HOST: Prime Minister, good morning and welcome to AM.
PM: Good morning, Sabra.
HOST: What on earth made you think that Tony Abbott was going to break the habit of a lifetime and say yes?
PM: I believe Australians have been looking at us and saying to their national leaders that they want us to put politics aside, they want us to work together, they want us to resolve this issue for the nation. I think Australians are sick of it.
I made those points yesterday, made them publically and also when I talked to Tony Abbott. I believe Australians want us to resolve this issue.
Now I gave Tony Abbott an opportunity to do that yesterday. Unfortunately he turned his back on the national interest when given that opportunity. And let's be clear about why he's turned his back on the national interest - it's all because of his political calculation.
What he is actually terrified of is that the Malaysia arrangement will work to stop the boats. That's what this is all about.
HOST: And to be clear you won't accept Tony Abbott's amendments.
PM: No we won't. We will bring to the Parliament the amendments that we showed Mr Abbott yesterday and released yesterday. And the important point there Sabra is the amendments that we will bring to the Parliament enable Executive Government to make the choices that it believes are in the nation's interest, this Government and governments in the future.
Mr Abbott's amendments, in contrast, are him playing political games because he is terrified that Malaysia will work. He's slammed the door on the national interest and pulled it wide open to his view of his own political interest.
HOST: Why are you going to persist with this now? The opposition says it won't support it, the Greens won't. So that you can say to the voters we tried, we did the best that we could?
PM: Because I believe that Tony Abbott and every member of the Liberal Party and National Party should walk into the Parliament and have their vote recorded so that the pages of history can show that when they were called on to choose between this nation's interests in protecting our borders, and their narrow political interest, they chose their narrow political interest.
They should record their votes name by name, person by person, stand up in the Parliament and say that they are people who believe their cheap politics is more important than protecting our borders and protecting our Australian values and the way that we deal with refugees
HOST: And you hope that voters blame Tony Abbott and the opposition for every new boat that arrives?
PM: Well, I'm making the point Sabra that is in the national interest. This is not for me, about the politics of it, this is about protecting our borders as well as protecting refugees. The Malaysia arrangement is about sending the strongest possible deterrence message.
I don't want to see people losing their lives in boats. I don't want to see that happen. I want to see boats stopped because I don't want to see lives risked. I don't want to see people smugglers profiting. And I do want to take 4,000 more genuine refugees from Malaysia.
HOST: And you categorically rule out Nauru?
PM: Oh, let's be clear about this, Tony Abbott has been clutching for Nauru to try and give himself some policy credentials in this debate. He has received the clearest possible advice, from the experts that advise government and indeed advised the Howard Government, the clearest possible advice that Nauru won't work and it will cost a billion dollars.
Well Sabra, I am not going to waste a billion dollars of taxpayers' money on a solution that won't work while Mr Abbott, for his political reasons tries to take away from the Australian people the mechanism and arrangement that our expert advice tells us sends the strongest possible deterrence message.
Now, if Mr Abbott is ever prime minister of this country, and he wants to waste a billion dollars on a solution he's been advised doesn't work, well that's a matter for him. And in fact, the legislation I will bring to the Parliament would enable a future government to make that decision if it chose to.
But it enables this Government to make the decision to implement the arrangement with Malaysia and we have the clearest possible advice that that is the strongest deterrence - that's what's in the national interest and Tony Abbott is terrified it will work.
HOST: The effect of this now means that processing claims will happen onshore.
PM: Well we will bring this legislation to the Parliament, but yes Sabra, you're right, the logical conclusion of Mr Abbott's political game playing, the logical conclusion of Mr Abbott's slamming the door on the national interest is that offshore processing is at risk in its entirety.
HOST: You're slamming Mr Abbott, but you are the government, you are the Prime Minister. It's not-
PM: -Yes I am-
HOST: -his job to provide you with the majority numbers.
PM: Well, I believe it's the job of every parliamentarian to act in the national interest. I believe its Mr Abbott's job to weigh the national interest in making his decisions. I don't believe and I've never believed that it's the job of an opposition leader to just say, national interest here, political interests there, I could do the right thing by the nation or I could do something cheap and chose something cheap.
Let's be very clear here about the decision Tony Abbott is making. I am not asking him and I have never asked him to endorse the Government's plan for Malaysia. What I am asking him to do is to put this Government and future governments in the same position that the Howard Government was with the same degree of options and powers.
Now why would Mr Abbott say no to that other than hypocrisy, opportunism and a deep, deep fear that the Malaysia arrangement will work? And what that means is he is sitting there calculating it is in his political interest to see more boats come to this country. That's how reckless he is being.
HOST: You talk about political opportunism, but up until 12 months ago you wouldn't countenance sending people off to a country that hadn't been a signatory to the UN Convention either.
PM: I wanted to see our convention obligations upheld. Yes I did. And Minister Bowen has worked with worked a non-convention signatory country to do that. Now, when Minister Bowen first started talking about this transfer agreement there were lots of people who said it wasn't possible and it couldn't be done.
But he has done it. He's negotiated an arrangement with Malaysia which means that even though it is not a Refugee Convention signatory country, that for the asylum seekers we transfer to Malaysia, Refugee Convention obligations will be upheld. That is, they will not be returned to a place where they could be persecuted. And they will have their claims-
HOST: -But those protections aren't legally enforceable under the legislation that you will put to Parliament tomorrow and that's a "why bother" clause because it's not, you're not endorsing the UN Convention there.
PM: Oh well, Sabra I absolutely reject that. The arrangement between Malaysia and Australia is an arrangement between two governments, freely entered into. On what evidence, and I know that Tony Abbott is out there bashing Malaysia, on what evidence can he say to the Australian people that he doubts Malaysia will live up to obligations it freely entered into. No one made them do it.
They could have said to Australia, no not interested in having a talk with you. But what they did over months and months of patient work was negotiated obligations they were prepared to uphold. That's the situation. There is no reason to assume Malaysia won't uphold those obligations.
HOST: On the flipside now, the left in your party will be happy because it does mean that claims will be processed here onshore. If any of them abstain or vote against this bill in Parliament, will they be penalised?
PM: Well you're making a set of assumptions about what will happen in the Parliament, and Sabra I'm determined we will bring this legislation to the Parliament. I'm determined that we will say in the Parliament, as I am saying to you this morning, that where the national interest of this country lies is in having this legislation pass the Parliament.
Now Mr Abbott has slammed the door on the national interest yesterday, we will obviously in the parliamentary debate be challenging him for once, for once to put this nation's interests first in front of his political opportunism and reckless negativity. For once to actually go into the Parliament and do the right thing by the Australian people so we can protect our borders as well as protect our values and protect the way that we deal with refugees.
HOST: When you became Prime Minister last year you nominated the carbon pricing scheme, asylum seekers and the mining tax as three issues that you needed to fix.
The carbon scheme is pretty much where it was when Mr Rudd left it - on ice. You've given away billions more in the mining tax and now the asylum seeker policy has resulted in this. Voters would be right to conclude nought out of three wouldn't they?
PM: Well Sabra that's a completely fallacious analysis. The carbon pricing legislation is before the Parliament and it will go through. Carbon pricing will start on 1 July next year. The legislation couldn't go through and didn't go through the last Parliament; it will go through this Parliament.
It will go through despite Mr Abbott's relentless negativity and wanting to keep this nation in the past. It will go through despite Mr Abbott arguing for an alternative which would cost Australian families $1,300 a year.
On this arrangement with Malaysia, a new, innovative, regionally-based solution to the issues of asylum seekers and refugees, we've worked hard and then we got a High Court decision which was unexpected and I'm bringing the legislation to the Parliament that will address that. And yes, we are seeing Tony Abbott, grand hypocrisy, opportunism, they're not prepared to look at the national political interest but we will bring this legislation to the Parliament.
On the Minerals Resource Rent Tax, I entered an agreement with Australia's biggest mining countries to work on this in a consultative way. We've been doing that. The legislation will be brought to the Parliament, that's on track and on time as we envisaged it would happen.
HOST: Ms Gillard, thanks for your time.
PM: Thank you very much.