: Let's bring in Prime Minister Anthony Albanese now live on the Grey Coast. PM, good morning to you. Look, Alfred certainly outstayed its welcome, hasn't it?
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: It sure has. We've got the four phases. Prepare - and people prepared extraordinarily well, Karl. They, they really did and that's made a difference. But then we have the response and people are certainly responding. The volunteers that I had the opportunity to thank yesterday at the Gold Coast Council, at Logan, and at the Barracks there of the Australian Defence Force, at Gallipoli, doing an extraordinary job. Then of course, we have relief and I can announce, Karl, that the Disaster Recovery Allowance will kick in, will be available from 2pm tomorrow afternoon. That provides up to 13 weeks payment for people who are unable to get to work, who have lost their living wage going through. People can check eligibility there on the MyGov website. And then of course we'll have recovery, and the recovery in this is going to take a long time. You've seen the beaches here on the coast have disappeared and certainly today there's still a lot of risk out there. People should stay safe, follow the authorities' advice because we will see flash flooding in the region. As you can maybe see behind me, there's been torrential rain this morning, just about all night.
SARAH ABO, HOST: Yeah. Prime Minister, I think that financial assistance couldn't come soon enough, right, for so many residents who have been impacted here. And also that frustration. It's so difficult though, isn't it, with a cyclone? We know that it is a delicate dance trying to get the forecast right. Obviously Alfred was delayed and then was downgraded by the time it made landfall. Do you think that councils maybe shut things down too soon? You know that financial assistance you mentioned is going to be taken up by a lot of businesses that feel as though they could have stayed open.
PRIME MINISTER: Look, I think the precautionary principle kicks in here and the preparedness that was done, I'm not going to criticise any council. I think that state governments - we've worked seamlessly with the governments of both David Crisafulli and Chris Minns. Local governments' response has been extraordinary. When I was at the council meetings yesterday, you have people who essentially have been working around the clock to help their fellow residents in their local communities. And as for the Australian Defence Force, it was really my honour yesterday to go and thank the fine men and women of the Australian Defence Force there at Gallipoli Barracks at Enoggera, because that of course, is where the units came from that had the accident on Saturday evening. One person remains in hospital, a soldier, and we certainly wish him a full recovery and our thoughts are with him and his family. It is good that everyone else has now been discharged from hospital and it just shows the risk that people in the Australian Defence Force take when they enlist to help out their fellow Australians, and we thank them today, tomorrow and every day.
STEFANOVIC: I think one of the great things was you getting the ADF involved early in this. It's a great visual. It's a great relief to folks out there for sure. Look, Canberra's made a lot of you having to delay the election. I don't think anyone cares, but they've made a lot of it -
PRIME MINISTER: Of course they don't. Karl, I'll tell you what I'm focused on. I'm focused on helping Australians -
STEFANOVIC: Yeah.
PRIME MINISTER: Not focused on votes. And you know, that - I did get a bit frustrated with people continuing to ask. I've said for a long time that - and I think that when we did the 60 Minutes piece, I said to you, you know, I think governments should serve their full term. You know, we're governing and we're governing in a way that's completely put politics aside. We're just about helping people because that's what people expect and that's what they deserve, most importantly.
STEFANOVIC: You are going to make us do an eight week campaign, though. I mean, it's a - God, God help us all.
ABO: It's going to be long.
PRIME MINISTER: Karl and Sarah, you'll get to chat to me even more than than usual.
ABO: Lucky you.
PRIME MINISTER: Surely that's something we can all look forward to. I miss our Friday mornings and I miss my friend Christopher Pyne as well.
STEFANOVIC: Well, you're going to have to buy some nuclear subs off him, anyway. Thank you, PM for being with us. We appreciate it. It's been a busy weekend for you.
PRIME MINISTER: Thank for the work that you've done.
STEFANOVIC: All right. Thank you, my friend.
