PM: Well it has been another busy day here in London. We have, in the last period of time, met with the President of Indonesia, the Russian President Mr Medvedev, and also with the new Prime Minister of Thailand.
And I have just come from Buckingham palace where I had the privilege of an audience with the Queen and lunch with the Queen and the Prime Minister of Canada.
In London, we are right now in the process of forging a global strategy for global economic recovery. This process is hard. This process is difficult, this process must be done, because the global economic strategy we are in the business of forging here in London, ultimately shapes the future of jobs around the world, including jobs in Australia.
At this summit, at this summit here in London, we may have Presidents and Prime Ministers around the summit table but what they do effects jobs for plumbers, for printers and police officers right around the world, including Australia.
The discussions in this summit begin today but the action happens tomorrow. And that action is critical to the future of jobs around the world. What sort of action are we contemplating taking? First, we are implementing coordinated fiscal and monetary policy action around the world to support jobs.
And again I emphasise the numbers, that that addition to global economic growth, off the back of that level of stimulus, has helped support nearly 20 million more jobs around the world.
Second, action together on toxic assets, the core of the economic problem and the re-capitalisation of the world's biggest banks.
Thirdly, action on the IMF to deal with emerging problems in central and eastern Europe and right across the world, so that they don't become problems for the whole pace of global economic recovery and jobs.
Action on new rules for the financial system for the future. And of course, what we need further is action to govern the way in which the global financial system operates for the long term. If we do that, and prevent a further outbreak of protectionism, you can begin to map a pattern, a trajectory, for long term global economic recovery.
And that is fundamentally important. National actions in Australia, necessary for what we can do to support economic growth and jobs at home. International action, equally necessary, in fact, essential to support the future of economic growth and jobs back home.
I have said before in the United States and elsewhere, that this global economic crisis has been like a fire. And therefore, what we must do is stop the house from burning down, that is about stimulus. What we must do is prevent the fire from spreading, that is stopping protectionism. What we must do is begin to rebuild the house and that is acting on toxic assets in banks and recapitalising those banks.
And what we have got to do is have rules for the future which make it less likely that we have this sort of damaging fire in the global economy again.
Just before taking your questions if I could add on an entirely different note, our congratulations to the Socceroos who I understand have won 2-0 over Uzbekistan in Sydney.
Great outcome for the Socceroos, I am reliably informed by the soccer nuts in my office, that this puts us within a hairs breadth of qualifying for the next World Cup, all the best to the Socceroos, well done.
Australia is proud of you. You did fantastically at the last World Cup, we look forward to a similar Australian performance next time around.
JOURNALIST: Mr Rudd, are you going to get another summit before you come out of this meeting?
PM: Michelle, I think what we see with the Governments assembled is an emerging consensus that there is going to be another lot of work to do, and therefore it would not surprise me that we end up with a further summit of the G20 and that there would be a further summit of the G20, later this year or early next year.
That is I think a rational course of action, but government's still continue to work that through.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister can you say with any level of assurance that 24 hours out from the communiqué that that communiqué will contain more than just motherhood statements or statements of intent, will there be anything concrete this time tomorrow?
PM: Let me, I referred before to five areas of work. Let me just drill in on one of them which is absolutely essential. If we don't agree on new resources for the international monetary fund, new resources, and if we don't agree on more flexible ways for the IMF to operate in the future, then the consequences for big problems in the global economy later this year, will not be dealt with and they will become problems for all of us, including back home in Australia.
So to go to your question, increasing significantly, the resources of the International Monetary Fund, to act in those economies which may otherwise go under and their financial systems as a result of the global financial crisis, is real progress, not just for the world, but frankly, if it is not dealt with, it ricochets back into Australia through the global financial system.
JOURNALIST: And just on that institutional (inaudible) the Japanese put a hundred million into the line of credit into the IMF, are you asking for new resources that (inaudible) will we be tapped for more money?
PM: Australia, as under previous Governments, will always do its bit, will always act according to its fair share. That is the right principle. Whether it is under our Government, the previous Liberal Government or back into the decades since the foundation of the IMF back in 1944, that has always been the case.
I think the other thing to bear in mind is that after the last Asian Financial Crisis, Treasurer Costello was out there, legitimately providing some billions of dollars worth of lines of credit for a number of developing economies within our region.
But Australia will play its part, we will do our fair share and the finality of the overall arrangements for the IMF are still being worked through.
JOURNALIST: Will it be more or less (inaudible)?
SWAN: Not until we see the outcome (inaudible)
JOURNALIST: In 24 hours time will you be able to stand here and say, Australia is going to contribute X amount in loans to the IMF?
PM: We will know in a day or so time what the total funding commitment is for the IMF, it will then depend on which of the individual instruments within the IMF, we as Australia will contribute to. And that in turn will shape our overall allocation.
It is complex stuff but they are about several different instruments within the IMF which have different contribution formulas associated with them.
But I go back to the principle: we have always played our part, we have always been up there, contributing our fair share. It has happened in the past, we will do so in the future.
JOURNALIST: Mr Rudd can you give as a, your latest and fairest assessment of -
PM: I will give you my latest assessment.
JOURNALIST: the alleged, or the apparent, or the real discord between France and Germany and the rest of the world on tomorrow's outcomes, because what they are saying publicly and what Obama is saying and what you have said previously don't seem to add up.
Are they just playing to a domestic audience? Political audience?
PM: I am always reluctant to contribute to unnecessary discord prior to a major international conference such as this. But let me say that from time to time, governments do what they have got to do in various parts of the world. The key thing is what governments do together here in London.
And that is where the rubber hits the road. Here, what is agreed in this place, what is agreed in this city. We are at an important point in history right now and I think in the discussions I have had with global heads of government, including the Russian President this morning, there is an acute sense, of what failed in this city, once before, the London conference of 1933, you have heard me speak of this in recent speeches.
And there is an acute sense of the challenges we face are now acute and requiring leaders where necessary, to step beyond their national briefs to agree on a overall international strategy for the global economy.
Because for the first time, all leaders around this table, I believe are seized of one thing. What each of us do nationally, helps reduce the impact of this global recession on local jobs, but it is only through coordinated global action that there is a way in which you can actually bring about a global economic recovery.
JOURNALIST: But can you explain the apparent difference between what you and Obama and Gordon Brown are saying and the posturing for want of a better word, of Sarkozy, what is going on?
PM: Well there are different senses of constraints in different countries. And if you are referring in particular to debates about fiscal stimulus, that goes in part to perceptions in certain parts of Europe in particular about where they stand, and their capacity to act further.
These things change over time depending on the sense of need for the future and the sense of what is necessary right here and now. That is why as I have said to you before, it is important for us as all governments gathered here in London to be attentive to what the International Monetary Fund says to us for the future as well.
We know what the IMF has said for 2009, we know what so far they have said for 2010, but 2010 is three quarters away. So the key thing is to be, continue to be responsive to advice from the IMF about what further stimulus, for example, may be necessary for 2010.
But I just know this, at the end of the day, this London Summit is about global action on jobs. Global action on jobs around the world and global action on jobs therefore in Australia. That is why we are here, that is why the Treasurer and I are here.
That is where the rubber ultimately hits the road. What further jobs can we create through stimulus? What jobs can we protect through appropriate actions around the world, and what pathways to recovery in private credit flows to underpin small businesses in the future, can we achieve.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister what did you talk to The Queen about?
PM: You know, as well as I do, that that is a question well worth asking and one which the response is a universal one from Prime Ministers of Australia, going back to Ming and beyond, conversations between the Prime Minister of Australia and Her Majesty the Queen, remain confidential.
It was a very good conversation. If I could say one thing about Her Majesty the Queen. She remains deeply concerned about the recovery efforts in the Victorian bushfires and she has been generally at pains to make it plain that her concern and other members of the royal family is acute, on how families and communities are recovering in Victoria.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister on the eve of the summit, are you more optimistic that pessimistic?
PM: I am born as an optimist and that is, that it is easy to tell everyone what is going wrong, it is much harder to tell people what is going right and how you fix those things which need fixing. I am in the fixing business. I am in the problem solving business. I am in the, how do we turn something bad into something good, how do we take what we have got and make it better.
That is why we are here and that is why Australia will always be a positive voice at conferences like this, because we believe problems have to be wrestled to the ground, dealt with, and a solution shaped.
JOURNALIST: If the communiqué's vague on the stimulus issue as is likely we won't know whether you have really taken any concrete steps to solve the problem.
PM: Well Michelle, let me answer it in these terms, back in November at the Washington summit there was a commitment to undertake fiscal stimulus as was necessary to support growth for the future. It didn't specify numbers, it just said we should take fiscal stimulus as necessary to support jobs for the future and we should be mindful, as I recall it, of what the international agencies have to say on this and that includes the IMF.
Guess what, we were. And we've taken that action. Trillions of dollars into the economy based on reportage also from the IMF. Also, certain governments back then for various reasons said they doubted whether stimulus was necessary. Certain of those governments since then have taken a lot of stimulus, a lot of stimulus.
Rolling the clock forward to what's necessary for 2010, the sensible thing to do is this: reaffirm the impact on jobs of stimulus already taken and make it plain to the people of the world that this sort of action translates into jobs on the ground as it is in Australia.
Secondly commit to future action as is necessary to fill the growth gap left by the retreat of the private economy. And thirdly and I think intelligently, be mindful of what the IMF will say in the period ahead, about what we need for 2010.
JOURNALIST: Mr Rudd can I ask you about the protest that flared today around the Bank of England, they smashed the windows of the Bank of Scotland. Can you understand why these people have so much angst about G20?
PM: When it comes to acts of violence, these are as unacceptable on the streets of London as they would be on the streets of Sydney or the streets of Melbourne. I have no truck with acts of violence.
People have a legitimate right to protest, I understand that. People around the world are concerned about the impact of the crisis which they did not cause, and its impact on their families and their communities through the loss of jobs, I understand that. That does not provide any justification whatsoever for acts of wanton violence in London or any other city of the world.
JOURNALIST: Treasurer, are you planning a further stimulus package in the budget?
TREASURER: I don't speculate on the contents of the budget Matthew, I don't speculate about it at all.
JOURNALIST: Well logic says your actions here at the finance ministers meeting and again here at the summit is all about stimulus, well surely there's going to be a stimulus package in the budget.
TREASURER: Well Malcolm, I would draw your attention to OECD report that's come out in the last 24 hours which points to the fact that Australia has implemented, a very significant stimulus package or stimulus packages.
First of all last October and again in February. And that report points to the effectiveness of economic stimulus that we have delivered, first of all through payments to support demand and importantly through direct investments - in schools, housing and so on.
So this government has been ahead of the game and put in place very effective stimulus and we've done it earlier than many other governments in the world. But as we've said repeatedly we will see what's occurring in the global economy and if further action is necessary then it will be on the table. But these are matters to be considered in the Budget context and as I just said to Matthew I don't speculate about that.
JOURNALIST: What then are the benchmarks that you have for whether the last stimulus has been a success and what you will have to do next?
TREASURER: Well I think we've seen a fair bit of evidence of how important economic stimulus has been in Australia. Look at what has occurred with retail sales, look at retail employment. Compare that to what is happening elsewhere in the world. I mean we are much stronger in that area than just about any other developed country.
Look what is happening in the housing market. Look at the OECD forecasts for '09. These things all demonstrate that Australia is in a much stronger position than many other developed countries and one of the reasons for that, highlighted in the OECD report, has been the concrete action and steps taken by this Government, since last October.
PM: Let me just add one, let me add one point, and that is, on this debate about retail sales, retail trade back home. Retail trade in Australia remains 2.3 per cent higher than in November 2008.
This compares with falls in retail trade in so many other parts of the world. Japan, retail trade was 2.1 per cent below it's November level, US 1.4 per cent below, New Zealand 1.8 per cent lower, Canada 3.3 per cent lower.
And Wayne just made the point before about employment in the retail sector, employment in the retail sector rose by more than 16,000 over the three months to February.
There are two fairly significant bits of data. So you are going to have, I presume some people sort of having a go at the February numbers, can I say, compared against what is going on elsewhere in the world and looking at this huge challenge to jobs around the world, the fact that we can generate growth in employment in the retail sector along the lines of those numbers, I think speaks for itself.
And I conclude on this, because we have got something else we have got to do, is, and it goes back to thinking about success or failure on this overall summit and success or failure if you like in other policy settings. You can either sit around and do nothing, as some recommend back in Australia, or you can act and have a go, and we have done that and there are some runs of the board. But let me tell you, there is a long way to go, a long long way to go.
And similarly internationally you can sit back, moan and criticise, and there is going to be a whole lot of people who do that tomorrow as well, about how much more could have been done here there and everywhere, or you can get in and have a go globally, as global leaders are now doing and make a difference.
None of these are perfect solutions to a global recession, but let me tell you, they are much better than doing nothing and they are much better than the alternative, which is simply to throw people into the unemployment queues, without any support from Government nationally and internationally.