With just a week left till Australia heads to the polls, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Opposition leader Peter Dutton faced off for the last leaders’ debate this weekend, exchanging barbs on national security, cost-of-living, Welcome to Country, and other issues.
The last of four scheduled debates between the leaders took place on Sunday night, this time hosted by Channel Seven and moderated by 7News’ political editor Mark Riley. The 60 undecided voters in the audience handed the win to the prime minister with 50 per cent of the vote, compared to 25 per cent to Dutton and 25 per cent remaining undecided.
Didn’t get a chance to tune in? Here’s what actually stood out from the night.
1. Welcome to Country
Days after Melbourne’s Anzac Day dawn service was interrupted by far-right extremists heckling the Welcome to Country, the topic of these ceremonies came up as a significant point of discussion.
Both men strongly condemned the actions of this weekend. Dutton, however, went on to say Welcome to Country ceremonies are “overdone,” suggesting they’re dividing the nation — like the Voice to Parliament debate of 2023, which he pretty vocally campaigned against.
“There is a sense across the community that it is overdone,” Dutton said, per The Guardian.
“To do it for the start of every meeting at work, or the start of a football game, I think other Australians think it is overdone and cheapens the significance of what it was meant to do.”
Meanwhile, Albanese said it’s up to individual organisations to decide whether to include the ceremony, noting they were a “matter of respect”.
“It is up to them and people will have different views and people are entitled to their views, but we have a great privilege from my perspective, of sharing this continent with the oldest continuous culture on earth. And when I welcome international visitors to Parliament House, they want to see that culture,” he said.
Dutton doubled down on his refusal to stand in front of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags during official press conferences as he continued to stoke the culture wars that have come up time and again in this election campaign. Both leaders said they wouldn’t change the date of Australia Day.
“We need to stop the teaching of some of the curriculum that says that our children should be ashamed of being Australian,” Dutton added, addressing the topic of January 26.
2. Whether Albo’s got Trump’s phone number
Both leaders were asked if they trusted US President Donald Trump (Albanese said “yes” and Dutton said he’d trust “whoever is in the Oval Office”) but another curious moment of the debate saw them talk about… who might have Trump’s mobile phone number.
Questioned on whether the relationship with Trump extends to exchanging texts, Albanese said he was not sure “[Trump] has a mobile phone”.
“It is not the way it works with any global leader,” Albanese said, per SBS News.
Dutton quickly jumped on to question whether Albanese had the phone number of other world leaders, such as British PM Keir Starmer.
“I am aware of the protocols,” Albanese responded, to which Dutton claimed “I think the answer was ‘no’ there”.
3. Does Dutton know the cost of eggs?
In another segment, the leaders were asked to respond to a series of images, which included being shown a carton of a dozen eggs and asked how much it cost. The opposition leader’s guesstimate was $4.20, which Sunrise host Natalie Barr pointed out “might get you about half a dozen”. Albanese guessed $7 “if you can find them”, which was a bit closer to the true price of over $8. (But honestly, when it came to being “in touch” with Australian voters, not sure either of the leaders can walk away grinning from that one.)
The rapid-fire-esque round also saw both leaders respond to a photo of billionaire Elon Musk. In terms of what came to mind, Albanese said “Tesla and a very rich man” while Dutton opted for “evil genius”.
4. The question of nuclear energy
Amid all the nuclear energy talk from the Coalition, Dutton was questioned if he’d be happy to “have a nuclear plant in your suburb”, which he agreed to.
“We have a safe technology,” Dutton said, adding he’s “proud” of the Coalition’s energy plans. But he would not commit to visiting any of the proposed sites in the final days of the campaign.
When asked by moderator Riley why he has not visited any of his proposed nuclear plant sites during the election campaign if the technology “is so good”, the opposition claimed he had visited one of the sites multiple times before the campaign started, as reported by news.com.au.
Dutton said he would visit nearly 30 electorates over the next week, the Guardian noted, although he couldn’t promise the visits would be to a site where he wants to build a nuclear reactor.
5. The jabs, barbs, and accusations
We’ve seen this in the last three debates, and Sunday night’s final debate continued to include a number of accusations hurled between the two leaders. Albanese described his opponent as a “risk” to Australia, claiming the Liberal leader would cut essential services and harm the economy, while Dutton called out “lies” from the Labor campaign.
Early in the debate, Dutton accused Albanese of lying and claimed he should be “ashamed” of the problems arising over the past three years, as reported by 9News, while Albanese hit back that Dutton could attack him but he wouldn’t let him “attack the wages of working people”.
With the public debates officially wrapped up, it’s unclear if the latest showing really swung any undecided voters. But whether or not the debates moved the needle, the final week is shaping up to be a wild one. With both sides throwing punches and the pressure mounting, I wouldn’t be surprised if things get even messier before May 3 rolls around.
If you wanna catch up on what went down before this, you can check out the key takeaways from the first debate HERE, second debate HERE, and third debate HERE.
And if you’d like to see where the major parties stand on key issues, you can check out their policies HERE.
Lead image: AAP Photos
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