Nation records at least 45 Covid deaths with 28 in NSW, nine in Queensland, six in Victoria and one each in South Australia and Tasmania; Scott Morrison addresses relationship with Barnaby Joyce ahead of deputy PM facing colleagues in Canberra this week after leaked text message savaging the prime minister. Follow all the day’s news live
Speers starts listing the leaders who have accused Scott Morrison of being a liar: Barnaby Joyce, the former prime minister, French president Emmanuel Macron. He asks whether this, plus problems in managing the pandemic, will make it harder to campaign with Scott Morrison at this year’s federal election?
Andrews:
We always knew that we would have our work cut out for us. This is a particularly difficult time in Australia and globally. We always knew that would be the case. Can we do without distractions? Absolutely. It is predictable that the opposition leader and Labor are going to go for a personal attack on the prime minister, of course it is...
Circumstances are very different now. He is a great campaigner. He was a great campaigner in 2019 and he connected very well with Australians.
“... out in Victoria, Queensland, New South Wales, all of the states across Australia. We all need to be doing that. It has been an incredibly difficult time for everyone and we all have to make sure that we are properly connecting.
You can understand the interest legitimately though. Trust matters, integrity matters. You are asking the Australian voters to re-elect a prime minister who has been called a liar, not just once and not just by his now deputy prime minister who even offered to resign over this. It is a pretty big deal.
Look, integrity is absolutely important and I’m not going to dismiss or attempt to dismiss any of that. But I would also say, too, that we are coming up to a federal election in the next couple of months and what Australians will be asked to decide on is who is going to lead that country, and that includes not just the issues that we are discussing today potentially tomorrow...
But it is a big part, minister, as to whether we can trust him?
Look, I would say to the people of Australia that my experience of Scott Morrison is that he has always been respectful and willing to listen to my point of view, but he has also got a very strong record, and that is as immigration minister, as treasurer and as the prime minister. Let’s put this into some context as well, that Scott Morrison has been the prime minister during a particularly difficult time in Australia...
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