April 28, 2025 • 20 mins
With just four days until the federal election, we're putting your biggest concerns to candidates from across the political spectrum.
From cost of living and healthcare to climate action and domestic violence, hear how Labor, Liberal, The Greens and an Independent candidate plan to address the issues that matter most to you.
And in headlines today Hero police officer Inspector Amy Scott who ended the Bondi attackers rampage, will testify at the inquest today; A power outage has crippled Spain and Portugal with public transport shut down, flights grounded and traffic jammed; Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for three day ceasefire in Ukraine to mark the 80 year anniversary of WWII victory; The conclave to pick the new pope will begin on May 7 with some saying this will take longer than in previous years; The elderly men accused of robbing Kim Kardashian in Paris, stealing her engagement ring in 2016, have gone to trial.
Want more on the election? Listen to these:
Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister: The Interview
Peter Dutton: The Interview
The 2025 Budget For Basic B*tches
First Home Buyer Policies Explained & What's Really Deciding Women's Votes
Politicians Try To Go Viral
Three Weeks That Could Change Australia
Why Gen Z Could Decide This Election
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CREDITS
Hosts: Taylah Strano & Claire Murphy
Guests:
Elizabeth Watson-Brown, Greens Member for Ryan
The Hon. Katy Gallagher, Minister for Finance, Women, Public Service & Government Services
Ro Knox, Liberal candidate for Wentworth
Kate Hullett, Independent candidate for Fremantle
Executive Producer: Taylah Strano
Audio Producer: Lu Hill
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
You're listening to a Muma Mia podcast. Mumma Mea acknowledges
the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast
is recorded on.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Hey, I'm Taylor Strano. This is Mummama's twice daily news podcast,
The Quickie. With just four days until the federal election,
we're putting your biggest concerns to candidates from across the
political spectrum. Before we get there, here's Clemurphy with the
latest from the Quickie newsroom for Tuesday, April twenty nine.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Thanks Taylor, the hero police officer who prevented further casualties
in a mass stabbing at Bondi Junction Westfield, will testify
about what exactly went down as she approached the killer
that day. Inspector Amy Scott will give her testimony to
the inquest into the April twenty twenty four attack, which
saw a man armed with a thirty centimeter long knife
enter the Westfield and begin attacking strangers, killing six, mostly women,
(01:03):
and injuring ten others. She was the first police officer
to arrive on the scene, pursuing the forty year old
attacker and shooting him twice as he ran towards her
with the knife. Yesterday, the lead investigator into the attack
said he was in awe of how Inspector Scott had
handled the situation, including her having the awareness to tell
bystanders to get out of her line of fire before
(01:24):
discharging her weapon, saying she acted bravely and professionally. Spain, Portugal,
and parts of France have been hit by a widespread
power outage that has halted public transport, caused major traffic jams,
and delayed flights. The cause of the outage is not
yet known. Some say it's linked to recent extreme temperature variations,
while a cyber attack has not been ruled out. Hospitals
(01:47):
are also without power, and people remain trapped inside the
metro and in elevators as the power companies work to
restore their service. People have been told to stay home
and limit the use of the phone network while work
has been done to try and get both countries back
up and running. High rise buildings in the Spanish capital
were evacuated, while parents trying to reach their children's schools
(02:08):
on phone services dropped in and out. The outage also
impacted the Madrid Open tennis tournament, with Grigor Dimitrov and
Jacob firmly forced to suspend their match when the scoreboard
went dark and the cameras stopped working. Russian President Vladimir
Putin has declared a three day ceasefire in Ukraine next
month to mark the eightieth anniversary of the victory of
(02:28):
the Soviet Union and its allies in World War II.
According to the Kremlin, the seventy two hour ceasefire will
run from the start of May eighth to the end
of May ten, with Russia calling on Ukraine to join them.
President Putin declaring the full cessation of hostilities was on
humanitarian grounds. The ceasefire comes as US President Donald Trump
scaled up efforts to broker a peace deal in Ukraine,
(02:50):
meeting with Ukraine President Volodimir Zelenski on the sidelines of
the Pope's funeral on the weekend. Zelenski said he would
be ready to hold talks with Moscow once a ceasefire
deal has been broken. The conclave to start the process
of electing a new pope will begin on May seven.
The date was decided in a closed door meeting of
the Vatican on Monday Sistine Champel, where the one hundred
(03:11):
and thirty four eligible voting cardinals will retire to make
the decision is now closed to tourists as it's prepared for
the event. The past two conclaves have lasted just two days,
but this one is predicted to go for longer as
many of the cardinals appointed by Pope Frances come from
places that have never had them before, including Mian Ma,
Haiti and Rwanda, and have never met each other. The
(03:33):
men accused of robbing Kim Kardashian in her apartment in
Paris in twenty sixteen have gone to trial. The group
referred to as the Grandpa Robbers. The main suspects, who
are all aged in their late sixties and seventies, are
accused of tying up the reality TV star and demanding
she hand over her four million dollar US engagement ring
that have been given to her by her then fiancee,
(03:54):
Kanye West. Kardashian recalled the event during an interview in
twenty twenty, voicing her fears that after she was tied up,
she would be raped. DNA traces on the plastic bands
they used to secure Miss Kardashian led police to the thieves.
One of them, seventy year old Uni mis Abbas, has
admitted to his role in the crime. He's written a
book about it and spoke to a French TV channel
(04:15):
on the topic, saying this big job was supposed to
be the last and that the diamond, not Kardashian, was
the target. He'd spent twenty years working in a jail.
Lawyers for the man who's accused of being the group's ringleader,
sixty eight year old Omar eight Kadesh, who's been nicknamed
Omar the Old, said he'd written to Kardashian to apologize,
but that his letter had been intercepted by officials. One
(04:37):
of the accused has died while awaiting trial, and another
is too ill to face court. Except for some jewelry
that the thieves dropped on the street as they fled
on foot and bikes, most of it, including the engagement ring,
has never been recovered.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Thanks Clan. Next, we asked what you want from this election,
so here's how the candidates planned to deliver. Last month,
we asked Mamma, Mire, readers and listeners about what matters
most to you this election. The results were crystal clear.
We've co of Living emerging as the overwhelming concern, nominated
(05:12):
by sixty nine percent of you as a top five issue.
Healthcare and hospital funding came in second at sixty percent,
followed by climate action at forty five percent. Housing affordability
and action on domestic and family violence rounded out your
top five priorities and with eight and ten of you
telling us you're the primary decision makers in your households.
(05:33):
These are just survey results. There are a powerful message
to politicians. So what are the parties bringing to the
table to address your concerns? Well, we asked four candidates
from across the political spectrum. First up, the cost of living.
It's this big umbrella term covering everything from the price
of fuel to groceries. And it's also the thing you
(05:54):
might have heard the Prime Minister Anthony Alberansi and Opposition
Leader Peter Dutton talk about at length, particularly the cost
of owning your own home, especially if you're a first
home buyer. So what do our four candidates have to
offer up on easing the cost of living? This is
Liberal candidate for the New South Wales seat of Wentworth, Ronox.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
So there's a tax break of twelve hundred dollars which
is means tested and as a party, we've ensured that
we're not just giving out tax breaks, We're trying to
give it to the pieces that need it the most.
We've also cut the fuel excise, which means every tank
you fill up, you're going to say about fourteen dollars.
And then there's the more structural pieces that we'll be
(06:37):
working on, which is bringing down government wastage, ensuring that
we've got a cheaper energy because obviously energy goes right
across the supply chain. So we'll be building new homes
and all our incentives are around people buying new homes.
There's a mortgage relief up to six hundred and fifty thousand,
which is once again also means tested. There's also first
(06:59):
home owner guarantee. We've opened that up much more broadly.
We're also working with APRA to get hex help debt
taken off the liability for first home ownership because I
hear from a a lot of young people that their
hex help debt means that they can't buy their first home.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
And what about the Greens. Here's Green's member for Queensland's
Ryan electorate, Elizabeth Libby Watson Brown.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
We think that a public developer could build over six
hundred thousand affordable homes over.
Speaker 5 (07:24):
The next decade.
Speaker 4 (07:25):
To rent and to sell the low market prices, so
that helps the people who are trying to get their
first house, and it helps the renters who are really
again being absolutely hammered by the current system. We need
to make those adjustments to the taxation system which are
really critical in order to stabilize house prices so that
wages can catch up. We need to do those tax
(07:46):
system things, phasing out negative gearing and the capital games
tax discount for more than one investment property, and I
think that's incredibly sensible policy.
Speaker 5 (07:54):
We've also got this really what I think is a.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
Really brilliant idea, the homekeeper mortgage product, with a regulatory
ceiling of only one percent above the cash rate. We
need to cap those rent increases at two percent every
two years, and we need national authority to protect those renters' rights.
So we're calling for a national Renter's Protection Authority, And
what say.
Speaker 6 (08:17):
You, labor, It's not just a matter of sending money out,
which would be a problem in the inflationary environment we're in,
but looking at ways where it be, say energy bill relief,
investments in urgent care clinics, investments in early education and care.
Knocking off twenty percent of your hex debt. All of
those types of measures. We've had two decades when we
(08:37):
haven't had enough housing built and so we've been really
trying to look at ways where we can just increase
supply and that takes a little bit of time, but
not just for people who want to buy their home,
and that's really important, and so our five percent deposits
and our bill to sell to first home buyers is
part of that to make sure that particularly young people
get that opportunity to buy a home and pay off
(08:59):
their own mortgage rather than someone else's. But also what
we're doing in this social and affordable housing end and
for women who are leaving domestic violence situations to be
able to go into housing as well.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
That's Katie Gallaher. She's a Labor Senator and also the
Minister for Finance, Women, Public Service and Government Services. And
if none of the traditional parties are blowing your skirt up,
Independent candidate for the WA seat of Fremantle, Kate Hollard
had this.
Speaker 7 (09:25):
To say, you know, when it comes to housing, things
like negative gearing and Capital Gainstact, which are fundamentally impacting
the cost of homes. Again, the government is failing to
tackle those big issues. And I think it's fine to
pink around the edges, but it's not what real leadership means.
Rent is such a huge topic here in Fremantle. The
(09:46):
rent has gone up something like sixty five percent in
Freemantle in the last five years and that is outrageous.
You know, no one's wages have risen in the way
that rent has risen. It's pushing people out onto the streets,
into their cars, you know, staying at powers on couches.
This is the perfect time for the government to step
in and say we need to curtail these rental hikes,
(10:10):
you know, particularly now interest rates are coming down.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Moving on from kazilibs to domestic violence. Already this year
at least twenty women have been killed by men. It's
a serious issue and one that both the Prime Minister
and Opposition leader have remained relatively quiet on. But about
a third of you say action on DV and support
for those experiencing it is a top election concern.
Speaker 6 (10:32):
I see it, as Minister for Women, as one of
the biggest barriers to actually delivering gender equality in this country,
because if women aren't safe, then it impacts on every
other part of their life and so we see addressing
an ending violence against women and children as one of
our key priorities. It's a big handbrake on women getting
(10:53):
a fair cracked opportunity and it filters through every part
of our thinking, our economic policy, our social policy and
all of those budget decisions we've taken. And that's why
we've tried to invest so much into this area, over
eight billion dollars in total in the last three years,
and there's much more work to do.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
That's Labour's plan.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
What about the Liberals, We've seen a marked uptick in
domestic violence, which the police are attributing to cost of
living pressures.
Speaker 5 (11:23):
So it's a huge issue as you imagine it across Australia.
We've committed as.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
A party to ninety million dollars in funding. We have
a local organization called the Ikai Foundation which was defunded
under Labor. We're planning on ensuring that a Locaiah Foundation
is one of the first organizations to be funded by
this ninety million dollars sets.
Speaker 5 (11:46):
People decide for.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Domestic violence and the Greens.
Speaker 4 (11:49):
When it's absolutely horrendous that seven women have been killed
in this first week of campaigning, just to remind us
of absolute urgency of getting something sorted around here. We
want to fully fund the National Plan to End Violence
against Women and Children and increase funding to the level
that it needs to be because it's been star obviously
(12:10):
under the two old parties. We need to increase the
funding for frontline services and frontline support so they're the
absolutely critical things that it's absolutely about being on the frontline.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Meantime, Independent Kate Hollett has framed this issue in an
extremely serious light.
Speaker 8 (12:26):
We really need to look at domestic violence and family
violence as a effectively terrorism domestic terrorism because it is
terrorism and it's not being treated as such. And I
think that we can see that the piecemeal approach is
not working from a prevenation as well as a cure
kind of perspective. When we look at the bigger picture,
(12:49):
we need to address some of the root causes, which
includes poverty of course, and making sure people have got
enough money to survive, but as well, there is a
lot of training and teaching and learning that could be
done in school, I believe, and a lot of psychology
kind of techniques that would really help when young people
(13:11):
grow up to identify bad behavior either in themselves or
in other people, and I think that we don't really
touch on that at all, and I think that's a
huge area that we could focus on to address problems
in the future.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
Health has taken up a huge talking point this campaign,
which makes sense as sixty percent of you want to
see increased funding.
Speaker 4 (13:31):
Really important part of our platform is full dental and
mental health cover under Medicare.
Speaker 5 (13:36):
That's absolutely critical.
Speaker 4 (13:38):
We think that those mental health services should be free,
including subsidized access to accredited registered counselors and mental health nurses.
Everyone should be able to access that. And I understand
why it's more urgent these days because so many people
are under pressure more free gps.
Speaker 5 (13:55):
So what we're saying is we want to triple the.
Speaker 4 (13:58):
Bulk billion incentives and build a thousand free healthcare clinics
across Australia, not to mention a thirty billion dollar investment
in public hospitals over the next decade. In terms of
assisting women's health, reproductive health leave is really critical, improving
abortion access for everyone who needs it, and free period products.
(14:18):
And so there's sort of some granular stuff there about
kind of everyday needs, but also a meta kind of
idea of how we need to adjust the system.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
Thanks Libby. While independent policy is very candidate to candidate,
here's what Kate had to say.
Speaker 7 (14:32):
We want to be able to see a doctor for
cheaply and easily, and we want to be treated at
hospitals appropriately. Investment into women's health been lucking. We know
that lots of tests and scientific kind of outcomes have
been based on men's health rather than female health. I
think we're coming to realize that, but of course it's
(14:55):
not moving fast enough. Every step of the way. Women
feel penalized through the medical system. The scans, we need,
the blood tests, we need, the extra support hormonally that
we need. We need to make sure we've got enough doctors,
nurses and facilities that they are working in conditions which
enable them to do their jobs well and for patients
(15:18):
to be treated now.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Labor have already announced to a string of health initiatives,
including expanding Medicare's urgent care clinics and a seven hundred
and ninety million dollar package for women's health. But here's
what Katie Gallaher had to say on the matter.
Speaker 6 (15:31):
We've recognized, particularly women haven't got a fair deal when
it comes to help with the cost of being a woman,
whether it be contraception or menopause assistance, or conditions that
affect women like endometriosis or pelvic pain. All of those
areas have been undervalued and haven't been addressed. And we've
put a big package on the table, over seven hundred
(15:53):
million dollars to make sure that women are getting access
to the best pills contraceptive pills on the PBS and
the menopause treatment as well. Our investments in medicare to
make sure longer consultations, which are often women used, are
better funded so doctors can provide that and bult build
people for it. And cheaper medicines here. To get medicines
(16:13):
down to twenty five dollars if you're paying for a
script will make a real difference over time. But there's
more to do because again the medical system wasn't necessarily
built by women for women, and we think there's more
to work to do, but we've got a really good
package there.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Meantime, the Liberals have said they'll match labors women's health package,
but there's an extension to it too.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
We're obviously committed to ensuring that bulk billing is accessible
for people that's obviously dropped by over ten percent under
this government, and so we'll be investing in that. We're
obviously ensuring that there's another nine billion dollar investment into
Medicare two to help accessibility for health.
Speaker 5 (16:51):
We've heard a lot about.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Women's health in this election, and we've particularly heard around
funding for some gynecological cancers, for example, and that's something
that once we get into government, will also be looking at.
Is there a way of provisioning a fund for women
that look at women's cancers in particular external from breast cancer,
(17:14):
which is already quite well funded, and that's something that
we'll be looking at from the Future Fund and also
from different sources.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Finally, climate action. It was touched on briefly during one
of the leader's debates, but overall conversations around energy prices
and renewables the nuclear power have drowned out any real
debate on what, if any climate action needs to be
undertaken by the government. The Greens, of course see things differently.
Speaker 4 (17:39):
What's totally terrifying is what Dutton is proposing, which is
why we're really really fighting hard to keep Dutton out.
But again, people have been expressing real disappointment to me
about what the Labor government hasn't done, you know, what
they promised to do, and how absolutely poor they've been
on climate change, and of course we just can't have done.
You know, this crazy kind of nuclear fantasy that they're
(18:01):
pushing is so incredibly dangerous, you know, all at the
expensive renewable energy.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
The Liberals are holding firm on their promises.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
The Liberal Party is committed to net zero by twenty
fifty and Peter Dunton has already assured this Rain public
that he'll stay part of the Powers Accords agreement. I
think we've just got a different pathway to get there,
and we won't be running a renewables only strategy. We
think we should be using every single piece of technology
that's coming on board, including nuclear, which has obviously been
(18:31):
used across the world in all major economies.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Well, Labor are sticking to their renewables plan.
Speaker 6 (18:39):
We leieve in climate change and we want to take
continued action on climate change, and that's really shifting our
energy from fossil fuels into renewable energy, relying on that
in the grid underpinned by gas and hydro and batteries
to store that renewable energy and I think there's a
big contrast between what we want to do and the opposition,
who wants to build nuclear reactors and sort of abandon
(19:02):
a lot of the work that we've done into renewable energy.
But I think a lot of women get it. Solar panels, batteries,
electric vehicles, this is actually the way of the future
and we need to keep investing in.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
Those and independent Kate Hullett says Australia is primed for
a surge in renewables.
Speaker 7 (19:18):
We are young, and we are mineral rich. We have
sun like nowhere else. We've got wind, we've got ocean,
we've got water. If you were going to design the
perfect country to deal with some climate change issues, usually renewables,
Australia would be it. Yet we are crawling along, and
not only that, we are still opening coal mines, we
(19:40):
are still approving gas processing facilities.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
So was this helpful? At least twenty one percent of
you told us you're still yet to make up your
mind on who you're voting for this election. Did these
candidates convince you one way or another? Maybe you need
to hear from the Prime Minister and Opposition leader again.
If that's the case, you're in luck. In our show notes,
I've linked our extended conversations with both Anthony Albanesi and
Peter Dutton from our No Filter podcast. You can check
(20:05):
them out and maybe that'll help move the needle for you.
Thanks for taking some time to feed your mind with
us today. The Quikie is produced by Me, Taylor Strano,
and Claire Murphy, with audio production by Lou Hill
You're listening to a Muma Mia podcast. Mumma Mea acknowledges
the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast
is recorded on.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Hey, I'm Taylor Strano. This is Mummama's twice daily news podcast,
The Quickie. With just four days until the federal election,
we're putting your biggest concerns to candidates from across the
political spectrum. Before we get there, here's Clemurphy with the
latest from the Quickie newsroom for Tuesday, April twenty nine.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Thanks Taylor, the hero police officer who prevented further casualties
in a mass stabbing at Bondi Junction Westfield, will testify
about what exactly went down as she approached the killer
that day. Inspector Amy Scott will give her testimony to
the inquest into the April twenty twenty four attack, which
saw a man armed with a thirty centimeter long knife
enter the Westfield and begin attacking strangers, killing six, mostly women,
(01:03):
and injuring ten others. She was the first police officer
to arrive on the scene, pursuing the forty year old
attacker and shooting him twice as he ran towards her
with the knife. Yesterday, the lead investigator into the attack
said he was in awe of how Inspector Scott had
handled the situation, including her having the awareness to tell
bystanders to get out of her line of fire before
(01:24):
discharging her weapon, saying she acted bravely and professionally. Spain, Portugal,
and parts of France have been hit by a widespread
power outage that has halted public transport, caused major traffic jams,
and delayed flights. The cause of the outage is not
yet known. Some say it's linked to recent extreme temperature variations,
while a cyber attack has not been ruled out. Hospitals
(01:47):
are also without power, and people remain trapped inside the
metro and in elevators as the power companies work to
restore their service. People have been told to stay home
and limit the use of the phone network while work
has been done to try and get both countries back
up and running. High rise buildings in the Spanish capital
were evacuated, while parents trying to reach their children's schools
(02:08):
on phone services dropped in and out. The outage also
impacted the Madrid Open tennis tournament, with Grigor Dimitrov and
Jacob firmly forced to suspend their match when the scoreboard
went dark and the cameras stopped working. Russian President Vladimir
Putin has declared a three day ceasefire in Ukraine next
month to mark the eightieth anniversary of the victory of
(02:28):
the Soviet Union and its allies in World War II.
According to the Kremlin, the seventy two hour ceasefire will
run from the start of May eighth to the end
of May ten, with Russia calling on Ukraine to join them.
President Putin declaring the full cessation of hostilities was on
humanitarian grounds. The ceasefire comes as US President Donald Trump
scaled up efforts to broker a peace deal in Ukraine,
(02:50):
meeting with Ukraine President Volodimir Zelenski on the sidelines of
the Pope's funeral on the weekend. Zelenski said he would
be ready to hold talks with Moscow once a ceasefire
deal has been broken. The conclave to start the process
of electing a new pope will begin on May seven.
The date was decided in a closed door meeting of
the Vatican on Monday Sistine Champel, where the one hundred
(03:11):
and thirty four eligible voting cardinals will retire to make
the decision is now closed to tourists as it's prepared for
the event. The past two conclaves have lasted just two days,
but this one is predicted to go for longer as
many of the cardinals appointed by Pope Frances come from
places that have never had them before, including Mian Ma,
Haiti and Rwanda, and have never met each other. The
(03:33):
men accused of robbing Kim Kardashian in her apartment in
Paris in twenty sixteen have gone to trial. The group
referred to as the Grandpa Robbers. The main suspects, who
are all aged in their late sixties and seventies, are
accused of tying up the reality TV star and demanding
she hand over her four million dollar US engagement ring
that have been given to her by her then fiancee,
(03:54):
Kanye West. Kardashian recalled the event during an interview in
twenty twenty, voicing her fears that after she was tied up,
she would be raped. DNA traces on the plastic bands
they used to secure Miss Kardashian led police to the thieves.
One of them, seventy year old Uni mis Abbas, has
admitted to his role in the crime. He's written a
book about it and spoke to a French TV channel
(04:15):
on the topic, saying this big job was supposed to
be the last and that the diamond, not Kardashian, was
the target. He'd spent twenty years working in a jail.
Lawyers for the man who's accused of being the group's ringleader,
sixty eight year old Omar eight Kadesh, who's been nicknamed
Omar the Old, said he'd written to Kardashian to apologize,
but that his letter had been intercepted by officials. One
(04:37):
of the accused has died while awaiting trial, and another
is too ill to face court. Except for some jewelry
that the thieves dropped on the street as they fled
on foot and bikes, most of it, including the engagement ring,
has never been recovered.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Thanks Clan. Next, we asked what you want from this election,
so here's how the candidates planned to deliver. Last month,
we asked Mamma, Mire, readers and listeners about what matters
most to you this election. The results were crystal clear.
We've co of Living emerging as the overwhelming concern, nominated
(05:12):
by sixty nine percent of you as a top five issue.
Healthcare and hospital funding came in second at sixty percent,
followed by climate action at forty five percent. Housing affordability
and action on domestic and family violence rounded out your
top five priorities and with eight and ten of you
telling us you're the primary decision makers in your households.
(05:33):
These are just survey results. There are a powerful message
to politicians. So what are the parties bringing to the
table to address your concerns? Well, we asked four candidates
from across the political spectrum. First up, the cost of living.
It's this big umbrella term covering everything from the price
of fuel to groceries. And it's also the thing you
(05:54):
might have heard the Prime Minister Anthony Alberansi and Opposition
Leader Peter Dutton talk about at length, particularly the cost
of owning your own home, especially if you're a first
home buyer. So what do our four candidates have to
offer up on easing the cost of living? This is
Liberal candidate for the New South Wales seat of Wentworth, Ronox.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
So there's a tax break of twelve hundred dollars which
is means tested and as a party, we've ensured that
we're not just giving out tax breaks, We're trying to
give it to the pieces that need it the most.
We've also cut the fuel excise, which means every tank
you fill up, you're going to say about fourteen dollars.
And then there's the more structural pieces that we'll be
(06:37):
working on, which is bringing down government wastage, ensuring that
we've got a cheaper energy because obviously energy goes right
across the supply chain. So we'll be building new homes
and all our incentives are around people buying new homes.
There's a mortgage relief up to six hundred and fifty thousand,
which is once again also means tested. There's also first
(06:59):
home owner guarantee. We've opened that up much more broadly.
We're also working with APRA to get hex help debt
taken off the liability for first home ownership because I
hear from a a lot of young people that their
hex help debt means that they can't buy their first home.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
And what about the Greens. Here's Green's member for Queensland's
Ryan electorate, Elizabeth Libby Watson Brown.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
We think that a public developer could build over six
hundred thousand affordable homes over.
Speaker 5 (07:24):
The next decade.
Speaker 4 (07:25):
To rent and to sell the low market prices, so
that helps the people who are trying to get their
first house, and it helps the renters who are really
again being absolutely hammered by the current system. We need
to make those adjustments to the taxation system which are
really critical in order to stabilize house prices so that
wages can catch up. We need to do those tax
(07:46):
system things, phasing out negative gearing and the capital games
tax discount for more than one investment property, and I
think that's incredibly sensible policy.
Speaker 5 (07:54):
We've also got this really what I think is a.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
Really brilliant idea, the homekeeper mortgage product, with a regulatory
ceiling of only one percent above the cash rate. We
need to cap those rent increases at two percent every
two years, and we need national authority to protect those renters' rights.
So we're calling for a national Renter's Protection Authority, And
what say.
Speaker 6 (08:17):
You, labor, It's not just a matter of sending money out,
which would be a problem in the inflationary environment we're in,
but looking at ways where it be, say energy bill relief,
investments in urgent care clinics, investments in early education and care.
Knocking off twenty percent of your hex debt. All of
those types of measures. We've had two decades when we
(08:37):
haven't had enough housing built and so we've been really
trying to look at ways where we can just increase
supply and that takes a little bit of time, but
not just for people who want to buy their home,
and that's really important, and so our five percent deposits
and our bill to sell to first home buyers is
part of that to make sure that particularly young people
get that opportunity to buy a home and pay off
(08:59):
their own mortgage rather than someone else's. But also what
we're doing in this social and affordable housing end and
for women who are leaving domestic violence situations to be
able to go into housing as well.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
That's Katie Gallaher. She's a Labor Senator and also the
Minister for Finance, Women, Public Service and Government Services. And
if none of the traditional parties are blowing your skirt up,
Independent candidate for the WA seat of Fremantle, Kate Hollard
had this.
Speaker 7 (09:25):
To say, you know, when it comes to housing, things
like negative gearing and Capital Gainstact, which are fundamentally impacting
the cost of homes. Again, the government is failing to
tackle those big issues. And I think it's fine to
pink around the edges, but it's not what real leadership means.
Rent is such a huge topic here in Fremantle. The
(09:46):
rent has gone up something like sixty five percent in
Freemantle in the last five years and that is outrageous.
You know, no one's wages have risen in the way
that rent has risen. It's pushing people out onto the streets,
into their cars, you know, staying at powers on couches.
This is the perfect time for the government to step
in and say we need to curtail these rental hikes,
(10:10):
you know, particularly now interest rates are coming down.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Moving on from kazilibs to domestic violence. Already this year
at least twenty women have been killed by men. It's
a serious issue and one that both the Prime Minister
and Opposition leader have remained relatively quiet on. But about
a third of you say action on DV and support
for those experiencing it is a top election concern.
Speaker 6 (10:32):
I see it, as Minister for Women, as one of
the biggest barriers to actually delivering gender equality in this country,
because if women aren't safe, then it impacts on every
other part of their life and so we see addressing
an ending violence against women and children as one of
our key priorities. It's a big handbrake on women getting
(10:53):
a fair cracked opportunity and it filters through every part
of our thinking, our economic policy, our social policy and
all of those budget decisions we've taken. And that's why
we've tried to invest so much into this area, over
eight billion dollars in total in the last three years,
and there's much more work to do.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
That's Labour's plan.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
What about the Liberals, We've seen a marked uptick in
domestic violence, which the police are attributing to cost of
living pressures.
Speaker 5 (11:23):
So it's a huge issue as you imagine it across Australia.
We've committed as.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
A party to ninety million dollars in funding. We have
a local organization called the Ikai Foundation which was defunded
under Labor. We're planning on ensuring that a Locaiah Foundation
is one of the first organizations to be funded by
this ninety million dollars sets.
Speaker 5 (11:46):
People decide for.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Domestic violence and the Greens.
Speaker 4 (11:49):
When it's absolutely horrendous that seven women have been killed
in this first week of campaigning, just to remind us
of absolute urgency of getting something sorted around here. We
want to fully fund the National Plan to End Violence
against Women and Children and increase funding to the level
that it needs to be because it's been star obviously
(12:10):
under the two old parties. We need to increase the
funding for frontline services and frontline support so they're the
absolutely critical things that it's absolutely about being on the frontline.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Meantime, Independent Kate Hollett has framed this issue in an
extremely serious light.
Speaker 8 (12:26):
We really need to look at domestic violence and family
violence as a effectively terrorism domestic terrorism because it is
terrorism and it's not being treated as such. And I
think that we can see that the piecemeal approach is
not working from a prevenation as well as a cure
kind of perspective. When we look at the bigger picture,
(12:49):
we need to address some of the root causes, which
includes poverty of course, and making sure people have got
enough money to survive, but as well, there is a
lot of training and teaching and learning that could be
done in school, I believe, and a lot of psychology
kind of techniques that would really help when young people
(13:11):
grow up to identify bad behavior either in themselves or
in other people, and I think that we don't really
touch on that at all, and I think that's a
huge area that we could focus on to address problems
in the future.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
Health has taken up a huge talking point this campaign,
which makes sense as sixty percent of you want to
see increased funding.
Speaker 4 (13:31):
Really important part of our platform is full dental and
mental health cover under Medicare.
Speaker 5 (13:36):
That's absolutely critical.
Speaker 4 (13:38):
We think that those mental health services should be free,
including subsidized access to accredited registered counselors and mental health nurses.
Everyone should be able to access that. And I understand
why it's more urgent these days because so many people
are under pressure more free gps.
Speaker 5 (13:55):
So what we're saying is we want to triple the.
Speaker 4 (13:58):
Bulk billion incentives and build a thousand free healthcare clinics
across Australia, not to mention a thirty billion dollar investment
in public hospitals over the next decade. In terms of
assisting women's health, reproductive health leave is really critical, improving
abortion access for everyone who needs it, and free period products.
(14:18):
And so there's sort of some granular stuff there about
kind of everyday needs, but also a meta kind of
idea of how we need to adjust the system.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
Thanks Libby. While independent policy is very candidate to candidate,
here's what Kate had to say.
Speaker 7 (14:32):
We want to be able to see a doctor for
cheaply and easily, and we want to be treated at
hospitals appropriately. Investment into women's health been lucking. We know
that lots of tests and scientific kind of outcomes have
been based on men's health rather than female health. I
think we're coming to realize that, but of course it's
(14:55):
not moving fast enough. Every step of the way. Women
feel penalized through the medical system. The scans, we need,
the blood tests, we need, the extra support hormonally that
we need. We need to make sure we've got enough doctors,
nurses and facilities that they are working in conditions which
enable them to do their jobs well and for patients
(15:18):
to be treated now.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Labor have already announced to a string of health initiatives,
including expanding Medicare's urgent care clinics and a seven hundred
and ninety million dollar package for women's health. But here's
what Katie Gallaher had to say on the matter.
Speaker 6 (15:31):
We've recognized, particularly women haven't got a fair deal when
it comes to help with the cost of being a woman,
whether it be contraception or menopause assistance, or conditions that
affect women like endometriosis or pelvic pain. All of those
areas have been undervalued and haven't been addressed. And we've
put a big package on the table, over seven hundred
(15:53):
million dollars to make sure that women are getting access
to the best pills contraceptive pills on the PBS and
the menopause treatment as well. Our investments in medicare to
make sure longer consultations, which are often women used, are
better funded so doctors can provide that and bult build
people for it. And cheaper medicines here. To get medicines
(16:13):
down to twenty five dollars if you're paying for a
script will make a real difference over time. But there's
more to do because again the medical system wasn't necessarily
built by women for women, and we think there's more
to work to do, but we've got a really good
package there.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Meantime, the Liberals have said they'll match labors women's health package,
but there's an extension to it too.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
We're obviously committed to ensuring that bulk billing is accessible
for people that's obviously dropped by over ten percent under
this government, and so we'll be investing in that. We're
obviously ensuring that there's another nine billion dollar investment into
Medicare two to help accessibility for health.
Speaker 5 (16:51):
We've heard a lot about.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Women's health in this election, and we've particularly heard around
funding for some gynecological cancers, for example, and that's something
that once we get into government, will also be looking at.
Is there a way of provisioning a fund for women
that look at women's cancers in particular external from breast cancer,
(17:14):
which is already quite well funded, and that's something that
we'll be looking at from the Future Fund and also
from different sources.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Finally, climate action. It was touched on briefly during one
of the leader's debates, but overall conversations around energy prices
and renewables the nuclear power have drowned out any real
debate on what, if any climate action needs to be
undertaken by the government. The Greens, of course see things differently.
Speaker 4 (17:39):
What's totally terrifying is what Dutton is proposing, which is
why we're really really fighting hard to keep Dutton out.
But again, people have been expressing real disappointment to me
about what the Labor government hasn't done, you know, what
they promised to do, and how absolutely poor they've been
on climate change, and of course we just can't have done.
You know, this crazy kind of nuclear fantasy that they're
(18:01):
pushing is so incredibly dangerous, you know, all at the
expensive renewable energy.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
The Liberals are holding firm on their promises.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
The Liberal Party is committed to net zero by twenty
fifty and Peter Dunton has already assured this Rain public
that he'll stay part of the Powers Accords agreement. I
think we've just got a different pathway to get there,
and we won't be running a renewables only strategy. We
think we should be using every single piece of technology
that's coming on board, including nuclear, which has obviously been
(18:31):
used across the world in all major economies.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Well, Labor are sticking to their renewables plan.
Speaker 6 (18:39):
We leieve in climate change and we want to take
continued action on climate change, and that's really shifting our
energy from fossil fuels into renewable energy, relying on that
in the grid underpinned by gas and hydro and batteries
to store that renewable energy and I think there's a
big contrast between what we want to do and the opposition,
who wants to build nuclear reactors and sort of abandon
(19:02):
a lot of the work that we've done into renewable energy.
But I think a lot of women get it. Solar panels, batteries,
electric vehicles, this is actually the way of the future
and we need to keep investing in.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
Those and independent Kate Hullett says Australia is primed for
a surge in renewables.
Speaker 7 (19:18):
We are young, and we are mineral rich. We have
sun like nowhere else. We've got wind, we've got ocean,
we've got water. If you were going to design the
perfect country to deal with some climate change issues, usually renewables,
Australia would be it. Yet we are crawling along, and
not only that, we are still opening coal mines, we
(19:40):
are still approving gas processing facilities.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
So was this helpful? At least twenty one percent of
you told us you're still yet to make up your
mind on who you're voting for this election. Did these
candidates convince you one way or another? Maybe you need
to hear from the Prime Minister and Opposition leader again.
If that's the case, you're in luck. In our show notes,
I've linked our extended conversations with both Anthony Albanesi and
Peter Dutton from our No Filter podcast. You can check
(20:05):
them out and maybe that'll help move the needle for you.
Thanks for taking some time to feed your mind with
us today. The Quikie is produced by Me, Taylor Strano,
and Claire Murphy, with audio production by Lou Hill
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