SUBJECTS: Millennium forum launch, PM's visit to East Timor, Timor levy,
privacy issues; illegal immigrants; time zones; sporting achievements.
MILLER:
Joining us live on the line now from our Sydney Studio we have the Prime
Minister, Mr John Howard. Prime Minister, good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Hello John, good to be with you.
MILLER:
Good to have you here too. Congratulations on a significant occasion last
night I believe.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, it was. It was an occasion that launched the millennium forum which
is a very important exercise designed to improve the financial position
of the Liberal Party in the State of New South Wales. And they also were
kind enough to use it as an occasion to mark my 25 years in Parliament which
actually occurred by the calendar early this year. But it was a nice gathering
and importantly it was an opportunity to generate and express a lot of very
strong support for the Liberal Party cause in Sydney. And that's something
I welcome.
MILLER:
Chalk and cheese, I guess, to compare with where you have been in the last
several days, you were visiting the troops in East Timor. From people I
have spoken to that have been there they tell me that the devastation there
is truly appalling.
PRIME MINISTER:
It is. I had seen it on television like so many other Australians but until
it's actually seen with the naked eye you don't have a full perception of
how extensive it was. And one of the really upsetting things is that when
you fly over the populated areas like Dili in a helicopter you see vast
areas of the town blackened and ruined and flattened but other areas completely
untouched. And it's quite obvious that they were areas where those who were
either part of or close to those doing the damage had assets or lived and
that, in a sense, made what occurred even more blameworthy. The people are
returning, their spirit is returning, they look secure, they are clearly
very grateful to the INTERFET forces, most of whom are Australians.
The Australian soldiers have done a fantastic job. They have not only done
their job militarily but they have worked with the community, they have
become friends of the local people, they play with the children, they care
for their wounds in the military hospital, which is a tremendously effectively
improvised building. It's not only got some patients from the forces who
have got in the most case thankfully minor ailments but it's also got a
number of quite serious surgical cases from amongst the local population
including some wounds inflicted by machetes. And the doctors and nurses
from the Australian Army are doing an absolutely incredible job and every
Australian should be hugely proud of what our young, in the main, young
men and women are doing over there.
MILLER:
Well, I think you can say that we are very, very proud of them for all the
right reasons. But tragically, of course, though as you would no doubt be
aware today there was a fatality?
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes. A New Zealand soldier was killed in a, in really a road accident, a
truck overturned and that is the first fatality in the INTERFET forces and
it's a source of very great sadness not only to the New Zealand Army but
to all of the forces. And the Government very much regrets and expresses
its sympathy to those affected, for that accident.
MILLER:
Let's come now to the Timor tax, the Timor levy on the Medicare. Now, I
have had it pretty unanimously said to me that everyone is saying, okay,
we can understand this and we will cop it but the feeling very much is that
once again the Government has gone after the soft target, the PAYE earner.
And you have circumstances where, for example, you can have a dual income
couple both earning $45,000 won't pay at a big level but a single income
family with one breadwinner on $50,000 will.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that, of course, is a product of our taxation system whereby we tax
people as individuals. Could I make the point that the purpose of the levy
was not to hit the so-called rich. I don't regard $50,000 a year as rich,
I mean, that's absurd to suggest it is. The purpose of it was to protect
the low income earners and the only, broadly the only way you can do that
in Australia is according to individual income. It becomes very awkward
and cumbersome if you start taxing people as couples. You introduce a whole
new concept into the taxation system and there would be just as many, if
not more complaints, if you tax people as couples which is really what those
complaints about individual income earners would suggest you might do.
Now, I have probably done more as Prime Minister in changing the tax laws
to help single income earners than any Prime Minister in the last 30 years.
And it was one of the big things in our 1996 policy that we gave special
extra tax help to single income families with dependent children. And their
tax position from the 1st of July next year will be infinitely
better off and better than what it is now. For example, if you are a single
income family with two or three children from the 1st of July
next year you will have a tax free zone of about $13,000 or $14,000 as a
result of the tax changes that we are making. And in all cases, what these
changes do will be to very modestly reduce a very big tax cut, or a significant
tax cut, for people whose incomes are over $50,000.
For example, if you are a single taxpayer on $60,000 a year the levy will
reduce by $6 from $62 a week to $56 a week, the tax cut that you will receive
under our tax cut plan. So people in that range although they will be paying
a levy they will still be significantly better off as a result of the tax
cuts. The levy is only for one year. It is because we have a particular
budget problem in the next financial year. There's no budget problem this
year, there is no budget problem in subsequent years. And I repeat that
the purpose of the way it was structured was to protect low and modest income
earners, not to make an assumption that people earning $50,000 a year were
well off, they are not. But their position to pay is, of course, by definition
somewhat better than that of people who are earning a lower amount.
Now, as to the double income thing, the only way you can cure that is to
really go down a quite different road in this country and that is to aggregate
the incomes of couples and tax them as a unit. Now, I don't think there's
community support for that, I think people take the view that people should
be taxed on an individual basis and that there should be special help for
single income families with children. And that is what we have done, both
in our 1996 policy and again in the tax package. I mean, we are doubling
the tax free threshold for single income providers and, as I said, if you
have got two or three children, one of them under five, you will be having
a tax free threshold of about $13,000 a year. Now, that is a vast improvement
on the present arrangement because I am very sensitive to the position of
single income earners.
MILLER:
What about the concerns raised that this is not the last we'll see of special
Medicare levies, that this is a very hand revenue raising tool for Government?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, it's not a revenue raising tool. We are using it to specifically pay
for an extraordinary item of expense that we couldn't have reasonably predicted
at the time of the budget. This is the second time that our Government has
introduced it. We introduced it in relation to the gun buyback in 1996.
And that lasted as promised for a year. That money was used to buyback the
guns and it ended. Now it's not a revenue raising measure in the normal
sense. If it were it would go on indefinitely. But this is a particular
reason, we have a particular need. If we didn't do it our budget would go
into deficit next financial year on present indications. Now we weren't
prepared to allow that to happen. The only alternative was more spending
cuts. And John, we have cut spending a lot. You're now getting to the point
where if you cut it further to get large amounts of money you're going to
start effecting things that people really need on a day to day basis and
we're not willing to do that.
MILLER:
Okay, well let's move on because there's a couple of other issues I want
to raise with you. First of all, does the Government have any concerns about
this massive database on Australians that has been set up by Kerry Packer
in a joint venture with an American company?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I've read all the newspaper reports about it and on the information
in front of me at the moment it would appear that what is being stored is
information in relation to individuals that can be obtained now. I mean
Electoral Rolls have been mentioned. Electoral Rolls are public documents.
I saw on the front page of the Sydney Daily Telegraph this morning what
I assume were the personal details of I think Mr Andrew Robb who is running
this company. Now all of those details can be readily obtained from easily
accessible documents including Who's Who. Now there are thousands of people
in Who's Who. You don't have to go in Who's Who. If you decide to go in
Who's Who you're asked certain questions. You don't have to answer all of
those but you provide information. Information like what club you belong
to, or what your cultural or sporting or recreational interests are. They're
the sort of things that you provide voluntarily. Now we will continue to
monitor it, and we are very sensitive to proper concerns about privacy.
But it seems that what has happened in this case is that it's the aggregation
of all of the information that people appear to be concerned about because
in relation to individuals, this kind of information is already held by
a large number of organisations, and it's not all that difficult particularly
in relation to people who have business activities and have some kind of
public profile, it's not all that difficult to assemble the information.
You can find out people's addresses in most cases by either the Electoral
Roll or the telephone book.
MILLER:
Sure. But the concern is I think that as you say with the aggregation of
all this information into a central database, and other information coming
in from for example, your David Jones account, or your use of your Visa
credit card, or your..
PRIME MINISTER:
Well my understanding is that the law prevents a third party passing on
information about you without your consent. So that it would seem would
be an adequate protection there. I mean my understanding of the law is that
if I've got some details of somebody, somebody's got some details of me,
say a bank. I mean I borrowed money to put extensions onto a house, my home
like most people. Now my understanding is that bank can't sort of willy
nilly pass that onto somebody without my permission. Now if that is not
the case, if my understanding is wrong well I'll be concerned.
MILLER:
Okay well let's move on again to another issue that a lot of Australians
are concerned about at the moment and that is the illegal immigrants flood
that we're experiencing right now. I mean I heard some fairly ridiculous
debate yesterday about air-conditioning barracks at Woomera.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I think everybody regards that as ridiculous. I can't imagine that
the people who made the suggestion are really serious.
MILLER:
Well how are we going in stopping this invasion?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well it's difficult but we're making progress. Getting the law tightened
will help because it will remove the impression that Australia is a soft
touch. I don't mind Australia being seen as fair and a fair touch if I could
put it that way in relation to refugees. But we can't be seen as an easy
touch because that will involve queue jumping and it will involve people
who've waited faithfully and played by the rules and worked according to
the system, missing out, and people who've been queue jumping getting advantage.
Now we don't want that to happen. But we are campaigning around the world
to send the message that people can't just turn up in this country, get
a foot hold, and then because of the complexity of our laws expect to remain
here indefinitely. Now that has happened in the past, and the Labor Party
in particular in the Senate has blocked attempts over the last couple of
years on the part of this Government to tighten the law. And all of that
has tended to create an impression that all you've got to do is get here
and then you're right because the lawyers will tie the courts up indefinitely.
And you can stay. Now we can't run a refugee policy on that basis. We are
a very generous country to refugees. We have a fine reputation around the
world. But we're not going to have people take advantage of our generosity
and we're just trying to get a balance.
MILLER:
Okay. Well I must say to you that I do appreciate your time this morning
even more so because it's now ten-to-ten in your world, almost the middle
of the working day in Sydney, while we still don't have daylight saving
here. There's been talk of that again by the way this week with our Premier.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I know this is a State matter but can I say from the point of view
of a Prime Minister that it really is ridiculous that communities within
Australia, and I look at this from a national point of view not from a State
point of view, that really are within plainly the same time zones if I can
put it that way, and I'm talking here about the eastern seaboard, Brisbane
and Sydney, and the Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast. It is difficult and perplexing
that the time zones are different. I can understand the view of country
people in both Queensland and New South Wales, and I've often wondered to
myself whether we should look at drawing time zones in Australia that ignore
State boundaries. For example many people as I understand it living in Broken
Hill for example, are more akin to Adelaide times and so forth even though
politically and geographically Broken Hill is part of New South Wales. So
I don't expect people to readily agree with that. A lot of people say oh
no this is a matter for the States. But whilst it's not the most important
problem facing Australia, and of course we can go on with the present system
and we'll still be a fantastic place in which to live, it does seem to me
to be a little bit odd to be governed by old State boundaries in relation
to something like this when the modern day reality is that the communities
of northern New South Wales and southern Queensland, and the coastal areas
of the two States are really one, and that it would be a hell of a lot more
convenient and also of course the business convenience in relation to Brisbane
and Sydney and Melbourne if we were all on the same time.
MILLER:
All right. I'll let you go now. But one final remark and that is how about
that Aaron Baddeley kid?
PRIME MINISTER:
Absolutely fantastic. It just keeps going on this sporting year for Australia.
I can't recall a year in my life when there have been so many outstanding
individual and team performances. Ian Thorpe, now Aaron, the incredible
Wallabies, great bunch of blokes, our cricketers, our netballers, our women's
hockey, our baseballers. It is extraordinary. It's been a vintage year and
of course we've got the Davis Cup at the weekend against the French.
MILLER:
There you go, all leading up to the Olympics. Prime Minister John Howard
thanks for your time this morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thanks John.
[Ends]