Australia election 2025 live: Albanese and Dutton attend Anzac Day dawn services; Coalition slips again in polls | Australia news

Reports of hecklers during Acknowledgment of Country at Melbourne’s Dawn Service

There are reports from Melbourne that some of the crowd at the dawn service at the Shrine of Remembrance were booing proceedings.

The Age and the Australian report that a group of men shouted over Bunurong elder Uncle Mark Brown as he welcomed attendees to his father’s land.

The Australian heard shouts of “this is our country” and “we don’t have to be welcomed”.

They also reportedly interrupted an address by the Victorian governor, Margaret Gardner, booing her Acknowledgement of Country.

Dawn services take place across Australia

Veterans and members of the public are attending services across the country. In Sydney:

In Melbourne:

And in Canberra:

Peter Dutton drags Coalition primary vote to lowest levels in YouGov poll

Though the campaigns are officially on pause this morning for Anzac Day events, we are now barely a week from election day – and the polls are continuing to look bad for the Coalition.

The Coalition’s primary vote plunging to its lowest level in a leading poll as the election looms large, Australian Associated Press reports.

The Coalition’s primary vote has dropped to 31%, down from 33% last week, the latest YouGov poll provided to AAP shows. Labor’s primary vote is up 0.5% to 33.5%.

The lowest-ever primary vote the Coalition had received in YouGov polling is driven by the opposition leader’s unpopularity, the organisation’s director of public data, Paul Smith, says.

“The public have clearly made a decision that they don’t want Peter Dutton as prime minister,” he told AAP. “The Coalition is going backwards at a rate of knots.”

The YouGov polling shows Labor leading the Coalition by 53.5% to 46.5% on a two-party preferred basis.

Labor’s support is higher than its 2022 federal election result of 52.1%, while the coalition’s is 4.7% lower than it achieved at that election.

Anthony Albanese (50%) has also extended his lead over Dutton (35 %) as preferred prime minister.

Dutton’s net satisfaction rating dipped to minus 18 from minus 10 last week while Albanese’s was down slightly to minus seven from minus six.

Here are some images from the dawn services attended by the prime minister and opposition leader. As a reminder, Peter Dutton is in his electorate of Dickson in Queensland, while Anthony Albanese is at the War Memorial in Canberra:

Paul Daley on Anzac Day’s increasing Christian elements

While Australia becomes increasingly secular, today’s Anzac services will be steeped in religious imagery and terminology, writes Paul Daley.

He argues that the “abundance of Christianity in Anzac Day services stands to emotionally and culturally isolate more and more people”:

The Australian War Memorial’s Anzac dawn service is popularly revered as a solemn and respectful commemoration of Australia’s participation in the Gallipoli invasion in 1915 – an event many still (fallaciously, I’ve long argued) cling to as the birth of the Australian nation.

But not everyone believes the ceremony ought continue to include elements of traditional Christian worship as it conventionally has, and as it did last year and doubtless will again this year. Last year, again, there were Christian hymns. The Lord’s Prayer. A presiding Christian chaplain.

Read his full piece here:

The opposition leader has issued a statement to mark Anzac Day as “one of the most significant, solemn and sacred days” on the Australian national calendar.

Peter Dutton said that on this particular Anzac Day, “we will especially feel the weight of history”.

2025 marks 80 years since the end of the second world war. That global conflagration engulfed almost every continent and almost every country. Barely a city or town, a suburb or street, a community or citizen was unscathed in some way by the catastrophe of that all-encompassing conflict.

On this 80-year anniversary, Dutton expressed his gratitude “to the one million Australians who served and served with great honour”:

We honour the 39,000 Australians who gave their lives. They experienced the horror of war to defeat tyranny and restore peace.

As the custodians of that peace, it’s our duty to deter tyranny and prevent catastrophic war. In that duty, may we never waver in effort, energy and endeavour – spurred on by the souls we commemorate on Anzac Day. Lest we forget.

The prime minister attended the service at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.

Anthony Albanese said this morning it was important to take time out of the flurry of campaigning to honour Australia’s defence forces, 110 years after the Gallipoli landings.

“As we gather around cenotaphs or watch the parades, we reflect on all who have served in our name and all who serve now,” Albanese said.

“We contemplate the debt we owe them – those who finally came home, their hearts reshaped by all they had seen and those who tragically never did.

“Anzac Day asks us to stand against the erosion of time. So each year, we renew our vow to keep the flame of memory burning so brightly that its glow touches the next generation and the generation after that.”

Sarah Basford Canales

Peter Dutton attends dawn service in his electorate of Dickson

It was an early morning for media following Peter Dutton on his campaign bus.

The opposition leader is in his own electorate of Dickson, north of Brisbane, visiting the Norths Leagues & Services Club in Kallangur for an Anzac dawn service.

It’s a dreary morning for the solemn event, with the rain proving relentless.

Dutton was joined by his wife, Kirilly, in the front row under a marquee sheltered from the rain.

Welcome

Martin Farrer

Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. I’m Martin Farrer with the top overnight stories and then it’ll be Krishani Dhanji with the main action.

The leaders of the major parties have paused their campaigns this morning to attend Anzac Day dawn services. The prime minister has been at the service at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, while the opposition leader was at an event in Brisbane in his own electorate. Albanese said the memory of the fallen must be kept alive while Dutton said it was Australians’ “duty to deter tyranny and prevent catastrophic war”. More coming up.

Our top story this Anzac Day morning is that the defence department has issued a “respectful request” to veterans such as the shadow defence minister, Andrew Hastie, and others who are standing as election candidates to stop using pictures of themselves in military uniform on their campaign material.

Another of our top stories is the Coalition pledging that if they got into government they would abandon a longstanding Howard-era target for a two-thirds share for skilled migrants in an effort to slash permanent migration by 25%, or 45,000 people, next year.

They need to make an impact, because a poll out today shows its primary vote has slipped to 31% with Labor up to 33.5%. Labor is leading by 53.5% to 46.5% on a two-party preferred basis, matching strong numbers in other recent polls.