t. Mr Turnbull should answer the question about senator Sinodinos’s knowledge; he should require that Senator Sinodinos be full and frank in his explanation about his knowledge at all times.
4.13am BST
Labor’s campaign spokeswoman and leader of the senate, Penny Wong is up now.
She calls Nova Peris a “trail blazer” and a “champion of change” in her career for her people.
We wish her all the best in whatever she chooses.
4.10am BST
@gabriellechan The only hole chart that matters. #donutblackhole #Ihaveachart #mychartneedsachart #auspol pic.twitter.com/vdruzkZNlt
4.08am BST
3.56am BST
Phew. Matt Hatter is back.
@gabriellechan All these black holes...you are getting fiscally sleepy... @ScottMorrisonMP @MathiasCormann pic.twitter.com/4vmsDakEFn
3.54am BST
This is interesting regarding political donations. Indi independent Cathy McGowan has her campaign donations in real time. Her site lists the donor but not the amount. The public can see she has raised $86,676 with a goal of $185,000. It is an interesting model, which I have not seen on any other politician’s site. Let me know via the Twits or below if you know of others.
3.46am BST
One more chart for you.
The chart of death. Is there a black hole in your black hole? Not at all, says @ScottMorrisonMP and @MathiasCormann pic.twitter.com/Tz6fYF3YRI
3.39am BST
Meanwhile in Perth.
breaking-the adult shop near the Shorten Campaign event was robbed, no reports of what was taken @gabriellechan pic.twitter.com/MZz8zuTCKn
3.37am BST
There may be a black hole in your black hole?
Not at all. These are measures that Labor have said they oppose. Until they say they support them, it’s for Labor to clarify. Worst case scenario is $67bn, best case is a $32bn black hole. Either way Australians will pay more for what Labor is claiming at this election. They’ll pay it more in higher taxes than what Labor will admit to. They’ll pay more in terms of higher deficits and higher debt. We have seen this all before from Labor and I think the Australian people understand that.
3.31am BST
We have a confirmation of the leaders’ debate on Sunday night, televised through the ABC and moderated by Chris Uhlmann, the ABC’s political editor. There will also be three other journalists asking questions.
3.28am BST
.@ScottMorrisonMP @MathiasCormann list of Labor's black hole spending. Much discussion abt where figures come from pic.twitter.com/jYpmPm63Xe
3.23am BST
Morrison and Cormann’s press conference continues. There is vigorous debate between the gallery and the ministers over where the numbers came from. We have been provided with a long list of spending commitments, which journalists are poring through now. The ministers are looking vaguely awkward. I hope to have some pictures for you shortly and am trying to bring the list to you in a format that is compatible and readable.
3.12am BST
Scott Morrison has a chart.
Over the next four years, and the chart sets it out here, over the next four years using consistent methodologies that are used in the budget, Labor have identified $16bn in budget improvements, which comprises $14bn in higher taxes, and $2bn in savings measures. So seven times what they’re raising in taxes over what they’re doing in spending. Those higher taxes, that $14bn, that includes them not proceeding with the tax cuts for small- and medium-sized businesses over the next four year, their houses tax changes on negative gearing, and capital gains tax. It also includes their other measure on superannuation and multinationals, some of which are similar to what the government proposes. None of these additional taxes are being used to reduce the deficit. All of these additional taxes are being used to chase higher and higher levels of public spending.
3.07am BST
We are on to black holes. The treasurer and finance minister in stereo yelling about Labor’s black holes. $67bn black holes.
Labor is making promises to spend money that simply isn’t there ... They will increase the debt and they will increase the deficit.
3.03am BST
Here is the Nova Peris story from my colleague Helen Davidson.
3.01am BST
Shorten is asked: If you are so angry about the AFP raids on Labor offices, why not commit if you form government to reforming laws to allow some public interest defence in leaking information?
We will make that commitment ... I do think this is a matter which deserves attention. I am scandalised the government is going to such efforts to cover up their poor performance in the national broadband network, the fact that under Mr Turnbull internet speeds in Australia have dropped from 30th to 60th. The fact he promised before the last election it would cost $29bn and now it’s at $56bn and climbing. This is the biggest commonwealth infrastructure project which we have ever done. It’s the only real thing that Mr Turnbull has been charge of in public life, other than being PM, and the extent the government will go to to suppress Mr Turnbull’s embarrassment and exposure over his incompetence is staggering. So the point you say about whistleblower protection, Labor is absolutely in the market to start strengthening whistleblower protection in this country, full stop.
2.57am BST
The Medicare legislation essentially would place a “statement of principle” that Medicare remains in public hands that reflects the intention of the parliament. It was first released in the budget reply speech. Remember that? Feels like a long time ago but it was only three weeks.
2.52am BST
Bill Shorten says Labor will legislate a “Medicare guarantee” to protect Medicare for future generations. He promises to:
If Labor is elected on July2, within 100 days we will pass a special act of Parliament to enshrine Medicare and protect it from privatisation. Our act will codify the importance of keeping Medicare in public hands.
2.47am BST
Bill Shorten is speaking up with Matt Keogh, Labor candidate for Burt (Perth). You will remember Keogh as their candidate for Canning, where the Liberal’s Andrew Hastie won, a week after the leadership spill.
2.39am BST
Her full statement:
After careful deliberation with my family, I have chosen not to re-contest my Senate seat in the upcoming Federal election.
It is my intention that I will serve out my term and fully support and endorse my replacement for the number one position on the Labor Senate ticket, whoever that might be.
2.37am BST
Bill Shorten meets Jacob & Amelia at Gosnells medical centre in Perth this morn. @GuardianAus @gabriellechan pic.twitter.com/IWo7foQT7q
2.36am BST
Michael Kroger says he thinks it’s more important for state leaders to be liked. Federal leaders just need to be respected.
They respect Turnbull and that is what will win him the election in the end.
2.24am BST
Victorian Liberal president Michael Kroger is speaking to Sky. Even though the polls are close, Kroger says it is early days.
At this stage I would still prefer to be in the coalitions position than in Labor’s position.
Yes Helen, but it’s built on a lie.
2.15am BST
James Massola at Fairfax has an update on his story about the Greens leader Richard Di Natale and his payment of au pairs.
Greens leader Richard Di Natale has failed to provide documents proving his family paid three au pairs a fair wage, despite promising to do so.
And Senator Di Natale’s office has conceded “timesheets were not kept” to record the hours worked by the au pairs.
2.07am BST
I do like the view from here.
2.05am BST
The return of Abbott. I know you are all clamouring for it and Troy Bramston in the Oz has delivered. He has a column Abbott Ready If Turnbull Stumbles. The premise is that if the election is close, the conservatives will be revolting against the Turnbull ascendency. If the Coalition loses, obviously it is on and Abbott - in the abscence of any other jobs - is ready and waiting. Which you would expect, right? We are assuming that if Turnbull lost, he wouldn’t hang around in opposition to hard slog it back to the prime minister’s office.
Here is Bramston’s lead.
The Liberal Party is so demoralised by Malcolm Turnbull’s leadership that some in its upper echelons are now contemplating the previously unthinkable in the event of a shock election defeat: a return to Tony Abbott.
The situation inside the Liberal Party is so volatile that if it doesn’t win a convincing election victory — and at this stage the contest is too close to definitively call — the party will be engulfed in another bout of soul-destroying turmoil and Turnbull will be blamed.
It is doubtful that the next two most senior Liberals, deputy leader Julie Bishop and Treasurer Scott Morrison, will be seen as viable leadership contenders. And it is too soon for the next generation: minister Josh Frydenberg and former West Australian treasurer Christian Porter.
So, with the party reeling from defeat and there being no obvious leadership successor, all eyes will be on the re-elected member for Warringah. For Abbott, the irony is too delicious to contemplate now. But, sitting on the opposition benches, would Abbott spurn the opportunity to return?
1.53am BST
Let us take stock. There are a few stories around we have not touched on yet. Bill Shorten is coming up in Perth for a doorstop and will then bring the pack east to Melbourne. Presumably Malcolm Turnbull is done in Victoria or at least we have no notifications of further events in the day.
Labor’s health shadow Catherine King is doing a policy on palliative care around lunchtime.
1.40am BST
Mark Di Stefano and Alice Workman of Buzzfeed have a story in which assistant multicultural affairs minister Craig Laundy distanced himself from Peter Dutton’s comments about refugees last week.
Buzzfeed reports Laundy rang a constituent in his very marginal and multicultural seat of Reid saying Dutton’s comments were incorrect.
[Laundy] said, Dutton’s comments about people on the humanitarian intake taking jobs were factually incorrect on two counts: firstly, it’s definitionally incorrect because the people he was referring to would be new Australians themselves and so they can’t be taking Australian jobs.”
Secondly, the statistic is that within the first five years, only 9% of those from the humanitarian intake are in full-time employment. This statistic, he said, is a result of the system letting people down, however, not the people letting the system down.”
I say this to the Australian people: ‘Put yourself in these people’s position. lf you were faced with what they are faced with, would you put your life at risk to give your children a chance?’. My answer is yes.
1.20am BST
The Greens are in Broken Hill, talking about water to the Barrier Daily Truth.
Such a great response in Broken Hill as we're taking to people about the Lower Darling and their concerns. pic.twitter.com/gmuwu9cEF4
1.11am BST
The last question to the PM was whether he had spoken to Canadian PM Justin Trudeau about Canada taking refugees. Turnbull said he had not spoken to him on that issue and reiterated the point that the Coalition was stronger in this area.
It is worth quoting at length because here, Turnbull is channelling John Howard, whose main argument is that to maintain a strong immigration program, governments have to be tough on the borders to ensure public confidence. Tony Abbott said the same thing, though with much more fist-shaking and tub-thumping.
Literally dozens of (Shorten’s) candidates, and including his parliamentary colleagues, do not agree with the position Mr Shorten takes, which he claims to be on a unity ticket with my government on this issue. You know, Kevin Rudd said the same thing in 2007. Kevin Rudd said he was going to be strong on border protection and turn back the boats and look what happened. I was Opposition Leader at the time, I begged him not to do so. I really begged Kevin Rudd not to do so but he pressed on because that’s what the Labor Party believes, that’s what the Greens believe, that’s their constituency and we know what happened. 50,000 unauthorised arrivals, 1,200 drownings at sea and we’ve had to set the border protection rules back to rights. We’ve done that. But I can tell you it’s a very serious, critically important responsibility of national security. Our multicultural society, which in many respects is our greatest achievement. How remarkable is it that we have such a harmonious society in a world with so much tension, that it depends upon a government being in command of the borders and the government determining who comes to Australia.
12.59am BST
I think it was Mark Riley from Channel 7 who asked this question - which cuts to the chase so far in this campaign.
Q: The choice for voters, if I can put it simply, seems to be to take your policy which is $50bn of tax cuts for business, which will take sometime to work through their way through the economy or Labor’s up-front payments to places where they can see work pretty well immediately, in schools and hospitals. Why should people wait?
What Australians are concerned about is how do we ensure that we have a strong economy in the years ahead, how do we ensure our children and grandchildren in this time of unprecedented change and opportunity, but also unprecedented challenges, how do we ensure that we transition our economy in a way that delivers strong economic growth and jobs? We have a plan. We have a clear economic plan. Labor has no plan.
12.55am BST
Malcolm Turnbull is asked about the high suicide rates, covered in an earlier blog post.
Q: Here in Corangamite the number of people who die from committing suicide outstrips the number of people dying on the roads. Will you commit to trying to lower that toll and signing a pledge from the National Mental Health Commission trying to reduce the impact of this?
Thank you for raising that. Suicide is a national tragedy. It’s something I am very keenly aware of. You may not be aware but my electorate of Wentworth includes The Gap at Watson’s Bay which is the place in Australia regrettably where more people take their lives than anywhere else. Suicide and suicide prevention has been a very keen personal interest of mine and I’ve come to learn a lot about it, particularly through my discussions with Professor Ian Hickie who talks and writes about what he calls the mental wealth of nations.
There is no doubt that mental health or mental illness is an enormous - has an enormous cost on our community. A tragic cost, obviously on the individuals who take their own lives and on their families but also a huge economic cost as well. So yes, that is why we are putting more money than ever, particularly into frontline primary health mental health services. Headspace, as you know, Fiona is very familiar, in fact I might ask Fiona to talk about this because this is a gigantic issue in regional Australia and the mental wealth of Australia is a vital national priority.
12.48am BST
Turnbull is asked:
Q: The figure being spoken about today that’s been based on everything Labor’s expressed concerns about. It’s not based on firm Labor policies, is it?
I have all the details here. I don’t think you want to go through them.
12.47am BST
From black holes to black spots. Malcolm Turnbull is in Corangamite announcing $60m for more mobile phone towers to increase connectivity in the bush. Turnbull gives a nod to the black hole, though the figure is now $67bn.
He is asked when the Coalition will reveal its election costings.
They will all be announced in due course but at this stage, if I may say so, the real issue is the flagrant wastefulness and recklessness of the Labor Party outspending us by 20 to 1 in this campaign, billion dollar Bill keeping on joking, making jokes about the spend-o-meter.
12.41am BST
Today, the government would like to talk about black holes. The Coalition are hoping that the gravitational field of the black hole rhetoric will drag in the substantial Labor policy work and make them disappear. If the electorate is talking about costings and budgets, it is fertile ground for the Coalition, even if the figures are a little rubbery.
Official campaign spokesman Mathias Cormann has been telling everyone about Labor’s $66bn black hole. He was asked how he costed that.
I have just explained it. There 18.1bn by fairly and squarely is the cost of measures that Labor is opposing,..where we need to pass legislation through the parliament. There’s a bit more than $30bn which is the cost of promises that Labor has made which, these are their own numbers. Then there is about around about $35bn worth of savings that we have banked where Labor in one way or another has said we must restore that spending. Now, if Tanya Plibersek wants to come out today and say “No, they’re no longer committed to restoring the funding cuts or the savings that we’ve put in place”, that’s fine, we’ll adjust the numbers but the people across Australia deserve clarity. They deserve to know what the numbers actually are. I mean, Labor has been ducking and weaving. Labor has been trying to fudge the numbers by interchangeably using 10-year projections and 4-year costings. Labor needs to come clean, what the cost of their promises is, over the 4-year estimates period and how they’re going to pay for their currently unfunded spending promises.
The fantasy that the government is putting about today just underlines the fact that they have no policy vision of their own. Now, we will not take any pious lectures from a government which has at the centrepiece of its budget a tax cut wouldn’t tell the Australian people how much it costs and is completely and totally unfunded.
12.24am BST
Mike Bowers really is a pollie whisperer. He gets the best out of his subjects, none more so than in this series.
11.52pm BST
Good morning and thanks for the donation,
There was a glorious sunrise over Canberra, combined with a full moon so perhaps the stars are aligned for political donation reform. Or perhaps not.
The managing director of Transfield Holdings, Luca Belgiorno-Nettis, says his company made political donations because “it was fairly plain that that bought access” to politicians and created opportunities to influence events.
Belgiorno-Nettis told Monday’s Four Corners program political donations were like the Latin saying Do Ut Des, “You give in order to have given back.”
I’ve been arguing for reform to the donations and disclosure regime for many years for two reasons: transparency manifestly benefits the public interest, and getting the money out of the system might help the political class focus on the interests of the people they are elected to serve: the Australian voters, rather than viewing politics as being little more than a series of arbitrations with cashed-up rent seekers.
But Yabsley’s point is the insider’s point. He’s focused on reputational risk: he thinks it has now gotten to the point where the rolling controversies around the political fundraising system is damaging politics itself, and also damaging the reputations of the players that seek to influence it.
I think it is time for us to really overhaul the entire system of political fundraising. It’s gone down a certain path, it’s been doing it for a long time, I don’t think there’s any real hard evidence that it has resulted in any form of corruption. But I think it’s just as much about people’s perceptions. If the public feel that they are not getting influence in the same way that other members of the community are, then that is not a healthy democracy. So, let’s look for a better way of doing it.
They know that there is a Leader of the Opposition, a leader of the Liberal Party, who is passionately committed and has been for many years to root and branch campaign finance reform. So I’m - I will be a willing partner in bi-partisan reform of campaign finance. But we’ve got to get on with it.
I do not believe businesses and companies or trade unions should be allowed to donate to political parties.
11.35pm BST
That’s it from me, Melissa Davey, thanks to those who joined me for all the fun from 6am. I’m now handing over to Canberra’s Gabrielle Chan to take you through the rest of the day.
I’ll leave you with this profile of 18 year-old Falla-Ricketts, the newly endorsed Greens candidate for Page. The party is hoping to capitalise on her local popularity and the strong anti-CSG sentiment in the community, writes Amanda King for Guardian Australia.
The chances of her being elected are remote – the Greens won only 6% of first-preference votes in 2013, well behind the Nationals’ Kevin Hogan, who narrowly beat the incumbent, Labor’s Janelle Saffin. Both are standing again.
The Greens hope to make some inroads. At the 2015 New South Wales state elections of 2015, the Greens came a close second to the Nationals in Lismore, which is part of the Page federal electoral district.
11.31pm BST
While some have called for a return of the “old Malcolm,” and the “real Malcolm,” Mark Latham has written in the Daily Telegraph that he misses the old Bill Shorten too. “Will the real Bill Shorten please stand up,” he writes:
Shorten is the first Labor leader in 50 years to go to an election without a plan for immediate economic and productivity growth. His tax policies are likely to damage the private sector at a time when consumer demand and investor confidence are fragile.
Shorten has also moved Labor to the left with his embrace of the philosophical underpinnings of identity politics.
Early in his leadership, Shorten promised to democratise the ALP and reach out to mainstream community involvement.
But then he did nothing.
11.26pm BST
I have just caught the end of an interview with the federal finance minister, Mathias Cormann, on the ABC’s Radio National, and it’s all about “jobs and growth”. Host Fran Kelly has pressed him on the lack of health and education announcements in comparison to Labor.
She asks him: “Why haven’t you had the health and education ministers out campaigning every day?”. Cormann replied that Australians wanted to know about how Australia’s economy would be secured.
The economic argument is very, very important for Australia’s future. We have increased funding for health and schools which are guaranteed in our budget.
But we are living in uncertain times. We’re facing global economic headwinds and lower economic growth. It’s important for people across Australia to know what our plans are for jobs and growth.
We are totally focussed on earning the trust of the Australian people again to implement our plan of jobs and growth.
11.18pm BST
The minister for foreign affairs and deputy leader of the Liberal party, Julie Bishop, will visit the electorate of Bonner in Queensland today. She will hold a press conference just before 9.30am.
11.06pm BST
A spokesman for the Federation of Community Legal Centres, Darren Lewin-Hill, has just been in touch with me. He’s perplexed that Turnbull is today announcing $60m for mobile black-spots in Corangamite. Lewin-Hill says:
At the same time he’s neglecting existing black-spots in free legal help and making them worse with more than $34m in cuts left in place in the federal budget amid a broader federal shortfall of $100m over four years.
The cuts mean that coverage of legal help for serious legal problems including family violence will grow worse particularly in rural areas and even in major regional centres like Geelong.
PM acts on mobile blackspots, but his community legal centre cuts will worsen blackspots for legal help #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/APLyS2vBUs
10.59pm BST
Greens leader Richard Di Natale has just appeared on Radio National. He’s been campaigning in rural and regional areas, and is currently in Broken Hill. He’ll be taking part in a regional leaders debate in Goulburn in NSW tomorrow night with Barnaby Joyce and Joel Fitzgibbon.
Support for the Greens in regional areas was growing, Di Natale said, with issues like sustainable agriculture, renewable energy jobs and climate change important to those electorates. He said:
You do find pockets [in regional areas] where Greens support is growing. Water is a major issue, of course climate change and dangerous global warming and water are connected. People understand, increasingly, the impact climate change is having.
What we’re seeing in the Lower Darling is a man-made crisis. It’s completely mismanaged... it’s a system in crisis. It’s causing huge pressure on the local community. They’re now resorting to bore water here in Broken Hill.
10.48pm BST
Reporter Calla Wahlquist has more on the ABC’s Q&A program last night, featuring Pyne and Albanese. She writes that Pyne defended the direct action climate scheme pitting him against Albanese – although the pair ended up agreeing on many issues:
Christopher Pyne has rejected a further suggestion that the Coalition’s Direct Action climate policy could operate as a de facto emissions trading scheme, telling the ABC’s Q&A program the scheme was not intended to work that way.
Pyne, the industry minister, and his regular sparring partner, opposition frontbencher Anthony Albanese, were the only two panellists on Monday’s election special, which fell in week three of the eight-week campaign.
10.45pm BST
More on political donations. John Madigan, an independent senator for Victoria, writes that it is naïve to think political donors don’t expect something in return. In a comment piece for Guardian Australia, he writes:
Australia’s electoral finance regime is among the most liberal of all comparable political systems. Most democracies employ a mix of caps, bans on certain types of donor, expenditure limits and public funding to regulate the flow of money from private sources.
However, in our federal sphere, there is no limit on how much can be donated to politicians (or the amount political parties can raise from donors). There are no restrictions on who can donate (not even foreign nationals, companies or governments are precluded from financing our politicians) and there are no limits on electoral spending.
Politicians can't be trusted to reform political donations | John Madigan https://t.co/QrBJsWIIrW #ausvotes #auspol
10.31pm BST
Guardian Australia’s environment reporter, Michael Slezak, writes that an unprecedented level of coordination between climate activists and conservation groups is aiming to raise the profile of climate change in this year’s election.
Their tactics involve a combination of stunts, forums and an attempt to use members to have 130,000 conversations with voters before the election, he writes.
I don’t think the climate movement has ever worked together this closely in the lead up to an election campaign before,” said Daniel Spencer a campaigner and media coordinator at the Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC).
The level of coordination between environment groups is, I think, unprecedented,” confirmed Paul Sinclair, campaigns director at the Australian Conservation Foundation.
#environment Climate groups join forces for election campaign blitz https://t.co/ArEKmo3EFW
10.28pm BST
The shadow treasurer Chris Bowen has just appeared on the ABC’s AM program, talking deficits, political donations and polls. You can’t get to budget repair without some spending, Bowen said.
The difference of approach between us and the government is we have said very consistently both revenue and spending are part of the answer to budget repair. So the treasurer [Scott Morrison] is the one who says we can get back to balance just by cutting spending. It is fantasy.
Yes. Yes is the short answer to that.
@QuentinDempster My take on the current culture of political donations…
https://t.co/g1EHtbUIHs pic.twitter.com/uEaTseMfco
10.22pm BST
On the ABC’s Four Corners last night, donations to political parties were exposed amid calls for overhaul in the political donation system.
Dr Andrea Able, a political scientist and election integrity expert, told ABC News 24 this morning:
The Four Corners program last night obviously brought up a lot of interesting points about the lack of regulation that the Australian political financing system at a national level has, and I want to emphasise we are talking here about the national level.
So Australia is an interesting context because the states themselves have varying degrees of regulation, but at the national level there is almost no regulation aside from the fact that we have public subsidies to political parties and that political parties are required to disclose their spending, but not until a few months after the election.
10.12pm BST
So as I mentioned earlier, Turnbull is in the marginal seat of Corangamite in Victoria. He’s going to announce $60m to subsidise the construction of new mobile phone towers in areas deemed commercially unviable due to the lack of mobile coverage. About 6,000 mobile phone black-spots have been identified by communities in regional Australia.
Meanwhile Shorten remains in Western Australia, where he and the opposition health spokeswoman Catherine King will announce $35m towards end-of-life care programs. The plan includes $22m for people to receive palliative care at home, and $9m to promote end-of-life planning. King says only 14% of people are able to die at home, despite around 70% of us wanting to do so.
10.01pm BST
A Coalition of mental health experts are calling on the parties to implement a suicide prevention action plan to halt what is a crisis. Suicide rates have risen by more than 20% in the past two decades.
Adjunct Professor John Mendoza, who is director of ConNetica Consulting and the former the former Chair of the National Advisory Council on Mental Health, told Radio National this morning: “In the lead-up to this federal election it is an opportunity to cal upon our major parties to spell-out what they’re going to do in the next parliament to tackle this major problem”.
The figures are shocking: Between 8-10 Australians die by suicide every day. Mendoza says:
Suicide now is responsible for more potential years of life lost than all cardiovascular disease. This is a real crisis. These are deaths on average at age 44. So baby boomers, Gen X, Gen Y [are all being affected]. We’ve been largely silent in our [government] responses. We need to see assertive responses to this.
9.35pm BST
Reports have emerged that Northern Territory Senator Nova Peris is the frontrunner to take up the AFL’s top Indigenous job following discussions in recent weeks with AFL executives. The league’s former head of diversity, Jason Mifsud, is now working with the Victorian Government as the executive director for Aboriginal Victoria.
Former prime minister Julia Gillard described Peris’s appointment to the Senate in 2013 as her “captain’s pick”. She was the first Indigenous woman to be elected to federal parliament.
“Nova Peris is a very strong representative for the [Northern] Territory, and indeed all Indigenous Australians. She’s made history on the track and in the Parliament.
Should Peris take the job, the ALP would be forced to move quickly to select a new candidate for her Northern Territory Senate position before the federal election in July.
The AFL, which is consulting with its Indigenous advisory group in making the key appointment, will relaunch its Indigenous round this weekend and the showpiece Dreamtime Game between Essendon and Richmond on Saturday night at the MCG in the name of Sir Doug Nicholls.
Labor senator Nova Peris a frontrunner for AFL's top Indigenous job #Live The Age https://t.co/SFfY4IcEmv pic.twitter.com/jDiLPqTql6
9.24pm BST
Peta Credlin has weighed in on the apparent turnaround in Turnbull’s popularity.
The longtime chief-of-staff to former prime minister Tony Abbott described the latest polls, which show a boost to Shorten, as “troublesome for someone like Malcolm who likes to be liked”. She told Sky News last night:
Some politicians are pretty resilient. They don’t need to be liked. Malcolm is a politician that likes to be liked.
You cannot expect to go to an election and win if you don’t talk to the base and you must talk to Alan Jones and you must talk to Andrew Bolt.
9.17pm BST
Here we go again.
According to the Australian, the Liberal party “is so demoralised by Malcolm Turnbull’s leadership that some in its upper echelons are now contemplating the previously unthinkable in the event of a shock election defeat: a return to Tony Abbott”.
The situation inside the Liberal Party is so volatile that if it doesn’t win a convincing election victory — and at this stage the contest is too close to definitively call — the party will be engulfed in another bout of soul-destroying turmoil and Turnbull will be blamed.
I’ve been surprised at the extent of the despair in Liberal ranks. You don’t have to go very far to find it. Past and present MPs, party officials and staffers freely offer up criticisms of the Prime Minister and the Liberal campaign strategy unprompted. Many of these views are being aired on television, radio and social media, and in newspapers and magazines.
8.56pm BST
Good morning and welcome to another day of the political campaign, Melissa Davey with you here to take you through until 8.30am.
Or should I say, good mourning [expect more bad puns like this at 5am]. On Q&A last night, an audience member, Rhys Whitelock, told the innovation and science minister, Christopher Pyne, that he was missing the “old Malcolm”. The Turnbull with moral convictions, who believed in climate change and gay marriage without a plebiscite, he said.
Labor, which won 55 at the last election, needs to win a net minimum 21 seats to govern in its own right.
“Have we got 21 seats in the bag? No we haven’t,” said a Labor strategist. “But the track is encouraging. We haven’t put our cue in the rack.”
Strategists on both sides said while the major published polls were important, they lacked the specificity required at election time because different seats were fought on different issues and swings were never uniform.
Malcolm Turnbull promised to treat the Australian people like adults,” he said. “Now when they look at Malcolm Turnbull, they hear Tony Abbott.”
Research intended for use in a bid to discredit Labor’s negative gearing campaign was commissioned after a meeting between Scott Morrison and a close friend and senior figure in Australia’s property industry.
But the draft report contains a series of factual errors and makes bold claims of a “resale price cliff” and “social dysfunction” that have alarmed some in the real estate industry to whom it has been circulated.
It is a community bitterly divided over a $28.9m Torquay aquatic centre, which threatens to influence the outcome of the seat. And with the polls running narrowly in Labor’s favour, every seat will be crucial.
Ms Henderson, whose victory in the seat in 2013 was vital in Tony Abbott winning power, has attracted fierce criticism for demanding the Surf Coast Shire withdraw a proposal to slap a “pool tax” of up to $150 a year on all ratepayers.
Bill Shorten #TownHall #Armadale #Perth @murpharoo @MelissaLDavey @gabriellechan @GuardianAus pic.twitter.com/EFHgHZ3lcJ
The Coalition is doing better in the marginal seats, they say, where its economic message is getting across well. It’s the marginals in which elections are won and lost and what’s happening there is of prime concern to the parties. The Liberals may be “spinning” or telling the truth – it is hard to know. Public polling done in marginals is usually very hit and miss, when tested against the later outcomes.
But worrying for the Coalition, based on the Prime Minister’s tumbling personal ratings in recent months, is that the Liberals may have miscalculated what would be Turnbull’s electoral appeal when they installed him in September.
It wouldn’t be the first time that a party over-estimated what a leadership change would bring in terms of votes. Polling analyst John Stirton says “leaders tend to be more popular in exile than in office”, citing the Andrew Peacock/John Howard opposition experience through the 1980s.
Related: What might life be like with opposition leader Burst Watermain as prime minister? | First Dog on the Moon
Christopher Pyne just called for an ABC Fact Check of Albo claim re: CSIRO. Pyne's gov cut money that forced @ABCFactCheck closure #qanda
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