PM: (inaudible) talk to people, many of them said to me those things, that they're more concerned about the circumstances of the people of Queensland that they are for themselves. So a real spirit that they wanted to say their best wishes to the people of Queensland, even as they confront floodwaters themselves. Of course we've seen quite severe flooding in Victoria, communities right across Victoria that are facing some of the worst flooding that they've ever seen.
So there is a need too in Victoria for a big effort for communities to come together and assist each other. But they are making a big effort, I had the opportunity to travel in a car today with Dean from the local SES, who told me here over the weekend volunteers filled 35,000 sandbags. It's that kind of spirit of pulling together that we've seen on display right across the country that we're continuing to see on display in Queensland as people move to the clean up and recovery stage.
So it's tough times right around the nation but some great Aussie spirit right around the nation too.
I'm very happy to take any questions.
JOURNALIST: Is there anything in the way of grants and what's the situation in terms of relief funding?
PM: What I can say here in terms of funding in Victoria, we work through the Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements, so the way that works is that the Premier, Premier Baillieu, would trigger a category of assistance and then approach the Federal Government to agree to the request. I know Premier Baillieu was here yesterday also having a look for himself and having a talk to people, so I'm sure he's configuring and working through what's the right category of assistance to make available for people. We do have Centrelink offices available, I had the opportunity to say hello to the Centrelink officers inside and there are some forms of assistance available, for example assistance when people, because of floodwaters, can't get to work, can't run their small business and can't earn their ordinary income.
JOURNALIST: Isn't it important that the assistance doesn't discriminate depending on where people live; I mean a flood-affected house is a flood-affected house?
PM: The way it works is because it's a State and Commonwealth arrangement, the way it works is the State Premier makes a request to trigger the arrangements, so you would expect that States, given that they manage the direct emergency services response, police and emergency personnel, that that's the level of government that takes the first step. So I know Premier Baillieu has been here and has been looking at it himself.
JOURNALIST: Are you expecting him to (inaudible)
PM: I can't put words in Premier Baillieu's mouth and I'm not going to try to but obviously Premier Baillieu was here yesterday having a direct look at circumstances.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) pressure on wage (inaudible) skills shortage, do we need to boost skilled migration?
PM: We're going to see all sorts of economic effects; this has been such a huge catastrophe, huge catastrophe in Queensland, floodwaters in New South Wales, floodwaters here in Victoria. We've seen houses damaged in Tasmania, but obviously the major point of this crisis is the widespread devastation throughout Queensland, and yes there are going to be big economic effects. The Treasurer Wayne Swan today has said that in economic terms this is probably the biggest natural disaster the country has faced. Now we're going to have to work through those economic affects as we move from the immediate crisis stage through the clean-up and recovery stage into rebuilding of infrastructure and getting communities back on their feet. So we'll need to take it a step at a time, but yes there are going to be economic impacts.
JOURNALIST: Is it time yet to reassess the (inaudible)
PM: We will be managing the Federal Budget, we will be managing the Federal Budget so that we can meet the needs of recovery and rebuilding and I've been in Queensland, I've been to a number of locations there, I've seen as far as you can see with the floodwaters still high the scale of the damage and we know when those floodwaters recede we're going to see even more damage underneath.
So I know that there's going to be a lot of effort and money and resources needed to rebuild, particularly rebuild Queensland, but we'll be managing the Federal Budget through the Federal Government so that we can meet those needs as well as managing the Budget into surplus in 2012-13.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) potentially a matter of words in terms of how people are covered in Queensland (inaudible)
PM: What I'd certainly say to them is they should be doing the right thing by the people of Australia at a time as tough as this. The Treasurer Wayne Swan and the Assistant Treasurer Bill Shorten have met with the insurance industry, they met with the insurance industry in Queensland on Friday to put that message direct. Now is the time to show a spirit of generosity that matches the kind of community spirit we've seen right around the country.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: I know that the Treasurer Wayne Swan has said that there may need to be a look at a more standardised definition of floods and flood damage and those questions can be worked through, but the issue for now is how claims from these flood events are going to treated and my message to the insurance industry would be to show the same kind of spirit the people of Australia have been showing as they've really pulled together in these very difficult circumstances.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) a uniform definition to say what a flood is, how (inaudible)
PM: These are questions for days ahead, for the days to come, to work through. The focus now is on still managing floodwaters, we've got people I've just spoken to who are evacuated from their homes who don't even know what the dimension of the damage is that they'll face when they go back. We've got Queensland in clean-up phase with tens of thousands of volunteers getting out there and helping their neighbours, helping their friends, helping complete strangers, people they don't know to recover from this disaster. So the focus is on that, yes they'll be issues to work through in the days ahead and that's one of them that we very clearly signalled through the work that Treasurer Swan and Assistant Treasurer Bill Shorten have been doing with the insurance industry.
JOURNALIST: What was the general feeling like in that room you went into in the relief centre, what was the general feeling in there?
PM: Plenty of congratulations for the volunteers for assisting the people who are working with them in this relief centre, plenty of congratulations too for the people who came and assisted with evacuations, I met some people who were assisted to get into boats to evacuate and they are full of praise and good wishes for the rescuers and volunteers who put themselves on the line to come and help others, and a spirit too of sticking together as they work their way through the issues here locally and a spirit of sticking by the people of Queensland, quite a number of them indicated to me that they thought their wishes are really with Queensland, even as they're managing their own personal circumstances wondering what's happened to their own home, their best with the people of Queensland, so that's a lovely spirit.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) how does that make you feel?
PM: It makes me feel both privileged and humbled. I had the opportunity over the past few days to be in a number of evacuation and relief centres to hold a hand, to give a hug, to have a conversation and I think that's really important part of the job for me, personally being there to offer people the reassurance that we know that they're hurting, we know that they want people to understand that they're hurting and need assistance and best wishes from their fellow Australians, so by being here I think I can bring a bit of that spirit with me.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) not respect warnings with floods (inaudible)
PM: I'm sure that in the days to come both her, New South Wales, Queensland particularly, but everywhere that has suffered from floodwaters there will be thinking and questions, even some tough questions about what we can learn from these experiences. The SMS system was obviously developed following the devastating Victorian bushfires and in the days ahead we'll obviously work through, and I'm sure the State Government will want to work through, issues about how it works in these circumstances.
JOURNALIST: A lot of the area down here in Victoria that's been affected by floods is farmland (inaudible) will the Government continue the exceptional circumstances package for those farms?
PM: Isn't it amazing, you're absolutely right that the same people that have struggled with years and years of drought and then we have the locusts and now we've got floods, so mother nature has been here with all sorts of contradictory challenges, drought on the one hand and flood on the other. In terms of the way Federal Government assistance works, flood assistance obviously works differently to drought assistance because you can immediately or almost immediately see what the damage is once floodwaters subside whereas drought gets worse day after day, month after month, year after year as the drought continues.
But what I'd want to say to people is we obviously want to be working to assist people through and I'm sure that Premier Baillieu, Opposition Leader Daniel Andrews is here, people right across will be working with the Government to assist.