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Benita Kolovos
Jewish Community Forum wraps up in Melbourne
All eyes are now on the treasurer’s debate but we’ve just wrapped up at the Jewish community forum at Temple Beth Israel in St Kilda.
Benson Saulo ended his closing statement with a vow to stand with the Jewish community in Macnamara:
I’m really proud to be able to stand here and to put my hand up and say that I will stand with the Jewish community here. I will stand with Israel and I will stand as a strong representative for Macnamara in parliament … you know that you have a friend in me. You have a strong advocate in me, and I continue to fight for and address the issues that we are seeing right across our communities and around cost of living, around privacy and anti semitism.
Josh Burns said with a Labor win likely, it’s important to have an advocate for the community “inside the room”.
We are heading towards being re-elected in this country, and I think that the Coalition are slipping right now as they have not outlined a vision for our country. And I think that the interests of the Jewish community needs to be served by people inside the room, someone who is existential for and someone who cannot turn away from this community. Now I love this community. I grew up here. I went to Mount Scopus. I played basketball for Maccabi. Now I am every time I’m in the newspaper, it says, Josh Burns, who is Jewish.
To this, the same man from earlier interjects, describing Burns’ comments as “useless bullshit”. He was promptly ejected.
After a vote of thanks from Daniel Aghion from ECAJ, just as the event was wrapping up, another man yelled out:
Josh you are a friend of Israel but your Labor mates are not.
But there’s been some heated moments, both Burns and Saulo have been highly complimentary of each other and most of the crowd has been respectful, following repeated warnings from moderators and the local rabbi.
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Chalmers says Taylor ‘evasive’ on cuts because he is going to election with three policies
Jim Chalmers was asked if he would reverse the $20bn to forgive student debt to save money – but he ruled this out:
It’s a very important investment, and we’re proud of it, and we will do it if we win the election in a few weeks.
He turned the spotlight back on Angus Taylor and said the reason he was “so evasive when you asked him to come clean on his cuts” is because he is going to the election with just three policies:
First of all, to increase income taxes on every Australian taxpayer. Second of all, lower wages. And, thirdly, secret cuts to pay for nuclear reactors. And you can’t find $600bn to pay for those nuclear reactors without coming after Medicare, just like Peter Dutton did when he was the health minister.
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Updated at 05.51 EDT
Angus Taylor is asked: how do you manage an economic downturn when a government has got to cut?
He responds that you need to “give the private sector the confidence to grow”.
The host says that he is “talking about a possible downturn, [and] there’s no growth in the downturn”.
Taylor replies:
Well, you know, if you get business investing, you can avoid a downturn … We’ve said grow the economy faster than spending. We’ve also said there’s $100bn of spending that Labor has committed to, Jim’s committed to, that we think is unnecessary at this time.
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Updated at 05.51 EDT
Shadow treasurer argues Chalmers overseeing ‘a lost decade’
Angus Taylor is back up, and has argued that “GDP per capita has gone backwards for 21 months in a row under your so-called stewardship, Jim [Chalmers]”.
There was a bit of back-and-forth as he spoke, with the shadow treasurer saying:
There is no plan. This is incredibly important. Your plan that you put out in your own budget doesn’t have our standard of living going back to where it was when you came into government until 2030 or beyond … This is a lost decade that you’re overseeing, Jim, a lost decade.
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Updated at 05.50 EDT
Chalmers says budget in ‘much better state’ than three years ago
Jim Chalmers said he expects the Australian economy to continue to grow, when asked about the state of the budget.
He argued it was in a “much better state” than it was three years ago, and continued:
The average unemployment rate under this Albanese government is the lowest of any government in 50 [years] … It means that we go into this uncertainty around the world from a position of strength, and what we’ve been able to do, which is unusual in the world, is get inflation much lower than what we inherited from Angus.
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Updated at 05.45 EDT
Taylor defends Coalition history of dealing with Trump
Responding, Angus Taylor said he’d seen “the first piece of nonsense from Jim tonight”, and defended the Coalition’s history of dealing with Trump and the US.
When we were last in government, of course, we did take on the Trump administration, and we avoided tariffs. As a result, Jim went over to the US not long ago, got the photo opportunity, but he didn’t come back here with what we needed, which is free access to the US market.
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Chalmers labels Coalition ‘Doge-y sycophants’ over response to US tariffs
The treasurers were played part of this exchange from US senators over the tariffs placed on Australia:
Trump trade chief says US ‘running up the score’ on Australia as senator slams tariff – video
Jim Chalmers responded first, saying he had met with Senator Mark Warner in the past and appreciates his support.
A lot of the sentiments that he expressed in that clip are points that the prime minister has made himself.
The treasurer pointed to the need to make the economy “more resilient [and] our markets more diverse”.
Here, I think we’ve got the first contrast of the debate tonight … because we’ve got a prime minister standing up for and speaking up for Australia, and we’ve got an opposition leader and an opposition which is absolutely full of these kind of Doge-y sycophants who have hitched their wagon to American-style slogans and policies, and especially cuts which would make Australians are worse off.
And now they wonder why nobody believes them when they desperately try to pretend to unhitch their wagon from some of the policies and cuts that we’ve seen in the US.
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Updated at 05.43 EDT
Taylor gives opening remarks: ‘Who do you trust to manage the economy?’
Angus Taylor also began by saying we are living in “tumultuous times” – and argued Australians are worse off now than they were three years ago.
The choice of this election is, who do you trust to manage the economy? … Labor promised the world. They promised lower electricity prices. They promised lower mortgage costs. They’ve promised a lower cost of living and easier lives. The reality has been different.
He argued the Coalition would “fix our housing and energy markets, [and] provide immediate relief at the bowser as we fix our budget”.
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Updated at 05.39 EDT
Chalmers gives opening remarks: Australia ‘in good stead in uncertain times’
Jim Chalmers begins his opening remarks by noting these are “uncertain times in the world”, but that Australia is well placed thanks to Labor’s economic plan and “the progress that we have made together as Australians.”
When this government came to office, inflation was much higher and rising. Real wages and living standards were falling sharply, and we were already on track for more than $1tn of debt.
And since then, inflation has come down considerably, our real wages and incomes and living standards are starting to grow again, unemployment is low … we’ve got the debt down and growth is rebounding solidly in our economy as well.
So all of this puts us in good stead in uncertain times, but we know that there’s much more work to do.
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Updated at 05.39 EDT
Treasurers’ debate begins
The treasurers’ debate is now beginning in Sydney on Sky News, with Jim Chalmers and Angus Taylor standing opposite one another behind two podiums.
The host, Sky News’s business editor, Ross Greenwood, noted this was the first debate between the two.
Jim Chalmers will give the first one-minute opening remarks, and there will be three key topics:
Jim Chalmers and Angus Taylor ahead of the first treasurers’ debate in Sydney. Photograph: Christian Gilles/AAPShare
Updated at 05.49 EDT
Benita Kolovos
More heckling at Jewish Community Forum
There’s more heckling when Josh Burns is asked about how he’s felt personally, as a “Jewish guy from Melbourne”, about the events of the last 18 months.
He said images he has seen of the events of 7 October will stay with him for the rest of his life, alongside the Adass Israel synagogue in Ripponlea, in his electorate, burnt down.
But I know that for every day I’ve been in this position to represent our community, I have used my voice. I’ve tried to get outcomes for our community that I’ve been inside the room trying to get things done.
To which a man in the crowd shouts, “Bullshit”.
Another says, “lies”.
But it’s worth noting, there’s more people who are unhappy at the outburst, who are also shouting at the men not to interrupt.
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Josh Burns says no funding allocated to Unrwa for 2024-25 because ‘standards have not yet been met’
Benita Kolovos
At the forum, a question on the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (Unrwa) has led to the most heckling from the crowd of Josh Burns. Someone in the crowd is unhappy there was $20m allocated in the 2023-24 budget to the aid agency.
Back in 2024, Australia was among more than a dozen donor countries to suspend funding to Unrwa in late January, after the Israeli government alleged that 12 Unrwa staff members were involved in the 7 October Hamas-led attacks on Israel. At the time, the foreign minister, Penny Wong, said the $20m was delivered prior to the accusations.
Burns began saying that after the revelations, the government came to an agreement with Unrwa that included security guarantees – but he was interrupted by a heckler. He replied:
Just wait, you might get the answer.
He then continued with his answer:
Because of the high standards that we have set, there is no funding that has been allocated for the 24-25 financial year as a result, because those standards have not yet been met.
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Updated at 05.24 EDT
Benita Kolovos
Liberal Macnamara candidate says Labor has ‘priorities around the wrong way’
Benson Saulo, however, said Labor has “priorities around the wrong way”.
To know that there’s still over 50 hostages being held in Gaza or somewhere, many of those lives already being lost, then to think that our foreign policy is to overturn a stance that we have around ensuring that Israel has the right to exist, has the right to defend itself, and has the right, as every nation does, to bring to justice those that seek to do harm against their own citizens …
Yes, we are a strong believer in a two-state solution. But how can you negotiate with bad actors? How can you come to the table in a willing and open negotiation when you know there’s 50 of your own citizens being held hostage with the terrorist agents, with a terrorist organisation that seeks the destruction, the eradication of Israel and Jewish people?
So right now, when we see the shifts in foreign policy, when we see the weak action here … what I say to that is Labor has priorities wrong and Labor does not have the best interest of the Jewish community [at heart].
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Updated at 05.15 EDT
Benita Kolovos
Burns calls on Macnamara community to ‘re-engage with the Labor party’
Circling back to the Jewish Community Forum in Melbourne: one of the moderators, Naomi Levin, said there are many in the room who feel “betrayed by the Labor government’s stance on Israel,” pointing to a “repeated commitment” by senior members of the party to recognise a Palestinian state, shifting its votes at the UN and an “inability of ministers to condemn antisemitism even after clear incidents of Jew hatred without also calling out Islamophobia at the same time”.
She asked Labor MP Josh Burns:
How do you justify this to those in our community who feel a sense of betrayal from the Labor government, which in the past, has always been a friend of Israel?
Burns responded that “everyone in this group” wants to see peace:
But as the prime minister said last week, until Hamas … is no longer governing the people of Gaza, we are not in a position to move forward on recognition.
Now, I understand that there have been some things that people have disagreed with, but there have also been things that those of us inside the Labor party who have tried to maintain a sensible and strong position, maintaining Israel’s right to exist and defend itself, ensuring that there is a constant voice for hostages to be released, ensuring that there is people inside the room continuously engaging with high levels of the Israeli government. I was on the first plane of Australian[s] … to Israel.
I’m not pretending it’s perfect, but I am saying to all of you that we can’t disengage from the Labor party. And we have to re-engage with the Labor party as a community, we can’t have it so that one side of politics is only for the community, and the community is only for one side of politics, it will end up very, very badly. As long as I’m in there, I will carry that and do what I can on behalf of our community.
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Updated at 05.14 EDT
Testing under way on powdered substance delivered to shadow minister’s office
Tony Pasin, the shadow roads minister, said a staff member at his Mount Gambier office opened an envelope containing a powdered substance earlier today.
In a statement, Pasin said the “appropriate authorities were advised and attended the office,” and the substance was undergoing testing.
I take the health and safety of my team very seriously and I am grateful that initial assessments indicate no-one has suffered any harmful effects.
I thank the first responders who acted quickly with diligence and professionalism.
Tony Pasin. Photograph: Mike Bowers/The GuardianShare
Updated at 05.10 EDT
Chalmers shares post ahead of tonight’s debate
Jim Chalmers says he is grateful for the opportunity to “join my counterpart for a wide ranging debate on the economy tonight”.
In a post to X earlier this afternoon, the treasurer said:
This election is a choice between Labor helping with the cost of living and making our economy stronger and more resilient in uncertain times – or Peter Dutton’s plans for lower wages, higher taxes and secret cuts to pay for nuclear reactors, which will make Australians worse off. Tune in to Sky at 7.30pm
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Updated at 05.08 EDT
Treasurers’ debate to kick off in half an hour
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, and his Coalition counterpart, Angus Taylor, will go head to head in spruiking their economic visions for Australia in a debate this evening.
It follows a leaders’ debate between the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, last night, the first of two in the coming weeks.
Albanese won 44 votes out of 100 at the debate in western Sydney, Dutton won 35 and 21 people remained undecided.
Tonight, Sky News will host the debate between Chalmers and Taylor, kicking off at 7.30pm AEST – in about half an hour.
It will be hosted by Sky News’s business editor, Ross Greenwood, and the pair will discuss a variety of topics including the cost-of-living crisis, tariffs and debt.
You can read more about the debate, and other upcoming debates in this election campaign, below:
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Updated at 05.02 EDT
