PATRICIA KARVELAS, HOST: Let's bring in the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, to get his reaction to these pretty significant inflation figures. Prime Minister, welcome to Afternoon Briefing for the first time in 2025.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good afternoon, PK.

KARVELAS: Do people with mortgages deserve an interest rate cut in February?

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: It's wonderful to be back in Western Australia with another positive announcement of the cooperation that we see between my Government and the Cook Labor Government here in WA. We're building Australia's future, and Western Australia is a key to that future, because it's driving the present growth. But if you look at where the future economy is going, Western Australia will continue to be such a key role in driving national economic growth as one of the engine rooms of our national economy.

LAURA TINGLE, NATIONAL PRESS CLUB PRESIDENT: Thank you so much, Prime Minister. A couple of observations from your speech. You talked about trying to rebuild during a period of global uncertainty and you marked the anniversary tomorrow of your tax cut announcement here at the Press Club. We've got the ultimate global uncertainty going on at the moment in the White House. A lot of executive orders have been coming out of there this week and indications from President Trump that he's looking at slashing tax rates.

ANDREW CLENNELL, HOST: Prime Minister, thanks so much for joining us.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good to be with you, once again on January.

CLENNELL: Indeed. Well, it's an election year. You're behind in pretty much every poll. Are you the underdog leading into this election?

MARK GIBSON, HOST: The PM has phoned through to chat to you this morning. Good morning.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: G'day, good to be with you. It's great to be back here. I just had a lovely brekkie at Freo. It was a beautiful morning here.

GIBSON: Just stopping off in Freo on the way, a little bit down the freeway there to make this announcement.

PRIME MINISTER: That’s right.

OLIVER PETERSON, HOST: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, good afternoon.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good afternoon, Oly. Wonderful to be able to chat with you again and great to be back here in the great state of WA.

PETERSON: Well, this morning you were out and about with a major road announcement. The Kwinana Freeway to get a $350 million Commonwealth injection on top of a $350 million state injection. What's planned to happen to the Kwinana?

The Albanese and Cook Governments are building Western Australia’s future, driving economic growth and delivering benefits for commuters with a partnership to deliver a $700 million upgrade to the Kwinana Freeway.

The Albanese Government will invest $350 million to ensure this important work gets delivered.

Widening the Kwinana Freeway will add around 50 per cent capacity to the upgraded sections, easing congestion for motorists and improving the efficiency of moving freight on a road that typically carries 100,000 vehicles every day.

Current and future generations of Australian school children will learn the history and lessons of the Holocaust, following a $6.4 million investment by the Albanese Labor Government to build a National Holocaust Education Centre in Canberra and to deliver an upgrade to the Holocaust Institute of WA’s Education Centre in Yokine.

The announcement, made on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, comes as Australia and the global community mark 80 years since the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we hold on to the memories of millions. We reflect on the great multitude of Jewish life that the Holocaust robbed from the world - all of that energy, potential, inspiration, talent and love - and we hold their names and their faces in our hearts.

We tend to these memories because we cannot allow the Holocaust to recede into history. It was a pitiless and unrelenting act of cruelty that was long in the planning, cold in its calculation, and carried out on a scale that falls across the decades like a terrible shadow.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Well, happy Australia Day to all throughout this amazing country. There'll be 700 events held by local communities right around Australia, just like the National one that's been held here. I've had the privilege as first Opposition Leader and then Prime Minister to come to the National Australia Day event here on the shores of Lake Burley Griffin, and it is always inspiring.