Canberra
HOST: Julia Gillard is the Prime Minister of Australia. She's in the national capital and even at this early stage in the election year calendar she has a plate full of issues to deal with. Prime Minister, good morning to you.
PM: Good morning Jon and happy new year.
HOST: Thank you and the same. Yesterday we ran through a roll-call of Victorian hospitals: the Alfred, Peninsula, Eastern, Melbourne Health, Barwon Health, Peter Mack, St Vincent's, the Children's Hospital today have confirmed also in excess of 100 beds being closed across the state, and somewhere round my estimation is $50 million worth of cuts and hospital after hospital are saying that this is because of Commonwealth funds being reduced.
Why are you reducing funds to Victorian hospitals?
PM: We most certainly are not reducing funds to Victorian hospitals. What's happening here Jon is a blame game and I think people are pretty sick of blame games between state and Federal Governments.
I think people too can judge from the facts and judge for themselves. And the facts are these: we are increasing funding to Victoria for health at $900 million.
HOST: That's for health. This is hospitals. They're not the same thing.
PM: And overwhelmingly what we give Victoria for health is for hospitals, Jon.
HOST: But the hospitals themselves, Prime Minister, say that these are because of Commonwealth funds being cut.
PM: And that's because the hospitals have received advice in part from the Victorian Government that's desperate to put a spin on this Jon, and to try and get away from taking responsibility for their more than $600 million worth of cutbacks.
So let's just do the maths, use the figures; our funding is going up $900 million.
The Victorian Government's funding is going down by more than $600 million. Of course Premier Baillieu is desperate to get away from political responsibility for that $600 million cut, and so he has been representing to hospitals that somehow this is all about the Federal Government.
HOST: Prime Minister, the actual hospital budgets themselves come from various sources; it comes from Commonwealth allocations and state allocations, the total pool of Victorian funds available from the Commonwealth for Victorian hospitals has been reduced.
Even if health funding's gone up, hospital allocations have gone down. Yes the state government has made a cut, but so has the Commonwealth.
PM: Jon, get out the figures and look at the year on year increases and you will see Federal funding going up by $900 million over a four year period.
HOST: The reductions that the hospitals say they're experiencing will cut jobs, and we'll speak to the Children's Hospital a little later this morning.
This is an election year. The state government's not facing the ballot this year but the Commonwealth Government is.
You are going to have this thrown at you in Victorian electorates - marginal electorates - seats you need to secure and win, right through the course of this year.
PM: And I'm happy to be judged by increasing Victorians' funding for hospitals and health, and all of that money predominantly goes to hospitals.
I'm happy to be judged by increasing that funding by $900 million by making more money available for Victorian hospitals from the Federal Government than has ever been made available before.
HOST: So this is going to be a credibility test between you and Ted Baillieu as you each point the finger in the other direction, and the voters are basically going to be asked who they believe.
PM: Well there are these things called facts, Jon, you know, facts. I know they might sound old-fashioned, heavens above, facts, but there are these things called facts that can't be denied.
And you don't really have to have a PhD in mathematics to work out that if one level of government is putting an extra $900 million in and another level of government is taking more than $600 million out, that the problems are associated with the $600 million cutback, not the $900 million increase.
HOST: Prime Minister, speaking of facts, there's some unfortunate facts being unravelled on Darwin ABC radio yesterday and today over your announcement of what you've called a captain's pick for Nova Peris for the winnable Senate seat.
This is just a little bit of what's been heard on the ABC on talkback in Darwin.
ABC DARWIN CALLER: After 37 years of being a Labor Party activist or a member, that this would be thrown upon you in this disgusting way.
HOST: A talkback caller to the ABC in Darwin describing your conduct in taking a captain's pick to elevate Nova Peris over Senator Trish Crossin as disgusting.
PM: These are always tough decisions, it's a leadership decision and I made one.
Jon, I expected that there would be a reaction, I expected that there would be people who weren't happy with my decision, but I came to my decision because I thought it was so important that we as a Federal Labor Party embrace amongst our numbers an indigenous Australian, an indigenous woman of incredible merit, and that is Nova Peris.
HOST: But why did you do it this way is the question everyone's asking?
Typically when Prime Ministers want to install and hand-pick someone for elevation to the Senate. The traditional way is to offer Trish Crossin a diplomatic posting or something that can't be refused; you move her sideways and elevate somebody in that way.
PM: I chose, Jon, to do it this way because the outcome is so important. I believe Nova Peris is a person of incredible merit.
She is well-known to Australians from the sporting field but she has done so much more besides that in education, work with children, work on opportunities in life.
I formed the view that I wanted her to be a Federal Parliamentary candidate, that I wanted Labor to break the history that we have had of not having an indigenous person serve in the Federal Labor caucus in the Parliament.
Now I knew that it would be controversial amongst some and that there would be a reaction, but I decided that this was the best way forward for the party. Now as leader I do make some tough calls. This was a tough call.
HOST: I understand the objective, but the methodology is what's being questioned and there are those including Senator Doug Cameron and others within your own ranks who are publicly saying that this is clumsy politics and it should have been done another way.
PM: Look there will be people who put all sorts of perspectives about those kinds of things.
In reality Jon, in terms of who comes into the Federal Parliament, who gets supported by political parties, there's a very limited number of spots and there's always more people that would like to be in there than get there so it's always controversial, there's always going to be disappointment by some.
That's kind of the nature of the way that things work. I've decided on this occasion that it is important that we endorse Nova Peris for the Northern Territory Senate spot.
When I spoke to Trish Crossin and as I said publicly, I'm very admiring of the work that Trish has done-
HOST: Well you can't be.
PM: As a Federal Labor Senator she's served for 15 years in the Senate representing Territorians and doing a good job.
I do think this is an opportunity at the next election for an indigenous Australian, Nova, to come in in that spot.
HOST: Are you going to deny that it was in any way a factor that Senator Trish Crossin was a Kevin Rudd supporter?
PM: All of that is completely irrelevant.
This was about my desire to ensure that Labor had within its caucus, representing people in the Australian Parliament, an indigenous Australian.
HOST: As we speak the polls have closed and votes have been counted in the Israeli election. You aggravated some of your Labor Party colleagues and cause a bit of a diplomatic storm over your stance on recognition at the United Nations of a Palestinian representation at nation-level.
The Coalition likely to be elected in the new Knesset in Israel looks like it is going to oppose the peace process. What does that do to our relationship with Israel?
PM: I am getting some reports coming through on the results in the Israeli elections. They are coming through off the Financial Times website and other places, all the international news sources.
Jon, I'm not an election commentator and I'm not going to comment on the nature of the Israeli Government until all the election processes are finished, counted and a government is formed. That wouldn't be appropriate.
HOST: But we have a commitment at the United Nations and a seat now on the Security Council and we have a belief, we have a publicly stated, internationally recognised view that we believe in a two-nation solution and we may now have as a close ally, and we're told a strong friend, a government in Israel that no longer agrees with our position.
PM: Well Jon I've just said to you, I'm not going to run commentary on Israeli politics.
What I can say is we as a government are strong supporters of a two-state solution in the Middle East.
We always have been as a Labor Party. We always will be and we will advocate that irrespective of who is in which positions in government. That's our long-held view.
HOST: President Obama, in his second inauguration speech placed extra emphasis on the current spate of extreme weather events and the need to urgently tackle climate change.
Do you have a renewed sense of urgency about tackling climate change because of extreme weather events right across Australia; particularly bushfires of course - Tasmania, New South Wales, Victoria and now cyclones already on the top end of Western Australia?
PM: Jon, we've already stepped up and done the single biggest thing we can do to tackle climate change, which is put a price on carbon and reduce the amount of carbon pollution we're putting in our atmosphere.
And you would see from reports in today's papers that our emissions are being reduced by the way in which the Government's policies have been smoothly implemented and they're making a difference.
We've lived through this summer. We've seen some horrible bushfires, some extreme weather events.
Now you can't point at one individual day, or one day's temperature and say that that's climate change, but our climate is changing.
The scientists tell us that and the scientists tell us that climate change will mean more extreme weather events.
Which is why it's important that we act, and we have acted. It's been a fast and furious debate but it's done and all of the claims that were made about carbon pricing, the hysterical nonsense that people had to listen to during 2012 has all been disproved.
People were told no one would ever work again in this country. Apparently the economy was going to have a wrecking ball through it. No one would ever be able to eat roast lamb again. Inflation would be cantering out of control. And they we also told that it wouldn't work.
Well, all of those things have been proved to be untrue.
HOST: So your sense of urgency is going to be expressed in what particular changes to government policy or which particular parts of the election campaign?
PM: Jon we've done it. We've done the single biggest thing you need to do to reduce carbon pollution in this country, putting a price on carbon.
We've done it. The nation has had a big debate. It's been a hard debate. It at times has been a very hot debate, talking about matters associated with temperature a very, very hot debate, but it is done and it is the right policy for the country.
HOST: Do you expect it still to be a high priority issue in the election campaign?
PM: I anticipate that we'll see a continuation of the sort of negative fear nonsense campaign against carbon pricing. Yes, I do think that will continue.
HOST: And do you expect to face a campaign of promises that if you vote for, in fact the current Opposition, then the carbon tax will still be abolished?
PM: I think that that will be stated but that's masking-
HOST: Do you think it's achievable?
PM: That's masking a grand intention that if the current Opposition was ever to end up as the Government then they'd have a little fiddle and a little name change and that'd be the end of it.
HOST: We will see in due course. I'm sure I'll get a chance to speak to Tony Abbott.
And just finally, Prime Minister there is a committee meeting in Melbourne today for the first public hearing over the Attorney-General's draft law on discrimination changes and there's a curious and quite unprecedented coalition of opposition to it from people who are normal fellow travellers with you on many issues such as Julian Burnside as a civil libertarian through to indeed representatives of the churches and the like.
It seems to have united people across the spectrum in opposition to what seems to be an ambit claim on discrimination laws.
Why are you pursuing something that's already attracting so much ire across all parts of the political spectrum?
PM: Well I don't want to quibble with your question, Jon, but I'm certainly not going to endorse the terminology ‘ambit claim'. It's quite the reverse.
HOST: It's an exposure draft. I'm calling it an ambit claim.
PM: What the Government is seeking to do here is we've got quite number of different pieces of discrimination law.
That all brings complexity as to which law applies and different processes and all the rest of it in different pieces of discrimination law.
We are trying to consolidate them into one piece of legislation and therefore make the system easier for everyone.
Now, we always understood this is an area where people would want their views to be heard, which is precisely why we put out an exposure draft so people could engage in commentary and people could put forward their opinions and we would get the benefit of that. So that's the process that's underway now.
I think what we're seeing in terms of the reaction to the discrimination law, the exposure draft, is that there are some areas of concern that have been raised.
I suspect too we're seeing some people who have had a long term opposition to discrimination law in any form coming back around again.
But we will get all of this feedback. We deliberately set out to get feedback and we'll consider it.
HOST: I'm indebted to you for your time and I think I've gone over what was allocated for which I apologise and I look forward to speaking to you again shortly.
PM: Thanks Jon.