TRANSCRIPT OF DOORSTOP, ST THOMAS THE APOSTLE SCHOOL, KAMBAH
18 APRIL 1989
E OE PROOF ONLY
JOURNALIST: If the trend continues on the balance of
payments do you don't think there'll be pressure on the
currency today?
PM: We'll leave that to the markets.
JOURNALIST:, You don't think that you'll stop interest rates
rising in the dollar?
PM: I don't want to talk about that. The very subject
you're talking about, what we'd do would of itself have an
effect. I'm not into that business.
JOURNALIST: The Opposition has said that you're trying to
doctor the CPI figures.
PM: Which opposition is that?
JOURNALIST: That's the Federal Opposition.
PM: But which part of it?
JOURNALIST: In this case, Mr Peacock, if I can be specific.
PM: I see. What's he said? All I've seen in the paper
today is he's been telling Mr Howard how he should run the
Party. JOURNALIST: He has said the Government is trying to doctor
the CPI figures. Is that right?
PM: No of course it's not right. It's not right at all.
We wouldn't be doing that. The Statistician is independent.
A number of people have pointed out to the Statistician the
impact, the unusual impact of the movement in the housing
prices and it did involve the assumption that every
Australian family was buying a new house every quarter. I
think that's not the case. I don't buy a new house every
quarter, I don't think you do, I don't think everyone else
does. So it has been pointed out that that had some sort of
impact. He may be taking that into account, if he is,
that's sensible.
JOURNALIST: If Mr McPhee runs as an independent, would you
offer him Labor preferences?
W
-2-
PM: If Mr McPhee now that sounds dangerously like a
hypothetical question. I usually don't answer them.
JOURNALIST: The numbers indicate he's going to lose his
preselection. That's the reality and he said that.
PM: Yes, he said, I noticed, that there is a vicious
campaign against him within the Liberal Party in Victoria,
that they are a pack of losers. one thing that Mr Kroger
and Mr McPheee agree on is that the Liberal Party are
losers. They'll just have to go on with their blood letting
and their fighting and their viciousness in their own ranks,
we'll just go on with running the country.
JOURNALIST: Roger Shipton has complained about a lack of
loyalty Mr Hawke. Does that surprise you?
0 PM: No it doesn't surprise me. Mr Howard does seem to have
sort of flexible standards about intervention in his Party.
He intervenes when his own, or what he regards as his own
may be at risk, but where others like Mr McPhee or Mr
Shipton are at risk he stands aloof, So there's not much
loyalty there, but as I repeat, the very simple point is
that the conservatives are deeply and bitterly divided, they
don't like each other, they can't govern themselves. While
they're like that they'll never be given the opportunity,
nor should they, of governing this country.
ends