Election Diary: Albanese promises 30% discount on household batteries in latest energy bill help

In the government’s latest initiative on energy prices, Anthony Albanese on Sunday will promise that if re-elected, Labor will reduce the cost of installing a typical home battery by 30% from July 1.

This would cut about $4,000 from the upfront cost of an 11.5 kWh battery, which is the typical household size.

Small businesses and community facilities would be eligible for the discount, as well as households.

The government says the discount would save a household with existing rooftop solar panels up to $1,100 off their power bill every year. For those with new solar panels and battery, the saving would be up to $2,300 annually – up to 90% of a typical power bill.

More than one million installations would be expected by 2030 under the measure. The initiative would cost an estimated $2.3 billion over the forward estimates, including in the 2025-26 budget.

The discount would be applied on installing virtual power plant-ready battery systems beside new or existing rooftop solar until 2030. The absolute value of the discount would decline over the five years in line with the expected fall in the cost of batteries.

Albanese said the measure was “good for power bills and good for the environment”.

Labor’s number one priority is delivering cost-of-living relief. That’s why we want to make sure Australians have access to cheaper, cleaner energy.

Energy Minister Chris Bowen said:

The contrast is clear – a re-elected Albanese government will take pressure off household energy bills, while Peter Dutton’s Liberals will spend $600 billion on a nuclear plan that drives power bills up.

For the second election campaign in a row, a Liberal leader has claimed a victim on the football field.

At least, some relieved Liberals might be saying, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton felled a member of the media, not a child.

Dutton, campaigning in Darwin on Saturday with a few million dollars in hand to promise for the local footy ground, was happy to have a kick with kids for the cameras.

But the ball hit a TV camera, which went into the face of Channel Ten cameraman Ghaith Nadir. A federal policeman helped with a bandage for Nadir’s forehead. Dutton promised a compensatory beer.

In the 2022 campaign, Prime Minister Scott Morrison joined some youngsters in their junior soccer training.

Becoming rather too competitive, Morrison crashed into a boy, and they both ended on the ground. It made for plenty of jokes about the man who’d admitted in the campaign that “I can be a bit of a bulldozer”. The clip was replayed again and again.

After Saturday’s incident, Dutton quipped, “If the prime minister kicked it, he would have told you that it didn’t hit anyone”.

Last week, Albanese stepped back off a stage, appearing to fall, during an event. He later insisted he hadn’t fallen. “I stepped back onto a step, I didn’t fall off the stage,” he said. “Just one leg went down, and I was sweet.”

Way back in 1984, there was another unfortunate incident on the sporting field during a campaign. That time, the perpetrator was a journalist and the victim was Prime Minister Bob Hawke.

Hawke had called an election a few days before playing in a cricket match against the parliamentary press gallery. A ball from Gary O'Neill, a journalist with the Melbourne Herald, caught the edge of Hawke’s bat and smashed into his glasses.

Hawke went to the Canberra Hospital, where (after he jumped the queue) a patch was put on his eye. He returned to the match, watching from the sidelines.

At least he scored 27 before the incident. However, the accident set him back for the early days of what was an eight-week campaign.

Over the years there are plenty of examples of leaders losing their (physical) footing.

A few months before the 2007 election, Prime Minister John Howard tripped and fell on his hands on the way to a radio interview in Perth.

Visiting India in 2012, Prime Minister Julia Gillard tumbled when her shoe got stuck in grass. She explained:

For men who get to wear flat shoes all day every day, if you wear a heel it can get embedded in soft grass and when you pull your foot out the shoe doesn’t come.