As it happened: Dutton hints at ABC cuts, speaks on crime in Victoria as PM ignites wages fight; Trump tariffs set to begin

Thanks for reading our rolling federal election blog. This is where we’ll end today’s coverage.

To conclude, here’s a look back at the day’s major stories:

• Anthony Albanese – campaigning in Victoria and Tasmania – refused to rule out taking action against the US at the WTO if Australia is hit with tariffs on Trump’s so-called Liberation Day tomorrow morning (AEDT).
• The ABC’s funding will come under scrutiny if the Coalition wins office after Peter Dutton – campaigning in Melbourne – demanded the broadcaster demonstrate “excellence” to show taxpayers it deserves its annual funding of more than $1 billion.
• The shadow treasurer used a National Press Club address to outline Coalition plans to repair the federal budget via faster economic growth while effectively ruling out wide-ranging tax reform.
• Labor ignited a political fight over wages by using a submission to the Fair Work Commission today to call for a real increase in pay for 2.6 million workers.

Our live coverage will resume before 7am tomorrow AEDT.

Thanks for your company. Have a good night.

The Greens will demand that the party hoping to form the next federal government spend billions to “restore nature”, if the election ends with a hung parliament.

Under a policy announced on Wednesday as party leader Adam Bandt campaigned in Adelaide, the Greens want at least 1 per cent of the federal budget to be used to protect Australia’s environment, prevent extinction and arrest biodiversity decline.

Greens leader Adam Bandt.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

This equates to about $8 billion in 2025-26, against total expenditure in the budget of more than $785 billion.

As a rising number of voters turn away from the two major parties, the May 3 poll could end with neither winning the majority of seats needed to govern in their own right, possibly giving the Greens the balance of power alongside a slew of independents.

AAP

The Liberals have released a new TV ad that says Labor’s claim the Coalition would cut health funding is disinformation.

The advertisement cites Australian government hospital funding figures to suggest the Liberals gave hospitals dramatically more money when they were last in office compared with Labor. Plus, it points to higher bulk-billing rates in 2021-22 as evidence they will look after Medicare.

But these figures are slightly misleading themselves.

First, the Morrison government gave hospital funding a boost primarily to combat COVID-19, and the Liberal ad compares that extraordinary pandemic figure with funding under the Gillard government more than a decade ago, when Australia had a smaller population to care for. It isn’t adjusted for inflation either.

Second, the bulk-billing rate figure ignores the multi-year Medicare rebate freeze that largely happened under the Coalition, which meant the bonus for bulk-billing did not keep up with inflation that soared as the world emerged from the pandemic, causing the rate of free doctor visits to fall sharply early in Labor’s term.

With Natassia Chrysanthos

An attempt to extend the scope of a controversial High Court ruling on immigration detention has failed in the same court, drawing ire from refugee advocates.

Two asylum seekers – one from Poland and one from Vietnam – sought damages after claiming it was illegal for immigration authorities to detain them while their applications for protection visas were being processed. Both men were taken into detention after they served prison sentences for drug offences committed in Australia.

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal found their criminal activities exposed them to risk of significant harm – such as the death penalty in Vietnam – if they were to be deported to their home countries.

The pair maintained the tribunal’s decision meant they could not be removed from Australia, which meant their subsequent detention was unconstitutional.

They relied on the 2023 landmark decision in the NZYQ case, which found indefinite immigration detention was illegal if there is no reasonable prospect of the person’s removal from Australia in the foreseeable future. The fallout from that case has caused headaches for the Albanese government.

However, the High Court today determined the ruling did not apply if the detention of an illegal non-citizen is limited to what is necessary for visa processing or deportation purposes.

AAP with Lachlan Abbott

The PM and Peter Dutton are on a whistle-stop tour of the nation, promising money for everything from a rural Queensland museum of Chinese Australians to $10 million to put traffic lights at an intersection in Melbourne.

It can be hard keeping on top of where the major party leaders are, so we’ve been keeping a close eye on them for you (and will do so every day before the election on May 3).

Over the next few weeks, we’ll also be keeping a tab on how much Albanese and Dutton are spending in each electorate, as well as bigger national promises.

On the map below, electorates shaded in blue are ones to which the Coalition have committed money, while the areas shaded in red are the ones where Labor has pledged money. Those shaded in purple are electorates where both Labor and the Coalition have dropped comparable amounts of cash.

Read more about the campaign so far here.

Some breaking news from the hot-seat of Kooyong this afternoon.

Liberal candidate Amelia Hamer has withdrawn from a scheduled candidates’ forum tonight at Hawthorn Arts Centre, where she was to speak alongside independent MP Monique Ryan.

Liberal candidate Amelia Hamer pulled out of tonight’s Kooyong candidates forum at midday today.Credit: Justin McManus

An email seen by The Age, sent by Hamer to the event organisers, Lighter Footprints – a local climate action group – stated that she could no longer attend because she had been asked at short notice to attend an event with shadow treasurer Angus Taylor.

Political observers may recall then-Liberal MP for Kooyong Josh Frydenberg declined to attend a Lighter Footprints candidates’ forum during the 2022 election campaign, dismissing it as akin to one of Ryan’s political rallies.

Unlike Frydenberg, however, Hamer had initially confirmed her attendance as she tries to wrest back the former blue-ribbon seat from the teal movement.

Read more about the ground game in Victoria here.

Peter Dutton has again attacked the Victorian premier for crime in the state, pledging to do more federally to enforce law and order if he wins office.

Speaking on Melbourne radio station 3AW earlier this afternoon, the opposition leader said there needed to be more independence in choosing Victoria’s chief commissioner after Shane Patton was ousted and acting top cop Rick Nugent today revealed he wouldn’t apply for the permanent job.

“I think it says a lot of the dysfunction right at the heart of the [state] government,” Dutton said.

“I think the police force will probably feel as much frustration with this government as the public is feeling at the moment. They just don’t seem to be able to manage the basics. They try and politicise things.”

Regarding tackling crime, he later added: “At a federal level, frankly, I think the prime minister can be doing a lot more than what he has been doing over the last few years.”

The treasurer has sidestepped questions on whether the government would take the US to the World Trade Organisation if the White House hits Australia with tariffs.

Chalmers also told the ABC moments ago it was unlikely that Australia would consider retaliatory tariffs.

Jim Chalmers during a press conference in Canberra on March 27.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“I don’t want to preempt the prime minister’s response .. except to say ... our focus will lie on resilience and diversification,” said Chalmers.

“We’ve said on earlier occasions that we believe in going for resilience rather than retaliation.”

Peter Dutton is taking his political cues from the United States, says Treasurer Jim Chalmers.

Chalmers spoke to the ABC’s Afternoon Briefing from Longreach where he is with Emergency Services Minister Jenny McAllister and Senator Anthony Chisholm to visit flood-hit communities in outback Queensland.

He accused Dutton of proposing cuts to healthcare and education that would leave Australia worse off.

“All of these policies are more or less straight from the DOGE playbook,” Chalmers said.

Peter Dutton is staying true to his brand as the hard man of Australian politics by telling voters he wants to make the ABC more efficient, stop the “woke” agenda in schools and cut the education and health departments in Canberra.

This is red meat for the conservative base. But will it win him the election? The opposition leader has rammed his flag into a political hill that the Liberal faithful dearly want to own. But in the battle for power in 2025, it is the wrong hill?

Anthony Albanese, meanwhile, has shown an occasional tetchiness that can undercut his attempt to present a positive agenda for the next three years. The prime minister also made a gaffe earlier this week when trying to rule out a deal with the Greens on forming government.

The difference between the two leaders is that some mistakes are quickly forgotten while others shape the campaign. Albanese has had some patchy moments in his press conferences, but he is positioned where he needs to be – and Dutton is exposed.

Read David Crowe’s full analysis here.