Election 2022 live: PM pours beer and plays two-up after Anzac Day parade in Darwin – amid grim warnings we must prepare for war
The PM and Labor deputy shouted beers and played two-up after honouring the troops. But Anzac Day was shadowed by grim warnings that Australia should “prepare for war”.
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Labor deputy leader Richard Marles says Australia’s national security is at its “most complex point” since the Second World War, but lashed the Coalition for making Australians “less safe”.
It comes after Defence Minister Peter Dutton on Monday sounded the alarm that Australians should be prepared for war given the world’s increasingly uncertain political climate.
As Prime Minister Scott Morrison and the Labor deputy honoured the troops at Anzac Day ceremonies in Darwin – then engaged in the traditional chaser of beer and two-up (updates below) – both parties offered a dark assessment of the global political climate.
“We are at a moment in our history where our strategic circumstances are as complex as any point since the end of the Second World War, and we certainly need to prepare,” Mr Marles said in Darwin in response to Mr Dutton’s comments.
“But we have not seen the preparation under this government. Words are one thing. Actions are another.
“This is a government which beats its chest, but when it comes to actually delivering and doing what needs to be done, this is a government which repeatedly fails.”
Mr Marles said if a Chinese military base is to be established in the Pacific, “Australia at that moment is less safe”.
“The fact that we find ourselves asking these questions at this moment says everything about the failure of Scott Morrison in his managing of the relationships in the Pacific, and specifically ... the Solomon Islands,” he said.
He hit out at the government’s record, pointing to the scrapping of a French submarine contract in favour of nuclear-powered vessels – which are not expected to arrive until 2040.
Earlier on Monday, Mr Dutton was frank in his assessment of the global landscape.
“We have to be realistic that people like Hitler and others aren’t just a figment of our imagination or that they’re consigned to history,” he told the Nine Network.
“We have in President Putin at the moment, somebody who is willing to kill women and children. That’s happening in the year 2022. It’s a replay, in part, of what happened in the 1930s.”
As to the rise of China in the Pacific, Mr Dutton said “we have to stand up with countries to stare down any act of aggression to make sure we can keep peace in our region and for our country”.
The reality of the situation, Mr Dutton said, is that Australia must “prepare for war” in order to keep the peace and remain strong.
“Curling up in a ball, pretending nothing is happening, saying nothing, that is not … in our long-term interests and we should be very honest about that,” the Defence Minister said.
On the Solomons, Mr Dutton pushed back on claims Australia dropped the ball by not having advance knowledge of the Pacific nation’s security pact with China.
“It wasn’t not knowing. We had to work with our intelligence,” he said.
“It points to a disturbing development but it’s not our country that’s changed. You’re not hearing Solomon’s prime minister say he has any problem at all with Australia.
“The Chinese operate by very different rules and they do it here, they do it in Africa, they do it in other parts of the world.”
SALUTES, BEER AND TWO-UP
When in the Territory, do as the Territorians do. And that’s exactly what Scott Morrison and Richard Marles did after their Anzac Day dawn service and parade duties.
The Prime Minister pulled beers and won a game of two-up during a spirited Anzac Day visit to a Darwin RSL.
Mr Morrison was met with a warm welcome at Cazaly’s Palmerston Club, where he first made a $50 donation to buy three Anzac Day pins and a stubby holder.
Mr Morrison then took up a position behind the bar, pulling beers including Carlton Dry and Great Northern to the delight of punters.
“He’s not too bad at it!” one exclaimed.
While mingling with the crowd, Mr Morrison imparted pool advice to a young player and flipped the first game up two-up – which he won after three attempts.
Meanwhile, the deputy Labor leader shouted locals pints of Great Northern at the iconic Darwin Hotel.
“You’ve got to have a Great Northern when you’re up here,” said Afghanistan veteran Brent Potter. “And I wasn’t going to say no to his offer.”
Mr Potter, who has lived in Darwin since being deployed, said he enjoyed a chat with Mr Marles during his quick visit to the pub.
He said the Labor deputy leader appeared genuinely interested in his story and “that’s what Anzac Day is all about”.
“He’s a pretty personable guy. He’s probably a true reflection of what I’ve seen on TV,” Mr Potter said. “They’re all in campaign mode but he was pretty genuine. He wasn’t talking to me like I was a voter.”
LEADERS AT DARWIN DAWN SERVICE
Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Labor frontbenchers have paid their respects at a moving Anzac Day dawn service along the Darwin waterfront on Monday morning.
At least 9000 people were expected to fill the park in front of the cenotaph, 107 years after the arrival on Gallipoli beach.
Deputy Labor leader Richard Marles and frontbencher Terri Butler joined Solomon MP Luke Gosling and Senator Malarndirri McCarthy to represent Anthony Albanese, who remains in isolation with Covid-19.
Both Mr Morrison and Mr Marles put politics to bed for the morning, taking turns to address the Anzac legacy and the lasting impact it has had on Australia.
Mr Morrison addressed the thousands who gathered to honour the fallen, and spoke about the dangers of war still troubling the world.
He said it was important to learn from the past as he made reference to the ongoing war in Ukraine and the “troubling” situation plaguing the region with China’s control.
“As (the late) Clive James said on Anzac Day a long time ago, the memory of past sacrifice ... (is important) precisely because we’ve got the world our parents dreamed of, and I would say fought for,” Mr Morrison said.
On Anzac Day, we think of those first Anzacs, huddled in their landing boats more than a century ago, wondering what the dawn would bring.
— Anthony Albanese (@AlboMP) April 24, 2022
We gather in the dark of the early morning because they did.
We remember that because of them, we await a brighter dawn. pic.twitter.com/510lz0hVLX
“But our world is changing. War does strike Europe. Coercion troubles our region once more. An arc of autocracy is challenging the rules based order our grandparents had secured.”
Mr Morrison used his address to pay his respect to Sydney Kinsmen – a WWII veteran he met in Alice Springs on Sunday who told the Prime Minister Anzac Day “is a day you don’t forget”.
Mr Marles echoed the Prime Minister’s sentiment, asking those gathered to keep Ukrainians in their thoughts and prayers.
Mr Marles paid particular mention to the city of Darwin, where “war first met Australia 80 years ago”.
“Around us more than 230 people died in the bombing of Darwin,” he said.
“And right behind me, is the final resting place for 80 Americans. We are deeply grateful,” he said.
Mr Marles also referenced Australia’s link to the Pacific, evoking John Curtin’s tenure and how he “located” Australia’s national interest in the pacific and “devoted our national energy and our national resource”.
Mr Morrison was swamped by crowds following Darwin’s dawn service.
The Prime Minister posed for photographs and shook hands with veterans.
Hundreds of people surrounded Mr Morrison to thank him for being there, while a small number of the crowd questioned why he was in Darwin.
After the dawn service, Mr Morrison stopped to talk to Darwin’s oldest veteran, Colin Heard.
In his first Anzac service without his wife, who passed away a few weeks ago, the former fighter pilot – who turns 98 next month – was joined by his son, grandson, and great grandson.
Son Sam said while his dad still walked three kilometres a day, he was honoured to have pride of place in leading Darwin’s Anzac Day parade in a vehicle.
“Mum would have been very proud,” Sam said of his dad.
Great grandson Ash, 11, said Anzac Day was a special day “to thank those who’ve fought for Australia”.
The city’s Hotel Darwin was packed at 5am, with people having a pre-service pint as the city swelters through a 29C early morning.
Anzac Day commemorations have been disrupted for the last two years by the pandemic, so the return of large crowds at the dawn service is the first since 2019.
PM DEFENDS FOREIGN AID CUTS
Foreign aid cuts to the Pacific cannot be blamed for the controversial security pact signed between Solomon Islands and China, Mr Morrison claims.
Sandbagging Labor attacks over the deal for a fifth consecutive day, Mr Morrison said Lowy Institute analysis showing Australian aid to the Solomons dropped 43 per cent in the decade after 2009 was not a swaying factor.
The PM, who shifted his election campaign to the Northern Territory on Sunday – almost colliding with Labor’s shadow ministers Penny Wong and Mark Butler on the hustings in Alice Springs – would not be drawn on when he last spoke with Solomon Islands counterpart Manasseh Sogavare.
“(Mr Sogavare) was very clear in his latest communication with me, not that long ago, that he has no intention of putting a naval base on the Solomon Islands,” he said.
“The correspondence that I’ve had with (prime minister) has always been deeply grateful … for the extensive economic and law and order support we have provided.
“We have always upped our investment across the Pacific.”
Mr Morrison did not receive the warmest of welcomes in the Top End, intercepted by Greens protesters voicing discontent over environmental issues.
The same group, demanding an end to fracking, targeted Senator Wong and Mr Butler, who were standing in for leader Anthony Albanese, who is part-way through his Covid-19 isolation period.
But it was foreign policy which pulled focus for both parties, with Senator Wong grilled on why Labor has not yet outlined an alternative plan on the issue.
She said voters should “anticipate” they will see “more resources and more energy from a Labor government”, as China was “much more aggressive”.
“And so the question is, how does Australia respond? What we’ve got to do is secure our region,” she said.
“So I can tell you what we wouldn’t have done, we wouldn’t have cut foreign aid and development assistance, which is important to … national security, by almost $12bn which is what the Coalition has done.
“We wouldn’t have mocked Pacific Island nations about water lapping at their doors.”
Mr Morrison was seething over a new advertisement attacking Chisholm Liberal MP Gladys Liu, which claims she spread fake news on Chinese messaging apps, had to give back $300,000 because the donors were deemed a national security risk and used misleading signs in the colour of the Australian Electoral Commission.
“It’s a desperate ploy by the Labor Party, who has been caught out actually running their own policies and speeches past the Chinese government, before they’ll even talk to the Australian prime minister,” he said.
Mr Morrison maintained his support for biological sex campaigner Katherine Deves when asked about comments she made equating surrogacy with a human rights violation and a vanity project.
“The issue is fundamentally about women, women in sport,” he said, of the Warringah candidate’s statements.
Mr Morrison used his visit to Alice Springs to announce a $14m investment to address increasing rates of crime with improved CCTV and more community patrols.
He also visited 100-year-old local Rat of Tobruk Sydney Kinsman ahead of Anzac Day, and the Alice Springs Desert Park to announce $1m to support the ongoing conservation and management of bilbies in the NT.
DEVES CLAIMS SHE’S IN DANGER
The family of embattled candidate Katherine Deves has been forced out of Sydney after the Liberal hopeful received death threats for her past comments about transgender people.
Ms Deves, who opposes the inclusion of trans women in sport, broke her silence in an interview on Sunday evening in which she detailed the abuse she had received.
“I have had to have the police and the (Australian Federal Police) involved,” she said.
“My safety has been threatened. My family is away from Sydney because I don’t want them to witness what I’m going through and nor do I want their safety put at risk.”
Ms Deves, handpicked to run by the Prime Minister, has come under fire over a series of since deleted tweets, including one which she claimed trans teenagers were “surgically mutilated”.
Her social media footprint was deleted just days before she was announced as the Liberal candidate.
She said she participated in the interview in “a secret location” in order to correct the record, insisting she was not transphobic.
Labor deputy leader Richard Marles said it was “totally unacceptable” for any politician to endure death threats.
ROOFTOP SOLAR ‘JOBS BOOM’
Australia could create more than 60,000 construction jobs by replacing the energy produced by a single coal-fired power station with rooftop solar, a new report has found.
The nation’s biggest coal-fired power station, Eraring, is scheduled to close in just three years’ time and debate is raging about how best to replace the 2880 megawatts of electricity it produces.
Analysis by the Australian Conservation Foundation has found that producing the same amount of power with rooftop solar would generate 63,562 construction jobs.
This compares with 14,415 jobs from building the equivalent solar farms, 13,339 jobs from wind, 8576 from coal fired plants and 1566 from gas fired plants.
The analysis also found that replacing the power from Queensland’s biggest power station,
the six turbine coal-fired Gladstone Power Station, would provide 30,898 jobs if done with rooftop solar, 7007 if using solar farms and 6484 with wind.
This compares with 4169 construction jobs for a new coal plant and just 761 for gas.
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Originally published as Election 2022 live: PM pours beer and plays two-up after Anzac Day parade in Darwin – amid grim warnings we must prepare for war
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