MURRAY:
Prime Minister, you have weathered the worst of the storm of distrust among many Australians over the reasons for us going to war in Iraq?
PRIME MINISTER:
I think Australians overall want to move on on this issue. I think many people are waiting on the outcome of the search for weapons of mass destruction, and I believe in the end evidence of programs will be found. I can only repeat that what I said in Parliament about the attempts of Iraq to get uranium was accurate, I said that it was the view of the British joint intelligence committee that Iraq had sought uranium in Africa and that remains the view of that committee and the British continue to standby that.
MURRAY:
But do you think most Australians now, even in the absence of definite information about weapons of mass destruction, are happy with the war?
PRIME MINISTER:
I think the majority are. I think the majority realise that a brutal regime has been removed, mass graves of up to 300,000 people have been discovered since the war ended. We have the additional dividend of the best hope for a long time of a peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians and that wouldn't have been possible without Saddam Hussein being deposed. If you put all of those things together, I believe the majority of people supported Australia going to war, the majority of people now want to move on.
MURRAY:
Prime Minister, the American Ambassador to Australia was in Perth last week and he was talking fairly openly about a stronger American military presence in Australia, even raising the prospect maybe of more American military bases here. Would you support that?
PRIME MINISTER:
I've said that we would examine any proposal that the Americans put to us, but we won't give approval in advance, we don't offer a blank cheque on something like that to anybody, the Americans included. If they have a proposal, they will put it to us and we will consider it but so far that hasn't happened.
MURRAY:
Are you expecting it?
PRIME MINISTER:
I'm not entirely clear about that. I don't think the Americans have made up their minds, they are going through the process, following the war in Iraq, of assessing their military basings around the world, not only in our region, and it may be that out of that a request were to come but you can't be certain. But our position is - of course we would look at it and consider it, but we're not saying in advance of receiving a request that we'd say yes to it. We want to hear it, we want to examine it and work out what it means.
MURRAY:
Prime Minister, this latest confusion over the warnings coming out of America about Al Qaeda based attacks, the confusion appears to be between the American interpretation of their own warning is it might affect Australia, has that been damaging?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, oh look, I don't think so. We've got to keep a sense of perspective about this. There was some intelligence suggesting that there might be a possibility that a plane originating in Australia, and indeed a number of other countries, could be hijacked and could be used for a terrorist attack on the east coast of the United States or in Europe. The Department of Homeland Security, incorrectly - that's the American department - incorrectly, interpreted that to say that Australia was a target as distinct from a point of origin and that's the thing that we've had straightened out. But you get these bureaucratic mix-ups, now this is entirely a mix-up in America, there was no misunderstanding by us because we saw the intelligence assessment and as soon as we heard of the Homeland Security Department's interpretation we said to the Americans - hey that's wrong, you'll have to correct it - and they have corrected it. But I don't think we should get too head up about something like this because there's acres of raw intelligence coming in every day to different agencies, a lot of it's right, a lot of it's wrong, a lot of it's speculation, and the agencies have got the daunting task of trying to make some sense of it and making public assessments that they think should be made public.
MURRAY:
Yeah, it appears that our agencies see the main threat out of this as being maybe to flights out of or coming into Australia…
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, out of.
MURRAY:
Yes. And we now hear that we're going to have sky marshals on Australian flights out of Australia, international flights out of Australia. It's almost two years since September 11. Are you disappointed it's taken so long for this to happen?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, the problem with getting security officers, as we call them, on aircraft going out of Australia is you've got to negotiate that with other countries. I mean, we've had them on domestic flights for a long time, we don't say which ones and we don't say how many. But you've got to get agreement and it's often very difficult to get agreement because the carriers of some of the countries with whom we're negotiating don't want to commit the resources and they therefore don't want to agree to Australian airlines carrying the security officers into their own countries because that might make travel on those airlines more attractive than theirs and we're making a lot of progress and I expect to have signed up with the Americans very soon and we have to make a bit more progress with some of the countries in our own region.
MURRAY:
Prime Minister, the nation's health ministers are meeting in Perth at the moment, started yesterday. Have you got the states over a barrel with the hospital agreement? In the end they're just going to have to accept what you offer.
PRIME MINISTER:
The important thing to me is that we are offering the states a 17 per cent increase after inflation over the next five years. We're offering them $10 billion more than what they've had under the current agreement.
MURRAY:
They say it's $1 billion less.
PRIME MINISTER:
I mean, that's just not right, I mean that is literally wrong of any state health minister to say that. They can argue till the cows come home that they want even more, but they can't argue with any justification or honesty that we're offering them less. We're offering them $10 billion more, a 17 per cent increase and we're saying to them the condition of this offer is that you match it. We are after all talking about hospitals that are operated and run and owned by the state governments. We don't run the state hospitals, all we do is provide a lot of the money. And we're willing to increase the money we provide by $10 billion over the next five years, by 17 per cent in real terms and we're saying to the states will you please, as a condition of accepting that offer, will you please do the same. Now I don't think that's unreasonable, particularly if we don't operate these hospitals. The states have all the money flowing from the GST and that will get bigger and bigger as years go by, so we don't operate, all we do is help fund them.
MURRAY:
Yeah and you've always done that. They say you're basing the projections on a three per cent increase a year inflation rate, they say medical costs are increasing at 10 per cent.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I mean, they will find any figure to try and argue that we're not giving them enough, but the reality is that if you look at what we gave them over the previous five years, if you look at what they've put in over the previous five years. I mean, let me ask me this rhetorical question - if our offer is meant to be so niggardly, why isn't it that the states haven't easily agreed to match it?
MURRAY:
Yes, I agree with you, that's a failing in their argument.
PRIME MINISTER:
And it stands to reason that if what we're offering is niggardly, which they incorrectly argue, they'd have no difficultly saying oh well of course we'll match it, but they're not doing that. I mean, they're playing this silly game of trying to sort of blame the Commonwealth for not providing enough money, when in reality both the Commonwealth and the states have responsibilities in this area. Although they are state hospitals, we accept the responsibility to help fund them and we're willing to do that, we've put a lot of money over the last five years and we're prepared to put more money over the next five years. All we're asking is that the states match that money. Now, if the states don't match the money we'll still maintain the current level of funding but it's only reasonable if they're not prepared to increase their money for their hospitals, it's a bit unreasonable to say to the Commonwealth you can increase your money.
MURRAY:
State Ministers appear to have no confidence at all in your Minister, Kay Patterson, they want you to settle this argument now. Will you do that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, I have every confidence in Kay Patterson. We have articulated a position. I wrote to all of the Premiers several months ago outlining what our offer was, explaining the basis of it, pointing out that there had been a much greater growth in private hospital usage as a result of the higher level of private health insurance, that had taken some of the load of public hospitals. I laid out the offer, now that is our position. It's not a question of confidence, I have every confidence in Kay Patterson, what she is doing is arguing the Commonwealth's position and the Commonwealth's position is a 17 per cent real increase.
MURRAY:
But they want it settled now by the Coalition of Australian Government.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that is not the forum. I mean, you know, are they arguing that they are irrelevant? I mean, that's what you have ministers for, you don't get everything settled by the Prime Minister and the Premiers. But there's… in a sense there's not a lot of settle. We have told the states what we are prepared to do.
MURRAY:
And that's it?
PRIME MINISTER:
And we're waiting on them to agree to match that increase. I mean, why don't they think of the patients of the hospitals? The patients of public hospitals in Western Australia and around the country want the Commonwealth and the States to reach agreement. We have offered a significant increase and we're asking the states to do the same. Now I think the patients of Australia are saying to the states we want more money from both the Commonwealth and the states, the Commonwealth is putting up more money, will you do the same.
MURRAY:
On that matter - they tried to have a meeting with your Aged Care Minister, Kevin Andrews, about getting aged care patients out of public hospitals, they say he wouldn't even meet with them.
PRIME MINISTER:
I don't know what the diary arrangements are of all of my ministers, I just don't know about that. But…
MURRAY:
That's a pressing issue.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well hang on. Let me deal with the issue. It is not the pressing issue that many state ministers argue. I've seen some figures recently that show that the number of overstays in public hospitals in a number of the states is less than five per cent and it's not a major issue as far as the drain on public hospitals is concerned.
MURRAY:
Okay, well I know you're pressed for time. One last question - you're here in Perth this weekend for the Liberal Party State Conference. We're seeing a lot of heavy reliance on green politics from the state government at the moment. The Ningaloo Reef decision, huge cutbacks again to our timber industry in Western Australia. Can the Liberal Party in WA beat Labor at the next state election in this increasingly green electorate?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I think state elections have fought on a lot of issues and the answer obviously is with the right policies the Liberal Party can win in Western Australia. But what the final detail of those policies are is a matter for Colin Barnett and his colleagues. But it's… couple of years or 18 months before the next state election and I think the Liberal Party in Western Australia is better placed than it is in a number of other states to win government.
MURRAY:
Thanks for your time this morning Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you.
[ends]