Anthony Albanese has repeated his declaration that Australia’s ambassador to Washington, Kevin Rudd, won’t be going anywhere. Follow today’s news live.

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has now repeated his declaration that Australia’s ambassador to Washington, Kevin Rudd, won’t be going anywhere.

On Sky News, Albanese agreed that Rudd would still be in the job a year from now. On ABC Insiders, Albanese went further:

He’s Australia’s appointment. It says something about the importance of the United States that we have appointed a former prime minister.

That’s a sign of how seriously we take this relationship, which is a relationship between our peoples, based upon our common values.

The work that he did with Aukus was a difficult task to get that through the Congress and the Senate. But when I was there, one of the things that struck me was just how extensive the links that Kevin Rudd had developed with you at the US, Congress and the Senate were.

He continues to do the job. He has developed relationships across the political spectrum in the United States, as I expect any ambassador to do, and that’s why he received praise from people such as Tony Abbott as well as Malcolm Turnbull as well as Peter Dutton for the job that he’s been doing.