PM Transcripts

PRIME MINISTER
E OE PROOF COPY ONLY
TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P. J. KEATING MP
DOORSTOP, SYDNEY, 20 JANUARY 1992
PM: I'm doing today what I did last week and that is going
out into the community and listening to what they have
to say and I think it has been a good process. I notice,
by the way,, that Dr Hewson said in Tasmania last week
that I shouldn't be listening, that the business
community were only after handouts and obviously what he
believes one should do is hand down tablets from on
high, don't ask or don't speak to anybody and then slap
everybodly with a 15 per cent tax on their food and then
regard that as reform. So what we're doing is going to
business, all sectors of business, and to the trade
unions and saying, well, what do you believe should be
the steps of reform7. How do you believe a recovery ought
to be promoted? And that is what I have been doing. Now,
on the wreekend we had a very interesting episode in
politics: in Australia where in a by-election, upon which.
the balance of the State Parliament was held, the Liberal
Party lost the seat and Dr Hewson said in the course of
the by-election campaign that " let this be a test of the
GST". Well to the extent it was a test to the GST, it
was a slap on the face of Dr llewson. Now it was a State
by-election, I didn't involve myself in it. It is a
great compliment to Bob Carr and the NSW Labor Party.
And it was a slapping down for the Coalition. But the
extent that Dr Hewson and John Howard campaigned in the
by-election, and Dr Heweon said, " let this be a test of
the CST' a very flat refusal to the politics of
GST and all that came with it. So I just want to say
this to Dr Hewson: I'm not taking his advice. That is,
to not talk to people. I am going to talk to people
. ome of our largest and smallest companies, some of our
largest and smallest trade unions and I'm going to See
that at least the people's views are listened to,
weighed -and sifted through carefully.
ENDS