PRESS OFFICE TRANSCRIPT 5 DECEMBER, 1978
Prime Minister Interviewed by Swiss Television Team
Question Can Australia's agriculture prosper without the E. E. C.?
Prime Minister
It can prosper without the European Community, yes. At
the same time the European Community is enormously important
to Australia. 80 percent of our exports, agricultural
exports, to Europe have been prohibited by the rules of
the Community. It is not only a question of access but a'-so subsidised
exports while 000 million worth of which compete very directly
with our exports in Third markets. We have the anomalous
situation where we are not allowed to send a kilogram of
cheese to Europe. 4,000 or 5,000 tons of very heavily
subsidised European cheese find their way into the Australian
market. Dairy farmers don't like that very much. If there
were equal trading opportunities there Nxould be no troubles but there
aren't. I believe that increasingly people are recognizing
the justice of Australia's case in relation to the European
Community and recognizing also that some changes will have to
be made. We do need to get to a situation in which there are
fair rules of trade and that applies not only to access, it
also applies to the question of export subsidies into other
traditional markets which can be destroyed completely by
the export subsidy policy, and often have been.
Question Do you think that new markets can be found nonetheless?
Prime Minister
There are other markets. But that doesn't alter the principle.
We are involved not only with the right of access and what
that will do for our own industries, we are involved with
the principles of trade. That's a lot of what the MTN is
all about at the moment; establish fair rules of trade so that
the largest industrial trading groups don't use their
industrial weight, their power, their size, to deny a reasonable
opportunityto other countries.
Question Are you blaming the E. E. C. and other countries, for applying
discriminatory rules in agricultural sector. The Asians might
do that and say you are having high tariffs on industrial
goods. / 2
SWISS TELjEVISION TEAM -2-
Prime Minister ( continued)
I don't think they can because they know quite well that
in the areas they are talking about their exports to our
markets have been increasing by 30% to 40% a year for
seven or eight years. They've had very favoured access
into our markets. The ASEAN countries know that we've made
a number of very special arrangements to assist them to get
access, and greater access, into our markets. One of their
problems of course is that they are competing against each
other, very often with the same compmodities,, but also
competing against Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, who are
starting to export to our market area. You've only got to
look at the rate of access, or the increase in the rate of
access to our markets and it has been very great. You can
look at it another way around we buy more sensitive goods;
textiles, apparel and footware, from ASEAN countries, from
the developing countries, than any other developed nation.
We buy $ 2.50/$ 3.00 a head where Europe, North America,
Japan, buy something in the 25 to 60 range. Now that
indicates that is another measure of the openness of
the market. There are some ironic things in this particular
arena. I had one of our manufacturers approach me the
other day wanting to export textiles to the Phillipines
and he wasn't allowed to and he was told this was 100 percent
reserved for the local market because it was a labour
intensive industry. If our exporter was able to compete
on fair economic terms he should have been allowed some access.
I don't think the ASEAN countries, when you look at the facts
of their trade and the growth of their trade, can really complain
about the sort of access they've had to the Australian market.
It's substantial access and it's a growing one.
our position in Europe is that it used to be a substantial
access but it has been reduced to nothing by the special rules
of the Community.
Question In your opinion, do you think Australia has done enough for
its Aboriginal people, or is there still a lot to be done?
Prime Minister
There is a lot to be done. I think it might be a fair criticism
to say that Australia started too late. In recent years great
progress has been made. Resources are being made available
and in this kind of problem I think we recognise that progress
you can't achieve all you want to achieve in a week or a year.
It will take some time. .13
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Question Your Government has decided to mine uranium despite
some opposition within the country. How vital is uranium
for this country? What made you go ahead with it?
Prime minister
A number of reasons. There are, as we believe, international
obligations. Overwhelmingly Europe wants access to larger
supplies of uranium for peaceful purposes. Europe is short
of power. It doesn't want to be blackmailed again as Europe
was by the OPEC countries. It therefore wants to diversify
sources of power. Uranium for peaceful purposes is an
obvious energy source. We do believe there are international
reasons, international obligations. Also because of the
particular qualities of uranium we believe that it is much
better for Australia to be involved in the trade so that we
can make sure that the trade is conducted in the safest
possible manner, with the strongest non-proliferation regime.
We believe that the non-proliferation regime will be stronger
than if Australia was not involved because of our very deep
and real concern to make sure that the safeguards are as
tight and as strong as possible.
Question In your opinion, is Australia a part of Asia? Do you have
any plans of bringing Australia closer to Asia?
Prime Minister
I think Australia has probably come closer to Asia over a long
period. The Columbo Plan, a major aid program, was founded
many years ago. Our foreign aid is centred in Southeast Asia
and now in the Pacific also. We have very close relations
with the ASEAN countries. A very particular relationship
with Japan and a developing relationship with China which I
believe all goes very well for the future development of
Australian-Chinese relationships in future years. Geographically,
we are on the edge of Asia and what happens in Southeast Asia
will inevitably affect us. So to that extent, economically,
geographically, we are very much a part of Asia. We can't
avoid the circumstance that much of our historic background,
cultural background and traditions are different. European,
originally Anglo-Saxon but now broadened out into a
multicultural society which I hope is less narrow, less insular
and more tolerant than Australia might have been in the days
before the last World War. What happens in Asia is of enormous
concern to us.
Question But would you be, for example, prepared to let in more Asian
immigrants than you are today?
Prime Minister
There's no discrimination in our immigration programme on
the grounds of race or colour or origin. The problem with / 4
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-Prime minister ( continued)
immigration at the moment is the level of unemployment
within Australia. It's that that imposes the ( inaudible)
Question But would you be prepared to let in more Asian refugees
than Prime Minister
More have been coming in. If you look at the figures, the
numbers have grown quite greatly.
Question
Even more?
Prime Minister
Let's take the decisions as far we've gone at the moment.
There's a very real refugee problem in Southeast Asia which
we are aware of and there will be international discussions
undertaken in Geneva within the next few days. We hope very
much that the United Nations and others will recognise to
a greater extent the international responsibilities in
these areas. The size of the problem could well be beyond
the capacity of countries in the region itself to overcome.
This has been recognised by the United States and some
other countries who do take a substantial number of refugees.
Let me only say that Australia, with a number of countries,
has been increasing it's intake of refugees very substantially.
We will certainly do everything within our power and capacity
to alleviate the very real and serious human problem.
Question Why are there so many strikes in your country?
Prime Minister
I don't know that there are. Our newspapers report them
very fully. There are sometimes too many strikes in export
areas which bring people to notice but over the last year or
so the number of strikes in Australia, the time lost in man
hours and sort of thing, is much less than in the United
States on a comparative basis. Three or four years ago
it was quite out of hand. There is always room for
improvement and we have recently made some ministerial changes
which will enable greater attention to be given to this
general issue. Make comparisons with some other countries, no need
ton ame them, I don't think Australia's record stands too
badly.
Question
Are the economic problems of Australia any different
from those other industrialised countries in so far as
fighting inflation and unemployment?
Prime Minister
I think our approach to the problems might be a little bit
different because we believe, as does the OECD organisation,
as does the Secretariat of GATT, in its last most forthright
report, that the only way to fight unemployment is to fight
inflation; so that your industries become more competitive
and get a greater share of your own markets and a better
share also of export markets that might be offering. This
also will give people confidence to buy and expand their
investment, general activity. I think one of the problems
there has been with advanced industrial countries over recent
times is that people have said inflation is very important;
they've made some progress against inflation. To an extent
they've relaxed their general economic policies hoping that
that will improve employment but in fact it has tended,
very often, to make inflation a bit worse again with unfortunate
effects on employment. When the GATT Secretariat said that
if there is to be real progress in the expansion of markets,
expansion of production, the reduction in unemployment, we
need to get back to inflation levels of the earlier 1960' s
or even earlier times. I think there is a great deal of
truth in that. I believe we've got inflation down from, for
us historically high levels of 17%, 18% and 19% which we
inherited from our predecessors, to somewhere around 7% or 8%.
It is still trending downwards. Our Treasury forecasts indicate
that by the middle of next year it should be running at an
annualised rate of about But we wouldn't be satisfied
with that. We would still believe that that is too high.
I think now in the Australian economy we are starting to see
the signs, the early signs if you like, of the policies of
the last year or two. Many industries have better order books.
They are getting back into exports. They are getting a larger
share of our own domestic market. / 6
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Question Do you still consider Australia to be a lucky country?
Prime Minister
In many wags Australia is a lucky country. We do have
natural resources and we have a wonderful land but other
people could say that of their own countries. I think a
country is what a people make it. Australia is what
Australians collectively make of Australia. What we can
contribute to Australia; how we can build it and improve
it and make it a better place. I think you could say that
of your people and your country it's what your own
people make of it. You asked me this particular question,
I think I am allowed to say that I think the Australians,
the Australian people, have the capacity to make this the
best country on earth; the best country in which to build,
bring up a family and build a person's, a family's, future.
That's the way Australians see it.
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