MARTIN:
Prime Minister, thanks for your time.
PRIME MINISTER:
Hi Ray.
MARTIN:
Now, is this a misunderstanding or is somebody lying?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I dispute what he said. He didn't tell me on that night that everybody in Defence no longer believed that children had been thrown overboard. He did tell me that he'd looked at the video. And he said that the video itself did not support the argument that children had been thrown overboard nor did it disprove it - he said it was inconclusive. That's what we talked about, that was my sole purpose in ringing him. I had no other reason to ring him because....
MARTIN:
...the one conversation, he says three.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I say two, he says three, that's immaterial. I rang him because he'd been asked by his Minister to look at the video - that's the only reason I did so. And after being told that the video was inconclusive and went neither way, certainly not supporting the proposition that kids were thrown overboard I authorised the release of the video and the following night every news bulletin in Australia said that the video had under cut the Government's arguments. Now, that's hardly the behaviour by me of somebody who's trying to cover up.
MARTIN:
Do you feel at the moment that you're being accused of lying?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, I'm rejecting what he's saying, of course...
MARTIN:
Why is he saying it?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well look I don't know, people have all sorts of reasons and I'm not getting into any personal denigration. I do know however that he did make a statement to the original administrative inquiry only a few weeks after these events and he didn't raise any of these matters then and he left the public service eight months ago and he didn't say anything about it then.
MARTIN:
You know he's saying now that his conscience got to him, plus the fact of that Iraq letter by the 43 former senior public servants have been dismissed and ridiculed by your Government and that's the reason he's come out?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that's for him and that's his call. I'm not going to try and enter his mind. I can only react to what he's said and I did not set out to misled the Australian people on this issue and the other point I'd make is that this all happened three years ago. Now, truth is always important, whenever it's in dispute, whether it's three years ago or 10 years or...
MARTIN:
There's no time limit on the truth.
PRIME MINISTER:
Of course not. But the real reason the Labor Party is pursuing this issue is they can't get over the fact that they lost the last election; they didn't lose the last election on children overboard, if border protection was an issue in the last election, and it was, they lost the election because they were seen as weak on border protection and because we stopped the Tampa and stopped illegal immigration coming to this country. That was the issue on border protection that determined the outcome of the election, not children overboard.
MARTIN:
But Prime Minister, it would seem still that this man who's been a senior public servant, he's got most to lose out of this, I mean he knows he's going to be vilified, he knows he's going to be attacked.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well Ray I'm not vilifying him, I'm disagreeing with him. I'm not attacking him, I'm disputing his version of our conversation.
MARTIN:
And there's a second public servant today who's comes out and confirms his version.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, hang on, hang on, she wasn't present at the conversation...
MARTIN:
She got a phone call the next day.
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes, but that's not, she wasn't there and in any event what she said confirmed what had previously been on the public record, namely that he told me that the video was inconclusive, it did not contain evidence that children had been thrown overboard. She did not, as I read it, explicitly confirm his claim that he told me that everybody in the Defence Department no longer believed that children had been thrown overboard. Now that's the central claim...
MARTIN:
The photos, he hadn't told you about the photos...
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no, we talked about the video, that was the purpose and the central argument he's put, which I dispute very strongly, is that he told me that people, everybody in Defence no longer accepted that children had been thrown overboard. Now I'm not, I mean to put this video out knowing that it was not going to support the earlier claim is hardly the behaviour of somebody who's trying to cover something up, quite the reverse.
MARTIN:
Given the fact that he worked for Peter Reith at the time as a senior public servant, he didn't persuade you to qualify your comment about it? You still went ahead a month later and said that they'd been thrown overboard?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, hang on, hang on, I only had one conversation with him. I had a conversation with him, well two conversations on the one occasion, on the 7th of November, and it was about the video. And the reason I spoke to him, the sole reason, was that Peter Reith told me he had sent him to Sydney to have a look at the video on Peter's behalf and to brief me on the results of that discussion.
MARTIN:
He said it was inconclusive but you didn't, that didn't affect your opinion?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well inconclusive? I then go and put it out. Now I mean if, I mean some people might have said well if it was inconclusive why put it out? I put it out because I didn't want to be accused of sitting on a video that might be seen as inconclusive. That's hardly the behaviour of somebody who's trying to cover up.
MARTIN:
Prime Minister, there's a new poll today that finds three-quarters of Australian voters believe that they were misled by your Government on the war in Iraq...
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes, yes.
MARTIN:
... but half of them say that you misled them deliberately.
PRIME MINISTER:
No...
MARTIN:
53 per cent...
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no, no, well, but then you throw in the people who don't think they were misled, something like 26-27 per cent as I read it are saying that I deliberately misled them, the rest think it was either inadvertent or that I didn't.
MARTIN:
So 47 per cent don't believe that you misled them?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, let's not confuse it. 47 per cent say it was inadvertent, quite a number don't think they were misled and, about as I understand it, 26-27 per cent think I did it deliberately.
MARTIN:
Do you think that this is going to be major issue in the election? Whether in fact the Prime Minister tells the Australian people the truth?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I do tell them the truth. But I will always be judged by my masters, the voters, and your viewers will decide my fate, they are the great lie detector of Australian politics.
MARTIN:
You're not going to take a lie detector test?
PRIME MINISTER:
They are my lie detector, they will decide my fate and nobody else and that is right in a great democracy.
MARTIN:
Can I ask you, are you getting any sleep at the moment, like the rest of us?
PRIME MINISTER:
Not a lot, I can't claim I've got up every morning but I think it has been a fantastic start for Australia. I was out in Gunnedah today and of course the excitement out there for their local girl, Sara Carrigan, who did so very well, it's tremendous. I met two of her grandparents, her two brothers and a large part of her extended family and it's this enthusiasm for the Olympics in these provincial, rural area which is so fantastic,
MARTIN:
Yeah, well get some sleep. Thanks for your time, very much indeed.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you.
[ends]