RAY HADLEY:
The Prime Minister Tony Abbott joins me from Canberra. Prime Minister, good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
‘Morning, Ray.
RAY HADLEY:
Now this is troubling for all of us in many, many ways and, obviously, you’re a resident of New South Wales, as is your family and so let’s deal with those issues first, not as Prime Minister, but as a resident of New South Wales. It appears to me that we have a monumental problem with bail laws in this country, as they’ve had previously in Victoria, and it appears to me that the equivalent to you, our government – the Coalition Government in New South Wales – has stuffed this up for a second time.
PRIME MINISTER:
Ray, look, I think there’s a number of things that we need to do at the moment. Obviously, we’re still in shock and in mourning for the victims, particularly Katrina Dawson and Tori Johnson. We are full of admiration for the professionalism of the New South Wales Police, but obviously, there are lessons that need to be learned from this. That’s why Premier Baird and myself have commissioned this joint inquiry. I want it to be thorough but I also want it to be swift, because we do have, tragically, people in our midst – not many, but some – who would do us harm and it’s important that we have the best possible procedures in place for dealing with them. The commitment that I’ve given repeatedly to the Australian people is that you will be kept safe by this Government. The highest priority of this Government is your safety and we will do everything we humanly can to make that happen.
Now, we can’t monitor everyone all the time. That’s impossible and wrong in a free society, but where there is significant evidence that people are capable and willing to do us harm, well then we need to have them under proper supervision.
RAY HADLEY:
As a citizen of New South Wales as opposed to Prime Minister, were you stunned when you read about this man’s activities, including charges of accessory before and after the fact of murder, 40 indecent sexual assault charges that resulted in him continuing bail and the fact that his wife is also accused of the murder of his former wife and she remains on bail until this very day?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, like just about everyone else from the Premier down, I was incredulous and exasperated at this. This guy has a long history of violence, he has a long history of mental instability, he has a long criminal record and an obvious infatuation with extremism, so it was extraordinary that he was on our streets, not apparently on any watch list, at least since about 2009. This is all extraordinary and that’s why it’s important that we get to the bottom of who knew what and when and how it was all handled, not because we can ever get all these things absolutely perfectly right, but because we need to learn the right lessons from every incident of this nature and I’m determined to do so.
RAY HADLEY:
Now federally – and you can talk as Prime Minister – his arrival in ’96 cuts across Keating, Howard, Rudd, Gillard and now you’re in the chair, so it goes across successive governments. There are reports today that he was a wanted man in Iran. Somehow he came here, he sought refuge, he was given it, he was then given either citizenship or permanent residency and he hasn’t got off his backside since 1996 until the day he died to actually strike a blow and get a job and yet we continue to fund him. You’ve got Kevin Andrews at the moment looking at over 800,000 people on the Disability Support Pension. 140,000 of them we know are under the age of 35. How many other people that arrived here in the last 20 years have sat on their – if you’ll pardon the expression – their arses and not done one day’s work?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, this is a fair question. The vast majority of migrants to this country work very hard and they join Team Australia – no doubt about that. There are a small minority who appear to be out to game the system. There are people who are born and bred Aussies who are out to game the system as well and anyone who is gaming the system should have the book thrown at them and that’s what this Government is determined to do. It’s at one level really annoying and infuriating that people who would do us harm turn out to have been on social security. I guess at another level, though, many of these people are mentally unbalanced and I suppose you can half understand why they might gravitate towards the Disability Support Pension or something like that. The important thing is to ensure that no one is on the Disability Support Pension who ought not be and that’s why a recent, very important reform announced by this Government just a week or so back is that you won’t be able to get on the Disability Support Pension in the future without having been seen, not by your own doctor, who inevitably I think is a little conflicted, but by a government doctor who will be as rigorous and as objective as possible before saying, “Ok, you’re on the disability pension.”
RAY HADLEY:
With this joint review, who looks at legal aid? I mean, I get petitioned by listeners all the time because their friend’s in strife, he’s got no money and needs legal aid. This bloke went to the High Court with eminent silk beside him and now we find out today funded by legal aid. What nincompoop made that decision? Is it one of your nincompoops or one of Mike Baird’s nincompoops?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well that, Ray, is again another thing that we will try to get to the bottom of. We have any number of cases going through the courts which appear to be, one way or another, publicly funded cases and it’s almost like taxpayers are funding attacks on taxpayers and this is not right. Obviously, people are entitled to go to the law, but why they are entitled to go to the law with taxpayer funding when they are essentially attacking public policy, when they are essentially attacking the policy of the elected government, I think is something which again exasperates and sometimes infuriates the public and, frankly, it exasperates and sometimes infuriates me.
RAY HADLEY:
Well he had senior counsel in Guy Reynolds. I mean, if I were defending myself in a matter and I wanted Guy Reynolds…
PRIME MINISTER:
It would be $5,000 a day I’d think, out of your pocket.
RAY HADLEY:
… I was going to say try $10,000 a day. He might do you a favour if he knew you or he knew your uncle or your brother or something, but it would be $10K a day. So he’s down there at the High Court and he’s doing exactly what he’s entitled to – apply his trade – he’s got the shingle out the front, but we’re paying for it. People are insulted by that. They were even insulted before what happened at 2:11 on Tuesday morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
And look, Ray, we are a decent and a fair and a compassionate society and these services exist to help people in trouble who might otherwise not be able to get justice. But like so many good things, it can be taken too far and my worry is that sometimes there does appear to be a mindset which sees criminals as victims. Now, sometimes they are – sometimes they are – but there would be very, very few criminals who aren’t largely responsible for the predicament in which they find themselves and our sympathy has always got to be with the victims of crimes, not the perpetrators.
RAY HADLEY:
As the Prime Minister – and I go back to the fact that I’m a resident of this state, you’re a resident of New South Wales where this atrocity occurred – are you troubled or perplexed sometimes by the workings of the judiciary, of decisions of courts?
PRIME MINISTER:
The short answer, Ray, is yes and I guess the obvious case before us today is our terrorist from earlier in the week who was out on bail – inexplicably out on bail for…
RAY HADLEY:
Yeah, but I make the point Prime Minister…
PRIME MINISTER:
… a succession of horrific crimes.
RAY HADLEY:
Well I’m not going to blame the magistrate in this one; I’m going to blame your party. I’m going to blame your Liberal Coalition. Barry O’Farrell came to power, swept to power here on a vast majority, and the first thing that Greg Smith did after an approach by the Law Reform Commission – you know, the squeakiest wheel gets the most oil – said, “Oh, we better do something about bail laws” and everyone said, “You beauty, we’re going to toughen them.” They weakened them and I get petitioned and I’ve been talking about this since March as you probably know…
PRIME MINISTER:
I know, look, I know…
RAY HADLEY:
... and police officers spoke to me and said, “Ray, this is terrible, this is an accident waiting to happen.” Prime Minister, the accident occurred on Tuesday morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Yeah, and Ray, look, a bad, bad business and one of the first things that Mike Baird did when he became Premier, one of the first things Brad Hazzard did when he became Attorney-General, was look again at this and my understanding – I don’t claim to be an expert of New South Wales bail laws – but my understanding is that if this guy had been before the bench under the new rules as opposed to the old rules, he would never have got bail.
RAY HADLEY:
Well I can tell you, I’m not an expert either, but I’ve become one and I’ll tell you what I know about them without going into legalese: they’re crook, they’re really crook.
PRIME MINISTER:
And this has been a horrific wake-up call. And yes, the tragedy is that this has happened. I mean, this was an atrocity, it may well have been a preventable atrocity, and that’s why this swift and thorough review is so important. But, it seems that Mike Baird and Brad Hazzard between them had already acted to address the issue that you have rightly been highlighting for some months now. It’s very sad; it is just unspeakably awful that these changes occurred too late for the victims of this monster.
RAY HADLEY:
Back to you, I saw the media conference recently where… we talked about report cards yesterday, what the teacher’s said and, you know, there is a template for reporting. It appeared to me you gave yourself somewhere between a C and a D for the last couple of months. Are you hopeful of starting 2015 with a B+?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Ray, I try to avoid scoring myself because…
RAY HADLEY:
Well, let me give a…
PRIME MINISTER:
…if I score myself high people think I am full of myself, if I score myself low people think I am lacking in self-confidence and I know there are about 23 million judges out there and I will leave each of them to make their own judgment. You give us your judgment Ray and I will do my best to respond.
RAY HADLEY:
I thought, till about a month ago, you were going B+. I think you are now a D– and one of the reasons I say that, and I have the utmost respect for your authority and your position, I thought it was a really bad call to continue with that mid-year review by Joe Hockey on the day of the siege. I just think it could have been put off till the next day. I know you said we need to go on but we had, at that time we didn’t know how many, we had 17 people in there whose lives were at risk and I just think Joe Hockey sitting in a corner talking on another platform not to the mainstream media about something that could have waited till today or tomorrow or next Monday was a really poor call by you. I am sorry.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Ray, look, you’re entitled to that, I carefully considered it and I made the call that the ordinary business of Government should go on and this was something that was widely anticipated, much expected and important. So, I made the call. Some people thought it was a good call. Obviously, some people didn’t and you are in that latter group. Look, it was a ragged conclusion to the year – as I have said before. There was a bit of ill-discipline in the ranks and I always regret that but what I hope people will focus on is not the glass half empty but the glass at least half full because; the carbon tax is gone, the mining tax is gone, the boats have effectively stopped, the very important three free trade deals have been done, the Korean free trade deal is already in operation, the NBN is finally happening with realistic budgets and timetables, we have got the Green Army rolling out, we have got the new Colombo Plan scholars fanning out across our region. I think it has been a year of achievement for our country. I am so pleased, Ray, that every household is $550 a year better off because the carbon tax is gone and I am so pleased that hundreds of people aren’t dying at sea because the boats have been stopped. Now, we still have a huge job of budget repair and, yes, maybe our communications could have been more effective; maybe at times when we were preparing the Budget we should have been also communicating the strategy as well. I am happy to accept that various things could have been done better but my message to the Australian people is that we inherited a mess, we have made a good start, there is a lot more to be done, a hell of a lot more to be done but we are on the right track and getting on the right track really starts with getting the Budget back under control because that is the key to a stronger economy. In the medium term our economy won’t continue to be strong if we don’t get the Budget back under control because confidence is at the heart of a strong economy and confidence comes from knowing that there is a government with a plan and that is exactly what we are.
RAY HADLEY:
If I can just say something to you in relation to the polls and other things at the moment, obviously, I get a lot of emails, a lot of phone calls from people who were part of the movement that carried your Government to victory – in the Lower House particularly. Now, they are not all that happy with you or the Party at the moment it would appear to me. One of the reasons they are really angry about things is because the alternative is very unpalatable to them. They don’t want Bill Shorten to be the Prime Minister, they don’t want you to be a one-term Prime Minister – they want you to be there to complete the job and that is why. It is a bit like, you know, you love your kids and sometime they are naughty and, you know, you still love them but you think, “well hang on a sec you have to start pulling your socks up.” That’s what the people think of you and your Government. They gave you their mandate and now all of a sudden, they are thinking “oh God not Shorten, please, please.” That’s why they are a bit angry with you because they think that maybe he might be the answer and if he is the answer I don’t want to be asking the question.
PRIME MINISTER:
Ray, I think you have pretty well described the situation. A lot of people who are willing the Government to succeed get a little frustrated when they think that maybe it is not succeeding because they understand that there is no alternative to this Government because this is the only government which is serious about a strong economy. This is the only government that is serious about reining in government spending and getting unnecessary, bloated and over the top government under control. So, in a sense it is our fans in the stands looking at what they think is the scoreboard and thinking, “gee whiz the team ought to be in front and it is not, isn’t this a pity.” My job, my job is not so much to be worrying about the scoreboard/the opinion polls – my job is every day to be getting on with our plan and as we have said from the very beginning it is to build a strong and prosperous economy for a safe and secure Australia and a strong economy starts with a Budget under better control. Now, I know there has been all sorts of complaints, including from our supporters, over elements of the Budget but every single element of that Budget is designed not just to save money, important though that is, but to make our economy and our society stronger in the long run. For instance, the higher education reforms are designed to make our great universities stronger and indeed to help all those people who don’t go near university but also want post-school qualifications. Our health reforms – the co-payment – it’s a microeconomic reform. It’s about injecting a little bit more responsibility into the system. The pension changes which I hasten to say are not cuts, just a change to the indexation which starts after the next election – not now – again, that’s designed to make the system more sustainable for the long term because at the moment, Ray, there are about five workers for every retired person. Going the way we have been going in 2050 there’ll be just three workers for every retired person. So, we do have to tackle this. The changes to social security, particularly for younger people, are designed to encourage a have a go mindset designed to say to people you can’t leave school and go on the dole.
Now, every single one of these is imminently justifiable and sure we’re prepared to negotiate in the Senate. We understand that we have to do that and we’ve done a fair bit of negotiation over the higher education reforms and we’ve now got a revised Medicare package, which I think is a better package than the one we brought forward on Budget night. And I guess my appeal to people is: try to ignore the critical chatter and look as objectively as you can at what this Government is trying to do and ask yourself what is the alternative. Because believe me, Ray, I am absolutely convinced in my deepest heart this is the right path forward for Australia. This is what’s necessary to keep our society a fair and a free and a prosperous society. The alternative within a relatively short space of time would be the kind of predicament that so many European countries find themselves in now.
RAY HADLEY:
Just one or two final things. Do you regret raising sexism in your defence of your Chief of Staff, Peta Credlin?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, I thought it was a fair call at the time.
RAY HADLEY:
Which makes me think you don’t think it’s a fair call now.
PRIME MINISTER:
It’s sort of yesterday’s issue now, Ray.
RAY HADLEY:
I know that, but it was most unlike you. That’s all I’d say. It looked to me like you were a bit cranky and you said something you probably shouldn’t have said. And if you thought about it you probably should have said, ‘look this woman is a very capable woman and I’ll defend her to the hill because she’s a very capable woman’.
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, I stand by my team. Whether it’s the Ministerial team, whether it’s the Parliamentary team, whether it’s the office team, I stand by my team. And I take full responsibility for everything that goes on. I mean, I take responsibility for what my Cabinet Ministers do, I take responsibility for what my Parliamentary colleagues do, I take responsibility for my office, and I don’t say that every single thing that every last person does is absolutely always perfect. We are all human, Ray. But this is a good team and it is working night and day, might and main, for the betterment of every Australian and that’s my duty, that’s what I was elected to do, that’s what we were all elected to do and that is what we will spend our lives – we will spend our lives – trying to achieve.
RAY HADLEY:
See, I’m a bit old fashioned. People ring up and give it to me or I get it in social media and I cop it, but you see I get really cranky if one of the young ladies I work with here or my PA Sophie cops a hammering from someone. And I get much crankier about that than I do about myself and what I saw with Peta Credlin was a bit of old fashion chivalry. That’s what I saw and you shouldn’t apologise for that. I mean, it might be old fashioned but if someone gives it to a woman as opposed to giving it to one of the blokes, if you’re old fashioned, you get your back up a bit and that looked to me what you did.
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, Ray, I’m not going to sort of revisit the controversies of last week – I’m looking forward not back. But, look, thanks for those observations and my determination is to be a better Prime Minister with a better Government and a more effective Parliament next year than this year. I think so much that’s good for people has been achieved this year. The important thing is to do better next year and better the year after that because it doesn’t matter how good you are, you’re always obliged to strive to be better in the future than you have been in the past.
RAY HADLEY:
One final thing – a very perceptive listener says to me from Ingleburn in South Western Sydney, it’s interesting that the judiciary would fine Craig Thomson $10,000 less than the NRL fined Paul Gallen for an alcohol fuelled rant on social media. And I think it’s a pretty good point – one gets a $35,000 fine, one gets a $25,000.
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, you can understand people’s bewilderment and perplexity at these things and look, I respect the judiciary, I really do respect the judiciary and maybe if I was sitting on the bench listening to everything I would make exactly the same decision. But I do often think that a little bit more real world involvement would be beneficial for some of these people.
RAY HADLEY:
I think you’re right. Now, I hope you have a very holy and happy Christmas, along with your wife Margie and your three daughters and the extended family and I hope that you come back full of beans for 2015. There’s no doubt you will.
PRIME MINISTER:
That’s the plan, Ray. And the same to you and yours and look forward to talking to you early in the New Year.
RAY HADLEY:
Thank you, Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thanks so much.
[ends]