KYLE SANDILANDS, HOST: Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese.
JACQUELINE LAST, HOST: Look at you, new engaged. Congratulations.
SANDILANDS: Good morning, Prime Minister.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning. Thank you so much.
SANDILANDS: How exciting.
LAST: I have to ask you Prime Minister, when you were on last, which was only two weeks ago, right before you popped the question, Kyle said, when are you going to pop the question? And you got all funny. You would have known in your head, oh my god I’m going to.
PRIME MINISTER: I did completely know at that point in time. And I think I might have pushed back hard.
SANDILANDS: Yeah, you did
LAST: I think you pushed back hard, yeah.
PRIME MINISTER: That's between me and Jodie, because I didn't want her talking about it either because it was really important it be a surprise. And indeed it was. It was a miracle in my business.
LAST: Tell me everything.
SANDILANDS: Okay, Valentine's day. So, that was the day. What did you put the love heart roses. What did you do? What happened?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, in the morning, first, she got roses, of course, from the rose garden it must be said at The Lodge.
SANDILANDS: You picked your own flowers. Oh that’s nice.
PRIME MINISTER: They were fresh. Absolutely fresh. So, Jodie thought that's pretty good, I’d probably topped out there. And so we went out to dinner at a restaurant in Canberra called Italian and Sons, and we had a little two course dinner. It wasn't very long.
SANDILANDS: Two course, what did you have?
LAST: Did you have starter and main or main and dessert?
SANDILANDS: No, main and dessert.
PRIME MINISTER: Starter and main.
SANDILANDS: Oh, what? No dessert?
LAST: That's what I do.
PRIME MINISTER: I'm trying to be good, Kyle.
LAST: Yeah. You're shredding for the wedding.
SANDILANDS: Shredding for the wedding, yeah, that's it.
PRIME MINISTER: So, then we went back to The Lodge, and Jodie said, I'll get ready for bed. I said, hang on, hang on, I got something. And Jodie was doing Febfast, and I was doing it in solidarity. So, I got out, I had a bottle of champagne ready, I had glasses on one of the balconies at the Lodge overlooking the side garden. So, it's quite nice. You can't see anything except for trees.
SANDILANDS: Is the sun down, or it’s dark now, though right? It’s dark?
PRIME MINISTER: It's dark now. It's dark, but there's a little delicate light out there. And we sat down and I just told her that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her and asked her to marry me.
SANDILANDS: Did you get on your knee?
PRIME MINISTER: I'm not giving that level of detail, Kyle.
SANDILANDS: You won't take a knee, even for the wedding?
PRIME MINISTER: No, I'm just not giving that level of detail.
SANDILANDS: Let's just assume he got on his knees.
PRIME MINISTER: Some things have got to stay between a gentleman.
SANDILANDS: That's true. And when you asked, did she immediately say yes or was she flabbergasted?
PRIME MINISTER: No, she was totally ready.
SANDILANDS: Oh that’s so nice.
PRIME MINISTER: And it was lovely. It was a really lovely moment. And then she got the big shock because I put the ring in a box below the seat. And so what she was shocked about was my ability to actually, as Prime Minister, go out and secretly get an engagement ring.
SANDILANDS: How did you organise that?
LAST: How did you get that? That's a good question.
SANDILANDS: You must have pulled some strings there, did you?
PRIME MINISTER: My security team are very discreet, and it didn't appear in my diary where I was going, to Cerrone’s, which is a lovely jewellery place at Leichardt.
SANDILANDS: I know Nick, I know Cerrone’s.
PRIME MINISTER: Nick, he's fantastic.
SANDILANDS: He's a great jeweller.
LAST: Oh, he would have loved that.
PRIME MINISTER: And he can keep a secret. So, we went through that exercise. There were a couple of visits there.
SANDILANDS: Really? You whipped into Cerrone’s on the sly. Obviously you didn't have the flag, you didn't drive the car with the flag. Do you have another car you just get in and you're like a normie driving around or no?
PRIME MINISTER: You can just take it off.
LAST: Oh yeah, right. Is Jodie's dad still here with us?
PRIME MINISTER: Yeah. Jodie, there was a bit of a surreal moment when Jodie said that she was seeing her parents on the weekend so she could tell them then. I said to her, have a look at where we are, I think this might get out.
SANDILANDS: Yeah, exactly. Did you ask the father for permission or are you beyond that?
PRIME MINISTER: No, we facetimed her mum and dad, woke them up. They were in bed. They were very happy to be woken up. They're lovely people.
SANDILANDS: They’d be thrilled.
LAST: Would you be doing a bucks party?
SANDILANDS: I've already organised it. I've spoken to a couple of my boys and they say we got you sorted. You know what I’m saying?
PRIME MINISTER: There might be more than one.
SANDILANDS: Oh, yeah. You'll have to do your loser one with your loser Canberra friends, then the real bucks party me and John got sorted.
LAST: Are you doing a bucks or will it be something else?
PRIME MINISTER: We haven't had, well since last Wednesday, it hasn't been very long, I've been literally on the road. I've been to Perth, I got back from Perth last night into Sydney. But I've been up in Newcastle and the Central Coast and down to Nowra. So we haven't really had a chance to advance any of the discussion. But hopefully -
SANDILANDS: Sorry for texting you yesterday because I was out the front of Albo’s joint on a boat with all the Idol top twelve. And these kids are from all over the country, some are in the bush. And I was like, oh, that's the Prime Minister's house, that's Kirribilli. And they'd never seen it before. It was like it was a miracle to them. They were like, really? They couldn't believe it.
PRIME MINISTER: You could have called in if I was there.
SANDILANDS: Well, that's why I texted you and was like, ‘Yo, bro, you home? We are out the front on the boat’ is what I said.
PRIME MINISTER: And I was in Perth.
SANDILANDS: You were in Perth. Yeah, unfortunately.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I got to say, I'm loving some of Idol. It is one of the shows that when it's on, I flick over and I'm amazed by the talent of some of these young people.
SANDILANDS: By the way, you’re going to Taylor Swift on Friday night? Me and Jackie are headed off to the big. I know you love a concert. Have you got time or not?
PRIME MINISTER: I am. Everyone's got time for Tay Tay, haven't they?
SANDILANDS: One hundred per cent.
PRIME MINISTER: It's going to be an event -
SANDILANDS: Do you know when you're going?
PRIME MINISTER: I'm going Friday.
SANDILANDS: We're all going Friday.
LAST: You might be in the same suite as us then.
PRIME MINISTER: Might be.
SANDILANDS: We're in the Frontier Presidential Suite. Is that where you're at or are you down the front?
PRIME MINISTER: I have no idea where I am.
SANDILANDS: You probably mosh pit in that.
LAST: Yes.
PRIME MINISTER: Probably.
SANDILANDS: And I saw on the news last night and I was watching Channel Seven and they showed that you guys are getting all these unmanned drone navy boats, which I think is a great idea.
PRIME MINISTER: We are.
SANDILANDS: What's with the drone navy boats? And I think they say smaller boats, unmanned, missile carrying. Because maybe I'm wrong, I don't know about international protection, but for the future are we better off putting all the money into protecting ourselves? Because we're not an aggressive country, but we need to protect right? Is that the vibe?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, that's exactly what these will do. And they'll work with the larger ships that are manned. But what they'll do enable the capacity of the Navy to have a defence instead of having just one ship. To put it simply, going forward, they'll have sister ships, if you like, unmanned ships next to them that are armed and are able to be unmanned. It's quite exciting. In the briefings that we had about it all, it's certainly a way of the future. And we want to make sure that we bring our defence forces up to the twenty-first century, up to the task. That's why we're more than doubling our surface fleet.
SANDILANDS: We're doubling our navy fleet. Wow.
PRIME MINISTER: When you think about it, we're an island continent and Navy is absolutely critical for us. So, we will be increasing our naval personnel as well over the years. So, any of your listeners there who are thinking about a career of the future, certainly the Navy will be offering many positions.
SANDILANDS: So, you're looking for seamen?
PRIME MINISTER: Yes, we are looking for naval personnel is the way that I’d put it.
SANDILANDS: I don't know the lingo.
LAST: Just going back to the wedding that's coming up. Kyle invited you to his wedding. I'm wondering -
SANDILANDS: Don't put him on the spot.
LAST: I know, but it's what we all are wondering. Do you think he would get an invite?
SANDILANDS: Sorry, Prime Minister. That's such an asshole move.
LAST: Sorry.
PRIME MINISTER: Everyone at this point is on the maybe list, except for Mr. And Mrs. Haydon.
SANDILANDS: Who are they?
PRIME MINISTER: The parents.
SANDILANDS: Jodie's parents.
LAST: The only ones not on the maybe list.
SANDILANDS: Is Barnaby invited? Because Barnaby looks like he has quite the fun time. Old Barnaby.
PRIME MINISTER: No, Barnaby's not invited.
SANDILANDS: Well it's not an open bar, so he probably wouldn't show. Listen, I reckon that, I know Barnaby's not everyone's favourite, but shouldn't that kid instead of filming him, actually asked him, ‘hey, are you alright?’, even if it was anyone laying there.
PRIME MINISTER: Sure –
SANDILANDS: But you wouldn't get the TikTok hit.
PRIME MINISTER: Probably a good idea that it didn't happen, but -
SANDILANDS: Better off that you avoid those things. I get it.
LAST: All righty, well, we'll let you go. Congratulations. So happy for you and Jodie. Send her my love.
SANDILANDS: Has everyone stopped bitching about the tax cuts and realised, hey, this is helping everyone. Have they all realised or are they still listening to the Mr. Potatohead going on and on and on?
PRIME MINISTER: Nah. The tax cuts -
SANDILANDS: It dropped out.
LAST: Oh well.