Politics With Michelle Grattan

As the energy crisis continues to grip Australia’s east coast with consumers told to limit their consumption and warnings of blackouts Tony Wood, director of the energy program at the Grattan Institute, speaks with Michelle Grattan about why this has happened and what can be done to fix the system. The crisis is unprecedented, Wood says. “We’ve certainly seen situations where things have got very tight[…] But this sort of extended period when we’ve had major power outages and real stress on the entire system for such a long time has never been seen before.” He says the crisis could have been minimised if past governments had worked to “address climate change” and “bring on more renewables” as well as all the technology to support a renewables industry. That being said, Wood points out there are other factors also driving the crisis. “We still would have had the weather patterns we had in the south, on the east coast of Australia, that caused all the rain and caused all the flooding of the coal mines that inte

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. This week Michelle and politics editor Amanda Dunn discuss the apparent early signs of a thaw in China’s attitude towards Australia. But Anthony Albanese has responded by saying China needs to do something tangible – removing trade restrictions it has imposed on Australia. On the domestic front, Energy Minister Chris Bowen warns of a “bumpy” time ahead for power supplies but says you should keep the heater on (just switch off outside lights if they’re not needed). Amanda and Michelle also canvass the people smugglers testing the new government on border protection, and Friday’s national cabinet meeting where premiers will be pressing the federal government for more funds for their struggling health systems.

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. While Anthony Albanese this week continued to receive a warm reception abroad, at home the new government faced more difficult news. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass Tuesday’s 50 basis points rise in interest rates – the latest cost of living blow for many families – and Albanese’s trip to deepen Australia’s relationship with Indonesia. They also take a look at the new shadow ministry, announced by Peter Dutton and David Littleproud on Sunday.

Tony Burke is the minister for employment and workplace relations and minister for the arts, as well as the leader of the House of Representatives.   One of his first tasks is the government's new submission for the minimum wage case, which will say these workers should not be left behind, as inflation has spiked.  If the Fair Work Commission gives a 5.1% rise, in line with inflation, is there a case for it not flowing through to awards, or all awards?  "I can't imagine a situation where there was no flow-through at all. The commission always has the capacity to work out how the flow-through might happen."  He notes one option floated has been a flat dollar increase so the flow-through happened differently.  "The commission will work that through. But certainly there are many awards that are not far from the minimum wage.  "And when we talk about the heroes of the pandemic  a lot of those people are on those awards. So while the focus  has been specifically  minimum wage, I tend to use the term low-paid worke

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass Anthony Albanese’s ministry, with its record number of women in cabinet but one woman, Tanya Plibersek, having her portfolio unexpectedly switched. Peter Dutton, on being elevated to Liberal leader, flagged he’d pitch to the suburbs and small business. Meanwhile the Nationals showed that holding all the party’s seats (and winning an extra one) doesn’t guarantee the leader keeps his job. Barnaby Joyce was dispatched, in favour of the rather less flamboyant David Littleproud, to the relief of many Liberals. Meanwhile, Anthony Albanese will be off to Indonesia next week, in his second overseas trip since winning office.

Every election is unique, but each also presents comparisons and contrasts with elections past. In this podcast, Australian National University history professor Frank Bongiorno gives his insights into the current battle but also takes the long views of campaigns. Bongiorno talks about the role of leaders in what’s often dubbed the “presidential” election age (“a kind of proxy for judgements about policy”) and how Scott Morrison and Anthony Albanese are presenting themselves. The debate on wages and inflation has overtones of the arguments in the 1970s and 1980s, but “sort of minus the policy”. This was supposed to be a “khaki” election, but the khaki has faded during the campaign, perhaps unsurprisingly. Most often, Australians are solidly focused on domestic issues when they vote. The “teals” have been a special feature of this campaign. But are they a new version of other breakaways, like the Australian Democrats of old? The rise of voter disillusionment is a feature of recent elections, as is the detachme

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass the Coalition’s “super” housing pitch, five seats to eyeball on Saturday night, and what would happen if the parliamentary numbers were “hung”.

Danielle Wood is the CEO of the Grattan Institute, an independent think tank, Its purpose is to research and advocate policies to improve Australians’ lives. Wood laments the dearth of policy debate in this election. “There was a lot of optimism when we were coming out of COVID that this might be a period of genuine policy reform. It certainly was a period that laid bare a lot of challenges. We saw trust in government go up and there was a lot of talk of building back better in the sense that government might do some of those big things. But clearly, that’s not the election we’re in right now,” she says. “We are now in a world where we’ve come out of COVID with government much bigger than what we went in. So we’ve baked in this higher spending on aged care, higher spending on defence, a higher spending on the NDIS.   "In fact, size of governments increase about 2% of GDP, which is pretty extraordinary. Yet we’ve had no conversation about how we pay for that.” Climate change is to the fore in the minds o

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass how the interest rate rise has played against the government, Scott Morrison defending Katherine Deves (again), the major parties’ keeping the climate change issue low key, “gotcha” questions, and the coming Liberal launch.

In the Wentworth Project, sponsored by the University of Canberra’s Centre for Change Governance and The Conversation, we are tapping into voters’ opinions in this seat, which appears to be on a knife edge. In this podcast we talk with the two main candidates, Liberal incumbent Dave Sharma and “teal” independent Allegra Spender, as well as with Kerryn Phelps, the former independent member in the seat, who has mentored Spender and is on the advisory council of Climate 200, which is donating to her campaign. Sharma says “Kerryn Phelps was a genuine independent candidate or a more traditional independent candidate. […] This independent candidate is really sort of a franchise or party operation.” Sharma casts the teals, who are challenging Liberals in a range of city seats, as reflecting “populism as a political force”. “People think populism only belongs to the right because of Donald Trump. I think the independents are basically harnessing a populist mood, which is similar to what Donald Trump did, which is ‘a

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass the Reserve Bank’s increase in interest rates, and which side wins or loses from it, as cost of living is centre stage in the election battle. They also discuss Anthony Albanese’s launch, and the implications for the Liberals if Josh Frydenberg were to lose in Kooyong.

After Wednesday’s larger-than-expected inflation number, all attention has turned to the Reserve Bank’s meeting on Tuesday. If the bank moves next week, it will be the first time there’s been a rise in a campaign since 2007, the election John Howard lost. Pointing to recent rate rises overseas, independent economist Saul Eslake says: “If the Reserve Bank were to do nothing in the face of this much sharper-than-expected acceleration in inflation, it would be leaving itself open to a charge of acting in a political way, which would undermine its credibility for an extended period. "So I think the Reserve Bank really has to raise interest rates at its meeting next week.” If it doesn’t, Governor Philip Lowe would require “a very persuasive explanation”. If the bank didn’t act next week, it could subsequently have to make a 75 basis points rise in one hit, “which would be a considerable shock to the mortgage-paying population in particular, but I think for small businesses and a whole lot of other participants in

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass the latest (static) polls, apparently unaffected by Anthony Albanese’s COVID absence, or indeed by much else in the campaign so far. They also discuss shock jock Ray Hadley’s extraordinary shouty assault on Albanese, how the very serious issue of the Solomons-China security pact is playing into the campaign, and whether controversial Liberal candidate Katherine Deves is really all about seats other than Warringah, the one she is contesting.

Andrew Wilkie, MP for the Tasmanian seat of Clark, has “lived” a hung parliament. In 2010, Wilkie did a formal “deal” to support Julia Gillard. When later she didn’t deliver on his key issue of gambling reform, he broke it off. In this podcast Wilkie explains how he would approach the situation if the election produces no clear winner. No deals. But maybe a letter on giving confidence and supply. He suggests independent candidates – who are being assailed with questions about which side they would support in a hung parliament – should contact him for a chat about how to approach that situation, and the role of crossbenchers generally. “If they give me a call and ask what I think, I’ll tell them how I’ve navigated my way through the last 12 years and what my community has thought of it,” he says.   “I’ve explained how I’m going to approach things, and it’s always been well received by my community. In fact, my primary vote and two-party preferred has increased in every election. So whatever formulation I

In this episode, Michelle Grattan speaks with Joe Hockey about his newly-released memoir titled Diplomatic.  Hockey, treasurer in the Abbott government and former Australian ambassador to the United States, picked early that Donald Trump had a good prospect of becoming president and reached out to his team, something that went down badly at the time with the foreign affairs bureaucracy back in Canberra.   But Hockey says: "Diplomacy is just about human relations. It's countries dealing on the same basis with each other as human beings. So you're never going to get on well with someone you don't know. You're actually going to have to engage." Of Trump's successor, Hockey says: "I think Joe Biden has aged quite a bit in the presidency.  He's only been president for just over a year.  He's really shown he hasn't had the energy that you would expect of someone as president of the United States." Also, "he's run a very left wing agenda, and that's completely stunned – completely stunned – middle America, because t

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn canvass the fallout from Anthony Albanese’s lapse when asked to nominate the unemployment level and the cash rate. Meanwhile Scott Morrison, with poor popularity, has drawn on voters’ experience with their dentist: it doesn’t matter whether you like them – it’s about their competence. They also discuss the strange story of Alan Tudge, who remains in cabinet and education minister, albeit without ministerial salary or duties, despite Morrison earlier saying “he is not seeking to return to the frontbench, and I support his decision”. Finally, they canvass whether this election will ever turn to actual policy issues.

The tax offset for low and middle income earners (LMITO) will not be extended beyond this financial year, so does this amount to a tax increase for these people? Treasurer Josh Frydenberg tells the podcast the offset was a “temporary measure” that was extended as fiscal stimulus, due to the pressures on the budget from COVID. It’s being removed “now that the economy is normalising”. With unemployment set to fall below 4%, Frydenberg also says “what we think is going to happen is upward pressure on wages”. Annual wage growth is at 2.3% but Frydenberg says there’s a “broader indicator of earnings across the economy [Average Earnings in the National Accounts (AENA)] which has been higher than where the wage price index is. It’s expected to get to 5% this year, which is above where inflation is at. That’s a broader earnings indicator, which takes into account bonuses, promotions, people moving jobs and the like.”   The treasurer, who holds the Victorian seat of Kooyong, is one of the Liberal members being targete

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation politics team. In this podcast, Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn talk about treasurer Josh Frydenberg's 'big spend' budget, Anthony Albanese's coming budget reply speech, a Liberal senator's scathing review of Scott Morrison, and what the parties' key issues will be at the election that's about to be called.

The opposition is criticising the government’s “giveaway” budget but, predictably, with the election close, is not opposing its cost of living package, which includes a temporary cut in full excise and billions of dollars for low and middle income taxpayers, pensioners and welfare recipients. Jim Chalmers is shadow treasurer, and he tells this podcast, “It’s a vote seeker budget in the sense that it’s got a shelf life of six or seven weeks. "The government is temperamentally incapable of seeing beyond the election, and that’s the difference [with Labor]. I think there was a real appetite in the community for something that said, ‘we’ve been through a lot together. And what does the future look like?’” Chalmers argues voters will “see through it in the same way they see through the prime minister”.   Like the Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, Chalmers rules out extending the petrol excise cut beyond its September expiry date. “I’ve said, to be upfront to the Australian people, it’s difficult to see a government

As the devastating war in Ukraine continues, Michelle Grattan speaks with ABC journalist Sarah Ferguson about her experiences in reporting her Four Corners episode Despair and Defiance – how she was able to capture this story – and her views on where the conflict is likely to go from now. Sarah and her team presented a raw portrayal of the conflict and its human toll in Kyiv and elsewhere. “[In reporting] so much of these things comes down to simple practicalities. Can you get food? Can you get a driver? Can you get out? And once we’d got all of those things in place, we were good to go.” Ukranian officialdom knows how vital it is to get its story to the world. Ukranian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy “has understood the importance of telling people the story of what’s happening.”   “The Russians actually shelled people during the evacuations and fired on people. […] The Russians aren’t observing the sort of conventions of war where civilians are able to be evacuated. So getting them out and witnessing th