Foreign Minister Penny Wong is asked on Adelaide radio about cashing in on the popularity of South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas in the marginal seats of Sturt and Boothby:

Q: “Could South Australians be forgiven for thinking Peter Malinauskas is actually running in this election?”

Penny Wong:

Look, I think a lot of different people who appear on different campaign materials. We’ve got Albo on campaign materials. We’ve got the South Australian ministerial team. We’ve got the Premier. You’ll see a range of materials, but I think the message is very clear.”

Ms. Wong is then asked if she’s spoken with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio ahead of “Liberation Day”, (Thursday, Australia time) when President Trump will announce another round of tariffs.

It’s our job to stand up for Australia, and that’s what we’ll do. We are engaging. I engaged, obviously with Secretary Rubio on the first day he took office, when I was also at the inauguration. But when it comes to the trade, trading policy of the Trump administration, I think Australians can see pretty clearly this is a very different America with a very different economic agenda. That’s what Americans have voted for. But from the Australian Government’s perspective, a Labor Government is not going to trade away the things that make us the best country in the world, like our healthcare system, like our PBS. We want to continue to deliver cheaper medicines for Australians, so we’ll continue to stand up for Australia.”

So, that’s a no?

Q: How will Labor be preferencing the Greens at this election? Can we expect you to preference them second?

Albanese:

That’s the matter for the organisational wing but I make this point as I have made it again – because there was some reporting of something in spite of the 385 times that I have said we will not govern in Coalition with anyone, including the Greens, that I rule out – I rule out – just to be really clear again – if you ask me, “Do you rule out governing in Coalition with the Greens?”, the answer to that is no. I don’t negotiate with the Greens. I’m about campaigning against the Greens and I’m confident we’ll be successful given…we saw a Labor majority, an absolute majority on the inner west council.

Now, if in the inner west of Sydney for those of you familiar with the demographics of Sydney, if the inner west of Sydney can deliver a majority of the Labor Party to govern the inner west council, then I’m pretty confident that I can deliver a majority of Labor members to the House of Representatives to govern the nation.

And for those up the back – preferences are YOUR choice. You can preference any which way you choose, it has nothing to do with the political parties, other than them setting out the way they wish you would preference.

As for ‘will not negotiate with the Greens’ – well Labor does. And so do the Coalition. In the little thing called the SENATE political parties negotiate with whomever will give them the numbers they want when they need the numbers.

If it comes down to having power or not having power – well, you know which way they’ll go. No matter what they say during the campaign.

Q: Prime Minister, your predecessor, Malcolm Turnbull says Donald Trump plainly doesn’t believe in the international rules-based order and his world view actually aligns with Vladimir Putin more than our own. Given Trump’s in the last few months spoken openly about taking over and controlling Gaza and annexing Canada and controlling Greenland by any means, why is Malcolm Turnbull wrong?

Albanese:

Well, Malcolm Turnbull can speak for himself. I’m not going to comment on all of the views of former Prime Ministers. I speak for Australia and the Australian Government’s position is that we continue to enjoy a strong relationship with the United States.

Oh cool beans. That’s completely reassuring.

Q: Former immigration detainee has been arrested and charged in Melbourne after allegedly charging at officers with a metal pole. He was released after that High Court ruling. Did your Government do enough to keep the community safe?

Anthony Albanese:

Well, the DPP charged the bloke. The Commonwealth DPP charged the bloke. We want people and we have introduced laws to ensure that that happens, but most importantly as well we have introduced laws – we want these people out of the country. But you can’t – you can’t override the High Court and that is just something that we have had to deal with. Peter Dutton would have had to deal with the same thing*

*This is true – it was a high court ruling which made indefinite detention illegal, because shock, horror – ministers and governments shouldn’t have the power to lock people up forever. That’s the court’s job (as a Queenslander I am very well across the separation of powers). This could have been avoided if at any time since 2007, either major party had a policy of what to do with asylum seekers and refugees who are unable to be returned to their country (because they face death, persecution, or are stateless) and have had their visas cancelled or rejected in Australia. It is also worth pointing out that if you are an Australian who commits a crime, no matter what crime that is, or how many times you have re-offended, you are released back into the community when your custodial sentence ends. Because that is how the law works.

And dear Dolly save us all – the MODELLING WARS ARE BACK.

For reasons not immediately clear, a reporter from the Australian seems very energised over modelling which sends all our eyes twitching back to 2019.

Q: Prime Minister, can you clarify – is the modelling on power prices still any part of Labor’s energy policy offering?

Albanese:

Our energy policy offering is all out there. The modelling was the modelling they put out. Our policy…

Q: You adopted your 43% target base off that modelling and 82% target, why are they still your targets if you’re now distancing yourself from…

Albanese:

I hope when you get the chance on the next – on the next leg where I assume you’ll be following around, to ask Peter Dutton what his 2030 target is.

Q: I will.

Albanese:

He doesn’t have a 2030 target. He doesn’t have a 2030 target. We have a 2030 target. We’re confident we’ll meet it and our policy is very clear. Our policy is for, same as this bloke’s [Roger Cook] policy, he just got elected and won 46 seats here in WA on, and the Liberal Party were reduced to seven and they just pipped the Nats on six, our policy is for renewables backed with firming capacity of gas, factories and hydro.

That’s our policy.

Q: Do you believe that the North West Shelf Gas project should be extended? And will approvals to that project be further delayed by Labor’s plans? Do we introduce nature positive legislation and the environment protection Agency?

Anthony Albanese:

On the latter, they won’t be delayed by that. They’ll be considered in accordance with the law but I make this point: Peter Dutton for people who haven’t followed, perhaps, the details the way the law works – in him declaring and pre-empting an announcement and a decision on North West Shelf, what he is doing is ensuring that it gets delayed.

That is what he is doing. And the former government the I the same thing with PEP-11 – the exploration licences off the coast of New South Wales, by pre-empting it, it meant that it got delayed and took a long period of time for eventually Minister Husic was given responsibility for it in accordance with the law and that issue is now settled.

If you go out there and you pre-empt the law which says that consideration must be given objectively by the Minister, then you, by definition, put yourself in a position of legal challenge.

There is no question that if the Coalition were to succeed and Peter Dutton were to move to Kirribilli with – on the Harbour, then what would happen would be there would be a legal challenge which is a bit of a lay down misere frankly, you can get any lawyer from – random, pick them out and they can win that case because it is shut, you know – a shut case. It is not sensible to do so for an alternative Prime Minister and there are so many ways in which the alternative government of this country shows that it is not ready to form government. They have been in opposition for under three years, what this shows is they need more time.

Some facts on Woodside’s North West Shelf plan:

Q: The Council of Small Business is asking both sides today to commit to a further tax cuts on small business from 25% to 20%. I’ll get your response to that. And also because you’re in the great minding state of WA, could you rule out further changes to the fuel tax credit for mining companies?

Anthony Albanese:

Of course, on the latter, yes. We have a tax policy, we announced on last Tuesday. Our tax policy is to give every Australian a tax cut. Every sickle one — single one, all 14 million of them. One of the big distinctions in this campaign is a Labor Government wanting tax cuts for every Australian and a Coalition promising to actually introduce legislation to increase income tax for all 14 million Australians at the same time as they’re cutting essential services.

Does Anthony Albanese have plans to visit a mosque today, for Eid?

(The context of this question which is missing is that there is a campaign from anti-genocide protesters to make MPs feel ‘uncomfortable’ at mosques, given the lack of response to what Israel is doing in Palestine).

Albanese:

Not today, but I visited a mosque in Edmonson Park just a couple of weeks ago. That was one of the mosques that had been the subject of threats online. Some of what has occurred online with the threats talking about Christchurch and the need for it to be repeated. Quite frankly, they are reprehensible. So, my thoughts today – I’ve issued a statement of respect for those of Muslim faith who are celebrating Eid today. Eid is a time where the end of the fast – the breaking of the fast – the members of the Islamic community have been going through the period of Ramadan, which is a time for them to renew their faith.

Q: Do you believe you’re welcome within Australia’s Muslim communities?

Albanese:

Yes, I was very welcomed into that community. I thank Mazar Hadid for welcoming me there in south-west Sydney and I have had discussions regularly with members of the community.

Anthony Albanese is still pretending that the only reason there isn’t an environmental protection agency is that he doesn’t have the numbers in the senate and not that he would not allow negotiate with the crossbench in the senate because it might have actually made it stronger:

Well, we won’t be legislating the same model, point one. What we’ll be doing is attempting to legislate an EPA. We have 25 votes out of 76. I’m yet to see a list published, including by The Guardian, that shows a majority 50% plus one of the voting for any of the legislation that’s put forward. That’s just a fact. We took the recommendations from the Samuel review – importantly, a review initiated by the coalition, not by us – initiated because the EPBC Act is out of date.

We know that that is the case. What we will do if we are elected is sit down. And I had a discussion with Rebecca from the WA Chamber just last week, just last week. There is industry and environmental groups who both recognise that it’s not fit for purpose. What we’ll do is work it through, we’ll consult widely, make sure that we get it right, and that is what we will legislate. Something that provides certainty for industry and the way that processes occur – but also provides for sustainability. That’s what we’re after.

There are more questions on the research vessel that might be a spy ship and ‘what is Australia doing to protect underwater cables’ so that’s a thing.

Albanese:

What we have done is we’re continuing to monitor it. We won’t – for obvious reasons – broadcast everything that we’re doing. But we’re keeping an eye on this as we do.

BUT WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?

Albanese:

Australian Defence Force is monitoring what is happening. It’s going from New Zealand – we expect it to go around to China around way.

BUT DOES HE HAVE CONCERNS?

Albanese:

I would prefer that it wasn’t there. But we live in circumstances where, just as Australia has vessels in the South China Sea and vessels in the Taiwan Strait and a range of areas, this vessel is there. What our task is to do is to make sure that we represent Australia’s national interests. We do that each and every day. And I have every confidence – every confidence – in our Defence Force and our security agencies to do just that.