ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER OF AUSTRALIA: Well, Your Excellency, President-elect, welcome. Welcome to the Cabinet Room in the Australian Parliament to meet with all of my senior Ministers here. Once again, you are no stranger to our great country, and I have not been a stranger to your great country. I look forward to attending your inauguration in a short period of time which will be a great occasion to cement once again the friendship between our two nations. Our partnership is profoundly important for Australia.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Richard Marles, will welcome Indonesian Defence Minister and President-elect Prabowo Subianto to Australia from 19 to 20 August 2024.

This is President-elect Prabowo’s first visit to Australia since Indonesia’s general election in February 2024.

SABRA LANE, HOST: The Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese joins us now. Good morning, Prime Minister.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning, Sabra. Good to be with you.

SALLY SITOU, MEMBER FOR REID: It’s great to be here at one of the best Italian festivals in all of Australia. And it's great to have Anthony Albanese, the first Prime Minister to come to Ferragosto here today, and I welcome him.

I begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, and I pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging.

It such a great pleasure to join you all here in Five Dock for the joy of Ferragosto, and I thank your wonderful local member Sally Sitou for inviting me along today.

It is especially a pleasure to be here with you as Australia’s first Prime Minister with an Italian surname – and as a very proud son of the Inner West.

The story of Italian Australians is deeply and proudly woven into the fabric of our nation.

I begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, and I pay my respects to their elders past, present and emerging.

Good evening, everyone — namaskar.

It’s such a pleasure to be here with you all.

I’d like to thank the India Australia Business & Community Alliance for hosting tonight’s awards, and doing so much to strengthen Australia’s relationship with India over the past decade.

I also acknowledge the High Commissioner of India to Australia, His Excellency Mr Gopal Baglay.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER OF AUSTRALIA: Well, thanks for joining us. It has been an absolute delight to have my friend Prime Minister Luxon here in Australia, to welcome him on what is his third visit to Australia as Prime Minister. Of course, over a long period of time, he's been a regular visitor here to Australia. Today has been an opportunity for us to host the Prime Minister, to talk through the range of issues that our closest of partners have, together.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER OF AUSTRALIA: Well, Prime Minister, welcome to you and your delegation. This is your third visit to Australia since your election as Prime Minister, but you and I have known each other for a very long time, and as we commented walking here to this room, we are probably the two leaders of nations around the world who are most ably to be called aviation nerds, and I look forward to a positive discussion today. Our relationship, our economic relationship, has never been firmer.

1. The Prime Minister of Australia, the Hon Anthony Albanese MP, welcomed the Prime Minister of New Zealand, Rt Hon Christopher Luxon, to Canberra for their first annual Australia-New Zealand Leaders’ Meeting on 16 August 2024.
2. Prime Ministers acknowledged the Ngunnawal people as Traditional Custodians of the lands of the meeting and recognised any other people or families with connection to the lands of the Australian Capital Territory and region.

New data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) shows the national gender pay gap is the lowest on record - today falling to 11.5 per cent from 12 per cent in November 2023, and 14.1 per cent in May 2022. Under the Albanese Government, women’s average weekly earnings have increased $173.80 a week since May 2022.

Labor came to government in 2022 with a commitment to drive action to close the gender pay gap. Since then, we have seen the gender pay gap drop to all-time lows over four consecutive reporting cycles.