Subjects: election; CHOGM; US terrorist attack; illegal immigrants; economy; Ansett; Michael Wooldridge.
E&OE................................
CORDEAUX:
Just let me say while we're getting this fixed, I was listening to one news report this morning on the ABC and it was talking about your surge in popularity. It was saying it's amazing what a crisis can do for popularity, what they didn't say of course was it has nothing to do with the crisis it has a great deal to do with the way in which you handled it, but you won't hear the ABC say that I shouldn't think.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, it's true but can I say that I don't take too much notice of a poll like that. My view is that the Government's position has improved over a period of months but the next election will still be very tough.
CORDEAUX:
You are thinking of a tough election, I'll do a little more talking here because we're trying to lift the gain on that line as they say because it is just too low for us to hear you. When we've got an election so close, Prime Minister, I think that's better.
PRIME MINISTER:
I can hear you now.
CORDEAUX:
When we've got an election so close it is a kind of destabilising thing an election, at this particular time, are you tempted to maybe go earlier than the November that has been rumoured?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well my position has always been that we have it towards the end of the year and that's really November/December period. We have got a meeting of the Commonwealth Heads of Government in Brisbane in the first week of October and there'll be a lot of overseas visitors, the Queen will be here as head of the Commonwealth and also visiting Queensland and South Australia. So it's never appropriate to have an election campaign that straddles an event like that. I believe firmly that the CHOGM meeting should go ahead. It would be a bad sign if for one reason or another CHOGM was put off even if that was because of the appalling events in America last week. That would be a sign that terrorism was winning because it was intimidating people out of meetings. So, from my point of view and I assume that this also covers other Commonwealth leaders, that meeting will go ahead. So we really have that meeting and then we have a look at what happens in relation to the election.
CORDEAUX:
So CHOGM is definitely on at this stage, you haven't.
PRIME MINISTER:
What, CHOGM?
CORDEAUX:
Yes.
PRIME MINISTER:
CHOGM is definitely on. Nobody has got in touch with me and said they're not coming. And in my view it should go ahead. What the Australian public wants from the Government at the moment is (inaudible) given that we are inevitably looking towards an election. There has to be an election under the Constitution.
CORDEAUX:
Prime Minister, we just can't hear and I don't know what we're going to do. We'll try another line or try and get you on the telephone if we can. Now that sounds better.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well have I done something, I haven't done anything here. Well the gremlins are gone, is that right.
CORDEAUX:
Well I think they are.
PRIME MINISTER:
Is that any better?
CORDEAUX:
Yes I think that is fine.
PRIME MINISTER:
Yeah alright. The point I'm simply making is that there has to be an election soon because our three years are up and the Constitution requires us to go and clearly we'd want to have an election because the law requires it. And it will be some time between now and close to Christmas so, and exactly when it is I can't say because I haven't made up my mind but we will be having a CHOGM meeting and that CHOGM meeting will be the first week of October and it's not proper to have an election campaign straddling a meeting of that kind so I don't know that I can be any more explicit than that.
CORDEAUX:
No, as we, the Americans say that this is war and you've sort of stopped short of saying that Australia is at war. But we're certainly on a war footing. How would some military activity in which we were involved, how would that affect the timing of the election?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, the timing of the election is dictated by the law. We have to have an election under the constitution, effectively for all practical purposes we have to have an election under the law not later than the 12th of January. We're not going to have an election over the Christmas period so that means in practice there has to be an election before Christmas. Now, we have no option on that because that is what the law requires and that is what the democratic process requires and I am above all somebody who believes in the democratic process and I don't fear facing the Australian people, they'll make a decision, if they return the Government well we'll be very grateful and we'll do our best. If they decide to vote us out and install the Labor Party well I will accept that decision because that's the decision of the Australian people. I'll be disappointed but it always happens, you can have one, you can only have one victor in an election. I'll fight very hard, I think it is still going to be very tough for us. I think our position is better but we live in a very volatile political climate as well as a very volatile world and I would counsel any supporters of the Government not to get carried away with reports of one or two opinion polls. Those opinion polls have bounced around a great deal this year and they can bounce around again and nobody should assume anything as a result. But there's nothing really new I can say about the date of the election, there has to be an election by the end of the year and there will be because the Constitution requires it.
CORDEAUX:
Do you believe, what do you think will be the outcome of this attack? Do you believe the Americans will be going in and going in soon to get revenge?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well the Americans will retaliate. I believe that they will do it in an effective measured way. I don't think they'll be indiscriminate. They feel very angry and they're right to be angry. 5,000 people probably dead, all of them completely innocent, all of them going about their daily lives and you know without warning, without reason they're put to death. Now that is an act of internal destruction the like of which America has not seen since her Civil War in the 19th century.
CORDEAUX:
Will the US brief you before any, before they make any attack do you think?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well there are discussions going on all the time let me put it that way. Clearly any country in the United States' position has to worry about elements of surprise and security and the details of action. I think all I can say is that there are discussions going on all the time.
CORDEAUX:
Now the Labor Party has fallen in line with the Government on strengthening legislation to make it more difficult for people to arrive at our backdoor. Is that effectively the end of that or is it going to go on being a problem for this country into the future?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we certainly as a result of the Labor Party caving we certainly do have far better prospects of having stronger laws. The Labor Party is now going to vote for a bill which a few weeks ago they voted against effectively. The new bill has some different clauses but its overall effect is just as strong and in some areas stronger than the bill they voted against before. But that change of heart is something for the Labor Party to explain. But I do make the point that any suggestion that the Labor Party has had some kind of win by getting the Government to water down its bill is wrong. The new Border Protection Bill in fact has a more comprehensive reach than the old one and what has happened is that the Labor Party has accepted the need for whatever combination of reasons to support the Government's bill.
I noticed one Labor frontbencher is quoted as saying that they were fed up with the pressure but if they won government they'd seek to change it. Well if that is their true intent then their position is even less worthy of merit than I originally thought. But anyway the important thing to me is that we will now get the legislation through and that's good, and we'll then be able to have a more effective regime. But all we're endeavouring to do, and this shouldn't be lost sight of, is to ensure that the way in which applicants for refugee status in the eyes of Australia are processed is a uniform one and that the sort of approach adopted by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees applies as extensively as possible across the full gamut, and it will also allow us to have people processed off the Australian mainland. And when you add all of these things together it does send an even stronger signal that we will do everything we can to resist people smuggling. We won't in any way walk away from our responsibility to take refugees. I want to emphasise again this country takes more refugees on a per capita basis than any country except Canada, and there are only eight or nine countries in the world that regularly take refugees and Australia is one of them. So I have to again make the point that those people who attack Australia and this Government for being unfair and unreasonably insensitive seem to ignore the fact that our record on refugees is better than most.
CORDEAUX:
Well if the people listening to this program and the people who ring this program are any guide when that appeal was launched against the action that you had taken with regard to the Tampa and this whole thing went to court and you had to appeal Judge North's decision, people were so angry about that that our system could be used in that manner against an elected government.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I can understand that anger. I'm very pleased that the Appeal Court overturned Justice North's decision. It seemed to us and the Appeal Court has vindicated, that it's part of the sovereign right of the government to determine who comes to this country and on what terms.
CORDEAUX:
Do you need anything at the next election by way of a mandate to strengthen the Government's ability to make decisions in this areas?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well Jeremy people will have a lot of things in their mind when they vote at the next election and that's a matter for them. We have put through a lot of legislation, put up a lot of legislation and it looks as though it will finally get through and at long last the Labor Party has stopped been obstructive on this issue.
CORDEAUX:
And that's all you need really?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well as presently advised that is what we need. Our circumstances may alter. I can't guarantee they won't. But as presently advised what we have now put up is what we need to give us an effective border protection pattern of laws and at long last the Labor Party has come into line and agreed to support it. They should have done so a long time ago and that's a matter they have to explain to the public, not us.
CORDEAUX:
I heard the Treasurer last night say we were going to be in for a fairly predictable bumpy road. We've had a few knocks, I mean with the NAB losing all that money, HIH, One.Tel, and now the Ansett collapse. It's been a very very difficult time but it seems that Australia is not too badly set up to whether the storm.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well compared with others we're stronger. That doesn't guarantee we won't be singed by what has occurred.
CORDEAUX:
What do you expect?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I think there will be eventually some impact on the Australian economy. It will be manifested in perhaps slower growth than we would otherwise have had and that will have an impact in time on revenues and therefore on the budget position. That's something both sides of politics will have to accommodate to and live with.
CORDEAUX:
Have you got anything up your sleeve to buffer it, maybe extending that homebuyers' grant into next year?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well that sort of area of the economy is performing very well. We haven't made any final decision about whether there'll be any extension or phase down. At present it's scheduled to end at the end of the year but we'll have another look at that fairly soon and there are a number of options before the Government. But we are spending more money in relation to illegal immigration. Clearly there could be additional expenditures in the defence area. I don't know to what degree but it's possible because of the changed circumstances and if of course what has happened in the United States..and that will have an enormous impact on internal air travel in the United States and will have a big impact on probably world tourism. So we have to realise that because of those events in America last week the world has not only changed in a security sense but it could well have changed somewhat economically. And the US economy and the European economies and the Japanese economies were in difficulty anyway and this will only aggravate their problem.
Now conversely we have been performing well and that's good and our growth has been very strong. But there's now way in the face of events that we have seen and are going to impact around the world very significantly, there's no way that we can be completely immune. So it will have an impact and that impact will be felt in different ways.
CORDEAUX:
I'd like to talk to you a little bit about workers' entitlements and that kind of thing but would you take a few calls first?
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes I certainly would.
CORDEAUX:
Hello Bill.
CALLER:
Good morning Jeremy, good morning Mr Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
How are you Bill?
CALLER:
Good thanks. Mr Howard, I'd just like to give you a message - I'd like to say that may God bless you and may you be guided in his wisdom as we embark against this fight against evil. Finally in the upcoming CHOGM meeting it would be an appropriate moment for all of our politicians in Parliament to reaffirm their oath of allegiance to the Crown.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thanks Bill.
CORDEAUX:
All right Bill, thank you. Just on the subject of what Australia might be able to do to help the Americans, just in a slight way, would you consider dropping aid to those countries like Afghanistan and maybe Pakistan and other countries that have come under suspicion?
PRIME MINISTER:
Off hand I don't know whether we provide any assistance to Afghanistan. We would probably to Pakistan. I haven't given any thought to that at present and it's not something we've been asked to do and I don't know that it's helpful to the processes underway at the moment for us to speculate about that. The American objective at the moment and Australia endorses that objective, is to enlist the support and understanding of Pakistan. Pakistan is in a, strategically, a very important position. And if we can get the Pakistanis on side that will be very helpful. Therefore I wouldn't be wanting to sound as though we were issuing some kind of threat at the moment. We're trying to engage and get beside the Pakistanis. The Americans are trying that very hard and I think we should let that process work its way through for the time being.
CORDEAUX:
There are rumours around that Bin Laden's people are in Australia and have set up cells and they are active. Have you tightened security, have you briefed.?
PRIME MINISTER:
We have taken a number of security measures in response to what happened, I won't go into them. And it's always important that I not talk in any detail about intelligence briefings I've received. What I will say about that issue is that nobody should assume that Australia is completely immune from threats of terrorism. We are lower on the scale than a number of other countries but we are, perhaps, higher than yet others. So the reality, the difficult, uncomfortable reality is that we can't adopt the attitude that it won't or can't happen here. I'm not, equally, trying to be or sound alarmist or exaggerate the risk. It is not as high but it's high enough for me to say to the Australian people, don't imagine that it can't happen here.
CORDEAUX:
Well, it vindicates the stand that you've taken about strengthening and maintaining the strength of our borders, doesn't it?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, certainly we had the view, before what happened in the United States, that this country had a right to decide who came to this country and in what circumstances. I'm not deliberately extrapolating from one set of circumstances to the other but, nonetheless, I'm making the point that if you maintain a strict border control and border protection policy you have a better chance of screening out people who you don't want in this country.
CORDEAUX:
The Prime Minister's my guest. Aaron, hi.
CALLER:
Hello, Mr Howard, how are you?
PRIME MINISTER:
Very well, Aaron.
CALLER:
I'm just inquiring - I was watching CNN this morning on Fox and apparently the militia in Indonesia say if the United States take offence against Bin Laden they will attack the US Embassy in Indonesia. If that happens will our soldiers be going over to Indonesia to help the United States?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I wouldn't think that that would automatically follow, Aaron, no. I'm not as.I don't know that that threat will be carried out because the Indonesian President is in America at the moment and she's actually said that Indonesia supports the American reaction and is sympathetic to and has been highly critical of the terrorist attack. So I imagine that if there were any attack on the Embassy of any country in Indonesia the Indonesian armed forces would do something about it. I don't think it would automatically follow that Australian forces would get involved in that.
CORDEAUX:
Prime Minister, just on the workers' entitlements. Why is it that the Government should feel responsible for bailing out a company whether it's big or small. At the end of the day why don't we have laws that say that companies must put aside money for workers' entitlements or they must have comprehensive insurance to cover any possible loss? What is your thinking on this?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, we're not bailing out the company, certainly we're not doing that. What we're doing is where, because of the very large number of people involved, we are guaranteeing their holiday pay, their long service leave and their leave without notice..
CORDEAUX:
But how can Air New Zealand wash their hands of that responsibility?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, they apparently.well, they may not have been able to get away with that. What we're going to do is, out of consideration for the Ansett employees, we're going to meet - and this is going to be funded out of a ticket levy, which I know is not popular but we can't afford to take the hit of almost $400 million on our budget, we really can't afford that - we're going to meet the entitlements that I've mentioned plus eight weeks redundancy. Many of the workers have a higher redundancy entitlement than that but we don't think we can ask the taxpayer to pick up the higher redundancies because eight weeks is the community standard. Then we are going to seek to recover the money from Air New Zealand and if Air New Zealand has resources then those resources will be available to repay the money that we've given to the Ansett employees. And so if that all works its way through what the Government will have done is to have facilitated early payment of the entitlements because of the distress felt and experienced by many of the Ansett employees but, in the long run, the liability will be met by Air New Zealand which is the right thing.
CORDEAUX:
Yeah well, taking over Air New Zealand's responsibility, I mean, we've got to be careful we don't get asked to take over New Zealand's responsibilities generally.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I think.I understand the feeling a lot of people have at the moment about Air New Zealand but it would be a great shame if that spilt over into a general attitude of hostility towards New Zealand. You can't blame the population of New Zealand for what an individual company has done any more than it would have been fair of New Zealanders to blame Australians for corporate failure that might have hurt some of their countrymen and women. Our relationship with New Zealand is very important. New Zealand was a good friend to us over some of the boat people. They offered to take them and I'm very conscious of that but I'm also conscious, historically, of the links between our two societies and we've got to separate the two. Yes people are entitled to be angry with Air New Zealand but that anger should not spread to the entire New Zealand population, that's not fair.
CORDEAUX:
Word was around that you might be looking at more tax cuts but that was before some of these crashes and unexpected expenses. Are you still looking at tax cuts or are you [inaudible] have to lift tax?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I hope we won't have to do that and I don't have any evidence before me that suggests we'll have to lift taxes. What I've said before is that our preference, if there is an available surplus, is to give tax cuts and not spend more money and that does remain our position but as to the details of that, well, that is something that we would say a bit closer to the event and particularly when we have more information about our likely budget position.
CORDEAUX:
I said to my listeners just after this American tragedy that I was enormously proud as an Australian by the way in which you represented us in that country at that time. And I was enormously impressed with the way in which that country came together, the flags came out and the camaraderie was there and the support was there. It was a wonderful thing to see a country come together even though the cause of their coming together was so terrible.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, they do have that very strong and very overt patriotic spirit. Ours is very strong. It's expressed a little differently because the mood and the temper of the Australian people, although very similar to the Americans in many ways, is also quite different in other ways. We displayed a great patriotic fervour at the time of the Olympic Games. Now, gladly that was built on events of great happiness and success and a different set of circumstances. I have no doubt that the Australian community would come together if it faced the sort of thing that we faced.the Americans have faced but, please God it never happens but it might in a different way. I think we would come together. We've come together in times of national disaster. We have a great and latent cohesion, although we're not perhaps as demonstrative as the Americans.
CORDEAUX:
Well, the symbol, of course, is the flag and it reminds that, I think it was Christopher Pyne who had this idea that, possibly before the last election, that what the Government should do is to in some way sponsor, maybe make even tax deductible citizens buying and flying the Australian flag. Would you revisit that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes, I mean, it's fairly easy for organisations and groups to get flags at no cost, a club or a school or another organisation.
CORDEAUX:
But wouldn't it be wonderful to see.
PRIME MINISTER:
I haven't.I must say I hadn't thought about it but I will. I won't say definitely we will, I just haven given thought - a lot of people are very happy to buy flags. I think some people would be attracted by such a proposal. I think other people would feel a bit offended. They would say they don't mind spending a few dollars to demonstrate their patriotism. It would have a differential reaction in the community.
CORDEAUX:
Some people are worried, Prime Minister, that you will relinquish the reigns of power some time into the next term if you're re-elected. Have recent events caused you to rethink your retirement and maybe making a commitment to go on longer?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I've said something about this before and I don't really want to repeat it because every time I repeat it somebody puts a different interpretation on it, so I don't really have anything to add to what I've said before. I feel very committed to what I'm doing and I'm very keen to go on serving the Australian people.
CORDEAUX:
And through the next term. That's what's worrying people.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I've talked about that before and I don't really want to add anything to what I've said before because every time I do somebody tries to interpret it differently. I think it's better to just say I've got nothing to add to what I've said before except for me to say that I am very committed to serving the Australian people. I feel very adequate to the task and in very strong health.
CORDEAUX:
Michael Wooldridge, just quickly, announces his retirement, was that a surprise?
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes it was. I had no warning of that and I'm sorry he's going. It is a genuinely personal decision. It's got nothing to do with policy or a lack of enthusiasm for the task. I'm sorry he's going. He's been a very good Health Minister but that's his decision and we have to move on and there'll be others to take his place but I do record my gratitude to him for what he's done.
CORDEAUX:
Prime Minister, thank you so much for talking with us and I apologise for the mess with the line in the beginning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I think it's turned out okay.
CORDEAUX:
Thank you, sir.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thanks very much.