From the Skying Center.
This is Paul Murray Live.
Did they come on in the man Cave as the center of the political universe for the next hour. Thank you so much for watching. Yeah, of course I'll talk about the tariffs, how Albo is going to try to turn the obvious loss into a win. I'll use some stats to prove that in the moment of two his time, not one, but two segments of debate tonight looking forward to This is tonight, the night Stephen Conroy finally beats problem and vishof or where she continue her unbeaten run.
As part of our conversation, we'll get the all of that and a massive decision in the High Court today that could lead to biddinings and I mean biddings a dollar's worth of federal government compensation to indigenous peoples in
the Northern Territory specifically. But before I get to the wall of that, I want to talk about something that is a little more real than many of the news stories that are around today and a little more personal than what you may come to expect when it comes to the front page of the paper or so the six PM news. Last night, there was a huge reaction when I highlighted the comments of a gentleman who is at his wits end on the central coast of New South Wales who had to move out of Sydney because
of the cost of rent. He's now in a scenario where if rent goes up, he is going to have to move again, and that's a good chance that he, his family and his little girl are going to be homeless.
One more rent increase and my family, my one year old baby, we're facing homelessness and we've got nowhere to go.
Now, I've spoken a lot about the number of people that are this close to homelessness. Sometimes they get the number wrong and say two million.
It's actually three and a bit million.
That is an extraordinary indictment on our federal government. But before you think, hey, Paul, I've heard you say all this before and you start to tune out, No, no, no, come back, come back, pay attention, because last night on SBS there was another example of another Australian who was doing it tough, and this was on the Insight program on SBS. Now, I really liked this show because essentially
they sit around, they do a forum with people. They get really interesting stories, all different perspectives are quite like the show. But there was one bloke in particular who symbolizes just like that guy did on Q and a millions of people who are struggling, millions of people who couldn't work any harder, but they go backwards every day.
Currently juggling three jobs, so I'm holding a full time job down in the insurance sector. I'm doing Uber Eats and Tawdash food delivery in whatever free time I can get, and on top of that, I'm also making YouTube videos online as an extra source of income. When I first started three years ago, I was doing seventy hours a week and I held that up across an entire year. I hit a New Year's resolution, outsaid man, I am killing myself out here.
One of YouTube videos and I didn't know about them until that program was him walking around his suburb talking about the difficulties of cost of living that we have focused on almost every show at the start of our show for the past three years.
Things are expensive. The cost of living is insane right now. If you are just working one job and you're on the medium income in Australia sixty seven thousand dollars per year right now, you are living just above the poverty line. Ten years ago, I was earning probably half of what I worked one job, and things just seemed easier to afford. I go out and buy things. I wasn't stressing about groceries. I wasn't stressing about paying rent.
And the federal election just weeks away, there's a key question who's he going to vote for?
Who will you be voting for in the election?
The way things are going, it's whoever screws me the least. I think a lot of people have lost a lot of faith in our politicians, in our political.
Parties at this point.
So whoever screws me the least is probably going to get my vote. I'm going to be looking at policy. I'm going to be reading policy, and more importantly, we've got to I think we've lost faith a lot as Australians at this point. We have our pension is struggling to retire. They can't retire. And if our pensions can't retire right now, what the's going on with me? When I retire? Can I retire?
Am I working till the day I die?
Because this is looking pretty grim in my stances.
We know people are hurting, We know people are starting to get angry and they are sick of being told that everything is getting better when their life is only getting worse. More than three million people this close to homelessness, and the number of people who are homeless in this country is the record number it's ever been. But again, before you think, well, hang on, Paul, haven't you sung this song before?
Yes, I have.
But there are others that are noticing. Simon Benson, writing in the Australian newspaper Today, makes the following point that Australia's living standards are the worst in the developed world. No other developed nation in the world has suffered the decline in living standards anywhere near the magnitude of Australia. No amount of boasting that the household recession has finally come to an end can alter that reality, he continues.
Fresh OECD data in the form of updated data set on household income shows that even after the marginally better but still slightly grim economic news, Australia's living standards continue to be the worst in the world and there's no bounce back coming soon, at least not within this decade. The updated OECD data released in the past two weeks
gives expression to this. The average gains in living standards by OECD countries, whereas we're talking about places like the United States, New Zealand, Canada, UK, the first world basically is up five and a bit percent since March twenty twenty two.
Australia in decline.
Before this week's National accounts the cumulative fall in living standards was a negative eight point three. So the rest of the world goes forward, Australia goes backwards. They go forward five point five, we go backwards eight point three and again. If you think you've heard all of this before, new data out today shows us that Australians are losing hope. It comes via this study from the Australian National University.
It helps put again more data, more insight into how Australians are feeling about their lives, about the future for their kids, and the future for their country. Overall life satisfaction between October two thousand and nine and the dots on the far right of your screen is January twenty twenty five, you can see that Australia is turning pessimistic about its current situation and about its future.
You can see that.
Those numbers are the worst, even after periods of time like the COVID pandemic. Now, there's a lot inside all of this, and I want to take you through it nice and slowly because it's many thousands of people who participated in their survey, and there are some people whose sense of doom is linked to things like climate change and housing affordability. But I want to zone in on this issue in and around cost of living that is
not just a talking point. It is a moment where Australia is going backwards and this government promised promised to make it better instead worse after the past three years. In fact, I have a look at this life in the past twelve months, thirty one percent of people saying that it is worse, just twenty one percent saying better,
everyone else basically saying pretty much the same. And of course if life has been tough and it's still pretty much the same, then that's way over fifty percent that are in a world of pain right now, specifically in and around the issue of cost of living and the
effect on your household. Again, I show you this here that thirty five percent of people believe that things are worse since last year, sorry, since twenty twenty three So despite two little too late tax cards, despite four fifths of bugger all twenty.
Five dollars a month.
When it comes to power, the reality is this, thirty five percent of people the household is financially worse off under this government. Meantime, if you have a look at the overall graph, you're about the percentage of Australians who find it difficult or very difficult when it comes to their own financial circumstances. Have a look. These are not good graps for our country. These show how unhappy, emotionally
unhealthy and struggling. Too many people are equally depressing about all of this is does anyone think anything is going to get better? Yes, about twenty nine percent of people, so less than a third say it is going to get better. But once you put together same which is the worst in recent memory, plus those the quarter who believe it's going to get worse, you can see they're what's sixty six in a bid percent, almost sixty seven percent of people who believe that things are not going
to get better. And then we come to the part that broke my heart. How do we feel about our kids and the life that they will have in an Australia that is supposed to be the greatest place in the world. As a person who's got two little ones, this one broke my heart. Fifty eight percent of people in this survey believe that their kids' lives will be worse than theirs. Almost sixty percent of people believe that their children are going to be worse off. What will
life be like in the next fifty years? Fifty percent of people there also believe that life is going to be worse. So it's worse for their kids. It'll be worse for them as they move into retirement and then into the oldest of years, and when it comes to this current government and the institution of Federal Parliament. This survey again is heartbreaking. It's one thing to talk with pride about your country, and we do. It's one that
love our country and we do. But one of the reasons that we have remained laser focused on cost of living for the past three years is because if you cannot provide for yourself for your kids, if you are one of three million people who doesn't know where their food is going to come from, if you're the bloke who is working seventy hours a week, and you still can't make ends meet that our system is failing. Every member of the Australian Federal Parliament has received not one,
but three pay rises in the past three years. Every member of the Australian public services receive their biggest pay rise in ten years. But what do people think about the institution that is Federal Parliament. Do you have confidence in the Federal government? It is now down sixty six percent of people have little to no confidence in the Federal government, in part because they don't do enough, in part because they claim they're doing more when they aren't
doing enough. But again, let's compare that over time. Have look at this graph again, it's the same when it comes to our trust in the Federal government. It's the same when it comes to our confidence in the life that is there for our kids. It is the same when it comes to our own financial circumstance. If anyone thinks the politicians like Jim Chalmers or the Prime Minister can spin and bs their way that everything is better when everything is.
Worse, good luck.
But to see the greatest country in the world having an awful lot of people in it who don't have faith in its future, than we are at a fork in the road. We need to get rid of this government, the government that lied their way to power, that promised that everything would be cheaper. Instead everything became more expensive.
And now because they're able to cobble together some numbers deeply affected by government spending that make things seem ever so slightly better than the bottom dip, the reality is, how could anyone vote for the return of a government that has presided over not just are breaking.
Our finances, but a break in our hearts. We are at a fork in the road now.
I don't know if it's this election that this means people go further to the left or further to the right than the parties of government, searching for someone, anyone who is going to promise them a better future than what they have currently had. But off all of these numbers, there is no way that anyone is going to be voting for the current government because they think they've done
a good job. It's going to be at best out of partisan loyalty or about something even deeper than that, but it's not going to be based off any sort of quality performance. Those numbers are frightening, and that's why I talk about that before we get to tariffs and the politics of all of that.
It's not unimportant, but.
This stuff is a little heartbeat check about a country whose pulse is getting weaker. The other one is, I want to talk about violent crime in Victoria. Now, this has been a world of pain. And remember you've been called racist for talking about it. You've been called somebody who's beating something pretending it's not happening. Well, the reality is that crime has been getting worse for a long
time in Victoria. Perfect example, a bayside family has this not one, but two home invasions within twenty four hours. Daniel Andrews let all of this ride, but he changed the subject just into Alan does not have the same political skills, But she too, has failed to deal with this. There have been many efforts to try to force the government to do something, but chief amongst them is my mate Fefe box over on Fox FM.
When an FM.
Breakfast show is basically doing what you would do in the middle of a talkback show, then you know something has gone wrong. Congratulations to Fife and her colleagues for going.
Front and center.
It's always easier to give away money and make people laugh, but to talk about what people care about. It really matters, and they are put together a petition demanding new changes when it comes to bail laws, and they've had more than one hundred and sixty thousand people agree with that petition. Here's part of what Feofe was saying this morning on the radio.
So many people have suffered through home invasions, aggravated assaults, car jackings, theft, in timid dation, in supermarkets, in shopping centers. We have repeat youth offenders that have run riot in this city.
Good stuff, mate, congratulations again. I know how hard it is to make the call to do something as serious as that in a format like theirs, but they've done it. And the premiere didn't hold a press conference. She went to Fife's show this morning to say that finally there's going to be a change.
We are bringing in the toughest bail laws in the country, and there's a combination of factors that lead to that. The first year is we are putting community safety first and foremost in bail decisions, putting the safety of the community front and center. And we're also reversing that change where ramand or bail was seen as a last resort for youth offending. So that's a key change.
But unbelievably, there are still people who want to tell you that there is nothing to see here when it comes to crime in Victoria. This was one of the hot takes that was there in the turbul Times today as Labour vows to introduce its toughest bail laws. Ever, is Victoria trulli in a crime crisis?
Now?
You see there's lots of ways that this gets hidden. Often you'll end up seeing reporting which is a number of crimes per one hundred thousand people, and therefore when the population increases, the number of crimes increase, but the percentage on which it's connected back to they're able to
hide the figures. But when you actually go and have a look at the website that the Victorian government uses, as you can see, even on this version of trying to pretend nothing to see here, it's up twelve months by twelve and a half percent.
Or ten percent.
We were talking about the offense raper one hundred thousand people. I also want to compare just the past couple of years in Victoria about how many crimes are being committed and have been committed under a system that this government that has been in there for the best part of ten years tried to look the other way or gaslight victorians that it was not as bad as it seemed. This the total number of criminal offenses recorded in Victoria just a couple of years ago was four hundred and
seventy four thousand, still way too many. That's jumped to five hundred and seventy eight thousand in.
Just a couple of years.
We don't even have the latest numbers when it comes to now you want to break them down by say, people being assaulted in Victoria, Well, the number of crimes against the person, and that can be everything from assault, murder, all other forms of that stuff, intimidation eighty three thousand. Two years later, it's four and a bit thousand more people. Now, remember, these are not just crimes, these are victims. Eighty three thousand victims two years ago becomes ninety one thousand victims
last year. It's not about the perpetrator, It's about the person who forever looks around a corner and is nervous about what's about to happen. When it comes to property crimes again, showing you this too, what an explosion this has been in terms of people breaking into houses two hundred and forty three thousand, seven hundred and ninety eight Crimes Committee just two years ago up to now three
hundred and thirty two thousand. Yet the Guardian turns around and asks the disgraceful question, is Victoria truly in a crime crisis? It was two years ago, it is now and it will be next year. I mean, this is very serious stuff that we need to talk about. This is very important because this is not just people making it up, responding to talk back radio, getting REDVD up by what they read in the paper or see on television.
This is their lives and this is things that is happening to their family, to their home, to their business, to their car, to their communities. And good on everyone who forced this government's hand, but shame on this government for needing this all three three mcgs worth of offenses for them to finally take notice and finally promise that they're going to be doing something different. For their part, the police have responded today the Police Association, who remember are.
The people who have to lock these people.
Up only to see them get bail when some sort of soft magistrate, here's some sort of sob story. They respond today that they're police that's happening. Yeah, too little, too late, but they're pleased at least something is moving.
Ordinary people in our community who deserve to be safe in their homes, deserve to be safe in their cars, deserve to be safe on our streets. They've got every right to expect that, they've got every right to feel that when the police do their job, that the courts will carry out effectively are decisions that are in their best.
Interest as for the people that will potentially take over government whenever that Victorian election is This was their take on too little, too late today.
The Premier may have apologized for a poor judgment and weak bail laws, but that's going to be very cold comfort to the families of every victim of crime who has suffered attacks on them on their personal safety because this premier got it so badly wrong. An apology isn't enough. Labor got it wrong because they believe in weak boil laws.
Make no mistake, the Premier is being dragged, kicking and screaming to announce these changes today, not because she believes in it, but because the polls tell of Victorians are sick and tired of Labour's week bail laws.
Absolutely absolutely, Oh does Victoria have a crime crisis problem? Seriously, these numbers are on the front page of the Crime.
Statistics so I want to know.
But if you push this one and you double this near please, if somebody broke into your house, it had changed your life forever. If somebody has sold it a member of your family, it had changed your life forever. So don't give me this population garbage. The reality is that a system where people think they can get away with it means there will be more crime when they don't think they're going to get away with it. Guess what crime will fall. That's the way it has worked
the world over. It should be that all over Australia, particularly in Victoria. Now today massive news out of the High Court as well. This one's going to cost taxpayers billions, and I mean billions of dollars. A landmark High Court decision today has led about seven hundred million dollars worth of compensation to Indigenous people in the Northern Territory. Put simply, these is a decision in and around a mine from a long time ago. Let me try and read this
to you because it does get complicated. The case, which was brought by the late Indigenous elder and land rights pioneer, exposed as the Commonwealth with a multimillion dollar compensation claim of a land had acquired in the Northern Territory during the twentieth century. The claim would reach about seven hundred million dollars based on the reported value of the forty two year old Rio Tinto and Go traditional owners stuck struck in twenty and eleven. It's all to be with
a mind that goes back to the sixties. Beyond that, the case is significant because it opens the federal government but not the States, to further compensation claims when Commonwealth controlled the Northern Territory between nineteen eleven and nineteen seventy eight.
Watch this space.
Okay, let's now talk about the tariffs and the trump of it all, because there's a little more to.
This than you may realize.
And yes it's all about Ozzie steel and yes, Ossie steel going into the United States is not a huge industry, but it's an important one. But of course it's indicative about just how bad the relationship is between Australia and the United States. The arrogance of this prime Minister is hopeless, self absorbed and arrogant ambassador in Washington who thought that he could shit can Donald Trump and somehow thought there would be a forever Biden area and no attempt to
change the relationship. In the period of time between November when the election took place and January when he was sworn in, the Prime Minister did not go to meet Donald Trump, did not try to build any relationship, and Donald Trump is all about relationships.
Now.
I had thought that somehow I was going to join the leap in at the start of this, and I thought we were probably going to get an exemption because someone will pull some string somewhere. But all of the strings have been pulled and we have failed in part. Today he's the Prime Minister responding to remember what he had already set up as a previous conversation and agreed language and basically hinted a few weeks ago, Yeah, we're
we going to get one. Now he can't even get Trump to answer his phone.
Such a decision by the Trump administration is entirely unjustified. Friends need to act in a way that reinforces to our respective populations the fact that we are friends.
Now, remember this bloke in a phone conversation just a few weeks ago, pretended that he was on the inside track to a deal. Can't get a phone call. Sharry's reporting in her program and at sky onees, dot com dot auho has followed this for many a week. But these people want to pretend on I know it's all Donald's fault now, okay, it's ultimately Donald's decision. But where
was the relationship? Who did we deploy? Did we deploy the man in Kevin Rudd, who, as I said, has abused this bloke Uphill and Dan Dale for his own ego when he thought that was the best way to raise his international profile. Peter Dutton speaks on the behalf of the country. Who knows we missed an opportunity here to form a relationship to get an exemption.
This Prime Minister is completely out of his depth. He has no idea what he's doing when it comes to energy, when it comes to the economy, when it comes to national security, when it comes to keeping Australian safe, and when it comes to this relationship which obviously is now critically broken between the US and Australia because of the Prime Minister's incompetence.
Now, I'm going to tell you how Albo's going to turn this obvious loss into what he thinks is going to be a political win. Every time Australians are polled about Donald Trump, those of us that our fans are in the minority.
That's just the truth.
I think many people are wrong about Trump, but he's the reality. A pollo was taken just before the American election would show that if Australians could vote, they would have voted for Kamala Arras. There would have been about a third of the country that would have voted for Donald Trump, and then obviously a collection of people who
don't know or wouldn't vote. That has been updated now in a red Bridge pole which turned up in one of the Sunday papers just a couple of weeks ago, it shows that what forty seven percent of people have a very unfavorable Put that together with twelve percent who believe it to be a very unfavorable it's about fifty nine percent of Australians who have a negative view of
Donald Trump. That means we're going to get a scenario where Anthony Arberneze thinking that he doesn't really have to deal again with Trump at any time in the next few weeks is basically going to slowly but surely, maybe not use his name, but start to pivot against Donald Trump.
Of course, what he's going to try to do is try to pretend that the alternative Prime Minister is the Aussie version of Donald Trump, despite the fact that Peter Dutton receives regular criticism from the right wing that he ain't Trump enough. Now, how many times does this guy have to say, I'm not Australia's Trump. I'm not going to be like Trump, I'm not Trump, I don't believe in things like Trump. I'm not going to do things
like Trump. But it doesn't matter because the Labor Party think they've worked out the big brush and they're going to stain him with again. This is what Peter Dutton says about him and Donald Trump.
And I don't believe I am. I grew up.
Under John Howard's when I've worked closely with Peter Costello as assistant treasurer, so I think that's more my role model than others around the world. But of course that's not going to stop Labour's mates like those reporting on sixty Minutes and we spoke about it at the time, trying to pretend no matter how many times he says, I'm not Aussie Trump. You go back and back and back and back and back until people don't even hear the denial anymore.
From what the Australian seen thus far, they'd be forgiven for thinking that you are right up Donald Trump's ass.
There was another version of it today.
I know that you are a man who can have a laugh at himself, and you have pretty thick skin, and you've copped a lot of nicknames over the years, one of the most recent being Timu Trump. I'm interested to get your take on that, on being described as a cut price Donald Trump, and do you see any similarities between yourself and Donald Trump.
I read two things.
One is that I'm nothing like Trump, or I should be more like Trump. Although I'm a cut price version of Trump, I'm my own person. The biggest influence in my political life has been John Howard and Peter Costello.
Watch this space.
They'll do it over and over again, because yes, they may have to deal with Donald Trump after the election, but there is an election to be one. And trying to pretend that Peter Duddan is Ossie Trump, despite the fact that the people who are the third of the country or so who really like Donald Trump, No he's not Donald Trump.
They'll just do it anyway.
And speaking of all tariffs and things to do with this, can I be very clear Australia has not got clean hands when it comes to the little taxes that we put on products coming in from the rest of the world. For example cars. Now, cars come in all shapes, all sizes, but the bigger they are, the more expensive they are. And the most expensive sorry, the number one car in the country is the Ford Everest. Now that has a price tag which attracts a thing called the luxury car tax.
Now you may well think they are luxury or not luxury, but anything over a certain amount of money attracts the luxury car tax. Now that, of course was all to protect the Australian car industry. But there is no Holden anymore. There is no Ford plant, there is no Mitsubishi or Toyota. As Ross Green would explain a couple of years ago on Channel.
Nine, buying a new car is never cheap, but thousands of Sydney drivers are being slugged with a luxury car tax on their family vehicles. Loophole is being blamed, with drivers of some European convertibles avoiding it altogether.
It's the tax that really shouldn't exist. The luxury car tax protected Australian car makers and workers from falling tariffs on imported vehicles.
The dealer is now forecast ruined for a trade that was already suffering declining fortunes.
Today Australia doesn't make cars, there's no industry or jobs to protect, but the tax remains.
And the number one selling car in the country gets if you get the tricked up version the luxury car tax.
You see, this is how it works.
If you purchase a car, every dollar over eighty thousand, five hundred and sixty seven dollars gets a thirty three percent tax. If it is a fuel efficient vehicle, that number is ninety one, three hundred and eighty seven. Could somebody please explain why are we still putting a tariff, not a luxury car tax, but a tariff.
On over a certain amount of value. Now you would know.
If you've been anywhere overseas, you know their cars are cheaper. You should be able to buy them overseas if you want to ship them in at your own expense without paying any of these taxes, let alone.
The GST on top of all of this.
In fact, I double checked this about just how much money easy money Australia collects via car tariffs. In twenty twenty, it was five hundred and forty million dollars. Remember the car industry was basically done in twenty twenty. That number is now one point one billion dollars. Bigger cars, more expensive cars, but everything over eighty grand gets thirty three percent tax for every dollar over that eighty thousand dollars. So this federal government has a tariff, a tariff on cars.
So what we want to run around and pretend that to well, it's Donald Trump that's out of control. Why wouldn't we try to negotiate to make sure that we've got an exemption when it came to steel taxes by saying we're going to get rid of our car tar because we don't have an Australian car industry because the unions, of course made it completely uncompetitive, let alone Australia when
it comes to our cost of power and electricity. But this billion dollars car tariff will just sit there in the next federal budget and nobody will think about it. But also to explain why the Americans are doing what they are doing. You can agree or disagree, but this is the central logic, which is that they make millions of cars in the United States and they want them
to be sent around the world. And as a person who'd like to one day drive around in a Chevy, Silverado or one of those big rams, I'd love to do it, but I don't have one hundred thousand dollars to do it.
Of Cadillac at fifty thousand dollars from Detroit cost sixty five thousand dollars in Germany because all the unfair trade. Well, that same Cadillac, you try to sell it to China, it's eighty thousand. You try to sell the Vietnam, it's one hundred and ten thousand. You try to sell at the India the Maharajia tariffs, that's one hundred forty thousand dollars.
All right, bit of doom and gloom, but necessary doom and gloom. So let's put some effort back into the hope. Let's lift the tone, Let's lift the Aussie spirit. Oscar Piastre will be racing in Melbourne this weekend and the opening round of the Formula One. How good strive to survive by the way, Oh, I can't get enough. He drives for the McLaren team, and he's a man who
one day will be a world champion. It was confirmed today that he has signed a new multi year deal, meaning that he wins that world championship with McLaren.
Hey, everyone, I just wanted to say thanks for all the nice messages comments that I've had since we ann It's the very same news today, So yeah, thank.
You very much for all of that.
I'm super excited to continue with the team for many many years to come.
What a great blow. Good luck to him and everyone else who's competing and watching that things are sell out each and every year.
Bang, just like that.
It's awesome to see. Right, you'll see that all this weekend on Fox Sports. All right, let us get into it. Bromin, Bishop Stephen Conroy, lots to talk about in there, and breaking news about leaks that are now starting to come from inside the Liberal Party. Who was out to sabotage Peter Duddin.
We discussed next.
In a couple of weeks time, we are going to be into Wombo it's the next of our ourtown locations. If you would like to join us on the thirtieth of March, please send me an email tonight. Let's fill the joy. We've got the biggest room we possibly can and I know plenty of people watch the show there on Sky News Regional, on Foxtell, Flash through the app or.
Any old how if there's still VHS taps around.
Outown at sky news dot com dot you outtown at skyews dot com dot are you in the man cave? The man who just he gets this close and then just Bromwin goes in for the kill. Stephen Conroy, he's here to help as always and Bromobishop to carry over chap, love you to see you. So let's talk about the tariffs,
the failure to do so. Add again my suggestion there about how Albow plays the next few weeks trying to sort of leverage Trumps standing in Australia and the Dutton mini Trump of it all, no matter how unfair all of that is. Bromwin, why didn't we get an exemption and who's to blame?
Well, we didn't get an exemption for a whole host of reasons. I suspect and I think a lot of it has got to do with our behavior in the United Nations with regard for Penny Wong. I think also with regard to watching the way the Albanese government has handled tariffs and China literally cow towing and saying what else can we give you to so we can sell you some wine and some lobsters, And then when we get our airmen or our naval divers attacked by China,
we say nothing. We find warships going around our country, we don't even know they're there, and we see Albanese come out and apologize and explain why it's really okay for them to be a threat. And I think they see that as an enormous weness, and I think all
those things have played into it. And I think the contrast between the way the government has tried has tried to handle the tariffs with regard to the United States and the way it's handled tariffs with regard to China tells us that all those things that have worried me forever that Albo is happy to be the Let's come on, China will be a vessel state if you like, whereas
with the United States it's a partnership. We're saying we want to have a defense and he won't even come to the party and say three percent.
So Stephen, what does it say if you can get a better deal out of China, you can't get it out of America.
Well, I think Trump has got his own agenda. We've just got to get used to the change paradigm that he's bringing in both economic and foreign policy. And it isn't like it's just Australia that's being harmed. As a close ally, the UK has been attacked. He's attacked a starm NATO, He's attacked. If you talk to Europeans now, they don't believe that Donald Trump will actually follow through on Article five, the most critical part of the NATO agreement. You see him attack Canada. I mean, how is it
possible to have a fight with Canada. I am still trying to understand on what basis he is making the attack on China. I mean he's ripped up the NAFTA North American Free Trade Agreement. He has now ripped up Australia's US and I helped negotiate this from opposition when I was in Parliament. The US free trade agreement with Australia. He's now ripped it up. But he's ripping up all of these things across the world. And it doesn't matter
whether he used to be America's best friend. He is about, in his view, reshaping the debate, reshaping the world to his perspective, whether the rest of all think it's economically crazy. You know, people are now looking at the nineteen thirty saying America tried this.
It's very interesting, but you missed the point. What has the Albanese government done about handling a very difficult, difficult situation and how does their behavior get judged in the real world that you're describing Now, the real.
World is Australia. Do have to do more on the defense?
Exactly?
Okay, exactly, let's be we're down to one Trump nine Trump and spent four years telling Europe stop being dependent on Russian oil and Russian energy supplies. And you know they've been caught out negotiating with the Russians and secrets they're more revealed to rebuild the pipeline that got buywn up. So he is actually now trying to readdict Europe. He is negotiating with the Russians to rebuild the pipeline to.
Readict you intake on European But okay, but what about what about the run of it all?
What about the elbow of it all that we all know I know it as just a bloke on the TV right. Trump's about relationships, about familiarity. We know that there are some inns here. We know that there are very significant Australians that are very significant supporters who've been to Marlago plenty. We have a former Prime minister in
Scott Morrison who spent New Year's Eve with him. We have a former Prime minister and Kevin Rudd who literally was dressing up stalking him at a golf course as a meeting that under centded estimates that the Foreign Afairs Department had no details of, no data off. We got a prime minister who yes, gets aphone call at the start, he gets referred to as a wonderful person and then no follow up afterwards. Why didn't they put the work in? And Stephen, is it fair to say they didn't put
the work in between November? The great system about America is you know who's won the election, they don't take over till January. Get off your dot and go to their house and see them.
So some gossip that has been put to me is that to be fair, and we all know how relentless Kevin Rudd can be. Okay, we've all witnessed it, we've been.
Okay.
My understanding is he, just like the promise have been trying to do over the last few days, did reach out to mar A Lano.
He did attempt him.
It's too late and they just wouldn't take his call.
Too late. There was a very that one of you, even loosely the other. There are a whole lot of people who are very pro Australia in the Congress, with whom who do get the ear of Donald Trump. And these are the areas where concentrated if it should have been put there's a whole lot of diplomacy that could have been exercised. But with the players in the field, and I've got to say I think Penny Wong's one of the worst in the field and making relations worse than they ever needed to be has put us on
the back foot. Now when when the spokesman came out today and said yes it was on the table to consider Australia being exempt, but has been denied. So what happened between the statements being made. Yes, we're going to consider it and know it's off the table.
That's the bottom has attacked every matter of he did traditional Canada.
He did not, did not say to any other ever, other country that we are considering giving you an exemption, not one only Australia. Now, who blew it from being on the table.
Trump being never had any intention?
Well you can no, you can't.
He was polite because it was one offers.
We all know the dance plate and he doesn't all know how the dance works.
On the first call, everyone's everybody, no, no, no, he never on the.
Phone and got on the plane. Is the bloke who's been bagging him off? That doesn't work that way.
And also found half.
Too easy Stephen to say we didn't get it because it was never.
The Donald Trump.
You gone all right, you've opened the door now.
Peter Dunne just really wants emmy Donald Trump.
Des don't believe me, Peter Dutton, all right.
Let me get off that. Let me get off the fence now, or not off the fence, off the bench to he wants to be Peter Donald Trumps ivic said a hundred times that he said he's not right. He cops it from the right for for staying on ned zero, for staying in a human rights counsel, the whole collection of things, and not tearing up Paris all the rest of it. Right, So there's plenty of people already starting to sort of echo and I think this is them
taking out insurance in case he doesn't win. By the way, people do that sometimes that you know, he's not pure enough, right, the goldilocks of it all. But there is something to be said about Donald Trump's standing in Australia. Now you know, I'm pro Trump, right, but that's not the majority position
in Australia. So for Albanezi, is he going to try to play this game of constantly saying you're Trump, your Trump, your Trump, your Trump as a way of dirting up somebody who's been criticized for not being Trump.
Enough, just because the right wingers I want to try and drag him to the climate. You know, cancelation argument doesn't mean that Dutton himself doesn't desperately want to ape Trump. He just knows that it will lose more votes if he does so.
He is called in that frand to want to mc Donald Trump to be.
Unlike Elbows, even worse than Stammer.
He is ignoring your advice. I mean he desperately wants him to ado Trump policies. Albert, I hope you win the argument. I hope you dragged up into the Trump can. No, I'm not doing that Australian's deep down.
I'm saying he really wants to be No, he does.
That's why they don't want to elect him.
Rubbish.
They do want to elect him.
They just actually did a poll in newspoll and said they don't want to elect him, want him not to.
Look.
I won't say it's ever easy to do my job, but that was pretty easy.
Thank you guys. All right, stick around, we've got to do another one round two next.
Don't go anywhere.
I'll report back on what they say, which, by the way, we'll just be hugs and kisses during the break. Plenty more here on Paul murraw Life. Thanks for watching, here, were Bromber, Bishop Stephen Conroy. Let's keep going speed around now. But there's a lot about all right, Annabel crab I think trying to find some sort of passive aggressive way of having you go at. Peter Dutton suggested that somehow he's losing advantage.
Because he's more popular.
But then there's a couple of other stories worth talking about which are a little bit of a worry if you're this close to an election. In the Australian newspaper tonight online and in the paper tomorrow, there's a story about Liberal MPs who I apparently have a problem with the small target approach.
And then there's the even.
More damaging story which is the City Morning Herald, where some people are now starting to leak what the internal documents are of either the talking point to MP's and potentially some of the decisions that are about to be made so bromwin.
The one thing the.
Labor Party does the closer they get to an election is the tighter their amounts become about ever criticizing anyone, even if they think the person who is leading the ship is exactly the wrong one. Liberals not so much. What's going on here?
Well, I read both those articles. I thought the Underbelt Prayer article was a little bit like the curitique a little bit and it was interesting, a little bit was bad. It did go on a bit and on and on and on with regard to the Sydney Morning Herald. That's
a bitch piece. And I think when the leader, when the opposition leader is looking good, are then you're going to find those stories because those who want to cut him down, dare I say it coming from the government, who might dress it up as looking like it's coming from the opposition. Right tactics are used to you'll see those sort of articles emanate. So I don't think it's
a trend. But the tighter, the tighter the race, and the longer to go, the more of these little things can come out and they have to be battered back.
Yeah, but I.
Mean it ain't. It ain't Kevin rut on the phone to Lory Oaks. Oh sorry, never proved, never proven, right, But we know that the part of the effect of this stuff is so that whatever you were planning to talk about tomorrow, whatever heat you were trying to put on the person you're fighting against, a question will come from somewhere, which means you have to step away from
the thing that you're trying to fight on. I think what was really interesting to note about that sort of Dutton Trump stuff from when he pivots pretty well whenever he's asked this question. Now into the greatest hits.
And she's got a simple answer. Really, yeah, I'm not without the hair, there's no similarity.
Yeah, there we go.
But Steven as a person who would like the political advantage to fall the way of the government, this stuff is not good.
Yeah.
Now, look, I think there's it's probably been the toughest I don't necessarily say the worst, but the toughest few weeks he's had.
For a long time.
Some of the stories around his personal finances, the stories around trips to fundraisers have caught him and he's looked a little bit flat food. I think the West Australian election will have rattled him a little bit. Like the PM's we're saying to anyone, you know, we're holding up in WA. Dutton is not working as well in WA, and.
You know it lives him.
We say no, it's not true. Definitely not true. Or the West Australian.
You know, with Western Australia, I thought any expectation for the Liberals still have done at a state level better than they did was really blowing into the wind, was their own speak.
The Lips thought they'd get ten and fifteen was a bit over the top. But they are not even close to ten. So what the results show is that Dutton is not taking as well in Wa and that Labor may win the four seats, so may hold the full seats they won last time. Bullwinkle, no one's tried to claim on our side, so I think that would rattle
them a bit. And the small target Now, to be fair, there's a couple of other really prominent people who've been talking about the small target problem and they named Paul and Bromwin. We have had this discussion over a month or two now that the strategy You've been like, he is like, I've been involved in small target strategies.
This is a very small target strategy.
But the one thing that the one thing that a delayed election does do is it gives him budget in reply Now, unlike many opposition leaders where normally that'll happen, you know whatever, March April may floats around and then an election's way off. If I mean, there can be a scenario here where basically the following Monday an election could be called or a week later, and dunt I don't think he's got enough credit for his budget in reply speeches because they have been yes, general sort of
overall statements. But that's where he dropped the foreign vent stuff that's popular with seventy three percent of people in marginal seats. So I think they've got a massive chance to put perhaps the biggest part of the stake on the table on that day.
What do you reckon?
Well, I do too. And he used the budget reply speech to drop the policy on nuclear energy.
Yes, correct, and.
It has maintained its attraction.
Good point.
And when you look to be honest that the worst problem this country has at the moment is a cost of energy. We have an energy crisis because everything we do, whether it's buying a piece of a pencil and a paper for a kid at school, the fact that it has to be transported, that it has to be made, everything is dependent on the cost of energy. And not only are we absolutely defacing this beautiful continent.
Of ours that ma came like you have.
I said he would cost the New South Wales Liberals government and he did end up costing you too, because he's just such a I don't know, there's no words to describe how I feel about.
It's a good way to tap the brakes because I don't want to have the meeting with the lawyers on it. I do appreciate it all right, Thank you very much, Browin, Thank you very much, Stephen. A reminder if you'd love to join us for ourtown into one but in a couple of weeks time, and we'll have some big news in and around all that which we'll announce in the next few days, simply send me an email which is outtown at sky news dot com dot AU, outoun at sky news dot com dot A you for Sunday, March
the thirtieth. If ever, you want to also send me an email, news tip or something that you've seen around and the rest of the Meetia is doing that you'd love to see me get the size nines and am I size and probably slightly smaller anyway, but still rip in. You can always send me that email. Pollard skuynews dot com dot E. The late debate just a couple of moments away. We'll look for to seeing you again tomorrow night where we're looking forward to a conversation in the
next couple of days with the Tasmanian premiere. Why because he's cutting up red tape.
See you then, Yes,