00:00Look, he's indicating, Gemma, that he wants the government to put something in writing
00:06should they rely on the Greens to form government after the next election.
00:10There has been plenty of speculation as people watched the polls over the past few months
00:14that neither Labor nor the coalition will hit the 76 seats they need at the next election
00:20to form majority government.
00:22In that case, both Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton would need to go to the crossbench
00:26and seek support from those independents, and potentially the Greens as well, to form
00:32government, to make their numbers up to that 76 required to pass bills within the House.
00:38Now, going back to 2010, the last time we had a hung parliament, Julia Gillard formed
00:43a deal with the Greens and some independents as well to form government there.
00:48That has left some Labor MPs fairly scarred from that situation because they went on to
00:53lose government in 2013.
00:56But the Greens are saying they would like some sort of deal, something written down,
01:01some key agreements, for example, to map out how the parliament would work, and the terms
01:05of their support as well.
01:07All of this, of course, is speculation because an election is, of course, months away and
01:11we don't know what the result will be.
01:13But this is what Adam Bandt is setting out as the Greens essentially conditions or at
01:17least their hopes for how a minority government might work, should that be the situation.
01:22Here's Adam Bandt speaking on this yesterday.
01:26It should be a stable, effective and progressive parliament and I think there would be a lot
01:32of merit in knowing from the start what the reforms are that could be achieved in that
01:38parliament and I think working that out in advance, working out what the benefits will
01:43actually be for people and knowing how then the next three years would map out, that's
01:48probably the priority and I think from there it could take all sorts of different forms.
01:54Tom, the government says a deal is not on the cards.
01:57The Prime Minister has been asked about this quite a few times over the past few months
02:01because of that speculation around what a minority parliament would look like and he
02:05says Labor simply isn't inclined to be cutting deals with the Greens or with anybody else
02:11for that matter.
02:12Labor has been very clear they're campaigning to form a majority government.
02:16The Greens there talked about stability, well Labor says the most stable outcome would be
02:20a majority government potentially in either direction, whether that's Labor or the coalition.
02:27That being said, of course, the government, as I mentioned before, is a little bit scarred
02:31from that 2010 experience.
02:32There's a desire not to return to a minority parliament like that with those kinds of deals
02:38being cut with the Greens and with independents.
02:41That was sort of held over Labor at the time, they were attacked quite a bit by the coalition
02:46on that very issue.
02:47So there's certainly sensitivity around that.
02:50Here's the Finance Minister, Katie Gallagher, speaking this morning on this question of
02:54whether Labor would be open to any kind of deal.
02:57We're not planning on that, Michael.
02:59We will go into the campaign seeking majority government.
03:02We will be explaining why we think that is important to provide certainty, particularly
03:07in these difficult economic times and that is what we will campaign for.
03:12Now Gemma, of course, an election is only a few months away now.
03:16There's no way to forecast the results apart from the opinion polls that are floating around
03:20in London.
03:21Minority government is absolutely a possibility at the very least.
03:24If that were to occur, well, all bets would surely be off at that point.
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