February 1996 TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER
THE HON JOHN HOWARD MP
AM PROGRAMME WITH FRAN KELLY
E& OE
KELLY: Prime Minister, good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning.
KELLY:
Prime Minister, yesterday you announced the bare outline of a ' work for the dole'
scheme and in so doing successfully managed to knock the headlines, turn the
headlines away from the messy Bob Woods' affair that dominated last week, can you
tell us now any more about this proposal for the young unemployed?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, can I just say on that question of knocking things off the front pages, I thought
the main challenge of governments was job generation, small business and boosting the
economy. So, I mean, let it not be thought for a moment that a Government scheme to
tackle youth unemployment is a diversion from the main issues. I thought it was the
main issue.
KELLY:
No, I'm just making the point, as you said this morning, that it's there on the headlines.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I think the context in which this... . this was no sudden announcement. We've
been looking at this for a number of weeks. We still have more work to do on it. It
will be piloted in about 30 or so rural and regional areas of very high unemployment.
We will try a mixture of voluntary and compulsory schemes. We'll be inviting various
community organisations to put forward proposals for approval by the Government.
Award rates will be payable and that means In effect that people will only have to work
in most cases 15 or 20 hours a week. They will still have time left to look for long
term employment. It is not scab labour. It is not slave labour. It is not chain gang
labour because people are being paid at award rates. It will help, along with a number
of other things, to try and break the cycle of despondency which is my biggest worry
about the 100, 000 young people who can't get work, of which 3 0, 000 are out of work
for more than six months. Can I stress Fran that it's not the only thing that we are
doing. It's one of a number of things we're doing. We've successfully launched the
Green Corps. I understand, for example, that we advertised for something like 230
place and within a week or 10 days we had 1100 responses for those 230 places. And
we still haven't launched the first, formally launched, the first Green Corps project. So
it's one of a number of things I'll be announcing later this month, some more initiatives
to reduce red tape for small business. And we've launched the new and modern
training and apprenticeship scheme. I want the ' work for the dole' scheme to be one
of the total, one element of the total armory of policies that the Government has in
order to tackle the problem of youth unemployment.
KELLY:
Well just a little bit more of the details you've said people will work for award
wages. I think the under 20s dole is around $ 90 a week, I think...
PRIME MINISTER:
That's right.
KELLY: a little bit less if you're 17.
PRIME MINISTER:
And there are junior rates though. So when I talk about awards I mean the rate that is
prescribed in the case of people under 21 the relevant junior rate in the award which is
lower, of course, than the adult rate.
KELLY:
And some people it will be compulsory for some.
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes, it will.
KELLY: So if it's compulsory, if it doesn't work out for a young person, what happens to their
benefits? PRIME MINISTER:
Well, there are certain. obviously, when you say, doesn't work out, I mean if a person
refuses to work and persists with that refusal over a long period of time, well that
person could run the risk of losing their dole in the same way that if a person doesn't
satisfy the work test under the existing dole over a long period of time that person
could lose their dole. It will be no more severe or less severe in its application than the
application of the existing work test. So let's say, I understand what you may be
getting at, so let me just say at the outset, obviously if people stubbornly refuse to do
anything in return for the dole then over a period of time they could run the risk of
losing it. But it's not something that would happen immediately, but it would happen
in a measured way in exactly the same way as it happens under the existing
arrangement. I mean, I am quite unashamedly in favour of the principle of there being
a community obligation for a person to work out at award rates the value of his or her
dole. I don't think there's anything wrong in that providing it's based on the concept
of an award rate and in that sense you are not in any way exploiting people. But the
idea that a person can forever say, well, I expect a safety net to be provided and even
though I can do so I refuse to do anything in return for it, I don't think that's unfair, I
don't think it's harsh and I would imagine there'd be reasonable community support
for it. I was very interested in the vox pop you played at the beginning of the
programme. It indicated a fair amount of support for the concept and I'm encouraged
about that.
KELLY: Not all the support not all the comment though is positive. ACOSS has criticised
the scheme as third rate. They say it's been tried and discounted under other names in
the 70s and the 80s. Isn't it true that this kind of scheme does go against all the
thinking in this area, all the research? Your own Department of Employment
commissioned an 18 month study just recently that concluded that compulsory
voluntarism doesn't work. Isn't this reinventing the wheel, if you like, a wheel that's
been discarded?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that's completely wrong. To my knowledge a ' work for the dole' scheme of the
type 1 have just described has never been tried in Australia before. It certainly wasn't
tried by the Fraser Government and it definitely wasn't tried by the just let me finish
by the Hawke and Keating governments. And as for whether you say it goes against
established advice, well, we still have 8.5% unemployment, we still have 100 000
young people out of work. Maybe some of the established advice is inadequate...
KELLY:
But wasn't the whole criticism of Labor....
PRIME MINISTER:
Fran please let me finish. You asked quite a long question. And I think it is very
important to occasionally in these areas challenge the conventional wisdom. I am not
surprised that ACOSS would attack it although I notice that some of the individual
member bodies have been identified in the papers this morning as supporting it. I'm
not surprised that the Labor Party and the unions and the Democrats oppose it, but I
think out in the community people see the fairness of it and people want this
government to try a number of things. They know youth unemployment is a difficult
challenge. They know we were left with a huge problem; they know the Labor Party
had thirteen and a half years and left us with 8.5% unemployment and pushed it to
11% during its period in office, so they understand that we can't fix it overnight, but
what they do expect and require of us is that we try different stratagems and this is one
of those stratagems. It's never been tried before in the way I've outlined it in Australia
and therefore we are not reinventing the wheel, we are in fact trying something
different. KELLY: Well, when you came to power you criticised Labor for their make work programmes.
You said Labor wasn't creating real jobs, you were going to change that, you would
create real jobs. These aren't real jobs we're talking about here are they and more than
that they don't have necessarily real training attached to them.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Fran, there are other things that we are doing. I mean, if this were the only thing
that we were doing then that criticism would be legitimate, but we are trying to give,
we are giving incentives to small business. I mean, small business still remains the
hope of the side to reduce unemployment. We've cut their interest rates, we've
reduced their capital gains tax, we are reducing their paper burden, we've got rid of
the unfair dismissal law, we've given them new pro-small business industrial relations
laws, we are doing everything we humanly can to improve the climate for small
business. We've introduced a new apprenticeship and training scheme that will more
effectively marry the desires of young people for apprenticeships and the available
apprenticeships in the business sector. We've introduced a Green Corps which the
early signs are is going to be very successful, as well, we are going to pilot and if it
works effectively, introduce on a permanent basis a work for the dole scheme. Now, if
were only doing " work for the dole" and nothing else then what you say would be a
legitimate criticism, but we are doing a number of things. We are constantly attacking
this issue on every front. It's a very important issue, it's going to be very hard to solve
in the short term and the Employment Committee has been working very hard and
there are other issues, there are other policies also in the pipeline, other initiatives of
the Government that I'll be announcing over the coming months in this area, but this is
a very important part of the initiative.
KELLY:
On another issue Prime Minister, your first week back in parliament was dominated by
the troubles of a Parliamentary Secretary, Senator Bob Woods. Should you have
asked Senator Woods to step down from the front bench at least while the police
investigation was going on?
PRIME MINISTER:
No. KELLY: Why not?
PRIME MINISTER:
Because the normal thing is that you don't step down just on the basis of an allegation.
You do if a charge is made and in any event it would have been quite wrong of me to
have drawn the police investigation to Senator Woods' attention.
KELLY: When did Senator Woods first become aware of the investigation?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well you'd have to cross examine him, but he told me that he didn't know anything
about it until his office was raided. That's what he told me, but if in fact that is the
case and I have no reason to doubt that it's the case, but of course it is a matter for
him, then it would have been grossly improper of me, and it would have left me open
to an accusation of interfering with a police inquiry to have alerted him to the
complaint. KELLY:
Did you ask the Federal police or ask for advice whether it would have been
appropriate? PRIME MINISTER:
No. Look, the longstanding procedure with this is that you are advised of it but you
stay out of it. I mean, it is a police matter. I treated Senator Woods in the same way
as any other citizen. He didn't get any preferment. On the other hand, he does not
deserve any pre-emptive judgments to be made. He is entitled like any other citizen to
a presumption of innocence. I behaved absolutely correctly. It may have been
politically easier if I had done other things, but I didn't. I behaved absolutely correctly
and I have no apology at all to make for my handling of it.
KELLY: We now know that another Coalition MiP, Michael Cobb, was being investigated by
the Federal Police last year. Have you been told of any other Coalition Mi~ s being
investigated by the Federal Police for allegations of...
PRIME MINISTER:
Well you shouldn't get too excited about the answer I'm about to give but the usual
thing is that you don't comment on those matters.
KELLY: You were informed by the Attorney General in September last year that Senator
Woods was under investigation by the Federal Police...
PRIME MINISTER:
That a complaint had been made.
KELLY: Yes. PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that's an important difference.
KELLY:
That PRIME MINISTER:
That a complaint had been made.
KELLY: All right. I was under the impression that in November last year Senator Woods was
given extra Ministerial responsibilities when he was put in charge of the $ 2 billion
pharmaceutical benefits scheme. Was that wise given that he had had a complaint
made against him in terms of handling of moneys?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, they weren't extra responsibilities in the sense that they were outside the ambit of
the area in which he was already assisting the Health Minister and you know, you are
either in or out and I would have thought it was perfectly normal that if somebody
continues until good grounds exist for them not to continue, then they ought to do
what a person continuing that job would normally be expected to do.
KELLY: So that didn't trouble you when you were made aware?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no.
KELLY: Have you now initiated any action by your department to make sure that all members
of your Executive Council knowingly or unknowingly everything is in order, all their
books are in order...
PRIME MINISTER:
Well what do you mean by unknowingly?
KELLY: Well, any of your M~ s may have unknowingly made a mistake that makes...
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I think I would have, look Fran, I am not going to go into the details of private
discussions I might have with my colleagues about this. Suffice it to say that I expect
people to be careful. I expect them to be scrupulously honest, I expect them to be
completely above board. There is no evidence yet, there is no evidence yet that Bob
Woods wasn't above board with his travel allowance. I mean, the easy way in which
we are already slipping into accepting that somebody is guilty of something, I reject. I
mean, the man, whatever has been said over the last week, the man is entitled to a
presumption of innocence and I demand, I expect that he get that presumption like any
other citizen.
KELLY: Just finally and briefly, there is a suggestion that Cabinet will today reconsider the cuts
to legal aid funding. In your view, is there any scope for any of those funds cut in the
last budget to be reinstated?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I don't speculate about what is going to be on the Cabinet agenda but the
principle behind those cuts is a very fair and sustainable one and that is, we pay legal
aid for the operation of Commonwealth law. We expect the states to pay at the state
law. Now that is the basis upon which our decision was taken. I think that is an
absolutely defensible and correct basis and the quite disgraceful way in which many of
the states have tried emotionally to use individual cases involving the operation not of
Commonwealth law but of the operation of state law to put pressure on the Attorney
General and to put pressure on the Government is something that ought to be exposed.
Now I am not going to pre-empt or talk about what is discussed at a Cabinet meeting
but let me defend very strongly the principle that it is fair for the Commonwealth to be
expected to pay for legal aid in relation to the operation of Commonwealth law and it
is fair of us to say to the states, you look after legal aid when it comes to state law, and
if you apply that principle, you will see that the decisions that were announced in the
budget were very fair indeed.
KELLY:
Prime Minister, thank you.
PRIME MINISTER:
It's a pleasure.
ends
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