Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea
PM: I am delighted to be here in Papua New Guinea. I've arrived this afternoon and I will be here today until the day after. I am very pleased to be here.
Papua New Guinea is Australia's closest neighbour and of course we are long term friends.
The bond between our two countries was forged during the dark days of World War II and over the 70 years since, our friendship has grown to today's comprehensive relationship between our two countries.
I'm here on this visit as Prime Minister to discuss the next chapter in our relationship with PNG.
Papua New Guinea is modernising, it's changing, you can see it all around you.
And that means it is a good time for me to be here talking about the future of this relationship.
When we look at the modern relationship between our two countries it spans across an economic relationship which is growing in strength. There are now more than $16 billion of Australian investment right here in PNG.
Our relationship spreads to our Defence cooperation. And one of the things that I will be doing on this visit is working through and signing a Defence cooperation arrangement between our two countries.
Our relationship spans people to people links.
The education links that we have and of course the partnership we have here for development in PNG.
The centrepiece of the visit that I will have here will be my meetings tomorrow with Prime Minister O'Neill and senior members of his Cabinet.
I have met Prime Minister O'Neill on a number of occasions and I look forward to seeing him again to talk about the relationship between our two countries.
Tomorrow I will too have the opportunity to visit the LNG project; a symbol of the growing economic strength of PNG and collaboration with Australia. This is Australian investment at work.
It is work through our export finance corporation and of course we are also working with PNG on designing a Sovereign Wealth Fund for the proceeds from this major resources investment and this very important time of economic development here in PNG.
I will have the opportunity to see too some of the work that our development monies are doing. I will be able to visit a school and we are big contributors to school education here in PNG. I will have the opportunity to go to a market where through our work for women and their empowerment we want to see more women being able to bring their produce to the market.
I am looking forward too, to speaking to the Chamber of Commerce.
On the final day that I am here, on Saturday, I will pay my respects and the respects of the Australian nation at the war cemetery, thinking about the history that binds us together. But here on this visit I will be very much focused on a new chapter in our relationship and the future of the relationship between our two countries.
That future also means that we work together on regional issues. This is a bilateral relationship but one where we take our partnership out into the region.
I will be discussing with the Prime Minister issues such as people smuggling, where we are cooperating to combat people smuggling, and work in our region including Fiji returning to democracy.
So it is a broad agenda. I am very much looking forward to it. And I am happy to take your questions now.
JOURNALIST: Peter O'Neill has asked that the construction of the permanent centre on Manus Island be speeded up. And be completed earlier. Can you offer him anything in this regard?
PM: Well we are moving to construction of the permanent centre. So construction will be starting later this year. Starting in July. We do want to see a permanent facility on Manus Island too. So we are on the same page.
JOURNALIST: Ms Gillard, any chance of the ECP being renewed?
PM: Well one of the things that I will be talking to Prime Minister O'Neill about is Police Cooperation. We have had that Police Cooperation in the past under the enhanced program that you refer to and we will be talking about police cooperation for the future.
So I am not in a position to detail all of what will happen in those discussions today.
But it is certainly an item on our agenda and we know that it is very valued here in PNG to see a strengthening of police capacity.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, what about the conditions on Manus Island? Some doctors have said that it's no place for women and children to stay.
PM: Well my perspective is that in line with the things that have been recommended to us by the review undertaken by Angus Houston and other experts, are that we do need to have offshore processing.
We do need to make sure the conditions are appropriate. The Minister for Immigration has visited Manus Island. Our High Commissioner has visited Manus Island. We do invest in the circumstances there in making services available for people and we will continue to do so.
JOURNALIST: Excuse me PM, do you have any plans to visit Manus Island yourself?
PM: No I do not.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister would it be appropriate for you to visit Manus Island seeing as some Immigration Officials, people within that department, have raised some serious concerns (unclear unclear) to look at new information as it comes, is that something that would be useful to look at and see at with you own eyes?
PM: I of course can get information about what is happening on Manus Island and I do reiterate our Minister for Immigration was there in February and our High Commissioner has visited more recently than that.
The purpose of my visit here is a broader one. It is about the full breadth of the bilateral relationship between us and Papua New Guinea.
JOURNALIST: Do you see Manus Island playing a role in regional approaches to people smuggling that you mentioned and when it is made permanent should it be expanded?
PM: The role we see for it at the moment is the one that is happening now and a permanent facility will be built which is dealing with flows that come to Australia. That is its purpose.
JOURNALIST: Regarding the Defence Cooperation agreement that was signed. What practical difference will that make and are there any other declarations to be signed?
PM: We will be in a position to detail all of that for you. I will be signing a declaration about the relationship between Australia and PNG. A relationship about a new chapter, a new phase.
A declaration that really recognises that PNG is modernising, it's changing, and that we want to work together as partners.
JOURNALIST: Could you tell us any more about the defence agreement with PNG?
PM: We will be dealing with it tomorrow and so will be happy to talk to you about that tomorrow.
JOURNALIST: Do you want to make it easier for PNG nationals to travel to Australia and commute? Could you explain how that will work?
PM: Well yes we do or course want to see people able to travel and not hit unnecessary obstacles.
So we do have an online visa arrangement for PNG and we are moving to arrangements that are less burdensome in terms of the paper work for people who engage in multiple entries into Australia.
We do not have a visa on arrival system for anyone, even New Zealand, despite the long term bonds between our two countries, the Anzac tradition. We do not operate visa on arrival systems.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister have you had a chance to cast your eye over Tony Abbott's Industrial Relations Policy?
PM: The Minister for Workplace Relations has been dealing with that back in Australia so I will leave it predominantly to him.
I spent more than a year of my life working to get rid of the hated WorkChoices and to replace it with the FairWork System and so it stands to reason I will do everything in my power to make sure that we never see WorkChoices come back.
JOURNALIST: Are you hopeful that your visit here will provide something of an inspiration for the women of this country?
PM: You would need to be out and about talking to women in PNG about that. What I think, and I think this from my own experience in Australia as well as some of the things I have got to do as I have travelled representing Australia around the world, that it is important for women to see women's faces in leadership.
It is important for women to believe that it is possible for them, or a women in their country, to become a leader. That really is one way of reinforcing a sense of equal opportunity in society.
One of the things about me being the first women Prime Minister of Australia is I do think that there are women and girls who have looked and thought, well maybe that is something that I could do and the very image of a women doing a job has reinforced that in them.
So if that has any broader effect then I am delighted about it.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, you have spoken about the modernisation here. Do you think that could eventually take us to the level where Australian aid to this Nation is reduced?
PM: Well this is our second biggest aid program; our biggest aid program is to Indonesia.
So it is a substantial investment from Australia doing a lot of good work in areas like health and education and in infrastructure. And there is a lot to do when we look at modern PNG.
Even though it is growing and changing there is still work to do to realise the Millennium Development Goals and to give the people of PNG appropriate health care and access to opportunity through education.
But as PNG modernises and grows, well our aid component, is 7 per cent of the budget available to PNG, so overwhelmingly the budget available to PNG does not come from Australian aid it comes from their own sources, and of course there are some other countries that are aid donors but not at the level that we are.
JOURNALIST: So you don't see aid reduced, then?
PM: Well I think as PNG becomes stronger and more prosperous that it will have more of its own resources to devote to the task of lifting people up.
That is of course appropriate. That is the journey of development. That is what we want to see happen. Countries develop and strengthen and use that new prosperity to ensure that all of their people are lifted up and get an opportunity in life.
I think Australian aid will be required here for quite some time to come. When we look at the indicators against the Millennium Development Goals there is much work to do. But PNG is growing in its own capacity to do that work.
JOURNALIST: What about this upcoming Budget? Will you be assuring the Prime Minister tomorrow that the aid to PNG won't be affected by budget savings?
PM: Well look we will do our budget matters when we are in Australia not in PNG.
JOURNALIST: How close is an announcement to being made about a permanent facility for the Manus Island site?
PM: We will move to building a permanent facility. There is no doubt about that.
JOURNALIST: Has the site been (inaudible)?
PM: We will be moving to building a permanent facility on Manus Island; we indicated that at the time we constructed the temporary facility so that will be happening. We will be looking to moving to the construction phase from July this year.
JOURNALIST: Has the PNG Government signed off on that?
PM: Well, I do want to thank Prime Minister O'Neill for his leadership and support on this centre on Manus Island.
He has been a strong supporter and we will work alongside him to get this done. But because he has been a strong supporter and it has always been part of our plan to have a permanent facility.
Apart from the usual pressures that come with doing construction work I do not see any problems with getting it done.
JOURNALIST: The Coalition's industrial relations policy, do think it is a considerable easing from Work Choices? And are you interested in the timing of the announcement today given the time you flew out?
PM: I have nothing to say on timing of questions. You will have to ask the Opposition about that. On the Opposition‘s outlook here.
It is not that long ago that the leader of the Opposition was out telling Australians that Work Choices was good for wages, good for the economy, good for everyone and that that needed to be remembered.
Well presumably when he spoke those words he was saying what he felt in his heart and his mind. That Work Choices was wholly good.
Well if he believes that, if he believed it then, I think he believes it now and whatever is said by the Opposition, that their drive, if they are ever the government will be to reintroduce a policy they passionately believe in, and that is Work Choices.
Thank you very much.