PM: I'm here at Erindale Leisure Centre and I'm very pleased to be joined by the local member Gai Brodtmann and by the Minister for Ageing Mark Butler. We've had the opportunity today to talk to some older Australians who are here exercising using the benefits of the leisure programs here. It's giving us a vision of healthy ageing, of what it means to be growing older but still striving to keep your health, to keep your mobility and to be able to stay in your own home as long as possible.
Yesterday we released the Productivity Commission report into caring for our older Australians. And last week I made the point that our nation now has two generations of retirees, our older retirees and the baby boomers moving into retirement. With these twin generations in retirement, people will be looking for more choice as they age. The baby boomers are very likely to change our conception of what it means to be old and of ageing.
We want to make sure that as Australians age they have security. That no one is left behind. We also want to make sure that people enjoy more choice and control over their lives as they age than they have in the past.
That means that we need to make sure we've got a sustainable financing model for ageing and the Productivity Commission report released yesterday makes important recommendations about financing and about ageing generally.
We said yesterday that we would pursue the recommendations in the productivity commission report in a national conversation about ageing. Mark Butler will be leading that national conversation. It's been good to come here today and to meet with people who are living it, who are showing what it is to think about your health, think about ageing, think about your lifestyle and consequently be able to age independently and to enjoy that sense of personal security as you age.
So I'll turn now to Mark Butler for some comments and we'll be happy to take questions.
MINISTER BUTLER: Thank you Prime Minister. The Prime Minster and I said yesterday that allowing and supporting older Australians to live independently in their own home for as long as possible will be central to our approach to ageing generally and to aged care in particular. And staying physically healthy is central to that capacity for older Australians.
In a facility like this you will see retired Australians undertaking weight training, resistance training, which not too many years ago was an utterly foreign concept to people in their retirement. You'll see older Australians doing aqua-aerobics, doing swimming and things like that to make sure that they can stay as physically fit as possible in their older years but also they can keep the physical strength and the balance to avoid things like falls which can often create the sort of injuries that lead people into residential aged care.
This Government, with its focus on preventative health, the establishment of the Australian National Preventative Health Agency, has been working in this area now for some time. In 2008 we concluded a record agreement with the states on preventative health which included health promotion for older Australians as a central focus with money going to groups like local governments, the Heart Foundation, to conduct in addition to activities you see in this facility, walking groups and things like that, for older Australians.
Now, not only is this incredibly important in terms of maintaining physical health, but it's also incredibly important in terms of opportunity to maintain social connections, to build new friendships and to stay connected to your community on a daily or weekly basis. So, this will be the sort of thing that we want to see more of, opportunities for older Australians who stay at their home to be able to come out to a facility like this, stay physically healthy for as long as possible and to maintain the sorts of social relationships that they enjoy through working.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister.
PM: Yes.
JOURNALIST: During the election campaign you spoke a lot in response, I think, to public concern about the need for a sustainable Australia, not a big Australia. However, as you are now confronting this issue of an ageing population and how we're going to pay for all the older people as they leave the workforce, aren't the - don't we actually need a big Australia to be able to sustain our economy?
PM: Thank you for that question, but we actually have to be a bit careful about how these issues are connected. As has been made clear through population discussions in the past, of course migration programs do change, you're dependency ratio immediately in terms of numbers of tax payers and numbers of older Australians, but they don't over time - migration doesn't over time change your need to deal with ageing because those migrants too will age. So, we have to as a society confront the challenge of ageing. It is upon us as we see these twin generations of retirees.
As for our appropriate migration settings, what I've made clear is I do believe in a sustainable Australia, I do believe we need skilled migrants but it's a question of getting people to the places they are needed and when we look across our nation, I've talked at length about our patchwork economy, about different demands in different places, some places crying out for more workers, hungry for growth. Other places, obviously working through as some industries and sectors are under strain due to our sustained high Australian dollar and other economic conditions. So we've worked hard to get our migration program right so it meets regional demands and enterprise demands where growth and skills are needed and I believe that's the right setting.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, can I ask you, with trouble on financial markets, do you believe the world's seeing another Lehman Brothers moment at the present time and do you think that the budget - your surplus promise is under threat?
PM: Clearly Australians are continuing to see the impacts of some global insecurity and people are seeing that in the stock market. I'm certainly not going to engage in running commentary on stock market questions and what I can say about all of this is of course we're not immune to global economic events, we're not immune and we're seeing that on the stock market over recent days.
But we should also get a degree of confidence from the strong fundamentals of our economy. We have low unemployment, we have low debt, we've got a strong pipeline of investment coming through and that will mean economic growth. We are located in the right place of the world where we are still seeing and will continue to see economic growth.
So, Australians should approach this period with a degree of confidence in the fundamentals of our economy.
JOURNALIST: Are we seeing another GFC?
PM: Well, what we're seeing is some instability arising from circumstances in the US around fiscal consolidation and how that has obviously worried markets and some continuing concerns about parts of Europe, that's what we're seeing.
I think it's very important to deal with the facts of it and to be explaining the facts of it rather than trying to put a label on it, which is what you're inviting me to do. We are seeing some insecurity factors out of the US and out of Europe but it's important to be very clear about our economy here, the fundamentals are strong - low unemployment, low debt, big pipeline of growth. We avoided recession during the last global financial crisis, we live in a country with a well regulated financial sector and of course unlike the kind of gridlock you've seen in the United States, we've been able to deliver fiscal consolidation through our Parliament.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, would you, as the IMF said you had the capacity to do, if you needed to would you be prepared to delay a return to surplus in the promised time if it came to that?
PM: As the Treasurer has made clear, events impacting on global growth make the challenge more difficult, but we are working to return the budget to surplus in 2012-13 as promised.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) has anyone from the Government spoken to the High Court to try and expedite this asylum seeker case before the 22 August?
PM: It would be completely improper for anybody from the Government to speak to the High Court. So, no, of course not.
JOURNALIST: The Immigration Minister yesterday said that the government was trying to see if the High Court can move the case forward?
PM: What the Immigration Minister says - let's be very clear about this - what the Immigration Minister said is that the Solicitor-General would go through the appropriate proceedings to seek a more urgent hearing by the Court. Certainly no one in government is communicating directly with the Court.
JOURNALIST: Has there been any progress on that (inaudible)?
PM: Look, the Minister for Immigration's been dealing with this matter this morning and obviously it's a work in progress and he's been explaining to people exactly what's happening with that. So, I'd refer you to his more detailed statements.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, Penny Wong has announced she and her partner are having a child (inaudible)?
PM: Well, Penny Wong is a colleague of mine, she's also a very long-term friend. So I'm very pleased for Penny and her partner Sophie as they look forward to a new baby and the next phase of their lives which will be as parents raising a new child.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, under what circumstances will it take for the return to surplus pledge to be negotiable?
PM: Well, what you do is you deal with the facts and you deal with the economic circumstances and that is what the Government is doing, the economic circumstances in this country are that we've got low unemployment, we are looking forward to growth, we've got a strong pipeline of investment, we've got strong public finances, that's the economic circumstances in Australia and we are continuing to manage those economic circumstances.
JOURNALIST: So would the Government consider under any circumstances a return to stimulus or would you only use the existing monetary policy levers?
PM: I don't think dealing with hypotheticals helps here, what helps is to deal competently with the economic circumstances that face our nation and we are dealing with our economic circumstances - big pipeline of investment, economic growth, economic growth being particularly experienced in some parts of the country, a resources industry that's hungry for skills, hungry for people, hungry for infrastructure, low debt in the Government with rapid fiscal consolidation under way and delivered through the Parliament. These are our circumstances and we'll continue to manage those circumstances.
Of course our economy is not immune from global events but we've got to be very clear about the strong fundamentals of our economy.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) it's fair that Penny Wong's child will have parents that cannot get married?
PM: Clearly there are strong views about same-sex marriage in the community, there are strong views in the political party I lead and we'll have a debate at National Conference about those strongly held views, I've made my views clear.
JOURNALIST: Yes you have, but do you believe that the likely outcome here is a conscience vote?
PM: Well National Conference will deal with this debate as is appropriate; I've said all along that I want the Labor Party to be a party of ideas as well as a party of government. I think it's a good thing that Labor people come to Labor meetings, want to talk about ideas and we'll talk about them at National Conference in December.
JOURNALIST: Labor Party Conference doesn't decide whether it will be a conscience vote, you do, so you think (inaudible)?
PM: That's not technically true, so technically you've got the question wrong and in any event the National Conference will work its way through these issues. I've always said that I think it's important people can come along and have a debate, have a conversation and they will.
JOURNALIST: Your standing in the polls and indeed the Government's standing appears to have stalled today, has the carbon tax, the message, selling the message of the carbon tax stalled as well? Is this where you foresaw that you would be at this point?
PM: We've got a lot of hard work to do and we've got a lot of hard work to do getting the big things right that we need for our nation's future, and of course putting a price on carbon and seizing a clean energy future is one of the big things we need to get done and we're getting it done, and continuing to explain to the Australian people what it means for them, that it's a tax on our biggest polluters, that people will be assisted, that literally millions of Australian households will come out in front as a result of our carbon pricing plan.
Whilst we're getting that big thing done, of course we're continuing to do the other big things that our nation needs: health reform, delivering a budget with opportunity and participation at its centre, dealing with our economic circumstances in this nation, getting people the skills they need so that they can get the job that they want. And here we are today dealing with another big question for our nation's future, the question of ageing and of course in coming days I'll have things to say about other big questions including the Productivity Commission report on disability.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, there's some commentary today that the debt crisis in Europe and the United States could flow over and impact on China, and the fact the Chinese economy has demand for commodities including Australian economies. Do you concede that what we're seeing could have negative impacts for the Chinese economy? And secondly are you saying that the return to surplus 2012-13, that's non-negotiable, that's definitive regardless of what's happening?
PM: What I'm saying is that they economic circumstance of our country, which is the one we should understand and make sure people do understand, is one where we're looking to strong growth through a big pipeline of investment, low unemployment, we've got strong government finances, we've been able to deliver fiscal consolidation which will bring the budget to surplus in 2012-13, the budget we announced in May has the budget coming to surplus in 2012-13 as promised.
At the same time, of course, we are seeing instability in the US and in Europe and we're not immune from that, global growth is not immune from that, we understand that. We're also a government with a good track record of managing our economy in circumstances of global instability.
So we are dealing with the economic circumstances but I'm not going to be drawn on hypotheticals because I think they've got the capacity to mislead people about what is happening in our nation today. What is happening in our nation today is we stand here in a nation with low unemployment, low public debt, a well governed financial sector, a government that's been able to deliver its budget without the kind of gridlock we've seen in the United States, a strong pipeline of investment and of course we came out of the global financial crisis without having gone into recession. Our economic fundamentals are strong.
So as we continue to analyse the impact of instability in Europe and the US on the global economy, we come to that analysis knowing our economic fundamentals are strong.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, Therese Rein has resumed her personal business presence in Australia, circumstances previously were well understood, are you happy that Kevin Rudd would be able to avoid any conflict of interest issues in the light of this?
PM: Certainly, certainly he will be able to and what Kevin's done in the past for example when we were in Opposition to take one example, is he would excuse himself from discussions that had any impacts for employment services in this country and he'll do the same obviously in view of Therese's re-entry into the Australian market.
JOURNALIST: Are you shocked by the images coming out of London, Prime Minister?
PM: I like many other Australians have been very, very disturbed to see the images coming out of London, there's no excuse for the kind of violence we're seeing on our TV screens. So, they are disturbing images and obviously we'd wish our UK friends well and that the situation be brought under control as soon as possible.
We'll take the last two questions and then we'll go. Yes.
JOURNALIST: Just on the school chaplaincy program, is the Government facing a potential second blow in as many days in the High Court?
PM: Look, I'll have to refer that to the Minister for Education for an answer, school education. Yes.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister what should Australians in the UK be doing?
PM: Well, look, obviously just taking advice from local authorities about what's the best thing to do in the circumstances.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister this is a question on the High Court and the injunction, do you think people smugglers are going to try to exploit this, take advantage of it and try and send more people out here before that August 22 deadline and will it damage the High Court? Does this decision damage the High Court in any decision to determine this illegal, would that damage the High Court?
PM: I think the High Court's independent of government and the High Court's got to do what it does, which is be our highest court and highest part of our judicial system. The Minister for Immigration has made clear the Government's perspective about the interim injunction that's been granted by the High Court, he's also made clear that we will, through the Solicitor-General, be seeking to bring an application to expedite the hearing.
Thanks very much.