BEN FORDHAM:
Prime Minister, good afternoon.
PRIME MINISTER:
Ben, it’s fantastic to be with you and it’s nice to be Scott’s stand in just for once.
BEN FORDHAM:
So, did you land the chopper on the roof?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no, I fought my way through Sydney traffic and one of the reasons why we need better infrastructure, and why I want to be the Infrastructure Prime Minister, is to ensure that the traffic jams are not as bad as they currently are.
BEN FORDHAM:
OK, alright. Look, a few things to get through and I’ve cleared ourselves of ads between now and six o’clock. We spoke to Brian Egan from Aussie Helpers earlier on; he’s delivering emergency bales of hay to farmers who are battling to survive the drought. He’s in his 70s; he’s never seen it this bad. I asked him today what are the three things the Prime Minister could do to help farmers through the worst drought in oh so long. He says a moratorium on bank interest rates for farmers affected by drought. Subsidise the wages in country towns of small businesses, because as we know, a lot of these country towns they’re now turning lights out of small businesses and walking away. So, subsidising wages in those towns where you’ve got people struggling with drought and bring back the exceptional circumstances payment. He says the farm household payment doesn’t work, nobody really qualifies – bring back the exceptional circumstances payment. What can you do for them?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don’t want to go backwards, I want to go forwards, but I accept – in fact, I know – that this is a very serious drought. There’s a band from Longreach in central western Queensland down to Walgett and beyond in western New South Wales that is very affected, very, very badly affected. And as one of my colleagues said in the Party Room just the other day, “if you’ve got a fire or a flood or a cyclone, help turns up within a few hours of the disaster and you’re looked after, but with drought, no one comes because it sneaks up on you.” And so I absolutely accept, Ben, that this a really serious problem and we’ve got concessional loans, so it is possible to roll out of your bank loan into a concessional loan – that’s a good thing. There is the income supplement which is essentially unemployment benefit for people who are on farms. What I’m looking at – and we’ll have more to say about shortly, Ben – is something that will stimulate economic activity in the towns and regions which are currently very badly hit by droughts.
BEN FORDHAM:
And they’re the veins, aren’t they – really?
PRIME MINISTER:
Exactly right, because there is assistance for the farmers. Some people say it’s not enough, but there’s certainly assistance for the farmers and we’re looking at what more we can do. But the people in the town don’t get the drought assistance, but their economic base has been destroyed while the drought lasts.
BEN FORDHAM:
OK, we’ve also been in contact with Jamie Warden, a sheep farmer from Walgett. He says the biggest help you could do right now as PM is to send a message to the banks who have got their foot on the throat of farmers at the moment who are involved in the drought to say, “lay off, give these people some space or some time.” What can you say right now to the banks?
PRIME MINISTER:
I’m happy to give that warning to the banks that the Government takes a very dim view of banks which foreclose on businesses that would be viable but for the drought – a very dim view indeed. And look, at the senior levels of bank management, I know they want to do the right thing and if down the line the right thing is not being done, well obviously that’s wrong and the affected farmers should talk to their local members of parliament.
BEN FORDHAM:
Why can’t we take, say $100 million from what we give to Indonesia in foreign aid – $600 million – take $100 million and give it to the farmers?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Ben, they’re all sorts of things that we can do and there will be something that we will be doing very shortly and we won’t be doing it at the expense of any other good things, but we will be doing it because it makes sense.
BEN FORDHAM:
OK, in the last six days in New South Wales, two women have been killed allegedly by their partners. One is an 18 year old girl by the name of Melita Hart, she’s from Brewarrina, she was killed on Saturday. Police allege she was killed by her 23 year old boyfriend and yesterday the local community marched down the main street. Her name is Melita Hart, 18 years of age. The other’s 51 year old Linda Locke. She suffered serious head injuries and a collapsed lung following a brutal beating in her home at Quakers Hill. It happened Monday and police have charged her partner with murder. Now, staying away from the specifics of these cases for obvious reasons, I want to know how you feel, not only as Prime Minister but as the Minister for Women about 34 women being violently killed in Australia in the first four months of this year – two a week, one every 72 hours?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I feel sick in my stomach. I think everyone should and I think that 99.99 per cent of people do. I guess the first thing, Ben, is that all of us blokes, because nearly all of the perpetrators here are blokes, domestic violence is much more a function of out of control blokes than of anything else. All of us blokes have got to say, “it is never, ever, ever acceptable to be violent towards women or children – never.” It’s just dead wrong.
BEN FORDHAM:
Now, there almost needs to be a conversation amongst blokes, doesn’t there? Like some of these awareness campaigns where you say, “I’ve never hit a woman, have you?” I mean you almost want to put it on people and put it on your mates and whatever to say, “I’ve never done that, I’d never do that, would you?”
PRIME MINISTER:
Dead right, mate, dead right.
BEN FORDHAM:
Because people out there are doing it. There are a lot of blokes out there who are doing this stuff.
PRIME MINISTER:
Particularly when they’ve got a skin full. So, it is absolutely essential that every strong male says to every other would-be strong male, it is not strong to beat up on women and children. That’s the first thing. Second thing, obviously, the police need to understand that violence is violence and it is just as wrong, in fact in some ways it’s more wrong, if it takes place inside what should be the sanctuary of the family home.
BEN FORDHAM:
As opposed to, “oh, it’s just a domestic”…
PRIME MINISTER:
Exactly right.
BEN FORDHAM:
… I’m not saying that police say that, but we know that’s part of the vernacular.
PRIME MINISTER:
Exactly right. Once upon a time I think there was this culture, even in our law enforcement agencies. If there’s any vestige of it left, it’s got to go instantly.
BEN FORDHAM:
Indonesia killed two of our citizens this week – Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran. They were executed by gunfire after serving 10 years in prison over their role. They were ringleaders. They were sending young Australians into a potentially fatal situation because they were strapped with drugs in a country with the death penalty and, certainly, I don’t support what Indonesia did to them – not under any circumstances – however, they were high-level drug traffickers coordinating a group of mules to do their dirty work. How do you feel about the fact that the Australian Catholic University has created two scholarships named after the Bali Nine ringleaders?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I was wondering whether you were going to ask me about that, Ben, because while I deplore what happened this week – I absolutely deplore what happened this week – it casts a very deep shadow over what is normally a very good relationship with Indonesia, by the same token there can be no truck with drug trafficking – absolutely none. It sends a very unusual message. It’s, if I may say so, an odd thing for a university to do, particularly for an institution which is supposed to stand up for the best values. I know part of Christian faith of forgiveness, but another part of Christian faith is calling people to be their best selves. Now, we know that they were repentant, we know that they were rehabilitated, we know that they seem to have met their fate with a kind of nobility and all of that is admirable, but whether that justifies what has apparently been done I think is open to profound question.
BEN FORDHAM:
Tuesday week you’re handing down your second Budget. You have famously described it as ‘dull’. All of the talk today is about revamped child care packages. I know you won’t go through much detail on all of this stuff now and we are about to hit the news, but am I right in saying that any spending you announce in the Budget will be contingent on Labor and the crossbenchers passing existent budget savings that are currently stuck in the Senate? So, in other words, if these existing measures you announced in last year’s Budget aren’t passed, then any new spending won’t be possible?
PRIME MINISTER:
I wouldn’t put it quite like that, but certainly all new spending has got to be offset. So, we’ve got to find savings for all new spending and some of the big items, childcare in particular, is contingent on the passage of savings through the Senate.
BEN FORDHAM:
Are you nervous about the Budget?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, it’s a big event, it always is. It’s a punctuation point in every political year, but I’m confident, I’m confident, Ben, that this is going to be a Budget for jobs, for growth, for opportunity. I know it will be measured, responsible and fair because I’ve done little else but labour over it for the last couple of months.
BEN FORDHAM:
Prime Minister, you can admit to me if you’re nervous!
PRIME MINISTER:
Are you ever nervous, Ben?
BEN FORDHAM:
I am!
PRIME MINISTER:
Alright, well that goes for me too!
BEN FORDHAM:
Every day when the microphone comes on and it’s ready to talk.
PRIME MINISTER:
A live mic has the same impact has the same impact on me as it does on you.
BEN FORDHAM:
We’ve both got in trouble on those ones over the years! Just a quick one because we’ve only got a minute, but a memorial service for emergency service personnel today and you honoured firefighters and emergency service workers who’ve died in the line of duty. It’s a big job.
PRIME MINISTER:
It is, it is, and many of these were volunteers. They were people who were doing it entirely out of love and commitment to the community. And look, I know the fire services pretty well having been in the local volunteer Rural Fire Brigade for almost 15 years now. If you want to serve the community there are few better ways to do it.
BEN FORDHAM:
You’re very kind for coming into the studio with us. You’ll be able to help me talk it up to the news. We were just talking about our abilities on the live microphone. Do you think you’d be able to do that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, if I can just repeat: the Budget will be measured, responsible and fair. It will be a Budget for jobs, growth and opportunity and I think people will be thinking this is a Government that cares.
BEN FORDHAM:
I can’t believe it, you know you timed that perfectly, Prime Minister, for the closing music? So you better say now, “Have a great weekend” and all those types of things. What’s your message to everyone in Sydney as we say goodbye?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well look, everyone should have a good weekend. I know some people will be working hard across the weekend, but I hope everyone gets a bit of family time.
BEN FORDHAM:
Good man. Thank you very much for coming into the studio.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good on you, Ben. Nice to be with you.
[ends]