r-,
PRIME MINISTER
TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P J KEATING MP
INTERVIEW WITH RANALD MACDONALD, RADIO 3L-0, MELBOURNE,
16 JUNE 1995
E& OE PROOF ONLY
RM: The Prime Minister of Australia, Paul Keating. Good morning to you
Prime Minister.
PM: Ranald good morning on this your last day.
RM: Yes it is and thank you for fitting me in to your very busy schedule.
I would like to steer clear of the news events of the day if I can and
concentrate on, as you like to refer to it as, the bigger picture.
However, I was struck by the banner headline in The Australian
" Evans to spearhead Sth Pacific assault on Paris". What will our
assault consist of?
PM: I think it will be a representative group of South Pacific nations,
representing the whole of the forum island countries, the forum
countries of the South Pacific, expressing our condemnation at this
decision by the Government of France and to let them know that it is in
their best interests as well as ours, for them not to proceed with this
decision and to leave the Government with no misapprehension about
the strength of feeling in this region of the world.
RM: Is there anything else that you are going to do on top of that? I mean,
obviously trade boycotts have been talked about.
PM: Well I am meant to have a long talk to Senator Evans about it. I have
had a discussion with him, but I think he will consult with our
colleagues in the South Pacific and probably after that consultation we
ourselves will have a conversation and we will discuss what approach
he takes on Australia's part in these discussions.
RM: But how seriously do you take what the French are doing and that is in
our part of the world, eight nuclear tests?
PM: Well again I don't think it is going to do the Government of France or
their interests any good at all. I think that the best way France, the
Government, can protect its people is not by some Gaullist weapon or
similar such approach, but rather engagement with the rest of the
world and to play an active international role because the bomb in
the post-Cold War environment is the 1990s version of the Maginot
line. It didn't work for them between the wars and it won't work now
and I think all it is doing is basically rupturing relations around the
region and continuing to put pressure on the ecology of this region.
RM: I want to talk about your vision for Australia and obviously that
incorporates the Republic, so we will start with the Republic. Is your
decision to embrace the minimalist position recognition of the political
reality. The fact that, if you look through the history, it proved really
difficult to get referenda up and particularly if there is opposition to it?
PM: Well look, not that. That is an issue I think Ranald. The main issue for
me is not to disturb the system of Government we have. I think that
which is broader, or broadest, is best. And in the representative
Parliamentary system we have, you have got 150 people who
represent the nation's aspirations by each constituency, they are in
touch with their electors, their voters, over the course of each
Parliament. You have got the Senate there representing the States at
large because they are elected at large. And, I think, what is healthy
about our Parliamentary democracy is that it is broad and no one
person has elected office across the country. No-one has a mandate
in their own right. You see at the last election, for instance,
on election night though the Government had won the election I was
not elected Prime Minister, I was elected Member for Blaxland. And
the Party then chose me again to be the leader and on that basis I was
appointed by the Governor General to be Prime Minister and I could
be unappointed tomorrow morning for all sorts of reasons, at the whim
of my Caucus, and I think that is the way it should be. People need to
be relevant and maintain their position. So the general cast, the
proposal Ranald, is about preserving that broad representative,
diffuse, basis of Parliamentary democracy in Australia and not have
some single person sitting above it.
RM: Why are you not actually codifying the reserve powers, you are not
detailing them? You are in this, as I understand anyway, effective job
description of the new President saying that you have got to consider
the conventions of the President's power?
PM: Yes and I think that given the fact let's look at the history, we are
five years short of a century, and only once were these powers ever
used controversially. That was in 1975 and even then it was resolved
at an election. So what I am saying is rather than delineate the
powers, or codify them, or reduce them, the function to purely a
ceremonial role, let's leave the powers with the head of state, but
make certain that the head of state's source of power comes from the
representative chambers of the House of Representatives and from
the proportional powers of the Senate. In other words, let that person
whoever he or she may be know that the source of their power is one
given them by the democratic system of Australia, the representative
system, and that therefore the powers they have can only be as
powerful as their source.
RM: But the issue is that you are ensuring that it is really just a ceremonial
position, the President, aren't you because by establishing in the basis
under which the person is put there, the fact that they have to take
consideration of what has taken place in the past, that there are
conventions? You are actually adding to his power, or her power,
aren't you?
PM: The answer is that yes, but at the same time we are keeping those
conventions. I think the conventions matter. But the way in which our
system of Government has evolved, those who say to you let's keep an
interest in our traditions and our history, well this does that. It keeps
that continuity and link with those powers and there is a tension in a
system between the Government and the head of the Government, the
Prime Minister and the head of state. When I say tension, I mean by
that, I think, most of the time all of the time I hope a creative
tension. That is it is not simply a ceremonial post to be ignored. It is
truly somebody representing the whole nation as the head of state.
But in the Government's model they are not by popular election. He or
she will not walk around hearing voices saying " I've been invested by
the country, I am the embodiment of the nation and I will deal with this
Government, Prime Minister, or Parliament as I choose." I mean
I think this would be a very unhealthy approach. Whereas the
approach of the person being elected by the Senate and the House of
Representatives is a far more healthy approach if the powers remain
with the head of state to be used in the event of any national
emergency in the next couple of centuries.
RM: The Constitutional Centenary Foundation, under Sir Ninian Stephen
has put up many areas for discussion. I am just wondering where you
hope the debate will go? It ought to go surely, if we do embrace a
Republic, far beyond the question of President and how the President
is put there?
PM: Well you are probably right about that, Ranald, and maybe it should.
But in the first instance, as I said in my speech, let's make sure the
head of state is one of us. Let's make sure that the complete
independent expression of Australian sovereignty is just that
completely independent by having not the Monarch of another
country as our head of state, but one of our own. I mean I think when
people see the President in the place and know that that person
represents them, that the sense of nation that will come from that, the
sense of us being one and together, represented by one person who is
one of us, will have a profound effect on the country.
RM: Let's just talk about, if we may, because I am discussing things with
the Premier of Victoria a little later in the program, the way in which
you work through the Premiers and also the question of local
Government? In Victoria, we moved from what 210 councils to 78.
Huge restructure of local Government. What is the role you see of the
third tier of Government? Do you think this will change the
relationship?
PM: Oh yes, I think this is a healthy development. I think that we have
picked up the sort of British borough system of local Government,
which has been largely inefficient and you don't get the continuity of
policies and I don't think that residents or ratepayers get the value they
would otherwise get from a system which is, again, more diffuse, more
representative, broader. So I think that is going in the right way and
I think local Government does play a significant role as a tier
Government which affects people's lives in a very close way, that is
the way in which they live, the services they have and that is why we
provide, the Commonwealth provides, grants direct financial
assistance grants to local Government, to complement the only
source of revenue they have which is an inefficient one and that is
municipal rating, property rating.
RM: It is true that Gough Whitlam, your predecessor ( sic), supported the
concept of a healthy local Government. What about
State Governments, obviously a different political complexion,
of course, with different baggage? But there are similarities between
Jeff Kennett and yourself on things, even though you both criticise
each other. Can you do business with them?
PM: Well I do and we have done quite a lot of things together and I think
what you find in this business is you are always looking past the Party
labels and the titles to the people who actually do things somebody
who can go and do something and agree to something and is
interested in doing things. And I have joined with the Premier and his
colleagues in terms of the quite historic decisions of the Council of
Australian Governments in respect of competition policy. We have
now, as you know, got a working party together on health. I think that
is going to be important and I think it is entirely critical that the
Commonwealth and the States are able to work together across these
otherwise distinct boundaries which we have for most of our history.
I think we are getting there now with that and at the last Premiers'
Conference, the Treasurer and I put together with the States, a
financial deal certainly which the States have never had. Certainly not
in the last 20 years or so and I think all of those things mean that you
can do things that are worthwhile and good, but it has got to be by
decisions and I mean this is my beef with Mr Howard, you know
obfuscation and indecision. This is the antithesis of the sort of thing
the country needs at this point in its history. It actually has embraced
change right through the 80s and it wants change and I think it expects
Governments, both Federal and State, to continue those changes.
RM: Well I know you are rushing for a plane, so a very last question and
that is this, I am going away for a year, I am wondering by how much
I will miss the election? Is the election going to be pre-Christmas or
after Christmas?
PM: Well for your sake I would like to tell you for the news value, but I don't
even know myself. So I think the honest answer to that is to say that
I have always taken the view we ought to wring as much out of these
Parliaments as we can. For a start they are too from our point of
view hard to win without giving time away and I think the public
appreciate us getting on with the job and getting things into place and I
made the point just in the last month, we have turned the Budget into
surplus; we have introduced this huge superannuation scheme for the
nation, 15 per cent for everybody putting their savings away and a big
outcome at the end; we have seen, you know, the Republic
announcement; bilateral arrangements with Japan. All of that has
happened in a month and I think these are the things the public want
to see, rather than us getting sort of obsessed about elections and our
own survival.
RM: Alright Prime Minister, many thanks for talking to us.
PM: Well thank you, Ranald, and good luck to you with the change in your
life and I hope it's both rewarding and pleasing for you.
RM: It's very much appreciated, thank you again.
PM: Thank you indeed.
ends