Anyone else receive this text on election day last Saturday? Source: Supplied
He’s back from his first assignment as Australia’s prime minister at the Quad meeting in Tokyo, and now Anthony Albanese has accused his predecessor Scott Morrison of a “disgraceful” act on his final day in office.
Texts under “NEWSALERT” were sent to voters in targeted areas hours before polls closed on Saturday night, telling recipients that an illegal boat had been intercepted by the Australian Border and advising them to “keep our borders secure by voting Liberal”.
The move was heavily criticised, and Mr Albanese doubled down by accusing Morrison of politicising the issue.
So the instructions for the boat text on Saturday came from the PMO……..tells us everything we already knew and voted against
— Jane Austin (@onejaneaustin) May 26, 2022
— Karen Middleton (@KarenMMiddleton) May 21, 2022
“It’s an entire abuse of proper processes,” the newly minted Prime Minister said.
“This statement was made so it could facilitate the send of … potentially many millions of text messages to voters in a last-minute scare campaign.
“A disgraceful act from a government which was prepared to politicise everything but solve nothing.”
Former education minister Stuart Robert scoffed at the “hilarious” response from Mr Albanese and Labor.
“The fact a boat turned up is a statement of fact,” he said.
“How the information was disseminated, you’ll need other to comment on, having not been the home affairs minister at the time.”
Outgoing Home Affairs minister Karen Andrews said she had no knowledge of the texts being sent out before it was eventually confirmed that Morrison’s office had ordered the details be publicly released.
