Penny Wong says Rudd will ‘continue to do an excellent job’ as ambassador
The foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, has congratulated Donald Trump on his election on ABC Radio this morning.
“We will obviously continue to work very closely with America as an old ally and a true friend,” she says.
She is talking about a recent meeting with Mike Pompeo, who is set to work in Trump’s administration. It was a “very important engagement,” she says.
Asked about Trump’s foreshadowing of tariffs on all imports, she says he “has run a campaign based on change”, so it won’t come as a surprise.
On former prime minister Kevin Rudd as Australia’s ambassador to the US, she says he has been “highly effective with both Republicans and Democrats”:
So we’re confident that Mr Rudd will continue to do an excellent job in engaging with the new administration.
On Aukus, she says Australia is buying submarines as a deterrence “to enable peace”.
“That is the objective and that is the intention,” she says. “It is an important part of making sure we maintain a peaceful, stable and prosperous region. That’s why we want this, this capability.”
And she says the “sovereign capability” is supported by legislation and public comments in the US.
On Ukraine, she says the alliance is “one on which we share so many strategic objectives”, and democratic values. “And it’s an alliance which has, through its history … there have been times where leaders and governments have disagreed”.
And on working-class white men deserting the Democrats and lessons for Labor, Wong says “we don’t need the US election to understand that cost of living is the first priority of Australian voters right now”.
“People are doing it tough,” she says, and points to Labor’s tax cuts, Medicare measures, cheaper measures and energy bill relief as examples of what they’re doing.
Key events
Customers and food suppliers will air their grievances over supermarket prices as the consumer watchdog digs into the grocery giants, AAP reports:
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) will begin a series of public hearings for its inquiry into the supermarket sector.
Consumer advocacy groups and supplier representatives are first up, with Choice and the Australian Food and Grocery Council set to attend on Thursday. Commission deputy chair Mick Keogh said:
We have received a large volume of information … and these hearings will provide an opportunity for us to seek clarification on a range of the very complex matters.
Aldi, Metcash, Woolworths and Coles will all appear at the hearing in coming days.
Coles and Woolworths have come under fire as Australians accuse them of benefiting from the cost-of-living crisis.
The federal government has vowed to take action, announcing in January it would set the consumer watchdog for the supermarkets and directing the ACCC to conduct an inquiry into the sector.
Many consumers have lost trust in supermarket pricing while suppliers have said they are forced to agree to unfavourable terms, according to the commission’s interim report.
A final report on the inquiry is due to be delivered to the government by February.
The ACCC in September launched a court case against Coles and Woolworths, claiming the retailers had misled customers with illusory discount schemes.
Both grocers deny the allegations and say the legal cases against them are misconceived.
The federal government will provide $30m in extra funding for the ACCC to continue investigations and enforcements in the supermarket and retail sector.
It has also proposed changes to merger laws and a mandatory food and grocery code of conduct that proposes multimillion-dollar penalties for serious breaches.
While I am very reluctant to direct you away from this Australian blog, US vice-president Kamala Harris has just taken to the stage to make her concession speech. So if you just can’t get enough of United States politics, head to our US blog … then come straight back here after, ta.
Sarah Basford Canales
Labor to introduce fee-free Tafe legislation
The Albanese government will today introduce new legislation to offer at least another 100,000 fee-free Tafe places a year from 2027.
The bill’s introduction intends to add further free spots in vocational education after a partnership with states and territories offered 180,000 places in 2023 and 300,000 a year from 2024.
Another 20,000 places for construction and housing courses is now being finalised, the government said.
A national advertising campaign will be launched this weekend to increase awareness about the places aimed at addressing key workforce shortages.
The skills and training minister, Andrew Giles, said:
More than half a million Australians are gaining the skills they want and which we need to build Australia’s future. We want more Australians to take advantage of the opportunities on offer, which is why we’re launching this advertising campaign.
The opposition is yet to announce whether it would wind back the policy if elected at the next federal election but has been critical of completion rates.
The deputy opposition leader, Sussan Ley, said 13% of enrolments had resulted in a qualification as of 31 March 2024, with the program costing $1.5bn.
“Fee-free Tafe has not made a meaningful impact in alleviating skills shortages,” she said.
Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie’s attacks on prime minister Anthony Albanese’s flight upgrades hit some turbulence yesterday. The shadow transport minister apologised and updated her official register of interests after revealing she had not declared 16 flight upgrades.
Two were in July and August, not so long before she claimed she had never been offered a single upgrade on Qantas. We’ll see how this lands:
Donald Trump’s election ‘not good for those who believe in climate action’, Turnbull says
And on Donald Trump as a threat to the fight against climate change, Malcolm Turnbull says his election was “not good for those who believe in climate action”.
“He’s said the quiet bit out loud,” Turnbull, says, referring to Trump’s slogan “drill, baby, drill”.
Turnbull says both Labor and the Liberal party will be influenced by Trump’s victory:
I think Dutton’s approach will be to project himself as a Trump-like strong man and present Albanese – as he’s seeking to do – as weak.
Please refer to yesterday’s question time, when the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, and others in his team repeatedly referred to Albanese as “weak”, despite protestations from speaker Milton Dick. But Dutton should think “very carefully” about that approach, Turnbull says, because Australia is different, “more sober” and rational, and has compulsory voting, so “rushing off to the Trumpiest extreme” could just “get more teals elected”.
Turnbull warns Albanese not to ‘suck up’ to new president and says Aukus ‘a dud deal’
Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull, who had some colourful moments in his relationship with Donald Trump in his first presidency, is up now being colourful on the ABC. He says the Australian prime minister “has to stand up for Australia and not follow the conventional approach, which is being urged on everyone, which is to suck up to Trump and be utterly deferential:
I had a very successful relationship with Trump because I stood up to him, stood my ground, incurred his wrath, won his respect, and then got very good outcomes for Australia.
Karvelas asks Turnbull about his comments that Trump is a “threat to democracy”. Turnbull demurs over the exact wording, but says Trump isn’t committed to democracy or the rule of law in the way previous presidents have been:
He did sort of encourage a mob to try to overthrow the peaceful transfer of power in 2021, on January 6.
And he says he doesn’t think Australia will “ever” get any Virginia-class submarines from the US because the US is not producing enough even for themselves. We signed up to a dud deal, he says:
The deal that Morrison instigated and Albanese signed up to is a very, very asymmetrical deal. All of the risk was on Australia. We have no agency and no leverage over this, and that’s why I think the most likely outcome is we’ll end up with no submarines, and that will be entirely our own fault because we signed up to a dud deal.
Birmingham says Liberals have ‘no plans’ to change abortion laws
Still on Birmingham on the ABC, host Patricia Karvelas asks whether he thinks cost of living, immigration, abortion and character of the candidate will shape Australia’s next election, as it did the US’s. Birmingham says cost of living will be the No 1 issue, and Karvelas presses him on abortion, and whether he would vote to remove an anti-abortion bill brought in by his colleagues Matt Canavan and Alex Antic. He says he would personally vote in favour of removing it, and:
We have been clear, in terms of the Liberal party leadership, that Peter Dutton and the Liberal party have no plans, no intentions, to see any changes to abortion laws, that we respect the states’ rights in that regard, and I am very clear in terms of my respect for women’s reproductive rights.
Simon Birmingham says Australia needs to make sure Aukus delivered speedily
Simon Birmingham, the shadow foreign affairs minister, says Australia’s priorities relate to the security environment and “the need to ensure that Aukus is delivered upon as quickly and effectively as possible”:
That is clearly mutually beneficial to both of our nations and, when it comes indeed to the strength of our two economies, it is mutually beneficial for us each to be as strong as one another, to be able to underpin those security considerations.
And they are some of the key arguments you’d advance when it comes to dealing with trade and tariff agendas, or with ensuring that we are actually delivering upon those Aukus commitments that have been made and secured.
He says Australia has a “very good deal”, that it has been secured, and that it is unique to Australia because of the shared capability. Asked about whether Australia should pitch in more money for production in the US, he says it would be “irresponsible to foreshadow that we wanted to change things”:
This is something that enjoys strong bipartisan support in both of our countries. It was launched and, of course, initially negotiated by the Morrison government with the Biden administration, but has enjoyed support across the parliament in Australia, across the Congress in the United States, and it has done so because of those mutually beneficial aspects.
He says the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, took a “risk” appointing former prime minister Kevin Rudd as ambassador. Rudd is “not bigger than Australia’s interests”, he says, and he hopes he is able to continue to “be as effective as he has been to date”.
On tariffs, Birmingham says Australia has successfully carved out exemptions (on steel and aluminium) before. And he describes Trump thus:
He takes an approach with policies that are sometimes less conventional than people are customarily used to, and he makes a strong and bold pronouncements that are less normal and more surprising than people are used to.
We’ll have to look carefully at the “totality” of measures, Birmingham says, when asked about Trump pulling out of climate change agreements.
I want to see Australia stay committed to net zero by 2050 … I don’t anticipate any change in those commitments.
Penny Wong says Rudd will ‘continue to do an excellent job’ as ambassador
The foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, has congratulated Donald Trump on his election on ABC Radio this morning.
“We will obviously continue to work very closely with America as an old ally and a true friend,” she says.
She is talking about a recent meeting with Mike Pompeo, who is set to work in Trump’s administration. It was a “very important engagement,” she says.
Asked about Trump’s foreshadowing of tariffs on all imports, she says he “has run a campaign based on change”, so it won’t come as a surprise.
On former prime minister Kevin Rudd as Australia’s ambassador to the US, she says he has been “highly effective with both Republicans and Democrats”:
So we’re confident that Mr Rudd will continue to do an excellent job in engaging with the new administration.
On Aukus, she says Australia is buying submarines as a deterrence “to enable peace”.
“That is the objective and that is the intention,” she says. “It is an important part of making sure we maintain a peaceful, stable and prosperous region. That’s why we want this, this capability.”
And she says the “sovereign capability” is supported by legislation and public comments in the US.
On Ukraine, she says the alliance is “one on which we share so many strategic objectives”, and democratic values. “And it’s an alliance which has, through its history … there have been times where leaders and governments have disagreed”.
And on working-class white men deserting the Democrats and lessons for Labor, Wong says “we don’t need the US election to understand that cost of living is the first priority of Australian voters right now”.
“People are doing it tough,” she says, and points to Labor’s tax cuts, Medicare measures, cheaper measures and energy bill relief as examples of what they’re doing.
The high court’s ruling of ankle bracelets and curfews for former immigration detainees as unconstitutional unfolded rapidly yesterday, and it will keep moving today. The Albanese government will scramble to bring in rules to “allow for an adjusted process for electronic monitoring devices and curfews”. See Paul Karp’s report for all the details:
Good morning, all – and thanks, Martin Farrer, for your overnight work. Tory Shepherd with you, trying not to sound like I stayed up too late watching telly with a bachelor’s handbag and bottle of shiraz.
The reactions to Donald Trump 2.0 will be coming thick and fast today. It’s also the last sitting day of the week, estimates will keep bringing the goods, and there’ll be legislation, interest rates and student debt on the agenda.
Donald Trump’s return to the White House presents a series of disruptive challenges to Anthony Albanese, writes our political editor, Karen Middleton, this morning.
But, she writes “the Australian government is focused on what it can control” rather than what it can’t as it contemplates a second Trump administration.
Read her full piece here:
And there’s more on that reaction from politicians here:
RBA chief to face grilling in parliament
Questions about the central bank’s decision to keep interest rates on hold will be levelled at the Reserve Bank governor, Michele Bullock, at her regular parliamentary grilling, writes Australian Associated Press.
The RBA board has yet to declare victory in Australia’s war on inflation and on Tuesday kept the interest rate on hold, bringing up a calendar year since the last rate rise.
Bullock and assistant governor Chris Kent may get a hostile reception on Thursday, with the Greens senator Nick McKim likely to press them on why they have still not dropped the cash rate from 4.35%.
McKim called on the government to override the central bank and use its powers to cut rates back in September, when the quarterly inflation rate still read 3.8%.
That figure is now back within the RBA’s target band at 2.8%.
But the board in its post-meeting statement on Tuesday said it would be “some time yet before inflation is sustainably in the target range and approaching the midpoint”.
The bank’s preferred measure of underlying inflation, the trimmed mean, is still at 3.5% and proving much stickier, given elevated services price growth.
“While headline inflation has declined substantially and will remain lower for a time, underlying inflation is more indicative of inflation momentum, and it remains too high,” the board said.
The jobs market was still running too hot for Bullock’s liking, even though the RBA increased its peak unemployment prediction to 4.5% from 4.4%.
PM says Australia ‘will strive to strengthen’ co-operation with US
Anthony Albanese says the election of the US president marked an important moment for Australia and the Asia Pacific region, and vowed to work closely with Donald Trump’s administration. This was his full statement as the election result became clear:
I congratulate President Trump on his election victory.
The election of the president of the United States is always an important moment for the world, for our region and for Australia.
Our government will work closely with the new Trump administration to realise the benefits of our strong economic partnership.
The United States has long played a leadership role in the stability and security of the Indo-Pacific. Australia will strive to strengthen the co-operation between our two nations in the region.
Australia and America are old allies and we are true friends. Our nations are bound by a history of shared sacrifice, a commitment to common values and – above all – enduring respect and affection between our peoples.
I look forward to talking with President Trump and working with him in the best interests of both our nations.
Welcome
Good morning and welcome to our live politics blog. I’m Martin Farrer with the best of the overnight stories and then Tory Shepherd will take the controls.
There’s really only one place to start this morning and that is Donald Trump’s election win. Anthony Albanese sent his congratulations and said he looked forward to talking with Trump and working with him “in the best interests of both our nations”. Peter Dutton, Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott all delivered messages of congratulation to Trump, with the latter saying Trump had the self-belief the “west needs … in spades”. More reaction coming up.
We also caught up with the expat and Australian Trump supporters who celebrated at watch parties – “We want to bring this to Australia” – and with the Kamala Harris backers drowning their sorrows.
Trump’s win had an immediate effect on the financial markets overnight, sending the US dollar soaring at the expense of the Aussie dollar. But it also saw Wall Street stocks hit another all-time high as investors moved into more risky assets amid the prospect of a new government united across the presidency and Congress. The ASX200 futures market looks becalmed this morning although that might change later as the Reserve Bank governor, Michele Bullock, is quizzed in parliament. More details on that soon.
