PM Transcripts

-I C
PRIME MINISTER
TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE lION P J KEATING MP,
DOORSTOP, HYATT HOTEL, CANBERRA, 26.10.92
E& OE PROOF COPY
J: Irish presidents arc welcome?
PM: Well they are with me particularly, so I had a very good talk.
J: What sort of things did you discuss?
PM; I think she said at the Press Club that we should keep the content of our
discussions privatc, and I think that is a good rule.
J: Mr Keating do you believe that the Coalition is going to impose a wage freeze?
PM: I will answer just this one question. The Coalition is going to push 8 million
Australians onto common law wage contracts. What Dr Hewson established
yesterday was he has not the faintest idea about how he will protect the living
standards of Australians against exploitation by anybody who may employ them.
All the flexibility that anyone requires in the labour market in this country is now
available through the system of enterprise bargaining and enterprise agrecments,
which this Government has established. The only flexibility that we don't provide
is flexibility down cutting people's pay and cutting thcir conditions of work. In
the end that's what John Hewson and John Howard are after, they arc after their
pay packet. That's why they're slipping and sliding over this question of minimum
raitcs of pay. It's the old Tory agenda, it has never changed.
ends