Subject:
drought assistance announcement; Bob Collins; hospitals.
E&OE...
PRIME MINISTER:
Could I just start by saying that I've been really buoyed by the very widespread and positive response to the Government's latest announcement on drought. It's not only seen as a comprehensive and properly generous response to people's immediate needs, but the increase in the exit payments to $150,000 recognises that some people will find it difficult to remain on the land and that they'll be given quite a bit more help in order to exit their properties with greater dignity and that is very important. Now there'll be some people who will take that up but the great majority of farmers, typical of their type will stay and fight and work and hope for the end of the drought and hope to keep going with their farming because that is what they love and that is what their families love. So it is a comprehensive package, it's been very warmly received and I can only say again that if this country were not in such a strong financial position we wouldn't be able to help our farmers and this is another human dividend of good economic management and the strong economic circumstances of the Australian economy and the strong position of our budget.
JOURNALIST:
Are the increased exit payments a change in position from the Government, a concession perhaps that some lands being farmed are quite marginal?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we've always had exit payments, what we've done is to double them and that is a recognition that maybe they weren't sufficient to enable people who were thinking of leaving the land to make the decision and to enable them to do so with a greater level of dignity and self respect. I think that is important so I wouldn't class it as a radical change in policy, I would class it as a greater recognition of the need to have more effective exit payments. We've always had them but we've decided to improve them, to double them, and that means more people should by rights take them up and if they do they'll be able to leave their properties with a great deal more dignity.
JOURNALIST:
So you're paying farmers not to be farmers?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, we're helping people who've reached a rational decision because of the desperate difficulties of farming their particular properties, to try something else in their career.
JOURNALIST:
Will Bob Collins still get a state funeral given the child sex allegations?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well what I've done as a result of the detail of the allegations that have emerged today is to instruct officials in the protocol section of my department to be in touch with his family and to suggest that in all of the circumstances it would be more appropriate if the funeral were private.
JOURNALIST:
Are you not comfortable with a state memorial for Mr Collins?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well the charges that have been made are appalling. I mean, I don't know whether they're true, the man is dead, but the charges if true are just unbelievable, terrible charges and I think the right thing to do because it is normal if somebody's been a minister for a state funeral to be offered, that's the normal practice, the normal protocol and of course there's been no conviction recorded against him and...but I have formed the view today given that the detail of allegations has become public and that it's become a matter of great public controversy and debate, that the family should be approached and invited to reach the conclusion that it would be better if it were a private funeral. Now, I can't make a judgement, nobody can, the man is dead and you will never know, but I do know that these allegations are awful and they are terrible and they are abhorrent, but I don't know whether they're true and we won't know and I think in all of the circumstances because it has become a much more significant issue of public debate that the appropriate thing to do is to approach the family and to invite them to reach the conclusion it would be better if it were a private funeral.
JOURNALIST:
Will the federal government consider taking over Royal North Shore Hospital given the decreasing care there, I don't know if you've heard this, a woman was left in the toilet to miscarry her child this morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I've heard of that particular incident and I heard the minister say it was going to be fully investigated so I won't prejudge that investigation but I know something of Royal North Shore Hospital and there are many people I know who've been treated there and they speak very highly of the hospital and I don't think on the basis of one incident, just, even if it is completely the fault of the hospital, I just don't know the circumstances, you can't make a decision to take over a hospital on the basis of one incident, that is not good public policy making. But while I'm on the subject of taking over public hospitals can I say something about Mr Rudd's extraordinary behaviour regarding the Mersey Hospital in Tasmania. When I announced that we were going to take that hospital over because the Tasmanian Government was ripping a vital community facility away from people in northern Tasmania, Mr Rudd said it was a piece of opportunistic cherry picking. He attacked it, he condemned it. He said it was wrong and there was no way the Labor Party was going to do it. He now says he supports it. Now what this indicates to me is that Mr Rudd has no policy compass of his own. I don't know what he believes in. I mean, Mr Rudd either agrees with the Government or he does what the unions tell him. Name me a policy where he's really gone out and argued the case for change to the Australian public in defiance of the Government, in defiance of other sections of the community and really staked his ground and said this is the Australia I believe in. He never does that, he just meekly agrees with us or he does what the unions say. Now that suggests to me that in government he would be a weak prime minister. Thank you.
[ends]