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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
National
Amy Remeikis

Bill Shorten defends plan to boost early childhood workers' pay – as it happened

Bill Shorten takes his campaign to St Maria Goretti’s Catholic school in Perth.
Bill Shorten takes his campaign to St Maria Goretti’s Catholic school in Perth. Photograph: Darren England/AAP

Both campaigns seem to have gone to bed, so we are going to tuck the blog in for the night.

But we’ll be back, bright and early, for whatever hump day brings us. Which in this campaign, who the hell knows.

Thank you to everyone who followed along today. And to everyone in the Guardian brains trust, both in the bureau and behind the scenes, for keeping everything ticking along. We appreciate it more than you know.

Have a wonderful night – and, as always – take care of you.

This is also happening tonight:

Updated

Remember the complaint the Victorian Liberal opposition made about the Victorian Labor government’s plan to run an anti-federal government advertising campaign?

It’s moved up.

Updated

Clive Palmer says it is up to the workers to make the claim and 69 claims have already been lodged with about 330 or so expected in total.

The Queensland refinery has been closed since 2016.

Clive Palmer confirms he will pay workers

Clive Palmer is holding a press conference in Townsville, with a lawyer, to confirm he has put $7m in a trust fund to pay the outstanding entitlements for Queensland Nickel workers.

They are saying on the record that workers’ claims will start to be processed in the next 10 days “well before the election”.

Updated

The interview finishes with this:

PK: I’ll ask again because you know I come back.

AT: I know you do and you’ll continue...

PK: Will he be a destructive force in the Senate potentially?

AT: PK, I think that the people of Australia will be best served by electing members of the Liberal and the National party. That’s what I think. I think that Labor’s economic policies – and at the end of the day this is a contest between two teams as to who will form government.

PK: The Senate has a lot of power too.

AT: It’s a contest as to who will form government. That is between the Labor party and the Liberal and National parties. Our view very strongly is that if you want to keep the economy strong and our borders secure, and continue to have record funding in schools and in health and medicines without increasing taxes, then you must vote for the Liberal and National party. Don’t vote for the Labor party or Clive Palmer or anybody else.

Updated

And it continues.

PK: Should Clive Palmer immediately pay back the workers?

AT: If he owes the workers money, absolutely.

PK: Immediately?

AT: [He’s in] court over the issue.

PK: I haven’t heard strong language from your side.

AT: If he owes the people money he should pay it back as soon as possible. Today.

PK: What kind of Senator will Clive Palmer be?

AT: That’s a good question. I don’t know. He’s quite an unpredictable person at times as you know. But he has to get himself elected obviously to start with.

PK: He will probably get elected because of your preference deal.

AT: Let’s see.

PK: Describe what he will be like?

AT: I’m not here to make observations about what...

PK: You’ve seen him in the past and seen his parliamentary performance and his broader strategy.

AT: I can tell you he won’t be as good a senator as every single Liberal and National party senator. If you want good senators, vote for the Liberal and National parties. Don’t vote for Clive Palmer, don’t vote for the Greens or the Labor party.

PK: You said erratic. Do you think he will be an erratic senator?

AT: I said he was sometimes unpredictable.

PK: Yes, you did.

AT: I just don’t know.

PK: Isn’t that risky for Australia? He could do anything in the Senate. He could hold up legislation.

AT: What he has said is that he’s concerned about Labor’s economic policies, as we are. We’re very concerned about Labor’s economic policies because they’ve got $300bn of new taxes on retirees.

PK: Do you think he could play a destructive role as a senator?

AT: We want people to vote for the Liberal and the National parties because we’ve got the best team to manage the economy.

Updated

And just as the day started, it ends with a government MP defending the Coalition’s preference deals, leading to this exchange:

PK: Your deputy PM, Michael McCormack, said a vote swap deal with Pauline Hanson’s party just makes sense. We know these allegations about Steve Dickson, we know the other Al Jazeera allegations more broadly about guns. Does it make sense?

AT: That’s a decision of the National party.

PK: They’re your Coalition partner.

AT: These preference arrangements are done party by party. The administrative arm of the Liberal party negotiates preference arrangements for us and the administrative arm of the National party does it for them. Some seats we’re contesting against each other, as you know, such as Indi here inVictoria.

PK: Is it a bit embarrassing your younger Coalition brother, if you like, would be doing a deal with a party that the PM was so repulsed by?

AT: We’ve decided as the Liberal party...

PK: Were you embarrassed to be associated in Coalition with this party that thinks One Nation is OK to do deals with?

AT: It’s up to them.

PK: You’re not embarrassed?

AT: It’s up to them what they’re proposing to do.

PK: You have no feelings about the fact they’re doing it?

AT: Our decision was to put One Nation below the Labor party.

PK: It would be preferable if they didn’t do this?

AT: That’s what our decision was, was to put One Nation below the Labor party. It’s interesting the Labor party as well. They’re holier than thou on this when they’re preferencing Clive Palmer in 85 seats about of 150 above the Liberal party and preferencing the Greens in almost every single seat across the country despite the Greens wanting death taxes, wanting to end the US alliance, wanting to legalise heroin. In the case of the Greens before candidate in Kooyong, has supported the barbaric practice of female genital mutilation. The Labor party is still preferencing the Greens above the Liberal party.

Updated

The back and forth continues on the issue of congestion, with no answer.

So it moves on to the immigration intake.

PK: Let’s talk about the immigration intake because that has obviously an impact or at least the argument goes on some congestion. The government will have an overall target of 60% of the humanitarian intake to be women. Why favour women?

AT: Often the women are the most vulnerable in society, particularly if they’re widowed or have children or for some reason their partner is not with them. If you’re a single woman in a refugee camp, for example, it’s not a particularly safe place to be. So we’ll be prioritising more women over men. We’ll increase the target from 50% to 60%.

We’re also by the way prioritising more new refugees to go to some of the smaller cities in the regions, rather than necessarily all of them coming to Melbourne and Sydney. That’s consistent with our broader migration and population plans where we want to take the pressure off our big capital cities and support the growth of some of those smaller cities in the regions.

PK: Do you believe in gender quotas then?

AT: I thought you might come to that. The refugee intake is a particular matter. We haven’t got a gender quota for our party. We want to see more women and have fantastic women who are running for parliament this time.

Updated

The discussion then goes into why all this infrastructure is suddenly needed.

Patricia Karvelas: I mentioned 30% and you say that’s for this one fund. Is there any way of ratcheting that up? Do you think that should come forward in the next three years?

Alan Tudge: In terms of?

PK: The spending. So there’s overall movement.

AT: Much is in the forward estimates. There’s a $4bn urban congestion fund and much of it is in the forward estimates. And the ones we’ve announced will be in the forward estimates and they’re being done in the next few years. We have a long-term pipeline of projects which we have laid out, a 10-year horizon, which is what we do. That includes things like the Melbourne airport rail, which is due to start on in 2022. And will take many years after that. And we’ve got $5bn spread over the decade in order to pay for that.

PK: Was it a mistake to cancel all federal investment in public transport projects that were not already under construction after 2013?

AT: We’re looking ahead here, PK.

PK: Do you think in hindsight that was a mistake?

AT: We are absolutely committed to public transport, supporting the states in terms of the development of their infrastructure.

PK: I know now. But people want honest answers. Do you think with the benefit of hindsight that was a mistake?

AT: At the time it was very clear that the state governments were doing public transport, including public rail. And the federal governments were doing national highways and other national infrastructure. So there was a clear demarcation. That is no longer there. From that time on we’ve said that wherever there is a need we will be there to support them. If I added them up, there’s probably more investment in rail than there is in roads.

Updated

Alan Tudge is the Afternoon Briefing guest.

So far, it is about getting some detail about the “congestion busting” narrative.

Patricia Karvelas: The government is campaigning on congestion-busting. But only 30% of your congestion-busting road investments will be funded in the next three years. There’s no immediate relief, is there?

AT: Well, in fact, our billion-dollar congestion-busting fund will be rolled out as quickly as possible.

Most of the announcements we’ve made will be done over the next few years. We have projects which are going on right around Australia, not just those urban congestion-busting funds, all of which will be, we’ve announced today, will be done in the next few years.

We’ve got things like the Melbourne airport rail, the fast rail to Geelong, more on the M1 in Queensland and more in western Sydney as well. This is an absolute priority for us to bust congestion where it is so people can get home sooner and safer.

Updated

Negotiations continue.

And anyone who wants to follow along with the early voting journey can do so here:

Updated

The AEC has updated its pre-poll count from yesterday.

122,771 people voted on the first day the polls opened. That’s up from 66,894 on the first day of polling in 2016.

The campaigns have gone quiet now. It’s been a long day in WA. Labor is expected to move on first, with South Australia the target (as I understand – but honestly, most of this is guesswork).

I believe the government is planning on overnighting in Perth, but will make its way east early tomorrow, with Victoria the most likely resting place.

Both will then meander up the east coast, with the next leaders’ debate to be held in Brisbane on Friday.

Updated

The Liberal campaign in Western Australia continues:

Updated

Ahhhh street walks. From AAP’s Angus Livingston:

Before Kaylee Deere met the prime minister she had a quick look at Instagram to check if the man greeting voters on her street was Scott Morrison.

The Liberal leader was on the campaign trail in Mandurah, Western Australia, on Tuesday as he announced $20 million for 2,600 new CCTV cameras to combat crime.

Ms Deere said she checked online when she met the prime minister.

“I did actually go back on Instagram and go ‘I think that’s Scott Morrison and I need to double check with my children’, but I did realise in the end,” she told AAP on Tuesday.

The pair talked about how her small business was going, but she says she hasn’t made up her mind who to vote for on May 18.

“Not just yet, we do tend to sit down as a family and have a little chat and sort of work out what’s best for us and what’s coming up, having a small business and family,” she said.

Updated

Looking back at the Michael McCormack press club address, this was an interesting tidbit:

Question: So you’re side stepping the Paul Grimes question?

McCormack:

The fact is that the auditor general will look at all of those, all of those buybacks, all of those purchases, all of those sales. And they’ll do that back to 2008 and we’ll see what the [auditor-general] comes up with.

Updated

It finishes with a question on franking credits:

We’ll always keep talking to people about it. I don’t think anyone should be persecuted because of their faith. But what I do also think is that if we’re gonna talk about priorities in this country, three million Aussie pensioners don’t need to be forgotten in this election.

Do you know the number of times I walk around in the community and the pensioners come up? These aren’t people with a million dollars in shares and getting all the franking credits for not paying tax.

I’m talking about three million battlers. And so many elections, people have said, “What’s in it for the pensioner?”

Now, I know Mr Morrison says he indexes it every six months.

Well, every government does that. That’s like giving yourself a medal for getting up in the morning. The real issue is what are we gonna do extra for pensioners.

Just as I’ve said this election needs to be about real change in climate, this election also needs to be about cost of living and child care.

This election needs to be about our pensioners. And I and my united team, we’re not going on with the antics of Palmer and Hanson et al.

I can promise every pensioner in Australia, worried about their oral hygiene, the health, cleaning, costs of looking after their teeth, if you vote Labor at this election, we’ll make sure in Medicare you’ve got up to $1,000 every two years for the rest of your life to make sure that you can have at least a fair go at having proper dental hygiene.

Updated

We’ve got a plan to make sure in Victoria, or in Queensland, we invest in key public transport.

Of course, the Bruce Highway, you name it, we have been looking at infrastructure. That’s good, that’s more productivity.

We want to upgrade our ports and airports. But the other part of our economic growth plan is to invest in people. The beauty of what Labor is suggesting, the vision under our plan, which we’re trusting the Australian people with by telling what we’re going to do, as we should, is imagine if we’re a country, where every three-year-old and four-year-old actually gets kindergarten, 15 hours a week, 40 weeks a year.

That just means they get the best start in life. That’s world’s-best practice. Only just good enough for Australia. Imagine if we’re a country that puts back the $14bn that the current government promised for public schools but never did.

Imagine if every kid can go to school, regardless of their postcode, the wealth of their parents. Imagine if you’re a parent of a child with a disability and you don’t get treated like a bully merely because you demand a fair go for your child. Imagine if we have 200,000 more people going to university in the next 10 years.

Imagine if we can restore the 50,000 apprenticeships and traineeships which have disappeared under the current government?

Why don’t we, in this country, have a debate about how we can be the best in the world?

Imagine if a million Australian households actually get real help, a thousand, 1,500, 2,000 dollars a year to help with their childcare subsidies?

And imagine if we’re a country who doesn’t desert our pensioners. Three million people are on the Commonwealth Health Seniors’ Card, or indeed on a pension, full or part. Imagine if we as a country designed to invest in the dental health of our older Australians?

That’s the sort of country which will grow into the future and we see a fair go not just for the top, but for everyone.

Bill Shorten during a press conference at St Maria Goretti’s Catholic School in Perth
Bill Shorten during a press conference at St Maria Goretti’s Catholic School in Perth. Photograph: Darren England/AAP

Updated

Question:

Out of then the economy and interest rates, if the Reserve Bank decides to reduce interest rates next month, so a rate reduction during the height of an election campaign, what do you think that says about the economy?

Shorten:

Well, first of all, the RBA has got to make its decisions independent of government pressure.

So the decision they make, I’m not going to start putting pressure on them. I think, though, that if they felt they had to do that, that’s not a reflection on the Reserve Bank, but it is a reflection on the Australian government, isn’t it?

This is a government who’s boasted about their strong economic management, but the fact that we’re even talking about an interest rate cut shows the anaemic weakness in the current government’s economic management.

What this nation needs is we need to make sure that we’re not just relying on our mineral exports, as important as they are, to prop up our economy. We need to go back to the fundamentals.

Let’s invest in people, let’s invest in infrastructure. You know, let’s invest in our human capital and let’s invest in our physical infrastructure. We’ve got a plan, for example, in Western Australia to invest in Metro Net.

Updated

Question:

Back on wages, what about aged care workers? Don’t they deserve a pay increase as well, and can you promise that to that industry?

Bill Shorten:

I think that aged care workers are underpaid. But we’ve got a royal commission under way. Let’s see what the royal commission produces in the way of it. I want to pay a compliment to our aged care workers. They do a lot of work with a lot of vulnerable people. I think that we need to invest more in aged care generally. But I think let’s have the royal commission. The solution that we’ve looked at for early childhood educators is a recognition that nothing else has worked, they are underpaid, they’re highly trained, and that is long overdue that we do the right thing.

Question: Which childcare workers will get the pay increase? Will it be all of them?

BS: Well, our plan is that all childcare workers will see an improvement in their wages.

Updated

Question:

Can I ask your reaction to Steve Dickson resigning from One Nation over the strip club incident?

Shorten:

He should have.

His comments were appalling. Absolutely. Appalling. Should have resigned. But it just, I think, highlights the bigger problem of this desperate Morrison government. No wonder they’re cranky in their public presentation at the moment. They realise that they’ve pulled the wrong reins.

They’ve made as their key allies Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party and Clive Palmer.

You know, this is chaotic. Imagine if Mr Morrison sneaks home at the election courtesy of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation and Clive Palmer. Imagine if we have a country, if you vote Liberal or One Nation or Palmer United Party, and you have Clive Palmer and Pauline Hanson calling the shots to the government. I mean, does anyone seriously believe that Clive Palmer and Pauline Hanson just give their preferences to Mr Morrison without there being an IOU on the other side of the election? I promise you this – a vote for more Morrison is a vote for Hanson and Palmer, and it’s a vote for chaos, chaos, chaos.

Updated

Question: Mr Shorten, you just described the recent inflation number, unless I’m wrong, as “alarming”. I think I...

Shorten: That was the metaphor I used.

Question: Well, tell me if I’m taking you out of context here, because I wanted to get a sense of how much peril you believe the Australian economy is in when inflation is flatlining? Just how bad is it?

BS:

I think this government’s economic record is pretty bloody hopeless. Let’s just call it as it is. Let me answer your question you’ve asked. First of all, let’s go to some key numbers.

Under this government, debt has gone up. Debt has doubled under this government. That’s a problem, because if interest rates go up, all of a sudden Australians will be stuck with paying bigger interest rate payments on the government’s national debt that they’ve run up.

We’ve got the problem of underemployment. We’ve got the problem of wages stagnation. Now you see 30% inflation. This – 0% inflation. This economy is not operating in the interests of working people.

What we’ve got is a government with a very threadbare policy offering. Hopefully you all saw the debate last night. What we saw is two contrasting policies. We’ve got a positive vision for the future.

We understand that if you invest in education, you’re gonna get a productive workforce in the future.

We understand that if you aim for the world’s best healthcare system, you can have healthier Australians. We understand that when you take on cost-of-living and don’t just leave it, that what we do is we’ll see price restraint in child care, private health insurance, more renewables will ultimately mean lower prices.

We’re the only party with a wages policy and we want to take real action on climate change. By contrast, what did Mr Morrison offer viewers watching last night? His only argument for re-election is that he’s not Labor. I mean, his only argument is very threadbare.

You and I know this is the most threadbare policy offering in a century of Australian elections. They just basically say, “It will trickle down.” If we look after the top 10%, the top 5%, maybe you’ll get more tips on your plate when you go out to lunch. They say that they’re gonna give you tax cuts in five years’ time.

But do they explain to you where the money is coming from? They’re promising you unfunded tax plans on the Never-Never, which can only be delivered as cuts to hospitals and services. They’re promising business as usual. That’s not good enough. The Australian people need a government worthy of the people.

Updated

Question: Will you review the RBA’s target rate for inflation, if you win the election?

BS:

We think that the RBA should be independent in terms of its setting of monetary policy. The RBA has said that it likes to see inflation between 2% and 3%. I think the bigger problem, the bigger challenge for me, isn’t what the RBA says inflation should be, it’s the fact in the last quarter inflation was 0%.

Can I tell you, that’s the equivalent of the alarm going off in the fire station. When you’ve got 0% inflation, that means people aren’t spending money. The reason why people are not spending money is, under this government, they’re unconfident.

One of the reasons they’re unconfident is we see cuts to schools and hospitals. We also see wage stagnation.

You know, Mr Morrison loves to talk about a strong economy, but a strong economy for exactly who? The reality is that there’s one million Australians who have gotta hold down two jobs to make ends meet.

There’s one million Australians plus who every month say they’d like more work. We’ve seen prices going up, cost of living, child care, healthcare. Under Mr Morrison, it’s never been a better time to be a high-priced CEO or multinational in Australia. It’s never been a worse time to be a middle-class wage earner in this country.

Updated

The ABC is now playing Bill Shorten’s press conference, saving me some transcription time.

So here goes.

Question: Why did you say yesterday that child care would be the first sector [to receive a wage increase].

Bill Shorten:

First of all, we think child care is a unique sector. So the model in which we’re going to finally sort out the underpayment of early childhood educators is a model, a template, which we will only use in child care.

In terms of the first industry to see wages move, we have other mechanisms to help other industries.

Like I make no apology for the fact that I want to reverse the penalty rate cuts. If they’re not reversed, $2.8bn of pay taken out of the pockets of hundreds of thousands of low-paid workers in restaurants, in accommodation, in pharmacy. So we’ve got a range of different strategies.

But for early childhood educators, this government is so mean-spirited. Mr Morrison must have a very warped view of how you treat underpayment of workers in child care.

To rule it out, to say, “We won’t fix child care unless everyone else gets an identical pay rise,” well, this is just absurd.

The fact of the matter is – and you may be aware – that if you look at 96 occupational categories in Australia, child care comes in at the 92nd lowest-paid. 92nd. And there’s no coincidence, in my opinion, that it’s an industry predominantly populated by women.

In other words, 96% of the workforce are women. So, when you join the dots, a feminised industry, underpaid. Early childhood education, underpaid. We’ve come up with a plan to help early childhood educators. I mean, the poverty of Mr Morrison’s wages policy, we heard in the debate last night, where when he was asked about wages, he started talking about emissions reduction.

Join those dots. The point is he doesn’t have a plan for people’s wages. The answer Minister Birmingham gave today, or last night, he said, “Get the providers to pay them more.” Well, that’s a great plan, Simon, because the providers will make parents pay more. So Mr Birmingham’s only plan to help early childhood educators is to make parents pay. You don’t have to take my word for it. Ask all the parents that send their kids to child care.

Updated

That was one of the longest years of my life.

But the fact is that I do think buybacks are lazy policy. The fact is that you look at the Murrumbidgee and the Murray at the moment, they’re running reasonably well because they’ve got environmental flows going down to South Australia.

Yes, the Darling, I was pleased to see photos on the ABC website, I look at the ABC website every day, it’s my go-to, you’ll be pleased to know. It’s my go-to website first thing of a morning. Fact is that there were some good photos – have a look – of the river flows in the Darling River. It will flow again. The rain will come again. It will probably rain that much we’ll be cursing it.

But when it does, we need to be able to harvest that water. We need to be able to store that water, and that’s why the national water grid will do just that.

The fact is that I don’t want to delve too far into the water policy because it’s going to create arguments, it’s going to give the Greens an opportunity to make it even a more environmental document than it already is and hurt our farmers even more.

And I would not stand for that. I would not encourage that. And so, for those asking to pause the plan or to look at the plan or revisit the plan and put it back through the commonwealth parliament, they might get something worse than what they’ve already got, and that’s the unfortunate situation of the current politics and the environmental movement.

The fact is our farmers need water. It will rain again. We can’t ... we can’t make it rain. It’s National party policy for it to rain, but we can’t make it happen, but we can store it when it does.

Michael McCormack speaks at the National Press Club in Canberra on Tuesday
Michael McCormack speaks at the National Press Club in Canberra on Tuesday. Photograph: Rohan Thomson/AAP

Updated

Question:

It relates to a clip that was broadcast on The Project last night involving Barnaby Joyce who was at a function, who reflected on the sacking of his departmental head, Paul Grimes. He said he sacked Grimes to remind him where the authority starts from. And then he noted that he got a lot more sense out of his bureaucrats after he sacked the departmental head. I’ve been in Canberra for 20 years and that’s a pretty extraordinary thing to say. Do you support that?

(He is also asked about the water grid policy)

Michael McCormack:

The fact is that all of the buybacks, the purchases, the selling of water, is going to be subject to an auditor general’s inquiry, and that is appropriate. Back to 2008.

Labor only wants it during the time that Barnaby Joyce had jurisdiction over water. But it’s appropriate that it goes back to 2008 so that the purchases of Penny Wong, for instance, are looked at, examined, fully investigated by an independent authority and then the government of the day, hopefully that will be the Liberals and Nationals, can look at the recommendations and look at the findings that the ANAO office comes up with, and then act appropriately, accordingly as the taxpayers would expect and want us to.

The fact is that the statutory authority – water policy a water policy, and I don’t believe, and there’s a big clamour at the moment to pause the plan, to stop the plan and burn the plan. I don’t believe in that.

And I’ve said earlier that the plan is not perfect. But if you go putting the Murray-Darling Basin Plan back through the parliament and get someone like a re-elected Adam Bandt, get a hostile Senate with their grubby hands on it, they could well make sure that farmers never get the allocations that they need.

They could make it 100% environmental dock: There are elements of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan that agree on the triple down and environmental and social implications. It leans heavily towards the environment. Some might argue as it should be. We need a healthy river system. We need it in times when there’s plenty of rain and in times like now when there’s not hardly any rain.

Updated

Michael McCormack just said it is “National party policy for it to rain”.

That’s the deputy prime minister, in case you had forgotten.

It is my policy to ride rainbows into vats of non-sticky chocolate milk, while eating cakes of smiles, but I guess not all policies can be made reality.

Question:

You told me after the New South Wales state election that at the end of the day, the National party can’t make it rain. You said that as a way to absolve the party of the pain it felt from farmers suffering from the drought.

Since then, and in this speech, it seems like you’ve softened the rhetoric and mentioned, ‘Enough is enough, it’s a long time since we built a dam’.

I’m interested in hearing a clear line from you? Does the National party take any responsibility at all for the anger of drought-stricken farmers? If so, how much? Or is it all the drought’s fault?

McCormack:

I’m disappointed that we haven’t built more dams. So if that is a failure of everyone in government and everyone in the parliament, then yes, that is such a shame. But the fact is that we have been stymied by state governments and that’s why the national water grid is being established.

The fact is that we want to put the politics aside and make sure that we use best available science, local stakeholders, best engineers and the best people possible in the right place to make sure that we build more dams. It’s not enough to say, and it’s not good enough to say to some of the regional communities, well, it’s dry and so there is no water available.

There’s plenty of water going down the river in some systems for environmental flows. There’s plenty of water and the rivers in some cases are running a banker. And yet there’s no allocation for people and the cotton farmers in northern New South Wales and some areas of Queensland have not had an allocation for three years.

So what we need to do is when it rains, and it is raining in some parts of Australia, to store that rain. To pipeline it, if need be. But to make sure that we store it and harvest it and harness it when it’s most needed and that’s when it’s dry.

I went out and faced the people of Mendinee and it’s a crying shame what they endured. But the Darling River doesn’t flow all the time. It’s gone dry 57 times over the past 57 years.

The fact is that there have been 600 fish kills there since 1980. They weren’t all caught on a video and uploaded to social and they didn’t go viral in the past, but they have this time. But we need to do more, and if that means taking blame for something, well, yes, I think that a lot of politicians, both sides, both sides of the fence, need to look at themselves. But the fact is that we’re now, from this vision today, we want to get on and we want to build dams and we will.

Updated

At his press conference Bill Shorten also explained why Labor plans to boost early childhood educators’ pay by 20% (at a cost of $9.9bn over the decade) but not workers in other sectors.

Shorten said the childcare sector is “unique” and the template of a taxpayer top-up of pay is a “special solution” Labor “will only use in childcare”. Childcare is the 92nd lowest paid of 96 sectors, he said, arguing that it is “no accident” that it is an industry where women are the majority of the workforce.

Shorten said Labor had “other mechanisms” to lift pay in other industries – citing the policy to reverse penalty rate cuts to restore $2.8bn of pay for retail, hospitality and pharmacy workers over the next term of government.

Labor also has a policy to change the rules for equal pay cases, so that unions trying to prove the undervaluation of work in female-dominated industries will not require a comparison with a male.

Asked about aged care – another female-dominated industry – Shorten suggested Labor would need to wait for the royal commission before considering conditions in the industry, but ruled out a pay top-up.

Updated

Question:

One reason why One Nation is strong in Queensland, and now Clive Palmer, is that the Nationals have not been successful enough in appealing to those disillusioned voters.

Do you believe that the Nationals would be in a better position in Queensland if the LNP was demerged and you went alone in the regional areas?

Michael McCormack:

The LNP went that way more than a decade ago, and went that way for reasons that were probably very much Queensland reasons. I like the fact that I represent the Nationals as a separate party in New South Wales, and I will always resist attempts to merge the parties here in New South Wales.

The fact is that the LNP has been a successful merger. The fact is that the members of the LNP, who were in seats that were once represented by National party people, still represent and still sit with the National party. George Christensen, David Littleproud, Llew O’Brien, Keith Pitt. You start naming people and you always forget one.

But they’re getting on with the job of making sure that we are represented, and the National party banner still flies strongly, and people in Queensland, they discern the difference between the Liberals and the Nationals and I know that the media does, too, and let me tell you that the prime minister does too, because sometimes it’s the Nationals in Queensland who give him the most grief when it comes to... And prime ministers past.

But they fight for their constituents. The National party members who come down from Queensland, they wear the LNP banner but let me tell you that they fight hard for people of central and north Queensland and fight hard for the interests of regional Queenslanders and will continue to do that.

Updated

Michael McCormack says the Nationals tend to be more polite on social media as a general rule (except for that time George Christensen posted an image of himself with a gun telling the Greens to make his day, or that time George Christensen posted a cartoon of a naked Annastacia Palaszczuk on a wreaking ball. In fact, except for that time George Christensen *insert example here*).

Updated

Question:

In recent days, we spoke about the divide between the city and the bush and how it is deepening. Yet you and other National MPs regularly use terms like “latte sippers” and “greenies” to describe people in the city.

Do you think that you’ve contributed to the divide? And will you commit to a more respectful dialogue to people who are farmers’ customers in the city?

Michael McCormack:

Sure, I think that everybody should be more respectful of each other, and I think that we were talking yesterday about Van Badham [disclosure, she is also a Guardian columnist] and the language that she uses, and yet, Tanya Plibersek and Bill Shorten are happy to be situated beside her and pose for photos.

I think that her language is far worse than calling some of the metropolitan people a latte sipper.

Mind you, they’re drinking milk that comes from no doubt a country cow. They’re having coffee beans, which no doubt come from a regional centre. The fact is, we need to be more respectful in our dialogue.

One thing that I will say about Kevin Rudd is that when he retired, he talked about the politeness needed in politics, and the need for more of it. And he was probably right. He was right then. He’s probably still to this day correct. But the fact is, Twitter, there’s a lot of people, and particularly on the left side of politics, which uses Twitter as a weapon against people who stand for and represent regional Australia.

The Great Dividing Range is not just a geographical barrier, sadly these days, it is a metaphor for the differences between metropolitan cities and the great sprawl that is regional Australia.

And more is the pity. Warren Truss said to me one day that back in his day when he was a young fellow, a lot of people would come and visit the country farm, the country cousins. That doesn’t happen these days. We’re so busy and so caught up in the hustle and bustle of life that I think that city people forget where the food and fibre comes from.

That’s why I was delighted to stand beside prime minister Scott Morrison last week and announce a new arrangement in which country kids and city kids will be drawn closer together because metropolitan kids will know where the food comes from. It doesn’t just come from a fridge.

It doesn’t just come from a supermarket but comes from a farm, and we will always stand up for farmers. We will always make sure that their hard work and their endeavours have respect, and we’ll get on with doing that and maybe I shouldn’t tweet about latte sippers in the next few weeks!

Updated

Question:

The National party has run into trouble with section 44 of the constitution in the previous parliament. Can you give a guarantee to voters today that all of your candidates are constitutionally sound?

Answer:

Our processes and protocols have been very, very much tightened since the last round of section 44, of course, rose its ugly head. The fact is, my executive tells me that everybody, the bona fides of everybody has been checked and that I welcome every one of those members who currently holds a position to be re-elected. I’m welcoming them back to the National party room and I hope that many other candidates who wear the green and gold are elected besides and I’m sure that they’ll all be appropriately signed off, and of course, the parliament has decreed that we have to sign a very regimented document to ensure that we are all above board.

Updated

Question:

You said today that no one in regional Australia should feel left behind, but heading into this federal election, we’re seeing more independents challenge Coalition MPs in a way that we haven’t seen in the cities. Certainly far more independents considered a likely challenge come May 18. Do you think that that points to you failing to represent those rural constituents? And how are you going to encourage people not to vote independent?

McCormack:

Well, independents won’t deliver too much at all in a situation where there’s a majority government. And we will see that in the majority government that Gladys Berejiklian and John Barilaro lead in New South Wales.

Yes, sometimes there is a protest vote, and I understand that and I understand that the clamour for independents heightens when you have a particularly prolonged dry spell.

My predecessor told me that everything will go reasonably well until there’s a drought. She was the member during one of our most terrible droughts, the millennium drought. It is difficult because country people are hardest hit when there’s a drought, hardest hit. Because the small businesses suffer. The farm and income deappreciatates and drops considerably.

But the fact of the matter is that independents can put their hand up and that’s the democratic system and good luck to them. But the fact is that no one will deliver like the Nationals for regional Australia. The fact is that we do hold significant and important portfolios around the cabinet table, and an independent will never be able to do anything other than throw stones at a tent.

They will generally be a voice in the wilderness. The Nationals are in there and we are in the portfolios of infrastructure, of water, of resources, of regional development and Aboriginal affairs.

We hold portfolios like small business, and hold important portfolios like Bridget McKenzie like rural health and rural telecommunications. The job of trade, tourism and investment, assistant minister. And doing a wonderful job in that regard. Matt Canavan as resources in northern Australia. The key portfolio areas for regional Australia. What will an independent be able to do? They might be able to pick up a phone and send an email?

Or tweet about it on social media, but not around the table where the funding is going out and not around the table where the big decisions are going out for and on behalf of regional Australia. But the Nationals are, and we always will be.

Updated

Question:

It’s been a turbulent time for the Nationals the past 18 months. There’s been untidiness, division and leadership rumblings. One of your colleagues described it to me in this way. “It’s like watching a nature documentary. The gazelles always get eaten by the lions. Michael McCormack is a gazelle, a lovely-looking animal but always a lion lurking.” Are you a gazelle? Is Barnaby Joyce a lion? And is there an inevitability of him taking the leadership?

MM:

The fact is that I have got out and worked very hard to build a united team. Under difficult circumstances I’ve made sure that some of the things that we weren’t able to tick off on, such as the Murray-Darling Medical School Network was made possible.

The fact is that I’ve got on with the job of making sure that we had money for a Collinsville $10m potential business case for a coal-fired power station there to help the cement factory, to help the aluminium smelter, to help the industries and the factories of Gladstone to be able to have a future so that they didn’t have to pay high power prices.

I did that. I did that, as the Nationals leader. The fact is, I’ve got on with the job of making sure that we had an extra $500m in the National Water Infrastructure Development Fund. I don’t get out on the mountain tops and scream about how good I am or how effective I’m doing.

The fact is that I’m getting in behind the scenes, and Scott Morrison and I have got a very good relationship. A very, very good relationship and I hope that that continues long into the future.

But the fact is, in a democracy, when you’re in a party, the positions become vacant after an election. That’s the case with every political party. The fact is, if somebody wants to put their hand up, they’re entitled to do so. But I’ll stand on my record. I’ll stand on the fact that what I’ve done for regional Australia, and while I might not go out and spruik my case in the national media, the fact is that I’m getting out and meeting real people in country towns, in town hall meetings and actually achieving real results for them. And the fact is people are actually very, very happy with my record of delivering, for doing just that.

Updated

That was a very niche Queensland answer. I think he is getting at the deputy premier, Jackie Trad (who is in the left of Labor). But, as with many things McCormack says, it is unclear exactly what he is getting at.

At least there is consistency in that.

Updated

Question:

But as you just said, you do whatever it takes. While National party preferences won’t be distributed, they will be, but the minor parties will be.

Are you comfortable that One Nation preferences could help you win the seats up in Queensland? Is it a good look for the party, for the National party, to get so close to a party where ... to One Nation, where they cosy up to the gun lobby, where the party leader in Queensland feels it quite good to hang out in strip clubs and do not very nice things to women? What sort of values does that send, message does that send on values to the bush, particularly when your voters are socially conservative?

Michael McCormack:

I think that the principles and values shown in the television program last night were, of course, abhorrent. When I used to go to North Queensland, they used to talk about JT.

They used to talk about JT as though he was a deity. Johnathan Thurston helped North Queensland to the first premiership win by kicking the memorial field goal.

These days JT for Labor and the Greens means just transition.

It means transition from a coal job or a mining job into another job. We can’t be a nation of coffee makers.

But we can’t be a nation where we tell our resources sector that you don’t have a job. And what really annoys me a is that in metropolitan Australia where they think of the blackened face and the torch on the front of the helmet and a hi-viz industry, that’s what they think about.

What they don’t think of is the many engineers and geo tech people and executive assistants and people working on behalf of the resources sector in many capital cities in Australia, and certainly in many of the regional areas and towns.

What they don’t think of is the $66bn of exports which helps to pay for many state schools, which helps to pay for many state hospitals.

What they don’t think of is the fact that there are 55,000 people working there. Bob Brown went up there with the convoy of no confidence in the coalmining industry and, you know, was greeted with the derision that he deserved to be.

The fact is that they drove up there in cars made of steel that come originally from coal. The fact is, every time you use your mobile phone, it comes from rare elements coming from the ground. We need a resources sector. We need to be able to make sure that we have a strong mining industry, and the Nationals will always do that. I will always stand side-by-side the mining people. The Greens and Labor don’t and that’s why they’re coming last in the preferences.

Updated

Question: The Graham Richardson philosophy – whatever it takes?

MM:

Well, it’s all very well and good to be pure and altruistic before May 18.

But after May 18, if you think – perhaps I should have thought more carefully about where the preferences flowed in local seat-by-seat, that would be rather stupid. Because then you can’t get on with doing what you want to do for regional Australia.

And the fact is I’m not planning on too many of the preferences being counted in National party seats.

I’d like to think that we’ll finish first or second and our preferences won’t be distributed. Other minor party preferences will be distributed and hopefully distributed to the Nationals candidate.

Updated

Back to Michael McCormack (I will come back to Labor, but it will take me time to transcribe).

Question: How wise is it for the National party to hitch its preference wagon to One Nation, given revelations recently about that party seeking funds from the National Rifle Association in the United States, and in light of today’s development with the candidate, Steve Dickson, resigning from the party?

McCormack:

Well, you have to do what it takes to get votes and to win at an election. And the fact is that the National party policies, are probably closer aligned with One Nation than they ever were with the Greens or Labor. Fact of the matter.

I appreciate that some members of One Nation have done some rather interesting things lately, and said some things that are quite unpalatable. I understand that. But we’re not One Nation.

We are the Nationals. We are in Coalition with the Liberal party.

My advice to people is – if they get a ballot paper with the National party candidate on it, put a 1 beside it and make sure that you fill out every box. If they get a ballot paper with only the Liberals on it, put a number one beside the Liberal candidate’s name and make sure that you fill out every box.

The fact is that I very rarely get asked, when I’m out and about, about preferences.

I know that journalists are obsessed by it, but the fact is that polling started yesterday. It’s going to continue for the next three weeks, prepolling.

And on May 18, think National, think local. That’s the best opportunity, that’s the best option that you have to build a better regional Australia.

But I guess Greens/Labor preferences are a completely different story that everyone is interested in.

Updated

'Impossible' to cost Labor's climate policy – Mark Butler

The first question is on the price impact of Labor’s climate policy.

Mark Butler takes the bulk of the answer:

The PBO would not model the safeguards mechanism for us any more than it’s modelled the safeguards mechanism for Malcolm Turnbull who introduced the mechanism, or for Scott Morrison, for whom it is continuing as part of its policy mix.

... If I can go to the cost impact of the policy we have announced, it is impossible to cost this, because a Labor government, led by Bill Shorten and Tanya Plibersek, would not be imposing a direct carbon price on businesses, it certainly would not be imposing a carbon tax any more than Malcolm Turnbull or Scott Morrison have, because what we have decided to do, after talking exhaustively with business groups over the last 12 or 18 months, is simply adopt the safeguards mechanism that was introduced by Malcolm Turnbull.

All that mechanism does is set a limit on carbon pollution. Businesses who are able to stick to their limit, then they won’t hear from the government any more. Obviously they are required to report on those limits, but other than that there is no price impact at all. And if they are not able to stick to their limit, in the same way they are not under the safeguards mechanism as it operates now, they will have the broadest range of possible offsets.

But how business deals with that is going to be a matter for them. It won’t be dictated by Canberra, so it can’t be costed by Canberra.

It will be a matter for them. That is what business unanimously asked the Labor party to adopt as our policy.

Updated

Bill Shorten press conference

Bill Shorten is now holding his press conference.

The ABC is staying with the national press club address, so we are watching on Sky, meaning there is no Tveeder transcript.

But climate is the focus. Mark Butler is there, as is Tanya Plibersek.

Right. So they are big and small things and they matter.

It’s like someone taught a loaf of white bread to talk.

Michael McCormack speaks at the National Press Club

Michael McCormack has begun his press club address:

At the heart of this campaign, at the heart of what the Nationals stand for, and at the heart of my vision for regional Australia, there are some key questions.

If you live beyond the city lights in a regional city or a country town, what kind of community do you want that to be?

Do you want better access to a local doctor? Do you want better roads to get you home sooner and safer?

Do you want more and better paying jobs to keep skills and opportunities in your region? Do you want country sporting clubs and facilities to have basic services like female change rooms at local sporting fields?

Do you think we should harvest and harness water when it does rain, to support communities when it doesn’t?

Do you think we should save and better prepare for drought by putting money aside to better support farmers, small business and communities when they most need it?

Should a farmer be able to produce whatever he or she thinks is best for that particular season? Or should they be told from afar to draw a line through commodities in some country and coastal communities?

When I’m walking down the main streets in country towns, these are the things that people talk to me about.

They are the issues which matter. They are the little things, the Nationals in government are working on in our country, coastal communities, on which they can grow. But they’re also big things.

They are very big things and they matter.

Updated

Last question: The audience obviously – the majority of the audience backed Bill Shorten. Any lessons learned? Have you underestimated your opponent?

Morrison:

I never underestimate anybody, whether it is the good people of the travelling gallery who are with me or anywhere else.

I treat my opponents with respect – I am talking about Bill Shorten now, not the gallery.

I treat people with respect and seek to do that. I think there is a very real and significant choice that is being made here.

Australians will make up their own minds about the debate. I thank all those Australians who have got in touch with me. I note on the Nine MSN poll last night, some 50,000 people voted and they gave it to me two-thirds to one-third and on 6 PR it was 80/20.

That is why I love the West. People will make their judgment it is always their choice. They can have me or Bill Shorten. Thanks very much, great to be here.

Updated

Question:

Last night’s debate didn’t make the top 20 rating programs and only narrowly beat reruns of Bob the Builder. Does that say people aren’t interested in what the leaders have to say?

Morrison:

I like Bob the Builder. What we know about this election is it will be close. Everybody’s votes will matter. The fact that Australians on most days of the week would rather talk about what is more interesting to them in their daily lives is one of the great things about Australian politics.

The fact we are interested about what we are doing with our families and kids on the weekends, that is where Australians’ passions are.

That is fantastic. They also know that this decision is going to be very important. As we get closer to the election, we are seeing them focus more and more. It is their choice.

They will make it, the choice is clear, you can choose between Bill Shorten as the next prime minister or myself, continuing on as prime ,inister.

You can choose a party in our Liberal and Nationals who have brought the budget back into surplus, who knows how to manage money or a Labor party that have demonstrated they can’t manage money.

A government that is going to ensure that we keep our economy strong or a Labor party who, through their own policies, will slow it down and a government that has demonstrated we can reduce taxes already legislated with more to come both now and in the future and a Labor party that wants to put up taxes.

Last night Bill Shorten lied about the impact of his retiree tax on pensioners. Pensioners will be hit by Labor’s policy on frank detective defend rebates. They will.

If you go into a self-managed super fund after the end of March last year, you will lose it. That is what will happen. You will lose it. He said point-blank last night pensioners will not be affected.

Whether it is the affect of his retiree tax he can’t explain, when he pretends he is not putting up superannuation taxes when he has 34 billion of them, when he tells a Gladstone worker he is pretending to take his taxes down or be looking at it down the track, when just in a few months time he will whack it up by 2% and when he won’t tell Australians the cost of his emissions reduction policies.

You are getting a clear signal about the choice that so offer at this election.

Scott Morrison and Liberal member for Canning Andrew Hastie meet locals on a street walk in Mandurah, south of Perth, on Tuesday
Scott Morrison and Liberal member for Canning Andrew Hastie meet locals on a street walk in Mandurah, south of Perth, on Tuesday. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

Updated

(On that $35bn figure, just a reminder of this story from the SMH’s David Crowe not so long ago)

The election fight on climate change has sparked warnings against “misleading” voters about the cost of cutting greenhouse gas emissions, as an independent researcher repudiates Coalition claims of a $35bn hit from Labor policies.

Prime minister Scott Morrison has been accused of “cherry-picking” numbers in the escalating row over the competing pledges on climate, as he prepares to release new estimates of the economic impact of the Labor carbon target.

... The research company cited in the government’s $35bn claim, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, has also told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age that the figure was “not a credible estimate” of the cost of buying international carbon permits.”

Updated

There’s another question on Clive Palmer preferences:

That is a big cost for Australia to bear. A cost that Bill Shorten won’t tell you about and we are pursuing Clive but let’s be clear about Labor’s hypocrisy here.

Labor is preferencing United Australia party. Labor is preferencing Clive Palmer in 85 seats around the country. 85 seats.

We had Anthony Albanese talking about the seat of Franklin this morning, where they are putting Clive Palmer ahead of Andrew Wilkie.

When he was asked about it he said “That doesn’t matter”.

If it doesn’t matter, I don’t understand why they have been raising this issue so much over the last few days. That issue has run its course and principally because of the hypocrisy of the Labor party who sought to raise this as an issue.

Clive Palmer should pay his workers. Clive Palmer should answer to the courts like any other Australian will.

I tell what you Clive Palmer is not going to do which Bill Shorten and the Greens are going to do, Labor and the Greens are going to put a $387bn tax bill on Australians which will slow our economy and cost peoples’ jobs.

On emissions reductions in particular, there is over 100,000 jobs here in WA that are in companies operating here in WA that will be directly impacted by Bill Shorten’s plan to force those companies ultimately to buy foreign carbon credits from overseas.

I asked him a simple questions last night and he didn’t answer it again. 1.3bn tonnes of carbon emissions reductions is what he has to achieve to meet his 2030 targets.

Our figure is 328m tonnes. I simply ask Bill, what proportion of that 1.3bn tonne is going to be met by foreign carbon credits? Our best estimate is half. 650m tonnes.

Now the price for the carbon credits in Europe at the present is around $42 or $43 per credit. It is estimated to go to $52 by the end of the decade. It is simple maths. This will cost Australian businesses anywhere between, on current prices, $27.5bn to up to $35bn.

I shouldn’t know Bill Shorten’s policies better than he does but that is what we saw last night. He was talking about electric cars last night and he had a go at me because I read the motoring pages of the papers.

I think a few people do that, Bill. What I do know is if you buy a Hyundai Ionic it will set you back $39,000 and if you buy an I 30 it will set you back $22,000. You have to think the things through. If you can’t manage money you can’t stop spending money and that is what we see from Labor.

Updated

Question: Given you’re chasing Clive Palmer through the courts and you said that legal action will come out after the election about that, how can you say Labor and the Greens are a bigger risk to Australia?

Scott Morrison:

Because Labor and the Greens are going to put a 45% emissions reduction target on Australia which is going to cost some $475bn over the next 10 years, reduce peoples’ wages by 8,000. It is going to increase wholesale electricity prices by 58% and cost 336,000 jobs.

Updated

Pensions will increase because of indexation – Morrison

Question: Will you increased the aged pension, prime minister, and if you won’t, why is Warren Mundine driving a bus around saying that you will?

Scott Morrison:

Because the aged pension goes up twice a year. It is indexed, going up twice a year, just like all payments of that nature, whether they be pension or Newstart, they go up twice a year.”

Updated

Question: Why is he a better leader than Peter Dutton?

Hastie: The prime minister showcased exactly why he is a superb prime minister last night and why he should be re-elected. He won is in my view. Anyway.

Question: There has been some stuff on social media you might be able to clear up. Have you ever met Neil Ericsson?

Hastie: I don’t answer defamatory questions and I won’t get involved.

Question: What is defamatory about saying yes or no?

Hastie does not answer.

Updated

Question [for Andrew Hastie]: Back in August you backed Peter Dutton to be prime minister. Were you wrong back then, do you regret what you did now standing besides the man next to you?

Scott Morrison is a great prime minister. I support him. He has always been a friend and colleague. August is last year.

This is 2019 and there is a choice before us. I’m committed very much to winning this election. There is a lot at stake here. A 45% emissions reduction target, for example, will put 3,000 jobs in this region, mainly Alcoa, at risk. We can’t afford that.

Updated

Question: What is your reaction to last night’s leaders debate and were there any moments that should have longer impact on this campaign?

Morrison:

At the end of the night, which was the question you threw at the end which wasn’t one on the running order, it gave people a chance to assess both of us with a question like that.

Last night Bill Shorten had the opportunity to explain a number of things. What is the cost of changing the government is the cost of Labor’s tax bill? $387bn which they haven’t refuted for a day. I imagine that is because they know as well as we do that the individual items that make up their tax plan, this he were costed by Treasury before we went into caretaker mode and that is the bill that Australia can’t afford that $387bn.

On top of that last night, Mr Shorten said he didn’t know and didn’t think you could put a cost on his emissions reductions policies. Bill Shorten doesn’t know the cost of anything because he’s not the one that is going to pay for it.

The Australian people are the ones who are going to pay for it. We are already out there, Australians are voting. I thought last night was an important opportunity for the Labor Party and Bill Shorten as leader to finally tell people what is the cost of his policies?

What is the cost of changing government? Last time we changed to a Labor government in 2007 there was a big cost. The budget went from surplus into deficit. Our borders went from strong to porous. We had 50,000 people turn up on 800 boats. We saw debts go through the roof and we saw ill-considered and ill-thought-through policies like the school halls programs and their cash for clunkers and the programs for insulation batts which were all a complete disaster.

It has taken us more than a decade to get back to where John Howard and Peter Costello left us. There is a big price for changing government.

Bill Shorten won’t tell you what the price is. If he won’t tell you what the price is, you shouldn’t vote for him. If he doesn’t know what the price is, you certainly shouldn’t vote for him. I know what the price is and you certainly shouldn’t vote for him.

Updated

Question: The independent running in Curtin, Louise Stewart, is in hot water. What do you make of her refusal to release the email she says came to her with that polling from a third party and should this matter be referred to the AFP?

Morrison:

What we have in Curtin is an independent who has shown why she shouldn’t be elected.

She has shown a great deal of poor judgment and I think that is what is on display to the electors. I believe the electors in Curtin will rightly mark her down on that and I think our canned out there will do an outstanding job and it reinforces why she would be the best candidate for the people of Curtin.

If you vote for the independents or the minor parties, you aren’t voting to get taxes down or voting to make Australia safer.

That happens by voting for the Liberal and National parties. The only people we’re advocating a vote for is the Liberal and National parties. That is the way you get strong and stable government that delivers on a strong economy, keeps Australians safe and brings Australians together into the future.

That is the agenda we are putting forward and that is the agenda we have pursued as a government for the last 5.5 years which has seen more than 100,000 young people get a job in one financial year which is an all time record.

Updated

On Steve Dickson’s actions and his resignation, in the wake of that, how disappointed are you in Mr McCormack’s comments that a marriage between the Nationals and One Nation just makes sense?

Morrison:

The Nationals are an independent party. They are their own party. I don’t tell the Nationals how to run their political campaigns or how they make decisions in their political party. We are a Coalition. We are not the one party and we have – we run our campaigns and I am sure Michael would be happy to answer those questions on behalf of his party.

Updated

Question: Michael McCormack said a preference deal between One Nation and the Nationals makes sense because the two parties’ policies are closely aligned.

Doesn’t that contradict your statements earlier about One Nation and the fact that the Liberals are placing them last?

Morrison:

We are two separate parties and there is no deal between the National party and One Nation. There is no agreement between them. The One Nation party have made their decision and the Nationals have made their decision. That is a matter for the National party.

Updated

Question: The Islamic State, the group has released a video to porting to show its leader ... [praising] an Australian jihadi. Do we have evidence that he is alive or could this be another Australian?

Morrison:

What we saw in Sri Lanka, as I remarked on on Anzac Day, is a new front line in the war against terrorism. What we now have is foreign fighters returning to their home countries, whether that is in Sri Lanka or other parts of the Indo-Pacific.

That presents a new threat in all of these countries because the Daesh network is activating foreign fighters when they come back on to their domestic soil.

That is why we have sought to introduce temporary exclusion orders as a key part of ensuring we can keep those Australian citizens returning under close watch on a parole-like set of arrangements as occurs in the UK.

That will be the first bill, amongst many, we will pass should we be re-elected as a government on 18 May.

You have to remain vigilant when it comes to addressing terrorism. We have our own counter-terrorism officers who are over there assisting with the investigation in Sri Lanka now and it remains a troubled and dangerous place.

We will continue to do everything we can to ensure we resist attacks here in Australia and that means knowing who the risks are and making sure we are keeping a close eye wherever we can.

Updated

Scott Morrison holds press

Scott Morrison is standing up with Andrew Hastie to talk security.

It’s telling that Peter Dutton, who is considered quite popular in Western Auastralia, is not here for this announcement – the home affairs minister is still in a fight to hold on to his seat, so he’s not stepping out of the electorate just now.

Morrison:

I also said I wanted to keep Australians safe and I wanted to keep them together.

Keeping Australians safe, whether it is doing the right thing by our defence forces and ensuring they have the capability where they need it, whether training here in Australia or being deployed overseas or ensuring through our anti-gang squad ... or ensuring we do the right thing by expelling people from Australia on visas who have broken our laws, 4,400 visas we have cancelled as a government.

I remember one of the first ones I did, I was the immigration minister, Alex Vella, the president of the Rebels Motorcycle Gang, and he has not set foot back in Australia today and Australia is safer because of that.

300 child sex offenders have been expelled from Australia who were here on a visa.

They paid for their price and going through our prison system and they wore out their welcome and we told them to go.

Those difficult things but the practical things like investing in the safety infrastructure, that small and family businesses need in towns and rein-ons and cities and suburbs all around the country. That is what this $20m is doing, keeping Australians safe, keeping our economy strong and keeping Australians together.

Updated

Speaking of socialism, and in the context of Michael McCormack’s comments that One Nation’s policies closely align with those of the Nationals, the Pauline Hanson party has long wanted a publicly owned bank.

It also wants to return assets to public hands. You know – have the government take over privatised sectors.

But, I mean, that is totally different right? That’s not ... socialism, surely?

Updated

Childcare wage increase 'Labor's socialist experiment'

For those who wanted the actual quote, here is Josh Frydenberg doubling down on the socialist terror that is Labor’s increase to the wages of childcare workers policy:

We learned yesterday about Labor’s socialist experiment, its plan to nationalise our workforce, with taxpayers funding private sector workers with increased wages.

The line, and the queue, outside Bill Shorten’s office is growing by the minute, from unions who are emboldened by this announcement.

Today it’s the childcare unions, tomorrow it’s the disability support sector unions, then it’ll be the retail unions – all who want a taxpayer-funded handout.”

Taxpayer-funded handouts? Like apprentice wage subsidies? Or franking credits? Or any subsidy/bailout of a commercial sector business? Or a concessional loan?

Updated

Palmer preference deal under fire in SA

The Liberals’ preference deal with Clive Palmer is under fire in South Australia, with the government forced to rule out doing any deals that could roll back the Murray Darling Basin Plan.

Palmer’s United Australia party’s is running advertisements in the eastern states pledging to rip up the Murray Darling Basin Plan, which South Australians believe is essential for the health of the river and lower lakes in the state.

The Coalition’s campaign spokesman, Simon Birmingham, was this morning asked to guarantee that the preference deal with Palmer would not lead to any horse trading over national water policy.

“The South Australian Liberals would never allow that to occur. We’ve stood up before when it comes to the Murray-Darling Basin, internal debate in the parliament about different issues on this and because of the strength, the representation out of SA, the position has always been rock solid in support for the Murray-Darling Basin Plan,” Birmingham said.

“Never will we step away from our policy commitment which is to fully implement the Murray-Darling Basin Plan.”

In a media release published last week, the United Australia party said it would abolish the Murray-Darling Basin Plan “to return the once-iconic river system to a healthy, sustainable and functional condition”.

Updated

I am so excited by Michael McCormack’s national press club address, I had forgotten it was on.

But on it is. Very soon.

Brendan O’Connor is in Townsville, where he and Cathy O’Toole have a few things to say about the Clive Palmer preference deal. Or as Labor HQ put it, to “talk to former Queensland Nickel workers who still have not been paid their full entitlements. While workers have not been paid their full entitlements, Clive Palmer is spending $50m on advertising and the prime minister is doing a deal with him in a desperate bid to cling to power.”

Updated

George Christensen has ... well, actually, it’s easier if you just see it.

He may have been everywhere but his electorate for a big chunk of the last term of parliament (which is why he’s been in the news lately), but he wants you to know he’s got north Queensland its share, man.

George Christensen’s latest offering to the election campaign

Updated

Over in WA, the campaigns are starting to kick into gear. From AAP:

Bill Shorten concedes Labor’s ambitious electric car targets may never be achieved.

The federal opposition wants half of all new cars sold by 2030 to be electric, backed by plans to bankroll more charging stations and imposing buying roles on government fleets.

“That doesn’t mean that will happen,” Mr Shorten told Nova Radio in Perth on Tuesday.

The no deal, deal

Well that didn’t take long

Labor’s new campaign ad

Josh Frydenberg really, really wants you to know that “Labor can’t manage money so it is coming after yours”.

He has said it at least three times now. And he is speaking very deliberately, so you know it is VERY IMPORTANT AND SERIOUS.

While standing in a room usually reserved for very serious economic press conferences, or “we will never surrender” speeches.

Updated

Following in the footsteps of Dan Tehan’s “Labor’s childcare worker pay increase policy is communism” comment from yesterday, Josh Frydenberg is doubling down, calling it “socialism” in a two-flag press conference.

He seems to think that raising the wages for workers in a sector which is heavily subsidised by the government, is a very fast track to socialism, where the ghost of Stalin runs riot.

[Bill Shorten] said, “We’re starting first with the childcare sector.” And then we saw Anthony Albanese this morning saying, giving hope to other sectors saying, “I can’t announce this morning who’s next,” but you know, he was giving hope to other sectors who would be supported here by the Labor party.

And then you had O’Connor from the Labor party, Brendan O’Connor saying, “This is a one-off with the childcare.” So you can’t even get Brendan O’Connor, Anthony Albanese and Bill Shorten on the same page.

The reality is this is a big Labor socialist experiment. It will turn the Australian economy on its head. We’re going to get the taxpayer funding private sector wages.

Last time it was done, it was a union slush fund designed to boost union membership. The Australian people should just remember one thing: when Bill Shorten increases taxes, he’s doing it to support his union mates. He can’t manage money, so he’s coming after yours.

Updated

Matt Canavan did it, Arthur Sinodinos did it - and now the Nationals Braddon candidate is doing it.

But so far, there is no actual commitment to raise Newstart.

Murray Watt has compiled a handy list of One Nation resignations, because I guess we all have to have our hobbies:

  • Steve Dickson - Senate candidate and Queensland leader - resigned, 2019
  • James Ashby, Hanson Chief of Staff - banned from Parliament, 2019
  • Brian Burston – Senator for NSW – resigned from One Nation, 2018
  • Fraser Anning – Senator for Queensland – resigned from One Nation, 2017
  • Malcolm Roberts – Senator for Queensland – disqualified, 2017
  • Rodney Culleton – Senator for Western Australia – resigned, 2016
  • John Fischer – Member of WA Legislative Council – resigned, 2004
  • Frank Hough – Member of WA Legislative Council – resigned, 2004
  • Paddy Embry – Member of WA Legislative Council – resigned, 2003
  • Elisa Roberts – Member for Gympie – resigned, 2002
  • Heather Hill – Senator for Queensland – disqualified, 1999
  • Dorothy Pratt – Member for Barambah – resigned, 1999
  • Jeff Knuth – Member for Burdekin – resigned, 1999
  • Bill Feldman – Member for Caboolture – resigned, 1999
  • David Dalgleish – Member for Hervey Bay – resigned, 1999
  • Jack Paff – Member for Ipswich West – resigned, 1999
  • Peter Prenzler – Member for Lockyer – resigned, 1999
  • John Kingston – Member for Maryborough – resigned, 1999
  • Shaun Nelson – Member for Tablelands – resigned, 1999
  • Ken Turner – Member for Thuringowa – resigned, 1999
  • Harry Black – Member for Whitsunday – resigned 1999
  • David Oldfield – Member of NSW Legislative Council – expelled, 1999.

There is a point to it though:

The fact Scott Morrison, the Nationals and the LNP have done a preference deal with One Nation shows how desperate they are to cling on to power,” Watt said in a statement.

A vote for the LNP is a vote for more One Nation chaos. A vote for One Nation is a vote for the LNP.”

Updated

These days it’s nigh on impossible to delete something once it is on social media.

Both campaigns are still in Western Auastralia, but they are taking it a little slower today.

We expect to hear rumblings from the leaders soon.

Updated

These videos are still happening

Sarah Hanson-Young is again calling for a royal commission into the management of the Murray Darling Basin.

Barnaby Joyce has admitted he worked for Kia Ora and Clyde prior to Eastern Agriculture Australia buying the properties,” she said in a statement.

“Taxpayers have every right to know what has gone on, what role Barnaby Joyce played before and after entering parliament, and he should be called before a royal commission.

“Sacking a department head because you weren’t getting your way is gross political interference. Bragging about it to make himself seem more important should worry all voters.

“We need a royal commission into the management of the Murray Darling Basin to clean up the rot plaguing our river system.

Updated

Will section 44 haunt the 46th parliament?

Probably. Paul Karp has had a look at whether the preference flow from ineligible candidates will prove a problem:

After a spate of resignations and disqualifications in the 45th parliament, the joint standing committee on electoral matters studied reform options for section 44, which disqualifies dual citizens and undischarged bankrupts, among others, from sitting in parliament.

In its report the committee warned that the presence of ineligible candidates on the ballot creates potential that “a successful candidate could have their election challenged on the basis of preference flows from an ineligible candidate”.

Williams said it is “a concern” he had raised in his submission that “hasn’t been tested in the high court” and is one of the “new frontiers” of section 44 challenges.

“It’s possible where, in a House of Representatives seat, the positioning of an unqualified candidate may actually have altered the result from one to another, you could say the successful candidate won because of an unqualified one,” he said.

Williams said this was possible where the order of elimination, and hence distribution of preferences, would have been different without the ineligible candidate. “If it turns out their presence affected the result, there may well be a challenge.”

Updated

Over on Sky, Simon Birmingham maintained the line that Scott Morrison emerged victorious in last night’s first leaders’ debate, despite the studio audience handing it convincingly to Bill Shorten (25 to Shorten, 12 to Morrison, 11 undecided)

Birmingham:

A studio audience of 48 people is hardly a scientific sample. I think what anybody who was objectively watching the whole show last night would have seen was Bill Shorten refused to answer detailed questions. When presented with detailed questions about what the cost of change is, he doesn’t answer those. When asked what the detail is around his tax policies he won’t detail it, in fact he misleads and he misled again in regards to pensioners last night and retirees. When asked about the cost of his higher emission reduction targets, he again obfuscates and dodges on that and that is really what this campaign is really crying out for.

Kieran Gilbert points out that the government also hasn’t modelled its own climate policy. Birmingham replies:

We went through an exhausted process, back four years or so ago, in terms of setting those targets, that was a very exhausted process informed by Treasury and other advice, to really get the right spot in terms of what we think is a high ambition target, 26% reduction by GDP, by per capita standards amongst the highest in the world, but also economic responsible. Bill Shorten is the one coming to this election proposing to double that and not actually telling us what the consequence of that change will be.

Updated

Virginia Trioli went another time on that question to Kristina Keneally:

VT: Kristina Keneally, and this is a third time, getting an answer to this question – neither did the opposition leader answer the direct question about how much that important policy of yours costs. Would you like to put a figure on that this morning?

KK: Virginia, what we know is that the cost of inaction is enormous, and we know that doing something about climate change creates jobs, creates economic growth, creates lower power prices, and creates opportunities for Australia. What we also know, from Senate estimates, Mathias Cormann sat right in front of me and said that the government had not modelled their own economic cost of their own policies. But we can look at the modelling that Treasury has done when it comes to Labor’s policies, as well as the government’s, on climate change. And we know that the economy will continue to grow.

Updated

Kristina Keneally is still on the “Bill bus”, which is travelling around Australia as a compliment to Labor’s main campaign.

She was asked on ABC News Breakfast about the cost of Labor’s climate policy, which Shorten was also asked about last night in the leaders’ debate.

Virginia Trioli: According to what we’re reading from the polls, the leader of the opposition won the audience vote last night. But if you can’t actually end up summarising the total cost of your emissions reduction scheme, then you’ve got a bit of a problem into the rest of this campaign, don’t you?

KK: Well, Virginia, what we saw last night in the debate was Bill Shorten outlining a full suite of policies that a Shorten Labor government would enact for Australia.

On climate change, on energy, on wages, on education, on health, on cancer. We come to this election with a bold vision for Australia, and with a government that is stable, united and focused on the Australian people. What did Scott Morrison have to offer? Nothing but more chaos and division, his cuts. He has such a narrow range of things he can talk about before he starts to spark division within his own ranks.

VT: Well, I’m gonna pull you back to the narrow range of things ... I’m going to pull you back to my question, Kristina Keneally. I didn’t ask for a stump speech. I asked a specific question about the fact that the leader of the opposition struggled to put a global and complete figure on, yes, a policy that’s very important to you, which is emissions reductions. But if you can’t give the Australian people that specific figure, then you have a problem, don’t you?

KK: Well, Virginia, right now we have a problem in Australia, because we have a government that is doing nothing about climate change. And the cost of inaction is enormous. The CSIRO puts that cost at some $14,000 per household, some hundreds of billions of dollars over the forward estimates, if we fail to act on climate change. Now, what we do know, that under the government’s own modelling, that the economy will continue to grow under both Labor and the Coalition’s policies when it comes to climate change.

But what we also know is that the government doesn’t have a clear set of policies that they can point to. And what they’re going to do to bring emissions down. Under this Coalition government, emissions are going up and electricity costs are going up. And last night the prime minister failed to outline, in any way, what he is going to do to help Australian households to deal with those rising electricity costs and also help Australia to bring down its emissions.

Updated

Good morning

We have passed the half way mark!

And it’s already proved too much for more than 100,000 people who hit the pre-polls the moment they opened yesterday. That’s about 50,000 more than the same number who had pre-polled this time last election, so I think those predictions of early voters hitting 40% this time around is on the money.

Which doesn’t leave a lot of time for the parties to convince voters of their case to govern.

Pauline Hanson’s One Nation is the gift that keeps on keeping on for the Coalition. On the same day Nationals leader, Michael McCormack (who will also deliver a national press club address around lunchtime), told the Sydney Morning Herald that preferencing Hanson made sense –

At the end of the day, we’re in an election. You can’t be altruistic and then after May 18 just be shouting from the sidelines and be in opposition and wishing you had done something else. We want to win.

– Hanson accepted the resignation of her Queensland party leader after footage emerged of him being gross in a US strip club.

It wasn’t so much that he was in a strip club as what he was saying and what he was doing.

The man had less chance of making it into the Senate as I do of convincing Daniel Craig I’m his soulmate, but it’s not great timing for One Nation, as Hanson struggles to fight off Clive Palmer’s resurgence in her home state. She said this morning:

I have always spoken very highly of Steve Dickson but the footage I saw last night cannot be ignored or condoned, I am both the mother of three boys and the only female leader of a political party in this country, I wouldn’t tolerate my own children behaving this way towards women and I cannot and will not condone my own candidates dealing with women in this fashion either.

Dickson, who joined One Nation after being left off the LNP shadow bench after the Queensland Newman government lost power, has asked for privacy as he will no longer be of “public interest”.

So it should be a fun day for McCormack, as he explains the decision to preference One Nation candidates. The government is also having to justify its preference deal with Palmer’s United Australia party.

Once again though, preferences only matter to the extent voters decide to follow a how-to-vote card.

Labor, fresh off Bill Shorten’s audience win in the first leaders’ debate, is still facing questions about how much its climate policy will cost.

Rinse and repeat. It’s that sort of day.

You’ll have the Guardian brains trust to help fill you in, and most of what is left of my brain.

Ready?

Let’s get into it.

Updated

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