Dutton refuses to specify what Coalition’s $21bn of pledged defence spending would be used on

Opposition leader insists costings will be released prior to the election as Andrew Hastie says ‘America-first’ US means Australia’s defence must be prioritised

The opposition leader, Peter Dutton, has refused to specify where an additional $21bn in pledged defence spending would be allocated, nor where the money would come from, committing only to releasing the Coalition’s costings before the 3 May election.

After announcing the Coalition’s policy to spend an additional $21bn over five years, lifting defence spending to 2.5% of GDP, Dutton was questioned over where the money would come from and what specific capabilities it would be directed to.

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Trade unionists, conservationists and church groups unite against Dutton’s nuclear plan

Seven Regions Nuclear Free alliance launches campaign representing groups who oppose the Coalition’s proposed nuclear reactors in their communities across Queensland, NSW, SA, Victoria and WA

Trade unions, conservationists, First Nations groups, church congregations and community organisations have launched a coordinated campaign against opposition leader Peter Dutton’s plan for nuclear reactors across Australia.

The Coalition has pledged, if elected, to build seven nuclear reactors to replace retiring or retired coal sites naming Tarong and Callide in Queensland, Liddell and Mount Piper in New South Wales, Port Augusta in South Australia, Loy Yang in Victoria, and Muja in Western Australia.

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‘Misleading and offensive’: Allegra Spender denounces unauthorised pamphlet as AEC launches investigation

More than 47,000 anonymous pamphlets distributed in Wentworth area, which includes Bondi Beach, Darling Point, Double Bay and Rose Bay

Allegra Spender has denounced “anonymous and misleading” pamphlets that the Australian Electoral Commission says had been distributed in her electorate of Wentworth without authorisation.

At a press conference on Monday afternoon, the independent member for the eastern Sydney seat welcomed an announcement by the AEC that it would be investigating the election material.

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Coalition promises crackdown on ‘drugs and thugs’ as polls continue to favour Labor

Opposition expected to use final two weeks of the campaign to focus on the traditionally safe grounds of national security, crime and defence

The Coalition would crack down on “drugs and thugs” with a new policy pledge including tougher narcotics laws and a new disclosure scheme to help parents “unmask” sex offenders who may be in contact with their children.

Peter Dutton said an elected Coalition government would spend $750m on its so-called Operation Safer Communities plan, to include tightened border security and safety laws, extra funding for police and investigators, and detection of illicit drugs.

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‘Propaganda’: Albanese mocks Russia’s ‘you have no cards’ warning to Australia

Incendiary letter by Moscow’s envoy says Australians should be more concerned about US bases on their soil than a Russian base in Indonesia

Russian warnings to Australia that “you have no cards” to stop Russian military activity in the Indo-Pacific have been mocked by Anthony Albanese, who has dismissed an incendiary letter from an ambassador as authoritarian “propaganda”.

The unsubstantiated spectre of a proposed Russian military airbase on Indonesian territory has loomed over the past week of Australia’s federal election campaign, with the opposition accusing the government of obfuscating and dodging questions, and the government responding that the opposition had misrepresented the Indonesian government and actively fanned Russian propaganda.

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‘Bordering on incredible’: Coalition under fire for planning to scrap Labor climate policies and offering none of its own

With Peter Dutton’s views on climate change in the spotlight, the focus has turned onto whether there will be any policies to reduce emissions in the next decade

The Coalition is refusing to say if it will introduce any policies to cut Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions in the next decade as it pledges to unwind most climate measures introduced under Labor.

Peter Dutton’s position on the climate crisis came under scrutiny last week after he gave contradictory answers on whether he accepted mainstream climate science. Asked during a leaders’ debate on the ABC whether extreme weather events were worsening, the opposition leader said: “I don’t know because I’m not a scientist”.

Dropping a Labor goal of 82% of electricity coming from renewable generation by 2030 and slowing the roll out of solar and wind farms, in part by scrapping a “rewiring the nation” fund to build new transmission connections. Instead, it says the country would rely on more fossil fuels – coal and gas-fired power – until it could lift a ban on nuclear energy and build taxpayer-owned nuclear generators, mostly after 2040.

Abolishing fines for car companies that do not meet targets to cut the average emissions from the new cars they sell.

Not supporting Labor’s 2030 emissions reduction target. Former diplomats say lowering the target would put Australia in breach of commitments made in the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

Opposing a joint Australia-Pacific bid to host a major UN climate summit in Adelaide next year.

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As Dutton faces a last-minute policy inquisition, Albanese seems to be on top – and he knows it

An increasingly confident prime minister has bounced back from his campaign missteps while a nervous-looking opposition leader is running out of time to make a comeback

Two weeks until the 3 May election day, and Anthony Albanese is cracking jokes about Star Wars.

Every profile and sketch of the prime minister during this campaign – which is now past its halfway – speaks of the confidence and even swagger Albanese projects as he travels the country. It is one of the starkest differences to his 2022 campaign, which was dominated by missteps: forgetting key economic figures, then his untimely Covid diagnosis and images of being chased out of a press conference by journalists.

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Trumpet of Patriots faithful told Australia needs ‘many’ Trump-like policies as Clive Palmer launches campaign

Billionaire tells crowd of 400 that ‘uni-party’ of Labor and Coalition are ‘dumb and dumber’ as hats with ‘Make Australia Great Again’ slogan given out

Billionaire Clive Palmer has made his pitch to party faithfuls after launching the Trumpet of Patriots campaign at his own resort.

Palmer hopes his Trumpet of Patriots can bring “common sense” back to Australian politics after launching the party’s campaign in front of a strong crowd at his resort.

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Dutton pledges tax breaks for business startups and meets alpaca who sneezed on King Charles

Opposition leader also says his migration plan would prioritise tradies and not yoga teachers

The Coalition says it will introduce tax offsets to help an extra 350,000 small businesses get going if it is elected.

On Saturday morning, the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, announced an “entrepreneurship accelerator” which would see new businesses receive tapered tax offsets and tax deductions for tech upgrades.

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Coalition’s claim that fuel efficiency standard would raise prices based on car no longer on sale

Questions arise over election proposal to axe penalties for high-emitting cars after revelations Toyota RAV4 model used in analysis has been discontinued

The Coalition’s claim cars will be more expensive as a result of the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard (NVES) has come under scrutiny because at least one of the opposition’s headline figures is based on a car no longer on sale.

The revelation casts doubt on a key Coalition election proposal to eliminate penalties for cars that emit CO2 beyond regulated limits, to ensure “Australians save thousands when buying a new car”.

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Zoe Daniel says team had nothing to do with Climate 200-backed robocall criticised by Coalition

Liberal senator says voters in teal seats receiving aggressive ‘push polling’ calls, but company behind poll says it complied with guidelines

The independent MP Zoe Daniel has said her campaign team had nothing to do with a phone survey the Coalition has criticised as “push polling”, a criticism rejected by the company responsible for launching it on behalf of Climate 200.

Nine Newspapers has published the audio of a robocall authorised by the polling company uComms, which provides a favourable overview of Daniel’s record in parliament before asking how a person would vote on 3 May.

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Leaders’ debate live: PM says he has ‘no reason’ not to trust Trump as Dutton says ‘I don’t know the president’

Prime minister and Coalition leader face off in showdown hosted by ABC. Follow live updates

Albanese says Labor didn’t commission modelling on negative gearing

Anthony Albanese said Peter Dutton’s suggestion that the housing crisis is something that developed in the last two years is “nonsense”.

Everyone watching this program knows that this has been developing for a long period of time. We have not had enough homes been built. The former government did not bother to have a housing minister for half the time they were in office. What we’ve done since we came to office, is look towards the big issue which is supply.

The experts say that what that potentially [would] do is is diminish supply, not increase it. That’s why the key to fixing the housing issues is supply.

It certainly wasn’t commissioned by us to do so.

We need to do both. We need to particularly give young people a fair crack … The key is supply. That’s why only Labor is offering a plan at this election to increase supply of housing.

That is on the supply side a very significant benefit. The second part is we reduce migration by 25%, so that we can allow the housing stock to be built up again and by doing that – as well as stopping foreigners for two years from purchasing Australian homes – we give young Australians a go.

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‘Let Rome burn’: Coalition MP says allowing blackouts the only way to turn voters off renewable energy

Exclusive: Power outages in major cities would help build opposition to climate policies, Colin Boyce tells podcast

The Coalition MP Colin Boyce says he believes the way to turn voters against renewable energy is to “let Rome burn for a while” and allow power blackouts to occur in major cities.

Guardian Australia reported on Wednesday that Boyce had described blackouts as a “big political opportunity” at a meeting of climate science deniers in late 2023.

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Coalition MP Colin Boyce told climate science deniers blackouts a ‘big political opportunity’

Boyce tells Climate and Energy Realists Queensland that opposition to renewables is growing and fellow MPs should adopt a ‘do nothing strategy’

Coalition MP Colin Boyce told a group of climate science deniers that blackouts were “a big political opportunity” and that he had urged fellow MPs to adopt a “do nothing strategy” that would allow power outages and build opposition to net-zero policies.

A video of Boyce, posted on YouTube, speaking to the Climate and Energy Realists Queensland group, includes comments by the Flynn MP that net-zero climate policies “need a rethink”.

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Peter Dutton’s nuclear power plan could lead to major electricity shortages, analysis says

Coalition’s proposal overestimates the reliability of Australia’s ageing coal generators, Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis says

Peter Dutton’s plan to build less renewable energy and keep Australia’s coal plants running longer has overestimated the reliability of ageing generators and could lead to major electricity shortages, according to a new analysis.

The Coalition has pledged to put taxpayer-funded nuclear reactors at seven sites around Australia and has pointed to modelling by Frontier Economics that shows the country’s ageing coal fleet would need to take up the slack in electricity generation while they are built.

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Muslim advocacy group to preference Greens above Labor in some seats despite disagreement on religious freedom

Muslim Votes Matter concerned about policy preventing religious schools from discriminating against teachers or students

A potentially influential Muslim advocacy group is planning to tell voters to preference the Greens above Labor on how-to-vote cards in several key seats, despite objecting to the minor party’s position on religious freedom in schools.

Muslim Votes Matter has expressed concern about the party’s plan to ensure religious schools cannot discriminate against teachers or students on the basis of their sexuality, but has welcomed a commitment to ensure “all rights are acknowledged and taken into account”.

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Brisbane Greens MP joins OnlyFans to ‘make people pay attention’ to HIV prevention drug policy

Exclusive: Stephen Bates spruiks free PrEP and PEP proposal on subscription platform best known for adult content, as well as on dating app Grindr

The Greens MP Stephen Bates has joined OnlyFans – a first for an Australian politician – as the party pushes to make the HIV prevention drugs PrEP and PEP free.

It may normally be a career-ending move for a politician to be joining a site known for pornography, but Bates has joined the site with the first video on his free-to-subscribe page announcing the Greens’ push to make PrEP and PEP prescriptions free to anyone with a script.

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Axing Labor’s free Tafe would mean fewer builders and higher house prices, experts warn

The Coalition remains opposed to the scheme, claiming it is ‘badly designed and poorly targeted’

Australia’s construction worker shortage – and prospects for affordable housing – would worsen if Peter Dutton scraps Labor’s free Tafe program, experts warn, pushing housing prices even further out of reach of prospective buyers.

After a video emerged of Liberal frontbencher Sarah Henderson saying the fee-free Tafe policy was “just not working”, the opposition leader was asked on Tuesday if he would cut the scheme – designed to encourage people to work in priority industries like the construction sector.

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Peter Dutton says he will help his children with a house deposit ‘at some stage’

Both major parties spruik housing policies, with Anthony Albanese saying critics may not have read all the detail of Labor’s plan

Peter Dutton says he will help his son with a housing deposit “at some stage”, a day after dodging questions about whether he would use his family wealth and salary to assist his children to get into the market.

Dutton on Monday brought his 20-year-old son, Harry, on the campaign trail to talk about the difficulties of saving for a home. Harry said he and his sister, Rebecca, had both been “saving like mad” to scrape together deposits of their own.

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Australia does not have enough tradies to fulfill Labor’s housing promise, experts say

Construction industry already faces shortfall of 80,000 workers as government vows to build 250,000 homes a year for four years

Australia does not have enough construction workers and other tradies to meet election pitches to boost housing supply, experts say, casting doubt over the major parties’ pledges to address housing affordability.

Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton announced their competing housing plans this week, with both major parties seeking to increase the number of new home builds above the current annual rate of about 170,000.

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