Subjects: Tax reform, budget, women in the workforce, private health
insurance, East Timor, aid workers in Kosovo, heroin trials, injecting
rooms.
E&OE....................................................................................................
GRIMSHAW:
Mr Howard, good morning
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning.
GRIMSHAW:
You're a week and a day off handing down a budget that will presumably
be predicated, at least in part, on a GST that the Senate isn't
showing any signs, at this stage, of passing. Are you going to have
to bend on compensation?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, every budget is predicated on the Parliament passing the legislation
to give effect to the budget measures. So it's no different in
that sense from any other budget. Tracey, everyone knows the position
with the Senate. We don't have the numbers. We fought an election
on major tax reform, not because it was good for this or that section
of the community but because it was good for the whole country. I
mean, we put that plan up because we believed it was good for Australia's
long-term future. Now, that's far more important than its impact
on this or that section of the community. In the long run, if we don't
have tax reform of this nature, we'll be a weaker, poorer, less
competitive country into the next century. It's that important.
And that's why we poured so much political effort into it and
that's why we took such a tremendous risk in the national interest.
And that is really what I want the Australian people to focus on,
that this is about securing the economic future of Australia. It's
not just about how it affects this or that section of the community.
We've lost sight of the national interest objective over recent
months. And that's not surprising but in the long run I believe
Australians will rally behind a reform that they know is good for
the long-term benefit of their country.
GRIMSHAW:
Well, I suppose it could argued as since Australians did rally behind
it, you won an election in which it was a key issue, but the Senate
is not rallying behind it and Senator Harradine said as recently as
Friday that the package remains structurally unfair. You need his
support, don't you?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, it is true, as you say, that the public voted for it. And I
would like every member of the Senate to remember that. I mean, we
fought an election on this. We didn't hold back any detail. We
didn't fudge it. We didn't say one thing and do another.
We've done exactly what we said in the election campaign we would
do. I rejected all the conventional political advice in going to an
election campaign proposing what some people said was a new tax. It
was not a new tax. It was an entirely new tax system. And in those
circumstances we'd actually believed that the Labor Party and
the Democrats, indeed, everybody in the Senate should listen to what
the public said. It's not just Brian Harradine. I mean, Brian
Harradine would not have all this focus on him if the Democrats and
the Labor Party had accepted the verdict of the people, would he?
GRIMSHAW:
And yet he does have this focus on him and he has said to you, he
has challenged you, to say publicly what you will do to rectify what
he describes as the structural unfairness in the system.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, everyone knows that we want to get it through. And obviously
there have been and there will continue to be discussions between
the Government and anybody in the Senate that shows a willingness
to consider the Government's position. Now, I'm not going
to go into the details of what may or may not be said and how it will
be said to Brian Harradine or to Mal Colston or, indeed, to anybody
else. But suffice it to say we want to implement the plan because
it's good for Australia's economic future. We're prepared
to, as I've said repeatedly, do a bit of fine-tuning but we're
not going to pull it apart the way that the Democrats, at the moment,
are suggesting we do. Because once you pull an important element out
of it you undermine the whole infrastructure, the whole architecture,
of the package.
GRIMSHAW:
Will fine-tuning perhaps been eating into the budget surplus to provide
a greater pillowing effect, if you like, cushioning effect?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well look, it's a fair question of you to ask and anybody in
your position would naturally ask that but I'm just not going
to get into that except to say that self-evidently, we are talking
and we'll continue to talk to the various players in the Senate.
I mean, self evidently that is the case but I'm not going to
sort of speculate, except to say that it's an integrated plan
and we're not, for example, going to exempt food, that's
out. You can't have business tax reform without general tax reform.
I was glad yesterday that Mr Beazley said he supported capital gains
tax reform. Well, I'd say to him, you can't have capital
gains tax reform without all the other reforms. You can't just
pull one bit out and say, we'll have that but we'll reject
everything else. I mean, life's not as simple as that. And the
whole thing is an integrated package. And that's its virtue.
I mean, it's easy to sort of do a little bit here and there.
Governments have been doing that to our tax system for years, that's
why it's such a mess. This is the first serious attempt to renovate
the whole system and it would be tragic, economically, for Australia
if it fell over, particularly after we won an election on it.
GRIMSHAW:
Senator Colston has accused Labor of trying to hasten his death. Do
you believe that they are dragging out the debate awaiting that eventuality?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, they're certainly dragging out the debate and I think the
attacks on him are appalling. I have never heard such language used
about anybody. I mean, it is just beyond reason. The man has cancer.
That is unarguable. The evidence has been given. Are people seriously
saying he hasn't? I mean, it doesn't matter what he's
done in terms of his rows with the Australian Labor Party. And there
does come a point where they ought to ease up and I just think the
attacks that have been made on him are just appalling.
GRIMSHAW:
If the GST fails is it back to the drawing board for the budget?
PRIME MINISTER:
The budget is unaffected. As I said before, there's nothing unusual
about a budget being based upon the assumption that the Parliament
will pass legislation giving effect to budget measures. So in that
sense there's no particular significance in that.
GRIMSHAW:
Mr Beazley suggested yesterday that if there's no GST and the
budget takes into account GST significantly then the budget will be
wrecked?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, he wants to wreck it. He wants to wreck the tax plan. I mean,
just remember the Labor Party has embarked upon a political exercise
of stopping tax reform in the hope that will damage the Government's
credibility. They're not really paying much regard to whether
tax reform is good or bad for Australia. They don't really care
about that. They just want to score a political hit on the Government.
Now, that's fine I guess, if you want to be a negative Opposition
but I think the public wants a bit more than that. Doesn't the
public really want to know what is good for Australia? And we put
forward a plan that we thought was good for Australia and we won the
election. They agreed with us. And what we're really saying is...
GRIMSHAW:
But you haven't won the Senate.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, but in the long run...
GRIMSHAW:
You've got to win the Senate, haven't you?
PRIME MINISTER:
...what's more important, I mean, the will of the I
mean, how do you run a country? How do you run a parliamentary democracy
if the results of elections squarely fought openly and candidly on
an issue are not listened to?
GRIMSHAW:
Now, we're looking for some budget leaks here.
PRIME MINISTER:
I'm the wrong bloke.
GRIMSHAW:
Some exclusive information, we are told that high tech medical research
and women returning to the work force will be among the big winners
in the budget. Can you confirm that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well there's a lot of rumours. Look I neither confirm nor deny
rumours. But I can remind you that in relation to giving encouragement
to women to return to the workforce after they've been out for
a couple of years having children we made some policy commitments
on that in the election campaign so there's nothing new about
that.
GRIMSHAW:
So pretty safe to assume that the budget...?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I'm not confirming or denying anything in the budget.
GRIMSHAW:
What sort of incentives could you give women who've been out...?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well one of the things that we want to do, we had in mind at the election
campaign, was to improve their skills in areas where there may have
been technological changes and advances while they've been out
of the workforce. Our whole policy in this area is to give women the
maximum amount of choice. If they want to stay out of the workforce
for a few years when their children are young, indeed indefinitely,
if that's there choice well they should be helped and encouraged
to do so. If on the other hand they only want to do it for a couple
of years, which many women wish to do. They like to stay out for a
while and then go back, they don't want to lose their skills,
they don't want to fall behind. And what we had in mind at the
election campaign was to try and give them a bit of help.
GRIMSHAW:
Okay. I want to get on a few issues during this segment. Health fund
premiums. We are told they are about to rise. Given that you have
just given us all a 30% rebate for being in private health insurance,
that must dismay you that news?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I've never given a guarantee that there'd be never
ever be any rises in premiums in the future. There's certainly
was an arrangement worked out with the Government where the rises
were to be less frequent. And there's no doubt the 30% rebate
will take pressure off the funds to lift their premiums. They're
still suffering from the enormous exit of people over the last couple
of years. The other point I'd make is that the 30% rebate is
a rebate on the increased premium if there is an increase. So it's
not a fixed amount. So if your premium goes up by x' dollars
you get 30% of that back.
GRIMSHAW:
And yet we were told that the rebate would bring more people into
the system and therefore make it cheaper overall. Now suddenly within
a short space of time of getting this rebate premiums are about to
go up.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I don't know the extent of increases but, as I say, I've
never said increases would never occur.
GRIMSHAW:
Six per cent.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well that's been kicked around but nobody can guarantee that
there'll never be increases in anything. I mean that's ridiculous.
But the 30% rebate has made it cheaper. Health insurance premiums
will always be cheaper, by 30% cheaper as a result of the rebate.
And the signs are, although we haven't got the official figures,
the signs are that there has been a big increase in the number of
people going back into private health insurance. Now....
GRIMSHAW:
Might that drop of premiums go up?
PRIME MINISTER:
Tracey, I don't know. I mean we don't control these things.
In the end they are controlled by the individual market choices of
people.
GRIMSHAW:
All right. While we're on matters of health we were told that
church groups in Sydney, one in particular, is planning to open a
heroin shooting parlour, in contravention of the law, in contravention
of your personal principles. How do you feel about that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I'm against heroin shooting galleries. I don't think
there's any evidence that they're of benefit. I think they
send a bad signal. They involve potentially a breach of State law.
The New South Wales Premier for example, who's got responsibility
in Sydney. He's against it. He has the same view as I do on this
issue.
GRIMSHAW:
And yet it seems to be, these sorts of ideas seem to be gathering
momentum.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well they get a lot of publicity because they have a news value as
distinct from the health value. I mean, it's terribly easy to
get publicity on the drug issue by sort of thumbing your nose at the
law and some say, oh look I'm in favour of the heroin trial,
I'm in favour of the shooting gallery. It's terribly easy
to get publicity doing that. The long term valuable work that is being
done is the extra money that's going in to helping people break
the habit. I mean I've talked to people who are involved and
as recently as last Thursday I sat down and talked to some young people
at the Central Mission in Adelaide. And the message I got from them
was that the biggest single need was to have rehabilitation and treatment
facilities available for somebody when that person decided that it
was time for him to break the habit. And the absence of that, rather
than other things, was what was uppermost on the minds of these people
who had been grappling with a heroin addiction for years.
GRIMSHAW:
All right. Let's look internationally and as closely as East
Timor. You had a very successful meeting with Indonesia's President
Habibie last week. But the actions of the militia in the wake of that
meeting must worry you. I mean how easy is it, well not even easy,
how possible is it going to be to have a fair and safe vote on independence
for East Timor?
PRIME MINISTER:
Tracey, it's not easy. It's better now than it was a few
weeks ago because there's a far stronger, or prominent public
commitment from the Indonesians for an open ballot.
GRIMSHAW:
Not from the militia groups though.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, but Tracey, you have to deal with the possible here. The asset
Australia has to use in Indonesia and Timor is influence. If people
are running around saying you should do this, you should do that,
what are they saying we should do? Invade the place? I mean, that's
ridiculous. If we walk away and wash our hands of it, that's
not going to influence the Indonesians to behave in a different way.
It's more likely to thrust them in on themselves and encourage
them to give up any responsibility for East Timor in saying, well,
if the world is unfair to us then we'll turn our backs on it.
What we have to do is steadily and sensibly and strategically use
our influence and that's what we've done. Now I can't
guarantee there'll be no more violence. Of course I can't,
because I don't control East Timor. East Timor is part of Indonesia
whether we like it or not. We have to deal with that reality and respect
it, and I think we've come a long way in the fact that the Indonesians
are now publicly committed through the UN will put a lot more pressure
on them.
GRIMSHAW:
Sadly we're running out of time, but I want to ask you about
diplomatic efforts to release the two Australian aid workers in Kosovo.
Are you encouraged by the release of the US troops?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I'm delighted for their sake, and for the sakes of their
families that they're out. And I congratulate Jesse Jackson and
all of those involved in it. Naturally I hope that the same thing
can happen for Pratt and Wallace. I mean it's....
GRIMSHAW:
Do you step up the diplomatic efforts?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we've never relaxed on that but you will understand it's
one of those situations where sometimes the less said the better.
We're trying everything we can at a diplomatic level. Malcolm
Fraser has done a great job as the Chairman of CARE in going there
and talking to the Yugoslav government. I thank him for that and I
know how concerned he and other members of CARE are. We have worked
very hard at a diplomatic level. We'll go on doing so, we'll
go on arguing that these men are not combatants. They're humanitarian
people who've helped serve refugees as much as they've helped
refugees in other parts of the country and I hope in the end that
that will be realised.
GRIMSHAW:
We'll leave it there. Thanks for your time.
PRIME MINISTER:
Pleasure.
[ends]