PRIME MINISTER'S INTERVIEW
FOR CHANNEL 7 STATE FILE SPECIAL
PERTH, SUNDAY, 20 APRIL, 1975
Interviewer: Is it possible in the next two years to create
a Socialist State in Australia having in mind this awful rate
of inflation which confronts you?
Mr. Whitlam: No. Even in the most favourable economic
conditions and with a completely different Constitutional
set-up, no, one couldn't.
Interviewer: Then it follows, would you rather have come
into Government at a different time than this awful time into
which you have been plummeted?
Mr. Whitlam: Oh sure, it's very bad luck that we have come
into office just at a time when there are economic difficulties
right around the world. Every country like us has the same
sort of economic difficulties. That's bad luck. But at the
same time it's your duty, obviously, to take office whenever
the public drafts you to do so. So you can' * t just choose your
time. You're in that game and you take it for better or for
worse. Interviewer: It does seem Mr. Prime Minister, that you will
be there for the full term this time. There has been a change
as far as the Liberal/ Country Party coalition is concerned.
Does that s urprise you? * 4
Mr. Whitlam: As far as the Liberal Party is concerned.-I'm
sure the Country Party still wants to pursue the old spoiling
tactics of bringing about an election whenever it can do so.
Interviewer: Do you see a change in tactics though as far
as Mr. Fraser is concerned?
Mr. Whitlam: Oh yO-s, very definitely.
Interviewer: Does this surprise you?
Mr. Whitlam: No, I thought he would be more rational or
better conducted. I'm not wanting to say that Mr. Snedden
wasn't well conducted himself although he was always getting
up and saying something without being called 6~ y the Speaker
and that sort of thing but his great error I think was to
allow the Country Party to make a scene every day. Every day
started off with disruption . Now Mr. Fraser, very sensibly,
hasn't allowed that.
Interviewer: As far as the economy is concerned, Dr. Cairns
has said that the Government deficit is expected to be
$ 3,300 million by the end of the year and you've said in the
dV House that you expect this to be reduced. How are you going
to do it?
Mr. Whitlam: I don't think it will be $ 3 billion it will be
nearer $ 2 billion but what's caused the deficit of course has
been the very large reductions in both personal income tax
and company tax and also on motor cars, sales tax, which
we've brought about. I know it's constantly asserted that the
increase in the deficit is due to increased Government expenditure.
It's not that. It's due to decreased Government revenue. We
deliberately cut the taxes to spur the economy.
Interviewer: But Mr. Whitlam, Medibank looks like being a
certainty. It'Is going to go ahead on 1st July. Critics of
Medibank will say that this is going to increase your deficit
out of ; sight.
Mr. Whitlam: N o, that's not so. After all, Government expenditures
are not going to be any larger than they were previously
for Medibank. There will now be Government expenditures in
addition, where hitherto there has been expenditure by or through
health funds. But the total amount being spent on health services
will not ' increase. Surely itb a delusion to suggest that what
you have to pay up till now to health funds is not a tax. Of
course it's a tax. You don't get anything from the health funds.
You don't get anything from the Government to meet your hospital
or doctor's bills unless you contribute to funds. So sure they
were voluntary funds but there was a compulsion. You got no
assistance from the Government except through funds.
Interviewer: But you aren't going to be allowed to levy special
funds for Medibank.
Mr. Whitlam: That's true. That's not our fault. The Senate
twice knocked out the Bill which would have given a levy, I
think it was 1.35% of your taxable income in order to finance
the Government payment instead of the health fund payment towards
those costs.*-
Interviewer: So the money the people are paying now for private
insurance won't necessarily go to the Government unless you
increase taxes.
Mr. Whitlam: There's an automatic increase so the reduction
in taxes, the reduction in income taxes, will not be as great
as it would have been because there will not be the levy for
the specific purpose of health insurance through the Government
that we propose. After all that's what I undertook at the last
two Federal elections, but of course the Senate knocked that out.
So it has to come out of income tax directly instead of a
health insurance levy.
Interviewer: Do you expect the non-Labor States to join
Medibank or be forced to join it?
Mr. Whitlam: I think they will. It's true that South
Australia and Tasmania will join as from the 1st of July.
The other States I would expect will join later in the year
and there is quite a good chance that Queensland, which has
always had free public hospital treatment, will come into the
joint funding, Commonwealth and State, of hospitals from the
1st of July. When you talk about Medibank of course at the
moment you are talking about the hospital aspect of Medibank.
The medical aspect of Medibank, the doctor's bills, that will
come in throughout Australia from the 1st of July whatever the
States do but since the States conduct the hospitals, the
hospital part of Medibank can only come in if the States
co-operate. It will only come in in those States which do
co-operate. All we are trying to do is do what was done in
1947 make an agreement between the Commonwealth and States
to share the cost of runninIg hospitals on condition that no
charge is made for hospital treatment in the standard wards.
That is, we are only wanting to do what was done 25 years ago.
Menzies ended it in ' 51.
Interviewer: It's not just Medibank which seems to be a
problem and is a problem I'm sure for a lot of people,
doctors especially.
Mr. Whitlam: The sum total that we will pay either from t~ ces-from
now on or up till now from taxes and compulsory contribution
to funds, will be the same. The system will be simpler and
more efficient in that generally, instead of having a dozen
different funds, you will have one form of insurance.
Interviewer: I would like to lead on from that if I mayto
the beef industry, farmers up in arms'or miserable anyhow,
and companies which are having to curtail their activities.
Do you think it's fear yet in Australia that things are going
to get out of hand, that money's got to come into Australia
from somewhere?
Mr. Whitlam: Money is in fact coming into Australia. The
amount of money which has come in in Australia in the last
six months or so is very high indeed.
Interviewer: Will it save jobs?
Mr. Whitlam: I think so, yes. Obviously most jobs in
Australia, three-quarters of the jobs, are in the private
sector and to have jobs in the private sector obviously the
private sector must be growing, it must have confidence to
invest. It varies from one industry to another. There are
-some industries in Australia which find it very difficult to
compete with similar industries in other countries producing
similar goods to those that we want to buy here. They're
the cdnes that are in trouble.
Interviewer: Can you predict the ones which are going to go?
Mr. Whitlam: No, I don't. The industries which have found
it tough in the last year are the ones which will never really
in the future be the most thriving industries in Australia.
Textiles and automobiles will not be, automobiles will not be
the great growth industry in Australia in the next 20 years
that they have been in the last 20 years. I think that is
quite clear.-
Interviewer: What about minerals?
Mr. Whitlam: Minerals is going to boom.
Interviewer: In the Government or in the private sector?
Mr. Whitlam: All the minerals are in the private sector except
uranium. All of them. But obviously, Governments have to accept
some respon~ sibility and there has been a change since my Government
took over in December, ' 72, in two respects. We do hiot believe
that the National Government could just wash its hands of responsibility
in two fields, where up till now, the State GoArnments
did wash their hands of responsibility. One is, that we think
our mineral resources should not continue to go into overseas
control. Secondly, we think that the development of our-resources
should pay regard to environmental factors. Now the only way
that the Federal Government can exercise responsibility on
minerals in the States, is in respect of export licences, and
we don't give export licences for future-contracts unless there
is a proper regard paid to Australian ownership and to environment.
Interviewer: On the subject of uranium which you did bring up.
Will any one nation get ' favoured nation' treatment when Australia
decides to export uranium?
Mr. Whitlam: No, obviously there are some-countries with which
we already have an understanding, such as Japan, but the other
countries which are interested, all the E. E. C. countries are
interested and Iran is interested, there will be no favouritism
between them We will obviously be interest6d in having
propositions from them, mainly in order to see that we in
Australia can enrich the uranium. We have known for 20 years
how to produce the yellow cake, the powder, we have done that
back in the ' 50' s in Batchelor, Rum Jungle and Mary Kathleen,
but we don't know how to enrich uranium. And that's what
we want to learn.
Interviewer: Will there be enough money, briefly,, coming
in from uranium to enable the high standard of living in
Australia to continue?
Mr. Whitlam: I don't say from uranium only. Clearly I
think we can be quite confident that there will be as much
coming in from uranium in the future as there has been from
wool in the past.
Interviewer: The standard of living. Ought we in Australia,
because of the standard of living is so high, be afraid of
what's happening in Indo-China tonight?
Mr. Whitlam: No. I suppose you're referring to the fact
that in Indo-Chinia Governments are being changed but I think
it is quite fantastic to suggest that any Government in Indo-
China can attack Australia. Such a proposition wouldn't be
accepted anywhere else in the world. I don't think it will
be accepted in Australia.
Interviewer: When you were Leader of the Opposition you were
very keen on what you said was open Government and a lot of
people questioned your decision not to table the cables that
you sent to Hanoi and Saigon which were supposedly identical.'
Mr. Whitlam: I quoted what Mr. Fraser himself had said ir 2
that matter and quite properly, that the communications between
Governments are never released because if they are, then you
cease to be able to negotiate with other Governments. That is,
it's never done.
Interviewer: I find it difficult to understand though, why
shouldn't it be done?
Mr. Whitlan: I think all Governments take the attitude, when
they are dealing with things that concern them, international
affairs, the only effective way to deal with them is on a
confidential basis. You just don't get any Government in the
world releasing the cables-that it sends to other Governments
or that other Governments send to it. It just doesn't happen.
Incidentally the particular one in which Mr. Fraser stated that
he wouldn't release the cable or the communications, it appears
that no communication was sent. I'm checking on that. That
was the original communication sent by the Prime Minister of
South Vietnam exactly 10 years ago this month to Sir Robert
Menzies, ostensibly to ask us to come and assist militarily
in Indo-China. I haven't been able to find it.
Interviewer: As far as South Vietnam is concerned, your
Government was very quick to recognise the new Government
in Cambodia. If the Thieu Government falls, what will be
your attitude?
Mr. Whitlan: Whatever Government takes over and presumably
it would be the we would of course recognise it.
I have said all along and it's the general practice through
the world that you recognise the Government, that is you have
diplomatic relations with the Government which has control of
the capital of a country. The alternative is to recognise
a Government which no longer controls-the capital of the country.
Interviewer: If such a thing occurs though, will you give
consideration to the position of South Vietnamese refugees
coming to Australia?
Mr. Whitlam: We have already. As you know we have already
said that the students can stay until things settle down at
home and secondly, we have brought quite a number of orphans,
that is little kids whom the South Vietnamese Government said
were eligible to leave the country and whom the State Governments
said had approved adoptive parents.
Interviewer: That displays our new attitude in Australia of
humanitarianism and being rational, sensible in foreign affairs.
How do you respond to that criticism which, sounds awful to you
I know, that we are being naive because that with the-~ new
Government in Phnom Penh we hear this weekend that they have
chopped their enemies heads off.
Mr. Whitlam: Well wait a bit. They didn't say whom they had
executed but there were seven people, that is the heads of the
new regime that took over in the last week. There were seven
people, they didn't say which ones they had got.
Interviewer: They did name them beforehand didn't they?
Mr. Whitlam: Oh yes, but I don't know which ones they had got.
There were seven people, don't let us exaggerate
Interviewer: Would you be angry about that?.
Mr. Whitlam: I think they ought to show magnanimity in these
matters.
Interviewer: And taking that a stage further
Mr. Whitlam: and I have conveyed that view.
Interviewer: This humanitarian line which we take in Australia,
doesn't that leave us defenceless?'
Mr. Whitlam: Are you suggesting that Indo-China, any of the
countries in Indo-China could attack us?
Interviewer: No, the other way around. Suppose you were
angry and the Government was angry at what was going on up
there, have we got anybody to send. I'm leading in to defence
of course.
Mr. Whitlan: Should we send troops? I thi'k it is absolutely
unlikely that Australian soldiers will be sent to Indo-China
again, ever. Let me point out that there is nobody in the
Federal Parliament who has suggested that. No, wait a minute,
there was one man, a Country Party member who was a Colonel up
there, but he is the only one who has suggested it. I don't
think I can usefully spend my time with you-answering suggestions
that no elected person is prepared to make. There are no forces
in the whole of Indo-China that have an aircraft, or a ship or
a missile that could reach Australia and there is no prospect
of anybody supplying them with aircraft, or ships, or missiles
which could reach Australia
Interviewer: I think that we are trying to get at here th~ at
a lot of your critics have said that you are leaving Australia
defenceless, in the sense that we are not building up our own
forces. Interviewer: I am suggesting that if we were in a position
where we wanted to act on behalf of a minority group or a group
anywhere in the world, would we do it?
Mr. Whitlam: We are prepared to send troops, we have them
set aside., We have had them set aside for nearly a year now,
to respond to any United Nations appeal for troops, and our
armed forces are the best for thousands and thousands of miles
around. There is no navy, no airforce, no army which could
compete with ours. Sure, if you were competing militarily on
the land in South East Asia, we couldn't, our army couldn't.
But there's no army that could get to Australia and there's
no navy or airforce within thousands of miles of Australia
which could compete with us.
Interviewer: We would work with United Nations then?
dr Mr. Whitlam: Yes, but even if we are alone.
Interviewer: With the Americans?
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, we have arrangements with the Americans.
There are facilities here which are of very great value to
the Americans. But quite apart from that, let's be clear
about this, there is no airforce within thousands and thousands
of miles of Australia which could compete with the R. A. A. F.
There is no navy within thousands and thousands of miles of
Australia which could compete with the R. A. N. and there are
no armed forces which could land in Australia which the
Australian Army gouldn't promptly eliminate.
Interviewer: On the Western Seaboard then of Australia, ought
we to be concerned about Russian activity in the Indian Ocean?
You want to keep it peaceful?
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, we ought to be concerned about the possibility
of the Soviet and the U. S. competing with each other in the
Indian Ocean because none of the countries around the Indian
Ocean want this competition to come about, still less to escalate.
Interviewer:. Is there a balance there at the moment, d1o you know?
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, there seems to be.
Interviewer: And does this affect our relationship with South
Africa? It is suggested this week-end that we might be severing
a link with the Republic of South Africa.
Mr. Whitlam: Well certainly there are no military links with
South Africa whatever. I don't suppose anybody is going to
suggest it. Now there is speculation about whether we should
have Qantas going to Johannesburg but these things haven't been
decided. In any case a year's notice has to be given.
Interviewer: Still on an aerial basis, there have been from time
to time, many reports of Russian submarines ' in the Indian Ocean.
One takes these on face value, they must be correct, but will
the Government give consideration to basing a maritime reconnaissance
squadron in Western Australia? There was one opice here in 1951,
but since then nothing.
Mr. Whitlam: Well the facilities for surveillance of the
Indian Ocean are better than they ever were. For instance,
the airfield at Learmonth will now take any aircraft in
the world.
Interviewer: But they have to come from the Eastern States
to get to here.
Mr. Whitlan: Oh sure, but all the things that need to be
there permanently have, under my Government, been immensely
improved. You don't advertise these things but I suppose
everybody knows how long the airfield is. It is as long as
pretty well any airfield in the world. It will take any service
aircraft which operates anywhere in the world and we are getting
more maritime reconnaissance aircraft.
Interviewer: We haven't made up our mind yet what we are
going to get?
Mr. Whitlam: No, but it's-going to be the Nimrod or the Orion,
that is the military version of the Comet or the military version
of the Electra.
Interviewer: Travel, trips. A lot of critics say you spend
far too much time out of Australia.
Mr. Whitlam: That is no longer said. There was a tlarrific
campaign of course last December and January about this but
I think the critics have been suitably chastened since. 4
Interviewer: You are off again soon.
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, of course I am. I'm leaving next Wednesday to go
to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in the Carribean,
Kingston the capital of Jamaica and surely nobody is going to
criticise an Australian Prime Minister going to a Commonwealth
Heads of Government meeting. After all there are 34 countries in
the Commonwealth and most of them are round the Indian Ocean or
in the South Pacific. It is the most important forum to which
Australia can belong.
Interviewer: The Minister for Foreign Affairs will be away..
Mr. Whitlam: He is attending the ANZUS meeting this coming
week, and surely it's not going to be suggested that Senator
Willessee, the Foreign Minister, shouldn't attend ANZUS.
Interviewer: The three top men of the nation will be away.
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, Dr. Cairns is going to the Asian Development
Bank meeting in Manil.. The Treasurer always has attended the
meetings of the Asian Development Bank since it was established.
Now surely nobody is going to suggest that we shouldn't be
represented by the appropriate Minister at each of these gatherings.
We have always been represented at the Commonwealth Heads of
Government meeting, always by the Prime Minister except in
Menzies time when there was a meeting in Nigeria so we sent an
Ambassador and at the Asian Development Bank and at ANZUS.
Australians expect us to be represented at these bodies and
to be represented by the appropriate Minister.
Interviewer: It is an unfortunate co-incidence that this should
happen at this time.
Mr. Whitiam: Well the Parliament won't be sitting the two weeks
after this coming one, so it will be properly manned and
Mr. Connor, a formidable character, a very competent character,
will be Acting Prime Minister in a week's time.
Interviewer: I don't want to cast any slurs in this at all, but
I remember distinctly asking Mr. Gorton if there would ever. be
a chance, when he was Prime Minister, that this country would be
a sort of Switzerland or Sweden, a neutral country as a catalyst
in the world to bring the nations together. Do you see that?
Mr. Whitlam: No, we aren't a neutral country, we aren't a no
aligned country, but very obviously we have to understand the
point of view of countries which are not aligned since, I think
this is right,-every country around the Indian Ocean and most of
those in the South Pacific, are non-aligned. Where would be the
nearest aligned country to Australia? Japan I would think would
be the only one. You couldn't regard Singapore or Malaysia as
aligned now, that is, everybody in our region is non-al igned
except Australia and New Zealand and Japan..
Interviewer: TPhe latest opinion poll says that if we went to
the polls again tomorzrow, that you would lose Government.
Mr. Whitlam: I don't comment on polls, but I'm certain of this;
tjiat when there is an election campaign and people have to express
their views on which of the parties they would like to form a
Government, they will chose the Labor Party. I have no doubt
that when it's just not a case of ' expressing dis-satisfaction
with the Government-and I don't know of an over-whelmingly popular
Government in any developed nation in the world niow. All the
O. E. C. D. countries, the sort of countries like us, Japan, Western
Europe, Northern America, Australia and New Zealand, the Government
comes in for a colossal amount of criticism but when there is an
election campaign and people have to face up to the question
11.
Would the alternative be better than what we have had?
I've no doubt that they will choose us again.
Interviewer: As far as State relations are concerned, the
Premier here, Sir Charles Court has often called your Government
an obstructionist government, now how can you convey to him or
establish a better rapport between Western Australia and Canberra?
Mr. Whitlam: When Sir Charles and I get together we are perfectly
civil, courteous.
Interviewer: Yes, he has even said that.
Mr. Whitlam: Ihave no personal arguments with Sir Charles Court,
as a matter of fact I'll be going to the airport with him after
this, but I must say that I get a bit disturbed at the fact that
outside the country he spends just as much time abusing the
Australian Government as promoting the Western Australian
Government and this is just not done and I don't think it helps
him nor the country overseas.
Interviewer: Isn't this an easy out for any non-Labor Premier,
to blame the Federal Government for anything that goes wrong?
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, but it's not done and it's not effective if
you do it outside the country. I made a very great number of
visits overseas when I was Leader of the Opposition. I had
very serious disagreements with the Australian Government a4%~
the time but you don't remember that I bucketed the Australian
Government when I was away. Billy Snedden, I'm sad to say, did
do so when he was in the United States over Christmas. I don't
think it does you any good. People in another country look askance
when you criticise the Government of your own country. They know
that you have disagreements with it if you are in the Opposition
but they don't expect for you to disparage it.
Interviewer: But isn't this because of the anxiety of the
Opposition if you like, of the free, private sector, that there
will be less and less money coming into Australia?
Mr. Whitlam: Whatever the reason for it, there is no justification
for it. The money coming into Australia in ' recent months has
been very great indeed. Our balance of payments, whether it is
the flow of money or the sale of-goods, is very favourable.
12.
Interviewer: What promise would you make to the electorate
looking at an election two hears hence of course If you
were in that situation now, what are the goods things Australia
can look forward to?
Mr. Whitlam: To take the particular angle you have, I believe
that in two year's time, we will have seen very much more recognition
in Australia and overseas, that Australians should determine the
pattern of control and development of their resources. That's
where we camne in. We said it was not satisfactory that all these
mineral resources which had been discovered in Western Australia
and in Queensland in the 19601s, should be progressively passing
under foreign control. Now there are a great number of Liberals
agree with our attitude on this. John Gorton certainly did. He
was right in my view..
Interviewer: Whiat percentage say can you allow the Japanese
trading.-partners to have in companies? You can't really have
100% Australian ownership.
Mr. Whitlam: We think we c an in some things, such as uranium
aid this would be the general attitude around the world. Although
I think uranium, for various economic and strategic reasons, is
regarded as a substance which the National Government should
regulate single-handed.
Interviewer: What about ironi ore and oil?
Mr. Whitlam: As long as there is a preponderant Australian
control, that is satisfactory.
Interviewer: Is that 51%,
Mr. Whitlam: 51% I would think. Control can be achieved without
ownership but the point is from now on we-ought to get the
percentage up instead of letting it go down. We have had
preponderaat overseas control and ownership for our iron ore
and for our-Queensland coal and for our bauxite.
Interviewer: This would make a higher standard of living then,
because all that money which has gone abroad will stay here?
Mr. Whitlam: Yes, most of it.
13.
Interviewer: Makes you wonder what you would do with it.
, Mr. Whitlam: There are plenty of things for us to do with
capital in Australia, but what we need to do of course, is
to concentrate on those things where we are strong and we
are strong in mfinerals. This is the sort of thing where
Australia ought to be marshalling her capital and skills
from now on. There are some things in which we are very
fortunate, where we are superbly equipped. There are some
others where we are no better than any other country. The
sensible thing is to concentrate on those things where you
are fortunate or strong.
Interviewer: Unemployment worries ' a lot of people. Does
your Government seek the situation of full employment or
can you see a reasonable level of unemployment?
Mr. Whitlam: Obviously we are very dissatisfied with the
number of people who have asked for jobs and can't get them
at the moment. Now, what is regarded as a reasonable level of
unemployment is a matter of--discussion but the present one is
obviously too high. We haven't been used to it in Australia.
It's no worse and even better than you get in North America
or in many parts of Europe but that doesn't give you any
satisfaction. It is coming down.
Interviewer: We won't have to wait for two years before it
gets better?
Mr. Whitlam: It's got very much better in the last month
and I think it will continue to get better over the coming
months. Interviewer: Can you put a date on it? Would you say three
months, six months?
Mr. Whitlam: Well every one of those months, the number of
people seeking jobs will go down. I have no doubt of that at all.
Interviewer: You haven't got your fingres crossed.
Mr. Whitlam: Oh no, I'm open-handed.