E&OE................................................................................................
FULWOOD:
Good morning to you Mr Howard.
PRIME MINISTER:
Hello Annie, nice to be on your programme.
FULWOOD:
Thank you. Mr Howard, universal criticism is what I see today. Does
that worry you?
PRIME MINISTER:
No. It's criticism from what I might call the commentators and
some of the elites. I think the Australian public's reaction
is both different and of course more important. And that reaction
so far has been somewhat different from that of many of the commentators.
FULWOOD:
But nevertheless the commentators many have some influence. Do you
consider that they have some influence over...?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we'll wait and see. The nature of something like this is
that you can never satisfy everybody. This is the first time in a
hundred years that anybody's attempted to write a preamble to
the Australian Constitution and therefore it was bound to be criticised
by a lot of people.
FULWOOD:
Yes, on the mateship issue certainly, a great deal of criticism that
you may well have alienated half the population, the women.
PRIME MINISTER:
I don't believe that. That's a very narrow, petty, short
sighted point of view. There may have been a blokey origin of mateship',
but it has acquired a hallowed place in the Australian experience
and Australian life. And it doesn't just mean friendship between
men. It means helping each other in adversity. It means dragging bodies
out of train wrecks and from the rubble of collapsed ski lodges. It
means that general spirit of volunteerism and self help which Australians
are famous for helping each other in adversity.
FULWOOD:
One commentator did say that one line, just using the word custodianship'
and recognising may well have helped you with the progress of this
through Parliament by getting the Aboriginal people on side and of
course Labor and the Democrats.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well without talking about one particular word which we shouldn't
get hung up about, you've got to remember the other side of it.
If you go too far in order to placate special interest groups you
might start losing the majority of the mainstream of the Australian
community. What I put in there about the indigenous people is truthful,
it's historical, it is dignified, it is sensitive, but it is
not going to raise the hackles of other sections of the Australian
community.
FULWOOD:
Is it a swipe at political correctness though all the same?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well the thing dealing with Aborigines, no of course it's not.
The thing I think you're referring to is a quite proper statement
to the affect that people should not have their liberty and their
dignity in anyway infringed by passing fashions.
FULWOOD:
Yeah, perhaps I as suggesting you're having a bit each way on
that all the same.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I don't think I am. I mean what is wrong with saying that
people's liberty and the dignity they have under the law should
not be infringed by prejudice, or fashion, or ideology. I think that
is a very proper and correct and dignified statement that people's
liberties and their dignity is something that should not be interfered
with by those sorts of things. I mean all Australians would support
that.
FULWOOD:
Mr Howard, Kim Beazley says you've broken Aboriginal hearts by
not including custodianship.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I don't believe that. I mean that is just a very knee-jerk
negative thing. Kim is in danger of becoming a spoiler. He's
against everything. I mean whether you consult him, or consult the
people or not. I mean I consulted the Australian people on our GST
and he's against that. I've prepared this draft preamble.
He's against that. He's against everything.
FULWOOD:
I actually wonder though, in the original draft were you more generous
to indigenous people? Stewardship' I understand was a word
that was going to be in there.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well there was the original draft that Les Murray put up. It had stewardship
of their lands' in it. Now that was open to two criticisms. From
the indigenous side there may have been argument that by using their
land' we were putting a very narrow interpretation of land as
established under native title processes and therefore was being too
clever by half. And then on the other hand others might argue that
it was reopening the whole native title issue.
FULWOOD:
Yeah, were you rolled in Cabinet on that?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no. Quite the reverse. I in fact made the change.
FULWOOD:
What about the simplicity of the language is another matter that's
been raised. We are free to hold our beliefs'....I've
just lost the word at the moment. But you know.....
PRIME MINISTER:
We are free to be proud of our country and our heritage. Well that
is self-evident. There are some people who aren't proud of their
country. Now if we are a truly democratic society we should have admitted
that possibility. I'm proud of Australia. You are. Most Australians
are. But you have to, in an egalitarian democratic society admit of
that possibility.
FULWOOD:
Nevertheless it's a Constitution as we say and not a song or
a poem isn't it. So shouldn't the substance be greater than
song words and poetic words?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, but the substance should be true. You are free on occasions to
be ashamed of something this country may do. So am I. So that's
all I'm saying. And it's a statement of the obvious.
FULWOOD:
So Mr Howard, if it doesn't get through then, passing through
the Senate, what happens then? Do you re-write and re-submit?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I've said that I would like people to make comment and I've
asked the leader of the Australian Democrats and the Opposition et
cetera to make comment by the 30th of April and I'll
have a look at their comments. I'm not going to go back to the
drawing board and I'm not going to sit down and negotiate it
through a committee. But I will have a look at the comments that people
make and if there are sensible suggestions that can be incorporated
without doing violence to what I've set out to do, and the Government
set to do, well we'll have a look at that. But we're not
going to engage in some kind of wholesale bargaining about it. And
then the final document will be put up to the Senate and we'll
then see what happens. But are the Australian Democrats and the Australian
Labor Party really going to vote and campaign against a document that
for the first time in a hundred years actually acknowledges the historic
place of the indigenous people in Australian life, and acknowledges
that we respect their continuing culture? Are they going to vote against
a declaration of the basic beliefs of the Australian community. I
mean that in the end is what has to be decided. But I will listen
to what people have got to say.
FULWOOD:
I'm sure that pleases them. Further to other matters on the agenda
Mr Howard. The Telstra bill withdrawn for now. What's going on?
Are there deals being done behind closed doors?
PRIME MINISTER:
That never happens. That never happens.
FULWOOD:
I don't believe you Mr Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
It's just not on. It's just not on at the moment. Look our
position's clear. We want to sell the whole of Telstra to the
Australian public. We want to wipe out Australia's government
debt. We want Australia to be the greatest share owning democracy
in the world and the Labor Party and the Australian Democrats and
others are standing in the way of that at the present time. Now we'll
push ahead and I hope we can get another 16% at least, and I hope
in the end we'll get the other 51%. Now when exactly it comes
back again depends on the Senate schedule. We haven't abandoned
that goal.
FULWOOD:
All right Mr Howard, yes. One more thing, Jamie Packer overnight back-flipped
as it were. He believes we should lift restrictions on foreign ownership
of Australian media in the national interest. What do you think of
that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well there's been no change of Government policy. As you will
understand we don't change Government policy according to the
views of individual media proprietors be they Mr Packer, or Mr Murdoch,
or Mr Stokes, or indeed anybody else.
FULWOOD:
Could we fall behind though if we don't?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well Annie, this has been debated at great length in the past. I have
been one of the strongest critics over the years of the existing media
laws. But when we had a look at it a couple years ago there was a
lot of opposition. In the Coalition, from the Democrats, the Labor
Party and others, and I've got more important fish to fry than
to re-ignite that particular issue.
FULWOOD:
All right Mr Howard. We thank you for your time here on 11AM.
We appreciate you joining us.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you.
[ends]