Australian politics and news live: Albanese, Dutton final face-off in election debate confirmed for Channel 7

The PM has been asked whether he’s “given up on getting the budget back into surplus”, given the billions of dollars of policy announcements in the last couple of weeks.

Mr Albanese rebuffs that, saying “what we’re doing is responsible economic management”.

Housing Minister Clare O’Neil is also in Adelaide this morning.

She’s taken aim at Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s new housing policy, but she also wants voters to remember his pitch to allow homebuyers to dip into their super to buy a property.

“What Peter Dutton wants to facilitate is for young people around the country to ransack their retirements, but it up against each other in auction and effectively gift that money to the older generation who own most of the property,” she said.

“If I was trying to cook up a way to make the housing crisis worse, this is where I would start.

“At the end of the day, we know we need more supply. And that is why Labor’s plan is about support for first home buyers... but the most important thing that we need to do is build more homes more quickly.”

The Prime Minister is in Adelaide this morning where he’s spruiking his newly announced housing policy.

He says the two policies - $10bn to build 100,000 homes exclusively for first home buyers and an expansion of the five per cent guarantee scheme for first-time buyers - will make a “significant difference to increasing supply”.

“These two policies will make a significant difference to increasing supply, but also importantly to getting first time buyers and particularly young Australians into their first home,” he said.

The Nightly’s Nicola Smith is reporting that the Australian Greens will announce a pledge today to push Labor to spend $46.5 billion to provide free higher education for all if they hold the balance of power in a minority government.

The election promise to woo younger voters builds on another pitch last week to reform negative gearing and end capital gains tax discounts on investment properties to help renters and first home buyers.

According to the party’s calculations based on Parliamentary Budget Office figures, the cost of the plan to make university and TAFE courses free would amount to $46.5 billion dollars over the forward estimates.

The PBO response, however, stresses that the financial implications of the proposal are “very uncertain” and sensitive to key assumptions including course enrolment and fees and behavioural responses by students and education providers.

The party says the extra cash needed for its plan would be funded by taxing big corporations, which it has previously claimed would raise $514 billion dollars over the next decade.

​Read the full story here.​

Natalie Barr hosted Tanya Plibersek on Sunrise this morning and asked the Minister for the Environment about her moment with Anthony Albanese at Labor’s campaign launch in Perth yesterday.

“The cameras at Labor’s launch caught an awkward moment between you and the Prime Minister and it looks like you’re going in for the hug. Here we go. Going in, but he’s kind of just grabbed your hands and done the double shake,” Barr said.

“Was that a bit awks? What happened?

“I reckon we should still all be elbow-bumping. During an election campaign, the last thing you want is to catch a cold from someone,” Ms Plibersek replied.

“So that’s on me. I should’ve done the elbow-bump, I reckon.”

“You two still getting along?,” Barr fired back.

Plibersek: “Yeah, of course! Oh yes!,”

Barr: “Friends, buddies? Just checking.”

Plibersek: “We’re buddies!

Barr: “That’s a yes, is it, Tania? ... She left me hanging”

Peter Dutton has told Sunrise that Labor wants people to ‘rent for life’ after being asked if the coalition’s decision on housing may push up prices.

“It would if you didn’t have the supply side,” Mr Dutton told Natalie Barr.

“We’ve been working on this policy for a long time and we’ve looked at, you know, if you push here and poke out there, all of the different interactions, but this is the best opportunity for young Australians to achieve home ownership.

“The Labor Party wants people to be renters for life. I want people to get into housing as quickly as possible. I want to be the PM for home ownership and housing accessibility.”

Read the full story here.

Sunrise’s Nat Barr has pressed Peter Dutton on the housing policy and how it will work with infrastructure and the traide shortage that may impact the construction of new property builds post election.

“What we say is we already announced a $5 billion plan to work with councils to help with sewerage and with roads and water upgrades that brings 500,000 new blocks of land on the the market,” Mr Dutton said.

“We also said we will provide support to building companies. So there’s the $12,000 incentive for them to put on new trainees and apprentices in construction.

“We’re going to cut the migration intake in this country because the Government’s brought in a million people over two years.

“They all want somewhere to live, as well. And we’ve also said that we’re going to allow people to access $50,000 of their super to help them put a deposit together which helps them get into a home more quickly.

“We said we will put a two-year ban on foreign buyers so they’re not competing against young Australians who are at the auction and can’t get the successful bid because they have somebody with deeper pockets there.”

Coalition leader Peter Dutton has appeared on Sunrise talking to Natalie Barr to kick off his post-campaign launch of policy sales and got straight into their housing promises.

When asked about analysts saying the policies could make inflation worse Mr Dutton responded.

“The Coalition is serious about helping people get into home and this allows us to provide deductibility on a loan up to $650,000 and it’s areally important step, because it builds on the other steps that we’ve taken and it shows we’re serious about being the party for homeownership again.”

“People lost that dream, that hope. We believe very strongly that because it only applies to new builds, to new units, new homes it will increase the supply and that’s the view of the HIA, the housing industry experts, as well. It’s going to encourage construction, which is really important.

“This just means for young couples, for individuals as well, there is a huge opportunity now to be able to get into the housing market and it means that for the first five years of the loan, you have got that deductibility in place against your income and it can be the game-changer.”

Buoyed by official launches complete with rousing speeches and expensive policies, Labor and the coalition have a swag of big-ticket promises to sell voters as the election campaign hits full swing.

With one week of the campaign to go before early voting begins, both sides know every day is crucial.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is kicking off his week in Adelaide, where he will spruik two of Labor’s centrepiece promises announced on Sunday - an automatic $1000 deduction on tax returns and a plan to help first homebuyers into a property.

Housing, an issue at the forefront of voters’ minds, dominated both parties’ campaign launches.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is in Adelaide and Peter Dutton has headed home to Brisbane in what shapes as a crucial week to sell their campaign launch announcements.

Stay right here for all the latest news and views as the ‘pollies’ go toe-to-toe.