And now, until early tomorrow – take care of you.
Updated
(Oh, one more post, because I missed this from Naaman Zhou.)
A New South Wales Liberal candidate has disavowed social media posts that expressed support for repealing the right of gay couples to adopt, and warning against Muslim immigration.
Allan Green, the Liberal candidate for Greenway in Sydney’s west, said the posts – which were made when he was a candidate for the Christian Democratic Party – did not reflect his personal views.
In 2012, Green shared a letter written by a Christian pastor to the Sydney Morning Herald that said “the Islamic community has grown to 800,000 in Australia”. “Our national leaders must exercise foresight and act now to keep Australia the way we know it; otherwise who is to say what the result will be in the years to come when the Islamic community has achieved a population growth into millions of residents,” the letter said.
In a post from 2015, Green shared a “Christian values checklist” from the CDP during the 2015 state election.
The checklist listed values such as “stopping taxpayer funding of obscene homosexual Mardi Gras”, “repealing homosexual adoption and refusing homosexual fostering” and “repealing [the] same-sex & defacto relationship register”.
Only the CDP was awarded ticks for all these boxes – with the Liberal party given question marks or crosses.
On Sunday, Green told Guardian Australia he did not personally believe in any of the sentiments expressed.
“I don’t support those comments personally,” he said. “I was a CDP candidate then and I don’t personally hold those viewpoints … In that situation you are tied to the policies of the party. It isn’t necessarily a personal viewpoint. I wish everybody the best. I haven’t got any ill will to anybody.”
He said he supported the policies of Scott Morrison, including on immigration.
“I support the platform of the government. I support the open immigration policy of the Liberal government.”
“Immigration is good for the country, we should share our wealth with the rest of the world,” he added.
Green said the Liberal party was aware that he had been a CDP candidate before he was preselected, and he intended to remain as the candidate.
“They know I was a CDP candidate,” he said. “I don’t support those viewpoints [in the posts]. It was in the process of a campaign and I don’t personally hold those viewpoints.
“I certainly intend to stay as the Liberal candidate. I don’t believe there is any conflict between me and their platform.”
Updated
And with that, we are going to bring the blog to a close.
It looks like Labor is on its way to Sydney this afternoon, but I am also told another visit out west, to WA, is very much on the cards.
It looks like the Liberals will spend the evening in Melbourne.
There are six days left, so not a minute can be wasted from now on. Pay attention to where the campaigns head to – it can often say more than any announcement or any ‘insider’ take.
Murph will have analysis on the launch very soon and Sarah Martin is working on the news take, so keep an eye out for that.
Thank you so much for choosing to spend your Sunday with us – we really, really appreciate it. We’ll be back early tomorrow morning.
As always, take care of you. We’ll see you soon.
Updated
Meanwhile, Marise Payne was on Sky, talking gender quotas:
.@MarisePayne on gender quotas: If we’re successful in some of these key seats in the election, then I think you’ll see a very noticeable shift in the numbers of women in our parliament. We should look at all options.
— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) May 12, 2019
MORE: https://t.co/cnxAXrLKY3 #weekendlive pic.twitter.com/BzwuuQItV8
And he finishes with this:
There is a big difference that each vote makes at this election. We have to make it crystal clear.
Vote Labor for action on climate change.
Vote Labor for cheaper childcare.
Vote Labor for better schools, hospitals, TAFEs and universities.
... Vote Labor for secure jobs and decent wages.
Vote Labor for real change, to put an end to the chaos and to bring the fair go back.
The next three years depends upon the next six days.
Let us make every minute count.
Let us bring this home.
Updated
Shorten continues:
This nation is like a nation with the door ajar. And do we go through that door into a bolder, brighter, bigger future? Or do we stay on this side of it? And it is whether or not we, in our movement, can help move the door open to that brighter future, which we’ve outlined.
We all know that every vote is important, in every seat. We understand the difference. We understand what is at stake.
Progress is never given from those who have great sums of power. Progress is argued for, advocated for and voted for. We know what is on the line for Australia. We understand there’s no second prize for Australia.
We understand we have to use every single minute, every moment that we have, to make sure that everyone understands there is a choice.
Updated
Shorten:
Tell them that we are not a collection of individuals, but we are a team. That we work together for the interests of the people, and beyond that – tell them that we are thinking about not just Monday, or Tuesday of next week, not just the next poll, we’re thinking about the future of Australia.
We’re thinking about the country in which you will raise your children and in which you will grow old. Thinking about whether or not our kids get to see the environmental beauties that we get to see. Thinking about how to make sure that our daughters get paid the same as our sons when they grow up.
We’re thinking about how to include properly in partnership, our First Australians.
We’re thinking that when you go to work, you shouldn’t have to spend all of your wages on childcare so you go to work.
We’re thinking that pensioners, people who don’t have massive share portfolios and assets, they’ve got a tight good oral dental hygiene, too.
We are thinking about the people. We’re a party borne from the people and the working experiences of the people of this nation, and we are consistent to the values which have driven us for 120 years.
But we understand, at long last in this election, it is a time for the choice.
Updated
Shorten:
But we need, and I say to women and men in Australia – we need you to make this choice, too.
And this is where everyone comes in. There are six days to go. I can guarantee you that there are people out there who haven’t made up their mind. Although, clearly a lot have and we like the early voting!
But what I say to you is that there are plenty of people out there still to make up their mind. I can promise you, if you walked not far from here, down to the heart of my electorate, you won’t have to walk too far to hear someone say they’re not sure. They haven’t made up their mind, finally.
You’ll hear some Australians say that it doesn’t make a difference, that our system is broken. What we need to do is explain to these people that for six years, the Labor party has learned its lessons. That we’re more united than we’ve ever been in contemporary history. We have the most talented front bench in generations.
Updated
Shorten:
I make a choice that we treat women equally to men, not just preselection, but in opportunity, in pay, in freedom from family violence. I can make this choice.
Labor can make these choices. Because we understand that the Australian people, the sum of the greater Australian people is greater than the parts of this tawdry Liberal-National government going forward.
We choose everyday Australian households over the top tier of income. We choose to look after our pensioners, not those who are already very comfortable. We choose to look after our regions as much as our cities. We choose to look after public transport as well as roads.
We choose to make sure that wherever you are in this country, when you’re in the fight of your life, dealing with cancer, we choose to stand alongside you. Cancer can make you sick, but it should not make you poor.
Updated
Bill Shorten:
So, friends, this is an election where the nation makes a decision. We can make the decision to embrace the next decade of our century with hope, not fear. With optimism, not pessimism.
With a sense of looking forward, not looking back. With a sense of including all of us, not leaving people behind.
In the campaign, as a leader, you make choices about where you go, and what you do and what you say.
We’re already 20% of the way through a new century. This country needs to do better for all Australians. Therefore, I make a choice to back in low-paid Australians over the very wealthy. I make a choice, to reform the tax system, the intergenerational tax scam against our young and our fixed income earners.
... I, and we and Labor makes a choice to say to our fellow Australians – that the future is not too hard for real action on climate change. Instead, we say we can do this together for the future generations.
Updated
He turns his attention to Clive Palmer and Pauline Hanson:
We’ve already seen the power that the hardcore, rightwing base of the Liberal party have over their politics and their policy. Just imagine that. The most rightwing Liberal party that we’ve seen in many decades, combined with the extremism of One Nation and the chaos of Clive Palmer.
I mean, the Liberals and the Nationals have a gaping void where their policy agenda should be. So it will be Clive Palmer and Pauline Hanson and all of the rag-tag extremists who trail in their wake. They will be filling that vacuum.
The billionaire businessman will be setting tax policy. Who knows, may be in charge of workers’ entitlements too.
The anti-vaxxers will be managing the health budget.
The tin conspiracy theorists, they’ll be dictating climate policy. Mind you – they already are!
One Nation, well they could be in charge of multiculturalism.
This, humorous as it sounds, this anti-fairness alliance, this Coalition of chaos will be signing off cuts to every facet of the Australian way of life.
Updated
Shorten:
Friends, the risk posed by three more years of the Liberals and Nationals is not just, though, the danger of drift and decay. It is the cumulative effect that nine years of cuts will have on our hospitals, on our schools, on our wages, on our standard of living and our way of life. On our egalitarian proposition.
It is the danger of nine years wasted arguing about the climate change, instead of doing something about it. Nine years if they get re-elected.
It’s the damage that will be done on the fabric of the nation if the government policy in the Senate is dictated by Clive Palmer and Pauline Hanson.
Just imagine it!
Updated
Shorten:
Many years ago, Australia took another way of a strong safety net. Where going to work for hours did not mean still living in poverty.
It is not the Australian way, and we will make sure that we don’t go down that path any further than we already have in the last six years.
But, of course, friends, perhaps the clearest choice, the clearest impact of three more years of this current Coalition of chaos, the clearest choice in the closing week of the election, is it means three more years of delay and denial and dysfunction on climate change.
Under this government, carbon pollution has gone up. If this government is re-elected, more carbon pollution will be produced and it will go up again.
This will inflict damage on our environment that cannot be undone. The cost of inaction grows if you have more inaction. Friends – let us make it very clear to every Australian we talk to between now and the election – the only way the Liberals will learn to take climate change seriously is to lose this election.
Updated
Shorten:
When our hospitals and our doctors and our nurses and our orderlies and our staff are already under pressure from six years of Liberal cuts.
Three more years of cuts will mean more patients waiting longer in emergency. More stress and strain for nurses. Longer waiting lists for knee operations, for hip replacements, for cataracts.
When public schools are already struggling. Three more years of cuts will mean that children with special needs will get left behind. That parents of kids with special needs are made to feel isolated, simply demanding a better go for their kids. It will mean schools in the bush, overcrowded schools in the rapidly expanding suburbs, in the now disadvantaged suburbs, missing out.
A two-tier education system in this nation. It will mean more of teachers and parents digging deeper in their own pocket to fund everything from musical instruments, to the camps, to the things which every Aussie kid should take for granted. Every parent should know that their kids should be able to enjoy ... At a time when wages growth is already at historic lows and insecurity at work is already at historic highs.
Three more years of rightwing ideology and industrial relations. It will mean more cuts to penalty rates. More ways for suppression. More moves to take Australia down the American road, where people work two or three jobs with no security.
Let me be clear, friends – there is much to love and admire about the mighty United States, but the Medicaid system and the wages system is not for us.
Updated
Shorten continued:
But if this Coalition of chaos was to creep into minority government, propped up by their unsavoury allies in the far right of the Australian political [establishment], if this Coalition of chaos, who finds this election an interruption to the civil war they really desperately want to continue amongst themselves, if this bunch of misfits and no-hopers and lack of vision operators, who see government as their privilege – who see government as a right because they’re the Liberal party, because they’re born to rule – if they have three more years, it means three more years lost to the nation. And make no mistake – nations cannot afford to fall off the pace.
And make no mistake – just because our opponents are offering the most threadbare cynical set of policies in the history of modern Australia, it does not mean that it is all “harmless”.
Their agenda may be shallow. But it holds great risk, great danger for the nation. Because in a world which is changing faster and faster and faster than at any time before, more of the same doesn’t actually mean that you stand still. The world doesn’t owe Australia a living. More of the same means Australia goes backwards.
Updated
Looks like he is winding up here:
As we enter the last week, Labor can deliver the trifecta. Better schools and hospitals and infrastructure. A fairer tax system for working class and middle class people. And bigger budget surpluses into the future.
Friends, we have the better plans, because we’ve been doing the work, because we are positive of inclination, not pessimistic and negative like this government. But all of this progress, all of this opportunity, all of this real help with the real cost of living challenges of millions of Australian families, all of these investments in the future of our country – all of this is possible if you vote for Labor, if you vote for real change.
Updated
Shorten:
This is what my united and talented Labor team are offering the nation. Not just a positive plan for the next decade and beyond, but a concrete, fully costed, fully funded plan to take us there.
Because of our reforms, because we’ve made the big decisions, we have the best set of books in this election, because we’re not going to allow multinational tax minimisers to treat Australian tax laws like a doormat and a matter of convenience as they walk out the door with the taxes they should be paying here.
Updated
Shorten:
Well, on behalf of millions of Australians who are counting upon a Labor plan, a Labor vision, who are counting upon a government who is working for the people, who stands alongside the people, we are very clear. Our country deserves better than the government we’ve currently got.
Our country can do better than what the Liberal and the Nationals ... as Clive Palmer and One Nation can do.
Our country can do better than this, and our country deserves better than the chaos of the Coalition.
... I’ll tell you what our country deserves – the worker, the millions of wage and salary earners. They deserve a pay rise.
Our schools and our TAFE and our universities deserve proper funding. Hospitals deserve more resources.
Australian families deserve cheaper and more quality childcare.
Three million pensioners and commonwealth seniors card holders, they deserve help with their dental care.
And Victoria deserves a fair go on its infrastructure, as we’ve outlined today.
... And every Australian, including the next generation of Australians, every Australian deserves real action on climate change. And the environment.
Updated
Shorten:
Because Scott Morrison has nothing positive to say. He’s got no policies for families. No plan for wages. No vision for our nation. And he has no faith in the Australian people – a respect for people’s intelligence.
There’s no trust in people’s capacity to make a judgment about the future of the country by presenting competing visions. More importantly, his whole case for re-election, his entire argument for three more years, the sole basis for which he justifies voting for the government – it all boils down to one basic idea.
He expects our fellow Australians to believe that everything is fine as it is. No need to change, he would say.
In fact, he wants to tell you that you’ve never had it so good. In the debate, he remarkably said that your childcare is getting cheaper. He said that your cancer treatment is free.
He says young people have never found it easier to buy their first home. He says that schools and TAFE and teachers and hospitals and nurses, they’ve got money to burn.
And he says there’s no need to act on climate change – he’s got that all under control. In fact, he believes that the only thing that this country actually needs – the only thing missing in his picture of perfection, is a $77bn giveaway to the highest income earners. And he probably does think because he said it 250 times, that an $80bn handout to big business and the big banks is a pretty good idea, too.
So essentially, after six years, this is all that the Liberals have to say for themselves. Tax cuts for the top end of town, and everything else and everyone else can move along, nothing to see here, ladies and gentlemen of Australia!
Move along, we just want to keep doing our deals behind the scenes, representing the vested interest – not working on behalf of the people of Australia. Move along, that’s what he’d say.
Updated
Shorten:
Now earlier this week my opponent made a song and dance saying that the Liberal party launch won’t be about the Liberal party.
Fair enough! But unlike a lot of what he says, that actually did make a kind of sense. I mean, first of all, there are lots of people in the Liberal party who can’t stand to be in the same sitting, let alone the same room.
I want to say a cheerio to Julie Bishop – I hope you’re enjoying doing something else! But then there’s a second group, of course.
There’s the remaining Liberals. If they haven’t already left parliament, that’s the ones who haven’t left parliament of course.
The ones who are there. Hello Julia Banks. These ones are too dodgy, too toxic, too incompetent, to be let out in public.
Now, seriously, with six days to go, there is more chance of the Tassie tiger holding a press conference than the current minister for the environment.
And third – we all know that today’s event will be like every other minute of every other day of my opponent’s campaign.
It won’t be about the Liberal party – it will be about the Labor party. It will be about us.
Updated
Bill Shorten:
Friends, as you know, our modest gathering is not the only gathering in town. I understand that the Liberal party launch is in town today. Now, I am reliably informed that tens of thousands of Melburnians were too scared to go out to dinner last night in Melbourne in case they ran into Peter Dutton!
Updated
Shorten:
And to our Premier of Victoria, Dan Andrews – Dan, I am so pleased that you and me and Albo, that we’ve worked together in a once in a generation infrastructure plan for Victoria.
This includes our new roads package in the south-east. A better deal for Endeavour Hill and Cranbourne, and completing the ring road between the Eastern Freeway and the M80. We’ll have new park and ride facilities for commuters right across the suburbs, so people can use the railway system.
We’ll upgrade Bendigo and Ballarat airports. We’ll have commonwealth dollars for the Metro Tunnel.
And on Mother’s Day, we will have the mother of all infrastructure progress – our new commitment to suburban rail. A game changer for Melbourne and Victoria.
... Some of you might know that I grew up in Murrumbeena. I went to Monash University. I remember watching the bus from Huntingdale railway station, and people were always saying, the government were going to put a train in here for university. It’s still not there.
But in fact, what’s even more interesting, is where we live, just down the road, there was some open park land that extended all the way from Oakleigh railway straight right around to Camwell.
And this open land has actually once been a railway line for three years in the 1890s. A circular rail.
It shut in 1893 and every government had spoken about it in Victoria and nationally, even before Federation, right up to the modern day. But at long last, with a genuine partnership between the Labor government in Victoria, and a Labor government nationally, we are going to deliver the Suburban Rail Link.
It will stretch right around our city. We will finally defeat the proposition that to get anywhere else in Melbourne, you have to go into the middle.
Now, as Dan has said before, we might not be the government when this project finishes, but we will be the government that made a start on this state-building exercise, and that’s what Labor is doing ... Labor governments get on with the work. We build for the future.
We’d rather swing the shovel than cut the ribbon. Dan, if I am elected prime minister, I am looking forward to working together to make sure that Victoria gets a fair go from Canberra after six long years.
Updated
Shorten:
You know, right across the board, the choice between our united Labor team, the talented Labor team, and our opponents is a study in contrasts.
But I cannot think of a more straight forward choice that highlights the difference than Labor’s offering Tanya Plibersek as deputy prime minister of Australia, or Michael McCormack?
Updated
ABC is showing some of Bill Shorten’s speech from earlier:
Wouldn’t it be great to see these faces in the federal parliament? Part of the first government in commonwealth in the nation’s history, nationally, to have 50% women? Let’s give them all a round of applause.
Well, friends, we’re down to the last six days now. After six years of cuts to schools and hospitals, six years of delay and denial and dysfunction on climate change, six years of chaos and paralysis and infighting and instability in government ranks, there are now six days to win this election. To end the chaos and change the country for the better.
... Australians are tuning in. People are making up their minds. In the final sprint to the finish line, the choice becomes clearer every day.
On one hand, three more years like the last six. Or on the other hand – real change for the better with a new Labor government on May 18.
This is the message that all of us need to drive home to people every chance we get between now and 6pm on May 18. You know the message – vote for change, vote Labor. End the chaos, vote Labor.
I too acknowledge the traditional owners of this lands. I pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging. And I also, today, want to wish a very happy Mother’s Day to the mums here who are with us today, and indeed, to all our mums who have always been with us.
And can I say a special thank you to Chloe. A wonderful mother and an amazing wife.
And ... if you’ll forgive me, too, I’d like to give a shout out to my twin brother, Robert. Happy birthday, Robert!
I’m genuinely happy to be here in Victoria. And after a long campaign, back home in Moonee Ponds where I live, I’m so proud to be joined by this all-star Labor line-up. Gee, we’ve got so many smart and passionate people running for Labor, determined to make this a better country.
But in particular, can I acknowledge Tanya Plibersek?
Updated
And as we told you a little earlier, in a somewhat cheeky move, Bill Shorten held his own campaign rally in Melbourne today, at the same time as the Liberal party was launching its campaign.
Labor are calling it the ‘final week rally’.
Question: Your path to victory is very narrow. There are opportunities, as you say. Do you have enough opportunities to offset the losses that might come?
Birmingham: I don’t concede that there will be losses that come. But we absolutely see...
Question: There are some...
Birmingham:
We can see seats that we can take off the Labor party, as well as seats that we’re defending. That’s what makes this a competitive race. I know that at the start of the campaign, Mr Shorten and others thought that this was a coronation election, and that he was just going to move straight into the Lodge.
That’s proven not to be case as he’s been shown up to not be across the detail, to be unwilling to talk about the costs of his policies and the impacts they will have on retirees, on homeowners, on all of those who will pay higher taxes.
It’s been shown up time and time again, and that has helped to create the circumstance where we go into the final week with everybody knows it’s a close race, and that everybody should think very hard about the choice in that contest.
Question: You’re absolutely in it to win it, and yet, you may or may not be aware that there are people in your own ranks who say things like “an acceptable result” for Scott Morrison under the circumstances in which he found himself is is an honourable loss – one with a number of seats in the high 60s, for instance. Is that something you’re prepared to countenance – an honourable defeat, but one that just fell a fraction short?
Birmingham:
No, because the only result that’s going to be acceptable to Australians is the re-election of the Liberal-National government with Scott Morrison at the helm. That’s the only way that Australians can guarantee the strong economy, lower taxes, targeted, careful, prudent investment and to help first home-buyers get a house. To tackle youth suicide, deal with mental health and create more apprenticeships, all without the taxes that targets retirees and homeowners and those saving for the future.
Updated
Question: We heard references specifically to Deakin, to Casey. What is the latest you’re picking up on the belt of seats, particularly through the eastern side of Melbourne?
Birmingham: I think that there were references to seats, to members, to locations right around the country. This is a national campaign.
Question: Particularly Victoria, though.
Birmingham:
We have to make sure that we win everywhere. The campaign headquarters is based in Queensland. The first debate happened in WA. Scott Morrison is from New South Wales. And here we are doing the campaign launch in Victoria. Everywhere matters to this election. We want to make sure that we hold every Liberal-National seat around the country. We see many opportunities to be able to win seats off the Labor party.
Question: So where?
Birmingham:
Well, there are certainly opportunities in terms of Tasmania and the Northern Territory, parts of regional Queensland, parts of suburban and regional New South Wales. These are all key areas, and I think the message for every Australian as we head into the last week is: this is going to be a close election. Every seat is going to count. Every vote is going to matter. And people genuinely have the power themselves to determine whether they get Scott Morrison – lower taxes and a stronger economy – or Bill Shorten – higher taxes and fewer jobs in the future.
Updated
Question: Can you confirm that it hasn’t been budgeted in the federal costings?
Birmingham: We made clear that there was already money, significant money, provisioned for this project, and, of course, as with everything we do, it will be fully costed.
Question: It’s not in the budget papers, is it?
Birmingham: No, in the contingencies and so on, this project has been provisioned in the past, consistently, because the money has always been there. We’re now making sure that it’s a different model and approach. Hopefully to secure it.
Question: But it is not there by name in the budget papers?
Birmingham: It is there in terms of being provisioned as part of the contingencies.
Question: You’ve also put $4bn towards a project that the state premier says won’t be built. Why would you do that?
Birmingham:
Because this is about delivering for the people of Melbourne, and particularly the people in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, the type of congestion-busting, life-changing infrastructure that we’re seeing being built elsewhere in the country. We hope and ask that the Victorian government reconsider. We’re putting a new offer forward in terms of how it could be done, in a way without them having to stump up as much cash as they have in the past, because we want to see that infrastructure delivered so that people get home faster, so that people get to work faster, so people get to spend more time with their families and less time stuck in cars.
Question: We know how much the commonwealth is putting on the tail. How much is it that you would reasonably expect from a Victorian Labor government?
Birmingham: Let’s have proper negotiations there around what type of model they might be willing to come to the table with.
Question: What if it was zero?
Birmingham:
There are different scenarios that could be countered in terms of potential private sector support for delivery of this. Ideally, of course, the Victorian Labor government would not have gone down the path of axing this project, of wasting $1bn in doing so, when the Labor government was elected here. They did. That’s in the past. We want to look to the future. We want to work cooperatively with Dan Andrews to see the project realised, because it will make a difference to the lives of many Victorian families.
Updated
Question: Can we pick up on the home ownership because you’ve spoken already about defining the role of government – the size of government, where and when it is and isn’t appropriate. And yet, this is a pretty direct intervention into the mortgage market on face value, isn’t it? Why, is the question. Why is the government seeing a role for itself in this deposit scheme?
Birmingham:
Because it goes very much to the core of traditional Liberal values – of wanting to help people establish their own economic security. We know that buying a home is one of the best things that people can do to set themselves up for the future. And we know, and we hear on the ground, that getting to that 20% deposit target is a real challenge for many young Australians in getting themselves set up.
That’s why we made the changes over the last couple of years to enable people to use superannuation as a vehicle for saving for that deposit.
We still think that we would be able to do more. Not to be able to give away money, but to be able to just help people access the loans required to be able to then buy their first home so that they don’t have to wait so long to build the 20% deposit, but to get there sooner, quicker and, therefore, of course, be able to start paying that loan and building the equity in their future.
(So I guess subsidising the private sector when it comes to childcare wages is a big no-no, but subsidising loans through a guarantee is cool beans.)
Updated
Question: It was very much focused on Scott Morrison, the man. Was this a tactic so that we voters out there forget what preceded August?
Birmingham:
Well, it’s about the future. I mean, at this election, come next week, we will have one of two people as prime minister of Australia. We’ll either have Scott Morrison or we will have Bill Shorten. And that is the choice for the next three years, and potentially beyond.
And there’s a very stark choice when you look at the policy differences between the two competing teams.
You heard the prime minister today outlining strong plans for how it is we keep the economy strong, continue to generate jobs. A further 1.25 million jobs in the future.
How we reform the tax system to help keep that economy strong, but to give people more incentive to work harder, better opportunities to get ahead, as well as the plans for targeted investments to help young Australians buy their first home. To ensure that we deal with the scourge of youth suicide.
These are strong plans for the future. But they’re careful plans for the future as well, and that’s the contrast to the very reckless spending plans of Mr Shorten.
Updated
The Coalition campaign spokesman, Simon Birmingham, is giving his debrief on the launch to the ABC:
Question: We were commenting before your arrival, the strong and almost folksy theme of the storytelling around the launch, it was, to borrow a phrase, the “ScoMo show”.
Birmingham:
Well, it’s about connecting with Australians. Australian families and households and the choices and the challenges that they face. And we know that Australian families don’t see government as being the solution to all their woes.
They want government to be there when required – in times of drought or flood. To help them get ahead. To provide the safety nets. To provide the lifesaving medicine that they need.
But they don’t want government or believe that government can go on a reckless, big-spending binge, and can solve their problems by taxing them more or by taxing their neighbours more.
Updated
So I am hearing from the room that it is straight back into campaigning.
The Morrison bus peeps have had the hurry up to get back on the bus.
Updated
The ABC has confirmed that Bill Shorten will skip what has become an Australian election tradition – a National Press Club address.
There weren’t a lot of Liberal prime ministers in that speech and room – but it looks like there were some parallels to one of Labor’s most famous prime ministers in that speech:
Scott Morrison has just drawn from the Bob Hawke 1987 election speech:
— Tim Beshara (@Tim_Beshara) May 12, 2019
This is the promise of Australia.
This is the Australian vision.
This is the reality of the Australian dream.
Together, let us begin a new century of Australian achievement. https://t.co/4TM3yOyZGk
Bob Hawke in 1987:
And sure, we have Australian achievements – splendid achievements – to celebrate.
But we Australians have mistakes to rectify, amends to make and wrongs to put right if Australia is to achieve its full promise of what it can be and should be – simply the best and fairest nation on earth.
So let’s use this election as a springboard to the future – towards the promise of the future.
It is a promise of what can be achieved in our time, for this generation and for the generations to come –
- By a free, proud, independent, intensely individualistic, uniquely diverse people
- Yet a united people
- A people who want a fair go for themselves and their families
- But just as much, a fair go for all their fellow citizens, for all their fellow Australians
- For their own children, their own families – but for all Australian children, all Australian families
- For all members of this great Australian family.
This is the promise of Australia.
This is the Australian vision.
This is the reality of the Australian dream.
Together, let us begin a new century of Australian achievement.
- A new century of opportunity – of even greater equality of opportunity for all.
- To make the best country in the world an even better, fairer Australia.
Australia will win through.
Let’s see it through –
Together.
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It looks like Labor is on its way to Western Australia as the last week of the campaign gets under way.
It’s just made an announcement to give $30m for the Waca stadium redevelopment.
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I have to say, it is refreshing to be able to give details of a major government policy this election campaign, instead of just reporting its comments against Labor policies.
From the Liberal party statement on the first home owner’s policy Scott Morrison announced today:
Complementing our First Home Super Saver Scheme, the First Home Loan Deposit Scheme will mean first home buyers won’t need to save for a full 20 per cent deposit, so Australians can get a loan and into the market faster. The Scheme will also help first home buyers save around $10,000 by not having to pay Lenders Mortgage Insurance.
The First Home Loan Deposit Scheme will be available to first home buyers who have been able to save for a deposit of at least 5 per cent.
While our First Home Super Saver Scheme has been about helping boost the savings of first home buyers and making buying a house more affordable, the new First Home Loan Deposit Scheme will help people achieve their goals years earlier.
We want to help make the dreams of first home buyers a reality.
The First Home Loan Deposit Scheme, which will start on 1 January next year, will be targeted towards first home buyers earning up to $125,000 annually or $200,000 for couples. The value of homes that can be purchased under the Scheme will be determined on a regional basis, reflecting the different property markets across Australia.
The National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation will partner with private lenders to deliver the First Home Loan Deposit Scheme, prioritising smaller lenders to boost competition.
We will also invest $25 million in the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation to establish the Scheme and develop the expertise to conduct comprehensive research into housing demand, supply and affordability in Australia. The outcome of that research will be key to ensuring owning your own home stays within the reach of most Australians.
As well as the new First Home Loan Deposit Scheme and First Home Super Saver Scheme, our government is taking a comprehensive approach to housing affordability by:
- Investing $1 billion in local infrastructure to unlock new housing supply in partnership with local councils through the National Housing Infrastructure Facility.
- Setting up the first affordable housing bond aggregator to drive efficiencies and cost savings in the provision of affordable housing by community housing providers.
- Releasing suitable Commonwealth land, including defence land, for housing development.
- Making it easier to get from home to school and work and back with our $100 billion investment in congestion-busting transport infrastructure putting more affordable housing options within reach for first home buyers.
- Reducing barriers for older Australians to downsize to free up larger homes for families, which commenced on 1 July 2018.
- Stopping foreign investors from getting a free ride on the Australian housing market, and making sure they are paying the tax they owe.
- Investing over $7 billion in housing funding and homelessness services, with the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement (NHHA) commencing on 1 July 2018 in partnership with the States and Territories.
- Providing $4.5 billion in Commonwealth rent assistance annually.
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From the launch:
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Anyone who was watching that launch could be excused for thinking that the Coalition has only been in power since August – all the mentions, the policies, the achievements, were largely framed around Scott Morrison’s leadership and the direction he has taken the party in, since he took over the leadership from Malcolm Turnbull.
There are standing ovations and Morrison’s family joins him on stage, along with Josh Frydenberg and his family, and the Nationals leadership team, Michael McCormack and Bridget McKenzie.
But it is safe to say that the Liberal launch was all about Scott Morrison and his presidential campaign for the prime ministership beyond 18 May.
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Scott Morrison concludes his speech:
So the election, friends, is about a choice.
The choice of who you can trust to keep the promise of Australia to all Australians as prime minister – myself or Bill Shorten.
The choice between a government that knows how to manage money, has returned the budget to surplus and will now pay down debt.
Or Bill Shorten and Labor, whose reckless spending and higher taxes will put all of that risk at the worst possible time. There are storm clouds and tensions ahead.
The choice between a government that will ensure you keep more of what you earn or Bill Shorten and Labor that will hit you and weaken our economy which impacts all 25 million Australians with $300bn in new and higher taxes.
The choice between a stronger economy under my government that can guarantee funding, real funding, for hospitals, schools and roads, and Labor who always runs out of money and always comes after yours.
And the choice between a prime minister and myself who just wants to back, acknowledge and cheer on the decent and simple and honest aspirations of Australians. And Bill Shorten, who just wants to tax all of those aspirations more.
So together, my whole team, with my whole team, we’re asking Australians for your support next Saturday.
To vote Liberal and to vote Nationals. So together we can build our economy, to secure your future and so we can keep the promise of Australia to Australians in this generation and the next.
Thank you very much.
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Morrison:
Operation Sovereign Borders – I never get tired of referring to that because it remains one of our government’s significant achievements. It has been a privilege to have been a part of it with so many others, as I said before.
But Australians know this. Only the Liberals and Nationals could have stopped the boats. And only the Liberals and Nationals can be trusted to ensure they remain stopped.
And our Defence Forces can also continue to rely on the Liberals and Nationals. We set our commitment to restore defence spending from the 1.56%, and to get it back to 2% of GDP.
We said we’d do that and we will be doing it three years earlier than we promised in 2020 and 2021. And our plan will grow the permanent ADF workforce to 62,400 under our future plan over the decade, and more than that, provide them with a capability and equipment and the support they need to do the job.
So, in conclusion, with a stronger economy, the Liberals and the Nationals will deliver on our plan to create one and a quarter million more jobs and better paid jobs over the next five years, maintain the budget surpluses and pay down debt, deliver real tax relief for families and for small businesses, hard working, guarantee increased funding for schools, hospitals, medicines and roads, and keep Australians safe and keep our borders secure.
And we will do that on budget night without increasing your taxes.
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Morrison:
Finally, Australians know that the Liberals and Nationals can always be trusted to keep them safe and our borders secure.
I pay credit to Tony Abbott for that. I pay credit to Peter Dutton, who is here today, and has been keeping it going. You’ve done an outstanding job, Peter.
I tell you what, I know who’s going to be protecting the borders in my government next Sunday, if we’re elected – Bill Shorten still can’t tell you.
Our $328m women’s safety package, and I want to acknowledge Kelly O’Dwyer who has done great work on this. More shelter, more front-line services for women in these situations.
Well done to Christian Porter on working with that element of the program. Domestic violence leave legislated. And cultural change. That, together, we all must continue to lead. Now that brings our total investment in tackling the scourge of family violence, which is a bipartisan issue, it isn’t a partisan comment, we’ all working together on this, to more than $840m.
And we’re going to accelerate that work further in the next term under my leadership.
We have a plan, and Mitch [Fifield] knows all about this – to keep our kids safe online. Ensuring the big social media and technology companies are subject to the same rules and responsibilities that apply in the physical world. They must be. And if re-elected, I’ll be taking that campaign that we’ve already begun to the next G20 Leaders’ meeting up there in Japan in a few weeks.
So I’m asking you to send me there with a mission – to ensure that the big social media companies do the right thing by our kids and by our community.
And our security agencies will always get the resources and the laws that they need to keep Australians safe from terrorism. These agencies have thwarted 15 major terrorist attacks. They are modern heroes, and we thank them for everything they’ve done to keep us safe.
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Morrison continued:
I’m not going to do it by forcing our hardworking companies, whether they’re in central and north Queensland, or down in Tasmania, or out there at Wodonga, where I was there with the transport trucking company the other day, or over in the resources industry in Western Australia.
I’m not going to tell those companies that they have to send billions of dollars offshore in those foreign carbon credits, money, billions that should be spent here, on our jobs, on our wage increases for Australians.
On our greater and stronger businesses. I’m not going to do it by sending money offshore to make someone else’s economy stronger.
Our investments in Australia will be about making our economy stronger.
So we’ve presided in record investment in renewable energy. Twenty five billion dollars slated to occur from 2018 to 2020. Record levels of renewables in this country.
There are now 2.1 million households with solar panels. That’s up from less than one million when we were elected. I don’t know how Bill Shorten has gotten around the country and hasn’t seen 2.1 million houses.
Well done to Greg Hunt in particular on his work when he was environment minister, and the Great Barrier Reef taken off the endangered list, and record funding thanks to Josh [Frydenberg’s] time as environment minister.
And the local community’s environment fund, another initiative of Melissa [Price’s], and the $100m environment restoration fund is ensuring that we’re supporting practical works to improve the quality of local waterways, parks and beaches – which is where we live.
Finally, Australians, the girls will be happy to know – getting close to the end of the speech, darlings! You’ve been very patient!
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Morrison:
And, of course, there’s funding for targeted urban congestion projects, like widening Racecourse Road in Pakenham, and commuter car parks in Hurstville and Gosford and Penrith.
There’s bridges up there in Brisbane, and there’s the third crossing up there on the Hawkesbury in New South Wales. There’s $100bn of projects going forward. There’s regional roads. There’s airports. We’re building on the $46bn already invested by our government.
And our $3.5bn Climate Solutions package is taking real action on climate change. And I welcome Melissa [Price], and together with Angus [Taylor], we worked together on this package, on the Climate Solutions Package.
Real action on climate change, with practical emissions reducing activities. Especially working with farmers and Indigenous communities that will meet and beat our Kyoto 2020 targets by 367 million tonnes.
And we will also meet our 2030 targets as well with this clear plan we have set out – reducing – and for those who say is it enough? We will be reduce our emissions per capita by half. And our emissions intensity by two-thirds.
That’s all action on climate change, that we are doing our bit as we should, as a global citizen, but I’m not going to do it and put our kids’ economic futures at risk.
And I’ll tell you another thing – I’m not going to do it by telling you what car to drive. I wonder if he’s looked up the price of it yet!
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Morrison:
You know, it’s OK. It’s OK. Labor may choose to continue to ignore residents of eastern Melbourne. I’m not going to pick a fight with them about that.
They’ve made their choices about who they’re going to stand by. We’re not going to ignore the residents of eastern Melbourne struggling with road congestion. We’re going to stand by them, as these three particular members always have.
And by increasing our commitment in the way that Josh has set out this morning, this project can proceed without the need for the state government to divert resources from the many other projects that they have identified.
So taking no issue with that. But you know, when I’m going to invest federal funds in these projects at a state level, it needs to add value.
I’m not just going to fund things that the state government is already doing. I’m just not going to subsidise states for things they’re already doing. They should get on and they should do those things, and I welcome that.
And I will work with every single state and territory premier and chief minister, regardless of what side of politics they come from, to ensure that we deliver our infrastructure plans, and that is very much what has motivated me today with our members to put it forward in this way.
I accept that the Victorian government has not identified the East West Link as a priority for them. So just let us get on and do it.
How about that!
(I think that might be an attempt to get ahead of criticism coming out of Queensland, that this federal government isn’t investing the same in cross-river rail, the number one infrastructure priority in that state. The state government has said it will fund it, and Anthony Albanese has committed to kicking in more, while the Coalition has said that with the state funding it, they don’t need to.)
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Morrison:
Our national plan also recognises the importance of infrastructure to people’s lives and and to the economy.
The infrastructure plan is part of a broader plan to manage population growth, and Alan Tudge and David Coleman work together with our entire cabinet to pull together a population plan that, in addition to infrastructure, includes keeping migration under control, which we must do.
Investing in programs to ensure we support migrants to settle successfully here in our country, and maintain the social cohesion in our communities that is the pride of the world, and working with state as we did, as I brought premiers and chief ministers together to have a planning framework, which means that we can plan better for population growth.
And that is why we will keep building the infrastructure Australia needs. The new Western Sydney International Airport up there in my home town, and Marise’s [Payne’s] home town, particularly in western Sydney.
The Bruce Highway up there in Queensland. The Melbourne Airport Rail Link here in Melbourne. The Tonkin Highway. The north-south corridor. The Bunteen Highway in the Northern Territory, and, Sarah [Henderson], the fast rail between Geelong and Melbourne.
So all those Cats supporters can get up to the game and back a lot quicker in the future. And, of course, our freight lines, as Michael [McCormack] knows, and our entire team knows, is so important to keeping our rural and regional economies to getting the products to market.
It’s also why today, and I know that Michael Sukkar will be pleased about this, but as will Alan Tudge and the Speaker – today we’re renewing and upgrading our commitment to the East West Link.
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Morrison:
Now to ensure young Australians reach their full potential, we’ll continue to make record investments in education, won’t we, Dan [Tehan]? From early childhood, to education, to university.
Alright, our government has increased funding for state public schools. You won’t hear this at a Labor launch.
Our government has increased funding for state public schools by more than 60%. And over the next decade, primary and secondary school funding will grow by 62% on average for the almost four million students we expect to be in our government, Catholic and independent schools.
Our $310bn investment – which is backed by a stronger economy, not higher taxes – in Australian schools, is about ensuring students and parents and teachers have the information and the quality of tools that they need for a world class education system. An education that’s not just about how much you spend – it’s how you spend it. And to spend it well, you’ve got to know how to manage money.
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Morrison:
Having fully funded the NDIS, and you hear our story with our dear brother, Gary, having fully funded and increased the number of Australians supported by the NDIS from 30,000 to 280,000, my pledge and my commitment is to increase the number of Australians supported by the NDIS over the next five years to more than 500,000 Australians.
This will be alongside the royal commission that we established into the abuse of Australians with a disability.
And you know, those, as I said before, who have served our country and defended our values will always be and abiding focus for a Coalition government.
Our plan for veterans announced in this campaign includes our investment in six veteran wellbeing hubs around the country, including up at the Oasis in Townsville, where I couldn’t be more proud of our candidate, Phil Thompson, and the service that he’s given to our country and the service he now wants to give to our country and the parliament.
Or down there at the old Repat Hospital site in Adelaide, which Nicole Flint has been such an advocate for in Boothby and I know that South Australians are excited about that.
This builds on an investment in veteran investment which has cut waiting times for impairment almost by half.
But we know, and I want to assure you, and Darren Chester knows, that we know that that still is not good enough. And we have to double down on ensuring our vets just don’t get the memorials to their service that we bow to every Armistice Day and every Anzac Day, because they fought for us and they deserve it.
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Morrison:
And for women here today, mums, I am pleased to announce $53m in new measures today.
A new mums, dads and bubs cheque to tackle perinatal depression. This is a cause that’s close to our family, as it has hit too close to home. Too many parents suffer in silence.
We give patients with lymphodema subsidised compression garments.
Extra funding for the Australian Breastfeeding Association to help new mothers to support and assist the health and women and babies.
I know that Katie Allen loves this.
And I need Dr Katie Allen as my member for Higgins to help me implement this plan. You care about the children, our children’s health. Vote for Dr Katie Allen and get her on my team next Saturday.
(The camera pans to the crowd, but it looks like Dr Allen may have popped out, or the camera was in the wrong place, because it was an empty chair.)
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Morrison:
Friends, one in four young Australians experience mental ill-health each year. Suicide is the leading cause of death of our young people.
Jenny and I are making a commitment. I am making this commitment, to combat youth suicide as a national priority. It’s a curse on our nation and it’s a curse we must break together – 428 young lives lost last year.
And with every life lost, and we have all been touched by this in some way, shape or form, countless more lives shattered or damaged in their wake.
When Josh [Frydenberg] got up and announced the budget he knows there was no more measure that I was more passionate about than what has now become the $500m for youth mental health and suicide prevention with 30 new headspace centres. Headspace was established by the Liberal-National government. More counselling, particularly after disasters.
Reaching out, particularly into rural and regional Australia, where we know they are hurting badly.
Better treatment for early psychosis. Building up the mental health of our young people so they grow up healthy. More support, particularly for Indigenous youth, out there where we know they are taking their own lives.
And reducing the waiting list for these services. I want young Australians to be full of hope and living their life positively for the future. I am on a mission on this.
And, as Jenny knows, when I get determined I get very determined.
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Morrison:
And today I make this pledge and I challenge Bill Shorten to do the same, I make a pledge to the 13.5 million Australians with private health insurance there will be no private health insurance cuts under my government.
I will not punish Australians for taking responsibility for themselves and their families.
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Morrison:
Our plan for future health services built on our records of investment so far. And I commend Greg Hunt and Sussan Ley and Peter Dutton for the work they have done to achieve this, a 60% increase in hospital funding since we came to government.
A record in Medicare bulk billing rates of nearly 90%. Medicare has never been stronger or better funded than under this Liberal-National government.
More than 2,000 medicines subsidised to provide affordable access through our pharmaceutical benefits scheme. When Labor ran out of money they stopped listing medicines.
A doubling in the number of older Australians receiving in-home aged care packages and funding up by 50% and growing by $1bn every single year.
And us having the courage to put the aged care system to a royal commission to ensure that we value our older Australians and they get the best possible care, because we love them so dearly.
Our extra $31bn... Karen [Andrews] likes that one! So does Christian [Porter] .
Our extra $31bn for public hospitals over the next five years, which is in our budget, is equivalent to over 46 million emergency department services, 75 million outpatient services, and on a million knee replacements.
Over 35 million life changing diagnostic scans is our future plan, including MRI, Pap and CT scans, including for breast cancer, and it will be funded by Medicare up by 21 million under Labor.
Three thousand additional doctors and 3,000 additional nurses and allied health professionals are being placed in rural general practice over the next decade through our $550m stronger rural health strategy.
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Morrison:
The scheme will complement our first home supersaver scheme that remains and all the state-based schemes as well as the stuff from the beginning of next year.
And I’ll tell you what we won’t do, what we won’t do is undermine the value of the home you have saved so hard to buy.
What we won’t do is undervalue the home that you are paying your mortgage on. Or you are out there trying to save for your first home and are renting and we won’t put up your rent, by making the sweeping changes to negative gearing, abolishing it as we know it and increasing capital gains tax by 50%, as Labor will.
The last thing Australians, as Josh was saying, who are owning their own home or paying a mortgage, is for the home value to fall and the rent to increase.
But that is what Bill Shorten has got planned with his housing tax and he refused the other night to rule that out.
And you know why? Because he knows what the impact will be and he will not tell you what the price of Bill Shorten is.
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New first home owners scheme announced
Scott Morrison makes the first big announcement of this launch – a new first home owners’ scheme:
We need to go further. It’s hard to save for a deposit. Especially with the banks pulling back and larger deposits of 20% now being standard. It is not getting easier.
We want to help make the dreams of first home buyers a reality. So we have decided to go further at this election and to adopt a scheme, similar to what has been running for our Kiwi cousins in New Zealand for many years now, our new first home loan deposit scheme will allow them to buy their deposit of down to 5%. This will make a big difference, cutting the time taken to save for a deposit by at least half and more.
This will work by the government’s National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation. Supporting these first home borrowers.
They will include guarantees to approved applicants the additional loan amount taken out by the first home buyer to cover the difference between the lower deposit, say 5%, and the 20% of the value of the property.
This scheme would give preference to working with the smaller banks and the non-bank lenders to boost competition.
Of course, the lenders will still be there once lending the money. They will still do all the normal checks on the borrowers to make sure they can meet their repayments. This isn’t free money.
This scheme will be available to buyers with an income of up to $125,000 or a couple with $200,000, where they are both first home buyers.
Support would stay in place for the life of the loan and when they refinance in a few years’ time, when the equity increases, which it would under a Liberal-National government.
That is when the guarantee ceases. But they have their first leg on the first rung of the ladder.
And, you know, when you give Australians a go, they’ll get a go and they will have a go.
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Morrison:
I want more Australians to be able to realise the dream of owning their own home. We have already put strong foundations in place. A strong economy is, of course, critical to that.
There were 112,000 new first homeowners last year. That is a nine-year high. The measures so far have included allowing those first time savers to use their super fund to get a tax cut on their home deposit savings, meaning they can save up to 30% faster with exactly the same what they are taking out of their pay each week.
Restricting foreign ownership and new developments in real estate and real estate more generally.
We established the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation that is directly lending money at low rates to support affordable housing projects by community housing organisations.
And we are making more government land available, particularly defence land, for new housing, including more affordable housing projects.
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Morrison:
Achieved on a responsible timeline, fully funded, without reducing expenditure or increasing taxes on anyone else.
Because in our party you don’t have to hold someone down to let someone else go ahead. We believe that all Australians can succeed in this country. We don’t buy Labor’s politics of envy.
And because it’s fairer, those on the top tax rate they will pay their fair share, in fact, under this plan, those on the top marginal tax rate will go from paying just less than one third of all tax in this country to slightly over. 36%.
So it is fair too. A strong economy has enabled us to invest in the essential services that Australians rely on. And we have a plan to keep investing in those essentials for the future.
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Morrison:
We believe, as Liberals and Nationals, that you know what is right for you. Your family, and your business. We believe that you, Australians, are the answer to keeping our economy strong.
Those who believe in big taxing, big spending agendas, are not only prepared to experiment with our economy at a time when we can least afford it, they believe that they know better than you.
Step one of our lower tax plan for the future provides immediate tax relief for low and middle income earners earning up to $126,000 a year. That is up to $1,080 for singles and $2,000 for couples and families. Ten million Australians will benefit from that. Step two, this is a plan. This is how you have a plan to lower taxes.
Step two is to make our income tax system simpler and fairer by lifting the tax threshold for the 19th rate, don’t know many high incomers on 19 cents, up to $45,000 per year. That is who we are delivering it for. And abolishing the 37 tax rate in its entirety. The party’s already legislated. That means Australians only between $45,000 per year and $200,000 per year, in the future, will never face bracket creep again. So you can take on that extra shift. You can have a go for that promotion and take on that extra training. You can study at night. And you will not be penalised by our government with higher marginal tax rates. Particularly for young people going through that first 10 years of your working life. Every time you get ahead only to face higher marginal tax rates. That is what will hold you back. We are getting rid of that.
Step three is to cut the middle income tax rate for that group I just said, between $45,000 and $200,000. From 32.5 cents. That means under our plan 94% of working Australians will pay no more than 30 cents in the dollar is a marginal tax rate. That’s tax reform.
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Morrison:
Our government has restored our nation’s finances. We have turned that around.
We have kept our triple-A credit rating. We have handed down, well done Josh and the entire team, the first budget surplus in more than a decade stop back in the black. (Reminder it is a projected surplus)
And by staying on this path we will eliminate the debt within a decade without raising your taxes.
We have achieved this by getting spending growth under control, getting Australians off welfare and into work, and treating every dollar provided to us by the taxpayer. It’s what Liberals are Nationals do.
Central to our plan of keeping our economy strong is a plan to keep lowering taxes for hard-working Australians and small and medium-sized family businesses start making life just that little bit easier.
We believe you should keep more of what you earn, because your money is better off in your hands than the government’s.
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Morrison:
If you can’t manage money, you can’t run the country. Have you ever noticed this – how those who can’t manage money always end up spending more of it, and never spend it well?
What they say – those who can’t manage money – is what the costs will be if they’re game enough to tell you. That’s only just where it begins. The real cost comes after their big spending programs fall victim to incompetent administration.
We’ve seen it every time under Labor. School halls last time, pink batts, border protection failures. Welfare blowouts and rorting.
You know, Labor’s appetite for big spending always exceeds their competency to spend it wisely or properly. You know, that’s the “Bill” you really cannot afford.
And as we know, when Labor runs out of money, they always come running after yours soon after. So today I’m not getting into a spend-a-thon with Labor – they’re welcome to it.
Reckless spending is not a vision, Australians – it’s a burden on current and future generations. So I say to Australians – do not allow Labor’s reckless spending to start. Vote Liberal and Nationals next Saturday.
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Scott Morrison:
An all-time record! And as, in particular, the seven women in my cabinet know, female participation is at record highs under a Liberal-National government. Two hundred and thirty thousand new small and family businesses have been created.
Seventy per cent of our trade is now covered by export agreements, up from just 26% under Labor. And we have a plan to keep it that way.
A plan that will see 1.25 million more Australians get a job over the next five years. One in five of those jobs will be for younger Australians – a plan that will see another 250,000 small and family businesses open their doors during the next five years.
A plan that will give an additional 80,000 Australians a career by gaining an apprenticeship, and particularly out there in rural and regional areas, where we’re doubling down on ensuring that in regional areas we can get more apprentices.
A plan that will see 10,000 more Australian champion companies exporting beyond our shores by 2022, supported by export deals that then will cover around 90% of our trade.
That’s what an economic plan looks like.
To run a stronger economy, as Mathias Cormann knows, because he’s been doing it with us for the last six years, to run a stronger economy requires a government that knows how to manage money.
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Morrison:
So I want to talk to you a bit about the future today.
It’s what I want to focus on today – about how, together with Michael and the Nationals, together with Josh and our whole team and the whole team that’s with me here today, moving forward – that if you vote Liberal and Nationals next Saturday, which is what we’re asking you to do, this is how we’ll keep that promise.
You know, it all begins with keeping our economy strong. A stronger economy where people have the confidence to invest more, to employ more, to invent more, to work hard. Because people matter, as mum said – a stronger economy matters.
Because the economy is what people live in. It’s real. You know, countries with weak economies do not have good hospital systems. They do not have a reliable pension. They do not have affordable medicines. They do not have Medicare. They do not have Headspace.
They do not have a fully funded National Disability Insurance Scheme. They are not increasing investments in their public schools and aged care. By 2030, around 800,000 more Australians today will be on the aged pension. They’ll be depending on a stronger economy.
And under our government’s policies, as Josh has said – we have made our economy stronger, and we’ll continue to do so in the future.
Growth is higher. There are 1.3 million more Australians in jobs. Ninety five per cent of the jobs created in the past year have been full time.
Last financial year, more than 100,000 young people got a job. How good is that!
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Front of the room & back of the room #LiberalLaunch #melbourne @AmyRemeikis @murpharoo #PoliticsLive pic.twitter.com/HZ3bieM7QM
— Mikearoo (@mpbowers) May 12, 2019
Morrison continued:
But you know, it’s also a country that acknowledges the First Australians, and strives to ensure that every Indigenous girl and boy can grow up with the same opportunities as every other Australian.
That’s the promise. And you know, it’s so much more.
This is where all the peoples of the world have come here to call Australia home, and make us the most successful immigration country and multicultural nation in the world today.
That’s the promise of Australia, friends. To all the Australians listening – that’s the promise of Australia.
A hard-won promise provided by the generation that went before us, and must be improved by us in this current generation, to pass on to the generations that will follow.
And you know, there is no one to whom this promise of Australia is more entrusted to than the person you elect to be your prime minister. It is my vision for this country, as your prime minister, to keep the promise of Australia to all Australians.
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'Australia is a promise' – Scott Morrison
Morrison:
So, when you meet and hear people like this, as I’ve been doing, you really understand why Australia is the best country in the world to live.
But I’ve got a tip. I’ve got a tip for you. I believe it’s even more than that. I believe that Australia is a promise to everyone who has the great privilege to call themselves an Australian.
And you know what that promise is? We know it!
It’s the promise that allows Australians quietly going about their lives to realise their simple and honest aspirations.
Quiet, hardworking Australians.
An Australia where, if you have a go, you get a go. Where you’re rewarded and respected for your efforts and contributions.
An Australia where you are accepted and acknowledged, regardless of your age, your ethnicity, your religion, your gender, your sexuality, your level of ability, or your wealth or your income.
An Australia where you can live in an economy that enables you and your family to enjoy the best living standards and be able to plan for your future with confidence. A country where you can live in an environment that is clean and healthy and the envy of the world.
A country where, if you or your family, God forbid, gets sick, you’ll get access to world class and affordable healthcare.
A country where your children get the best possible start in life – a great education – and can grow up safe. Safe.
A country where older Australians are respected, where their savings are secure and they get the recognition they deserve.
A country that honours the service and sacrifice of all those who have gifted us our freedoms, and to any veterans here today, any serving men and women here today – thank you for your service.
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Morrison:
I met Abigail in Perth with Ken Wyatt and Linda Reynolds at the Esther Foundation, an amazing foundation that we support as a government.
She told me her story, and at Esther you will find terrible stories of sexual abuse, substance abuse, terrible violence and attempted suicide by our youngest people.
At Esther, they are reclaiming their future and their lives by learning that no one can take away the most important thing – the unique and precious value as a human being and as a woman.
And, then there’s Jacqueline, and I want to thank Michael for his introduction today, and telling his story.
Jacqueline, who, together with her husband, Robert, built up their cattle station at Gypsy Plains in Queensland.
Doing it together for 35 years – a generation’s work. In just 48 hours, their herd was washed away or died from pneumonia from the chilling wind on the slight little hills. And as I stood with Jacqueline over the rotting stench of the carcasses, we just hugged.
I would not leave there without her knowing that we, and I, would stand with them and all those impacted, to rebuild. And we are, and they know it.
As Michael [McCormack] has said, we will continue to stand with all of our drought-affected farmers as well. All the graziers impacted by the drought, like the Tullys out in Quilpie. On the first day that I was on the job as PM.
And all the drought-affected towns and communities that are out there, and they will get that Future Drought Fund from us, Michael, they will get it, because next Saturday, you get the opportunity to vote for it.
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Morrison:
Donna is the mum of 13-year-old Luke Emery. Happy Mother’s Day to Donna.
They live in northern Tasmania as a family. Luke has cystic fibrosis. He was diagnosed, as most sufferers are, at six months old. Luke is now able to get access, as I know Greg Hunt will be thrilled about, to a drug – a drug that we announced that we were listing on Father’s Day, actually, last year.
That would otherwise cost that family $250,000 a script. And that we have now listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, and it now only costs a bit over 40 bucks! (the crowd applauds)
When I saw Luke the other week, it was just after his birthday down in Tassie, and he told me he could now run with his mates and not get breathless.
How good’s that! (more applause) The drug will add at least 20 years to his life, and you should see the smile on Donna’s face. Only a mum can smile that big.
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Morrison:
Josh, Bianca and their infant daughter, Ruby, are quietly living these aspirations up in the mid-north coast of New South Wales. I met them earlier this week.
They have just bought their first home in Wauchope. Christopher has just started work up in Gladstone, in Purcell where his father has been an employee for many years.
And Gavin is finishing his apprenticeship there as a fitter and turner.
All working in a family business that Terry and his wife, Kim, started 30 years ago – now employing 70 people.
I met Marianne, she’s a local mum, and actually a party member, here in Melbourne. And she went back to work by starting a wedding events business. And is now employing other mums doing exactly the same thing – coming back into the workforce. It’s a very flexible workforce, that one.
Rosalee, I haven’t met. But she’s a 69-year-old retired school teacher who lives on her own in a retired village in Perth. She saved for her retirement. She doesn’t qualify for the pension. She’s a self-funded retiree.
She has an income of $30,000 a year, which includes franking credits of $1,800. She doesn’t see it as a gift. It’s what she’s worked hard for and saved hard for, so she can live on it. Often life can throw things at you that can challenge these aspirations.
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Morrison:
Mum and dad both had to work hard to give Alan and I the choices they wanted for us in life.
They saved. They planned. They sacrificed. And they also served. Mum ran the local girls’ brigade at our local church every Thursday and Friday school nights for 45 years.
By the way, dad did the same thing ... at boys’ brigade the same Thursday and Friday night for 45 years.
Mum has a great and practical faith, quietly and patiently loving us, always. Life’s about what you contribute, not what you accumulate. That’s what mum and dad have taught me.
It’s about serving others, because in life, it’s people that matter. My family story is not uncommon in our country.
Australians quietly going about their lives with simple, decent, honest aspirations. Get an education. Get a job. Start a business.
Take responsibility for yourself, support others. Work hard. Deal with whatever challenges come your way.
Meet someone amazing – I did – there she is, Jenny! Create a life and a family together.
Work even harder to support them, and give them the choices and, hopefully, an even better life than the one that you have. Save for your retirement and your future, and strive, wherever possible, to be making a contribution. Rather than taking one. Leaving a legacy.
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Scott Morrison:
My brother, Alan, and I, we grew up in a loving and very happy family with our parents, Marion and John. Mum and dad have been hopelessly devoted to each other and married for 56 years and counting. They actually grew up in the same street.
Today mum cares for dad, who was sadly too frail to travel today. But I know dad will be up there listening to us today and be with us here today.
We all lived together in a house we shared with dad’s aunt, who owned the house, and she invited mum and dad to come and live with her in a separate flat in a house that they made when they got married
My brother and I were still sharing a room together in that house when he was at university and I was at high school. You can imagine how thrilled he was about that.
We went to public schools, like Jenny and her older sister and her brother did. And we had great times together in our family where you get the same disappointments and joys and challenges of so many other families. Not long after I turned one mum went back to work, juggling all her commitments, with a lot of help from family, particularly our grandparents.
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My name is Marion Morrison. And I am Scott’s mum. You already know Jenny and Abby and Lily. And now I’d like you to welcome my son ... And my husband ... And our dad.
Scott Morrison appears with two giant bouquet of flowers for Marion and Jenny.
Aren’t they fantastic? How good’s Mum? How good’s Jenny?
Well, thank you, friends. Thank you, colleagues. They are the women in my life.
I couldn’t love them more if I tried.
And they couldn’t love me more if they tried. Happy Mother’s Day, Mum.
Happy Mother’s Day, Jen.
To all of our mothers, Happy Mother’s Day, wherever you are today. Today is a day when our hearts are especially focused on family.
And, of course, our mothers. For some it is a very sweet memory. For some today it is a painful void for what has been lost or was sadly never there for you.
For the fortunate it is the warmth of the mum’s embrace that simply says everything will be alright, I love you. Our mums speak of the surety of selfless love. The most powerful thoughts in the universe.
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The Morrison family women walk out on the stage together – it’s the prime minister’s mother, Marion, wife, Jenny, and two daughters, Abigail and Lily.
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The video is very personal. It moves on to Jenny’s brother, Gary, who was diagnosed with MS.
Gary was a fit, strong fireman raising three young boys at the time. And over the years we just saw all the things that he had loved in life so much he could no longer do them. And while he showed great grace in how he dealt with that, it is sort of a double hit, it was not only he couldn’t do it and he couldn’t do it with his boys.
And today he is very limited with his mobility. But he taught his sons an amazing lesson and me an amazing lesson about the character and the strength of disabled Australians. They... They know stuff that we can’t pretend to know.
And the reason I support the NDIS, and I know is not perfect, is what it is designed to do is for people like Gary who wanted to have a go and want just those supports in other things to have the life they want to have. It’s not compensation, it’s not welfare. It’s about enabling people with disabilities to live the life they want to live despite their disability.
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There is another video, with footage Jenny Morrison has taken of their kids, asking them what dad makes in the kitchen that they like – he’s good at curry (obvs) and spaghetti bolognese and boiling eggs. His daughter’s think the banana pancakes he tried to make one Mother’s Day were “disgusting”.
The video moves on to how Jenny and Scott met (high school), their proposal (unromantic, while sitting on a bench in Martin Place), the couple’s struggles with infertility, and their home life.
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From the crowd shot, Peter Dutton is there. But the home affairs minister, who holds the most powerful portfolio in the government, outside the prime minister, has a seat in the second row.
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He continues:
And take their housing tax - conceived at a time when the housing market was going up and recently it’s been going down. And again, Bill Shorten looks down the camera and says it doesn’t have any appreciable impact on the market.
We’ve heard from the Master Builders Association that Labor’s housing tax will cost 32,000 jobs and see 42,000 fewer homes being built.
And anybody who owns their own home will see it worth less under Labor, and anyone who rents their own home will end up paying more under Labor.
Take their policies and their taxes on superannuation. Bill Shorten looked down the camera and told the Australian people he had no plans for higher taxes on super, and we know that he’s got $34bn of higher taxes on super. Including making it more difficult for mothers to take time out of the workforce and then to raise a child and to put additional money into superannuation.
They’re going to lift their taxes on family businesses and they’re going to lift taxes on income earners, to the point that even Paul Keating said was too punitive, and said that the Labor party had lost the ability to speak to aspirational Australians. You see, ladies and gentlemen, this is no normal election.
This is an election which will shape the future of our country. And we, on the Coalition side, led by Scott Morrison, believe in lower taxes.
The Labor party know only one answer to every question and that’s higher taxes. So this election, on 18 May, the choice for 25 million Australians could not be clearer. Vote for Scott Morrison and the Coalition government for a stronger economy and a brighter future.
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Josh Frydenberg:
In the blue corner under Scott Morrison, you have a Coalition government that has delivered a record number of jobs. With more women in the workforce than ever before, and more young people who have got a job over the last year than ever before.
Higher growth than when we came to office. Lower unemployment than when we came to office. Stronger investment than when we came to office. And a budget that is back in the black and back on track.
And we are delivering all that people expect of governments, including record spending on essential services, without increasing taxes.
Now, the same cannot be said of those in the red corner. Because Bill Shorten and the Labor party are promising $387bn of higher taxes that will suffocate the economy, lead to fewer jobs, lower wages and a weaker Australian economy.
Now when it comes to the Labor party, do not look at what they say – look at what they do. Because take the retirees tax.
They tell you it won’t affect many people. Well, there are over one million retirees who are going to be hurt and hit by Labor’s retiree tax. They say to you, it’s about levelling the playing field. But they exempt the unions and the union-backed funds and target self-funded retirees. And they say it’s about fairness.
How is it fair to target people, predominantly who are women? Who have saved diligently for their retirement and done nothing wrong?
And, indeed, push many people onto the pension. That’s Labor’s record on the retiree tax. But, if there is one bit of advice that I’d encourage you to take from the Labor party, it’s when Chris Bowen tells you, if you don’t like the retiree tax, don’t vote for them.
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It wouldn’t be a campaign launch without videos – Labor had Labor’s leadership team talking about Bill Shorten and each other.
The Liberals play the Scott Morrison in hi-vis ad, followed by two ‘Labor is the Bill Australia can’t afford ads’.
Josh Frydenberg takes the stage:
Welcome prime minister, your mother, Marion, your wife, Jenny. Your beautiful girls, to Melbourne.
The city that never sleeps! That has four seasons in one day. And that, tragically, and sadly, has seen another Carlton loss to Collingwood!
But, but ... as a long-suffering Carlton supporter, we say – we’re 15 years into our five-year redevelopment plan!
A particularly warm welcome to all the mothers in the audience, and my mum and my wife. I promised you a small intimate special event on Mother’s Day! And here we are!
(He gets the first lols.)
It’s fantastic to see so many colleagues and candidates here today who are working hard to see a re-elected Morrison government on May 18.
You are all busy door-knocking, phone canvassing, letterbox dropping. Putting up your posters everywhere, on every street corner.
In fact, after my first campaign, my wife went to work and one of her colleagues said to her, “Amy, I see your husband’s photo everywhere in the electorate. Is he a real estate agent?” “No, he’s a politician.”
And I know that when you are door-knocking, you have to be thinking on your feet, which reminds me of the story of one of our Coalition colleagues, who is enthusiastically spreading the Liberal message here in Melbourne.
And they were door-knocking and they got to the front of the house and as the lady came to the front door, they looked behind them and they realised they had stepped on a freshly cemented path.
So they put out their hand to the lady at the front door and said, “Hi, I’m the local Labor candidate!” (more lols.)
But ladies and gentlemen, this election is not about us, it’s about the Australian people, and the very clear choice that they and their families have at this election.
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So far, the Liberal launch not being about the Liberal party is proving true – according to Michael McCormack, it is about Labor:
It’s now less than a week until polling day, and from what we’ve seen, from what we’ve seen – Labor does not have a plan for regional Australia. Nothing – not a plan. No vision.
Regional Australians aren’t on Labor’s radar. Bill Shorten would hit regional households with billions of dollars in new and high taxes. The risk is real.
Bill Shorten and Labor have not yet announced a plan for jobs in regional Australia. Labor voted against the Drought Future Fund in the parliament – a $3.9bn investment, growing to $5bn in the future.
It’s a future for agriculture. It’s a future for our regions. But Labor could not bring themselves to support it. Between 2007 and 2013, Labor did not build, install, fund, promise one mobile black spot phone tower.
Funding programs that generate productivity such as the Building Better Regions Fund are in doubt.
Labor cut and diverted those programs when last in government. We have committed more than $3bn to water infrastructure.
This would not happen, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, under Labor.
I say to farmers – we value what you do. Thank you for what you do and I am proud to be in a Government which wants to ensure Australian children – all children – know where and how their food and fibre, the best food and fibre in the word, comes from. And that is Australian farms.
Labor wants to shut down ... Labor wants to shut down our resources sector, our energy-supplying export-earning, job-creating, mining industry.
We want to back those who work in our primary industries. Those who live off the land. Indeed, the Nationals and the Liberals back all regional people and all Australians and we do it every day. We have a plan to deep delivering.
We are investing a record $100bn on infrastructure in the right place right across this nation, because every place is the right place for more infrastructure, and we’re getting on and we’re doing it.
We want all Australians to be their best selves. We have the plan, we have the passion, we have the positivity and we have the prime minister to do just that.
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Michael McCormack gets a cheer. #sentencesyourarelywrite
McCormack:
The Nationals and Liberals have a relationship built on mutual understanding and respect dating back many, many decades. When I sat down with Scott Morrison after he became Liberal leader last year, we discussed our priorities.
Priorities for the people we respect. At the top of both of our list was one word – just one word – “drought”.
Right from that first moment, right from that very first point, he understood. He got it. Within days, he was heading to the Queensland town of Quilpie – his first trip on the Monday of his first week as prime minister. Almost as quickly came the next stage of what now amounts to more than $7bn in drought assistance measures – the largest this nation has ever seen.
Then, just like at that – just like that – drought turned to flood, ravaging northern Queensland. And again, Scott Morrison was there to act, cutting through the bureaucracy and the process to provide another $3.5bn in crucial measures. That’s a prime minister who gets it.
That’s a prime minister who doesn’t wait. Gets on with it and acts. It’s a person who gets things done. He sees a problem and he finds a solution – unlike our opponents, who are great at making problems and making others pay for them.
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Just one verse of the national anthem at this launch.
Sarah Henderson:
Trust is important in politics. And at this election the choice could not be clearer. A choice between our leader, the prime minister Scott Morrison, and the Bill Australia cannot afford.
Ladies and gentlemen, how good is Scott Morrison? (There are cheers.)
I serve on his government and his ministry. He is a man of integrity, conviction, strong values. Someone you can trust to deliver to get things done.
Then there’s Bill Shorten, who not even the cleaners at Cleanevent could trust. For the past two weeks on prepoll I have learned that many people in Corangamite don’t trust Bill Shorten.
Including the local union members and former shop stewards who saw him run the factory floor and never wanted to see him run the country.
Ladies and gentlemen, my late mother served as a Liberal MP in the Kennett government. She, along with my father, taught my brother, sister and me to stand up for what we believe, to do what’s right, and take individual responsibility for our actions. They taught us to live within our means and that no one owed us a living. To work hard. They instilled in us a strong belief in family, in community and in a fair and just society. These are my values.
They’re Liberal values. They’re parties values. I am so proud of our party. I am so proud of our government. And of our prime minister. I know you are looking forward to hearing from him shortly.
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Liberal launch begins
Sarah Henderson has taken the stage to begin proceedings.
Henderson holds the most marginal seat in Victoria – Corangamite. After the redistribution, the seat became notionally Labor’s at 0.03%.
The cameras pan to the ministry as she begins – Michaelia Cash and Paul Fletcher were on their phones.
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Meanwhile, else where in Melbourne:
.@billshortenmp will rally the party faithful in Moonee Ponds at the same time of the Coalition’s campaign launch. Labor is calling it a final week campaign rally #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/OfIXtrzs03
— Rosie Lewis (@rosieslewis) May 12, 2019
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Higgins is one of the ‘safe’ Liberal seats in Victoria which is in play. Bill Shorten spoke about the Labor candidate at the end of his Insiders interview this morning:
Oh you should meet our candidate running in Higgins. Fiona McLeod, senior counsel. She is a rock star. We’re running the best candidate we’ve run in Higgins.
I think with Kelly O’Dwyer going there’s a lot of disillusioned voters. Fiona McLeod’s CV is remarkable. She’s represented victims in class actions right through to complicated business transactions. She’s a tip top candidate. But there is a mood for change.
I make no apology for spending more money on cancer than I will on the top end of town. We can do this because we’ve got a great set of books, because we’ve made the reforms. But fundamentally our message, Barrie, is vote Labor to end the chaos in Canberra. Vote Labor for real action on climate change and the rest.
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The bells are ringing and people are taking their places, so the Liberal launch is about to get under way.
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Pretty small #LiberalLaunch with plenty of vacant seats with just a few minutes to go before kick-off #auspol #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/xmNMr8vJ01
— Troy Bramston (@TroyBramston) May 12, 2019
That’s a lot of sugar
Liberal cupcakes at the #campaignlaunch in #Melbourne @AmyRemeikis @murpharoo #PoliticsLive pic.twitter.com/aVfAt2l33K
— Mikearoo (@mpbowers) May 12, 2019
Mood
Campaign launch life @mpbowers #ausvotes @AmyRemeikis pic.twitter.com/vM1cpWFXHV
— Katharine Murphy (@murpharoo) May 12, 2019
We can confirm that Melissa Price has been found, and has been allowed out of her electorate to attend the Liberal party launch.
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Question: There won’t be former leaders and prime ministers here today for reasons you can outline if you wish but what does the party lose in not honouring its past in that way today?
Cormann: Today is an opportunity for the prime minister to talk to the Australian people directly about the very important choice in front of them at this election.
This is an election where the Australian people get to decide between our plan, which will deliver a stronger economy, and Labor’s plan, which would deliver a weaker economy.
Our plan for lower taxes to keep Australians safe and secure and indeed Labor’s plan for higher taxes and a plan from a bunch of people who don’t know how to manage money as they have proven in the past.
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Question: Was it wise to adopt a small target strategy for this policy just to make it a referendum on Labor’s plans?
Cormann:
I completely disagree with that characterisation. We have a strong track record when it comes to building a stronger economy, making sure Australians have the best possible opportunity to get ahead, Australians are safe and secure. We are going to this election saying to the Australian people look at our plans, our track record, look at our plan for the future, and we are saying to the Australian people this is not the time to risk what has been achieved. This is not the time to risk our economy, our country on the high taxing and reckless agenda of Bill Shorten.
Question: You seek forgiveness for the last three years of dysfunction?
Cormann:
You look at what we have achieved. We inherited a weakening economy, rising unemployment and a deteriorating budget position, chaos at our borders, we have strengthened the economy, the unemployment rate is below where it was and where it was anticipated it would be and our budget is now on track back to surplus. We inherited a deteriorating budget trajectory from Labor. The deficits have been coming down as a result of our work. We are back into surplus and now we are in surplus and projected to remain that way over the medium term, we are going to pay off Labor’s debt, the one they have left behind for us.
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Question: You accuse the Labor Party of being wasteful. You are today throwing $4bn at a project, the East West Link, a project that government doesn’t want to build. Is that not also wasteful?
Cormann: You ask people in the relevant parts of Melbourne whether they think it is wasteful. It is a key piece of very important economic infrastructure which was independently identified by Infrastructure Australia as a very important infrastructure priority.
It is designed to bust congestion, improve productivity, it is absolutely a necessary piece of infrastructure.
Question: What underpins this offer then if there is no matching commitment by the Daniel Andrews government in Victoria, the proposition is what, that the commonwealth picks up the four and the private sector?
Cormann: We want to get on with it, we think it can be fully funded out of a combination of federal funding and private financing arrangements because it is such a good, sound, solid economic piece of infrastructure. What we are saying to Daniel Andrews here in Victoria, we understand you don’t believe it is a priority. Get out of the way. A lot of Victorians, Melburnians want this project built.
Daniel Andrews spent a billion dollars not to build a road. A billion dollars of taxpayers’ money not to build a road. We are saying this is an important piece of economic infrastructure for Australia. Get out of the way, let us get on with it and we can – just give us the necessary approvals at the state level and we can get this important project built.
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Question: Do you deny your plan erodes the progress of Australia’s tax ...
Cormann: I absolutely deny it. It is not true. It is a Labor lie ...
Question: It is your policy, people on $45,000 and $200,000 will pay the same rate of tax.
Cormann: You know what, somebody on $200,000 will pay substantially more tax than somebody on $45,000 because 30% on $200,000 is substantially more in dollar terms than 30% as the marginal rate that applies for somebody on $45,000. Listen to what I have just indicated to you.
The top 20% of income earners in Australia will continue to pay 60% of all income tax generated in Australia, as they are doing today. The progress of our income tax system is maintained in our tax plan. What the Labor party is trying to do is making people worse off.
They want the silent thief that is bracket creep to go after hardworking Australians like the guy that Bill Shorten misled in Gladstone when he was explaining to Bill Shorten that because he and his colleagues work hard and do overtime and try hard to get ahead, why should they be penalised with higher taxes? He said to him, “We will look at that”.
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Labor turning 'Australian against Australian', says Mathias Cormann
Question: Your tax priority, let’s look at the top end, can you confirm that the better paid, those on over $180,000 get $77bn in tax cuts under your plan?
Cormann: I note that are you adopting Bill Shorten’s and Labor’s class war language. What I can confirm is we are providing income tax relief to all hardworking Australians that we’re prioritising low to middle income earners in the first instance but we’re addressing bracket creep because it is a punitive silent thief of peoples’ income. It drags people back, it is a drag on the economy, it leaves the economy worse off. If we were not to address bracket creep and provide income tax relief and the right incentive and reward for all working Australians, the economy would be weaker as a result. The Labor party knows this. The Labor party is pursuing ...
Question: Index thresholds to get rid of bracket creep, but instead you have got, under your plan, people under – being paid $45,000 and $200,000 being paid exactly the same rate of tax.
Cormann: The big lie that the Labor party has been trying to perpetuate in this campaign as part of their class war attack on Australians is they are trying to suggest a Liberal National government would shift the income tax burden from high-income earners to low-income earners.
That is an absolute lie. Under our fully implemented plan for income tax relief for all hard-working Australians, the top 5% of Australian income earners will continue to pay a third of all income tax generated in Australia. The top 20% of income tax earners will continue to pay 60% of all income tax – of all income tax generated in Australia. The Labor party in their desperation of turning Australian against Australian are perpetuating a lie on the Australian people.
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Question: You have spoken about your ability to over-project the experience of the economy and yet we got a significant – I would argue very significant – event happened on Friday when the Reserve Bank of Australia came out and said growth in the future might have a one in front of it. Can I suggest not only do we have a weakening economy but your costings, your budget, as well as Labor’s projected figures just may not be there?
Cormann: Here is a very important point. We are facing global economic headwinds, we are facing downside risks in our domestic economy as a result of the droughts and floods and other such events, which is why this is the worst possible time for Labor’s high-taxing agenda. To the extent that there are risks in our economy, this is the worst possible time ...
Question: They say bigger buffers?
Cormann: Where does the money come from? It comes out of the pockets of hardworking Australians, the money comes out of the pockets of retirees. We have got $387bn in higher taxes on retirees, on housing, investment, income, electricity, family business, on cars, you name it. If it moves Labor will tax it. That is the lazy way of trying to get a budget back into surplus.
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Question: They are saying the budget would be $87bn better off over that period.
Cormann: Labor has not delivered a surplus since 1989. The Australian people know that Labor party ...
Question: Neither has your government ...
Cormann: That is actually not true. You have got your facts wrong. If you say we have not delivered a surplus since 1989 you are factually incorrect ...
Question: You haven’t done ...
Cormann: Maybe you need to go to the ABC Fact Check.
Question: You haven’t done it this term.
Cormann: We have inherited from Chris Bowen in 2013, a weakening economy, rising unemployment, a rapidly deteriorating budget position and we have turned that around. The economy is stronger, growth is stronger – employment growth is stronger, the unemployment rate is lower and the budget is back in the black.
If you look at our performance against budget, the last two financial years substantial better budget outcomes compared to what was forecast at the budget and people know they can trust our economic and fiscal management. This is not the time to risk our economy, to risk peoples’ opportunities on going back to Labor’s discredited approach in the past, higher taxes, wasteful spending and a Labor party which doesn’t know how to manage money.
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Question: Haven’t you been outmanoeuvred by Labor, offering bigger surpluses, a faster achievement of the 1% surplus – 1% of GDP and bigger social spending?
Cormann: Labor’s numbers cannot be believed. Labor has not explained, for example, the impact of their high-taxing agenda on economic growth, on jobs, on property values, on the cost of rents. There is a range of unanswered questions there. They have not included a lot of spending promises, firm spending promises that they have made in their costings. They haven’t been paid for. Labor made a firm commitment to increase foreign aid funding to half a per cent of gross national income and that is not ...
Question: It is in their platform but they haven’t offered ...
Cormann: Binding platform and indeed from the first budget, from the first year, getting back to half a per cent of GDP, which costs between $68 and $82 over the next decade – billion – and not paid for.
They have made a commitment to increase the refugee intake and that costs a lot and that is not paid for. They have made a firm commitment to increase science funding to 3% of the share of GDP by 2030. That costs more than $30bn. Not paid for in the costings. Like all of this comes with $387bn in higher taxes, which would weaken our economy, cost jobs and leave all Australians worse off.
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A (it has to be said very tired looking) Mathias Cormann is speaking ahead of the Liberal party launch to the ABC.
He also wants you to know this election is about a choice:
It is an important opportunity for the prime minister to talk directly to the Australian people about the choice in front of them at this election and it is a choice between a Liberal National government continuing to build a stronger economy, where all Australians have the best possible opportunity to get ahead and the alternative, a Shorten-led Labor government, which would make our economy weaker.
Our lower-taxing genda, Bill Shorten’s higher taxing agenda. Our commitment and track record of repairing the budget and getting it back into surplus and the Labor party, which doesn’t know how to manage money, which is why they are coming after you with higher taxes all the time.
Our approach, which has guaranteed increased funding for hospitals, schools, medicines, infrastructure in a way that can be paid for in a strengthening – on the back of a strengthening budget and the Labor party, which is not able to do the same.
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Asked about the Liberal launch yesterday, Scott Morrison had this to say:
What we’re doing tomorrow is this: it isn’t a day for party hoopla. It’s a day for me to focus directly on the future. These are the choices I’ve made as the leader of this party, to ensure tomorrow is an opportunity to focus very much on the people who will be watching and reading about what I have to say tomorrow at home. It’s not about party festivals and slapping backs and doing all that sort of stuff. People aren’t interested in all that rubbish.
What they’re interested in is their own lives. What I’m going to be focused on tomorrow is what my agenda going forward is for their lives and how we are going to make life that little bit easier, responsibly. You know, I think Australians have got pretty tired of politicians who come to them all “ra-ra” and saying, “I’ll solve all your problems … so long as you give me all of your money”. That’s what Bill Shorten has been saying in this election. He’s running around telling people he can solve every problem there is, on one condition: that they hand over $387bn in higher taxes to him.
Now, I know from watching Labor’s form over a very long period of time, not only do they spend a lot of money, but they never spend it well. It always costs more. When that happens, they always come after more, from you.
That’s why this is just such a big risk. We’re going into a period of time in our economy which requires responsible financial management. Responsible economic management, not big spending, big taxing, big ego governments, running around pretending they can solve every problem that you have. What they expect from their governments is to be responsible, careful, targeted, spending your money well, focusing on the priorities. Record spending on hospitals – that’s what our government is delivering and will continue to. It will increase – record spending on public schools. That has occurred and will continue to occur, with increases into the future. Spending on things that bust congestion in our cities, to ensure you can get home sooner and safer. Ensuring that Australians who rely on getting access to affordable medicines through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, whether it’s cystic fibrosis or lung cancer or the many 130 other drugs that go towards treating cancer in this country. Ensuring that by responsibly managing the nation’s finances, we can continue to provide access to those medicines.
Now, we know what happened under Labor last time. They ran out of money and they stopped listing medicines. You’ve seen what happened in the Northern Territory. In the Northern Territory, the Gunner government went to the people of the Northern Territory with big spending promises. It was all going to be fine: “Just trust us”. Where is it now? A wreckage, absolute financial wreckage.
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Bill Shorten will also address a Labor campaign rally in Melbourne this morning – at 11am, the same time the Liberal launch is due to start.
Mike Bowers is at the Melbourne Convention Centre.
Seems like a slightly higher energy group of protesters than what was outside the Brisbane Convention Centre for Labor’s launch last weekend.
Maybe we were misled?
Malcolm is here! pic.twitter.com/Heg66z3th7
— Tom McIlroy (@TomMcIlroy) May 12, 2019
For those wondering how MPs and candidates are always on message, repeating the same lines, it is because they get sent something like this every morning.
Looks like today, the media list was included in the mail out from Labor
Labor's campaign team have sent their daily talking points to the media. Unclear if it was an accident #auspol #ausvotes19 pic.twitter.com/vy1OqiX6e5
— Tom McIlroy (@TomMcIlroy) May 11, 2019
And that’s about it.
We move on with the rest of the day - the Liberal launch starts at 11am.
And on the ABC, Shorten echoes what he said at the rally on Saturday and says he will look at five-year funding terms:
Cassidy: On the ABC, are you looking at the extra funding, but also on the five-year funding. You said that you’ll have a conversation and the managing director will argue very strongly for five-year funding.
Shorten: I am fundamentally in the national independent party. The constant undermining of it. The constant critics. This is a government who writes more letters complaining about the ABC to the ABC, than will invest in the ABC. So we’ve said – we will reverse the $83.7m worth of cuts. We’ve also said we’ll provide an additional $40m for more comedy, children’s shows and more music. And what I did also say yesterday at the Save the ABC rally is that I get that having three-year funding cycle not as desirable for long-term ABC planning as five-year funding cycles.
Cassidy: So you would prefer the five-year?
Shorten: I can see the sense of it and we need to sit down with the managing director. But I haven’t been elected, so that he is only a conversation that can happen if and when we’re elected. To anyone who loves the ABC, be it in the bush, be it the people who need the emergency warnings, you know, I’ve got a view – my policy for the ABC two words – ABC everywhere. Everywhere in reach and availability, and including in the Pacific.
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Cassidy: But you might be prime minister. You’re going after multinationals on taxation. News Corp, you could specifically target them. You could change media laws.
Shorten: This will surprise you – I look at the policy, not the personalities. I understand, I’ve done this job for six years. I’ve united my team. For six years, some in the conservative ranks and the media and the Liberals have just thrown bricks at us, but we’ve come through all of that. We are united. And one of the reasons why we are competitive – I wouldn’t put it any stronger than that – next Saturday, is we are respecting the intelligence of the Australian people. If we want the people to trust us, we have to trust them first. That’s why we’ve outlined our policies. That’s why we’ve outlined the best set of books that an opposition has ever presented in half a century, I would submit. So when it comes to some of the personality debates, I’m not interested. I’m not running for prime minister to square off.
Cassidy: The deliberate decision not to see Rupert Murdoch in the lead-up to the campaign?
Shorten: I’ll deal with businesses in Australia.
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Turning to News Corp, Bill Shorten says he will not “come after them” if prime minister:
Cassidy: You’re obviously angry with the Telegraph for that during the week and the story that referenced your mother. Are you planning retribution and going to go after them?
Shorten: The Telegraph and other conservative critics, I realise with them that they are what they are. And by that, I mean this – you could pick up the front page of that paper some days and all that’s changed is the date at the top. They are campaigning against Labor. It’s not all News Limited.
Some of their mastheads, a lot of the journalists, I don’t put a lump in the same bucket. But I think if some newspapers, and some editors, want to be political parties, they should just come out and say it. Beyond that, though, any vote that they can take off Labor, they took off three or four electorate cycles ago. The real problem here, and let’s not even talk about the Telegraph, but if you like, traditional media – is that they’re under threat.
And I have some sympathy that the new media platforms get a lighter run in terms of regulation and taxation than they do. To that extent, I might surprise you. I’m sympathetic to traditional media. But the way forward is not to become more frenzied. If you have a business model under challenge, loss of advertising and loss of eyeballs and people not running it.
I’ve never run a newspaper, so I’m just another consumer of the media like most people. Perhaps, rather than doubling down on an old business model of going the gossip, of playing the attack stuff, and not focus on the journalism, maybe there’s a way forward for them to look at. But hey, I’m just another consumer.
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Cassidy: The thing that could go wrong with the plan there, is that the Senate doesn’t support raising these measures. If they vote against the abolition of the tax concessions, you could be down as much as $6bn or $8bn a year?
Shorten: First things first – if we didn’t have a strong balance sheet, as we’ve presented to the nation, you would be criticising us for that.
Now we present a strong balance sheet to the nation and this government is saying, ‘oh, well, can’t be done!’
My answer to them is this – we will be the party of reform. This country needs a change.
This government is not trying to do anything for anyone else other than give away taxes to the top end of town, to the top tier. First of all, they haven’t all been elected. My first thing if Australians are worried about confusion is vote Labor in the House and in the Senate.
We have another seven days. I say to Australians – if you’re sick and tired of the last six years of chaos, where you voted for Abbott and got Turnbull. And you voted for Turnbull and got Morrison. This is now entering the third decade of the 21st century. We haven’t got a lot done in the first two decades. We need to get on with real action on climate change, bridging the inequality gap and reversing the cuts to hospitals and look after the childcare and dental care for pensioners. The way you do it is don’t vote for those parties in the Senate, vote for stability and for Labor.
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Cassidy: There’s another area where some of the surplus could be there. You’ve got a review into Newstart, and if they recommend, and they surely will - an increase. That could mean billions of dollars off a surplus bottom line as well?
Shorten: What we’ve done is said we’re going to review Newstart, but we also have to see in the review, the whole network. Because there are other benefits that people receive. We want to see exactly what is the best way to deliver unemployment support to encourage people back into work. I’m not going to pre-empt that.
Cassidy: It’s more likely than not, it’s going to recommend it. An increase, and that’s not allowed for?
Shorten: First of all, if you want to talk about that, we don’t know what that number is. And we’re going to talk to the experts. We’re not going to say that people on $265 a week should just be ignored because they don’t have the same political voice that the property industry has or that other invested interests have.
So we are going to be champions for people who are not sharing the Australian dream. But when we come to an outcome, that will be contingent, also, on how we’re going with the employment programs.
We announced last Sunday a measure to stop age discrimination amongst older workers who make up quite a cohort of people on Newstart. I actually think that older Australians, once they’ve got a little bit of grey in the hair, sometimes – present company excepted! – can’t face it. And I’m sick of seeing older Australians sent to 30 job interviews in a row. They’re not suitable for the jobs so we give up on them. We’ll give a tax cut to business to employ older people. The plan is not just Newstart but making sure that Australians who don’t have the political power to write the newspaper editorials in this country, I’m going to be a champion for the people who don’t have the big end of town there.
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Wage subsidy limited to early childcare workers, says Shorten
Cassidy: Let’s go back to the costings and you’re talking here about a record surplus in monetary terms, about four years from now. But that can quickly disappear. Let’s take, for example – you were already talking about subsidising wages in the private sector, in the childcare sector. If you go beyond that, that will cost more money – billions.
Shorten: We’re not going to. When you say the “childcare sector”, you say it’s the private sector. It is a hybrid. It is a sector where a lot of government money is paid into. But what we’ve seen is market failure. Did you know that early childhood educators, 96% of them are women. Yet, when it ranks across occupations in Australia, they’re at 92%. They’re at the bottom. Early childhood education is important. We’ve got to keep the talented people in this profession, but the problem is – we can’t ask parents to pay more money, and we shouldn’t.
Cassidy: But you just said that you won’t be going beyond that. So that means that you won’t be subsidising the wages of aged-care workers in the same way?
Shorten: I think that we’ll end up doing different paths to lift wages in other sectors. For example ...
Cassidy: So you will go beyond childcare?
Shorten: We’ll get wages moving. The solution we’re using for early childhood is unique to early childhood.
Cassidy: So what you’re saying is that you won’t be subsidising aged-care wages in the same way? It won’t be government money?
Shorten: That’s right. So what we’re saying about wages and getting wages moving again is this. Take, for instance, the retail hospitality, pharmacy. Did you know that people have had $60 or $80 a week cut because of cuts to penalty rates.
I’ll see all of the low-paid workers, who Mr Morrison wouldn’t know if he tripped over them, I’m going to make sure that they get their penalty rates back. I’m going to make sure that we treat women equally, and we make it easier to run pay equity cases. We’re going to clamp down on dodgy labour hire, and we’re going to make sure that there’s less sham contracting and stop the rorts where some guest workers are brought in from overseas to undercut the local labour market and they get exploited. Weapon want to stop the wages theft like we’ve seen with some of the big companies.
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Cassidy: Back on the negative gearing, what does your modelling tell you about what will happen to house prices as a result of this?
Shorten: What our experts say, and it’s not just the thinktanks to talk to us, but even New South Wales Treasury, what they’re all saying is that our changes, in the future prospectively, will have a minimal impact on house prices. What we’re simply doing ...
Cassidy: So minimal means a small fall?
Shorten: Treasury said – in the turnover of houses, it would have an impact between 0.3% and 1%. That passes the minimal test. The point about the reason why we’re doing the negative gearing is – first of all, if you’re currently negatively geared, you get a taxpayer subsidy if your investment makes a loss.
Now, that’s nice if you can get it, but it’s not sustainable going forward. But no changes for the existing people. Going forward, though, it’s all about choices. I want to see first-home buyers be able to bid for houses and not face the unfair competition of a property investor who is getting a taxpayer subsidy to bid for that house. And it won’t have the impact on house prices. I mean, I predict that the government is going to run a scare campaign on this. We’ve seen the absolute rubbish and lies on death taxes. We’ve seen the absolute rubbish and lies that we’re going to confiscate people’s utes in 2030.
The rubbish and lies that we’re going to end the weekend, and this is just another piece of rubbish and lie. If you want to look at house price falls – it’s happened under this government.
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Cassidy: But to be able to do that, doesn’t that demonstrate the size of the hit that some of these individuals are going to have to take?
Shorten: Not at all. What it demonstrates is that a few Australians will be getting a lot of taxpayer money spent on them and a lot of Australians have not been getting that priority. This election is all about choices. I’m choosing to shut down unsustainable tax refunds to some people and use some of that to provide tax cuts for 10 million Australians and use some of that to make sure ... I want the best hospitals in the world. I want the best schools in the world, the best Tafe, the best kindergartens and the best childcare and pensioner dental. It’s all about priorities. I can do these things, are going to be great for a vast bulk of Australians, because I’m going to stop spending taxpayer money. When we spend on pensioners for the dental care, or $2,000 per child for a household for childcare, that money is already being spent, but just being spent on other people.
It’s being spent on the top end of town in unsustainable subsidies.
Cassidy: It’s not just the top end of town. There are others that are going to be caught up in this that are hardly the top end of the town. In terms of the franking credits and the negative gearing.
Shorten: First of all, let’s talk about negative gearing. Our changes are not retrospective, so if you’re someone who has invested under the current tax laws – fine. You will still keep getting a taxpayer subsidy if you make a loss on your property investment. In terms of the franking credits, we are shutting down an unsustainable subsidy. By that, in plain English, what happens is – people who own shares are getting an income tax refund, even though they haven’t paid income tax.
See, the money that you get from the shares is in. But in retirement, that’s not taxed. But what happens is – and millions of Australians don’t even know that this exists and they’re quite amazed that it does. We are currently getting taxes off millions of Australians who go to work, and we’re paying those taxes, which the people who go to work every day pay, and we’re giving it back to people in the form of a tax refund who haven’t paid tax. How can you give an income tax refund to someone who hasn’t paid tax?
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Bill Shorten interview
Bill Shorten was up nice and early on his birthday to prerecord his Insiders interview – Barrie Cassidy says he would be partway through a Mother’s Day fun run by now.
Question: Let’s start with your costings that came out during the week. Bigger surpluses, delivered faster, and yet, increased spending across the board. Can you understand why some commentators are saying it’s all too good to be true?
Shorten: We’re actually just producing a better set of books than the current Liberal government. We’ve made the difficult economic reform decisions. We’re going to stop spending [money] ... on subsidies to the very well off in the top end of town. So by making that decision, we can get to the magic trifecta for Australian budget, Australian economy in the future. The trifecta being country. We can reverse all of the cuts to schools and hospitals that this government has made. We can, two, provide on 1 July tax cuts for 10 million working Australian, and for 4 million lower-paid Australians, better than the government is offering. And three: we can get bigger surpluses, which are a national fighting fund to deal with the world economy.
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Need any further proof Victoria is where it is at this election?
Melbourne’s where it’s at six days out from polling day. $4b for a major new traffic link from Coalition, $10b for suburban rail loop from Labor. #auspol pic.twitter.com/5ZqKAovO0E
— rob harris (@rharris334) May 11, 2019
Meanwhile, in Victoria, the big announcement from the government today is this (as per its statement):
The Morrison Government will end inaction on the East West Link once and for all, increasing its investment and covering the full government contribution required for the eastern section.
By putting $4 billion on the table there will be no excuse to not build this critical and missing part of Melbourne’s road network.
The East West Link will get Melbourne moving and we just need to get it done.
We respect the Victorian Government does not share this priority for residents in eastern Melbourne. That’s why we are prepared to go ahead without them, and let them press ahead with their other priorities.
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Josh Frydenberg plays down underwriting coal fired power plant
Also in the Sky interview, Josh Frydenberg played down the future of the government’s investment in coal fired power stations, which is of particular interest to central Queensland voters.
Particularly those in the Michelle Landry seat of Capricornia, where a small mining town called Collinsville is hanging its hopes on a new coal-fired power plant Shine Energy have proposed after the old plant was shut down. The government released a list of 12 projects it might look to underwrite and Collinsville was on it.
Scott Morrison was in Rockhampton just a few days ago, where he was asked about the Collinsville project
Question: Prime Minister, you spoke about the Adani project this morning and another sort of coal project I’d like to ask you about is the feasibility study into the new coal fired power station inCollinsville. Would you like to see a new coal fired power station built in Central Queensland and what do you think you can do [inaudible]? Secondly, the company behind it has asked for legal protection, they say the only way it can stack up is if they get legal protection for future increases in emissions targets. Would you be willing to offer them that?
Morrison: Well, what we’ve done with that project that we initiated before we went into caretaker mode, some couple of months ago, Michelle was involved in the process –
.... Getting to that point was ensuring that we had a project which identified how feasibly we can support medium to long term reliable power needs of Central and North Queensland. So, the study which is being initiated, which we’re supporting and funding, is actually designed to answer the very questions that you’re asking. Because they are the right questions to ask about these things; what is the best way to achieve reliable sustainable power to support industries here in Central and North Queensland? Now whether it be at Collinsville, or whether it be through other methods, that’s what this study is actually looking into. My view is once we have those answers, then why wouldn’t you proceed with the recommendations that would actually enable that to be achieved? See, this isn’t about any source of power, it’s actually about jobs and industries. What we want to see, is industries - whether it’s the resources industry, or the cement industries, or the meat processing industries or it’s the gas industries, It’s the Boyne Island aluminium smelter or these heavy industries that are here up in Central Queensland and in North Queensland - we want them to get cheap, reliable, affordable power so they can employ people. So we’ve have asked the question; what’s the best way to achieve that? Collinsville is an option that’s been considered.
But asked about underwriting new power sources by David Speers this morning, Frydenberg had this to say:
Frydenberg: We’ve explain what we will be underwriting as you know and they are predominately renewables, pumped hydro.
Speers: Coal fired power station that’s on the list?
Frydenberg: No what we well there’s one for 26 megawatts which is very small but if you’re talking about the review it’s quite a different thing. Now what that is is not a review into a coal fired power station it’s actually a review into what is the baseload power needs in that part of Queensland and having been the environment and energy minister...
Speers: I thought it was looking specifically at a coal fired power station?
Frydenberg: It’s looking at the whole suite of options.
Speers: It may not be a coal fired power station?
Frydenberg: We have to see what the business case shows.
Speers: This is the Collinsville project we’re talking about?
Frydenberg: “Yeah. Well who knows what the business case [shows]. You and I don’t know what it’s going to be. But the reality is this, with energy and climate, those two major issues, there is a transition under way in our energy sector and what we won’t do as a Coalition is compromise people’s energy bills.
Now we’re eight days from the election, or seven days from the election and Bill Shorten still hasn’t explained the true cost of his climate policies.”
It is no surprise the Liberal party launch is being held in Victoria – it’s going to be a tough fight for the party to hold on to seats – even those once considered very safe, blue-ribbon electorates:
.@JoshFrydenberg on his Victorian seat of Kooyong: I'm not complacent and I certainly don't take my seat for granted. The contest for Kooyong is tight.
— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) May 11, 2019
MORE: https://t.co/guSaoAlYe1 #SpeersOnSunday #auspol pic.twitter.com/e0jFfpyd9X
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Ahead of Bill Shorten’s Insiders appearance, Labor HQ would like you to know that the “message of the day” is:
This election is a choice between Labor’s strong, stable and united team and the Liberals’ coalition of chaos with no vision for Australia.
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As we have been told all week, the reason that former prime ministers Malcolm Turnbull, Tony Abbott and John Howard won’t be at the Liberal party launch, is because the party is moving on from “the past” and this election is about the future.
It’s also because Turnbull is in New York, Abbott isn’t hugely popular with voters in Victoria, where the Coalition is desperately trying to hold on to seats, and having Howard there would remind voters of who was missing.
Josh Frydenberg is on Sky this morning. Frydenberg filled in for Scott Morrison on Insiders last week.
He has been very busy this campaign.
Good morning
Welcome to a special politics live, bringing you all things Liberal party launch.
It’s also Bill Shorten’s birthday. The Labor leader will celebrate with an appearance on Insiders. As you do.
Both Scott Morrison and Shorten have spent the weekend in Melbourne, as we enter the final week of the campaign.
Morrison has promised a Liberal launch all about *you*, with former Liberal prime ministers – Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull and John Howard – not expected to make an appearance. Neither is Peter Dutton. That’s in line with the presidential campaign style Morrison has been running, and also, because things have been a little complicated on the unity front for the Liberal party these last few years.
But Katharine Murphy and Mike Bowers are in place for all your launch needs.
We’ll bring you the rest of the day as well, as it happens. So grab your Sunday breakfast and strap in.
Oh – and happy mamas’ day to anyone who needs to hear it.
Ready?
Let’s get into it.
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