PRIME MINISTER
TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P J KEATING MP,
INTERVIEW WITH RAY MARTIN, " A CURRENT AFFAIR",
3 NOVEMBER 1994
E& OE PROOF COPY
RM: Prime Minister, thanks for your time. Now you're buying a house, as I
understand it, like a lot of other Australians. What home interest rate
have you allowed for in your budget?
PM: Well, I'll take it as it comes, but I know it's coming with low inflation,
so it's not....
RM: You wouldn't handle 18% or 19% like you had a few years back?
PM: Well this is not going to be the 1980s. We're not sitting on an
inflation rate of or we're last week we had an inflation rate
of and that is what in the end drives interest rates. So, interest
rates will rise in the recovery you have seen that already
RM: Right. Are these the rises we had to have?
PM: The answer I think is yes but again, they won't be like the 1980s.
They won't be as high as the 1980s, they won't go up like the 1980s.
RM: Well we hope not, wouldn't we?
PM: Well we would.
RM: 14 or 15% is what Alexander Downer is predicting today he says
they're going to explode.
PM: Well that is just irresponsible, mindless behaviour that's what it is.
That is unnecessarily trying to frighten people when at the moment,
the official overnight cash and call rate in the Reserve Bank is
and that's what drives the bills and drives everything else.
RM: But you have people today that are paying 9.5% plus.
PM: Yes, but that is not 16%. 14 Z71
Q-D
RM: Do you categorically rule out 14
PM: Well I can't be the interest rate ruling out business, Ray. But one
thing for sure the 1980s are not here.
RM: Do you scratch your head though, when you read the papers and the
economics experts not just the pundits, but the experts who say
" well, despite this positive news, I think there is still a boom-bust
cycle around the corner"?
PM: You see, we have got the same local group of commentators we have
had for 20 years you and I know who they are and they are still
saying the same thing: " we're all ' rooned it will never be any good",
where the fact is that this is the best conjunction of economic
circumstances we have had in 30 years.
RM: So the people who rang up A Current Affair today when it was
announced that you were coming on tonight, and said " ask about
home loan interest rates" in a word what would you say to them?
Don't worry?
PM: I would say this that they have seen already a modest increase in
interest rates, part of that has flowed through to housing, a bit more
maybe but we will not see a repeat of the housing rates of the
1980s.
RM: If I asked you how a man who has been a politician all his working life
for 25 years can afford to pay over $ 2 million for his house what
would you say to me?
PM: Easy, from my point of view. Basically, I'm like most other people in
the Sydney market your house goes up in value and you end up
with a big mortgage at the end of it.
RM: So you are very much watching as everyone else is you're
watching these interest rates because you could....
PM: Well, I know what it's going to do to me. I mean, there's at least more
than an observers interest there. I mean, I have one house in the
whole of Australia a terrace house in Sydney the whole world has
heard about it, and I'm intending....
RM: Not a bad sort of a terrace house though....
PM: No, but it was a flop-house when I bought it. It had 40 beds and
hypodermics and joints laying all over the place when I moved in...
RM: There's about 16 million Australians who wouldn't mind having it
though would they?
PM: No, but again, I bought it 12 years ago, and you know what has
happened in the Sydney property market in 12 years. And it's
because I own that, that I can go from that house.... basically what I
am doing is moving houses by one mile, and I'm moving up a bit with
a mortgage.
RM: Up a bit, with a $ 2 million place...
PM: With a mortgage from one worth about $ 1.25 million to $ 2 million.
RM: But you don't think that as a dyed in the wool Labor man a working
class man that you have got to go sort of in the dark at night to go to
Woollahra where
PM: No. Because I have had 2 houses in my life. I had one in
Bankstown....
RM: How long ago was that?
PM: I sold that in 1983 when I became Treasurer...
RM: Right.
PM: and I bought the terrace I now own at the same time, and that's all I
have. And I will sell that as time goes by, and move into this other
one. But again, I am not moving into it it's there for later. I'll let it
because I'm quite happy with my current accommodation.
RM: So you will rent it? You are quite happy to rent it and...( inaudible) all
that sort of stuff?
PM: Well you can't live in The Lodge and live in Woollahra at the same
you have got to make your choice, and my choice is a pretty easy one
to make.
RM: How much rent can you get for a place in Woollahra?
PM: Oh, a couple of thousand a week $ 2,500 $ 3000 a week.
RM: That's not bad for a working class boy from Bankstown?
PM: Well, that's what an old friend of mine used to say: " in the Labor Party
Paul, we don't want to push people down, we want to bring them all
up".
RM: Have you ever lied in politics, like Graham Richardson?
PM: You don't need to tell lies. I'm surprised....
RM: Well, Richo says you can't be successful unless you tell lies?
PM: I'm surprised Graham thinks that, frankly. I think you can I tend to
take it on the chin and say it as it is. I mean, I'd rather say the thing
that is less popular than mislead people.
RM: How do you tell of a politician is lying, Paul?
PM: I don't know whether you can tell, but you can look at their work, that's
the best way to do it. I don't know whether Graham put this line in the
book for notoriety or not, but it is not a line I subscribe to.
RM: Have you ever lied in politics?
PM: No, I have never gone and said something I believed to be untrue.
RM: How about the challenge, the first challenge against Bob Hawke,
where you lost it and you came out on television and said that ' I have
only got one shot in the locker and I've used it', but in fact you had two.
PM: Well, later I had two, but I didn't at the time. At the time I thought that
was it. You see, it is very hard to dislodge a Prime Minister. You can
have one go at it and then what happened was, what basically beat
Bob was Fightback. That's where I came from.
RM: So, when you said that you meant it?
PM: I was prepared to, when the Parliament rose at the end of 1991 that
was the end for me. By early 1992 I would have left the Parliament.
RM: Lazarus.
PM: Well, they got me right at the end, but they knew they did too.
RM: Are you pleased to read today in the paper or to hear that Prince
Charles sees you as a kindred spirit?
PM: He says I have got an interest in architecture and aesthetics.
RM: And urban design?
PM: There is not much in terms of central interests we share, but that is one
of them.
RM: But, are you pleased that he regards you as a kindred spirit?
PM: Glad he has acknowledged the fact that I have I mean, his criticism
of modern architecture in Britain has been somewhat akin to the
criticisms that I have had in the design of our cities here.
RM: The Cahill Expressway and so on?
PM: Well, the Cahill Expressway is just an example, and I think he has
done quite a lot for the architectural debate in Britain and I am quite
happy for him to nominate me as a kindred spirit.
RM: Well, how about what he said, he told Jonathan Dimbleby that he was
relieved to find you not as bad as he had imagined.
PM: He got a very nice reception from me and my family and I from him
when I visited him and his family at Balmoral. I have always found the
Royal Family, in terms of personal relations, exceptionally nice to deal
with.
RM: What about when he said ' what do you mean when he said that you
were a great exponent of the art of monologue'. Does that mean you
wouldn't let him talk?
PM: He is a good talker, I don't know that too many people get too many
words past him. So, maybe he'll regard it as a bit of tussle, I don't
know.
RM: Would you accuse him of the same thing?
PM: Yes, he is a good chatterer. He has got a lot to say, but good on him.
RM: A republic by the Year 2000, has the pace quickened as we read?
PM: I don't think the pace has quickened, but I am delighted to see more
Australians believing that we can only go our own way with our own
head of state.
RM: Have the Royal scandals added to that, increased the number of
people believing?
PM: I think so, yes. I think that is part of it, but I think underlying it, that's
part of it. But, I think the underlying thing is that, I think, Australians
know we are making I am going to as you know Ray, to APEC in
Indonesia in a week and a half from now and you can't get around like
that saying ' oh, excuse me, we are just borrowing the monarchy of
another country.'
RM: You would like our own flag and our own head of state at a time like
this?
PM: I want our own republic. That is the first thing I want.
RM: All right. Now, it is clear certainly from The Bulletin this week, that
per cent of Australians want to elect the president, not allow politicians
like you to decide who it is. How are you going to turn them around on
that?
PM: Sometimes people say ' well, that Keating, he wants this republic so he
can appoint the president'.
RM: Or maybe be president
PM: You know how interviewers are always asking you to rule things out
well, let me rule that out.
RM: OK.
PM: And that you will give one of the popular guarantees I'll give a
guarantee on that.
RM: Never be president?
PM: Never be president.
RM: OK.
PM: But, on the issue itself, I think, this is a terribly strong thing for our
democracies that you don't have figures who are walking around,
hearing voices, saying ' I've been anointed by the Gods', I'm wearing a
national mandate, I have some position of supra authority above the
Parliament and the whole embodiment of a nation is invested in me.
RM: All right, last question. Jeff Kennett, I know you will want to answer
this, says that you made no real attempt to save David Wilson in
Cambodia a tough charge.
PM: And a very low grade charge at that. Jeffrey has got a big mouth and it
runs away from him every second week. We did everything we could
possibly do. We sent an AFP officer out there, the diplomatic effort we
mounted on this through the Cambodian government was as strong as
we have ever done, but again, you are dealing with rebel forces in a
dangerous part of the world.
RM: All right. We thank you for your time and good luck in Indonesia too.
ends