HOST: It's quarter to seven. It's the Prime Minister of this great nation Mr Kevin Rudd, Prime Minister good morning to you.
PM: Good morning, good to be back in Perth and thanks for having me on your program.
HOST: Yeah it's lovely to have you back here, what are you doing tomorrow? Do you want to come and co-host, are you still in town tomorrow morning?
PM: If I'm in town tomorrow morning I'll come and co-host. I could get a few brickbats from some of your leading mining executives but I'm up for that as well.
HOST: Do you feel as though you are under the pump?
PM: Well I actually had a very good discussion last night with representatives of the mining industry here in Perth, some of the biggest mining companies, and good discussion, they were very forthright in putting their views and their concerns about the Super Profits Tax that we're proposing. I was equally forthright in explaining why we believe this is necessary for the good people of Western Australia as well, because there's a big call here for greater investment in this state's infrastructure. Huge demand for road, rail, ports, new hospitals et cetera and part of our arrangement here, is to create an infrastructure fund for Western Australia, drawing in part on the revenues derived from this Super Profits Tax on our most profitable mining companies.
HOST: Prime Minister, I asked you the question do you feel as if you're a little under the pump? When you put your head on the pillow last night, did you go, you know, phew, it's been a big day?
PM: No, I slept very well actually.
HOST: Prime Minister, Monika Kos here from Channel Seven's Today Tonight program. I'm actually co-hosting this morning.
PM: G'day, how are you?
HOST: I'm very well thank you.
PM: Part of the reason you sleep well overnight here is because your day has been lengthened by several hours when you started the morning in Sydney.
HOST: Well a few red wines help you sleep well as well. Um, the general consensus, back on the mining subject, among the mining industries, is that the 40 per cent tax is too high. How much are you prepared to negotiate on that?
PM: We believe we've got those settings right but what we've said to the mining industry is that we're more than prepared to sit down and work through the detail with them, and that's what last night's discussion was all about, but also the discussions I'll be having this morning with other representatives of the mining industry as well.
I'll just go back to basic principles here: why are we doing this? So much of the profits that we've seen from the mining companies has been pretty big over the last decade. Profits, super profits, of the mining industry up about $80 billion over the last decade, however revenue back to the people of Australia, including the people of Western Australia, only $9 billion, and there's a huge demand for three things: better superannuation for working families, better tax breaks for small business, and better investment in all the road, rail and port infrastructure that this great state needs. That's why we're doing it.
HOST: Was last night's meeting a crisis meeting?
PM: No, no, no, we have rolling discussions with the mining industry all the time.
HOST: How much consultation did you have with the mining industry before you made your announcement?
PM: We had a lot of discussion between the Treasurer and representatives of key mining industries. In fact, I had a lot of discussions also with the Premier of Western Australia as well, before we announced our tax package last Sunday. Obviously it's controversial, I don't walk away from that. Part of the reason of being in Western Australia though is just to front people directly about their concerns. That's why -
HOST: You mentioned how we can benefit from it but it is very important to Western Australians given our reliance on the industry and our relationship with Asia, and our dominance of the market. I mean critics say that this could in fact put our global position at serious risk.
PM: Well, when you announce a change to the tax on mining companies, I draw people's attention to the fact that the Premier of Western Australia has said for a long period of time that the mining companies here have been under-taxed. The bottom line is there's going to be controversy. Therefore what I'm here to do is to sort through some of those details.
Also look at the rest of the package, which for mining itself, this is a new tax regime for mining companies which means that if you've got small and medium companies in particular, which aren't profitable in their early years, they in fact benefit from this package because they get their mining royalties paid back to them. The royalties regime here in the west is imposed whether or not a company is profitable or not.
And the last thing is, we've brought in a new tax benefit for the exploration industry, worth about a billion dollars, because we want to broaden the scope of the mining industry here in the future as well.
HOST: Prime Minister, there's been much controversy and also much criticism of several issues of late, particularly your handling of the ETS which is something you expressed considerable passion for. Can you see how it could be interpreted as a backdown and a contradiction?
PM: Our commitment to reducing greenhouse gases has not changed one bit. Our commitment to an emissions trading scheme as the best and most efficient and cheapest way of bringing about those greenhouse gas emission reductions has not changed -
HOST: Why is it no longer so urgent then, such a priority?
PM: - It's not changed one bit. What has changed is our pathway to getting there and for two reasons to go specifically to your question.
One is, Mr Abbott and the Greens in Canberra voted it down. It can't be got through the Parliament, that's the bottom line.
Secondly, what we've also had is slow action around the rest of the world on greenhouse gas reduction. And what we've said therefore is that if the Government is returned, what we would do, at the end of the current Kyoto commitment period at the end of 2012, is assess where the rest of the world's action is up to, and we'll make our judgment then about the timing of an emissions trading scheme. That's the course of action which comes out of Mr Abbott, who says that climate change is quote absolute crap, voting against it, and the Greens, who would have me close down the economy by lunchtime tomorrow.
HOST: We asked some of our listeners just to call in with a couple of questions for you, so let's do those -
HOST: - and there are some doozies -
HOST: There's some doozies -
HOST: There really are -
PM: That's great.
HOST: Joel rang in and he said, can we raise, this is not a bad one, can we raise the drinking age to 21 and in doing so free up some of the pressure on our hospitals right around the Australia I suppose?
PM: I think the key thing is just to teach responsible drinking to our young people. On pressures on our hospitals, you'll understand that's why we brought in a new National Health and Hospitals Network, with the Federal Government taking on the dominant funding role for the future. But no, we have no proposal to change the drinking age, that lies as you know within State jurisdictions anyway.
HOST: And Prime Minister there's been much talk over here lately of getting a new stadium. Peter, one of our listeners, would like to know how the bid is going to get the soccer World Cup to Australia?
PM: Could you tell Peter I wish I knew. But look, we believe we're in there with a reasonable show. As you know we're bidding for either 2018 or 2022. If we can pull this off for Australia, this will be a bigger event for Australia than even the Olympics. The television viewing audience globally, would be probably three times that of the Olympics, based on the figures from the last soccer World Cup. So we're going to give it a go, and I hope that if it comes off we can see a big growth in the game here in the west as well.
HOST: And hopefully Perth will have the venue for it.
HOST: Yes that would be nice.
PM: Well, we'll work through all of that with the State Governments later on but I was talking to some mums yesterday out at a sporting club where we're actually fixing up the netball courts for -
HOST: Yes, a flash photo of you in this morning's West Prime Minister -
PM: - Is there?
HOST: - You're a dab hand with a ball -
PM: Ah yeah, fortunately they didn't ask me to put it actually through a hoop. That would have been embarrassing.
HOST: You can balance it on your fingers hey?
PM: Well I can try that, I'll work on it.
HOST: Prime Minister, just a quickie from another listener who says should we secede here in WA, given everything that's happened, and we'll just take on the whole lot?
PM: This is a wonderful part of Australia. Remember I come from Queensland, where we have a very distinct personality, in terms of our Australian identity as well -
HOST: - there you go.
PM: And can I just say Queensland, you know, Queensland is as big a resources state as is WA, in terms of the depth and breadth of the mining industry there. But you know we've got to make sure that we help WA with its future needs and one of the things I'm trying to do is respond to people like the Premier of WA who says, on the one hand I desperately need more Australian Government investment in this state's infrastructure needs, but on the other hand when I turn round and raise a tax for that purpose, he says oh no we can't do that. Well I've got to say, we've got to be fair dinkum about this. That's my policy. I think Colin's in danger of walking both sides of the street on this one.
HOST: And very quickly I'll just, I just want to bring you back on that for a moment, because we've actually seen Clive Palmer, we spoke with Mr Palmer yesterday, he's threatened to pull out of Australia's mining interests. How concerned are you of this and the reaction to from the Premier as well?
PM: Well can I just- let's just call a spade a spade here. Mr Palmer is a huge financial backer of the Liberal and National Party in Queensland, a huge financial backer. I would have thought that Mr Palmer, as far as his mining interests are concerned, the responsible course of action is to first of all engage in the detailed consultations with the Treasury in Canberra -
HOST: - and that hasn't occurred?
PM: - on the implementation detail that would affect any project which he had. I'm advised that has not occurred. That invitation is extended to him, as it is to any other person who is supporting a mining industry development here, or in Queensland, or South Australia, as you work through the details with the locals.
But my bottom line is we want better super for working Australians, here in Western Australia, 700,000 of them, tax breaks for the 230,000 small businesses through that $5,000 tax break, as well as investing in the WA infrastructure needs of the future. And to do that we need this Super Profits Tax on our most profitable miners because a lot of their profits are heading overseas.
HOST: Very quickly Prime Minister, Mr Howard used to walk around Swan River every morning when he was visiting us here in Perth, what are you up to this morning?
PM: Well you know something, maybe I'm a night owl, I walked around the Swan River last night -
HOST: -oh did you?
HOST: Because we're such a beautiful safe city we can do that.
PM: Well terrific, and the Swan is such, it's one of the stunning river scenes of any Australian capital city, looks like a lake as I looked out over it this morning. You have one of the most beautiful cities in the world here in Perth and it's always a pleasure to be back here.
HOST: Prime Minister, enjoy your stay and we'll see you for the brekkie show tomorrow morning.
PM: I'll see what I can do with the schedule guys.
HOST: Thank-you.