This podcast was recorded on the land of the Gadigel people of the Eura Nation. Hello, and welcome to the Real Story with Joe hild about it. I just can't keep it anymore. I'm so excited. I know absolutely everything that's coming on in the election camp, and I'm going to tell you all there is to know, absolutely everything the box and dice, even who won, which I've already told you and it's now even more true. So let's just get right into it. Okay, now that I've taken a deep breath and switched to decaf, this has been the most extraordinary election campaign I think I have ever seen, let alone been a part of this. After what was arguably the most boring week in human history, which thank god Albow took a stage dive because it was the only interesting thing to happen in Week one, has suddenly turned into this incredible cacophony, this rollercoaster ride of events. And I'm not just talking about Peter Dutton kicking a football into the head of a cameraman. Never before, I don't think have I seen either major party, basically, right smack bang in the middle of an election campaign just dump their key policy, just actually no, sorry pause. In fact, we're going to do the opposite. I've never seen that. If you have, let me know, please drop me a line. But that is something that just does not happen, and when it does happen, you can be pretty sure that it is terminal for the party that's doing it, because, of course, the humiliation of publicly backflipping on a major central policy, and we'll get into that very shortly, is so great that the only thing greater in terms of sheer seismic damage must have been the policy itself. So they've basically chosen to sort of wipe themselves out ninety percent because they were about to wipe themselves out one hundred percent. And again I do not know how it even got to that stage. So we are talking of course about the work from Home policy that the Coalition introduced, and again this was meant to be a policy that only applied to Canberra public servants, but they were so poor at controlling the bandwidth of information, so poor at spelling it out really really clearly and defining the terms, and so poor at explaining why this was happening in Canberra among public servants, but wouldn't be happening everywhere else. The people thought he's coming after all of us. He's going to ban all of us from working from home. And I love working from home, and of course, in typical Dutton star God love him and I'm done. I know there are a lot of Dutton supporters out there who listen to this podcast. I'm not bashing him up. I'm just breaking down where it all went wrong. They weren't able to explain why it had to be just for Canbra public servants and why everyone else was safe. And even if you're attacking Canbra publics events for working from home, it's kind of like you're attacking everyone works from home because you're saying, well, they're obviously skiving off, they're not really doing anything. They need to get back of the office where they're working. And so everyone things, well, hang on a minute, I work from home. I'm not scribing off. You calling me lazy, That's what it sounded like. And again they've got confusion to a debate about not even just all workers, but all public servants. And so you had people thinking, hang on, is it going to affect me because I'm a public servant, even though I might work for the state government, and it got confused by the media in the extra jobs in the public service, because the public sector workforce is the one that's really growing and driving employment. But that's not bureaucrats in Canberra for the most part. That's things like age care workers, nurses, doctors, cops, soldiers. Apparently the working from home edict that Peter Dutton release was causing disquiet in the seat of Herbert around Townsville, where the big military base is. Peter Dutton, the champion of national security, going after the soldiers, the armed forces, That's what they felt. That's how badly the messaging on this was managed. And it's the same with the cuts to forty thousand public servants across the board now again but they didn't even say which forty thousand public servants they were going to cut. So you've got nearly two hundred thousand public servants. I think there's about one hundred and eighty something that worked for the APS, the Australian Public Service. They were going am I next, So instead of losing forty thousand votes, were probably not going to vote for you anyway. You know, just give some examples. Diversity and Inclusion and Equity manager he's probably gone, so they are probably got, you know, hold up. Some examiners, people in the Labor Party I speak to, were flabbergasted that he didn't even have examples of the kind of roles that he was going to get rid of. Instead, it was just could be you, could be you. It's like squid game, And of course everyone's terrified, and so that all the public servants and again granted, ninety percent of the public service was probably going to vote against Dutton anyway. There's a reason why the act is greener than the Amazon rainforest. But still it makes it feel like he was going after everybody, both in terms of the working from home and both in terms of the job cuts. And so then he comes out and actually, sorry, scratch that, we're going to do a complete backflip on that complete reverse ferret. We don't actually think that, we don't actually believe that. Sorry for scaring you like that, and no, we're not going to do it. We're going to do the upset. Everything's fine. How does that happen? How does a policy get to that point? How does you know they blame labor for running a scare campaign? How do they not anticipate the scare campaign. Why weren't they disciplined enough to say exactly what was going to have and have the detail to prove that other people wouldn't be affected, or that it was just going to there would be a carve out for parents, for example. So oh no, this doesn't apply to parents, any of your school needs, any of your kids needs, You'll still be able to do it. And again, why go whole hog? Why god, this is why Chris Minn's got away. They just said, just come back to the office most of the time, not all the time, just most of the time. And where is the outcry at the Men's Labor government in New South Wales doing the exact same thing pretty much but not quite that Peter Dutton was trying to do. There was about one day and that was it. There are a few bureaucrats who sent around a few crazy emails, and sure a couple had a couple of mental health days, but apart from that was all fine because it was moderate. It was done with the consulting with the department. So he said, look, if you still need to do this, we'll work with you. That's okay, don't worry about it. It's all fine, And it completely blew over because there was no control, because it was more absolute, more kind of extreme, more typically kind of you know, again, Dunton, this is his brand and that was working for him for a while. But you know, you know, tough, you know, hardline, relatable, understandable. No, they've got to get back to the office five days a week. And that's what I stand for because I believe in hard work and I'm ben't And it just has blown up in his face. It's a great time, I have to say. And I knew my time would come. It's a great time to be a boring, moderate, pragmatic centrist anyway. So that is the first thing that happen in this campaign, and I've just never seen the likes of it. And this came after after the government had gone up to fifty two percent two party preferred, the ALP fifty two percent, two party preferred to the coalitions forty eight percent. In not one but two poles, and the two most I think trustworthy, reliable, respectable poles that's news poll of course, and Redbridge, which is the Cos Samaras pole that everyone is just talking about, the Polster d Juur, I call it so right now. So Albo has gone from almost unbackable to form majority government just a few weeks ago, and it's now looking like the government might actually pick up seats, could even maybe steal some seats from the coalition. That's what they're thinking. And I can tell you they reckon they're stealing some seats from the Greens. I mentioned this before. Now I had heard that the Libs would probably get Ryan off the Greens. They've got three seats in Brisbane, Ryan, Brisbane itself and Griffith, which is Kevin Rudd's old seat which went from Labor to the Greens at the last election. That's just mean, that's just mean behavior anyway, and the Greens pick up Ryan, the Greens pick up Brisbane from when Labour thought they were going to win it, and the Greens pick up Griffith from Labor. Now the Libs reckon they're going to win back Ryan. Labor reckons it's going to win back Brisbane. But everyone's kind of thought the Greens would hold on to Griffith. Well, cut to last week and guess who's in Griffith. One Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister of Australia, Leader of Australian Labor. But he's holding a rally of the Labor faithful. He's pulling out all the zingers. He's saying that Peter Dutton is a closet Sydney Sider because he wants to live in Kiribilly House. And I'm told that they reckon they're actually going to win Griffith. They reckon they're really going to win Griffith, and you think that is shocking. I have also been told that they reckon. There's a pretty good chance that Labour could win the seat of Dixon also in Queensland, and you know who the local member for Dixon is, Peter Dutton. And now to the big story of the week, which is of course the giant global meltdown of the entire worldwide economy. Just kidding. It was the leader's debate because I was there and it was really exciting and this is what gets my political antennages. So we were there at when he Leagues Club, right in the heart of Western Sydney, Anthony Albanezi and Peter Dutton in the first ever leader's debate of this election campaign. Now this took the form of a Sky News People's forum and it's slightly different to a conventional debate because instead of having a moderator and a panel of experts quote unquote who ask all the questions, it's one hundred chosen undecided voters that chosen and waited to try to represent the community. And they all are supposed to be undecided. Of course, by says how in a minute, that person's not undersirned. It's been like the Q and a audience, you know, undecided eighty percent vote Green. But no, that was pretty balanced, it seemed to me. And a great night. And they get to ask all the leaders all any questions they want and there's no heads up. No one knows what's coming. Now. This makes it really really hard for either leader to prep for because instead of just knowing what the usual sort of questions are going to be, or like the gotcha questions like how much is a loaf of bread? Or how much is a leader of petrol? Or what's the interest rate? Stuff that's tripped up leaders throughout the ages, and John Howard is said to have had answers to all those questions on a piece of paper in his pocket all times in case he was ever surprised by them. But this time it's from the audience, so they can ask anything, how come you know, I called a plumber last week to fix my leaking tap and they still haven't rocked up. So these guys are often incredibly specific. Well. One example is a guy who's whose kid was at university and he was worried that having fewer foreign students at that university would create a funding shortfall that meant that his kid wouldn't have as higher quality education. I must admit I've never heard that problem raised before, and it raised a few eyebrows amongst some of my more conservative friends. But there you go. So you never know where someone is going to be coming from. The most important thing about these debates is that they are one and lost in the room, because those one hundred people then go off, they cast their vote to leader who they thought won the night, and then that is what is reported the next day. So even though they are broadcast on television and many many more people are watching them on TV or online at home, the only people that really matter to the result of the debate is those people in the room, and so the number one thing that both leaders have to do is connect with those people and make those people feel like they are being listened to. What they are worried about is being addressed. And that is actually something that's very different from a normal debate where you're on a podium behind a dais and you're trying to lay out your vision for the country and you're trying to be bold and far sighted or passionate or strong on whatever that is. None of that really matters as much in one of these rooms. It's quite intimate, and again, the only people you are trying to convince, the only people whose vote matters on that night, are those one hundred people just a few feet a few meters away in front of you. And this is where Anthony Albanezi really had the edge over Peter Dutton. He came in early and sort of laid out his picture for where the country was at and where it was going to go, all perfectly good. He rattled off that many numbers. I think he was anxious just to prove that he knew things like the unemployment rate and the interest rate because he got caught out in the last election campaign, so he just got all the numbers out of his system. And I was thinking, oh, come on, you've got to get him lean in a bit more mate a little bit more, and he did, and he got a couple of good questions for him early on, so again luck of the drawer. But he had a question from a teacher about public education, and had a question from an old mate about his son at university, worried about their not being enough international students novel take on the issue, and Alba was playing a home game and was able to engage with people. He talked directly to them, you know, use their name. Peter Dunton, on the other hand, was you know it should have been it should have been more a vibe for him. It was very sad. His father had a heart attack just before it was revealed, just minutes before the debate was about to start. So I don't know if he was a bit rattled by that. You would think he would be. And so that's awful, an awful way to have to come and begin, you know, getting on your fron foot when you're worried about someone you love so much. So very very sad, But he did really well, made it relatable. Early on, instead of talking about the headline inflation, he was talking about the price at the supermarket checkout that families are facing. And again that's the sort of stuff that really cuts through in these intimate and personal environments. But he also accused the PM of lying or being dishonest or whatever, shock horror, politicians dishonest an election campaign, which he may well have been I'm not going to judge on that, but ends up sort of dragging the PM and therefore dragging the kind of debate into a back and forth over, for example, whether or not a coalition cut health funding when he was a health minister. And he's saying, well, you can check the budget papers. You can check the budget papers. No one's checking the budget papers. No, not one. I can absolutely guarantee you London to a brick. Not one of those one hundred people went back and looked at the budget papers. The only way you get people, normal people to look at the budget papers is if you lock them up for seven hours, which is precisely why the government does it every year. So it just sort of got trapped in the weeds a bit had a great gotcha moment and this is again, this would have gone really well on TV and why a lot of people I think watching home to oh you know, Dunton might have won this or it was a drawer. It was very close when he asked a woman who was worried about healthcare cost if she had to pull out her credit card as well as her Medicare card when she went to the doctor. Because of course that's that their response to Albo constantly pulling out his Medicare card and saying you should only have to use your Medicare card, not your credit card. It turns out this woman did have to pay when going to the doctor. And even though that's a problem that Albo says he's going to fix the fact that this is happening on his watch when he's PM I think a lot of people felt was a good win by Dutton and also showed Dutton be nimble, taking a chance, thinking there's an opportunity here. And he went back and asked that woman. After it was everyone thought the sort of discussion was going to move on, he said, hey, just wait one second, can I ask you a question when you go to the doctors, do you have to pull out your credit card? And the answer was no. He was all right, just checking, thank you very much, meaning right along. But he did it and he got the win, and that's what we need to see more of. But still Anthony Albanezi was there able to turn things around. And an older lady was clearly very against foreigners and people on temporary visas buying houses in Australia, as a lot of people are, and both parties are putting limits on that. She was backing in Peter Dutton on that, and she wanted him to go even further, and so why aren't you going ever further? And Dunton explained why for new builds it wasn't appropriate, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So this is absolute home to her for him, and she's already you can tell a card carrying supporter for him, or maybe even someone to the right of him. And then it goes to Anthony Albanesi to address this woman's concerns. And what does he do. He asks her if she's got any grandkids. Next thing, you know, she's smiling, She's talking about her grandkids, how much she loves them. That has absolutely no political or policy merit whatsoever. To people at home. It would have meant absolutely nothing. But I saw that exchange. I watched it for just a few meters away, and I thought he's won. He's just won. The debate and he's won the night, and that is how you do it. And I was so confident that I'd actually written my entire analysis of it and declared Albanesi the winner before the results even came through. And that was all I'd written. There was no other, no plan B. And sure enough the results did come through very shortly afterwards, and it was Peter Dutton thirty five, Anthony Alberzi forty four, and another twenty one voters who were undecided. And that means two very important things. I was right all along. And you have to keep listening to the podcast because there's heaps undersided voters and we still don't know what might happen. Well, as mentioned, it's been a pretty tough week and a half for Peter Dutton, So what does he need to do to turn it around? How can he turn it around? And can he turn it around? Well? To get the answer to all these questions more, we thought we'd go to someone who, much as I am known as the Elbow Whisper, is sometimes known as the Dutton Whisper. He's none of them. Paul Murray, the host of Paul Murray Live on Sky News, and he joins me on the line right now, get a my friend, What does Dutton need to do?

This podcast was recorded on the land of the Gadigel people of the Eura Nation. Hello, and welcome to the Real Story with Joe hild about it. I just can't keep it anymore. I'm so excited. I know absolutely everything that's coming on in the election camp, and I'm going to tell you all there is to know, absolutely everything the box and dice, even who won, which I've already told you and it's now even more true. So let's just get right into it. Okay, now that I've taken a deep breath and switched to decaf, this has been the most extraordinary election campaign I think I have ever seen, let alone been a part of this. After what was arguably the most boring week in human history, which thank god Albow took a stage dive because it was the only interesting thing to happen in Week one, has suddenly turned into this incredible cacophony, this rollercoaster ride of events. And I'm not just talking about Peter Dutton kicking a football into the head of a cameraman. Never before, I don't think have I seen either major party, basically, right smack bang in the middle of an election campaign just dump their key policy, just actually no, sorry pause. In fact, we're going to do the opposite. I've never seen that. If you have, let me know, please drop me a line. But that is something that just does not happen, and when it does happen, you can be pretty sure that it is terminal for the party that's doing it, because, of course, the humiliation of publicly backflipping on a major central policy, and we'll get into that very shortly, is so great that the only thing greater in terms of sheer seismic damage must have been the policy itself. So they've basically chosen to sort of wipe themselves out ninety percent because they were about to wipe themselves out one hundred percent. And again I do not know how it even got to that stage. So we are talking of course about the work from Home policy that the Coalition introduced, and again this was meant to be a policy that only applied to Canberra public servants, but they were so poor at controlling the bandwidth of information, so poor at spelling it out really really clearly and defining the terms, and so poor at explaining why this was happening in Canberra among public servants, but wouldn't be happening everywhere else. The people thought he's coming after all of us. He's going to ban all of us from working from home. And I love working from home, and of course, in typical Dutton star God love him and I'm done. I know there are a lot of Dutton supporters out there who listen to this podcast. I'm not bashing him up. I'm just breaking down where it all went wrong. They weren't able to explain why it had to be just for Canbra public servants and why everyone else was safe. And even if you're attacking Canbra publics events for working from home, it's kind of like you're attacking everyone works from home because you're saying, well, they're obviously skiving off, they're not really doing anything. They need to get back of the office where they're working. And so everyone things, well, hang on a minute, I work from home. I'm not scribing off. You calling me lazy, That's what it sounded like. And again they've got confusion to a debate about not even just all workers, but all public servants. And so you had people thinking, hang on, is it going to affect me because I'm a public servant, even though I might work for the state government, and it got confused by the media in the extra jobs in the public service, because the public sector workforce is the one that's really growing and driving employment. But that's not bureaucrats in Canberra for the most part. That's things like age care workers, nurses, doctors, cops, soldiers. Apparently the working from home edict that Peter Dutton release was causing disquiet in the seat of Herbert around Townsville, where the big military base is. Peter Dutton, the champion of national security, going after the soldiers, the armed forces, That's what they felt. That's how badly the messaging on this was managed. And it's the same with the cuts to forty thousand public servants across the board now again but they didn't even say which forty thousand public servants they were going to cut. So you've got nearly two hundred thousand public servants. I think there's about one hundred and eighty something that worked for the APS, the Australian Public Service. They were going am I next, So instead of losing forty thousand votes, were probably not going to vote for you anyway. You know, just give some examples. Diversity and Inclusion and Equity manager he's probably gone, so they are probably got, you know, hold up. Some examiners, people in the Labor Party I speak to, were flabbergasted that he didn't even have examples of the kind of roles that he was going to get rid of. Instead, it was just could be you, could be you. It's like squid game, And of course everyone's terrified, and so that all the public servants and again granted, ninety percent of the public service was probably going to vote against Dutton anyway. There's a reason why the act is greener than the Amazon rainforest. But still it makes it feel like he was going after everybody, both in terms of the working from home and both in terms of the job cuts. And so then he comes out and actually, sorry, scratch that, we're going to do a complete backflip on that complete reverse ferret. We don't actually think that, we don't actually believe that. Sorry for scaring you like that, and no, we're not going to do it. We're going to do the upset. Everything's fine. How does that happen? How does a policy get to that point? How does you know they blame labor for running a scare campaign? How do they not anticipate the scare campaign. Why weren't they disciplined enough to say exactly what was going to have and have the detail to prove that other people wouldn't be affected, or that it was just going to there would be a carve out for parents, for example. So oh no, this doesn't apply to parents, any of your school needs, any of your kids needs, You'll still be able to do it. And again, why go whole hog? Why god, this is why Chris Minn's got away. They just said, just come back to the office most of the time, not all the time, just most of the time. And where is the outcry at the Men's Labor government in New South Wales doing the exact same thing pretty much but not quite that Peter Dutton was trying to do. There was about one day and that was it. There are a few bureaucrats who sent around a few crazy emails, and sure a couple had a couple of mental health days, but apart from that was all fine because it was moderate. It was done with the consulting with the department. So he said, look, if you still need to do this, we'll work with you. That's okay, don't worry about it. It's all fine, And it completely blew over because there was no control, because it was more absolute, more kind of extreme, more typically kind of you know, again, Dunton, this is his brand and that was working for him for a while. But you know, you know, tough, you know, hardline, relatable, understandable. No, they've got to get back to the office five days a week. And that's what I stand for because I believe in hard work and I'm ben't And it just has blown up in his face. It's a great time, I have to say. And I knew my time would come. It's a great time to be a boring, moderate, pragmatic centrist anyway. So that is the first thing that happen in this campaign, and I've just never seen the likes of it. And this came after after the government had gone up to fifty two percent two party preferred, the ALP fifty two percent, two party preferred to the coalitions forty eight percent. In not one but two poles, and the two most I think trustworthy, reliable, respectable poles that's news poll of course, and Redbridge, which is the Cos Samaras pole that everyone is just talking about, the Polster d Juur, I call it so right now. So Albo has gone from almost unbackable to form majority government just a few weeks ago, and it's now looking like the government might actually pick up seats, could even maybe steal some seats from the coalition. That's what they're thinking. And I can tell you they reckon they're stealing some seats from the Greens. I mentioned this before. Now I had heard that the Libs would probably get Ryan off the Greens. They've got three seats in Brisbane, Ryan, Brisbane itself and Griffith, which is Kevin Rudd's old seat which went from Labor to the Greens at the last election. That's just mean, that's just mean behavior anyway, and the Greens pick up Ryan, the Greens pick up Brisbane from when Labour thought they were going to win it, and the Greens pick up Griffith from Labor. Now the Libs reckon they're going to win back Ryan. Labor reckons it's going to win back Brisbane. But everyone's kind of thought the Greens would hold on to Griffith. Well, cut to last week and guess who's in Griffith. One Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister of Australia, Leader of Australian Labor. But he's holding a rally of the Labor faithful. He's pulling out all the zingers. He's saying that Peter Dutton is a closet Sydney Sider because he wants to live in Kiribilly House. And I'm told that they reckon they're actually going to win Griffith. They reckon they're really going to win Griffith, and you think that is shocking. I have also been told that they reckon. There's a pretty good chance that Labour could win the seat of Dixon also in Queensland, and you know who the local member for Dixon is, Peter Dutton. And now to the big story of the week, which is of course the giant global meltdown of the entire worldwide economy. Just kidding. It was the leader's debate because I was there and it was really exciting and this is what gets my political antennages. So we were there at when he Leagues Club, right in the heart of Western Sydney, Anthony Albanezi and Peter Dutton in the first ever leader's debate of this election campaign. Now this took the form of a Sky News People's forum and it's slightly different to a conventional debate because instead of having a moderator and a panel of experts quote unquote who ask all the questions, it's one hundred chosen undecided voters that chosen and waited to try to represent the community. And they all are supposed to be undecided. Of course, by says how in a minute, that person's not undersirned. It's been like the Q and a audience, you know, undecided eighty percent vote Green. But no, that was pretty balanced, it seemed to me. And a great night. And they get to ask all the leaders all any questions they want and there's no heads up. No one knows what's coming. Now. This makes it really really hard for either leader to prep for because instead of just knowing what the usual sort of questions are going to be, or like the gotcha questions like how much is a loaf of bread? Or how much is a leader of petrol? Or what's the interest rate? Stuff that's tripped up leaders throughout the ages, and John Howard is said to have had answers to all those questions on a piece of paper in his pocket all times in case he was ever surprised by them. But this time it's from the audience, so they can ask anything, how come you know, I called a plumber last week to fix my leaking tap and they still haven't rocked up. So these guys are often incredibly specific. Well. One example is a guy who's whose kid was at university and he was worried that having fewer foreign students at that university would create a funding shortfall that meant that his kid wouldn't have as higher quality education. I must admit I've never heard that problem raised before, and it raised a few eyebrows amongst some of my more conservative friends. But there you go. So you never know where someone is going to be coming from. The most important thing about these debates is that they are one and lost in the room, because those one hundred people then go off, they cast their vote to leader who they thought won the night, and then that is what is reported the next day. So even though they are broadcast on television and many many more people are watching them on TV or online at home, the only people that really matter to the result of the debate is those people in the room, and so the number one thing that both leaders have to do is connect with those people and make those people feel like they are being listened to. What they are worried about is being addressed. And that is actually something that's very different from a normal debate where you're on a podium behind a dais and you're trying to lay out your vision for the country and you're trying to be bold and far sighted or passionate or strong on whatever that is. None of that really matters as much in one of these rooms. It's quite intimate, and again, the only people you are trying to convince, the only people whose vote matters on that night, are those one hundred people just a few feet a few meters away in front of you. And this is where Anthony Albanezi really had the edge over Peter Dutton. He came in early and sort of laid out his picture for where the country was at and where it was going to go, all perfectly good. He rattled off that many numbers. I think he was anxious just to prove that he knew things like the unemployment rate and the interest rate because he got caught out in the last election campaign, so he just got all the numbers out of his system. And I was thinking, oh, come on, you've got to get him lean in a bit more mate a little bit more, and he did, and he got a couple of good questions for him early on, so again luck of the drawer. But he had a question from a teacher about public education, and had a question from an old mate about his son at university, worried about their not being enough international students novel take on the issue, and Alba was playing a home game and was able to engage with people. He talked directly to them, you know, use their name. Peter Dunton, on the other hand, was you know it should have been it should have been more a vibe for him. It was very sad. His father had a heart attack just before it was revealed, just minutes before the debate was about to start. So I don't know if he was a bit rattled by that. You would think he would be. And so that's awful, an awful way to have to come and begin, you know, getting on your fron foot when you're worried about someone you love so much. So very very sad, But he did really well, made it relatable. Early on, instead of talking about the headline inflation, he was talking about the price at the supermarket checkout that families are facing. And again that's the sort of stuff that really cuts through in these intimate and personal environments. But he also accused the PM of lying or being dishonest or whatever, shock horror, politicians dishonest an election campaign, which he may well have been I'm not going to judge on that, but ends up sort of dragging the PM and therefore dragging the kind of debate into a back and forth over, for example, whether or not a coalition cut health funding when he was a health minister. And he's saying, well, you can check the budget papers. You can check the budget papers. No one's checking the budget papers. No, not one. I can absolutely guarantee you London to a brick. Not one of those one hundred people went back and looked at the budget papers. The only way you get people, normal people to look at the budget papers is if you lock them up for seven hours, which is precisely why the government does it every year. So it just sort of got trapped in the weeds a bit had a great gotcha moment and this is again, this would have gone really well on TV and why a lot of people I think watching home to oh you know, Dunton might have won this or it was a drawer. It was very close when he asked a woman who was worried about healthcare cost if she had to pull out her credit card as well as her Medicare card when she went to the doctor. Because of course that's that their response to Albo constantly pulling out his Medicare card and saying you should only have to use your Medicare card, not your credit card. It turns out this woman did have to pay when going to the doctor. And even though that's a problem that Albo says he's going to fix the fact that this is happening on his watch when he's PM I think a lot of people felt was a good win by Dutton and also showed Dutton be nimble, taking a chance, thinking there's an opportunity here. And he went back and asked that woman. After it was everyone thought the sort of discussion was going to move on, he said, hey, just wait one second, can I ask you a question when you go to the doctors, do you have to pull out your credit card? And the answer was no. He was all right, just checking, thank you very much, meaning right along. But he did it and he got the win, and that's what we need to see more of. But still Anthony Albanezi was there able to turn things around. And an older lady was clearly very against foreigners and people on temporary visas buying houses in Australia, as a lot of people are, and both parties are putting limits on that. She was backing in Peter Dutton on that, and she wanted him to go even further, and so why aren't you going ever further? And Dunton explained why for new builds it wasn't appropriate, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So this is absolute home to her for him, and she's already you can tell a card carrying supporter for him, or maybe even someone to the right of him. And then it goes to Anthony Albanesi to address this woman's concerns. And what does he do. He asks her if she's got any grandkids. Next thing, you know, she's smiling, She's talking about her grandkids, how much she loves them. That has absolutely no political or policy merit whatsoever. To people at home. It would have meant absolutely nothing. But I saw that exchange. I watched it for just a few meters away, and I thought he's won. He's just won. The debate and he's won the night, and that is how you do it. And I was so confident that I'd actually written my entire analysis of it and declared Albanesi the winner before the results even came through. And that was all I'd written. There was no other, no plan B. And sure enough the results did come through very shortly afterwards, and it was Peter Dutton thirty five, Anthony Alberzi forty four, and another twenty one voters who were undecided. And that means two very important things. I was right all along. And you have to keep listening to the podcast because there's heaps undersided voters and we still don't know what might happen. Well, as mentioned, it's been a pretty tough week and a half for Peter Dutton, So what does he need to do to turn it around? How can he turn it around? And can he turn it around? Well? To get the answer to all these questions more, we thought we'd go to someone who, much as I am known as the Elbow Whisper, is sometimes known as the Dutton Whisper. He's none of them. Paul Murray, the host of Paul Murray Live on Sky News, and he joins me on the line right now, get a my friend, What does Dutton need to do?

Look, he needs to sharpen the attack. But I also think that the point of opposition is that, to be honest, you should have made your attack for the past two and a big years now. They had followed that plan, They had done that. One month ago they were head in the polls, which meant the transition now is into the what's on the table, what's on the offering? What's going to be different? The X factor is, you know, frankly Trump has changed everything in the past four weeks and then there's the policy black flips on work from home, all the rest of it. But I think if you're looking for, you know, in ten years time, when we're talking about the twenty twenty five election, it's going to be how did the bloke who had a sixty percent negative rating end up in front with a month ago the answers Trump. So in terms of the what Dutton has to do is I think that he's got to get a little bit out of his own head about trying to be in four places in four things. And that's part of the psychological game that labor and parts of the media have played pretty well, which is, oh, you know he is he playing too much Trump? Not enough Trump? Is it about Trump? It's not about Trump. What's he cutting? What's he aiding? All the rest of it? Just come up with two things. What's the main line of attack? What's the main line of selling his thing? Regardless of what question he gets asked.

Look, he needs to sharpen the attack. But I also think that the point of opposition is that, to be honest, you should have made your attack for the past two and a big years now. They had followed that plan, They had done that. One month ago they were head in the polls, which meant the transition now is into the what's on the table, what's on the offering? What's going to be different? The X factor is, you know, frankly Trump has changed everything in the past four weeks and then there's the policy black flips on work from home, all the rest of it. But I think if you're looking for, you know, in ten years time, when we're talking about the twenty twenty five election, it's going to be how did the bloke who had a sixty percent negative rating end up in front with a month ago the answers Trump. So in terms of the what Dutton has to do is I think that he's got to get a little bit out of his own head about trying to be in four places in four things. And that's part of the psychological game that labor and parts of the media have played pretty well, which is, oh, you know he is he playing too much Trump? Not enough Trump? Is it about Trump? It's not about Trump. What's he cutting? What's he aiding? All the rest of it? Just come up with two things. What's the main line of attack? What's the main line of selling his thing? Regardless of what question he gets asked.

It's a really good point. I mean, part of it, as you say, is kind of just bad luck. Donald Trump was a really good kind of brand for conservatives just a couple of months ago. Now, with all the tariffs and the stuff with Ukraine, he's much more toxic but better. Dutton has already kind of hitched his wagon to him and can't afford to go too far in the other direction without alienating some of his base. So you say you need to sort of just get out there, really stake his claim, map out the battleground, and then take a clip position. What should those position kind of be? I mean, how does the I mean? The problem is he's got a thread and needle, doesn't he between being a sort of hard, strong values driven politician but also not being seen as too much of an attack dog or too scary or too aggressive.

It's a really good point. I mean, part of it, as you say, is kind of just bad luck. Donald Trump was a really good kind of brand for conservatives just a couple of months ago. Now, with all the tariffs and the stuff with Ukraine, he's much more toxic but better. Dutton has already kind of hitched his wagon to him and can't afford to go too far in the other direction without alienating some of his base. So you say you need to sort of just get out there, really stake his claim, map out the battleground, and then take a clip position. What should those position kind of be? I mean, how does the I mean? The problem is he's got a thread and needle, doesn't he between being a sort of hard, strong values driven politician but also not being seen as too much of an attack dog or too scary or too aggressive.

Yeah, look, I don't know how many people it is, whether it's a few hundred thousand or whether it's a few million, but there are people who when they make decisions about politics, you know they're shopping on price. Frankly, this is why Elbow in all of the ads lists a whole bunch of stuff that he's done. Now, anyone who's actually paying attention to the detail, we can all argue about how much, how little that's a rebrand, that's a respin, But the whole point is the ad is making it seem like, you know, it's a carpet warehouse, and look at all of this stuff we've got. I think that dun't had an opportunity in budget and reply has got a great start with the fuel tax thing. Harving the fuel tax further, I'd bring back the load of middle income tax offset, which was an automatic fifteen hundred dollars tax return to ten million workers. It was taken away by labor after the last election. That money was then redistributed into many of the things that they have have quote unquote given back over the past three years. I think then you get to go to market and say five dollars and fifteen months or fifteen hundred dollars first of July. That's the first thing I do. Second thing I do is I believe in a policy, and it's not necessarily about Peter up and twenty twenty five. It's about just a philosophical position that I think that there should be in the same way there's the instant asset right off for business up to thirty thousand dollars right the same should be for households. Now, obviously you know you're hemme it in, so it's you know, the upper limit is not rich people. The lower limit is not impossible for normal people to attain. But you're able to then say politically, look, I think you know how to spend your money better than I know how to spend your money. So fifteen hundred dollars off your tax for you, if you went and bought a fridge in the past twelve months, write it off against your tax. It means that you then, in a raw political sense, it means you can walk into multiple constituencies and use that policy. So say, if you're going to a bunch of renters, you could say, hey, guys, you know if you pull you get money together and you have a portable air conditioner. You can write that off on your tax. If somebody is trying to escape a difficult home. If you want to buy a lounge, you can write that off against your tax. If you're talking again to an elderly couple who might want to upgrade the washing machine, and so on and so on. So I think that those are the very positive offerings. Now many people will center and say how do you pay for it? My answer is, does anyone care?

Yeah, look, I don't know how many people it is, whether it's a few hundred thousand or whether it's a few million, but there are people who when they make decisions about politics, you know they're shopping on price. Frankly, this is why Elbow in all of the ads lists a whole bunch of stuff that he's done. Now, anyone who's actually paying attention to the detail, we can all argue about how much, how little that's a rebrand, that's a respin, But the whole point is the ad is making it seem like, you know, it's a carpet warehouse, and look at all of this stuff we've got. I think that dun't had an opportunity in budget and reply has got a great start with the fuel tax thing. Harving the fuel tax further, I'd bring back the load of middle income tax offset, which was an automatic fifteen hundred dollars tax return to ten million workers. It was taken away by labor after the last election. That money was then redistributed into many of the things that they have have quote unquote given back over the past three years. I think then you get to go to market and say five dollars and fifteen months or fifteen hundred dollars first of July. That's the first thing I do. Second thing I do is I believe in a policy, and it's not necessarily about Peter up and twenty twenty five. It's about just a philosophical position that I think that there should be in the same way there's the instant asset right off for business up to thirty thousand dollars right the same should be for households. Now, obviously you know you're hemme it in, so it's you know, the upper limit is not rich people. The lower limit is not impossible for normal people to attain. But you're able to then say politically, look, I think you know how to spend your money better than I know how to spend your money. So fifteen hundred dollars off your tax for you, if you went and bought a fridge in the past twelve months, write it off against your tax. It means that you then, in a raw political sense, it means you can walk into multiple constituencies and use that policy. So say, if you're going to a bunch of renters, you could say, hey, guys, you know if you pull you get money together and you have a portable air conditioner. You can write that off on your tax. If somebody is trying to escape a difficult home. If you want to buy a lounge, you can write that off against your tax. If you're talking again to an elderly couple who might want to upgrade the washing machine, and so on and so on. So I think that those are the very positive offerings. Now many people will center and say how do you pay for it? My answer is, does anyone care?

I think you might be right about that too. I think that the surplus has disappeared so far off the agenda, over the horizon that basically it's just you know, I mean a trillion. I don't think people can even conceive of that. Nuh.

I think you might be right about that too. I think that the surplus has disappeared so far off the agenda, over the horizon that basically it's just you know, I mean a trillion. I don't think people can even conceive of that. Nuh.

Now, well, I many budget deficits, and this is what I love, right, And this is what I love about your mate, Jim Chalmers. Right, Jim Chalmers is out and about saying everything that happens in the next four years is because of Donald Trump. Well, i'll give you the tip. In twenty and twenty three, on the twenty fourth or fourteenth of August, that's when the thing called the Intergenerational Report came out, modeled by the same people who do the budget released by Jim Chalmers. It said that Australia was going to be in budget deficits all the way through the twenty twenties, the twenty thirties to twenty forties to twenty fifties, all the way through the twenty sixties. Do you know where Donald Trump was on the day that report was released, the one that showed how screwed we are for the next forty years. He was getting his mug shot patent in Georgia. So if you want to say that the nuts ruined for us a Trump, tell me how that's the case when you've already told us how screwed we were when he was a chance of spending the rest of his life in jail.

Now, well, I many budget deficits, and this is what I love, right, And this is what I love about your mate, Jim Chalmers. Right, Jim Chalmers is out and about saying everything that happens in the next four years is because of Donald Trump. Well, i'll give you the tip. In twenty and twenty three, on the twenty fourth or fourteenth of August, that's when the thing called the Intergenerational Report came out, modeled by the same people who do the budget released by Jim Chalmers. It said that Australia was going to be in budget deficits all the way through the twenty twenties, the twenty thirties to twenty forties to twenty fifties, all the way through the twenty sixties. Do you know where Donald Trump was on the day that report was released, the one that showed how screwed we are for the next forty years. He was getting his mug shot patent in Georgia. So if you want to say that the nuts ruined for us a Trump, tell me how that's the case when you've already told us how screwed we were when he was a chance of spending the rest of his life in jail.

There, you guys, that is very strong play, my friend. Of course, it's all the fault of the war in Ukraine. Paul Murray's Yes, the one that had started I got the talking points right here.

There, you guys, that is very strong play, my friend. Of course, it's all the fault of the war in Ukraine. Paul Murray's Yes, the one that had started I got the talking points right here.

Yeah, the one that had started before the last election, when the two seventy five was a load of rubbish.

Yeah, the one that had started before the last election, when the two seventy five was a load of rubbish.

Yeah, in that case, I blame the Greens for Mara. It's an absolute pleasure to talk to you, as always, my friend.

Yeah, in that case, I blame the Greens for Mara. It's an absolute pleasure to talk to you, as always, my friend.

Take care, Yeah, absolutely, Look, I'll say this about the upcoming election. Surprise surprise is history happens, which is first term governments get re elected. The X factor of this election is, unlike previous governments, Albow doesn't have a backbench to burn, so the conversation is pretty extraordinary if he can get anywhere near a majority, but most likely a pretty ugly minority. The idea of the Liberals winning, though it seems that that has gone in the past month.

Take care, Yeah, absolutely, Look, I'll say this about the upcoming election. Surprise surprise is history happens, which is first term governments get re elected. The X factor of this election is, unlike previous governments, Albow doesn't have a backbench to burn, so the conversation is pretty extraordinary if he can get anywhere near a majority, but most likely a pretty ugly minority. The idea of the Liberals winning, though it seems that that has gone in the past month.

Well, you are nothing if not a very realistic man and a great political brain, Paul Murray, Thanks so much, mate, It's always a pleasure.

Well, you are nothing if not a very realistic man and a great political brain, Paul Murray, Thanks so much, mate, It's always a pleasure.

Love you brother.

Love you brother.

Well that is all we have time for this week. I hope you enjoyed it. Anything you want to know about the election, you just tell me. I've got it all for you. We'll come back again. I'll tell you everything that's happened in the next week as well. In the meantime, you can DM me on Instagram at Joe Underscore Hildebrand, or you can send us an email the Real Story at novapodcast dot com dot au. Write to us, rate us, send us a little review about how fantastic the podcast is and how I know absolutely everything, or tell me that I don't know everything, but just do it privately and you can catch me. Every Monday and Saturday, in fact, every single day, I'm doing an election update for all the news court mastheads, so just get on there you can hear all this analysis and more. See you next week.

Well that is all we have time for this week. I hope you enjoyed it. Anything you want to know about the election, you just tell me. I've got it all for you. We'll come back again. I'll tell you everything that's happened in the next week as well. In the meantime, you can DM me on Instagram at Joe Underscore Hildebrand, or you can send us an email the Real Story at novapodcast dot com dot au. Write to us, rate us, send us a little review about how fantastic the podcast is and how I know absolutely everything, or tell me that I don't know everything, but just do it privately and you can catch me. Every Monday and Saturday, in fact, every single day, I'm doing an election update for all the news court mastheads, so just get on there you can hear all this analysis and more. See you next week.