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TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P J KEATING MP
INTERVIEW WITH MURRAY NICOLL, -DRIVE TIME", ABC RADIO SAN
ADELAIDE E& OE PROOF COPY
MN: Prime Minister, Paul Keating.
PM. How are you Murray?
MN: I'm well, thank you. You're back in the ciV now after being on the
Peninsula?
PM: Yes.
MN: What did you say to the people of the Eyre Peninsula, and perhaps
more Importantly, what did they say to you?
PM: Well, the point of going was to talk about the sus~ tinability of
agriculture, and we have been now looking at regions of Australia
there is ai strategy we have in South West Queensland, one in NSW
and now the Eyre Peninsula in* South Australia, to look at support
from the FederarGovernment, to look at ways of in which farms can
be improved, to underline the importance of whole of farm
management. What that means is drawing the farm so that on the
good soils you grow certain crops, not all the soils will be uniform, the
place won't be able to stand uniform stocking rates, in other words,
getting a plan for the farm, and getting a plan for the region. And you
might remember a year ago, in November last year, Bob Collins and I
announced the Drought Package for the drought affected farms, and
we also introduced Bonds Firm Bonds to smooth income out, and
concessions for water and fodder. Well, during that time we started
then putting a line under this question of sustainability in agriculture,
and from that day to this, we have been on that subject, and today I
received a report from the Land Management Task Force on this very
subject. And, of course, we are seeing this-put Into place here in a
regional way on the Eyre Peninsula.
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MN: Traditionally, of course, Liberal strongholds out in the bush we have
not seen much Labor action out in the country before now...
PMV: We have held Grey for 10 years, until we lost it last.
MN: Yeah you reckon you can get it back this time, right?
PM; Well, it's a margin of a couple of percent... . but look, I mean, I heard
your introduction about the election and the rest, but I have been
going around rural Australia now for a couple of years about this
same subject. I was in Orange 2 weeks ago, I was in Roma about a
month before that, in Wlnton in Queensland a month eore that.
And I think with the droug~-t ' having come through, with all of the
devastation it left in its wake, we have got to draw some lessons from
it, and keep the momentum going towards sustainable agriculture, so
that we are not seeing people walk off arms because they become
marginal because they are not properly managed. I think this is the
time to actually drive that lesson home.
MN. Meantime, you are getting a bit of a jump on the Opposition Leader,
John Howard?
PM: Well, we are interested in Australian farms, and the family farm we
did as no Federal Government has ever done we suspended the
Farm Assets Test for those areas which were affected by drought,
Whfich means that now 11,000 farm families are getting income
support, so we are doing these very solid and tangible things. The
Farm Bonds are, I think, a great breakthrough, and I have always
held the view that the family farm is the backbone of Australian
agriculture that we will get the... . no one will care for agricultural land
if the family walk off the farms. So, we need to keep our productivity
up, and the quality of the land the whole Landcare movement is
coming from the family farming community, and I think we the
Federal Government, certainly this Labor Government wants to
keep that going.
MN: Did you get any reaction from out on the land at the French nqpcleqr
,--tests? I mean, you have been dealing with people who's livelihood is
the land, and vice versa the land is their life and this is what it is all
about the environment and the nuclear tests in the Pacific, and the
ap'iazing second test a huge explosion on another Atoll did you get
any reaction from the people put on the land about that?
PM: No, I didn't today, but I have it, of course, in many other places, and I
can only agree with the sentIments I think you are expressing there
implicitly, Murray. That is, this is a very foolish thing for the French
Government to do. The interests of France, and every developed
country, and all those people who cherish liberty, should be to
dimlnlsh the proliferation of nuclear weapons. The sin that France is 015 P0,~'
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committing is to say to the would-be proliferators this is the lraqs,
Irans, the Pakistans and countries like that, who, we're told, are
developing a nuclear capability to say to them as a sort of
developed democracy, well, that's okay you can go and let your
bombs off, and do as we're doing. I mean, that I think, is the principal
point of objection, let alone the lack of regard for the people of the
Pacific whose wishes they have simply just ignored.
MN: What about the suggestion and it's come from many quarters of this
country that we should say to the French Ambassador in Canberra
it's time you got on your bike, and that, in fact, all other countries
around the world should do the same thing. How would you feel
about that?
PMV: Well, it's a matter of whether you do better engaging these societies
and governments, than not engaging them.
MVN: And that is the reason our Ambassador is still in Paris?
PMV: Yes. I think we have been more effective in engaging them, As you
may know, I wrote an article for LeMonde, I did one also for
Liberation, and these had some Influence in-the French debate, and
in'the German debate. And I think this debate in Germany is starting
now to run against the French President and he may deign to, you
know, take a view askance at Australia's view, but certainly not
German public opinion. But he doesn't need to go further than his
own country now, the overwhelming number of people in France
now dis-favour this policy, and wish he would desist. It's all about, of
course, the Second World War it's all about saying it will never
happen again. Well, they already have a stock of nuclear weapons in
their inventory. The issue for France, I think, is to engage the rest of
the world not to sit back with a sort of a you know, a nuclear weapon
under its arm, but rather to deal with the real problems and that's t
way I think France will find that it doesn't face any sort of problems
that it faced in 1940.
MVN:-So the French Ambassador will stay In Canberra?
PM: Well, I think if we say to him go, what we are saying is that we don't
want a dialogue with France, we don't want to talk to them, we don't
want to have a communication with them, That seems to me to be a
pretty strange policy when you object to what they are doing.
MN. Can we go any further than we have already gone is there anything
else we can do?
PM: Well, we have got the Foreign Minister at the moment at the United
Nations getting a resolution together against France. We have,
today at the Pacific Forum, broken off their dialogue partner status
this is the dialogue partner status that France enjoys with the
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countries of the Pacific Forum, which is the Pacific Island countries,
including Australia and, as you know, our protests against France
has been our strongest protest ever against a democratic state.
MN:-John Howard today has said that the Coalition is seriously
considering releasing more of their policies in the lead-up to the
election, and we're moving onto the fact that you are doing a lot of
moving around the country at the moment, and so are a lot of others
in this pre-election campaign they're calling it a scare campaign, of
course, that you are Involved in. Have you seen Mr Howard's 12
point minimum standard through industrial relations?
PM: No, I haven't. You might remember Murray you need a bit of a
memory with John Howard but you remember before the last*
election, he had an Industrial Relations Bill he was going to table?
And he was going to table it up until the last week of the campaign...
MN: Well, they did run into some other problems during the campaign.
PM; I know but he never tabled it. He had a Bill ready, he said the IR
Bill, the Industrial Relations Bill but we never saw it. Now, if he had
it ready for March 1993, he certainly had it ready in these last couple
of.. because he was then the Industrial Relations spokesman. He is
now the Leader of the Opposition with essentially the same view, and
what we are saying to him is I mean, he wants to cut the wages of
people in the bottom deciles of income. He calls it labour market
flexibility it's basically wage cuts. People would lose penalty rates,
overtime rates, holiday leave loadings without compensation in their
wages. And what I have said today and yesterday was if Andrew
Robb their Federal Director who was on the Sunday program on
Sunday saying we have got 98% of our policies prepared why are
they keeping them from the Australian public? I mean, they are not
keeping them from me I only get 1 vote in the election, It's the
community of Australia who are entitled to know where the major
Parties would lead them.
MN: But it is a valid answer, when we are not officially in an election mode
it is a valid answer to say well, last time we laid it all out on the
table, it got up and hit us between the eyes?
P M: It got up and hit them between the eyes because it was no good,
Murray. It's not valid for any Party to hide its policies. The Federal
Government is out there with a balanced Budget with a Budget in
surplus we say how we are doing it, we have got all the measures
down there in the Budget. I mean, when I announced -with the
ACTU the Accord, we had to say how it would work, how it endorsed
the 2-3% inflation rate. When I lay down the structure for the
Republic, I said we are going to move to an Australian republic, and
here is the model. There's no trickiness on our part. This tricky view
this sort of sneaky view that you have policies, but you think they 015P. U'
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are too crook to show the public because they won't like them, and
you can slip them past them in the last 10 days of the poll, is, I think,
high dishonesty in politics.
MN: But realistically, nobody comes up with policies they are fully
convinced that the public won't like?
PM: Well, if you have got policies that you are convinced that the public
won't like, why would you want to be Prime Minister of Australia? I
mean, Kf you think your policies are going to be anathema to the
community, then you ought to be out of the business. I mean, these
people are saying here's Andrew Robb brazen as they come, out
there on the Sunday program saying we have got our policies 98%
prepared. Well, why won't you show the Australian public, Mr Robb
and Mr Howard? [ And they will reply] " because I don't think they will
like them".
MN: The standard question that you are getting at the moment as you
move around the election. Ralph Willis, the Treasurer, was on this
radio station not so many weeks ago saying that the election will be
held in the first quarter of next year does that still hold?
PM: Well, the Treasurer doesn't speak on these matters. These matters
have always been left to the Prime Minister, and every Australian
Prime Minister has the discretion in this. But, I have made clear right
through when I have been asked this and remember this, first of all
John Hewson started talking about an early election 15 months ago,
then Alexander Downer said we were going to have an early election,
then John Howard said we would have an early election, and all the
pundits when the Budget came out they said " oh, surplus Budget
clearing the decks for an election". Well of course, it was all untrue.
I have said right from the start that I think the public believe that
Parliament when they elect a Government they should be able to
draw the maximum advantage from the Government's work over the
course of the Parliament, and that having early elections is too tricky,
and not to be considered. That's always been my view,
MVN: And that still holds -we won't be going to the polls before Christmas?
P M: I'm not. . the chance of us going to the polls before Christmas is very,
very slender Indeed. But I am not saying definitely to you or to any
other commentator to give away a Prime Minster's right which every
Australian Prime Minister has enjoyed.
MN: So that's an almost definite?
PM: No you'll get no more from me than that. I'm not here to make
headlines for you.
MN: It's an almost definite it's a definite should be that way?
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PM: Wts a definite that the public want value from the Parliament, and they
don't like politicians being tricky, purling erections at times to suit
themselves.
M N. And the Prime Minister would never go to an election until he thought
he could win it?
PM: Well, the Prime Minister will have to go to an election within 3 years
of the last Parliament sitting. It's just a matter of the Constitution.
MN: Okay. Now, you're about to head off in fact, I think I have held you
up, I think. What are you doing in town tonight?
PM: Well, I'm opening the restoration of the Palm House in the Gardens.
MN: Oh, yes.
PM: We gave $ 1 million to it, under the, 0, Oe-J~ on program, which I
introduced, as you know, for these public works back in 1992. Now,
my last visit to Adelaide was on the One Nation train which brought
the standard gauge railways for the first time from Melbourne to
Adelaide. Arnd we also had one there for heritage buildings the
restoration of heritage buildings and this is a classic heritage
building. Now, the Premier is down here tonight, and the Premier
knows this you don't get to get your name on a plaque unless you
put some money in. Now so far, we haven't got any money out of
him. So, all the garden types down there who support this garden,
should say to him now listen Dean, if you want your name on the
maker's label here, you had better get your cheque book out.
MN: Well, if you find out a way to get a buck out of Premier Dean Brown,
let me know will you there's a lot of people wTho would join the
queue?
PM: Well, he always comes around asking me.
MN: Maybe he thinks you have got a Santa wallet?
PM; He puts on a sad face, and he thinks I'm a sucker for a sort of sad
look.
MN: Okay. Thank you I would like to talk to you next time you're in town.
PM: Thanks Murray.
ends.