Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was declared the winner of Sunday night’s final leaders debates, concluding a four-debate series with a 2-1 win over Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.
None of the questions were a surprise, however — at least not to us at Crikeywho were leaked Seven political editor Mark Riley’s script more than two hours before the debate began at 8:10pm eastern time.
Images of Seven’s internal script program, used to guide Riley’s prompts to both major party leaders throughout the debate, show that while at times he strayed off-piste to push the leaders on certain issues, he mostly followed them verbatim.
Crikey first received images of Riley’s full script at 5:36pm on Sunday afternoon, and has confirmed at least two other political journalists also received the leaks; the Daily Mail reported ahead of the debate that there would be a question on Welcome to Country ceremonies.
Related Article Block Placeholder
Article ID: 1203921
The first question in the script asked the leaders about the cost of living: “Australian families are under the pump. Our viewers constantly tell us they are getting smashed at the supermarket. How will you make life more affordable?”
Riley’s words on air were very similar: “Australian families, we know, are doing it tough — they’re under the pump. Our viewers constantly tell us that they’re getting smashed at the supermarkets every week. What will you do from Sunday to make their lives easier?”
References in Riley’s script that quoted Dutton calling energy rebates a “Ponzi scheme” and calling the proposed fuel excise cut a “taxpayer funded shopper docket” also materialised.
Notably, a late change to Riley’s script didn’t materialise — on the topic of defence, Riley’s script included a question for Dutton about Albanese being “weak on Israel”, but possibly owing to an extended discussion on the implications of a Trump presidency in the United States, the question was skipped over.
During the 2022 federal election, Seven’s questions were leaked to both parties, with Albanese the opposition leader at the time seeking election against former Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison.
While it is not known whether the leaked questions made it to either team this time around, it would be unlikely that Dutton’s camp were made aware in advance, given the opposition leader’s struggles to accurately guess the price of a dozen free range eggs — a question that was also leaked ahead of time to Crikey.
Crikey asked Seven whether participants were briefed by the broadcaster ahead of time, whether it had changed its operational processes since 2022 to avoid the questions leaking, and whether it had any comment on the fact that Seven staff had leaked the questions for two successive election debates.
Seven declined to comment.
