3 November 1997
E&OE..........................................................................................................................
WARNEKE:
Prime Minister, good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning, Ross, nice to be with you.
WARNEKE:
Thanks for joining me. A year or so ago I was chatting with our State Premier, Jeff Kennett, and he made a good point. At least I think it was. You can’t expect too much from any anti-drugs programme until you fix the problems that cause people, particularly the young people, to start using drugs and those problems are unemployment and a feeling of insecurity. How confident are you that this new scheme will achieve much at all?
PRIME MINISTER:
Ross, I’m very confident that it will help. And no scheme will rid the country of the drug scourge but sensibly targeted schemes that have a balance between law enforcement, education and rehabilitation will help. I’m very confident that over a period of time this scheme, which I know will have the support and the cooperation of State governments and I hope people of goodwill all around the community, will make a contribution.
Obviously the psychological, human, personal, family, the employment and other circumstances that lead people to start taking drugs in the first place are the prime cause of the problem but this programme is designed, for example, through education to dissuade people from starting in the first place by pointing out the pitfalls of drug taking. At the rehabilitation end it is designed to help people who have fallen victim to drugs to rehabilitate themselves. And I talked to some young people yesterday after I’d launched the programme who had been in difficulty with drugs and were trying to put their lives together. And when you talk to even two or three young people and you gather from that discussion the sense of hope which has replaced a sense of despair then you realise that however difficult the task may be you have a moral obligation to try even harder and that basically is what we are endeavouring to do.
WARNEKE:
Mr Howard, I don’t think many people would argue with governments spending more money on rehabilitation for drug takers and the huge amount of money being pumped into that, I’m sure, is very welcome right around the country. But in education, that’s been tried, hasn’t it? We’ve had ad campaigns, we’ve had government initiatives sponsoring rock concerts and so on. Doesn’t this...
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don’t know that those sorts of approaches that you’ve named are necessarily the best...certainly not the only and not necessarily the best. I think one of the things you have to do over a period of time is to remove any notion in the eyes of young people that it is semi-fashionable to be involved in drug taking. I mean, we have had great success in other areas through educative programmes and there’s no reason why you can’t in relation to drugs. Now, it’s hard. Some people may think that it’s impossible but if you are serious about prevention - I mean, you cannot simultaneously say, look, once people are addicted then there’s really not much hope for them and yet deny the need for education.
I mean, I think you have to tackle it at every level. You’ve got to try and tackle it through law enforcement. You’ve got to try and dissuade people through education. And those who do fall victim, you’ve got to extend a helping hand and to try and rehabilitate them. And that is exactly the three-pronged approach, the balanced approach, which is involved in this initiative of mine. Now, I don’t pretend for a moment that it’s going to cure the problem - I’m a realist. But I do believe it is going to make a serious dent and it will, if it is supported all around the community - and bear in mind this is only the first instalment, it’s a very significant first instalment - if it is supported around the community then even if there are only a relatively small number of people whose lives are changed forever and whose lives are saved, well, it will have been worthwhile. And I’m confident it will be more than just a few. I mean, we lost 634 mainly young Australian men and women last year through heroin overdosing and that is a tragic loss of life. And, of course, the contribution it makes to crime, to break-ins and burglaries in particular, is incalculable.
WARNEKE:
Well, let’s look first of all at this issue of education because numerous surveys show that by the age of 17 or 18 a frightening percentage of young people have tried drugs.
PRIME MINISTER:
That’s true.
WARNEKE:
You’re talking about zero tolerance of drugs in schools. I’m sure a lot of parents would be aghast at you saying that because they would have assumed that we already have a zero tolerance.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, we don’t. There’s not much point in pretending that we do. I mean, we even had an appalling example in New South Wales recently where the local school expelled a couple of people because they’d been involved in, I think, smoking marijuana. It was the school rule and then they were over ruled by the New South Wales Education Department. And the strong stand that the school had decided to take was in fact undercut by the political pressure of the Minister. Now, I think there are parents all around Australia who might be aghast at my making that statement but they very strongly support such an approach. One of the reasons why there is such a high incidence is indeed the belief on the part of many people in the community that it is a normal thing to do. We have been very successful over the last few years in reducing the incidence of cigarette smoking in the Australian community. It is a lot less fashionable to smoke cigarettes now than used to be the case and that is the result of a concerted campaign.
WARNEKE:
But you seem to be talking about simply recruiting a different advertising agency?
PRIME MINISTER:
In fact I am not talking about that at all. I am talking about a far more sophisticated approach than that. I am talking about an education approach in the schools which explains in a non-judgemental fashion the consequences of drug taking and drug addiction and in a far more systematic and targeted and effective way than has been the case in the past. Now I don’t pretend to be an educator myself, I am not, but there are plenty of experts in the community who can help and I know that there will be a lot of goodwill from the States.
WARNEKE:
Let’s look at the question of policing. You have increased funding for the Australian Federal Police and Customs. The Opposition, of course, is saying that you simply are restoring money that you have already cut from them in the past couple of budgets.
PRIME MINISTER:
That is nonsense. Last year expenditure on the Customs service actually rose from $402 to $422 million. That is just absolute nonsense.
WARNEKE:
What about the Federal Police?
PRIME MINISTER:
The reductions that were made in the Federal Police budget did not have any significant effect at all on the anti-drug activity of the Federal Police. It would be a good idea on something as socially sensitive and important as drugs if people forgot their political differences. The public is not interested in political point scoring on an issue like this, they want people whether they are Labor or Liberal or anything else to work together in a sensible, constructive way. When we were in opposition and the Hawke Government launched its campaign in relation to AIDS we gave it bipartisan support, we didn’t knit-pick, we were very careful not to do that.
WARNEKE:
If you are not trying to score some political points with this announcement yesterday, and a lot of people have made the point that it really has served as a distraction from other issues, that the Government hasn’t been doing to well on. If it is not a political thing....?
PRIME MINISTER:
Are you suggesting that yesterday’s announcement was a political stunt are you?
WARNEKE:
Well a lot of people are.
PRIME MINISTER:
You are the first person who has made that suggestion, not even Mr Beazley has said that.
WARNEKE:
I think he has come pretty close.
PRIME MINISTER:
He has not even done that. Come on, you have got to be kidding yourself to make that remark. We decided three months ago to put together a strategy and yesterday’s announcement was the culmination of that. It has absolutely nothing to do with any other events. I announced three months ago that I would set up a task force to gather together possible initiatives in this area. It was sneered at by some of my critics at the time, we have produced a balanced package that has been widely applauded by the Australian Medical Association, by people in the community and volunteer sector like the Salvation Army and others who work at the coal face and know the personal misery and upset and distress and devastation caused to individuals and families, they have welcomed it. And I don’t think it merits, with great respect, the description of just a carefully staged political stunt. I mean, that is the ultimate in cynicism if I may say so.
WARNEKE:
Mr Howard, you quote the people who support your announcement yesterday...
PRIME MINISTER:
And there were some, but there are people who oppose it, of course.
WARNEKE:
And they’ve said really that it’s simply continued campaigns that in the past have proved totally unsuccessful.
PRIME MINISTER:
I don’t accept that criticism and I’m very happy to rest my case on the views of people who have been involved very directly at the coal face. Now, there are people in the community who believe that the answer to the problem is to remove any taint of criminality, any sanctions, any kind of criticism in a legally judgemental sense of drug taking and that the answer to the problem is to surrender as far as law enforcement is concerned. Now, that is not my view. I know there are people in the community who have the opposite view. I respect their point of view but I don’t think they’re right. Naturally when one is in government, one applies one’s own judgements after consultation with community organisations in arriving at decisions in areas like this.
WARNEKE:
So you’re saying that this programme is sufficiently different to what has gone before to make a difference.
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes, I am.
WARNEKE:
In what particular area?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, particularly in the area of education and also in the area providing more resources to community and volunteer organisations. This is the first time that there’s been such a heavy emphasis on giving resources to those organisations and I’ve always favoured delivering these sorts of programmes through those sorts of organisations because they have a better understanding of the problem than anybody else. They are there everyday helping people, putting lives together, listening to the heartbreaking stories of parents who’ve tried against enormous odds and not succeeded, bringing children back together with their parents and helping young people to break their addiction. Now, I think those people are very deserving of help and subsidy and support and that is why an enormous amount of the resources in this programme is directed to those sorts of organisations.
WARNEKE:
I made the point before, but the rehabilitation segment of this would be welcome by everyone.
PRIME MINISTER:
But the point I’m making in answer to your question about is it different is that there’s a much greater emphasis on giving resources for rehabilitation and detoxification to volunteer and community organisations. They have been dealt in to this programme in a way that that they haven’t been dealt in in the past. So many of them have had to get by in a very threadbare fashion in the past and quite a lot of them will benefit very significantly in terms of enhancing their capacity to help people.
WARNEKE:
Prime Minister, earlier this year your government, to put it bluntly, put the kybosh on the Canberra heroin trial for whatever reasons...
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I’ll tell you why we put the kybosh on it. We put the kybosh on it because I believe and the Cabinet believe that embracing such a trial sent entirely the wrong signal. Now, I know there are a lot of people who disagreed with me, there are a lot who agreed with me. But I don’t make any apology at all for having taken that decision.
WARNEKE:
But some are saying now that the way you’ve structured this new programme it is almost inevitable that that issue will come up again and will one day be approved.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don’t believe that will happen.
WARNEKE:
So you think it’s out of the question forever.
PRIME MINISTER:
As far as I’m concerned, while ever my Government is in power it won’t happen.
WARNEKE:
All right. Well, what about this controversial treatment in Israel that’s been getting a lot of publicity recently. Will you consider that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I’d need to get more medical advice on that. I think there are a lot of people who have a lot of reservations about it and I have a profound degree of scepticism.
WARNEKE:
Correct me if I’m wrong Prime Minister, but I was under the impression that the Hawke Government’s national drug offensive - and that I think cost $100 million - was, in fact, still going. This really just tops it up, doesn’t it?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, it doesn’t top it up. I mean, there were many programmes the former government introduced that were good. And once again, this is not something where I seek to score a political point. I don’t think it’s an area where people should endeavour to do that.
WARNEKE:
There was a fair bit of discussion on this radio station, I think, on Friday about your government’s decision to offer $1 billion [inaudible] paid in the form of a loan to the Indonesian Government. And some comments have been made this morning that if we can offer $1000 million to Indonesia, why can’t we spend more than $87 million here on the home grown problem.
PRIME MINISTER:
That’s a fair question - I’ll answer it. To start with, it is not a grant and it’s not aid, it is a loan repayable with interest and we’re doing it because it’s in Australia’s interests to do so. We have a huge trade surplus with Indonesia. We’ve invested billions of dollars, Australia businessmen have, in Indonesia. It’s our nearest neighbour. It’s a very big market. It is in Australia’s national self interest and it’s in the interest of generating Australian jobs that the Indonesian economy does not fall over. And the Indonesian economy has been severely hit by the financial turmoil in the region and if we are thinking in the long term, not in the short term, and governments are always criticised when they think in the short-term and produce knee-jerk reactions, it is in Australia’s long-term interest that Indonesia be a strong growing economy. And if, along with countries like the United States and Japan, we can make a contribution towards stabilising the Indonesian economy and forcing on the Indonesian economy necessary economic reforms, which is a condition of our making this money available to the International Monetary Fund’s rescue package, then Australia will benefit enormously.
WARNEKE:
With due respect Prime Minister, why $1000 million to them and only $87 million on something that’s [inaudible]...
PRIME MINISTER:
The two things are utterly different.
WARNEKE:
I realise that.
PRIME MINISTER:
They are utterly different. Look, if the Indonesian economy falls over we will suffer, suffer a lot. People will lose jobs. The economic momentum of the region will be badly effected. We export 55-60 per cent of our goods and services to the Asia Pacific region now and it is in our interests that that region continue to be stable, continue to grow, continue to have the capacity to buy those goods and services because that generates Australian jobs and generates income for Australia. In other words, we are promoting Australia’s interests.
Now, it is an entirely proper, defensible, intelligent thing to do.
WARNEKE:
All right Prime Minister. One last question because we’re running out of time. When are we going to see the start of this new campaign in schools and presumably in the media and how seriously do you really think young people are going to take any campaign that you run?
PRIME MINISTER:
Some young people won’t take any notice of it but others will. Time will tell how effective it is and it will be started as soon as is humanly possible. It will involve cooperation with State governments. We are making the resources available. I’ll talk to the State Premiers about some of the details of it later this week when we meet in Canberra. But whilst I’m a realist I’m also an optimist and I believe that I will have the support of millions of Australian parents in what I’m endeavouring to do. I don’t make extravagant claims about this but I do have a moral responsibility as Prime Minister to do more than has been done in the past and that’s not a criticism of anybody in particular, it is just an observation and a statement of reality and a statement of fact. And I believe that it will, over time, make a significant impression for the better.
WARNEKE:
All right, Prime Minister, thank you for your time this morning. I hope you’re right. I hope it does succeed. It’s one of the biggest problems we’ve got in this country.
[Ends]