ELECTION SPECULATION ABOUT TO BURST
Before we get into it, happy Valentine’s Day everyone — here’s hoping for a day of love and kindness in a year so far very much dominated by the opposite.
Where to begin this morning… well, how about the fact Anthony Albanese obviously hasn’t called the election yet but many, many publications are getting very excited that he’s about to.
The ABC reckons the PM dropped “hints galore” in the final question time of the sitting fortnight yesterday, going as far as saying Albanese went on something of a “valedictory” lap.
“The prime minister has hinted Parliament will not return after Thursday, all but killing off prospects of a March budget and paving the way for an election between mid-next month and early April,” Jacob Greber writes.
The broadcaster called the prime minister “buoyant” following legislative wins on childcare and electoral funding reform this week. Deals were also struck on things such as production tax credits and the passing of the anti-hate laws, while stuck legislation like the nature positive reforms was dumped.
What really got tongues wagging though was Albanese visiting the Canberra press gallery on Thursday, during which he is believed to have looked in on several newsrooms, “something the prime minister has not done since winning the job in May 2022”, the ABC reports.
As well as getting a fair amount achieved (not all of which has gone down well, see: electoral reforms) in this sitting fortnight and Labor believing it had a fairly good run of question times, the major reason for election speculation is the strong expectation the Reserve Bank of Australia will cut interest rates next Tuesday.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers earlier this week tried to bat away questions on election timing and the impact of a potential rate cut, declaring: “We are working towards a budget towards the end of March.”
The federal budget is due to occur on March 25 unless the election is called, with a sitting week also scheduled for that week. From February 24 the next Senate estimates is also scheduled. Whether any of that now happens is somewhat up in the air — plus there’s the fun of the Western Australia election on March 8.
The ABC tries to explain it: “If the strong hints that Thursday was the final sitting day of the Parliament are correct, an election could be called as early as Sunday and as late as March 23, two days before the budget is slated. Those dates mean an election might fall as early as March 22 and as late — given the Easter holidays — as April 12.”
So, really, who knows (well Albanese does, you’d assume) — the next Worm you read could be me telling you it’s on.
Elsewhere, The Sydney Morning Herald has been leading overnight on its report saying Opposition Leader Peter Dutton is planning to “launch an assault on Labor heartland” as he tries to win an ambitious majority at the election.
Apparently, Dutton is setting his sights on outer suburban seats previously seen as unwinnable, such as Bruce and Hawke in Victoria, plus Werriwa in NSW and Blair in Queensland.
Senior Liberals claim the Coalition leader will target the seats in the next fortnight. Senator Jane Hume is quoted as saying: “Labor has taken their traditional Victorian heartland for granted and its clear voters have had enough.”
The Coalition appears to be buoyed by the state by-election in Werribee last weekend where the Victorian Labor Party looks set to hold onto the seat despite having lost 17% of its primary vote. But as has been pointed out many times, that drop does not necessarily signal fantastic news for the Liberals given they picked up hardly any of those lost Labor votes.
On that theme, the SMH adds Liberals this week have “expressed private concern that some MPs might be too complacent, assuming they are on track to win [the election]”. It adds: “The Coalition needs to pick up about 20 seats — a feat not achieved since Tony Abbott ended the Rudd-Gillard era — to form a majority and about a dozen to be within reach of cobbling together a minority government. Some Liberal MPs believe winning eight to 10 seats would be a good result.”
Meanwhile, Industrial Relations Minister Murray Watt has said Labor is stepping up campaigning in the likes of Brisbane and Griffith (the seat of Greens’ MP Max Chandler-Mather).
“Having personally doorknocked voters in Griffith and Brisbane, it’s clear that voters have tired of the Greens’ grandstanding and obstruction. Even Liberal voters are telling us they are considering voting Labor, just to get rid of the Greens,” the Nine newspapers quote Watt as claiming.
Some of the breathless election speculation following the conclusion of question time yesterday was fuelled by Albanese apparently exclaiming “On his last day!” as retiring MP Graham Perrett was ejected from the chamber. However, there is now debate over whether the PM said “day” or “days”.
So again, no one really knows what’s going on.
GAZA, UKRAINE, MUNICH AND RFK JR
There have been so many international news headlines this week — and not only because of the endless stream of commentary from Donald Trump — that it’s been hard to stay on top of it all.
I’ll attempt to summarise what’s been leading the way over the last few hours (but I’m definitely going to have to miss out an awful lot).
Hamas has said it will continue implementing the Gaza ceasefire deal and release hostages as scheduled, the BBC reports.
The announcement came following talks in Cairo aimed at preventing the collapse of the agreement after Hamas said it would halt the release of hostages if Israel did not allow more aid into Gaza, and Israel claimed the ceasefire would end if hostages were not released as planned at the weekend.
The Guardian says the Israeli government signalled it would stick to the hostage-release schedule agreed in the ceasefire deal “but warned that if the anticipated three hostages are not released on Saturday, it would go back to war”.
The fallout from Donald Trump’s 90-minute phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday is still being felt as Ukraine and Europe attempt to respond to the actions of the US president.
While the 78-year-old continues to post on his own social media platform (this time stating there was a “good possibility of ending that horrible, very bloody war!!!”), the actual reality of trying to bring to an end the three-year conflict is being discussed all over the world (see The Commentariat below).
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy (whom Trump had the courtesy to call after his hour-and-a-half chinwag with Putin) posted on X that he has “warned world leaders against trusting Putin’s claims of readiness to end the war”.
Recalling a conversation with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Thursday, Zelenskyy said: “We discussed the conditions needed for a lasting and real peace in Ukraine and agreed that no negotiations with Putin can begin without a united position from Ukraine, Europe, and the US.” He added: “I emphasised that Ukraine must negotiate from a position of strength, with strong and reliable security guarantees, and that NATO membership would be the most cost-effective for partners. Another key guarantee is serious investment in Ukraine’s defence industry.”
Ukraine’s potential NATO membership is something Trump’s new Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has been saying this week is “not realistic” while declaring America is no longer “the primary guarantor of security in Europe”. Hegseth reckons European allies “must make NATO great again”, The Guardian reports, by increasing spending and taking more responsibility for the security of the continent. Apparently the Trump administration “will not allow anyone to turn Uncle Sam into Uncle Sucker”…
The AFP news agency states: “NATO’s European members are terrified about Ukraine being forced into a bad deal that lets Moscow claim victory and leaves them facing the threat of an emboldened Russia.” In response, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has claimed Ukraine “will of course one way or another be taking part in the negotiations”, the BBC flags.
AFP highlights Hegseth’s comments at the NATO headquarters are “part of the first flurry of high-ranking American visits to Europe since Trump took power”. Those visits will culminate with US Vice President JD Vance meeting Zelenskyy in Munich on Friday (local time).
On Thursday, authorities in Munich said almost 30 people were injured after a car driven by an Afghan asylum seeker ploughed into a crowd of demonstrators, the ABC reports.
“If it was an attack, we must take consistent action against possible perpetrators with all means of justice,” Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said.
Finally, in the endless news cycle that is American politics, The New York Times states: “Robert F. Kennedy Jr, the vaccine sceptic and former presidential candidate who fled his family’s party and threw his ‘medical freedom’ movement behind President Trump, has been confirmed by the Senate as the nation’s next health secretary.” There isn’t really much to add to that statement, other than to highlight Mitch McConnell, a polio survivor, was the only Republican to vote against confirming Kennedy.
The paper also flags that Trump is set to describe his plans to impose “reciprocal tariffs” on America’s trading partners as he’s scheduled to meet with India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
ON A LIGHTER NOTE…
Normally I like to keep Lighter Note free from politics and you-know-who, but I think I’ll make an exception today.
A petition calling on Denmark to buy California has received almost a quarter of a million signatures as the Danes fight back against Donald Trump’s attempts to acquire Greenland.
The satirical petition declares: “Have you ever looked at a map and thought, ‘You know what Denmark needs? More sunshine, palm trees, and roller skates.’ Well, we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make that dream a reality. Let’s buy California from Donald Trump!”
Outlining its “Tremendous Plan” the site goes on to say: “Crowdfunding goal of $1 trillion (give or take a few billion). That’s just 200,000 kroner [A$44,000] from every Dane. Skip a few lattes, and you’re golden.”
Apparently, the plan will involve sending in “our bestest negotiators — Lego executives and the cast of Borgen”, while Disneyland will be renamed “Hans Christian Andersenland”.
“Måke Califørnia Great Ægain” is the petition’s strapline and the aim is to attract 500,000 signatures, which given the amount of coverage the joke website has attracted in the last few days seems very achievable. Acquiring California may not be so easy.
Say What?
That is the height of insult, and that doesn’t bode well for having to work with an Albanese-led government in minority situation.
Zali Steggall
The independent MP, who made many a headline on Thursday by interrupting Don Farrell’s press conference on the government’s new donations laws, adds some spice to the prospect of post-election negotiations.
CRIKEY RECAP
Paul Hopper, a candidate in Victoria’s Werribee state by-election last Saturday and a plaintiff in the High Court challenge over that state’s electoral reform, said independent challengers were getting a “crap deal” under the current state rules.
“It is completely unfair and undemocratic in a country like Australia, where we’ve got a proud and pretty well-functioning democracy,” he told Crikey.
Labor’s federal Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister Patrick Gorman told the Senate in November the Commonwealth reform would be “delivering on our commitment to strengthen and enhance the integrity of federal elections through improved transparency and accountability”.
“This bill [seeks] to remove the influence of big money in politics, ensuring that our electoral system remains a system we can all trust,” he said. “Trust that election results are not unfairly skewed by ‘big money’; trust that elections are a contest of ideas, not bank balances; trust that we know who is funding election campaigns with more information about campaign financing provided before voting day.”
The ALP will likely hold on in Werribee. But it’s bad news for Labor and the Coalition, with the latter having clearly assumed it would benefit from Labor’s pain. The only solace for the duopoly is that the outer suburbs haven’t coalesced around an alternative — yet.
Kos Samaras wasn’t surprised by Saturday’s slump. The Labor official-turned-pollster has long been warning about Labor’s growing disconnect with its working-class base, which feels increasingly neglected. He and his colleagues have also been observing the rise of Australia’s “double haters”, a US term used to describe those who hate both Democrats and Republicans.
“The difference is in the US, they don’t vote,” says the Redbridge pollster. “Here they do.”
While their communications regarding Markson’s meeting with Netanyahu were all redacted — presumably all speaking neutrally about a controversial Australian journalist having a private one-on-one with a man accused of war crimes — we did get some documents back about Sky News’ attempts to interview Australia’s ambassador to Israel, Ralph King, while in the country.
Internal discussions from people across the department were fairly unanimous: no way. Even King himself weighed in, saying “at this juncture, I’d recommend declining”. The emails also said the FMO — foreign minister’s office, we presume — were consulted, but provided no clue as to what the FMO’s response was, if anything.
We asked Penny Wong’s office but heard nothing back. Markson acknowledged our request but didn’t get back to us in time with comment. And a DFAT spokesperson didn’t give an inch when asked why it had ducked an Australian journalist like this.
“As part of their work, Australian ambassadors focus on building relationships and communicating to audiences in the host country to which they are deployed,” they said in an email.
READ ALL ABOUT IT
Severe Tropical Cyclone Zelia: West Aussies warned this is a ‘life-threatening weather event’ (PerthNow)
‘Deliberate, orchestrated incident’: Daily Telegraph caught up in stunt gone wrong (The Sydney Morning Herald)
‘Unsafe and unprofessional’: Australia slams Chinese fighter jet’s flare drop on RAAF plane (The Australian) ($)
Referendum needed for Dutton’s call to toughen citizenship-stripping laws, expert says (Guardian Australia)
Bill Shorten’s $300k speechwriter follows him to University of Canberra (ABC)
Love rules as Aussies still splurge on Valentine’s Day (AAP)
THE COMMENTARIAT
The day the Ukraine War ended — Jonathan Lemire (The Atlantic): Yesterday, the Senate confirmed former Representative Tulsi Gabbard as Trump’s new director of national intelligence (DNI). Gabbard has received scrutiny for her previous comments about Russia and has been accused by Democrats of adopting Kremlin talking points, including when she suggested, shortly after the war started, that Moscow had been provoked into invading Ukraine.
Her selection as DNI was praised by Russian state media, surely a first for anyone in the position. And in another act of symbolism on a day full of them, Trump hosted Gabbard’s swearing-in ceremony in the Oval Office late this afternoon. He then took a few questions, including one about whether he viewed Ukraine as “an equal member of this peace process”.
Trump paused.
“That’s an interesting question,” he finally said. “I think they have to make peace.”
He did not answer further.
‘What Putin had been waiting for’: Moscow buoyant after call with Trump — Pjotr Sauer (The Guardian): The once-unthinkable image of a US leader seated beside Putin, watching Russian soldiers who fought in Ukraine march across Red Square in the country’s grandest display of power, no longer feels so far-fetched. If it came to pass, it would deal a devastating blow to the West’s three-year effort to diplomatically isolate the Russian president.
“The promise to exchange visits is a victory for Putin. Any dictatorship sees a visit from the US president as the highest form of international legitimacy, almost a magical ritual that lifts a diplomatic curse,” said Alexander Baunov, a political analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think tank.
Russian officials were quick to highlight Europe’s complete exclusion from the peace talks, as European leaders struggled to come to terms with being sidelined.
“Frigid spinster Europe is mad with jealousy and rage,” said the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev. “It’s been shown its real place; its time is over.”
Summing up the day, the state TV host Evgeny Popov declared on Wednesday that Trump was in effect doing Moscow’s job by tearing the Western world apart. “We wanted to chainsaw the Western world into pieces, but he decided to cut through it himself,” Popov cheered.
