Penny Wong was asked a question during Anthony Albanese’s morning press conference this morning. Wong has been traveling with the main Labor campaign for the better part of this week. Mark Butler has also been there, as well as a variety of other Labor ministers and MPs doing the side campaign.

So far it seems that just Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie has been the only shadow minister Peter Dutton has taken with him, although he did do an event with David Littleproud on Monday.

Q: The Chinese Ambassador has urged Australia to work closely with China to counter the impacts of tariffs. So is teaming up with China economically to counter Trump’s tariffs on the cards?
 
Wong:

Look, Australia is a trading nation and we know, we live in a time, where there is a lot of change globally, including on trade, but more broadly. And what we have to do is to recognise the reality and make good decisions for Australia and they include making sure we diversify our trade. And you’ve seen over the three years of this Government, our work to diversify our trading markets, not only to remove $20 billion of trade impediments on the Chinese market, but to do more to exploit the economic opportunities, to take the economic opportunities of Southeast Asia, of India, of a free trade agreement with the UAE. So, what I would say is we know as a Government, we live in times of great change, including on the economic front, and I’m sure we’ll talk about that shortly. But one of the things we have to do very clearly is to focus on Australia’s strengths, on diversifying where we export and where we trade to. And we will do that.

Now just on that, China, South Korea and Japan have come together in a statement saying they have concensus on trade. And as has been pointed out on social media – do you know how bad you have to be to get China, South Korea and Japan to come together in agreement?