Albanese v Dutton: The first leaders’ debate

From Schwartz Media. I'm Daniel James. This is seven am. Anthony Alberzi won the first leader's debate of the election campaign last night, but it was a tight contest, with both leaders well prepared and polished as they faced undecided voters in Western Sydney, exactly the kind of battleground both sides will need to win the Form government.

Thanks to the hard work of Australians, including the people in this room, Inflation is doubt to two point four percent, wages are up.

Anthony Alberzi spoke of the country rallying in spite of difficult global conditions. For Peter Dutton, it was about painting a dire picture of economic pain and blaming Alberanzi for it.

In forty years, there has not been a higher spending government than your government.

Is that correct?

Well, that's not true, except for the one that you were a part of.

And today Special correspondent for the Saturday Paper, Jason Gottus on the biggest moments of the first debate and what it tells us about the next stage of the campaign. It's Wednesday, April nine. Jason, thanks for joining us. Who had the most to lose from last night's debate.

Daniel, I think no question Peter Dutton, given the horrible start he's had to this election campaign, not just the first ten days of the campaign, but the four weeks leading up to Anthony Albanesi calling the election have not gone Peter Dutton's way and so he had a lot at stake tonight.

There have been reports that Anthony Alberezi has been preparing for the debate by training with Dan Andrews.

Did it show if having the better zingers was a measure of the training that Anthony Albaneze did with Dan Andrews, then I think it did show for well.

The only gas policy that the Coalition have is the gas lighting of the Australian public. He disagrees with all.

Of the because Anthony Albanesi did have some better cut through lines than did Peter Dutton.

I noticed that Dutton called Albanzi dishonest a number of times throughout the debate.

It's designed to scare people, and I think it's dishonest from a man who wants to well be Anthony with respect.

That's a very dishonest proposition. You could so we know there'd be a whole team of people nailing these lines of attack behind the scenes. So what did you make of that choice, Jason to use that line.

Well, I think that's exactly the sort of thing we would expect Peter Dutton to say to Anthony Albanesi, and the sort of thing that the PM would say back to Peter Dutton. This is I think standard fair in political debates that both leaders are going to call the other dishonest or imply that they're a liar in some way. That's just what we expect, that standard debate trash talking.

If you like. Is it a case that that's Dutton's best line of defense is attack?

Well, I think he does have to try to undermine the Prime Minister any way he can, and attacking his honesties integrity is probably the easiest way to do that. But I do think it's also worth saying that I thought this debate was pretty respectful both leaders. They are used to dealing with each other. They have quite a good relationship across the table in the House of Representatives. There's not a lot of ill feeling between these two people,

Well, let's get into some of the policy. Then, what did the debate tell you about where both leaders want to fight this election?

Well, I think for the Prime Minister very much Medicare. He kept trying to bring the debate back to Medicare. He brought out the Medicare card from his pocket, which we've sent him to a number of times.

And all you need is this little thing here, Prith. You just need your Medicare card, not your credit card because labor.

And I think for Peter Dutton it was very much about getting his campaign back onto the two key messages of the cost of living.

I want to provide support to Australians from the first day that we're elected, and that is through a twenty five cent a leader cut to fuel both diesel and unleaded. It'll help families, it'll help businesses, it'll help pegitics.

And also national security.

I want to make sure that we can live in a safe country. The Prime Minister says that we live the most curious period since the end of the Second World War, since nineteen forty five, and then takes eighty billion dollars out of defense.

Peter Dutton also talked about the housing crosses and what he would do to ease that if he was to become Prime minister.

A person is coming in every forty four seconds into our country and we haven't got the housing to accommodate that show them we need to get the sequencing right and it's why we're putting five billion dollars into a program to create five hundred thousand new homes.

And so Peter Dutton tried to remind people that one of his key policies is to let less people into the country than the Albanesi government has done over the last three years.

Both political parties are very similar when it comes to immigration. But there was a moment where it felt like Peter Dutton was wrong folded by a man asking about the impact of international students. He was worried that the plan to reduce the numbers would make UNI more expensive for his son.

How will those universities pick up the short and will will my son's unifees increase?

What did you make of that moment, Jason Well, I thought it was a really interesting question.

It gave Peter Dutton a moment of pause. You know, he didn't quite know how to answer that question.

The short answer is no, because what we do as a government is we provide that funding to universities and obviously there's a health scheme where students are paying for part of their own education as well. What we've done though, is that we've said under the government's.

It was Yeah, it was a really good moment in this debate, A really one of those candid moments that sticks with you.

What Peter Dutton is firmly laying the blame mate and is at the feet of international students who he says are causing the crisis in housing around Australia.

I want desperately to make sure that we get an opportunity for young people to believe in and achieve again and the dream of home ownership. They are about forty two international students coming into our country for every one student accommodation unit that's been approved, and that has had a big impact. So it doesn't is.

This working for him to blame students like that.

I don't think so, Daniel, because I'm not sure that international students come to Australia and buy the sorts of houses that ordinary working families are trying to buy. I don't see too many international students living in outer suburban areas and in our bigger cities. International students tend to cram themselves into small apartments very close to the campuses

Coming up after the break, who was more convincing on the economy?

Hi Ruby Jones. Here seven Am tells stories that need to be told. Our journalism is founded on trust and independence, and now we're increasing our coverage. Every Saturday until the election will bring you an extra episode to break down the biggest political moments of the week. If you enjoy seven Am, the best way you can support us is by making a contribution at seven am podcast dot com dot are you forward slash support? Thanks for listening and supporting our work.

My question to Peter is that you have posed every cost of living measure that we're put forward over the last three years in government. You now are going to an election with a nuclear plan that will build seven nuclear reactors that will cost six hundred dollars to provide four percent of power sometime in the twenty forties. What are you going to cut to pay for it? Because the private sector won't fund nuclear reactors because it doesn't

Jason Anthony Albernezi challenged Peter Dutton directly on his nuclear plan. Is this ultimately shaping up to be an energy election?

Well, I think the government wants to make it an election about Peter Dutton's nuclear policy, and Peter Dutton wants to make it an election about Anthony Albinezi's failure to bring power bills down by two hundred and seventy dollars a year, which is of course what he promised before the last election.

When you go to the supermarket now you're now paying thirty percent more for groceries, paying about thirty two percent more for your electricity and the Prime Minister promised at one of these debates at the last election that your power bills would go down by two hundred and seventy five dollars. Instead they're up by thirteen hundred dollars.

So I think both leaders are coming at this issue from different perspectives. Both leaders are throwing around a lot of numbers. They're talking about the cost of gas and bringing it down by percentages, and they're both arguing about each other's costings plan. Peter Dutton says his plan is forty four percent cheaper than the government's energy transition plan. The Prime Minister says the coalition's nuclear plan will cost six hundred billion dollars, which of course Peter Dutton disputes.

I mean both leaders were flooding the zone with heaps of different numbers being thrown at us during the debate. But through that, Jason, what did Dunn actually have to say about his nuclear plant?

Well, he didn't say all that much about it. He did try to say that in Canada in France, that there's a lot of nuclear power in their energy grids.

In France there is seventy percent nuclear in the system. Our policy is to make sure that we can underpin our economy with a stable energy market for the next hundred years.

I'm not sure that that strikes accord with many voters when he's talking about the next one hundred years, because people who are worried about their power bills want them to come down fairly soon, and Peter Dutton's nuclear policy is not going to do that over the next ten ten years because the first nuclear power plants not scheduled

Your plan independently cost it by Frontier Economics, a company used by the Labor Party and probably the best economist when it comes to looking at energy policy in the country, puts the Labor Party policy of renewables only at six hundred billion dollars. Our policy is forty four percent cheaper than that two hundred and thirty one billion dollars in total.

And I thought Peter Dutton was quite convincing on that issue when it comes to the relative costings that each party is applying to their energy policies.

As with most elections, Jason, ultimately both sides are trying to convince voters they are better at managing the economy. He was more convincing on that front.

Well, I don't think either leader delivered a knockout blow here, but this is the coalition's number one bread and butter issue, and I did think Peter Dutton made some good points about the coalition's strength when it comes to economic management, but he didn't really land a blow on the Prime Minister. And I think the Prime Minister was able to point out that Labor is the only party that has delivered two budget surpluses in the last twenty years.

A seventy eight billion dollar deficit we inherited, We turned that into a twenty two bion dollar surplus, and then we turned a deficit of more than fifty bon into a fifteen bion dollar surplus.

The Coalition had been promising a surplus, of course, it famously didn't deliver one under Scott Morrison, Malcolm Turnbull or Tony Abbott. And so I think Minister was able to show that well Labor has been managing the economy relatively well compared to the Coalition. He was also able to make the point that interest rates have started coming down,

Jason, the Prime Minister won the debate. But beyond that, what did it tell you about how he's faring at this point in the campaign?

Well, I mean, because this debate was in front of a studio audience of the people in that room, I didn't detect much anger towards the Prime Minister. There wasn't from what I could tell, much of a mood for change. And I thought that was really telling that if this is a random sample of ordinary voters. It didn't seem to me like most of them wanted to throw the Prime minister out. You often hear political pundits talking about voters you're waiting with baseball bats to smash the incumbent.

Jason, thanks so much for burning the midnight all for us.

Daniel, It's always great to talk with you, and beyond seven am.

Also in the news today, thousands of public hospital doctors in New South Wales are participating in a three day strike pleading for better pay and conditions to stop colleagues fleeing to other states. Doctors from more than thirty New South Wales public hospitals walked off the job yesterday seeking a one off thirty percent salary increase and better working conditions, including guarantee breaks. He's the first strike by New South