BEAUMONT: Prime Minister, good morning to you.
PM: Good morning.
BEAUMONT: Prime Minister, the day after Australia Day, Ray Martin says change the flag, Dick Smith says lower immigration levels, Professor McGorry says do away with long-term detention and Ernie Dingo over here says we need to study Indigenous history. Do we whinge too much on Australia Day?
PM: You know, the great thing about Australia is that everyone gets to have their own say - free country and everyone should be able to exercise freedom of speech, and we all have a different view on each of the ones that you've just been through. But do you know what I've discovered as I've gone around the country this last week and hosted Australia Day receptions in every state capital, including Perth, is frankly, what I discover is the spirit of the can do, which is 'here's a problem, how do we go and fix it?', rather than sitting around moping about it and whinging, and I just see that time and time again, right across the country, including in WA.
BEAUMONT: Do we see too much public drinking on Australia Day?
PM: Well, people are always going to make their individual choices on that one. I saw there were quite a number of arrests in Sydney. I haven't seen any figures from Perth.
Over the summer I got behind a campaign being run Channel Nine and the cricket which is simply entitled Know When to Declare, and that's not just about drinking at the cricket or drinking at sporting events, but I think it's drinking generally, just knowing when to draw the line. So I think if everyone gets behind that one, starts thinking it through, knowing when to put a line across the page and then just order a glass of water, I think that's going to be a big advance for the year ahead.
BEAUMONT: On matters international PM, this former Australian soldier Robert Langdon, he was working as a contractor, he'll be hanged in Afghanistan. The authorities have found him guilty of murder in May last year. Will you intervene?
PM: Yes, the Australian Government will intervene. First of all, can I say that in the case of this individual, my advice from the Department of Foreign Affairs is that an appeal will be lodged by his lawyers to the Supreme Court of Afghanistan, and while that appeal is underway I don't intend to get engaged in a rolling commentary on the content of the case, but can I say we are providing consular support to this individual in Afghanistan, also to his family in Australia. Furthermore, consistent with what we have done in the past and will do in the future, we as the Government always intervene in support of any Australian citizen who has been convicted of a capital offence.
BEAUMONT: How much currency does our intervention carry, Mr Rudd? We have a presence, a strong presence, in Afghanistan. We're helping to assist the locals and re-build as best we can. We obviously don't support execution in this country, but how much weight will your intervention carry?
PM: Well it's, I think, really important just to take this one step at a time. The first thing is the appeals process through the Afghan Supreme Court. That is necessary, it's important, and we need to adhere to Afghan due process.
Secondly, in terms of the political interventions with the Afghan Government, well we'll simply have to take that as it comes. I don't think it would be wise at this stage to predict or project the effectiveness of any particular intervention by me in the case of this individual. Let's take it step by step -
BEAUMONT: I understand that-
PM: (inaudible) closest advice of the Department of Foreign Affairs, who'll be following the case in Kabul.
BEAUMONT: I understand the legalities and the process needs to run, but how much weight does our intervention, how much currency does Australia have with Afghanistan authority?
PM: Well, let me just put it this way: if you're in the business of trying to help somebody who's in a situation like this, talking publically about how much influence you have with the Government in question may not help their case. That's why I'm answering your question in the way in which I'm doing it.
I think it's fair to say more generally that we have a good, operating relationship with the Government of Afghanistan. I spoke President Karzai at the end of last year when I was in Afghanistan visiting our troops. We've got a fully functioning embassy in Kabul. We have a team of diplomats there and they are the ones providing the consular support to this individual.
But as I said, the key thing here is to keep your eye focussed on the result, and we would do so in the case of any Australian convicted with a capital offence anywhere in the world, and that's why I don't want to in any way prejudice securing a result by talking too much about it in the meantime.
BEAUMONT: Prime Minister, you have spent some time in the last fortnight talking about us becoming more productive as a country and I guess that carries to us as individuals. How can you possibly justify the time, effort and money expended on Copenhagen?
PM: Well, Australia faces huge challenges for the future, one that you've just referred to, and that is how we deal with the big challenge of an ageing population, and that flows through to the sustainability of our health budgets in the future; it goes through to how we best invest in health and hospitals in aged care in the future as well.
The second is, and you've touched on that, how do we boost the productivity of our economy? To which our response is, investing in infrastructure, investing in skills and making sure we don't have regulatory obstacles in the way of business.
But that doesn't mean that these are the only challenges. The other one, fundamentally, is how we deal with the future challenge of climate change to the planet itself. What's the economic cost of not acting? Well, you'll see from all the data produced by the CSIRO, the incidence and intensity of drought in South-Eastern and South-Western Australia getting higher and higher into the future, and for this to be dealt with, you not only need Australian national action, which we have through our proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, but you need international action as well. Copenhagen was by no means a perfect result, but we did achieve some progress and the progress was to get the world community, for the first time, to agree -
BEAUMONT: But it was far from perfect. It was a disaster, wasn't it? The expectations were way too high going in, and we've had some United Nations climate change science largely denounced this week, and it seems like you as the PM and a great deal of taxpayer money, an inordinate amount of money, spent on this particular issue that seems to be yours and Penny Wong's primarily.
PM: Well can I say every government around the world is grappling with climate change. It's a global factor, it's a global reality. I notice Mr Abbott says that he regards climate change as absolute crap - that's his words, not mine. If you ask those who are working in the CSIRO for their independent assessment of the effect of climate change on our economy, on our agriculture, on our natural assets like the Barrier Reef, like Kakadu, these are real impacts in Australia because we are the hottest and driest continent on Earth and therefore the impacts of climate change will be felt here first and hardest. Therefore, the practical challenge for a government is what you're going to do about it.
You spoke before just then on Copenhagen. What are the three practical outcomes from Copenhagen? First of all, for the first time the global community agreed that we should aim to keep temperature increases within two degrees centigrade. That's never been agreed before.
The second is this: for the first time, developed and developing countries agreed to put out their targets and commitments for bringing about that temperature range in the future.
And thirdly, for the first time they agreed on an international measurement system for it.
I agree with you this was by no means a perfect outcome. The alternative would have been a zero outcome, and as Prime Minister of the country, let me tell you, I will be doing everything I can to bring about practical, reasonable, responsible actions in dealing with the scientific reality of climate change.
BEAUMONT: If the, Senator Wong has said that she'll take the new version of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme to parliament next week, possibly next Tuesday, what if it's defeated? I mean, people will once again start talking about a double dissolution. I mean, I expect that you'll hose that down, but that's, if it's knocked back again, PM what will you do?
PM: Well, the key thing as the Government of Australia is to advance action on both fronts. One's international and one is national. If we are going to do our part and do no less, no more than the rest of the world in bringing down our greenhouse gas emissions into the future, then secondly you've got to have a means by which that's done. We've put one on the table. It's called a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme or an emissions trading scheme.
By the way, it's the same idea supported by John Howard, Peter Costello, Tony Abbott when he was in the Howard Cabinet, Malcolm Turnbull still today, and until the end of last year, more than half of the federal Coalition, and the reason they've reached that conclusion, as we have, is because it is the most effective means of dealing with climate change environmentally and it has the least cost associated with it. That's why 34 other countries around the world are doing it. So if they want to block it again, it's a matter for them, but can I say Mr Abbott still has not been upfront about how he would deal with this challenge and he's already onto his fifth different position on climate change, including an emissions trading scheme.
Before, he said we should have one. He then said we should whack it through and pass it through the parliament sight unseen. He then said we should amend it. Now he says we should oppose it. Our position's been consistent all the way through and we believe that it's necessary for the parliament to consider this integrated proposal that we agreed with Malcolm Turnbull and more than half the Coalition at the end of last year.
BEAUMONT: On your opposition, Tony Abbott, he drew fire in the media yesterday for advising his daughters in a women's magazine to save themselves for marriage. Would you agree with him? You're a committed Christian like Mr Abbott. Would you agree with that sentiment?
PM: You know something? My job as the Prime Minister of the country is to focus on the big challenges of health, the economy and the one we've just been talking about, climate change. I don't think my job as Prime Minister is to provide individual, personal, moral advice to the young people of Australia. That's something for them themselves to sort out with their friends, with their families, with their mums, with their dads, and that's not a role I see for myself.
BEAUMONT: But why, but Mr Abbott does talk about these things. Why does he commit himself to print, to publication, on these types of issues and you don't? Don't you like to talk about sex?
PM: Can I just say personal position is as I've just described it, which is it's your right, as a fellow Australian, and your listeners' rights as fellow Australians, to make their own, private, personal decisions on these moral matters. That's my position, and it's very consistent.
If Mr Abbott has a different view that's a matter for him, but my view is that these are decisions which are best made, and properly made, individually and personally by the folk concerned. Taking the advice of, as I said, friends, family, mums, dads - that's the way these things should be approached. That's my policy. That's my personal approach. That's the one I've applied in my own family as well.
BEAUMONT: We'll take a break on the morning program, Prime Minister. We'll come back after these commercials.
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BEAUMONT: Ten minutes to nine. The Prime Minister is with us on the morning program this morning. Access Economics is saying today, PM, that interest rates could rise 1.75 per cent over the next 18 months. They could be at 5.5 per cent in the next 18 months. That'll hurt a lot of working families, won't it?
PM: Well, there are two things that have come out through the IMF, the International Monetary Fund's report on the global economy today, and one is that the global economy this year, 2010, is showing further signs of recovery. That comes on the back of Australia, in 2009, being the only one of the advanced economies, major advanced economies in the world not to go into recession.
But secondly, once you see economies recover, as we have said consistently, and the Treasurer has said consistently, you'll also see upward adjustments in interest rates. Remember, interest rates in the middle of the global economic crisis were brought down to record lows, the lowest since 1967, and as a consequence of that, there will in the future, as there has been in recent times, some adjustment.
The alternative for Australia, against the measures taken by the Reserve Bank last year to bring down rates to record lows, and the measures taken by the Australian Government through the national economic stimulus strategy, would have been this economy in Australia, falling into recession like all those economies around world. Instead, we didn't. We uniquely, grew our economy last year, compared with the other advanced economies. We've currently got the second-lowest unemployment of the major advanced economies, with the lowest debt and the lowest deficit.
BEAUMONT: We're also facing a situation where we have declining revenues. You know that. That's why you've been talking about productivity. So that's the downside of the economic stimulus package, isn't it, trying to pay that money back faced with declining revenues?
PM: Not at all. The bottom line is this: because we decided to act, take early, decisive and effective action through the national economic stimulus strategy, we as Australia managed to keep this economy of ours, Australia, out of recession. The alternative would have been hundreds of thousands of Australians losing their jobs. That's what's happened in practically every other economy around the world.
Look in Europe. Look in the United States, where you have double-digit unemployment, whereas in Australia our unemployment level is currently at 5.5 percent. That's because we've stepped up to the plate.
But secondly, the other consequence which flows from that is because we've kept our economy ticking over, and because we're able to keep growth positive in the economy, in fact we've been able to generate more revenue for the economy, tax revenue for the economy, than would otherwise have been the case had we allowed it to fall through the floor.
We've done the right thing in terms of keeping the economy, jobs, small business afloat during this very difficult time through our intervention. It's also been the right thing in terms budget policy, because by keeping the economy positive, we've also kept our revenues flowing in as well.
BEAUMONT: Alright, PM, final question if I can - the shopping centre council of Australia say they are unhappy that politicians just rolling up to shopping centres and wandering through and I guess using their customers to campaign. Will we be seeing Kevin Rudd in a shopping centre this year during the election year?
PM: These questions are always decided by individual shopping centre managers and individual shopping centre chains. That's my best advice. When you say folk just roll up and roll through, I think my understanding is that only occurs with the consent and the approval of the individual manager.
The broader point is this - it's really important for anyone in elected office to stay connected with working families across the country. That means being outside the Canberra bubble. It means out there, talking to people in the streets, in the highways, in the byways, and wherever else that's possible. That's why I try and get over the Perth as much as possible, quite a number of times since I've been PM.
But apart from that, also why we've been in Perth in recent times conducting community cabinets, inviting whole communities to sit with the Cabinet for several hours of an evening and taking questions directly from them. It's our way of keeping in touch.
But you know, on shopping centres, matter for the folk who own 'em.
BEAUMONT: Right, so it's like a restaurant. Always ring ahead.
PM: Well, exactly, and you know, we've, so far as I know, always checked it out to see whether people are happy for us to come through, and if they're not, you don't. Simple as that.
BEAUMONT: PM, thanks for your time. Thanks for speaking to our listeners today. We appreciate it.
PM: And it's good to be talking to our friends in WA.
BEAUMONT: Thanks, Kevin. Good on you.