Federal election 2025: Albanese says PM should live in Canberra as Dutton opts for Kirribilli — as it happened

We will wrap up our live coverage here.

Thank you for joining us on yet another jam-packed day of the 2025 federal election campaign blog.

We will be back bright and early tomorrow morning but if you can't wait that long, you can check out the rest of today's  online coverage at our Australia Votes page.

Thank you again for joining!

Minister for Energy and Climate Change Chris Bowen has told 7.30 Labor has made no decision to move gas to the east coast through a pipeline.

"One of the things people talk about is a re-gasification terminal," he said.

"One way of getting gas from Western Australia to New South Wales is through a pipeline.

"There's been no decision made to do that.

"It would primarily be about moving gas around the country more efficiently.

"You can build pipelines but it might not be the most efficient way, it might be done by ship.

"Ministers have written to me saying it means gas imports, it means regasification terminals to facilitate gas around the country.

"It's one option AEMO could look at."

He also took aim at the Coalition energy policy and accused Peter Dutton of "microwaving" a Scott Morrison gas policy, which Bowen said would fail.

"It's clearly been done on the run, it's falling apart with the most basic of scrutiny," he told 7.30.

"[It] is a reheated, microwaved Morrison policy.

"Gas-fired recovery was announced by Angus Taylor in 2020, the day that he did that, gas prices were $4 a gigajoule. By the time of the election, they were $34.70.

"That's the carbon copy of what they're doing today. It's exactly the same, word for word."

The prime minister says Peter Dutton is intentionally avoiding discussions about abortion ahead of the election.

Anthony Albanese made the comments during an appearance on pop culture podcast, Big Small Talk.

When co-host Hannah Ferguson asked whether the opposition leader was trying to steer clear of abortion "given his voting history on women's issues",  Albanese replied:

"He has said himself that he's trying to do that.

"Abortion is something that is regulated by state and territory governments, that's true.

"But what my government's done is to address the whole issue of women's reproductive health, and the fact that it imposes a cost."

 Dutton has previously said while he supported "a woman's right to choose", abortion is a matter for state and territory governments.

Earlier today, Oppositon Leader Peter Dutton and Nationals leader David Littleproud visited Thargomindah.

Here are some pics of their tour.

We're just a few days into the campaign trail, but early polling suggests the major parties will spend it neck-and-neck.

But the ABC's chief digital political correspondent Jacob Greber says the Opposition Leader Peter Dutton "has a big mountain to climb".

A veteran bureaucrat who is completing a government review of the Australian Submarine Agency has accused Malcolm Turnbull of undermining the country's chances of getting nuclear submarines.

Former Defence secretary Dennis Richardson was one of several speakers invited by the former prime minister to address a security conference in Canberra that discussed the future of the US alliance and the AUKUS partnership.

"You're almost making the 'if' a certainty — that we won't get it," Richardson told Turnbull during the day-long forum held at the National Press Club.

"I think there's a good chance we will get it. It depends upon the degree of commitment that we have in this country and our preparedness to pursue it as a national enterprise, not as a defence project. "

"Now, all right, we may fail, but I don't think the fact that we may fail should become a certainty that we will fail."

Richardson, who also served as Australia's ambassador to Washington, said AUKUS critics such as Turnbull were wrong to call for a Plan B such as buying French nuclear-powered submarines.

"If we're gonna go back to square one and start again, we have learnt nothing," he said.

"The French have had their problems with nuclear-powered submarines. They've had to, on a couple of occasions, get American assistance."

The first week of the official election campaign is well underway as both leaders take to the radio and another Chinese ship floats past Australia.

You can read more in Brett Worthington's analysis piece below:

Campaigning for the federal election is well underway and we want to hear from you.

You can have your say by clicking on the link below and filling out the questionnaire.

In a press conference earlier today, Anthony Albanese said he would "prefer" if the Chinese research vessel that Australia was monitoring wasn't in Australian waters, but he said that it was operating within international rules.

"This research vessel has not been a real secret for several weeks or even months.

"It's been operating out of New Zealand and has been cooperating with that country's scientists as they've done a series of deep-sea experiments off the New Zealand coast," Defence correspondent Andrew Greene told News Channel.

You can watch Greene's cross below:

 Didn't quite catch all the Afternoon Briefing action, you can watch it here along with all of our other political specials on ABC iView.

Former ACCC Chair Allan Fels says he thinks the ACCC will "recommend the introduction of the European law and the UK law test of excessive prices.

"Their laws there prohibiting excessive prices across the board for all industry and I think we should do something like that, providing there are multiple safeguards to prevent the cure being worse than the disease," he told Afternoon Briefing.

You can watch Fels's full interview below:

Hi Batesy,

Thank you for your question.

With regards to how nuclear waste from the Coalition's proposed plants would be managed, the question hasn't yet been settled.

It's a question several countries are still grappling with, and something my colleague Megan Macdonald delved into in a recent article.

You can read that piece here.

Barbarba Pocock said to reduce energy prices we need to help households who are struggling first.

"We need to assist those households who want to move to electrification and for whom cost is as a barrier.

"We have a plan to assist small businesses and households to make that move to electrify their cook tops and their water heating systems.

"There's a lot of things that can be done immediately that will assist and in the long-run get us to where we need to [be] which is cheaper renewables that deal with the climate crisis and assist those households."

Michael McCormack was asked about the Coalition's plan to reduce energy prices as Dutton hasn't made it clear when this will come into play.

"What is in the table is our national gas plan and that will reduce energy prices and if you bring more gas into the market, that will lead to a reduction in prices," he told Afternoon Briefing.

Up now is the Grattan Institute's Tony Wood to unpack the debate over gas.

He says most of the factors that influence the price of gas is are out of the government's control.

"They are weather-related or overseas-related, like the war in Ukraine, so government needs to be very careful in blaming someone for things that happened that they don't like or take credit for things they do," he says. 

Wood says the question neither side has answered is laying out exactly how they will get the price down.

"The idea that we will reserve enough gas for ourselves and then we will export the rest sounds simple," he says.

"It is far from simple in practice."

He says while he is "all for" finding ways to reduce the cost of gas, he is not sure he's seen any clear policy from either side of government that would achieve that.

If you'd like to read more about what the major parties have put forward, I broke it all down in this article last week.

On Afternoon Briefing's panel this afternoon we have Greens senator Barbara Pocock and Nationals MP Michael McCormack.

First up is a discussion about Peter Dutton's announcing he would ditch Labor's plans to co-host the COP 2026 summit with the Pacific Islands.

McCormack, who is the shadow minister for the Pacific, says the Pacific knows where he stands, despite the Coalition wanting to cancel plans to co-host the summit next year.

"The Pacific knows full well we are their best friends and we will continue to be so," he tells Afternoon Briefing.

Pocock disagrees and says: "It is a step in the absolutely wrong direction."

"If I think about the number of Pacific leaders who have been through our parliament in the last several years begging us to be more attentive to the existential crisis being created in Pacific nations through rising sea levels, through extreme storms.

"These are countries at the forefront of the climate crisis."

A final question for Jason Clare. 

Stephanie Dalzell notes the budget revealed expenditure related to the Youth Allowance payments is expected to decrease by almost $500 million over the next four years, which Treasury says is because less people are taking it up.

She asks the minister to shed more light on the projection.

Clare says he's "not sure about the take-up rates" but adds the government has increased funding over the last few budgets, as well as provided other cost of living support. 

"One of the things that a lot of students have asked me to assist with is financial support while they do their practical training, the practical part of a university degree. And on 1 July, paid practical or financial support for teaching years will start as well as nursing students as well as midwifery students and social work students.

"That is real financial support for students at university, and often they have to give up their part-time job or they have to move from one place to another in order to do that ... unpaid training. ... And the financial support will make a world of difference to a lot of students."

The issue of deportation for people who have committed crimes in Australia but are stateless has risen again today.

A man who was reportedly part of the cohort of immigration detainees released following the High Court's NZYQ ruling was shot by police overnight.

It's alleged he ran at an officer while armed with a metal pole.

Jason Clare is asked whether anyone in the NZYQ cohort has been sent to Nauru.

"We have acted as you would expect us to," Clare replies.

"The High Court said these individuals could not be detained and so we are taking steps, working with Nauru to make sure that people can be sent to Nauru.

"They are the actions you would expect us as a government to make."

He adds that Labor's plan is to "make sure people who break the law are locked up".

Stephanie Dalzell shifts to Labor's promise to combat supermarket price gouging. 

She asks whether the government's proposal to set up a taskforce measures up to "outlawing" the practice.

"It will provide us with the advice we need for legislation we need to put in place the sort of fines to stop this happening," Clare says.

"In the UK they have done this, and Europe as well, they have done it in 30 states in the US where you can outlaw this and put in place the serious fines to stop the big supermarket chains doing this."

Up first is Education Minister Jason Clare. 

First up, he's asked whether voters should expect energy prices to go up when the government's latest round of rebates run out at the end of the year.

Clare counters, saying voters can expect prices to go up under a Coalition government.

"What we know from the $600 billion nuclear reactor policy that is put in place is experts say power prices could go up by up to an extra $1000 a year," he says.

"These things will take 20 years to build."

Stephanie Dalzell presses him again. What if Labor wins?

Clare says prices will be lower under Anthony Albanese than Peter Dutton.

 He says Australia's coal-fired power plants need to be replaced in the coming years, and the cheapest and fastest way to do so is with renewables.