So long Wednesday
So that’s where the prime minister has been hiding out.
An unusual choice for your first campaign interview, Marie Claire, but these are exciting times.
Before the excitement overwhelms, I reckon that will do us today, with all the usual thanks to the readers and the colleagues.
Let’s recap the day with a few thoughts about the contest.
- Labor had a scrappy day yesterday, today it was the government’s turn.
- The Penrith pit stop this morning was a small shambles, and the government had to work overtime to keep a lid on the superannuation story, were the budget measure retrospective or not, which persisted throughout the day.
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Bill Shorten managed a clear day to campaign on the messages he wants to campaign on.
- It’s only mid week of the first week of a two month long sortie. You’d hope both sides would be conserving energy for the long haul, that’s entirely sensible, but the government is not only conserving energy, it’s intent on keeping itself the smallest of small targets.
- No new policies. No major interviews. Press conferences with a handful of questions then complete shut down.
- I assume this is transitional behaviour but if it isn’t, we are in a pretty unusual election campaign.
Long way to go, best not to make emphatic statements, apart from have a lovely evening, and see you all again in the morning.
Readers and their facts. Can you bear it?
@murpharoo how are you convinced he's driving in a Left Hand Drive vehicle?
— Alex Perrottet (@alexperro) May 11, 2016
Thanks to BuzzFeed for bringing this to my attention this afternoon. Not quite carpool karaoke, but superb in it’s own fashion. Who says Scott Morrison can’t drive and record a video and hold up a brochure at the same time?
Obviously he’s holding up the brochure with his third hand.
On Sky News just now the cabinet secretary Arthur Sinodinos has been asked about the superannuation brushfire. Sinodinos says it’s good news. It means people are still talking about the budget. Glass half full, right there, on the television.
"Ok then, down it goes .."
My colleague Paul Farrell has brought this sequence to my attention. This morning the Greens candidate in Grayndler Jim Casey posted a picture of himself reading the Daily Telegraph edition from today which endorsed Labor’s Anthony Albanese on the front page.
.@AlboMP slams opponent @JimCaseyGreens over 'Trotskyist' comment that he'd rather have Abbott as PM than Shorten.https://t.co/WToj9BnS3D
— abc730 (@abc730) May 11, 2016
Now, he’s been asked by the NSW fire service to take it down.
FRNSW management have asked that the pic of me reading the morning paper be taken down. Ok then. Down it goes.
— Jim Casey (@JimCaseyGreens) May 11, 2016
Down it goes.
We met Jim Gleeson at the end of Gabi Chan’s brief dispatch from Townsville after the Shorten street walk. She’s sent a lovely photo of him, which I thought I’d share.
From the north, to the west. Some news from my erstwhile colleague, Calla Wahlquist.
Greg Hunt has arrived in #Hasluck, jacket slung rakishly over his shoulder. @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/Ctzum0wG15
— Calla Wahlquist (@callapilla) May 11, 2016
While our eyes are still northward, the member for Dawson, George Christensen, has taken to his Facebook page to say he won’t support refugees from Syria in Mackay. He wants the Labor candidate, who campaigned with Bill Shorten today, to express a view on the subject.
I can assure local residents that rumours of Syrian refugees being housed at Jilalan or anywhere in the Mackay region are false. I have been advised by the assistant minister for multiculturalism that “Sarina is not currently a designated settlement location.” Further to this, I’ve advised the assistant minister that the Mackay region won’t be able to handle an influx of refugees given the state of the regional economy. I have repeatedly made this point clear to the government since September 2015.
I believe any jobs that are available in the region need to go to our residents who are already struggling to find work, and we don’t need to introduce more people to contest that pool of jobs. People may recall that I conducted a Facebook poll back in September last year to gauge community sentiment on this issue and about 75% of local respondents were against the idea of settling refugees in Mackay.
My views, and it appears the views of many in the community, are definitely at odds with those of the state Labor member for Mackay, Julieanne Gilbert, so it is important for the state MP’s husband, the Labor candidate for Dawson, to state his position on the issue. Given that Mrs Gilbert has repeatedly stated that she wants to see some of the 3500 refugees that may be settled in Queensland come to the Mackay region, I ask Mr Gilbert to be straight with Mackay people and state his position.
Does he agree with his wife, who is the Labor member for Mackay, that hundreds of Syrian refugees should be settled in Mackay, or will he join me in protecting local jobs?
Sadly Christensen’s hard yards with the campaign framing didn’t quite make the grade with the travelling press pack. The Labor candidate didn’t get a question on this subject today.
Checking in from Townsville. The North Ward shopping centre was chosen for Bill Shorten’s first street walk. It is the suburb of North Ward and has been recently redeveloped with a larger supermarket and all the usual chemists, discount stores and coffee shops. Shorten walked through the centre surrounded by a pack of media, greeting daunted shoppers in the camera lights.
Indigenous woman Patricia Dallachy from Charters Towers had her most important issue front of mind. She was fighting for diabetes medication, given she only two days left in her supply. Shorten assigned a staff member to follow up. Jenny Gaylard, shopping centre manager, told Shorten the biggest issue in Townsville was unemployment. She said her son in law was unemployed, while her son was on short term contacts with no job security. “He’s 27, he would like to have a house, get married and have children, but there is no security.” Her daughter is in the vocational training centre, which she said has been hit by cutbacks. She said she would assess the policies. She rejected the tag swinging voter. “I like to think I think about the policies and whether they suit the times”.
Former Townsville councillor and life long Labor voter Jim Gleeson turned up to shake Shorten’s hand. “People are hurting, they must never forget that. People are hurting big time. As I say, never forget the battler.
I’ve asked my colleague Gareth Hutchens for a ruling on whether the government’s super changes are retrospective or not, because he is more across the intricacies of this particular budget measure than I am. He’s currently working up an explainer on the topic. Superficially any measure that takes effect from 2007 is retrospective, but I acknowledge super is a complex area and analysis is best left to specialists. I note that the Grattan Institute’s John Daley, a thoroughly sensible economist, is backing the government’s characterisation of its measure. The ABC is quoting Daley saying the measures are not retrospective.
John Daley:
Lots of changes affect investments made in the past, and no one suggests they are retrospective. If I bought shares in a company yesterday, I expect that the future earnings on these assets will be subject to my marginal income tax rate. But if my income tax rates change, I would not expect that the old tax rate to be grandfathered to apply to all my future earnings. Misguided claims about retrospectivity should not be used as cover so that this older generation continues to gain unjustifiable benefits that will now be denied to younger generations.
Looking pretty claustrophobic on that Shorten streetwalk in Townsville, which is underway now.
North ward shopping centre manager Jenny Gaylard meets @billshortenmp @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/1TJeBFVRIy
— Gabrielle Chan (@gabriellechan) May 11, 2016
Preferences? Talk to the hand ..
Back to preferences for a bit. As Murph mentioned earlier, shadow ministers Anthony Albanese and Tanya Plibersek have been busy today claiming the NSW Liberals are set to direct preferences to the Greens in their seats of Grayndler and Sydney in return for the Greens running open tickets elsewhere. If true, it would mirror a deal Victorian Liberal party director Michael Kroger is reportedly considering.
In an effort to get to the bottom of this, I approached the NSW Liberals. They sent me a copy of federal director Tony Nutt’s statement from yesterday, that says “no decisions have been made regarding preferences”.
Well, not yet, anyway. But the statement notes “various parties have discussions” and decisions on preferences are only ever made after nominations close.
Bottomline? The NSW Liberals are not ruling it in or out. Not yet. Greens candidate for Grayndler, Jim Casey, said he had “absolutely no idea what the Liberals are going to do”.
"No there's some changes around taxation .."
Just a little bit more of Josh Frydenberg and Neil Mitchell.
Q: OK, so you’re denying there’s any increase of superannuation taxes. Are you?
Josh Frydenberg:
No, there’s some changes around taxation, they’re prospective as opposed to retrospective and importantly, what they’re allowing us to do is to provide real benefits to those at the lower income threshold, but also more flexibility there has to be said.
For example woman who leave the workforce haven’t been able in the past to carry forward their used concessional cap, we’re now allowing them to do that. As I mentioned the low income tax offset - it’s a number of positive changes there.
"Well, we're not increasing taxes .."
Readers with me all day know the budget superannuation measures are continuing to seed headaches for various Coalition folks attempting to engage with open microphones. The Coalition campaign headquarters evidently hasn’t had time to distribute a transcript of the resources minister Josh Frydenberg being mauled by Melbourne talkback radio host Neil Mitchell yet, so Labor’s campaign headquarters has kindly helped them out.
Humanitarians, really. Here’s an excerpt of the mauling.
Q: Thanks for your time. What are the unintended consequences Julie Bishop’s offering to fix?
Josh Frydenberg:
Look, there’s nothing usual about the government consulting the key stakeholders about the implementation of a specific measure. We’re not talking about the substance of the measure. We’re not talking about the threshold or who it would apply to, we’re mealy just talking about the implementation which maybe for example around the paper work that’s required or something related..
Q: But the thing on unintended consequences doesn’t refer to paper work surely?
Josh Frydenberg:
Well there might be in terms of the amount of forms you have to fill in. It’s not about the substance. You know - lets go back to first principles as to why we’ve announced these pay cuts.
Q: No, before we do that, I want the specific announcement from the government. What are the unintended consequences, Julie Bishop says we’ll in - what are they?
Josh Frydenberg:
Well, we’re not talking about the substance of the policy, we’re not talking about the threshold, we’re not talking about the people that it would apply to, in this case less that 1% of people who have superannuation. We’re not nearly talking about the practical, implementation which is done in all matters of policy Neil. That you consult with stakeholders before you ..
Q: Ok you it’s not really, unintended consequences. it’s bureaucratic fiddling is it?
Josh Frydenberg:
It’s nothing to be worried about.
Q: Well it is to be - we’re in an election campaign, we’ve got senior minister saying that you will change things for unintended consequences. We need to know what we’re voting for.
Josh Frydenberg:
Well you’re hearing it from me that these super changes are very important to go back to the purpose of super which is to be a substitute or a supplement to the age pension, that’s what David Murray’s financial system inquiry recommended. That is the best of super and what we have done is not only make some changes at the top end but we’ve provided a whole range of equitable measures, particularly to help woman and those at the lower income earners.
Q: And this is going to bring in $2.9bn extra in tax right?
Josh Frydenberg:
Well it’s going to bring in a revenue that is then being put back to a.. .
Q: No, no it’s bringing in a $2.9bn correct?
Josh Frydenberg:
There’s some changes around that. Which is - that’s the number you’re quoting.
Q: Are you aware that the treasurer promised no increase in superannuation taxes some months ago?
Josh Frydenberg:
Well we’re not increasing taxes...
Q: Well it’s $2.9bn extra - how are you not increasing taxes? Well what’s the $2.9bn doing? Falling out of the sky?
Updated
Meanwhile, in Townsville, Bill Shorten is tempting hustings fate in two ways: interacting first with children, and next with animals.
Check out Roxy the dog meeting @billshortenmp @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/Ai1OTeIdqj
— Gabrielle Chan (@gabriellechan) May 11, 2016
Canberra political blogger Paula Matthewson has drawn my attention to a move by the Australian Workers Union to snap up the domain names of Malcolm Turnbull’s snazzy new campaign branding.
@murpharoo Another rookie mistake https://t.co/m97P0PzlQk
— Paula Matthewson (@Drag0nista) May 11, 2016
Our PM forgot to register the domain names for his new brand. Thanks Malcolm, we own them now. #auspol #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/IVla7npcSZ
— AWU (@AWUnion) May 11, 2016
But there’s a potential plot twist.
This may actually be against Australia's domain rules, @auda can you clarify? https://t.co/g0PpnYxZfn
— Renai LeMay (@renailemay) May 11, 2016
@renailemay They would have to prove that it is a service or product they have, or they have a business name similar to it.
— James Collins (@jamescollinss) May 11, 2016
Just a quick recap from the road with Bill Shorten – looking backwards and pointing forwards. The Labor leader spent the morning at the Beaconsfield state school for a campaign event with a prep class – which is kids aged four and half to five and a half. Luckily, there was young Sophia Thomas, five-year-old daughter of a Labor campaign worker who, when lifted up for the wall of cameras, handled herself with aplomb.
Labor wants to fight this election on education and, generally, state school principals are happy to let them in. Today Cameron Wayman, principal of Beaconsfield state school, said of his current school budget, Gonski money is worth $118,000. He uses it to employ a dedicated specialist science teacher and said it means the school has specialist teachers at an earlier level. He said the low socioeconomic nature of the school meant often children did not get a chance to read at home. He also uses the funding for intensive literacy. “For me to be able to put them in front of a parent to read books in the morning, that makes a huge difference.” Flanked by Labor’s candidate for Dawson Frank Gilbert, Shorten followed the classroom visit with a doorstop. Shorten is planning a street walk this afternoon in Townsville.
Updated
While the campaign protagonists trade blows, a short update on various matters asylum.
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A 26-year-old Bangladeshi refugee has died in Nauru hospital from suspected heart failure. He had checked himself in to Nauru hospital two days ago with chest pains. Plans were being made to medivac him to Australia for treatment, but he was not able to be moved before suffering a series of heart attacks Wednesday morning.
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Two men on Nauru – one a refugee, the other an asylum seeker – were reportedly attacked and robbed by local men who threw rocks at them and threatened them with a knife. The attackers threw rocks at the men to knock them off their motorbike before assaulting them, and stealing their wallets, phones and bike.
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On PNG’s Manus Island, an Australian guard has been accused of assaulting a refugee inside the detention centre. A complaint has been lodged with Broadspectrum, which runs the detention centre, and with PNG police, but there are fears the alleged offender will be rapidly flown off the island to escape investigation. Previous alleged offenders, including guards who were reportedly involved in killing Reza Barati, and three expatriate guards who allegedly drugged and raped a local woman, have been flown off the island.
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The Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young says she has been told by the immigration department that all visits to onshore immigration detention centres – routinely approved for MPs – have been barred for the duration of the election campaign. The widow of Omid Masoumali, the Iranian refugee who died after self-immolating in protest on Nauru last month, had asked Hanson-Young to visit. The senator has told reporters it was “callous and heartless” to keep a grieving woman locked away from support.
Updated
Back to Tanya Plibersek.
Q: On your home front. A colleague in Sydney, Anthony Albanese, has The Daily Telegraph there, a News Corporation paper, shouting out today “Save our Albo”. As an astute watcher of these things is that helpful to have that particular publication campaigning in his corner or counterproductive?
Tanya Plibersek:
I am sure it is not counterproductive. He is a very popular figure. I am sure The Daily Telegraph are expressing the views of many Australians, particularly many Sydney siders in wanting to see Anthony Albanese returned.
Q: Do you look forward to “Save our Tanya” headline?
Tanya Plibersek:
I am looking forward to a ringing endorsement from the ABC and Fairfax Media and News Limited if they will give it to me. That would be fantastic. It draws attention to the deal that the Greens have done with the Liberals that spilled over from Michael Kroger’s Victorian arrangement to now. It seems the Liberals will be preferencing the Greens in Anthony’s seat and mine. You have to ask yourself why Michael Kroger would rather see a Green elected there than a Labor person. The simple answer is every seat that goes to the Greens, Labor is one seat further from forming government and Malcolm Turnbull is one step closer.
Just a translation point on the preferences issue. Both Plibersek and Albanese have every interest right at the moment in extrapolating the Kroger comments in Victoria (which I referred to in my opening post this morning shortly after 8.30am) to NSW.
Both are creating the impression the Liberals will direct preferences to the Greens in Sydney and in Grayndler. Right now, as of this post, there’s no evidence that I’m aware of indicating that will be the case. It might be the case, but it is speculative.
The various state Liberal organisations will determine those things for themselves, in coordination with the federal campaign. Kroger can call the shots in Victoria, but the NSW organisation will run its own race in NSW. We are currently chasing the NSW Liberals for a statement in relation to the allocation of preferences in the state. If particulars come to hand I will share them with you.
Updated
Out on the hustings in Geelong, the assistant treasurer, Kelly O’Dwyer, is still battling the superannuation brushfire. She’s asked, isn’t a logical assumption that the changes are retrospective if they apply from 2007?
O’Dwyer says no.
The government has said there is a lifetime cap on contributions of $500,000. That doesn’t mean you can’t contribute more to superannuation, you absolutely can. What we are saying is you have a lifetime after-tax contributions cap of $500,000.
For those people who have contributed more than that, let’s say they have contributed $800,000 before budget night, they are going to be grandfathered. They won’t be affected by the lifetime cap. They won’t be able to put in another $500,000 but all of the money they have already contributed is able to remain in the superannuation system.
That is not retrospective. That is the antithesis of a retrospective change.
Updated
Labor’s deputy leader Tanya Plibersek is on the ABC at the moment and she’s being asked about boat turnbacks. During the ALP conference debate in 2015, Plibersek voted against Labor adopting boat turnbacks via a proxy on the conference floor. So did Labor’s Senate leader, Penny Wong.
But Plibersek is today supporting the shadow cabinet position on turnbacks. It has to be “one” of the options.
Tanya Plibersek:
We have said turnbacks have to be one of the policy options available to us.
Q: You support that?
Tanya Plibersek:
Well, I think it is plain that it has to be one of the policy options available to us.
Of course I support it.
Campaign, this lunchtime
Let’s take a few minutes to summarise the events of the morning before regrouping for the afternoon.
- The prime minister began his day in Sydney, heading west for an event in Emu Plains with the member for Lindsay, Fiona Scott.
- Presumably wanting to show more respect for Scott than Tony Abbott did in 2013, when the then Liberal leader famously characterised her as having sex appeal, Turnbull emphasised the fact the member for Lindsay was a smart lady who had done at MBA at one of Sydney’s finest institutions before handing her the microphone in the morning session of campaign karaoke.
- It was a rookie error. Scott promptly faced a question about whether she could explain the government’s superannuation policy (she declined to add the the prime minister’s commentary on that subject) and a second question about who she voted for in the leadership ballot. Campaign karaoke ended rather abruptly after that, and campaign Turnbull folded its tent for the day.
- Up north, Bill Shorten went to Mackay to speak about schools funding. Today’s announcement was $4.6m to support targeted teaching.
- Apart from the campaign machinations, the government continues to fight a brushfire on its budget super changes, and all the parties are jostling about preferences for the coming contest.
Onwards, sideways, backwards, upwards.
Good grief it’s already lunchtime, I’ll do a summary post next.
Looking west, my colleague Calla Wahlquist is hot on the heels of the door knockers in WA.
Doorknocking in Hasluck. "Sometimes you get houses with people in them but they pretend not to be home." @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/AXbJatvWS6
— Calla Wahlquist (@callapilla) May 11, 2016
Come out, good people of Hasluck. Come out.
Back to George Brandis and the press conference. This has been reported this morning but I haven’t had a chance to get to it yet. It’s a security story.
Brandis can explain, and does in his opening remarks.
I can confirm that yesterday five men aged between 21and 33 years of age were arrested in far north Queensland on suspicion of breaches of the anti-terrorism provisions of the commonwealth criminal code. Specifically, they were arrested on suspicion of engaging in foreign incursions to commit hostile acts in a foreign country, specifically Syria.
They were arrested on the basis that they were believed to have taken a vessel, by road, towed from Melbourne to far north Queensland, with an intention of leaving Australia by sea, transiting to Indonesia and, from Indonesia, seeking to reach Syria to engage in hostile acts in that country. That is, of course, a breach of commonwealth criminal law.
The five men concerned were all from Melbourne, they were all individuals in respect of whom passport cancellations had taken effect so the suspicion is that they were seeking to leave Australia by vessel to avoid the fact that they couldn’t travel by air because their passports had been cancelled.
They are currently still in custody and the police will make decisions in relation to whether or not charges will be laid in the course of their investigation. I can also confirm that at least eight search warrants have been executed in Melbourne today arising from these arrests.
Updated
Never a good idea to stand near signs of any sort.
The attorney general, George Brandis, is holding a media conference in Townsville concerning a story I haven’t had a chance to reference yet. I’ll come to that shortly.
Updated
The last question was a high lob on Tony Abbott campaigning in Mackay.
A few local questions. Then one from my colleague Gabi Chan, which I suspect relates to the photograph she’s sent me and I posted before. I’m sure she’ll bring us up to speed in due course.
Q: Do you think parents are comfortable with political parties campaigning to 5-year-olds?
Bill Shorten:
The point about that is not the 5-year-olds and how they vote. The real issue is drawing attention to education. The real issue here is making sure that parents understand there is a clear choice at the next election.
I didn’t ask Mr Turnbull to make education an issue in this election. He could have chosen to turn his back on tax cuts for multinationals. He could have chosen not to give $17,000 tax cuts to people who earn a million dollars a year – but he didn’t. By contrast, I know where I stand and my party knows where we stand on education. The best thing that a government can do is back the parents and kids of Australia and the teachers of Australia.
Educating your kids, educating our kids is in the DNA of parents. It should be in the DNA of the nation and a Labor government I lead will make sure we educate our kids. It is the best thing we can do for them.
Shorten is asked why Labor won’t support the $500,000 lifetime cap on superannuation? Are you helping the top end of town? The Labor leader says changes to superannuation shouldn’t be retrospective, that’s an important principle.
Q: What will a Labor government do to make sure the Adani coalmine gets up and running?
Bill Shorten:
It’s a matter for the Queensland government in that regard. The Commonwealth government I lead wouldn’t be putting taxpayer money into the Adani mine. These matters have got to sink or swim on their own commercial viability. Our focus in the future is very much encouraging the development of renewable energy in a positive way.
A foreign investment question. Why does he say one thing about foreign investment and the shadow trade minister Penny Wong say another thing? This question is quite right, Wong is very pro-foreign investment, and Shorten is intermittently concerned about it.
Bill Shorten:
In terms of what my very capable spokesperson for trade has said, she’s right, foreign investment is part of the economic engine room of Australia. Really we’ve had foreign investment in this country since the First Fleet and that is part of how we constitute our economic activity. Australians also invest our money and our superannuation in other countries. The world works best when we’ve got flowing trade between nations, and that includes investment. That’s what I think but we’ve got to maintain the national interest and we’ve got a transparent foreign review process which considers all factors in each set of circumstances.
Updated
Shorten is then asked whether there will be a second election after the current one if the result is close and Labor won’t go into minority government.
Q: Tony Burke this morning wouldn’t rule out going back to the polls if he was faced with the choice of that – faced with the choice of that or [forming government] with the Greens. Will you be on the road again in August?
Bill Shorten:
No, we want to win this election. I want to make it clear that whilst we are the underdog in this election, I genuine believe our policies are better for Australia than Malcolm Turnbull’s out-of-touch policies.
I don’t think anything summarises or highlights the difference more clearly in this election to be held on July 2 than the competing attitudes towards education, schools, our children and jobs of the economy of the future.
Q: No second election?
Bill Shorten:
Our aim is to win the first one.
Q: You won’t rule it out?
Bill Shorten:
I’m not going to prejudge what the Australian people will do.
The only way you can have a second election is if there’s a not a clear outcome in the first election.
Updated
Bill Shorten is asked about the prime minister’s comments in Lindsay, and asked what is Labor’s chance of picking up that seat?
Bill Shorten says the prime minister is an infrequent visitor to western Sydney, and when he went there today the divisions in the Liberal party were again today on display because she famously was supported by Tony Abbott.
Tony Abbott is running his separate election campaign because he doesn’t have confidence that Malcolm Turnbull can do it. I think Tony Abbott will be in Mackay tomorrow.
Into questions now. I can’t hear the first question but from the answer it must be is money the answer to problems in the school system, and does investing in education boost economic growth?
Bill Shorten says it contradicts common sense to say that somehow, making sure that our kids are smarter and more educated, won’t improve the economy.
Bill Shorten:
I have travelled up and down the length of Australia in the last three years, I have never once met a parent who came up to me and said, “Please, Bill, if you’re elected, can you spend a little less on my kids? Can you spend a little less on our schools?” It is absurd logic.
Chris Bowen was 100% right yesterday at the press club – there will be 2.8% improvement straight away if we implement these changes, and over the longer term, an 11% improvement to our GDP.
Updated
Shadow education minister Kate Ellis says Labor is committing an additional $4.6m to support the expansion of targeted teaching.
In terms of targeted teaching, what this means is that we measure where a child’s learning is at, what they need to learn next and make sure that they get the individual attention and learning that they need and deserve.
Bill Shorten speaks to reporters in Mackay
The Labor leader has emerged from the Beaconsfield school in Mackay, possibly the first triumph of advancing in campaign 2016. Beaconsfield, Beaconsfield, Beaconsfield. Beaconsfield. Bill. Beaconsfield.
Bill Shorten:
It’s in the DNA of all parents to make sure that your kids, other than being safe and resilient, get a quality education. I want to put it into the DNA of the nation that every school is a great school, that every child gets a great start.
On the matter of cancellations.
But Turnbull's staff say we've gone overtime and he has a lot of meetings in Sydney so we're heading back to the big smoke #ausvotes
— Alice Workman (@workmanalice) May 11, 2016
I did say lock up your children at the opening of the campaign. Sophia looks fairly chilled, though.
Sophia Thomas, 5, daughter of Labor volunteer Craig(!!)at Beaconsfield school for day 3 of the campaign. @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/fmQik7SSp3
— Gabrielle Chan (@gabriellechan) May 11, 2016
The source for the cancelled street walk may be the bus driver on the Turnbull bus.
Bus driver Rick tells us the PM's second stop of the day, a street walk at Westfields has been cancelled #auspol pic.twitter.com/NGB52Bsuch
— Alice Workman (@workmanalice) May 11, 2016
Obviously I’ll keep you posted.
Interesting.
It appears the Prime Minister's day of campaigning in Penrith is over after one event - a planned street walk has been cancelled
— Andrew Greene (@AndrewBGreene) May 11, 2016
Meanwhile, up north.
The Pelfie: how to out-selfie Malcolm. @billshortenmp @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/ua2ZpKlqLY
— Gabrielle Chan (@gabriellechan) May 11, 2016
Updated
Turnbull is then asked a steadying question.
Q: The seat of Lindsay has been won by the party that formed government since 1984. How important is the seat for you, for your fortunes, are you worried about it and is it a must-win seat?
The prime minister thinks Lindsay is a very important seat to hold out the Labor/Green alliance, and to ensure the government is able to deliver its economic plan. Very important.
Really, the only way we can be sure of delivering the jobs and growth that Australia needs, the stability and the leadership that Australia deserves, to return my government on 2 July so that we deliver our national economic plan, every single lever of which, whether it is youth employment, whether it is giving women a better deal on super, whether it’s providing incentives to small and medium businesses, or whether it is innovation, every single element of what we are proposing is going to deliver jobs and growth. And that’s what we need. The opportunities have never been greater. They’ve never been greater. But there are uncertainties. Strong leadership. A clear vision. A clear plan. That’s what we have.
The minders wrap at that point.
A mess, that outing.
Updated
Things running slightly off the rails here in Penrith. Turnbull is asked whether or not Julie Bishop has flagged changes to the super measures yesterday when she said there was consultation about them. No, says the prime minister, no changes.
The prime minister is asked whether he’s in Lindsay to reward the local MP Fiona Scott for voting for him in the leadership ballot. Malcolm Turnbull says Scott is a marvellously accomplished woman who has an MBA from the top business school in Sydney. Presumably this is to counter Tony Abbott’s description of Scott during the last campaign, when he famously noted she had sex appeal. But it sounds very ... how can I say this ... Malcolm.
Turnbull then thinks Scott should speak to reporters about the marvellous work she does in Penrith. Having been invited to address remarks to the candidate, journalists immediately ask Scott whether or not she can explain the government’s super policy.
Fiona Scott declines that invitation.
Well, the prime minister did actually quite explain it with a journalist earlier.
The journalists move on.
Q: Could you tell us which way you voted in September? It seems to be an issue for Tony Abbott’s supporters in this seat that you became a traitor by voting for Mr Turnbull. Can you clarify here in front of us all which way you voted?
No, Fiona Scott would not like to share that information. She has her own moral code and she’s sticking to it.
The prime minister steps back in at this point.
(Oh dear.)
Updated
It’s worth recording the question and answer in full so you can see exactly what I mean. He gets there in the end. Yes, people pay more tax.
Q: Could I just clarify something on your superannuation tax concessions. If someone has more than $1.67m in their super account or has made more than $500,000 in post-tax contributions as at budget night, are you saying they won’t pay more tax on their money?
Malcolm Turnbull:
Let me start from the first one. If you have from 2017, from 1 July 2017, if you have more than $1.6m in your retirement account, this is the retirement account, then the amount in excess of 1.6m will be in what’s called the accumulation account. So that you would pay no tax on the earnings from your retirement account in the retirement phase, you pay 15% tax on the earnings from in the accumulation account. So if you are above 1.6m, yes, then if you had say $2m in your retirement account, you’re in the retirement phase in super, the earnings on $400,000, henceforth in the future, would be taxed at 15%.
Now, these changes – I’ve got to stress this: these changes that we’ve made to super are designed to make it fairer and more flexible. It is particularly beneficial to people on low incomes, because they have their super tax rebated or offset, so if your tax on your super contributions, if you’re earning up to $37,000, is you don’t have to pay that, so that is a big plus for people on low incomes. As we were discussing with some of Fiona’s constituents earlier, people who have not been able to make the full amount of their concessional contributions – and that’s typically or very often women who are out of the work force with family – they can catch up, so we’re providing additional flexibility there and we’re also providing additional flexibility for older people.
But you’re right: people in the top 1%, people on very high incomes, will pay more tax, and overall, the whole package either is beneficial or makes no difference to 96%. So it’s only the top 4% where there is any change that reduces the very high concessions you already have in super.
Updated
The first question is on superannuation and retrospectivity. The prime minister is mired in an incredibly long and complicated answer.
Never been a more exciting time to be in Emu Plains
Malcolm Turnbull:
So it’s wonderful to be here. Out here in Western Sydney, here at Emu Plains ... we had a lovely ride out on the train. We had a good discussion with lots of people on the train and it’s just fantastic.
The prime minister speaks to reporters in Penrith
It’s just fantastic.
Malcolm Turnbull is speaking to reporters in western Sydney now.
When you go out and meet the public, the public will express views. In Penrith Angela Maguire is worried about systemic inequality in education.
PM Turnbull grilled about "systemic inequality" in education funding by small biz director Angela Maguire #auspol pic.twitter.com/Cql6nTbpqp
— Primrose Riordan (@primroseriordan) May 11, 2016
Updated
Meanwhile, on the move in Mackay.
Bill on the Bill bus. @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/fJosyNVEn7
— Gabrielle Chan (@gabriellechan) May 11, 2016
Hello, Freya, aren’t you gorgeous.
Updated
In Sydney, the shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, is being pressed on Labor’s negative gearing policy. This will lead to a softening in house prices, won’t it? The questioner sounds like the Nine Network’s Ross Greenwood, who does finance, but I can’t see him so I can’t be certain.
Bowen says he knows that some people don’t like Labor’s policy but not one credible interest group has been able to punch a hole in the policy. There’s no evidence the policy will have detrimental effects, Bowen says.
None, none.
Updated
Why hello from the north. Today the Shorten campaign is going to Mackay in the heart of the electorate of Dawson. We are finally on our way after a media plane issue.
The seat is held by the tub-thumping Family Guy George Christensen, the LNP MP, who has a margin of 7.6. Christensen is at the National end of the LNP and a well-known supporter of Tony Abbott, who will be campaigning for him later this week, as Murph mentioned.
Dawson’s industries are tourism and primary industries – sugar, prawns, small crops. Labor has only won the seat twice in its history. Christensen won in 2010 with a 5% swing when the Labor MP retired after one term. He increased his margin again in 2013.
Shorten is here to hammer the education issue. We know we are going to a school but that is all we know. But he has spoken to the Townsville Bulletin, which is all over the front page today. The headline: “Libs don’t give a damn – Shorten says he’s the only one who cares for North Queensland.”
He told the paper he would be announcing a $4m water infrastructure feasibility study for the region. He has also promised $100m for a new home for the region’s beloved Cowboys.
The thing I find fascinating is that Shorten is spending so much time in his first week in the north. Locals tell me he was in Townsville late last year for quiet town hall meetings and Labor was running tightly focused radio and phone advertising at the same time.
His message is that the LNP has taken regional Australia for granted. It feels as though Labor is making a play for the regions much more so than in the past. Labor should consider the regions part of their demographic but they have rarely run credible candidates in safe LNP seats previously.
Remember nine of the 10 poorest seats are held by the Coalition. Labor’s agriculture spokesman, Joel Fitzgibbon, has been on about this in the current term – focusing attention on country Australia through the Labor country caucus. In NSW, the farmer and firefighter Vivian Thomson is No 3 on the Labor Senate ticket.
So it feels as though this might be start of a move to take the fight into the regions. Then again, I may have Stockholm syndrome.
Updated
Scott Morrison is campaigning still in Tasmania.
Q: The Institute of Public Affairs says your superannuation changes are retrospective. Have they got it wrong and why?
Scott Morrison:
We are not changing any tax on anything that people have earned in the past. All we’re doing is changing how much tax people will pay in the future, on earnings they make in the future.
And people who’ve been able to contribute to their superannuation on very high incomes have had the benefit of very high thresholds for a long time. And we’re simply saying that going forward, going forward, prospectively, not retrospectively, prospectively, that in those top tier, the top 4%, will be paying tax on earnings where they have capital amounts above $1.6 million. Which is, as I said, the top 1% of wealthy superannuants in the country.
Updated
Looking back north, the Courier-Mail reports that Tony Abbott will campaign in Liberal held seats so far “avoided” by Malcolm Turnbull. This turns out to be two seats: Ryan (where the local member won’t actually be present) and Dawson, held by George Christensen. Christensen has told the Courier Abbott was popular in Dawson and could connect on “heartland” issues.
Empathy and motivational speaking was the only motivation.
George Christensen:
He is going there to gee up people. I think that it is just a matter of him coming to offer support. No agenda other than that.
Updated
Meanwhile, back in Penrith.
"Everything we're doing is aimed at supporting you," PM says @murpharoo #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/xCcWja1WKM
— michael safi (@safimichael) May 10, 2016
From our friends at AAP, an interview Bill Shorten did on Nova Brisbane early this morning.
Opposition leader Bill Shorten can correctly identify the year Captain Cook landed in Australia and who our first prime minister was, but don’t ask him who features on the $10 note.
The man vying for Australia’s top job on Wednesday ventured into that notoriously dangerous place for political leaders – FM radio – taking part in a trivia quiz against Olympic swimming champion Susie O’Neill on Brisbane’s Nova 106.9.
Shorten knew Captain Cook landed at Botany Bay in 1770, Australia’s first prime minister was Sir Edmund Barton and that the Big Banana was located at Coffs Harbour. He narrowly escaped embarrassment by correctly stating, after a long silence, that there were six stars on the Australian flag.
Shorten told the Nova hosts he could not afford to get that one wrong. “That would’ve made the national news,” he said.
But when it came to whose face featured on the $10 note, Mr Shorten passed on the question. The answer was bush poet Banjo Paterson.
Shorten won the quiz by one point, graciously telling the former golden girl of the pool it was a lucky victory. “I think I escaped by the skin of my teeth, Susie, so I’m always up for a rematch during the election,” he said.
He proposed forming a team with O’Neill and taking on another two contestants, with prime minister Malcolm Turnbull and swimmer Elka Graham put forward as possible opponents.
Updated
On Sky News again, the Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young is asked about the Daily Telegraph’s front-page endorsement of Labor’s Anthony Albanese in Grayndler that Bridie drew your attention to first up today.
Sarah Hanson-Young:
I’m not sure the endorsement of the Murdoch rag is going to help.
Updated
Sticking with Townsville briefly, here’s the local view on the Shorten tour.
Politics: a local business. pic.twitter.com/p85dDhJK6r
— Katharine Murphy (@murpharoo) May 10, 2016
I mentioned yesterday Labor has put a lot of resources into north Queensland in the past few election cycles to little avail, and they persist in investing up there in 2016.
Speaking of don’t tell the boss, the Townsville Bulletin this morning is reporting a stimulatory effect since the arrival of the press pack following Bill Shorten. The paper is quoting the venue manager at the Australian Hotel on Palmer Street, Matt Wood, saying he’d observed an increase in the number of “corporates” coming in for a meal and drink.
Matt Wood:
We have been getting busier.
Updated
Uh oh. Can’t anyone have a sickie in peace?
Cafe swamped w media. Blonde lady doesn't want to show her face. "I'm supposed to be having a sick day" @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/7HBmnVoBA8
— michael safi (@safimichael) May 10, 2016
On Sky News, the resources minister, Josh Frydenberg, is trying to walk a delicate line on the rolling controversy of preferences with the Greens. Where to direct preferences is a matter for the party organisation, Frydenberg says, but there’s no way we’d every collaborate with the Greens.
(Apart from potentially giving them preferences in an election campaign. That’s my translation, not Frydenberg’s, to be clear.)
Updated
prep underway for PM's morning tea in Lindsay #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/RucNduLwzV
— michael safi (@safimichael) May 10, 2016
On thing is notable about this campaign from the prime minister’s perspective is the absence of interviews. To my knowledge Malcolm Turnbull has not done one interview this week, not radio, not regional radio, not television, not newspapers. That is quite an unusual way to launch on the hustings. Radio silence, apart from the daily public event and short press conference. Perhaps he’s still thinking about things. Thinking about things is not a bad thing of course.
Good to be thorough.
Toby the police dog checks media bags #election2016 https://t.co/0to9cSG8i6
— michael safi (@safimichael) May 10, 2016
Meanwhile to our north.
Shorten media plane grounded in Townsville. Shorten gives the hitchhikers a lift. @bkjabour @murpharoo
— Gabrielle Chan (@gabriellechan) May 10, 2016
Good morning from the Turnbull bus. First up the prime minister is heading to Penrith for morning tea with Fiona Scott, MP for the seat of Lindsay.
Scott holds the seat on a margin of 3% but faces a strong opponent in Labor’s Emma Husar, a former Labor staffer, disability advocate and lifelong resident of the region.As Lindsay goes so does the country, in the conventional wisdom, making this western Sydney seat particularly hot property at election time.
Jackie Kelly famously took the seat in 1996, establishing John Howard’s bonafides with a suburban aspirational class that came to be christened, “the Howard battlers”.
Kelly was unseated in 2007’s Rudd-slide, the dying days of her campaign marred by the involvement of her husband and others in fake leaflets from an Islamic organisation, spruiking Labor’s “support” for the Bali bombers and a new mosque in the area (“Ala Akba,” it ended – not the most sophisticated scheme).
Malcolm Turnbull will have morning tea with Scott and a group of mothers and small business owners.
Morning, everyone
Thanks to Bridie for battling the wall of sound and the flurry of page one PDFs and welcome good people of Politics Live to our rolling coverage of the election campaign, it’s delightful to be with you. Let’s take stock before we push forward into the day.
You know it’s an election campaign when the morning news cycle is thundering between superannuation concessions and preference deals. The ABC has picked up our story from yesterday that the Institute of Public Affairs intends to campaign against the budget superannuation measures, and that’s kicked hard into the news cycle. The IPA mobilising in the election season reflects concerns in the Liberal party base that the tax changes in the budget hit high-income earners retrospectively: like a slap in the face with a wet fish. The government again has the fire hose out in the early news cycle – these measures are not (underlined) retrospective says the finance minister and campaign spokesman, Mathias Cormann, because the change applies to future earnings. He’s done a couple of radio interviews and he’s now speaking to reporters in Canberra. The government has run a tight ship thus far – they really don’t want their own MPs wandering around like Brown’s cows on this issue, sharing their feelings. Hence the fire hose.
As to preference deals, the Liberals, Labor and the Greens are all dancing around each other in an effort to maximise their positions ahead of 2 July. Labor is hoping to draw attention to preference arrangements between the Liberals and the Greens in an effort to keep progressive voters in the Vote 1 cart for Labor in the inner city seats where there is a bare-knuckle contest with the Greens. The Victorian Liberal party president, Michael Kroger, says it’s now OK to preference the Greens and not Labor because Labor is no longer the party of Hawke and Keating. While I understand that argument about Labor, and have written about it recently, it isn’t actually an argument to preference the Greens, because the Greens are not now, nor have they ever been, the party of Hawke and Keating. The closest player to the party of Hawke and Keating now presenting itself to the voters remains the Labor party. But of course, logic isn’t always a basis for what people in politics say.
Now, to today. Malcolm Turnbull is in Sydney and heading north and then west. Bill Shorten is up north still, and will travel between Mackay and Townsville over the course of the day. Both leaders will address reporters somewhere around mid morning. So noted, let’s power on.
A reminder that today’s comments thread is open for your election day business. Visual maestro Magic Mike is up and about on the twits – he’s @mpbowers and I’m @murpharoo. If you speak Facebook you can join my daily forum here. And if you want a behind-the-scenes look at the day and the looming campaign, give Mike a follow on Instagram. You can find him here.
Onwards into Wednesday.
Updated
Cory Bernardi loses top spot on Senate ticket
Liberal rightwing senator Cory Bernardi has lost the top spot on the Senate ticket in South Australia.
He should still be re-elected but the Adelaide Advertiser is reporting he was knocked from the top spot by moderate education minister, Simon Birmingham, who said he was “happy with the recommendation”.
Bernardi has not commented.
With that, I will farewell you dear readers for the morning and handover to Katharine Murphy.
Updated
Word from north Queensland is that Bill Shorten is heading to Mackay this morning, to visit the third school within three days.
He is getting quite a good run in the press up there with the Townsville Bulletin’s headline this morning “Bill Shorten says he’s the only one who cares for North Queensland”.
In the story it says Shorten has promised to be “a prime minister of action for Townsville” and that the government is a “do nothing” one.
Updated
Fact Check is fired up over at the ABC and today it is asking: Do two-thirds of negative gearers earn under $80,000?
This argument is central to the government’s case that Labor’s policy will hurt “ordinary” people and that is why the Coalition will not be changing negative gearing.
So what has the ABC found? Well, it’s not an outright manipulation of figures:
[Kelly] O’Dwyer is exaggerating.
Fact Check has previously looked at what negative gearers earn in checking a claim made by treasurer Scott Morrison in March this year.
The data shows 56% of people who use negative gearing have an income of $80,000 or less.
Updated
Bill Shorten wanted to debate Malcolm Turnbull in Townsville, where Shorten has been set up the past few days.
Shorten:
I’m disappointed the people of Townsville did not get to hear what Malcolm Turnbull has to say.
Instead they will debate Friday evening in western Sydney in a televised debate.
Updated
From the Malcolm Turnbull campaign trail:
Dawn, Sydney home for a night-PM Turnbull campaigning in Sydney this morning @bkjabour @murpharoo @GuardianAus pic.twitter.com/XQAS3V21SL
— Mikearoo (@mpbowers) May 10, 2016
Which has headed north over the bridge after reports Turnbull would be campaigning in western Sydney today (you can get to the west by going north over the bridge, although personally I would’ve taken the Anzac bridge):
Where's the Turnbull bus heading this morning? NORTH. We're heading North over the Harbour Bridge. #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/WPkpZ7Vccj
— Alice Workman (@workmanalice) May 10, 2016
My colleague Michael Safi reports:
The Turnbull bus is winding its way west on the M2 Hills motorway for the prime minister’s first visit to the heartland, western Sydney, home to seven marginal seats including Lindsay, Macquarie and Macarthur, all Liberal-held, and Greenway, Werriwa, Parramatta and McMahon, in Labor hands. Where the bus will stop we don’t yet know. “All in good time,” Turnbull’s people are saying.
The finance minister, Mathias Cormann, on Radio National straight after Tony Burke to say the superannuation changes are definitely not retrospective. He says there will be consultation on the plan but it will go to the “practical implementation” of the plan, “not the substance”.
There is no retrospectively, the change here applies to future earnings in excess of $1.6m, if you have savings in superannuation you can transfer to your retirement account.
We are changing the tax on earnings on savings in excess of $1.6m and we are doing that prospectively, we are not taxing past earnings, we are not taxing capital.
Given it’s a lifetime cap it does take past contributions into account, only applies prospectively from budget night, there is a $500,000 cap on after tax contributions and that is per individual.
Asked why it is applying from 2007, Cormann says that is the year on which the government has proper data in assessing what contributions have been made to superannuation.
Given it’s a lifetime account, contributions since 2007 dictate whether you can contibute more or whether you have reached the cap.
Cormann says he does not accept the criticism of the IPA which have labelled the changes “diabolical”.
Obviously, we have to continue to explain what we are doing and why, we want to better target tax concessions in superannuation. The purpose of tax concessions is to encourage people to save more which replaces or supplements the pension, not as a vehicle for wealthy people to get tax concessions.
This is not open-ended opportunity to put all of your savings in an account that attracts no tax whatsoever, that is not fair.
And on to the topic of the day – who is making deals with the Greens. Cormann dodges the question of whether he supports the idea of preferencing the Greens in some Labor-held seats.
Preferencing arrangements in the Liberal party are a matter for the national campaign director. What I would say is there is a real risk of a return to the bad old days of a Labor-Greens government, the risk to the economy, the risk is to the AAA credit rating, the risk is to the sustainability of the budget, the risk is to jobs and growth, and the risk comes from a return to a Shorten-led Labor-Greens government.
Updated
The opposition finance spokesman, Tony Burke, has been on Radio National’s AM program where his zinger is “you know it’s an election when Malcolm Turnbull is in western Sydney”.
Talking about whether resources are being stripped from marginal seats and redirected to Grayndler, where the Greens are giving Anthony Albanese, a hard time Burke goes on the attack over the supposed preference deal.
There’s no doubt that the agreement that’s in place between the Greens and Liberal party makes a number of our battles tougher, the ‘Michael Kroger deal’ is all about the Greens getting some extra seats in parliament and Malcolm Turnbull remains prime minster.
Speaking on the government’s superannuation policy which the Institute of Public Affairs is mounting a campaign against, Burke is adamant the changes are retrospective.
It says it applies from 1 july 2007, when you want to know whether something is retrospective when start date is 2007 that’s a pretty strong start pointing for retrospectively.
When asked about the economic credibility of Labor’s education policy vs the Coalition’s platform he goes into the company tax cuts.
The moment you have children going through with better skills and finishing high school you get the 2.8% growth [in the economy]. When the government says [growth over] 10 years, it doesn’t start until after the end of 10 years of bringing down corporate rate. It’s 1% growth by the time Malcolm Turnbull is in his 80s.
The government has chosen to give $50bn to big companies at expense of providing money that is needed at schools and at last election they promised they would deliver to schools.
Updated
BuzzFeed has quite an interesting story from the heady days of Tony Abbott’s prime ministership. Mark Di Stefano has got hold of a selfie of staffers and a Channel 10 cameraman drinking in a pub and joking about going on a “bender” in a dry community.
Raises lots of questions about how the remote community visits were run and attitudes inside the PM’s office as well as in the press gallery.
According to one person on the message thread who spoke to BuzzFeed News, it left people ‘completely shocked and appalled’.
‘I mean, they were in a dry community with big problems with booze and family violence,’ they said. ‘They are supposed to be visiting and listening to Indigenous people and finding out about the problems facing them. It looked like a big joke to them.’
Updated
The NSW state Greens MP is feeling good about the party’s chances in Grayndler
At state level Grayndler is represented by Greens (Balmain,Newtown). Sydney by Independent & Greens (Sydney,Newtown) https://t.co/nd9J0FXBo3
— Jenny Leong MP (@jennyleong) May 10, 2016
Updated
Has the election campaign outlived its useful purpose? That’s the question Lenore Taylor is asking after trailing Malcolm Turnbull for the past few days.
Journalists – apart from the few questions allowed by each leader at their daily doorstop – are really becoming for the most part just added extras in an elaborate pantomime, unless there is a ‘gaffe’. And of course the absolute need to avoid such ‘gaffes’ gives the campaign organisers on both sides even more incentive to make sure no actual debate, no real discussion, intrudes on the whole contrived circus.”
Taylor writes that in the digital age pretty much the only useful thing reporters on the trail can offer that reporters watching live feeds in their offices cannot is the view from “behind the scenes”.
But that view regularly looks pretty ridiculous.”
Updated
A glance at some of the front pages, the election campaign is starting to fall off the front but there are still issues that should be at the forefront of our leaders’ minds:
Sydney Morning Herald front page. Wednesday 11 May, 2016. @smh #Election2016 #ausvotes #ausvotes2016 pic.twitter.com/gdazheeGSO
— Dave Earley (@earleyedition) May 10, 2016
The Courier Mail front page. Wednesday 11 May, 2016. @couriermail #Election2016 #ausvotes #ausvotes2016 pic.twitter.com/cggtoj42E5
— Dave Earley (@earleyedition) May 10, 2016
The Australian front page. Wednesday 11 May, 2016. @australian #Election2016 #ausvotes #ausvotes2016 pic.twitter.com/AqyOi5Zz82
— Dave Earley (@earleyedition) May 10, 2016
Time flies when you’re having fun
@murpharoo @bkjabour Wow there's already only 7 + 1/2 weeks to go! #ausvotes #auspol
— Brad Watts (@Gribnib) May 10, 2016
ABC reporting Malcolm Turnbull is not making any announcements over next few days because “the campaign is still in its infancy”.
More on the Daily Telegraph’s endorsement of Anthony Albanese in the seat of Grayndler:
It reports Albo has heard from Liberals that they are going to preference the Greens in his seat in exchange for the Greens doing “open tickets” in other seats and not preferencing Labor, a story which has been kicking around since Tuesday and has had various levels of denial from both sides. The Tele’s rationale for supporting Albo is it does not want a “radical who wants to overthrow capitalism” in his place.
Inside the newspaper the paper has “solemn pledges” it has put Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten’s signatures to under the headline “Give Greens the big Albo”.
The reports says the Daily Telegraph sent the pledges to the leaders and they each signed them.
Turnbull’s pledge says he solemnly swears “not to enter a deal, alliance or Julia Gillard-style power sharing agreement with the Greens to form government if there is a hung parliament”.
Shorten’s pledge is much the same, though no mention of Gillard.
Daily Tele has done up "solemn pledges" for the leaders about not doing deals with the Greens pic.twitter.com/k6RJvdHTvH
— Bridie Jabour (@bkjabour) May 10, 2016
Updated
In the last election the Palmer United party received 11% of the vote in Queensland and 5.49% across the country – certainly not to be sniffed at. But we have witnessed the at times slow motion, at times swift, demise of the party over the past three years and Clive Palmer is not running in his Sunshine Coast seat of Fairfax. So where will those votes go?
To independents and other minor parties, according to the Australian, which quotes the Griffith University political pundit Paul Williams.
The PUP supporters from the 2013 election came from both the major parties; they were angry, it was a pox on both of your houses. And they are unlikely to go back at this election with the current leadership — the personal ratings of [Malcolm] Turnbull and [Bill] Shorten show they are not vote magnets. At this stage, most of the PUP will go to minor parties sympathetic to the Right and populist independents.”
Updated
Good morning
Welcome to day three of the campaign. Apparently there has been some controversy about whether Sunday, when Malcolm Turnbull went to the governor general’s house to ask for parliament to be dissolved, was day one or day zero. Katharine Murphy and I both agree day one is the first full day (Monday) so consider it settled. Murphy will be with you from 8.30am and in the meantime, let’s launch in to the day.
The big picture
The finger pointing over supposed preference deals between the Liberals and the Greens and if there could be a Labor-Greens coalition government rumbled on through the night with the shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, appearing on 7.30 to say it would be “Labor governments alone, or not at all”.
Multiple Greens have said they would be open to negotiating with Labor to form government in the event of a hung parliament, leaving Labor open to a scare campaign from the Coalition.
Meanwhile, the Liberals have reportedly been making their own cosy arrangement with the Greens with negotiations (no firm deal yet) over preference swaps in key marginal Labor seats.
The Victorian Liberal president, Michael Kroger, told Andrew Bolt on Tuesday night that there was a case for the Liberals to do preference deals with the Greens.
“Here’s the reason why people in the Liberal party, hard-headed people, think that our policy might have to change,” he said. “Because this: Labor have gone to the left in recent years and now our view is there isn’t much to distinguish Labor and the Greens.”
The Greens lower house MP Adam Bandt was still out and about on the nightly news:
HEARTBREAKING: @AdamBandt saying on 7pm news that @billshortenmp can say "tell them they're dreaming well sometimes dreams come true."
— Samantha Maiden (@samanthamaiden) May 10, 2016
The Australian reports Bandt as saying it was Labor who were “begging” the Liberals to help them stay in parliament, and the Greens would win their target seats in their own right.
The Liberal party is set to receive $4.4m in public funding after handing over the details of donors to the New South Wales Electoral Commission. The commission was withholding the money after an Independent Commission Against Corruption investigation into illegal donations. It examined the Free Enterprise Foundation and the Liberal party had not revealed who had donated to the party through the enterprise in 2011.
The Daily Telegraph reported on Wednesday that the party had handed over the donation details and the commission would hold a meeting to decide whether to hand over the money. Many of the donations were from property developers which was made illegal in 2009.
Bill Shorten has been in north Queensland visiting two schools in as many days where Gabrielle Chan reports one of the principals says the defence department should be forced to raise funds with chook raffles rather than schools.
The Heatley school principal, Louise Wilkinson, said:
Because it’s about dollars, and dollars are allegedly short, it’s about a suite of competing priorities and I would argue ... that it’s about time defence did some chook raffles and sold tea towels.
My theory – and this is why I have stayed in education for over 30 years – I believe if we had better educated people and more active citizens then we might have less violence and less need for all the patch-ups that occur.”
Meanwhile, Tony Abbott was kept busy pushing a broken-down car off the Wakehurst Parkway in the northern beaches, with a very pleased rubbernecker recognising him as the traffic made its way around the car.
Good old Tony, if I was in the trenches that’s who I would want beside me.”
Draw your own metaphors and analogies.
To keep in the loop in the afternoon sign up here for our special election 2016 email, the Campaign catchup, a quick read on the campaign news of the day, delivered every afternoon.
On the campaign trail
Malcolm Turnbull’s campaign had moved to Sydney by Tuesday afternoon and will be in the strategic western suburbs on Wednesday while Bill Shorten’s campaign awoke once again in Townsville.
The race you should be paying attention to right now
Barnaby Joyce was out campaigning in Queensland yesterday, an effort to help the “toff” Turnbull, as the Courier-Mail put it, but thing are not well for him in his own seat.
New England in northern NSW is shaping up as a fierce contest between Joyce, and his predecessor, the independent candidate Tony Windsor.
Windsor retired in 2013 and Joyce was easily elected without serious opposition. Windsor had won New England with relative ease against weaker Nationals opponents before 2013. Both candidates have won New England easily in the past but never in a tight contest.
And another thing(s)
David Marr has written about what this election means, what will change at the end of this gruelling campaign? Not much apparently.
Government should be so easy in this prosperous, orderly country. But it is remarkably hard. Parliaments are short. Leaders don’t last. Power is fragmented. This is the land of unfinished political business.
Each election campaign is much like the last. Only the faces change.”
Laura Tingle has been very impressed with Chris Bowen’s performance and writes in the Australian Financial Review that Labor is “creaming” the government when it comes to policy in this election campaign so far.
Bowen is one of those Labor frontbenchers who speaks with the confidence and authority of someone who has recently done the actual job in government – he was after all, however, briefly, Labor’s last treasurer before the 2013 election defeat.
Scott Morrison, by comparison, has had three jobs in three years and still talks like he has left his freshly painted framework of policy principles out on the back verandah to dry off.”
The Greens are snapping at the heels of Labor seats, particuarly in Sydney where electoral redistributions have put Anthony Albanese’s seat of Grayndler at risk. There is a ripple effect too, as Michelle Grattan writes in the Conversation.
Albanese is one of the best ‘retail’ politicians in the parliament. They are much in demand by their respective sides to campaign in the marginal seats. But each is having to spend more time than is ideal defending his home turf.
In the enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend moment of the day
Front page of The Daily Telegraph. Tele endorses Albo to stop loony Greens in Grayndler #auspol pic.twitter.com/uhzO14Ckb2
— Christopher Dore (@wrongdorey) May 10, 2016
Updated
