JON FAINE: Malcolm Turnbull, good morning to you.
PRIME MINISTER: Great to be with you, Jon.
JON FAINE: And congratulations, I think it’s the first time I’ve seen you since your elevation to the Prime Ministership. You’re already on the record this morning as saying tax reform has to be fair or it won’t have public support, can you define fair?
PRIME MINISTER: Well fair is obviously in the eye of the beholder and people have different views of it but the fair I think for Australians means that the burden of tax is borne by those best able to pay it and that it’s a question of judgement you know, I think it’s like one of those things you know, we have a very unique culture in Australia.
JON FAINE: Every country has..
PRIME MINISTER: We do, we do, I agree. You’re dead right there and we have a very good mixture of you know capitalism and free market but we also have a culture of a fair go, of you know, looking after each other. We’ve got an egalitarian tradition and I think the test of whether any set of measures is fair is going to be whether people look at it and say yep, that seems fair enough and I think that’s the…
JON FAINE: You’re talking about the pub test or something but surely for a conservative politician with a party still wary of your leftish leanings.
PRIME MINISTER: Oh right.
JON FAINE: How far do you go in disappointing..
PRIME MINISTER: I’m such a leftie.
JON FAINE: Well some people in the Liberal Party think you are.
PRIME MINISTER: Well I don’t think so, well maybe they do ….anyhow. But, listen the fact is I am, I am passionately committed to enterprise, I’m passionately committed to the individual ingenuity of Australians and Australian businesses.
JON FAINE: Are you going to tax the rich? Are the rich going to pay more tax?
PRIME MINISTER: The rich will always pay more tax than the poor because they have more to pay it with and they do now.
JON FAINE: But under reforms that you want to introduce will they pay even more.
PRIME MINISTER: Jon I don’t want to go, I don’t want to get drawn into the details of what may be in a tax package. I want, what we’re talking, what we’re doing at the moment, well let me recap what I said in the speech this morning or one of the things I said. Economic reform is not a goal in itself, we’re not seeking to win an economics prize. What we’re seeking to do is to ensure that our society, our nation, remains a high wage, generous social welfare net first world economy so that it is good for people who are able to get ahead and want to get ahead and it backs them rather than holds them back. But equally it looks after those who for whatever reason can’t get ahead and you’ve got to get that balance right and you’ve got to be seen as you put those changes together to be doing so in a way that is thoughtful, considered and consultative. That’s why we’re not ruling stuff in or out because we’ve got to have an open debate.
JON FAINE: And I’m sure it’s not escaped your attention, nor those, the attention of those who advise you. The rich have been getting richer in Australia and there are many, many people who feel they are missing out entirely so is that what your tax reform will tackle.
PRIME MINISTER: Well Jon I hear what you say but again I don’t want to be drawn on, on drawn down a road of ….
JON FAINE: Ruling things in or ruling things out, super tax concessions, negative gearing, GST reform.
PRIME MINISTER: All of these things. I’m happy to talk about these things in a, you know, in a sort of almost a theoretical way.
JON FAINE: Understood
PRIME MINISTER: But what I don’t want because you see if you, if you look at what, if you look at what’s happened in the past the typical thing is, people, a scare campaign is started - you’re going to do this, you’re going to do that. Then you start ruling everything out and then there’s nothing left on the table and nothing happens.
JON FAINE: Let’s invoke Warren Buffett, who’s a hero of yours and many others as well in the entrepreneurial community.
PRIME MINISTER: He is a big success.
JON FAINE: He says it’s wrong that my secretary pays more tax than I do, do you agree?
PRIME MINISTER: Well of, that comment in the United States is absolutely right of course but that’s not the case in Australia.
JON FAINE: It is for many people because the wealthier you are, the more options you have to avoid paying tax.
PRIME MINISTER: Jon I think you might find that that’s, that’s not right. I mean the, you know, we have a very progressive, when I say progressive, we have high rates of income tax on high incomes.
JON FAINE: But you yourself, know it’s easy to avoid having income and instead to have other ways of having wealth, to put it in family trusts, put in all sorts of corporate vehicles, even for the very rich to offshore it.
PRIME MINISTER: Jon, I, there’s no doubt that some people avoid tax there is some. And the taxation department and the government - and this applies to every government in every season - is constantly plugging loopholes You should get Chris Jordon, the Tax Commissioner on your show because it is just wrong to say that you know tax is optional in Australia as it is in some countries - that is absolutely not the case. We have very high levels of compliance. There have been issues, I mean particularly in the digital economy you know with digital companies you know, you’ve seen the changes that we’ve made so the GST is collected on digital products. But that’s, this is not, you know tax, high net worth tax avoidance or evasion is not - it is always going to be an issue because they hire good lawyers. But it is not a gigantic integrity problem here as it is in some other countries.
JON FAINE: Our time is limited, a few other things. Peter Dutton, your Immigration Minister is at the moment in Jordan. Clearly, moved, emotionally moved by some of the scenes that have confronted him and his appearance on television and in the media in the last 24 hours it’s been visible, it’s been obvious to everybody. Will Australia change the numbers it will take from this global crisis as a result of what he is telling you?
PRIME MINISTER: Well we obviously, we’re taking, as you know, 12,000 additional - in addition to our already substantial humanitarian program, we are taking an additional 12,000 refugees from that Syria conflict zone. We’ll, that’s a substantial number. Can I just make this observation about numbers.
JON FAINE: Do you want to take more?
PRIME MINISTER: The, let me, we have, as a nation, we have very big hearts. We take a lot of humanitarian refugees but the most important thing to remember is we settle them successfully. It is a very - there are a lot of…..
JON FAINE: A great conversation for another day. The issue here is the crisis in Europe is clearly growing daily, the numbers are expanding. Will Australia increase its share of solving the problem?
PRIME MINISTER: We’ve made a significant commitment already. We’ve got no plans to increase the number that we’ll take but we’ll be talking with Peter when he gets back from the Middle East and any changes to the policy would obviously be taken carefully by the Cabinet. I mean one of the other things that I want to be clear about, about the nature of the Government I’m leading, is that it is a traditional Cabinet Government and that’s disappointing because it means I’m not going to make policy on the run -disappointing perhaps for you.
JON FAINE: No, for lots of people.
PRIME MINISTER: It is better for the country if we go about things in a methodical, deliberative way and decisions will be taken by the Cabinet after due consideration.
JON FAINE: I know you’ve got a lot to try and digest. I’m not sure if overnight you heard what happened in Canada, the new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has appointed a Cabinet fifty-fifty men and women. When he was asked why he said "Because it is 2015".
PRIME MINISTER: Yeah well, we have, as you know, we’ve considerably increased the percentage of women in the Cabinet and I guess in an ideal world you would have fifty-fifty but you’ve got to, we don't have fifty-fifty men and women in the parliament. The real, the fundamental problem, at the root of the issue is this, that there are not enough women who are, not enough women in the House of Representatives, in the Senate. So it is, it’s really important, and we in my party, in the Liberal Party, we are encouraging women to stand up to run for pre-selections and you know we have, in my Government, we have the first woman Defence Minister, Marise Payne. We have the first woman to be the minister for revenue, the Assistant Treasurer in Kelly O'Dwyer and what a great, she’s a Victorian of course. What a great role model is that. There she is with a young baby, a nursing mother and she is in charge of the whole tax system. I mean what that, and you know that, this is where symbols – it’s more than symbols, this is where examples and role models matter. Like Michelle Payne, what a phenomenal ride. It would have been a great ride if the jockey was a man but what an amazing ride, what an amazing family, a great story and it just, you can see the leadership and the example it shows to so many other women and girls and hopefully Michelle’s ride will encourage more girls to be more ambitious in terms of what they can do in sport. And what Marise and Kelly are doing, among other great women in the Government are doing, will encourage more women to say yeah sure, I should put my, throw my hat in the ring and have a go and as that happens, more will get into parliament and more will be in Cabinet.
JON FAINE: Your entourage are glaring at me, you do have to go very quick answer.
PRIME MINISTER: I’m sure they’re just smiling sweetly and saying time to go to Ringwood.
JON FAINE: Bill Shorten is saying 16-year-olds should have the vote. Very quickly, are you in the slightest bit interested in exploring it?
PRIME MINISTER: I don't see a lot of interest in it in the community. I think, it’s not something that gets raised with me. I think that was a bit of a thought bubble on his part but look I’m very happy to have a debate about it if he wants to but it is not something that has been raised with me as I get around the country.
JON FAINE: There might be more Republicans amongst them, it may help bring in the Republic. Something you’d still like to do?
PRIME MINISTER: That may, who knows that may or may not be right, you never know.
JON FAINE: Undoubtedly we’ll have other opportunities, especially between now and a forthcoming federal election, thank you indeed.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks so much, good to see you.
JON FAINE: My time is up indeed your minders are threateningly.
PRIME MINISTER: Ringwood beckons.
JON FAINE: Menacing through the glass there, Malcolm Turnbull, the Prime Minister of Australia joining us in between addressing an economic reform conference in the city and attending an event in Ringwood and whether or not he can get there in 12 minutes will be nothing short of miraculous. He doesn’t have Bronwyn Bishop’s helicopter after all.