PM: I'm here today with Brigadier Paul McLachlan and I've been briefed on the Defence Force efforts across Queensland. We have 1, 885 Defence Force personnel out across Queensland today making a difference in clean-up and recovery.
I've had the opportunity to directly see some of their work in Long Street, East Graceville, where they are literally just taking a mountain of rubbish off the streets, helping with the clean up. When I saw them today in pouring rain, despite the circumstances, they were in good spirits working hard and almost all of them commented to me that they are working alongside volunteers who just keep pouring in. People turning up with trucks, people turning up with equipment, to work alongside them and to help out.
So I do want to say in this opportunity to all of our Defence Force personnel who are out there working today, a very big thank you, they are making an incredible difference. And of course many of them are directly out there making a difference to the filth and the muck and the garbage, but there are continuing operations to get water to purification in to townships that need it, to make sure that food is moving around, getting to the places it's needed. There's continuing search work happening in the Lockyer Valley, right across Queensland Defence Force personnel in a myriad of ways are making a real difference.
So Paul, to you and your team, thank you very much.
Today too we know that there are people in Victoria battling rising flood waters. So here in Queensland I've been focused on the work that's happening in clean-up and recovery, but in Victoria we do have rising flood waters and some very anxious communities. I can announce that the Government will be making payments available through our Australian Government Disaster Relief Payment Scheme, that means that people who have been hit by flood waters can make a claim for emergency money, that first assistance they need when they've been evacuated, when they need some cash to get them through and that payment is $1, 000 per adult and $400 per child. I've also worked with the Premier of Victoria, with Ted Baillieu to work through to make assistance available through our Natural Disaster Relief arrangements and that assistance will be in the form of clean up money for primary producers and small businesses as well as some assistance for households.
From tomorrow people will be able to ring 180 22 66 to get full details of those payments, but today as communities in Victoria face difficult flood circumstances, our thoughts are very much with them as they go through what will be a stressing time and a difficult time.
But I did have the opportunity to visit in Victoria and when I did overwhelmingly peoples' thoughts were here with the people of Queensland, even as they faced flood waters themselves.
So with those words and that thank you I'm very happy to take questions.
JOURNALIST: Has the enormity of what's happened in Brisbane (inaudible)
PM: The scale of what's happened here is just almost beyond imagining, that's why it's great to be able to get out on the ground and actually see what's happened to people's homes, and I had a look through at a house today, clean up in progress and got to see what it looked like as the family and friends were going about the clean up. I had the opportunity to travel, not only in Brisbane and Ipswich, but to Rockhampton and St George to see the flood waters from the air and just see where they hit houses on the ground.
I had the opportunity to be in the Lockyer Valley and Toowoomba and see what's happened in those communities and talk to people who have been directly affected by these flood waters.
So, it's huge, it's everywhere, with so much of this great State facing troubles at the same time and when I've been here, people are of resilient spirit, but this is a big disaster and it's going to take a long time to recovery.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: We will make the decisions necessary to rebuild Queensland. So my focus is on making sure that we are rebuilding Queensland. It is going to require us to do a lot of hard work, make some difficult choices and decisions to rebuild Queensland and to bring the budget to surplus in 2013 as promised.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, which is more important for you?
PM: Both, we will rebuild Queensland definitely, full stop, we will rebuild Queensland and we will make the difficult decisions necessary to bring the Budget to surplus in 2012-13. This is not either/or, this is both.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) what can the Government do to ensure that flood insurance remains accessible to everyone?
PM: Look I don't want to speculate on what might happen with premiums in the future but as you would have seen the Treasurer Wayne Swan say, we are doing work with insurance companies, doing work to say that we want insurers to extend the maximum generosity and compassion to their fellow Australians in these difficult circumstances. We've seen community spirit on display everywhere, I saw some of it today as people worked alongside Defence Force personnel in the clean up. We want that spirit of generosity to also be taken by our insurance companies. As we said through Wayne Swan the Treasurer, there may well be a need to look at questions like flood insurance, its design, what the definition of ‘flood' is so that people can have clarity in the future about what they're covered for.
JOURNALIST: There's been some suggestions that insurance companies like RACQ and that sort, you know, the smaller ones may not be able to afford to pay out all these claims, that the Government should consider stepping-in in that regard?
PM: Well look I'm not going to speculate on hypotheticals, our focus here is on clean-up and on recovery and rebuilding. A tremendous job is happening on clean-up and 1,885 great Defence Force personnel are working and many of them are making a direct difference to clean-up. We are working through clean-up; we'll work through recovery and then work through rebuilding. In the days ahead there's going to be any number of issues that we're going to have to confront and work our way through, but we need to go through it stage by stage with the people of Queensland to help people recover and to help the state rebuild.
JOURNALIST: I realise the floods are obviously a priority now, but this is a big year politically for you as well. What are your priorities for the next 12 months?
PM: Well the Government's priorities are something that I will be speaking about in coming days and I think all of those priorities are pretty clear, it's about keeping our economy strong, it's about extending the benefits of opportunity to all Australians, continuing to improve our education system. It's about improving health, and also about tackling the challenge of climate change and pricing carbon. We've got a big reform agenda to work through but my focus right now standing here is on Queensland and recovering from this disaster and my focus as Prime Minister is also on those other parts of the country that aren't facing a disaster of this scale but are still facing floodwaters.
JOURNALIST: Will the Government have to re-prioritise though in the face of this disaster (inaudible)
PM: You betcha, yes, absolutely and they are the difficult decisions of the days ahead but we will do what we need to to rebuild Queensland, to be here working with Queensland as it is rebuilt. People now are on the immediate task, I've had the opportunity to be briefed by the Lord-Mayor this morning, talking to me about the rubbish removal that's happening right throughout the city of Brisbane, the sheer scale of the amount of filth and much and rubbish and broken household effects that need to be shovelled off streets and got away as part of clean-up. So the focus now is on that but quickly it will turn to rebuilding and we'll be here with the people of Queensland rebuilding Queensland.
JOURNALIST: Can you just clarify that (inaudible) are they the ones that are currently (inaudible)
PM: That's right, there's a payment called, the technical name is the Australian Government Disaster Relief Payment. This is the first emergency money that people can get, so it's in those really fraught days when peoples' homes have been flood inundated or affected by floods, they may be in an evacuation centre, circumstances like that where they need some cash, they might have to go and try and get some medicines or something that they had to leave behind when they left their homes; it's that emergency cash money.
That's been made available in Queensland and the most recent advice to me is more than $130 million had been paid as emergency assistance to people, that same assistance has been made available for parts of New South Wales that have got floodwaters, much of that coming from Queensland as a result of the water flow, and it will be made available for parts of Victoria and people will be able to get full details of that through the same telephone number that people have been using here, if people can look for those details from tomorrow, check 180 22 66.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister I just have a question from our Canberra bureau -
PM: Sure -
JOURNALIST: How do you think the Greens having the balance of power come July, how do you think that will change Australian (inaudible)
PM: Well, from the Government's point of view we'll just be governing guided by our values and delivering for the people of Australia.
Thank you.