MITCHELL: First, in the studio with me today, the Prime Minister. Mr Rudd, good morning.
PM: Good morning, Neil. Thanks for having me on the program.
MITCHELL: Well, thank you for coming in. I wouldn't normally ask you about family matters, but this is getting into different territory. Your nephew, Van Thanh Rudd, seems to be using his relationship with you to promote ideas which seems to me to be damaging to Australia. He told the Indian news magazine that Australia's racist, he's insulted dead Australian soldiers with a photo of coffins and then superimposing a picture of Shane Warne on it, turned up as Klu Klux Klan at the tennis. Now, I know it's not your fault or responsibility, but have you had a word with him to settle him down?
PM: First thing, as you know, there's free speech in this country, and everyone's entitled to it. Secondly, do I agree in any way with what he's done? No, I don't. Absolutely.
MITCHELL: Have you told him that?
PM: No, I haven't had a chat with him for quite some months. Can I just put a bit of context in this as well. We all have very broad families. This bloke's got a couple of brothers, one of whom's a policeman, the other of whom is in the Australian Defence Force. I don't think anyone knows that.
MITCHELL: Well, they wouldn't be too happy, I don't imagine.
PM: Well, I don't intend to go there. Families are complex businesses, as I think everyone knows, but I just want to put a bit of context in this, that it's a wide and broad family. His dad's a Vietnam veteran, my brother, so you know, as I said, we all believe in free speech, but I don't agree with what he said.
MITCHELL: Look, I understand that, and as I said, we wouldn't normally talk about this area, but it just - do you agree your name is being used in this? I mean, in the Indian magazine it's the Prime Minister's nephew says Australia is racist.
PM: Well, first of all, I don't agree with the argument at all. I think you've asked me about this before. Just, it's absolutely wrong. This country's not like that. It's just not. You know, I've dealt with so many members of the Indian community over so many years, the Chinese community, the Vietnamese community. It's just, frankly, wrong. In terms of the use and mayhem to which a family name can be put, I'm probably not Robinson Crusoe there, mate.
MITCHELL: No, it's a bit frustrating, must be frustrating for you as Prime Minister.
PM: Oh, yeah.
MITCHELL: Does it concern you?
PM: I think you may said on air somewhere, I think I saw you recently saying we choose our friends. But look, it's a free country, but I disagree with his views and I disagree fundamentally.
MITCHELL: Okay, Fair Work Australia. Now, it seems to be turning out not to be fair. Yesterday we unearthed this case of some kids in western Victoria being sacked because they were casuals. They could only work an hour and a half after school each day and they have to work three hours under the new award and that is inflexible, can't be moved. Several of them have been sacked. Other cases are coming through to us. The whole principle here was that nobody would be worse off. Do you accept people are now worse off under this?
PM: Well, couple of points, and then I'll go to the action on the specific one. First is, no apologies whatsoever from us for getting rid of WorkChoices. Why? Because it provided employers with the ability to axe penalty rates and to axe overtime. That's why we got rid of it. We had a mandate to do so. No apologies for it.
Secondly, under the Fair Work Act, obviously, we have a view when it comes to minimum working hours, because one of our concerns is you can have an employer who says "come in for half an hour a day here and a half an hour a day there", very inflexible - sorry, very unsuitable for young workers often.
But on this one, because each circumstance is different, the Office of Fair Work will have their officers speak with the employer and the young people later today. We'll try and work it through, because each circumstance is different and I don't know all the details surrounding this one.
MITCHELL: But this seems to be part of the point - each circumstance is different, but there's no flexibility here.
PM: Well, I think if you look carefully at the Act, there are provisions for flexibility, but not which enable workers to have their fundamental conditions undermined.
MITCHELL: (inaudible) I mean, these kids are saying "we don't want three hours, we want an hour and half". You're saying "you can't have it".
PM: Well, we have this principle, and we took it to the election, that underpinning the whole system are what we call basic work standards. That's what we're on about. Why did we object to WorkChoices? Because it said you can pull all these things away. You can give an employer the right to axe your penalty rates, axe your overtime, and frankly, give you an hour's work there, a half an hour work there, and all over the place. That's why we changed the law.
But secondly, we also want to have a fair and balanced system which has got flexibility attached to it. That's why Julia's office, the Office of Fair Work, will have its officers deal with these folk, employer, employees, and see what we can work out.
MITCHELL: Well, you agree there's got to be flexibility. If those kids want to work and the boss wants 'em for an hour and half, that's fair enough, isn't it?
PM: You know something? We've got to be very careful about industrial relations systems which enables people, incrementally, to be exploited. This is the big debate we had back in 2007, and you know something-
MITCHELL: But I used to deliver papers, and it only took me an hour and 15 minutes. Was I being exploited?
PM: Well, you know something? When I was a kid I used to be the kid who did the packing at the local Nambour Cooperative Store of a Saturday morning, but I was 12, 13, 14 years old. What we're talking about here is the conditions which exist and the provisions which exist under the industrial relations system of Australia. We've got to protect our basic conditions.
If you open the door to employers being able to rip basic conditions out, then I think you've got a system which puts us on the same slippery slope as we had last time - and by the way, Tony Abbott says WorkChoices will be back in everything but name.
MITCHELL: But is this an unintended consequence? We've got people that want to employ kids who can only get there for an hour and a half after school. They can get there by four, the business closes at five-thirty, the boss is happy, the kids are happy and the system says "no, you can't do it". Is this an unintended consequence?
PM: Well, actually, the system has another provision within it, which we negotiated long and hard with our friends in the trade union movement. These are called individual flexibility arrangements. And they, however, will not be allowed to undermine the most basic conditions, which is why, in the circumstances of this firm and these kids, the Office of Fair Work will try to sort it out. That's what they're going out there to do later today. Whether we get there or not's a separate question.
But I'm saying the system does two things: one, puts an underpinning safety net in terms of basic conditions like penalty rates and overtime, which my political opponent would happily rip away; secondly, it says there should be a balanced system which contains within it individual flexibilities, but we're not going to allow anyone to get exploited.
MITCHELL: Do you agree it's a silly situation we've got here?
PM: Don't know the full facts of it, and that's why I'm not gonna make a judgement on that, because you know as well as I do, Neil, that each individual workplace is different. How do we know, for example, that these kids have been, for example, remunerated at the proper standards under the pre-existing award? Was it lawful under the pre-existing legal arrangements in this country? I don't know those answers, either. That's why I'm always slow to judgement on an individual case until all the facts are before us. That's why the Office is going there to try and sort it through.
MITCHELL: Well, what about the broader case? Fast food industry workers, most of them kids, are going to lose penalty rates.
PM: Well, when it comes to enterprise bargaining, and it depends which part of the fast food industry you're talking about, the bottom line is this - we want to make sure that the overall conditions for young workers don't lead to exploitation.
As far as the fast food industry is concerned, and the arrangements there and the award negotiations underway, frankly, I think it's far better that Julia give you a direct answer on the fast food industry. I don't want to mislead you by saying anything that's incorrect.
MITCHELL: Well, let's look at something general, then. Dean Mighell, secretary of the Electrical Trades Union, and I think you'll remember from the last election who you managed to drum out of the Labor Party.
PM: Big fan of mine.
MITCHELL: He is very angry about this. I talked to the ACT [sic] during the week, I noticed the New South Wales unions are saying low-paid workers there will lose wages and conditions under Fair Work Australia. This is what Dean Mighell said last week.
MIGHELL CLIP: What Gillard has done is said we're modernising all awards, which sounds fantastic, promised no worker would be worse off. Promise isn't right. We're fighting to keep our apprentice rates of pay. Apprentice, 44 per cent of a trade rate kid, earning bugger all, from getting his wages cut under this Gillard process. Office workers are having their casual loading cut because Gillard's modernising awards. Workers are losing conditions of employment. If the Liberals were in power, we would be absolutely-
HOST CLIP: -Oh, WorkChoices was a better deal than this. WorkChoices was a better deal than this.
MIGHELL CLIP: Well, I gotta tell ya, I can't defend this because we fought so hard for Your Rights At Work and now we're losing them. I just don't get it (inaudible)
MITCHELL: Okay, well, that's Dean Mighell. Forget the other voice. That was a Liberal commentator or Liberal member of parliament in the studio. Do you insist that no Australian worker will be worse off under this system?
PM: What we said from the beginning is we're going to have a fair and balanced system. I'm not going to be in a position now nor were we then to say that in each individual circumstance there won't be some variation. You can't do that.
MITCHELL: So people are worse off? Some people are worse off, and according Dean Mighell and other unions, a lot of people are worse off.
PM: Well, you raise Dean Mighell. I wouldn't trust anything Dean Mighell said in a month of Sundays. I wouldn't trust Dean Mighell as far as you could throw him.
MITCHELL: Why?
PM: Because we have had extensive dealings with this guy over a long period of time, probably longer than you, mate.
MITCHELL: No, I've known him a long time too, but he got up and swore at a union meeting. That seemed to be the essence of the problem, but that's neither-
PM: - Absolutely not. Frankly, our objections to him have got nothing to do with that.
MITCHELL: You objected to his language very strongly.
PM: I'm saying that the reason for, shall I say, us having a different view about him is that he represents a particular set of views within the trade union movement which are right out there at the extreme. Always has done, probably always will do, don't belong in mainstream debate within the Labor Party as far as I'm concerned. He's entitled to his point of view. We just radically disagree with him and he has, I've got to say, a lot of angst [inaudible] when it comes to Julia, as you could see from the tone of his comments.
MITCHELL: The Shop Union agrees. They say kids are going to suffer, penalty rates are to be taken away. Also, the retail industry agrees. It's not just Dean Mighell, he's making the point.
PM: This is the question about award modernisation?
MITCHELL: Yes, Fair Work Australia, people being worse off under Fair Work Australia.
PM: The award modernisation process is underway. It's complex, it goes to each set of awards. You've spoken before about fast food and you're now raising the question of the retail sector. Can I just say each of these is complex in itself. You want to me to provide one sweeping statement concerning every worker in every workplace -
MITCHELL: No, no, I don't. I want a principle here, and isn't the principle here that workers will not be worse off, because they patently are in several areas?
PM: Can I say to you Neil, you asked me this many times before the last election, and I said I can't provide that guarantee, and I don't. The simple reason is that we are dealing with the fundamentals of the system, a system which enabled 65 per cent of people on Australian Workplace Agreements, AWAs, to have things like penalty rates pulled off them, 50 per cent having overtime payments pulled off them. That's what we're concerned about.
So you're always going to have these debates about the detail of individual awards, but if you ask me to provide a blanket guarantee concerning all workers in any individual workplace you can't do that, because everyone's circumstances are different, and what happens in the workplace is affected by a whole bunch of other stuff beyond the industrial relations system, as you know.
MITCHELL: There was no pre-election pledge that no worker would be worse off?
PM: We said that we were going to have a fair and balanced system. I recall being asked this on many, many different occasions. My response was the same.
MITCHELL: You avoided it.
PM: No, I was just being honest about it. You had Mr Howard go out there and say, Neil, on many occasions, that interest rates would be kept record lows. What absolute codswallop, and when I was asked that question, because people wanted -
MITCHELL: - Well, you were changing the system which you said was damaging workers and you've introduced a system which is damaging workers.
PM: Neil, what you're saying, you're asking me a question about consistency of position before, and what I said, mate, prior to the election that's what we said. That's what I'm saying now.
Secondly, in terms of the system overall, what the Australian people voted for was a system which prevents penalty rates and overtime being ripped out of basic industrial conditions right across the country, which was happening in 65 per cent of cases with all those AWAs which were issued by Mr Howard, 50 per cent in the case of overtime payments.
These were happening at a large scale. That's why working people were getting very angst about it. The impact on woman workers was huge. You compared people on AWAs as opposed to those that were on awards, people on AWAs were actually copping it big time.
MITCHELL: Well, there's a lot of people copping it big time now and I think it will emerge, but we'll see.
PM: Well, Neil, we welcome the debate on this, but you know something -
MITCHELL: - The kids who have lost their jobs don't welcome the debate.
PM: It's very important that we go through each set of circumstances individually. We have a workforce of 10 million people. You are able, as a radio presenter, to find any case here and any case there -
MITCHELL: - And thank God for that, because they're getting screwed.
PM: That's absolutely as you should do it, mate, and that's your job. I accept that, but you know something? Our responsibility is for a total system, and what Mr Howard had was a total system which Mr Abbott says he wants to bring back, which says -
MITCHELL: - Mr Rudd, the whole basis of your advertising campaign against John Howard's WorkChoices was to pick out individual cases and highlight how people are being screwed. There are now people being screwed under your system. Let's highlight 'em.
PM: No, Neil, what we said was the basic conditions applied to Mr Howard's industrial relations system, which in the law said that you could pull out basic conditions like -
MITCHELL: - Well, in (inaudible) you're hurting people.
PM: In the law, what you could pull out overtime and penalty rates, and guess what? In that first big set of AWAs he brought in, that happened in 65 per cent of cases, 50 per cent of cases, huge, right across the country.
And what you're raising, legitimately, is individual cases here and there and we'll work on each of those individual circumstances.
MITCHELL: We'll move on. Don't argue. It goes beyond individual cases into entire industries, and that will emerge.
PM: Well, we will work our way through each of those. It's a complex process.
MITCHELL: We'll take a break, come back with more from the Prime Minister.
[BREAK]
MITCHELL: The Prime Minister's with me. We need to be quick. There's a lot to get through. We'll take a quick call. Mark, go ahead, please, Mark.
CALLER: Good morning Mr Prime Minister.
PM: G'day, Mark .How are ya?
CALLER: My daughter works, Chloe, in a yoghurt store here in Melbourne and subsequently was sent home twice before the end of last year after working only for an hour of the proposed five-hour shift, and then with the Federal awards changing from February, oh, I mean, from the beginning of this year, now she has now lost her shifts because they can't give any casuals within that organisation any hours because they now are unable to send them home and there has to be a minimum of three hours, so she now, and a lot of other casuals within that organisation, have lost their jobs.
MITCHELL: How old is she?
CALLER: She's 15, Neil.
MITCHELL: And sacked.
CALLER: Yeah.
MITCHELL: Prime Minister?
PM: Okay, Mark, let's, through Julia's Office of Fair Work, we'll get the details of it. Can I say this, though, as I said to Neil earlier on air, in our industrial relations system we've got these things called individual flexibility arrangements. How they apply to this sector, let's work it out through the Office of Fair Work.
Young people wanting a job and getting out there, as Neil did when he was a kid and as I did as a kid, that's fair enough. We've got to make sure we don't allow practices and laws in this country, however, which enable kids to be exploited. But I want to get to the detail of young Chloe.
MITCHELL: Hang on, Mark, we'll get some details from you and a contact off-air. The Victorian Education Department has advised teachers to teach to the tests on the National Literacy and Numeracy tests. Surely that undermines the whole point of them?
PM: Yeah, I haven't seen the actual text of their communication out, so let's just leave that bit to one side until I read it. The second thing is, Neil, we fully support MySchool because of this huge emphasis on literacy, numeracy and the basics testing and the emphasis in schools. What we want the principals to do and the teachers and the education departments is to make sure the basics are right.
That's why the test is there and that's why the transparency of it's a concern - that's why the transparency of this for parents is so important. So this one I would be concerned if there is simply a focus on a test as opposed to getting into the whole system from the beginning in those critical areas of reading, writing and arithmetic so that people have got the basics.
MITCHELL: Richard, go ahead, please.
CALLER: Morning, Neil. Morning, Mr Prime Minister.
PM: G'day, Richard.
CALLER: How are you?
PM: I'm battling on, mate.
CALLER: Excellent. Um, I'm 60, aged 60. I've got rid of the kids and the mortgage and I'd like to salary sacrifice for my superannuation. Under the current laws that were introduced in parliament, I can only do a maximum of $50,000, which includes my employer's contribution, so therefore, basically, I can only do 41 at tops. I would like to be able to do a lot more just to try and make my life a lot easier. I'll be smashed with tax when I get to $50,000, not going to bother. Where do I go to from here? I'm trying hard to help this country but at the moment I almost don't care. I've paid my taxes forever and a day and I'm sick of it and that's it for super for me. You've lost me.
PM: Well, first of all-
CALLER: Excuse me, it's not a laughing matter, Mr Prime Minister.
PM: No, hang on, hang on, I'm just trying to get to grips with the absolute detail of your circumstances. On yours, as well, you've given me a whole series of facts and figures, I want to correlate it with what we've done by way of changes to the law, and if any of those affect you, I'll therefore have the Treasurer's office get onto you, if you're happy with that, directly through the people at the program.
MITCHELL: But that's the principle. You can't sacrifice more than $50,000.
PM: Secondly, in terms of proper savings encouragement for the country and proper super incentives for the country, one of the reasons why we have commissioned and received the independent review of tax is to deal with the whole future of the super system, which has become too complex for people and not enough incentives are there for people to save through the super system or beyond it.
MITCHELL: So there could be more changes to the superannuation system?
PM: Well, obviously, that's within the remit of the independent review of tax. That's been received by the Government. We're still working our way through it.
MITCHELL: I thought the Treasurer had said they wouldn't be touching superannuation? Do I misunderstand?
PM: Can I say, as far as the remit is concerned, that is, the terms of reference given to the independent review of taxation, obviously it affects savings policy. Savings policy includes many dimensions. As far as any wholesale changes to the superannuation scheme are concerned, we have nothing particular in mind, but I just don't want to set the horses running here, either, Neil. We are working our way through this systematically.
But to go back to the point that's made just before, I think by Richard - is that right? - let's get the details right. The office of the Treasurer will be on to you later in the day to see what your circumstances are and what's changed.
MITCHELL: Leave us your details, Richard. Didn't you promise before the election not to change super, though?
PM: We said prior to the election that we would keep existing superannuation arrangements -
MITCHELL: - Well, you've changed it.
PM: Hang on. If we make any changes - if - they'll be subject to what people said at the next election. They wouldn't come in before then.
MITCHELL: The $50,000 that you've already announced.
PM: Can I just say that if there are any substantive changes, and I'm talking about substantive changes -
MITCHELL: - So what's substantive and what's minor?
PM: Well, substantive goes to the entire system, as opposed to, let's call it, fine-tuning at the edges. These things affect people fundamentally. That's why, Neil, you've got to be absolutely straight up and down with people about what you're going to do, and then take it to the Australian people if you're going to make any substantive changes.
As I've said, I'm not prejudging what is in the independent review because I haven't worked my way through that yet, but if we make any decisions in that respect it'll be subject to full scrutiny and people make up their mind one way or the other.
MITCHELL: Prime Minister, Wall Street down 220 points over night. This economic crisis isn't over, is it?
PM: I think I'd be as cautious as you are, Neil. That's been my attitude all along. If you look carefully at what the IMF said in its report the other day, it was, for example, saying to governments right across the world: "anyone thinks you're out of the woods yet and you can just pull out your stimulus strategies right across the world in 2010, think again. There's still a long way to go yet."
Obviously, they are projecting a recovery and growth, but, you know, there are so many bumps and twists and turns to go. So our view is having negotiated 2009 for Australia reasonably successfully, that is, we are the only economy of the major advanced economies not to go into recession, we protected hundreds of thousands of jobs, 112,000 jobs created in Australia last year as millions were lost in all the other advanced economies, but we are not through this yet.
MITCHELL: It is the anniversary of the Black Saturday bushfires. Will you be making any official visits while you're in Melbourne?
PM: No, I won't. I will be attending the commemorative service at St Paul's Cathedral here in Melbourne on Sunday. I will be having some private chats with people, but they are very private.
MITCHELL: What do you think, I was suggesting it was time to perhaps give them some space. Is that your feeling?
PM: Look, everyone will make their judgements about this, but I've been back to the communities there in the course of the last 12 months half a dozen or so times. I've spoken to a lot of people, including fairly recently. This is a very deep, bruising and hard time for people, and there's something about anniversaries which are very hard to get through.
MITCHELL: Thank you very much for your time.
PM: Good to be on the program.