Anthony Albanese won’t divulge whether he will take an offering to his long-awaited one-on-one meeting with Donald Trump next month, like other world leaders, but flagged that there will be upcoming negotiations over access to Australia’s critical minerals stockpiles.<\/p>\n
The government had previously signalled plans to ramp up the mining and processing of the valuable critical minerals, with the hope it could be leveraged to negotiate exemptions from the Trump administration’s trade tariffs.<\/p>\n
But on Sunday, the prime minister would not say exactly what Australia’s critical minerals offer to the United States included \u2014 nor whether it was exclusive to the Trump administration, after he discussed the issue with his British counterpart.<\/p>\n
Other world leaders have gone into their meetings with Mr Trump armed with a significant gesture. British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, for example, went bearing an invitation from the king for a state visit.<\/p>\n
“We will have those negotiations with President Trump in person,” Mr Albanese told ABC’s Insiders on Sunday.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
King Charles and Anthony Albanese during a royal audience engagement at Balmoral Castle. (Supplied: Instagram \/ @Albomp)<\/p>\n
“Australia has everything that is in demand, almost the entire periodic table, and whether you’re looking at lithium, with the reserves that we have, or cobalt, or copper, or vanadium, we have great resources.”<\/p>\n
Critical minerals could end up being part of the AUKUS deal with the US and UK, Mr Albanese said, because the minerals will be required to build defence equipment.<\/p>\n
“One of the things that we want to do is to make sure that we don’t just dig things up, our resources, export them, watch someone else value-add, and then import them back at greater prices,” he said.<\/p>\n
“What we’re talking about here is not giving anything to anyone \u2014 even our friends. What we are talking about is making sure that we maximise the return to Australia of that.”<\/p>\n
After a “splendid” lunch with King Charles at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, Mr Albanese also ruled out holding a referendum to make Australia a republic while he is in office.<\/p>\n
“I have made it clear that I wanted to hold one referendum while I was PM and we did that \u2026 so one referendum the entire time you are prime minister, we did that,” he said.Albanese to sit down with Trump next month<\/p>\n
The prime minister is scheduled to sit down for his first formal meeting with Mr Trump on October 20<\/a>, after an earlier attempt on the sidelines of the G20 summit fell over when the president departed early amid the conflict with Iran.<\/p>\n The pair then had a brief catch-up during a function for world leaders in New York last week, with a smiling selfie from the encounter posted to social media.<\/p>\n But off the back of the meet and greet, Mr Albanese was coy on what would be discussed when he returns to the US.<\/p>\n “I need to treat him with the respect that the president of the United States deserves, and I expect that to be returned,” he said.<\/p>\n Donald Trump imposes 100 per cent tariff on pharmaceuticals from October 1 <\/a><\/p>\n The United States will impose a 100 per cent tariff on imports of branded or patented pharmaceutical products from October 1, unless a pharmaceutical company is building a manufacturing plant in the US.\u00a0<\/p>\n “And certainly, the indications are \u2014 we’ve had five either phone conversations or greetings in person now \u2014 and they’ve all been warm, constructive, positive and optimistic.”<\/p>\n