JOHN BURGESS:
I’m delighted to have on the programme this morning, the Prime Minister of Australia Tony Abbott. Good morning Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
Burgo, it is great to be with you and yes a terrible, terrible frustration for the people of Western Australia that they have to go back to the polls but it is happening. If you want strong representation there are some terrific Liberal candidates to vote for.
JOHN BURGESS:
It beggars belief that votes could go missing from one count to another doesn’t it?
PRIME MINISTER:
Exactly. An extraordinary oversight on the part of the Electoral Commission and I think that it is very appropriate that the Commissioner has offered his resignation and that it has been accepted.
JOHN BURGESS:
Now, you said lots of excellent Liberal candidates. We had some of the minor parties involved of course in the last count. That’s not the way I would suspect the Government or the Opposition want it to go, Tony.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, we want Liberal candidates elected and there is quite a few of them. There is David Johnston. There is Michaelia Cash, there is Linda Reynolds, there’s Slade Brockman – these are all outstanding candidates and if we got four or even five elected that would be terrific. We got three elected last time, then of course there was one Labor person and two minor Party people. I think if you want to see the end of anti-Western Australia taxes like the mining tax and the carbon tax the only people you can safely vote for are the Liberal candidates.
JOHN BURGESS:
And also, we have to thank you I guess, for the $500 million dollars coming our way, ear-marked for Perth’s public transport and the roads funding as well.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, look there is the Perth Gateway funding that is $600-odd million, there is the Swan By-pass funding – that’s $600-odd million. There is $300-odd million for the Great Northern Highway and there are other roads that are being funded in Western Australian and perhaps that’s the way it should be. This is a booming state. It has got so much potential and the best thing that Government can do is not try to hand out money to private businesses but to make sure we have the infrastructure right, make sure we have got the taxes down, make sure we have got regulation down. That is the best environment for businesses to grow and create more jobs and create more prosperity.
JOHN BURGESS:
Now, there are a couple of issues I know people would like me talk to you about, the national partnership agreement on homelessness. This is a problem that we have here. Of course the Labor Government funded the programme and then stopped doing that back in the middle of last year. I know that the Premier Colin Barnett needs to talk to you urgently about what is going to happen here because there is some 6,000 Western Australians involved in this; problems with domestic violence, single mums, young kids living in child protection and coming out of that. So, it is a very emotive topic. We sort of need an answer, Tony.
PRIME MINISTER:
The answer will be provided on Budget night, but I want to say to you, Burgo, and your listeners; we aren’t going to let Western Australia down. The formal answer will be provided on Budget night.
JOHN BURGESS:
Ok, well we look forward to that and if it doesn’t go the way we think it should we may have another chat.
The other thing, the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card: cheaper prescription medicines, Australian Government funded medical services etc. There is talk of a change there – could be a levy – anything to say about that, Prime Minister?
PRIME MINISTER:
Burgo, we will keep our commitments. Now, we made some commitments during the election on the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card. We made some commitments about indexing the thresholds and we will keep those commitments because that’s what I want to be - a Government that keeps its commitments. That was the problem with the last government – it made promises and then it broke them when it suited it to do so. I don’t want to be a government like that. I want to run a Government which is competent and trustworthy, and a trustworthy Government is one which says that it will do something and then does it.
JOHN BURGESS:
Well, the other thing of course which is in The West Australian today and there’s an editorial about it. We are talking about a change maybe in media regulations and anti-siphoning laws. As you know Tony, this is a big footy state. People with the very concerned if all of a sudden they found themselves paying to watch the sport they have always been getting for free.
PRIME MINISTER:
And that is a very understandable concern. The media world has changed a lot over the last couple of decades. These days you have broadcasters that effectively provide newspapers online. You have newspapers that effectively are broadcasters online. So, it is a very, very different world and I can understand why people want to change the regulation. We are open to that in a deregulatory direction but anti-siphoning rules are important and the last thing I want to do is see people having to pay for things they have always got for free.
JOHN BURGESS:
Now, Qantas has been in the news a bit lately and the Government has come under a bit of flak from the other quarters saying you should have done more to support them but we now have no international flight out of Perth. Open skies policy – proposition?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well Burgo, in the end it is up to the airlines to decide where they want to fly in and out of. I can really make Qantas’ commercial decisions for it and if I try to it will be a nationalised airline and we would be living in a very different world. A world of fewer more expensive flights - that’s the world we lived in before we had aviation deregulation. I don’t have a Perth international timetable in front of me but I would be amazed Burgo if you weren’t getting more international flights in and out of Perth today than two or three years ago, regardless of which particular livery the planes have got on their tails.
JOHN BURGESS:
Well, it just seems like a national carrier, as they were called, Qantas is no longer providing that service out of our state.
PRIME MINISTER:
And this is a matter for Qantas, Burgo. You wouldn’t expect me to try to give orders to Qantas. You wouldn’t expect me to use taxpayer’s money to prop up an airline. You would expect me to try to ensure that the rules as such that the people of Perth get a very good service and whether the service is through Qantas or British Airways or Emirates or Garuda or whoever it might be, Virgin, whoever it might be – the important this is to get a good service.
JOHN BURGESS:
Ok, we’ll just change the tack again. Coming in March some good news for pensioners – increase in payments – but also Centrelink have some new rules enforced which will certainly help people on the part-pensions.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, look the standard indexation arrangements will kick in and we want to try to make sure that we are always a decent and compassionate society that looks after those who have made a contribution during their working lives and now deserve to be looked after by a grateful nation. So, these are the standard arrangements that are coming in and that is the way it ought to be.
JOHN BURGESS:
Well, people who are in the workforce of course, the unemployment figures will be released on Thursday I understand. What are you looking to do?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I am hoping, always, to see unemployment going down. That is not the forecast although the monthly figures bounce around as you know. What we have got to do is get the economic fundamentals right. That’s what we have got to do and that’s why getting the carbon tax off, getting the mining tax off, getting this one-stop-shop up and running - and we are close to doing that in Western Australia so we can get our big projects approved more readily with less red tape and green tape. This is what the Government has got to do to work Burgo, and look if we get those fundamentals right over time there will be far more jobs.
JOHN BURGESS:
Well, I know you are here for the prime purpose of course of making sure that people get the message that the Liberal Party has some excellent people running for the Senate. So, I wish you well with that.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, thank you Burgo and look there is one other thing I am doing here. It is rather important – it is opening a magnificent new building for the Western Australian Institute for Medical Research or the Harry Perkins Institute, as it is now called. This was a project which when I was the Health Minister back in 2007 I committed $100 million to and it has come to fruition and the building is opening today. So, it’s nice to be back for that.
JOHN BURGESS:
Excellent. I’m sorry to rush through these things but you love the music we play.
PRIME MINISTER:
Do you want me to sing? Your listeners probably don’t.
JOHN BURGESS:
There’s just one thing that has come to my attention, Prime Minister. I mean Cabinet Meetings now, there are no chocolate biscuits or jelly beans anymore. Is this the Joe Hockey amendment?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, there are biscuits, I don’t know whether they are chocolate or not, but there certainly are biscuits. Maybe not quite as many as there were before. You’re right I haven’t noticed any jelly beans. There are nuts and the nuts are in a bowl rather than around the table, if I may say so.
JOHN BURGESS:
I astound you with my information.
PRIME MINISTER:
You’ve got a good informant somewhere.
JOHN BURGESS:
Prime Minister, very nice to talk to you, thank you for your time we really do appreciate it.
PRIME MINISTER:
Ok, Burgo
JOHN BURGESS:
And as I said we will watch with interest and if there is anything we don’t like here – I’ll be back.
PRIME MINISTER:
I’m sure you will.
JOHN BURGESS:
As the Governor of California once said.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you.
JOHN BURGESS:
Good on you.
[ends]