The prime minister is once against off the mark with press conferences.

The main announcement is as previewed – that the federal Labor party has put in a submission to the fair work commission asking for a minimum wage increase above inflation.
What that means is Labor is asking for a ‘real’ wage increase – an increase inline with inflation only takes you to where inflation is (and we all know it is delayed) and wants something above inflation, so people see a difference above the cost of living.

That’s a throwback to the last election and that $1 coin that haunted all of our dreams.

Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie was the guest on ABC 7.30 overnight, as the ‘sensible’ voice to clean up some of the public service cut mess. As you can expect for anyone working with the post-it Coalition policies have been scribbled on, she didn’t manage to do a great job.

We are not making any cuts to front line services. And no matter how often the Labor Party tries to say we’re cutting biosecurity agents or we’re going to make some sort of cuts to front desks in Centrelink offices, that is not the case.

We are not cutting the service providers to the public, what we are looking to do is the additional public servants and those roles that have been created under the last three years that have also driven up the cost to the Australian taxpayer into the tune of billions of dollars.

That’s billions of dollars that’s not being spent on building hospitals, schools, rail, filling potholes, our defence force. So we want to have a sensible approach to budget appropriation which doesn’t see taxpayers money funneled into roles that aren’t required to deliver front line services, so that we can get on with actually delivering the types of services and infrastructure. and defense forces that the Australian public needs and deserves.

OK the new public service roles include Services Australia and the Department of Veteran Affairs.

Barnaby Joyce told his local Seven News that he wouldn’t allow for any cuts there:

We’re not cutting DVA jobs because I’ve actually fought for the increase in DVA jobs to get the backlog of claims through. 

But McKenzie says the Coalition don’t know where the cuts will be coming from. Just that they will be made.

As Jane Hume has made very clear, we will be taking a very close look at this if we are successful at the next federal election, because it would be inappropriate at this time to be naming different types of roles when we don’t have the actual ability not being the ministers, not being able to comb through the detail of departments and what the Labor Party has done on their watch and the prudent thing to do, the responsible thing to do would be to make those decisions very shortly to come into government, if we get the great privilege of [being elected to government].

So no cuts to frontline services (where have we heard that before) but we won’t tell you where the 41,000 jobs will be coming from until we are in government. But it will be new hires under the Labor party. But not the frontline service hires. Which means it has to be other people, doing other roles, but we can’t tell you which ones. And also the education department is woke, so we should be filling potholes with the money we spend there.

Peter Dutton, who often goes further in explaining who he absolutely is when fronting ‘friendly media’ (where he does not face any critical questions or push back) went into the made up ‘woke’ agenda schools and universities are supposedly teaching children (and adults), which is a conspiracy theory that seems to be pushed by people whose adult children don’t speak to them.

On Monday he told Sky After Dark:

We do provide funding to the state governments, and we can condition that funding, and we should be saying to states, and we should be saying to those that are receiving that funding that we want our kids to be taught the curriculum, and we want our kids to be taught what it is they needed to take on as they face the challenges of the world, and not to be guided into some sort of an agenda that’s come out of universities.

And I think there’s a lot of work to do, but that’s that’s the way which the government can try and influence the New South Wales Government or the Queensland Government or the Victorian Government, whatever it might be. And I think that’s, again, a debate that we need to hear more from parents on.

I think there is a silent majority on this issue right across the community. And when the government, at the start of this term of Parliament tried to stop independent schools and religious schools from deciding on who they could employ* or what they were going to teach at their school, I think there was, there was an uprising then, not just from the religious leaders, but from parents as well, who pushed back on that, and I think that was, you know, something that the government dropped fairly quickly thereafter because they knew they were going down the wrong path. But again, I think it’s a big difference between the two parties.

(The legislation was mostly aimed at protecting LGBTIQ students at religious schools. The Coalition didn’t support it and given there was no bipartisan support, the government dropped it)

But it is very important to note that on Tuesday, less than 24 hours later, in front of the press back, Dutton couldn’t name what he thought was woke. He couldn’t say what issues he had with the federal curriculum. He didn’t name a single issue, just repeated talking points.

It would be really great if someone could ask these people to actually start defining ‘woke’ because it seems to be anything they disagree with.

Peter Dutton has followed the DOGE playbook (we resent writing DOGE as much as you hate reading it) and has started in attacking the department of education.

This is not new for the Coalition – Alan Tudge’s final acts as a minister was to try and force a change to the school curriculum

Dutton took aim at the education department while speaking at a Sky After Dark event set up in his honour on Monday night, which you can see below, but to save you, here is the main part where he echoes the shadow US commander in chief, Elon Musk:

The Commonwealth Government doesn’t own or run a school, and which is why people ask why we’ve got a department of thousands and thousands of people in Canberra called the education department if we don’t have a school and don’t employ a teacher, but we do provide funding to the state governments, and we can condition that funding

As the SMH and others have pointed out, the federal education department DOESN’T employ thousands and thousands of people in Canberra. It employs 1,639 people.

And I mean, I know I only barely have a bachelor’s degree, but I am pretty sure that not everyone who works for the department of education is meant to be a teacher or work in a school. That’s because I learnt at my public school, that the federal government gives the funding and the states are responsible for the services. Like schools. And given that across Australia there are just under 10,000 schools, SOMEONE has to administer that funding. Because the ‘independent’ schools also receive funding, not just the state-run schools. And then there is the curriculum, which the federal department helps to create, training, processing of payments, IT departments, general administration – you know, all the things that happen in the backend which become very, very obvious when they are missing.

We have been reporting on these public service headcount numbers here in this little blog and its great to see the SMH do an analysis of what the cuts Peter Dutton and the Coalition are talking about will actually mean.

You can find the SMH/AGe story here.

The APS headcount we covered on Monday was released on Friday, so it is the most up to date figures.

And far from showing that the growth in the public service (which is still very low when considered on a per population basis – and when the population grows it makes sense that the public service which implements their services also grows) has been in Canberra, it shows that the public service has been boosted across the country.

As a reminder:

• The APS headcount was 193,503, an increase of 16,462 or 8.5% from December 2023
• Ongoing employment as a % of total headcount is 92.1%, up from 88.5% in June 2022
• Overall, APS headcount is up 34,313 or 21.6% since June 2022
• 64.1% of the APS headcount is located outside of Canberra, up from 61.7% in June 2022
• The APS headcount in Canberra is 69,438
• The APS headcount outside of Canberra increased by 25,846 or 26.3% since June 2022
• 75.3% of the growth in APS headcount since June 2022 was outside of Canberra
• 24,377 or 12.6% of APS headcount is located in regional Australia, up by 3,229 or 15.3% since June 2022.

And for those who like tables:

Here’s the broad geographic breakdown of the APS workforce by capital city, rest of the state and state

Now, if you are here, than chances are you follow politics more closely than most Australians. That’s not shade on people who don’t – life is busy and people are just trying to make their way through it and sometimes, that means they only have room for what they have room for. And politics? Especially the way Australian politics plays out? That can be an easy one to push to the side.

But it also means that there is a disconnect and that journalists assume people know more about policies and politics than what they do. Which means that often, not a lot of explaining gets done because many in the media operate under the impression that there is assumed knowledge of what they are talking about. (We in the media also often make the mistake of thinking that everyone is as interested in what we are doing as we are, which can also be a bit of a turn off)

So the Australia Institute decided to do some research into what Australians actually knew about the key policy measures introduced by the Albanese government.

Here are the results:

• 84% of Australians support a wage increase for aged care workers and creating a National Anti-Corruption Commission, but only 39% (aged care pay rise) and 20% (creation of NACC) were aware of these reforms.
• Legislating a social media ban for under 16-year-olds is the only reform that most Australians have heard of (55%).
• Each reform is supported by the majority of Australians.
• 12% of Australians incorrectly identified a national ban on native forest logging as an Albanese Government policy, which it is not. 71% support it – more support than for some real Albanese Government policies.

For the polling boffins – 2009 Australians were polled and respondents were given a list of nine policies (including one fake) and asked to answer whether each policy was implemented by the Albanese government.  They were then asked if they supported or opposed each policy.

Senior Fellow at The Australia Institute Stephen Long said “high levels of news avoidance and declining trust in mainstream media make it harder for governments to communicate their policies and achievements, posing issues for democracy.”

Bill Browne, Director of the Australia Institute’s Democracy & Accountability Program

In a fractured media landscape, there is no longer a ‘national debate’ or a ‘national swing’ – so politicians will need to pay more attention to the priorities of particular communities,” said

Australians have relatively high awareness of changes to stage 3 tax cuts and of wage increases for aged care workers, a reminder that voters notice when governments improve the financial position of those worse off.

The high level of support for a native forest logging ban, even though it didn’t happen, is a reminder that this government could have been much braver on environmental issues. The public is way ahead of the Albanese Government on environmental, climate and integrity reforms.

Most voters haven’t heard of the Albanese Government’s achievements, but when they are told about them, they support them.”

In what we know of today’s campaign plans so far.

Anthony Albanese and the main Labor campaign are in Melbourne, and the minimum wage is once again set to become an election issue – Labor is announcing it has written to the Fair Work Commission asking for an “economically sustainable real wage” increase above inflation for about three million low paid workers.

Angus Taylor is at the National Press Club, where he will become part of the main Coalition campaign for the first time. Can’t wait for that!

The Greens will pledge to spend 1% of GDP on nature – that is in response to all of the Trump talk that we need to spend 3% of GDP on defence, which has been dominating the security hawks for weeks,

Hello and welcome to day five of the election campaign.

Try as the leaders might to avoid it, international issues continue to overshadow the Australian election campaign. Donald Trump’s tariffs and authoritarian take over of already weak institutions, Israel’s assault on the Palestinian civilian population and plans to ethnically cleanse the people of Gaza, Europe’s concerns, China’s needling of the region – the world continues to creep in on the domestic campaign and there is nothing either leader can do to stop it.

Meanwhile, protesters on the campaign have heightened security concerns – you may remember the laughable shots of Dutton’s campaign in a field at a winery looking at a placard from yesterday, which was meant to be the Melbourne airport announcement.

Well no one really knew why they were there, and the Coalition wasn’t saying, but Rising Tide protesters have been following around the campaign and it seems like maybe the Coalition is a bit sick of it.

Meanwhile, anti-genocide protesters are continuing to make sure MPs and candidates who they feel have not responded to the war on Gaza as one ought when innocents are being slaughtered and international law trodden on, have made it clear that Mosques and locations hosting Eid celebrations are not comfortable places for them.

These are just some of the undercurrents to the campaign, where the leaders are doing their best to stick their head in the sand and pretend there is nothing more happening than the Australian election campaign.

We’ll continue following them today, as well as let you know what else is going on around the campaign and fact check and answer your questions as they go.

You have the entire brains trust of the Australia Institute at your disposal and me, Amy Remeikis, the least smart person in the room – but I bring a bit of sass, too much coffee and fast fingers.

I can hear the second coffee about to boil on the stove and my third cup of tea is almost empty.

Ready?

Let’s get into it.