TRANSCRIPT OF NEWS CONFERENCE, RADIO 3L0, MELBOURNE, FRIDAY
27 OCTOBER 1989
E 0 E PROOF ONLY
JOURNALIST: Mr Hawke, what's your response to Mr Howard's
talks with Mr Peacock and his return to the front bench?
PM: I'm, quite seriously, I'm pleased that he's going back
on to the front bench, though they are not a very good front
bench as is generally recognised. I think it's good for
Government that the opposition should have its best quality
on the front bench. It makes for a better opposition and I
think it makes for a better Government. So I welcome the
move. JOURNALIST: Are you going to be going up to Queensland for
the election?
PM: Yes, I'll be up there.
JOURNALIST: When will you be up there?
PM: Look, I've just got back from overseas yesterday. I
haven't looked at my forward program. I know I'm going up
there, I'm not quite sure when it is it's in the next
couple of weeks.
JOURNALIST: How do you see the results going?
PM: How do I see the results going in Queensland? Well,
because of the massive gerrymander, it's a difficult job.
So putting it, calling it exactly as I understand it, I
would say that Labor has got the great majority of the
seats that it has to get to win Government. I would think
that, you know, the three or four over that that we can say
it's definitely got, I-think it will fall across the line on
it. It'll be a tough job, but Mr Goss is a very good leader
and the atmosphere of the conservative camp up there is
absolutely unacceptable. It's not just the National Party
who are the Government now, but what the electorate, I
think, is increasingly realising is that the Liberal Party
has been part of the mess and the corruption for most of
that period. Labor is the only alternative to what has now
been decades of inefficient and corrupt Government.
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JOURNALIST: Do you believe corruption is the issue for that
election? PM: No election at a Federal or State level is ever just
one issue. In the Queensland election it won't be just
corruption, but it will obviously be a very significant
issue.
JOURNALIST: Inflation is running at a two year high. Is
that acceptable to you?
PM: I'd prefer it wasn't there, but we will certainly be
seeing a lowering of that rate in the rest of the financial
year. We've got certain special factors which are
acknowledged in this. We've got the impact of the higher
interest rates shown in when they were rising, that's
now being reflected in the CPI. Well I think they've
plateaud and there's still being the reflection of the
floods in the eastern States being reflected in fruit and
vegetable prices, that's washed out now, if I can put it
that way. So the inflation rate will be coming down. I'm
sorry it's where it is, but it will be coming down.
JOURNALIST: Where do you see it ending at the end of the
financial year?
PM: Certainly be lower than where it is now. It's not very
useful to be absolutely precise about that, but the
important thing is that we can say to the Australian
electorate it will be coming down as we go towards the end
of this financial year.
ends
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