PM: I'm joined here today by the Member for Reid, John Murphy, and it's a pleasure to be here with him.
We're now not many days away from the forthcoming Federal Budget. This is a Federal Budget where we will be returning the budget to surplus in 2012-13, as promised.
It will be a tight budget. It's important that the Government live within its means, that the nation live within its means, in the same way that it's important that families do.
But even in a tight budget we are working hard to put resources into those things that truly matter, those things that as Prime Minister I want to see change about our country. I am passionate about making sure that every child in every school gets a great education, and that's why on Monday this week I confirmed that we will, in this budget, honour our election commitment to reward great teachers. I want teachers who are doing the right thing by students in their schools to see greater rewards. It's why yesterday we announced a new program: $200 million to assist schools to meet the needs of students with disabilities, because I want those students, too, to have a great quality education.
And I'm very pleased to be here today able to talk about another election commitment that will be honoured, and that is one to assist families with the costs of teenagers.
Now, we should acknowledge that we are here at Southern Cross Catholic Vocational College. This is a state of the art, world-class facility. It's been made possible by our Trades Training Centre program, where the Government invested $11 million in creating this world class training facility - but we didn't do it alone. We did it working with Catholic Education and the local community and I'd like to take this opportunity to publicly thank Catholic Education for partnering with Government and making available $11 million too, so that together a $22 million facility could be created, and there are a numbers of individuals to whom particular thanks go. I'd like to thank Brother Kelvin for his work in making this possible. I'd also like to thank Dan White for making it possible and to our Principal, who's shown us the facility today, with very great an appropriate pride, to Patrick O'Reilly, thank you very much for having us here.
This is a facility where students can get a hands-on education from hair and beauty through to construction trades, through to business studies and media studies. We wanted, through our Trades Training Centres program, to create new options for students, because it's so important that kids stay at school. We don't was 16, 17-year-old kids drifting away from education into a life of unemployment and idleness. That's why facilities like this one are so important.
But to keep kids at school there's another part of the equation, apart from giving them options that engage them and give them real skills - the other part of the equation is helping families with the cost of teenagers.
Our current system of providing family benefits, payments that the Government makes available to assist families with the cost of raising kids, our current system makes the assumption that teenagers cost less than younger kids, that somehow a 16-year-old is going to cost less than a 15-year-old. It's an old-fashioned model that's really based on an assumption that kids are likely to leave school early.
Well, in the modern age we don't want kids leaving school early. We want them engaged in full-time education, getting the skills that they will need for the rest of their lives.
That's why in this Budget we will change our family payment system so that the maximum rate of assistance for a family with a teenager will be $4,200. That is, we will give more money to families who support their teenagers. We'll no longer make the assumption that somehow 16, 17, 18, 19-year-olds cost less to support than younger children.
That's the investment that we will make in the maximum rate of family payment, which goes to those families that need it the most, but more than 60 per cent of families get more than the base rate of family payments and those families with teenagers will benefit from today's announcement.
This will benefit around 650,000 families, teenagers, and make a difference for them, but it comes with the condition that these students are in full-time education. They need to be in school or in some form of full-time education.
We want to work with families to assist them with the costs of teenage children, but we want that to be on the condition that those kids are learning. It's good for families - additional help with cost of living. It's good for kids because it keeps them engaged in education, with the skills that they will need for a lifetime.
So can I conclude by saying a very, very big thank you for having us here today, and I'm very happy to take any questions.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) carbon tax, Newspoll today shows that 60 per cent of people are against the carbon tax. Do you acknowledge that Tony Abbott's maintained offense to the carbon tax is cutting through, or is it that the Government plan to sell the carbon tax (inaudible)
PM: Well, really, neither of the above. What today's poll shows, and I don't normally comment on polls, but can I say this - if you look at today's poll it confirms very clearly that Australians believe that climate change is real. That's a pretty big contrast with Mr Abbott, who has said in the past that climate change is absolute crap. So, Australians believe climate change is real.
Now, I understand when a government, my Government, is putting forward a big reform, that that can make people anxious. That's completely understandable.
In the middle of this year we will be able to give everyone full details of how the carbon pricing system will work. They'll be able to sit at their kitchen table and work out all of the dollars and cents for them. Households will get generous assistance, so they will be able to work through what that assistance means for them and their family.
I think Australians, all Australians will ultimately judge carbon pricing when they have all of those details, but it's very clear to me that Australians do want to tackle climate change. I, as Prime Minister am very determined to make sure we drive this change - that we price carbon, so we have a clean energy future, a strong economy, do the right thing by the environment and the right thing by our future prosperity.
JOURNALIST: Why is that we have to wait until the middle of the year for the details? Why can't you produce those details now?
PM: Because we're working through with consultations. There were two ways of doing this, absolutely. We could have sat in a room with a locked door and worked out all of the details and then come out and announced them and then people would have rightly said ‘How come I didn't get a say? How come no-one listened to me? How come no one asked me what I think about the design of carbon pricing?'
Or we could do it the way we're doing it, which is we announced the general form of how we're going to price carbon and we are working intensively and in a consultative way with businesses, with unions, with environmental groups, to get all of the details right.
That's the right thing to do - to let people have a say, to hear their views, to respond to their views and to make sure that we get this important reform right.
JOURNALIST: So is that what you're doing this evening, with the business sector, you'll be listening to them, or will you be giving them a message?
PM: Absolutely, I will be talking to businesses, both talking and listening during the course of tonight's meeting.
JOURNALIST: Just on national security, in light of the worldwide fears of retaliation by al Qaeda after the weekend's events, what's been done in this country to ramp up counter-terrorism?
PM: We have our counter-terrorism approaches in place all day, every day.
We haven't increased the security alert. Obviously, I've taken advice on that and the advice is that we do not need to increase the security alert, but we, through our security agencies, working of course with State governments, with police services, all day, every day, take a prudent approach and preparations for dealing with the possibility of a terrorist attack.
So, my message to Australians following the death of bin Laden has been a very clear one - this is a body blow to al Qaeda. That's a good thing. That's a great thing. Al Qaeda is a terrorist organisation that came and took innocent lives, innocent Australian lives and the lives of people from countries all around the world and people of many faiths.
So, it's a good thing that al Qaeda's been dealt this body blow, but that doesn't mean that terrorism is out of business, so we've still got to be prudent. We've still got to be careful. We've still got to be prepared and we work with our security agencies to keep Australians as safe as we possibly can.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) advising you that it's highly likely that al Qaeda would have planned for that day itself, in terms of its own strategy for the Taliban?
PM: Look, I'm not going to go into too much detail about the nature of security briefings or intelligence, but what I can say is on the basis of the very professional advice to me we do not at this stage need to increase out alert system here in Australia. All day, every day, we take a very careful approach to these questions of counter terrorism.
Overseas, for Australians travelling, we have said don't get swept up in mass gatherings, in demonstrations - you know, go down to have a look, have a gawk, have a see, take a few photographs. I can understand that people might want to do that if they see something, a gathering of people coming together, but the safe course is not to get involved and not to be in those places.
We've put all of this on our Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade website. We say to Australians when they travel, please check all of the travel advisories. We also say to them, please register because in a whole lot of circumstances - most recently, for example, the natural disaster in Japan - it really helps us to assist Australians overseas if they've registered and we know where they're going.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, you talked about the good things about bin Laden's death. Is it the right thing that we should be so jubilant, that we should be celebrating the man's death, irrespective of how (inaudible)?
PM: I understand that this is an emotional time for many people. I mean, there are Australian families, families right here in our own nation, in our own country, that lost loved ones in violent acts organised or inspired by bin Laden. Now, Australian lost their lives in 9/11. They lost their lives in two Bali bombings. They lost their lives in other terrorist events around the world inspired by or organised by bin Laden. So, I understand this is an emotional time, particularly for those families who lost loved ones.
So, I welcomed the news of the death of bin Laden. He was a combatant in a war. He was killed in a fire fight. He effectively declared war with the strike on 9/11, to use the American expression and the one that we tend to adopt. On 9/11 he effectively declared war and he's paid the price for that.
JOURNALIST: PM, as a leader of this nation though, do you think welcoming the death of a man is appropriate language?
PM: I think in these circumstances, when we are talking about an individual who dedicated his life to violence, who dedicated his life to killing innocent people, who dedicated his life to being a combatant in a war, the war that terrorism is, when we've seen those circumstances I think for us to welcome the news that in a fire fight he has been killed, that he has been located, that he's no longer in a position to organise and wreak violence against innocent civilians is the appropriate thing to do.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) President Obama, or has he phoned you, or anyone from the Administration spoken to you about the weekend's events and the ramifications, more importantly about the terrorist threat (inaudible)?
PM: Look, I haven't had the opportunity to speak to President Obama as yet.
JOURNALIST: Has there been any suggestion that the operation on the weekend was delayed until after the royal wedding?
PM: The operation- obviously, the organisational arrangements for the operation were made by the US Administration and American forces. They were appropriately kept highly, highly secret. I'm not going to speculate on considerations that went through the mind of the Americans in putting it together, but I suspect the foremost, in fact probably the only consideration in their mind was prospects of success.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, New South Wales police have confirmed they're investigating the discovery of home-made bomb at Villawood detention centre last month. The Immigration Minister found out about this morning after speaking to Ray Hadley. Are you concerned that there may be a lack of communication between the Department and the Minister, or he's being kept in the dark?
PM: Look, I'm not going to speculate on a matter that's happened on radio. Of course, we have our detention centres overseen by a contracted body, Serco, and there are a set of contractual obligations that require them to provide appropriate security in detention centres and there is continuing reporting and advice to the Department.
JOURNALIST: Do you think that's something that the Minister should have been told about?
PM: I'm not going to speculate off information on a radio station. We'll take appropriate advice about it. Sometimes things said on radio stations prove, on analysis, not to be 100 per cent right.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister there's a report today in The Australian that Rio Tinto weren't invited to this carbon tax dinner. Are they (inaudible)?
PM: Look, let's just get a little bit of sense and perspective here. I have literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of meetings. I meet people in all sorts of circumstances. I meet them at breakfast; I meet them at lunch; I meet them at dinners; I meet them in my office; I meet them in their office; I meet them wandering around trades training centre facilities. We consult on the Government's agenda in all sorts of formats and forums.
This is not the only conversation I will have with the business community about carbon pricing. I've had dozens already, I'll have dozens more and we've got the business roundtable for consultation to continue and, of course, that consultation includes Australian's biggest businesses.
I see people from the mining sector very, very regularly, as recently as when I was in China, I was at an event with Sam Walsh and Marius Kloppers, to name just two.
Thank you very much.