Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

One of the things I won't do, in front of a boom mic, is make a joke about our island neighbours drowning. That's one of the things that I won't do! I won't do that. And I won't do that because I want to build good relations with our Pacific neighbours. One of the things that we provided for in the budget is there for all to see—and if the Leader of the Opposition wants to have a look at the budget papers, we've made it very clear that one of the things we will do is provide support for our Pacific island neighbours for infrastructure that they need to be dealing with because of the threat that countries like Tuvalu and Kiribati are experiencing.

One of the things that we saw during the election campaign was Solomon Islands front and centre of the campaign. The fact is that Australia, unfortunately, has stepped back and that other nations, with the strategic competition that's occurring in our region, have stepped in. One of the things we need to be very conscious of is that climate change is indeed a national security issue. That is something that is recognised by the United States and it's something that is recognised by our other partners and, indeed, by our allies. It's something that was recognised in the Quad leaders meeting.

The first thing I did as Prime Minister was get on a plane and visit Tokyo to meet with Prime Minister Modi, Prime Minister Kishida and President Biden. There, we spoke about the responsibility that we have—

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