PM Transcripts

PRIME MINISTER'S INTERVIEW WITH CHANNEL NINE 15 AUGUST 1978
QUESTION Prime Minister, a ritual question. What sort of Budget
is it going to be?
PRIME MINISTER
I don't know how often I have been asked that over the last
few months. There is not really long to wait now, is there,
because John Howard will be deliverin that Budget towards
the end of today, and then people won t have to speculate
about it any more. they will have the facts of the Budget.
QUESTION You have said a number of times in interviews with me that
this Budget is going to set the course for some years to come.
What do you mean by that?
PRIME MINISTER
I don't know that I used those precise terms. From the time
we first camne into government we set a course of getting
inflation. under control, restoring profitability, establishing
the circumftstances where Australia can look forward
with confidence, with an inner strength, and with a determination
to take its place in the world, as a middle-ranking nation,
but one of some substance. You can't do that if you have
got rampant inflation, you can't do that if unemployment is
much too high. The ills that had come from earlier times
in Australian society had to be put right much progress
has been made, but there is still much to be done.
The Budget that will be introduced tonight will continue
on the course it will further move inflation down, and
at the same time it will establish the circumstances in which
the steady but sustainable movement down in interest rates
can be continued and should be continued. This again, starts
to set the pattern where it costs much less for the home purchaser
to borrow funds to build that home. It costs much less because
interest rates are less for businesses that are going to expand,
that want to undertake new activities. This is the real way
of getting things right in the Australian economy.
You can never get matters right in an economy by pretending that
the basic imbalances are not there. That has been the trouble
with a number of countries overseas. I think one of the differences
between this Government and some others is that we have
recognised the basic imbalances and we have addressed our policies
to putting them right. That is to the advantage of all people in
Australia young and old, no matter what they do.