PRIME MINISTER:
Any questions you want to ask me about the announcement I've just made, or anything else?
JOURNALIST:
Can I ask one about cars?
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes certainly.
JOURNALIST:
Mark Scully from the Financial Review Prime Minister, just wondering, the Government has got to soon consider whether the Australian car manufacturers are meeting their commitments under the ASIS scheme for $4.2 billion of funding on the IR reform front. Are they doing enough at the moment do you think?
PRIME MINISTER:
I believe so but that's something you keep under constant review.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister was it a mistake to express support for Jeff Kennett last night now that it appears he is not running?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I was asked a question about whether I thought it would be good for the Liberal Party if he came back and I answered that question very directly and very honestly.
JOURNALIST:
What sort of leader do you think Ted Baillieu will make in Victoria?
PRIME MINISTER:
I think he will be very good, I have worked with him in the past. For a period of time in the 1980s he was the president of the party in Victoria and I was opposition leader and we worked together very closely. If he is elected leader, as appears likely, I will work very hard to help him win.
JOURNALIST:
You said this morning that Jeff Kennett would be the best candidate, does that mean Ted Baillieu is not the best candidate?
PRIME MINISTER:
No what I said this morning in no way denigrated others, but I was asked a question and I gave a very straightforward answer and I don't resile from what I said, but Jeff is not running. He's not running and somebody else is and I will support that person and I will work very hard to help him win.
JOURNALIST:
Would've you have preferred him to run?
PRIME MINISTER:
Obviously.
JOURNALIST:
Would he have been the...
PRIME MINISTER:
I am not going to repeat what I said this morning, but equally I am not going to retract what I said this morning. I said what I've said because I believed it and that remains the position. I don't just suddenly change my beliefs and everything I've said about Mr Kennett was prepositioned by the acknowledgement that he hadn't decided whether or not to run and that that was a matter for him.
JOURNALIST:
Have you spoken with him?
PRIME MINISTER:
No.
JOURNALIST:
What sort of chance has Ted Baillieu got at this point?
PRIME MINISTER:
It's going to be tough, it's going to be tough no matter who the leader is because the Bracks Government has a very big majority. This is the problem, when a party goes backwards after having lost narrowly the first time and goes back further the next time, it's got a lot of ground to make up and the same problem faces the Liberal Party in NSW and the Coalition in Queensland, that incumbent Labor governments have very big majorities, but politics is a volatile business and clearly once a new leader is chosen on Monday, the party will get behind him, and I will help him and I will work with him and my colleagues in Victoria will work with him because we think the Victorian people should be given an alternative, a strong, viable alternative and I'll do everything I can to make sure that happens.
JOURNALIST:
Is Ted the man to rebuild the Party?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well whoever is chosen, and it looks like it will be Mr Baillieu, will have my support and I believe with his organisational background as well, that will give him a good start in rebuilding the Party's fortune. Now I do want to thank Robert Doyle for what he did, not only in handling a difficult personal situation for him politically yesterday, but also for the hard work that he put in for the Party over a number of years. A thoroughly decent man. I thank him, I wish him well for the future and I hope he has a very happy and enjoyable life after he leaves the Victorian Parliament in November of this year.
JOURNALIST:
Given the Party infighting that has happened in Victoria what do you say to the Liberal Victorians? What do you have to say to them, do you ask them to stop what has been a habit for the last six-and-a-half years?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well let's separate out the Federal scene. There's been no infighting in the Liberal Party federally in Victoria or indeed anywhere else and I'm full of praise and admiration for the contribution my Victorian Federal colleagues make to the Government in Canberra. Clearly the Liberal Party has got to unite behind its new leader and if it's Ted Baillieu, which it looks like it will be, then he should be entitled to call upon and receive the undivided, united support of all of his colleagues. And I would ask of my Victorian state parliamentary colleagues, if you're to have any hope of a respectable outcome, let alone a win, in November of this year, you've got to get real and serious. Oppositions at a state level have got to realise that you can't fatten the pig on market day when it comes to winning state elections. You've got to actually work out some policies months in advance and seeing as you've asked me, I think that the weakness of state oppositions in the past has been that they leave it until the last four weeks thinking they can generate a momentum. It's too late then. Unless you start giving people a reason why they should change government months before an election, you've got no hope of shifting them.
JOURNALIST:
Is 20-something weeks enough time to do that for a new opposition leader?
PRIME MINISTER:
It's a big task, but nothing is impossible in politics. Would you 20 weeks out from the Victorian State election in 1999 have given Mr Bracks a chance of winning? Perhaps you did, I don't know. But not many people did, and I think we've got to bear that in mind.
[ends]