THE PRIME MINISTER'S PRESS CONFERENCE
PARLIAMENT HOUSE, CANBERRA
TUESDAY, 22 MAY 1973
PRIME MINISTER: Gentlemen: When nearly six months ago
I promised to have a press conference every Tuesday that
I was in Canberra, I had hoped that I would be able to
have them alternating between Tuesday morning and
Tuesday afternoon so that the afternoon papers and the
morning papers could share the benefits. As you know,
it has proved impossible to have any in the morning
because there has been no break between the Cabinet
meetings on Tuesday morning and then Question Time and
the necessary proceedural matters in the House. However,
last week and, of course, this week and next week there
will be Cabinet meetings on Monday. I had hoped that we
would be able to get through the Cabinet meeting yesterday
in time to have the Press Conference on Monday afternoon.
We weren't able to do so, so then I thought we would have
this one this morning after Question Time. We can't
have a Question Time until the Speaker lands, so I hope
it hasn't inconvenienced you we can have it now.
Now I have got no information to give you because the
decisions of the Cabinet were released to you yesterday.
You know my principle I don't release these until
after Question Time, and if people don't have the gumption
to ask questions at Question Time about Cabinet decisions
then you are the first recipients of them. But they have
been given to you.
Q. Could I ask you whether your Government
approached the States to try and settle areas of difference
on the Off-Shore Resources legislation. If not, why not,
and what have you to say about the South Australian Premier,
Mr. Don Dunstan's comments on Sunday night that the new
Federal Labor Government should have held such talks with
the States?
PRIME MINISTER: Any such talks would have been futile.
Mr. Gorton found that. We decided to go ahead. The States
are completely intransigent on this subject, and in my policy
speech well, I will go back further. The Labor Party
declared its attitude towards this legislation at its last
Federal Conference at Launceston in June 1971. I mentioned
that we were going to enact the legislation if the people
returned us. I said that in my Policy Speech in November.
The Governor-General's speech opening this Parliament undertook
that his Government would introduce the legislation. He used
the same words as he used in opening the previous Parliament in
February 1970. In the meantime, the Cabinet had made the
decision. I think it was in January it was one of the very
early decisions that we made. / 2
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PRIME MINISTER CONT... The decision was communicated to
all the Premiers. Without conferring with the Australian
Government, one of the State Government's did in fact seek
to approach the British Government about this I think
in February. But in all events gentlemen, the Labor
Party's attitude on this has been known ever since the
legislation was first introduced over three years ago
by a Minister representing Mr. McMahon who was then the
Foreign Minister. It remained on the Notice Paper for the
whole of the rest of the last Parliament. Throughout
the three years of the last Parliament the Labor Party
supported the legislation. Everybody has known and expected
that we would enact it, and this is our intention. Any
consultations with the States on this subject would have
been as futile now as it proved in 1970, 1971 and 1972.
The whole reason for it is this: That Australia is
believed to have valuable resources under the Territorial
Sea and in it, on and under the Continental Shelf. We don't
want to have the situation which has applied to our on-shore
resources, particularly Mr. Court as he then was and
Mr. Bjelke-Petersen enabled overseas interests to get access
to Australian on-shore resources under terms which were to
the disadvantage to our country. We don't want the same
situation to arise if 7 Governments in Australia exercise
or purport to exercise Jurisdiction over our off-shore
resources. There ought to be one national Government
dealing with this. We shouldn't allow a Federal system
to distract us from that issue and to dissipate our
resources once again. You don't want this sort of break
of gauge position arising in respect to those resources
where this country is fortunate, particularly minerals and
fuels. Q. On the Victorian State elections, Mr. Whitlam.
There was an apparent drop of about 6 per cent in support
for the Labor Party since the Federal election. Were you
concerned about this, and do you attribute it to a lack
of confidence in either the State Labor Party or the
Federal Labor Party?
PRIME MINISTER: No I don't attribute it to either. Of
course I was disappointed in the Victorian result. We got
only a marginally improved percentage of the vote over the
last State elections, but I will certainly give, and we
should all give credit to Mr. Hamer for having the good
sense to pick the eyes out of Labor policy. He is a very
different man to Sir Henry Bolte. He sees a good idea,
he identifies it and he adopts it. In fact, on the
relevant issues as everybody was saying before the
election there was very little difference between
Mr. Hamer and Mr. Holding and for that matter, myself.
Q. I refer to reports in this morning's press
about the cost of Commonwealth cars for ministerial staffs
and staffs of Opposition leaders, and I ask you whether you
are concerned about this misuse of Commonwealth cars, has
Cabinet discussed the matter, and are any new controls on
the use of these cars by the staffs of ministers and Opposition
leaders being considered?
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PRIME MINISTER: There has been no Cabinet discussion on this,
and I haven't seen the report on which the story is based.
I was naturally very interested in the report. I notice
that it was said that Mr. Lynch's staff has spent some
thousands of dollars on taxi orders. Yes, well I have
been unable to verify it I don't know what the strength
of this report is. I haven't seen it. I mean I've seen
no report upon which this story could be based.
Q. In view of the shortages of labour apparent
in the BHP and GMH factories, are you considering any
reassessment of the migrant intake, particularly
unskilled migrants?
PRIME MINISTER: This is a matter where really I think it would
be more helpful if you were to discuss the matter with
Mr. Grassby or Mr. Cameron. There has been difficulty in
recruiting unskilled labour for some of these remote or
unattractive jobs, and both ministers have made cormments on
this. I believe there are discussions taking place on it.
I have not been involved in them and the Cabinet hasn't
discussed them.
Q. I was told this morning that Cabinet decided
to support the Senate Inquiry into the Croation issue.
Does this recognise the right of the Opposition to determine
business of the Senate?
PRIME MINISTER: This is a matter which will come before the
Caucus tomorrow. It is not a matter which Cabinet decides by
itself, the Caucus decides whether it will participate in
Parliamentary committees which are proposed by any or several
of the Opposition parties, so that is something which I would
expect to be determined at Caucus tomorrow.
Q. Yesterday the retiring President of the Arbitration
Commission was asked about the penal sanctions, and he said that
they didn It really matter either one way or another and that it
was a matter of political ideology and not of reality. In the
context of the Victorian election results, would you be prepared
to hold a double dissolution on the issue of the penal clauses
being rejected by the Senate, and would you be prepared to have
the election campaign fought on that issue?
PRIME MINISTER: The crucial part of the Conciliation and
Arbitration Bill which has been passed by the House of
Representatives and is now awaiting the Senate doesn't turn
on the penal clauses. There have been penal clauses for many
years now, I think since 1951, and in recent years throughout
the history of the McMahon Government, and I think throughout the
greater part of the history of the Gorton Government, they were
never used, so they generate a very great deal of heat and
they have very little effect. What Sir Richard Kirby said was,
I think, as in most things he says, good sense. But the crucial
thing, the central thing which the Conciliation and Arbitration
Bill aims to do is to remove the barriers the union amalgamation
which were introduced in the Lynch law of last year and in fact
to facilitate union amalgamations. one of the very great
impediments to economic advance and industrial relations in
Australia is the fact that we have over 300 unions. If we only
had 30 unions we would be a much more orderly and prosperous
community. / 4
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PRIME MINISTER CONT Inevitably jurisdictional disputes,
demarcation disputes arise when there are so many unions, and
European countries in particular, marvel at the archaism, the
anarchy, of the dispersion of our industrial organisations.
Now I believe that is something recognised by people in the
employers side and everybody interested in industrial relations,
that we would be very much better off if we had 30 unions in
Australia instead of 300. I think there are only about 14
unions in Australia which have more than 50,000 members.
That's/ far too attentuated form of industrial organisation.
There are, I think, a hundred or a couple of hundred unions which
have less than 1,000 members. I don't know the exact figures but
if you are interested I can get them for you, of course.
Now that is an absurd position. Now you mention the position
about a double dissolution. Everybody should know, and I do
believe that you gentlemen of the press should play your part
in letting people know if they don't know already, that the
circumstances for a double dissolution arise when the Senate
has twice rejected a bill from the House of Representatives
or twice made a unreasonable delay in dealing with a Bill
from the House of Representatives, or has twice unacceptedly amended
a Bill from the House of Representatives. Each of those actionsthe
rejection, the delay, the amendment having a clear three
months interval. No what's happened at this stage is that the
Senate has rejected one Bill, the Electoral Bill, and that will
be introduced as early as possible, probably the first day again
in the Budget session. Now is those circumstances, if it is
rejected again, there would be the circumstances for a double
dissolution. If a double dissolution takes place it will
obviously be in the context that there has to be an election
before the end of June next year for half the Senate anyhow.
Now let there be a bit of rationality about this. The
circumstances haven't yet arisen, they may not, but they can't
arise for a few months yet.
Q. In your foreign affairs role. Have you sought
any support from other countries for the Australian case to
the ICJ through diplomatic channels, and specifically, will you
be seeking the support of the Danes when you see the Danish
Foreign Minister, I think on Wednesday?
PRIME MINISTER: We have already, of course, sought the
participation and achieved the participation in the proceedings
by New Zealand and by Fiji. You will recall that I discussed
this matter with Mr. Kirk in Wellington last January and our
respective Attorneys General, Dr. Finley and Senator Murphy
have discussed it a few times in between and I've been on the
telephone to Mr. Kirk a few times and I also discussed it
with him in APIA at the meeting of the South Pacific Forum.
I also discussed the matter with Ratu Mara, the Prime Minister
of Fiji when he was in Sydney about three months ago, and also
in APIA and there haw~ been telegraphic communications with the
Fijians. So, in fact, the application is three-fold:
Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. When I see the Danish Foreign
minister this week I expect to raise it. As you will remember,
I did raise it with Mr. Trudeau in Vancouver on Holy Thursday,
with the Foreign Secretary of Britain on the Tuesday after
Easter, and with Mr. Colombo in Rome on the Thursday in Easter
week and with the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of
Mauritius over that following weekend.
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Q. Sir, when you say you raised it with them, did
you seek their diplomatic support in perhaps their moving
against France as well?
PRIME MINISTER: None of the States even in the Common
Market support France. They all think France ought to sign
the partial test ban treaty which was accepted by the United
States, Soviet Union and Britain ten years ago. Perhaps I
should add this here, that there is a very great deal of
confusion and deliberate obfuscation about the attitude of the
Australian Government to Chinese nuclear tests in the atmosphere.
I made it plain to Mr. Chi Peng-fei in July 1971, and
Dr. Cairns has done so to Mr. Chou En-lai last week, that we
believe that these tests are objectionable whoever carries
them out, but we are taking proceedings in the International
Court of Justice. We are doing so on the advice of some of
the leading practitioners before the Court, and leading
academic men in the field of international law. We are
doing so because there is a 1928 Agreement to which both
France and Australia are parties and New Zealand also, which
permits use by each of the parties to have their disputes
settled by the World Court. China is not a
party to that 1928 Agreement. Again, we are parties to the
Statute of the International Court of Justice, so is New
Zealand, so is France, so is Fiji. China is not. So
the things that we are doing about the French nuclear
tests are not available against any Chinese nuclear tests
in the atmosphere.
Q. Sir, I realise the demand for funds from
various sources is a matter that has not probably been sorted
out by the Cabinet or the Government in its entirety, but
the go-ahead for the re-development of Brisbane airport appears
to have been delayed or deferred by the Cabinet. You may
have even heard of some of this concern during your visit
to Eagle Farm race course last Saturday. If there has been
a delay or deferral, when do you expect Cabinet to deal with
this long-standing matter and can you give any assurance
that this long delay delayed for many years by the previous
Government for the re-development of the Brisbane airport
to bring it to full international standard will not be affected
by any decision to have a second airport for Sydney?
PRIME MINISTER: The Cabinet has completed its deliberations
on this matter. There will be no further ones for some months.
At any rate, the decision, I think, was announced after the
meeting at which we considered it. That would have been three
or four months ago, I think. Now I don't want to be more
precise on this because I'm not sure if I haven't been in
correspondence with Mr. Bjelke-Petersen about this and after
the conference is over I will see if there is any more I can
tell you about this including the question of correspondence.
You will realise that I don't want to say anything on this
subject which would produce any inflation of land prices in
any relevant area. In answer to a previous question, I was
referring to this 1928 treaty, to which Australia, New Zealand,
France are parties. The precise title is the 1928 General Act
for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes. / 6
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Q. Have you received any indication yet whether
President Nixon will invite you to the White House when
you are on your way to Ottawa in August. How do you see
the present state of Australian-American relations?
PRIME MINISTER: There has been no communication either way
on this subject. I will be in North America between the
engagements I have accepted in Mexico and those, of course,
which I have undertaken as a Commonwealth Head of
Government in Ottawa.
Q. Does your answer to the double dissolution
question mean that you won't now go ahead with your threat
to recall Parliament during the winter recess, to consider
any Bills that may have been thrown out by the Senate between
now and the end of the sitting?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, let me clarify that one. If the
Senate rejects a Bill from the House of Representatives,
the Representatives knows that fact, it is informed of that
fact, no action is required by the House of Representatives.
It can, after a lapse of three months, following the rejection,
introduce the Bill again. That is what we will be doing in
respect of the Electoral Bill which the Senate rejected last
week. The only circumstances in which the House of Representatives
will be recalled before the Budget Sittings are if the Senate
makes amendments to any Bill from the House of Representatives
and then the Cabinet believes that those amendments are
unacceptable in those circumstances to save time we could recall
the Caucus and then we could recall the House of Representatives
and we would reject the amendment which the Senate had made.
In those circumstances we could three months later introduce
the Bill in its original form or with any amendments which
commended themselves to us. But you don't recall you don't
have to recall it would be completely superfluous,
irrelevant to recall the House of Representatives if a Bill from
the House of Representatives was rejected outright by the Senate.
The three months. dates in the case of rejection from the date
of the rejection. The three months date in the case of an
unacceptable amendment from the date when the House of
Representatives refuses to accept the Amendment.
Q. You told last week's Caucus you would recall,
now you say " could". Which is it?
PRIME MINISTER: That will depend on the actions, the
nature of the amendment.
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