Subjects: Greek Club function; pensions; Alice to Darwin Rail Project.
E&OE................................
JOURNALIST:
Good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning, how are you?
JOURNALIST:
Well thank you. Good cricket game yesterday, a great success.
PRIME MINISTER:
It was a great success. It was a good game of cricket, exciting finish, but it was better in a broader way and everybody was very pretty happy that what was an idea of Geoff Clark's, the Chairman of ATSIC, came to fruition and everybody feels cricket and the cause of goodwill between different sections of the Australian community has been enhanced and that's what things like that are all about.
JOURNALIST:
Now Prime Minister today you're due in Adelaide, and you've no doubt heard the controversy, will you take questions from one and all at the Greek Pensioners' Club this morning in Peberth?
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes.
JOURNALIST:
No problems at all? They can ask you .
PRIME MINISTER:
None at all, come along and hear me.
JOURNALIST:
Okay. Now many pensioners will reckon that they know they are worse off under the GST. How do you respond to them when they say that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I will point out that their pensions have gone up more than the cost of living. And that ultimately is the best test. I mean the measure of whether somebody is worse off or not as a result of a change of this kind is to look at how much the cost of living has gone up since the GST was introduced and compare that with the increase in the pension. And the pension is at least 2% in real terms ahead of the increase in the cost of living since the GST was brought in.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister why is the perception though among the pensioners that they are worse off? And you go around the country, you talk to them, you're about to do the same thing in Adelaide this morning and you'd be getting the message from the pensioners that they really do believe they are worse off?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well there are a couple of reasons that some of them believe it. Can I tell you not all of them do? I get letters from pensioners containing detailed calculations that they have made indicating that they don't believe that they are worse off. So you are talking about one side of the story, the other more silent side of the story is that many pensioners don't feel that they are worse off. The reasons are that they've been told by the Labor Party dishonestly, particularly in relation to 'claw back' that they're worse off. And I guess human nature is that if that if you have a change you, some people have a tendency to think that that change disadvantages them and that's human nature no matter who the government is and no matter what the change is. On that basis no government would ever do anything. But tax reform is good for Australia. It will in the future be seen to be even better for Australia than it is now. There are many more benefits around the corner, for example on the 1st of July of this year, the Financial Institutions' Duty, that nagging things that turns up on your bank statement when you get it each month, is going to disappear all together and that's going to a tax saving of $1.2 billion for the community. This is of course, the next thing I am going to say doesn't affect pensioners but it affects a lot of small businesses, the company tax rate will fall from 34 cents in the dollar to 30 cents in the dollar on the 1st of July. So the benefits of tax reform are still flowing through to the Australian community.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister, to an immediate matter, you'll know in South Australia and in the Northern Territory we are hanging out to get this railway started. Is there a chance that while you're in Adelaide over the next couple of days you might be able to join the Premier and finally sign off financially?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I'm hoping to go to Whyalla with the Premier on Saturday to sign one of the agreements and of course they are going to be a lot of jobs in the steel industry generated by this project. We have been a very strong supporter of the project, a very, very strong supporter, the Commonwealth Government is the first federal government in Australian history to put real dollars on the line. I mean Hawke talked about it, others talked about it, they never did anything, but I have actually kept my word to the people of South Australia and the Northern Territory on this. We've put in about, what $165 million at least, potentially a bit more over the next few years depending on what happens. And we are determined as a federal government to do all we can to see that railway built. It is a piece of nation building. It's not a strict bean counting exercise, it's a piece of nation building that this country has needed for a long time and I'll be very happy to go to Whyalla with the Premier on Saturday if that can be arranged.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister we're delighted to hear it, aren't we Tony?
PRIME MINISTER:
We sure are. Prime Minister thanks for your time this morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Okay and I might see you in Adelaide at the Greek Club.
JOURNALIST:
Yeah, right.
PRIME MINISTER:
Okay then.
[ends]