Albanese confident US tariffs will not affect Australia's economy
Mr Albanese was quizzed on his economic agenda at an event hosted by Sky News Australia and The Australian, where he invited business leaders to share their ideas to supercharge the economy.
'Our nation does not need to go looking overseas for an economic model to copy … we want to do this the Australian way, not talking to Australia down,' Mr Albanese said.
The forum was held ahead of the Prime Minister's visit to China.
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Perth Now
38 minutes ago
- Perth Now
Albo's scores big with football diplomacy
In the latest display of football diplomacy, Australia and Fiji have agreed to 'deepen' ties after Anthony Albanese and his counterpart Sitiveni Rabuka watched the Wallabies duke it out with Fiji in a dramatic rugby test. Fiji was poised to beat the Wallabies but a last-minute try from captain Harry Wilson saved the day, securing Australia a 21-18 win. The prime ministers posed for photos just before kick-off, with each of them donning scarves for their respective teams. But as much as the match was a friendly sporting rivalry between neighbours, it played out against a backdrop of Pacific politics shaped by an increasingly aggressive China. The Albanese government has pumped billions into countering Chinese influence in the region – an endeavour to which Fiji is key. Little more than an hour after the match, Defence Industry and Pacific Affairs Minister Pat Conroy announced Australia and Fiji were 'taking steps to formally elevate and deepen the Vuvale Partnership as we work together to ensure a peaceful, stable and prosperous Pacific'. Among the key elements outlined were supporting Fiji roll out its new national security strategy and boosting Australian development assistance by $40m over four years. The latest cash commitment put Australia's total assistance to Fiji at $500m from 2025 to 2029. Other key elements included more Australian Federal Police officers embedded in Fiji's police force and tightening up border security at the country's major ports. 'During Fiji Prime Minister Sitveni Rabuka's visit to Australia, we affirmed our support for Prime Minister Rabuka's vision for an 'Ocean of Peace' including family first Pacific regionalism and Pacific-led solutions to Pacific challenges,' Mr Conroy said in a statement. Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka has said a Chinese base in the Pacific would not be welcome. Martin Ollman / NewsWire Credit: News Corp Australia While defence and security have been top-of-mind, the Albanese government has also prioritised people-to-people links with Australia's 'Pacific family'. Speaking to Newcastle radio on Saturday, Mr Albanese spruiked the match as doing just that. 'It is really important to recognise that relationships between nations essentially comes down to relationships between people,' he told the ABC. 'And that's why we unapologetically have provided support to support rugby in the region. 'That includes support that Australia has provided of $10 million over seven years for the Fijian Drua women and men to participate in those Super Rugby Pacific and Australia Super W competitions.' He noted Mr Rabuka 'timed his visit to Australia' to coincide with the rugby test. 'It is a great way in which our nations can show our commonality,' Mr Albanese said. 'We are all members of the Pacific family.' Speaking in Canberra on Wednesday, Mr Rabuka vowed to fight Chinese efforts to set up a base in the Pacific for as 'long as I'm Prime Minister'. 'There is really no need for them to set up any other bases in the Pacific,' he told the National Press Club. 'If they want to come, who would welcome them? Not Fiji.'
News.com.au
an hour ago
- News.com.au
Albanese watches Rugby Test with Fijian PM in show of football diplomacy
In the latest display of football diplomacy, Australia and Fiji have agreed to 'deepen' ties after Anthony Albanese and his counterpart Sitiveni Rabuka watched the Wallabies duke it out with Fiji in a dramatic rugby test. Fiji was poised to beat the Wallabies but a last-minute try from captain Harry Wilson saved the day, securing Australia a 21-18 win. The prime ministers posed for photos just before kick-off, with each of them donning scarves for their respective teams. But as much as the match was a friendly sporting rivalry between neighbours, it played out against a backdrop of Pacific politics shaped by an increasingly aggressive China. The Albanese government has pumped billions into countering Chinese influence in the region – an endeavour to which Fiji is key. Little more than an hour after the match, Defence Industry and Pacific Affairs Minister Pat Conroy announced Australia and Fiji were 'taking steps to formally elevate and deepen the Vuvale Partnership as we work together to ensure a peaceful, stable and prosperous Pacific'. Among the key elements outlined were supporting Fiji roll out its new national security strategy and boosting Australian development assistance by $40m over four years. The latest cash commitment put Australia's total assistance to Fiji at $500m from 2025 to 2029. Other key elements included more Australian Federal Police officers embedded in Fiji's police force and tightening up border security at the country's major ports. 'During Fiji Prime Minister Sitveni Rabuka's visit to Australia, we affirmed our support for Prime Minister Rabuka's vision for an 'Ocean of Peace' including family first Pacific regionalism and Pacific-led solutions to Pacific challenges,' Mr Conroy said in a statement. While defence and security have been top-of-mind, the Albanese government has also prioritised people-to-people links with Australia's 'Pacific family'. Speaking to Newcastle radio on Saturday, Mr Albanese spruiked the match as doing just that. 'It is really important to recognise that relationships between nations essentially comes down to relationships between people,' he told the ABC. 'And that's why we unapologetically have provided support to support rugby in the region. 'That includes support that Australia has provided of $10 million over seven years for the Fijian Drua women and men to participate in those Super Rugby Pacific and Australia Super W competitions.' He noted Mr Rabuka 'timed his visit to Australia' to coincide with the rugby test. 'It is a great way in which our nations can show our commonality,' Mr Albanese said. 'We are all members of the Pacific family.' Speaking in Canberra on Wednesday, Mr Rabuka vowed to fight Chinese efforts to set up a base in the Pacific for as 'long as I'm Prime Minister'. 'There is really no need for them to set up any other bases in the Pacific,' he told the National Press Club. 'If they want to come, who would welcome them? Not Fiji.'
Sydney Morning Herald
2 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Australia needs a new China strategy: America's promised pivot to Asia is unlikely
The ceasefire between Israel and Iran, should it last, is a resoundingly positive development. But regional peace in its current form, after Israeli offensives in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and Iran, cannot be sustained in the long run without continuous American involvement. This has serious implications for America's longstanding commitment to disentangle itself from Middle Eastern affairs and shift focus firmly to the Pacific and its only peer superpower competitor: China. Successive Australian governments have staked their plans to navigate the growing superpower rivalry in our region upon promises of an American laser-focus on the Pacific that is unlikely to ever truly materialise. Just as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese prepares to meet President Xi Jinping in China this month, the ongoing role of the US in reshaping the balance of power in the Middle East in Israel's favour should have leaders and policymakers here questioning the viability of an American 'Pivot to Asia' that never arrives. For Australians, the stakes couldn't be higher. The pivot was first announced in November 2011, when then US president Barack Obama addressed the Australian Parliament. In response to the disastrous Bush-era campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, Obama declared: 'After a decade in which we fought two wars that cost us dearly, in blood and treasure, the United States is turning our attention to the vast potential of the Asia-Pacific region.' Loading Obama promised to refocus the US-Australia partnership around maintaining a strategic balance as China's power expanded, while emphasising peaceful and co-operative relations in areas of mutual benefit, such as trade, diplomacy, climate and non-proliferation. Australia has doggedly upheld its end of the bargain, providing bases for American forces, joining new US-centred alliances and security pacts, such as the Quad and AUKUS, and signing onto exorbitant arms-procurement programs. But in the 14 years since a US president addressed our parliament, precious little of America's own commitments to the pivot have come to pass. The economic arm of the pivot was strangled in the cradle when President Trump formally abandoned the Trans-Pacific Partnership on the first day of his presidency in 2016. American commitment to diplomacy, multilateral institutionalism and regional trust-building have followed a similar trajectory. But the Trump administration retained a supposedly iron-clad commitment to abandon the neoconservative model of foreign interventions and begin to focus squarely on the challenges posed by a rising China. Trump's consistent stated opposition to these wars was one of the most popular ingredients in his early political success. Arguably the most critical moment in Trump's nascent election campaign occurred a week before the 2016 South Carolina Primary, when he decried the Iraq War as a 'big fat mistake' and called out the Republican establishment for lying about weapons of mass destruction. Trump went on to win South Carolina, and Jeb Bush, once the frontrunner, abandoned his campaign.
