PM Transcripts

Transcripts from the Prime Ministers of Australia

Howard, John

Period of Service: 11/03/1996 - 03/12/2007
Release Date:
09/10/2001
Release Type:
Interview
Transcript ID:
12120
Released by:
  • Howard, John Winston
Interview with Jon Faine, Radio 3LO, Melbourne

9 October 2001

E&OE……………………………………………………………………………………

FAINE:

The Prime Minister John Howard joins me on the election trail, good morning to you Mr Howard.

PRIME MINISTER:

Good morning Jon.

FAINE:

Thank you for joining us. What news is there of the current state of play with the military activity in Afghanistan.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well largely what you’ve heard on the ABC news this morning, if people have been listening to radio news at quarter to eight and most of AM there were further attacks overnight. Clearly there is an intention through those attacks to try and disable communications and other installations and also to strike at some of the known terrorist spots. It’s likely to go on for some time. It’s very tightly targeted which is to be welcomed. Just how long it will go on I don’t know and perhaps the Americans don’t know either. Of course it depends a great deal on the assessment that’s made after these attacks are carried out as to how long it goes on.

FAINE:

Have you had any further briefings from the Americans since you were…

PRIME MINISTER:

No our defence people have keep in touch with the Pentagon but essentially what they’ve got is what has been you know put on public display. There obviously will be in the course of the next little while, there will be some material perhaps that will made available which can’t be publicly disclosed for obvious reasons.

FAINE:

I’m surprised to hear that we’re not being told any more than we get from CNN or the BBC or even the ABC. Are we not given, if we’ve been asked to commit troops, are we not been given any extra information?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well the point is that the information that is available to us is the sort of information as I understand it as present that can be made publicly available. That’s the point I was just making a moment ago, there will some information that will be given to us in the course of the next little while that can’t be made publicly available. The point I’m making is that according to my advice what is available is being made publicly available. That’s my point.

FAINE:

When do you expect to be called upon to commit Australian troops to the fray?

PRIME MINISTER:

That I don’t know. I spoke to Vice President Cheney about that yesterday morning and he said he thought it would be a further down the track. I asked him that. These things can change, it depends a great deal on the assessment they make of the success of the raids that are being carried out to date. I mean I don’t pretend to be a military strategist but I do understand that if you have a campaign that is initially designed to soften up targets, initially designed to dismantle communications, dismantle any air capacity to hit particular targets. Now depending upon the success of those attacks it will the use of other military forces be governed. I mean if they’re very successful first up then that will bring forward the point of which for example you might use ground troops. If they’re not so successful or they take a longer period of time that would put it back. But as of now we have not received a request but that could change within the space of 24 hours or even less.

FAINE:

So you’ve got up to 1,000 Australian troops, 150 soldiers and other additional Military personnel including refuelling flights and the rest on standby waiting to be deployed at any moment but the Americans haven’t told you what’s happened for how long now? 36 hours.

PRIME MINISTER:

No that’s not correct. I didn’t say that. What I said is that material that is available to us is material that has been made available publicly, that’s the point I’m making. It’s not they haven’t told us it’s just that they haven’t told us when they will want our forces. At the moment our forces, let me put it this way so there’s no misunderstanding. At the moment our forces are not wanted, at the moment. They are available. There have been offers of forces by Canada, they’re not involved at present but there have been offers of forces from the French, they’re not as I understand it being used at present. That’s the way a military operation goes. There are a lot of American ground forces that are in readiness but they are not being used at the present time.

FAINE:

Is it just a gesture that we’re saying that we’ll these troops available but really as respected defence analyst Des Ball says yesterday it’s really a political gesture….

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I don’t accept that….

FAINE:

..rather than a military necessity.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I don’t accept that, if it were just a political gesture there would not have been over the past two or three weeks detailed discussions in Washington, at the Pentagon, involving the Chief of the Australian Defence Force and the leadership of the American Military if it had just been a political gesture. They wouldn’t have wasted their time at a difficult period such as this talking to our people. So it is not just a political gesture, certainly the public statement of support for the American position is important but it has gone a step further than that and that has been acknowledged by President Bush when he made his statement yesterday. He acknowledged the contribution of the British and the commitment made by Canada, Australia, France and Germany.

FAINE:

Twenty three minutes to nine, Prime Minister, Mr Beazley says that in caretaker mode, which you now are you are obligated to consult him before committing Australian troops.
Will you do so?

PRIME MINISTER:

I will talk to him before any deployment, yes, I have said that. I would have done that even if we weren’t in a caretaker mode.

FAINE:

Will you talk to him to tell him that you are about to do it or will you consult him….

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I will do what you normally do in a caretaker situation such as this. See if I get a request I will indicate to him about deployment and bear in mind that the deployment of Australian forces would be in accordance with a policy decision already announced by the government. It is not a new policy decision to deploy Australian forces. The only thing that would be new about it would be the timing and Mr Beazley has said he strongly supports the deployment of Australian forces. I am not entering into a new commitment but look Jon, let’s not make a big issue of this, I want Australian forces to feel if and when they go overseas, to know that they go over in the name of the whole country and not in the name of one or other side of politics. That was the attitude I took in relation to the use of Australian forces in East Timor. I was meticulous about involving Mr Beazley in visiting the forces before they went overseas and I will do exactly the same in relation to this. I am not interested in any kind of partisan wedge in relation to the deployment of Australian forces overseas. That is not my game on this, this is too serious, too important, too relevant to Australia’s long term national interest for me to do that and I reject completely any suggestion that I have tried to do that.

FAINE:

Prime Minister, Australians of the Muslim faith are being asked to support the anti Taliban action even whilst Osamu Bin Laden is calling all Muslims around the world to support what he says is his cause. I was quite impressed and even moved when I saw President George W. Bush go to visit a Mosque in Washington and almost embrace the leaders of the American Muslim community. Have you done the same?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I have made quite a number of statements and I expect to visit a Mosque in the course of the next week.

FAINE:

Where would you be doing that?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well somewhere in Australia, I would rather not say at the moment.

FAINE:

It’s a gesture that has great significance…

PRIME MINISTER:

Yeah, I know and I’m not the least bit reluctant to make it.

FAINE:

Because we are being asked to choose, Muslim Australians in particular, and all of us are being asked to distinguish between good Islam and bad Islam.

PRIME MINISTER:

No I think we are being asked to, I would not dignify the terrorist behaviour of Bin Laden and his organisation with the description, I think to even use the expression implies any kind of association with Islam is wrong. There is nothing about the Islamic faith as I understand it that could possibly justify that kind of behaviour and the whole point of what I have been saying is that this is people of good will, whatever their faith or indeed of no faith around the world versus people of evil intent, that is the point I am making.

FAINE:

So we can look forward to that, that is terrific. Asylum seekers if we can move to that topic. The HMAS Adelaide has now picked up 187 people who would seem to have sabotaged even, or scuttled their own Indonesian fishing boat off Christmas Island’s waters. Where are they going to go to?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I hope to say something about that in the next 24 or 48 hours. At the moment they are on the Adelaide, they won’t be able to stay there for a long period of time.

FAINE:

What choices are available?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well there are a number of choices available, they are not coming to the Australian mainland that is one choice that is not available and the behaviour of a number of these people, particularly those involving throwing their children overboard. I mean I can’t imagine how a genuine refugee would ever do that. A refugee flees persecution or flees a country more than anything else in the name of the future of his or her children and anybody who would endanger the lives of their children in that kind of way, I find it hard to accept. I certainly don’t want people of that type in Australia, I really don’t, and the Navy has behaved impeccably. I want to thank the Commander of HMAS Adelaide and the sailors on board. It wouldn’t have been easy. As I am told now there have been no casualties, there has been no loss of life. I hope that continues to be the case.

FAINE:

Difficult seas too I understand, operationally.

PRIME MINISTER:

They are very difficult seas and these young men and women are being subjected to the most appalling provocation and I want to thank them on behalf of the Australian people for what they have done and the Navy generally, it is a very difficult, delicate situation and we are handling it in very pressing circumstances to the best of our ability.

FAINE:

But given all of that you still have despite your new laws and despite your stated intention to the world at large and particularly those people in Indonesia trying to come here, you still have boat after boat heading towards Australia with hundreds of asylum seekers. Where are they going to go?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well whether it is boat after boat with hundreds…

FAINE:

Well 187 here, and a couple of hundred the other day

PRIME MINISTER:   

Well it is something you have to judge over a period of time.

FAINE:

Where are they going to go?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well thus far we have made arrangements and we have a number of options in front of us at present. I am not in a position to say which one is going to be picked up.

FAINE:

Well Nauru is full as we understand it.

PRIME MINISTER:

We have a number of options in front of us. I am not in a position to say which one is going to be picked up. When I am in a position to do that I will make a statement and in the mean time I simply make the point that the evidence available to us, intelligence and other reports suggest that what we have done has had an impact on the people smugglers.

FAINE:

But it hasn’t stopped the flow of people, you can’t legislate against desperation…

PRIME MINISTER:

We never said that it would immediately stop any further attempts being made. What I have said and I repeat is that the action we have taken will over time act as a very powerful deterrent and the intelligence reports that we have received suggest very strongly that that has been the case.

FAINE:

The Melbourne Anglican Synod is calling on the Federal Government to convene a Royal Commission into its treatment of asylum seekers and the entire refugee intake policy. Is there any merit in that?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well with great respect to the Anglican Synod, no there is not a case like that. I would ask the Anglican Synod to recognise the difficulties faced by the Government. I would ask the Anglican Synod to remember that this country has a very generous refugee policy. I heard one of the spokesmen on early morning ABC Radio this morning talking of a. or expressing the hope that Australia would once again be seen as a compassionate country. Now I have to reject that very strongly. This country remains very compassionate towards refugees but we are determined that we are going to preserve the integrity of that refugee policy and we cannot allow a situation to arise where people choose, and not Australians choose, who comes to this country. That is essentially the mantra of many people that it is for others to decide whether they come to Australia not for us to decide. Now with the greatest of respect to the Anglican Synod and with the greatest of respect to other people who maybe critical of what the Government has done that is not a position that we can accept.

FAINE:

A quarter to nine. The Victorian Premier flies out today for Singapore to make a last ditch effort to persuade the Singaporean Business Community to make a bid for what’s left of Ansett Airlines. Do you support his mission?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I would delighted to see Singapore invest in Ansett. In fact we have been in favour that for sometime. I heard him on the radio this morning suggest that Singapore Airlines had been treated roughly by the Federal Government. I mean I know we are in an election campaign but I would remind the Victorian Premier that when you go overseas you don’t bag your own crowd and we’re a crowd together overseas and I don’t think that is very smart talk. Our position had been that we liked the idea of some involvement of Singapore Airlines in Ansett, we in fact have been criticised by Federal Labor for sort of putting that point of view but look I hope that Ansett, that out of the grounding of the old Ansett something viable emerges. Now largely because of Federal Government action there are some Ansett planes back in the air. I mean remember if it hadn’t have been for us none of those planes would be back in the air. They are not back as a result of any injection of money from the ACTU that has something to say about this every day. They’re not back as a result of, they are back as a result of action taken by the Federal Government and particularly in relation to the guarantee we gave on the tickets and the insurance guarantee we gave and also our guarantee in relation to workers’ entitlements.

FAINE:

If the Federal Government was prepared to offer the same support to Ansett’s Administrators of guaranteeing public servants to fly on Ansett flights en routes when they are available. Wouldn’t that not be a good thing to do? To match the Victorian Government.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well there are a number of contracts that we have and my understanding in relation to that is that the government has certain contracts which were entered into on a competitive basis when you had two airlines flying and there are some constraints under pain of being sued that would be involved if we didn’t adhere to those contracts. But I certainly have encouraged my parliamentary colleagues where they can to use Ansett aircraft. For security reasons I am meant to fly on a Falcon but if that weren’t the constraint I’d certainly be seeking to use Ansett and can I say before I became Prime Minister for a period of twenty or more years as a Member of Parliament my first preference was always Ansett and I found it a terrific airline to fly and I found all the employees very friendly and very efficient and I feel for them. I know a lot of them very well and I hope that a number of them can gain re-employment in a revived albeit slimmed down different version of Ansett.

FAINE:

Your Tourism Minister, Jackie Kelly yesterday announced a $20 million rescue package for the tourism industry. Tourism Taskforce Chief Executive Christopher Brown said it would not save a single job.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I don’t agree with that, I don’t, and that is a very negative response and it is not a very helpful intelligent response at a time of difficulty for the industry.

FAINE:

But if he is right it is a correct response.

PRIME MINISTER:

No he is not right and let me tell you why he is not right, 15 or 16 of that $20 million is to compensate, as I understand it, tour operators who had honoured Ansett packages and haven’t been paid. Well self evidently if you get compensated on that basis your cash flow will be better and you will be able to keep staff you’ve currently got. So on the most fundamental of all principles Mr Brown is wrong.

FAINE:

The economy is contracting everyday the newspaper tells us more bad news. Today we learn that Optus are laying off 300 staff, the car industry is preparing for its worst quarter in recent years. Coles Myer news yesterday sent the market into a spin. Qantas are laying off staff now as well as the Ansett 16 000 only a fraction…

PRIME MINISTER:

Qantas are not laying off staff. What I heard Mr Dixon say this morning, once again on ABC Radio, I heard him say that the reduction would be achieved by natural attrition so…

FAINE:

They are reducing their workforce. Are you happy with that?

PRIME MINISTER:

No well that is different, when you say lay off staff the implication is that people are being sacked or made redundant so I mean I happened to hear him reported as having said that so we have to keep these things very accurate.

FAINE:

The economic news is universally gloomy and the economy is clearly heading into, as you have already said and Peter Costello has confirmed yesterday, a very difficult time. Why is it that we are not talking more about the economy and what are your initiatives then to do something to rescue it and create jobs.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I am always happy to talk about the economy when I am asked about it. Always. As I will now. It is true that the Australian economy due overwhelmingly to external factors is going into a difficult period and I haven’t tried to hide that. What I say to the Australian people is that because of the way that we have managed the economy over the last five and half years we are better able to weather that difficult period and see it through than would otherwise have been the case if we had not kept inflation low, interest rates low, got rid of the Budget deficit, repaid $58 Billion of Labor’s $96 billion of Government debt. If we had not done all of those things then our capacity to handle and absorb and keep on top although not being unaffected by the externally induced economic downturn our capacity to do that would have been a great deal less. I can’t say to the Australian people that the Australian economy will remain unaffected by these external circumstances, it won’t. But I can say to the Australian people with utmost confidence that because of what we have done we are better able to withstand it and because what we have done over the last five and half years we have better credentials for handling that difficult period than does the Labor Party. That’s what I say to the Australian people with the utmost confidence.

FAINE:

When you talk about economic credentials. Yes there were periods of time, in particular achieving success with tax reform that have done nothing but proved your economic credentials but then the two edged sword shows there has been massive job loss, restructuring of the Australian job economy all those…

PRIME MINISTER:

When you say massive, I mean since I have been Prime Minister…

FAINE:

.. full time jobs…

PRIME MINISTER:

…we have added almost 900 000, 900 000 jobs to the Australian workforce…

FAINE:

..part-time and casual, Prime Minister.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well if you are seeking to draw a distinction between part and full time there are…

FAINE:

You have to..

PRIME MINISTER:

Well, yes but in the process of doing it you have to recognise that the definition of a part time job is now is fewer than 35 hours a week which is a different definition than used to be the case. And in any event the trend in society is towards a greater use of part time jobs and not only for economic reasons. Many women with children prefer part time work to full time work, they seek part time work as being the ideal compromise between being totally out of the workforce looking after young children or being totally within the workforce so it is not necessarily a bad thing. It is a rather dated notion built around the time when the only bread winners were men, or the great bulk of them were men that unless you have 100% full time jobs then there is something wrong. I think that you have got to recognise that there are societal trends so can I just go back to my main point and that is that nobody can accuse us of having presided over job reductions when we have added 900 000 almost and the rate of unemployment now is in the order of what 6.8%, it was 8.5% when I became Prime Minister. It had averaged 8.7% under Labor and it had hit a peak of 10.9% when Mr Beazley was Employment Minister.

FAINE:

Next figure’s coming out on Thursday it is expected that they will be worse.

PRIME MINISTER:

Look, Jon, I don’t know they, I really don’t know.

FAINE:

OK, Self funded retirees of course are the losers with interest rates going down even though homebuyers are winning. What can you do to make life easier for people trying to live off lower returns on the stock exchange and lower interest rates at the bank?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I would refer to you and any self funded retirees who are listening, and I am sure there are many to what we did in the May budget and the overwhelming reason why I was determined that self funded retirees would get a good deal in the May Budget was the very point you have made. That they have been the losers out of interest rate falls and I was very conscious of that, that’s why we extended the Commonwealth Seniors’ Card, its why we extended tax concessions, its why we introduced a number of other measures to help self funded retirees and I said at the time and Peter Costello said at the time “when interest rates fall it is great news for home buyers and small business and farmers not so flash for self funded retirees” and that’s why we introduced those changes.

FAINE:

Five minutes to nine. Prime Minister, Kim Beazley says you are a coward because you refuse to have more than one debate with him and you are having it, he says, way too early.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I will decline to sort of return the fire in relation to those sort of cheap personal jibes. I don’t think it does anything for the dignity of the campaign for Mr Beazley to use that kind of language. But we had one debate last year, I have been a far more accountable Prime Minister than either Mr Hawke or Mr Keating. I have answered more questions in Parliament as Prime Minister. The Parliament that was dissolved yesterday sat for more days than any parliament since the Chifley Prime Ministership of 1946-1949. I turn up every day in Parliament as Prime Minister. Mr Keating deigned to grace us with his presence for two days a week

FAINE:

Well that was Mr Keating…

PRIME MINISTER:

Yeah I know, I know but I mean, well Mr Beazley was his leader of the House, Mr Beazley went along with all of that. I simply make the point that there are plenty of opportunities for Mr Beazley to put his case to the Australian people.

FAINE:

He is right though isn’t he that having the debate this early in the campaign, you haven’t released a single policy yet, I know it is only a couple of days…

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I have been releasing policies for five and half years.

FAINE:

Well in this campaign of the things that make the points of difference between you and the Labor Party by the time you come to the only debate, we may know next to nothing about what it is that is supposed to be the subject.

PRIME MINISTER:

Jon can I make a point to you very strongly that people judge a government and alternative government not just one what they say and do in the five weeks of an election campaign. They judge them in part on that but they judge them overwhelmingly on how they have behaved and deported themselves over five and half years and if Mr Beazley thinks that he has a problem about defining himself to the Australian people in the next four and half weeks then that is his problem and not mine. He’s been opposition leader and alternative Prime Minister for as long as I have been Prime Minister and if he now feels that he has got a difficulty letting the Australian people know what he stands for then I can only say that that is his fault, it is not mine or anybody else’s. The problem is that Mr Beazley played the negative game.

FAINE:

Yes.

PRIME MINISTER:

He thought that he would want to surf into power off back of public discontent with our necessary reforms in the interest of the Australian people, that was always a cynical, negative approach which short changed the Australian people and if he is now sort of seeking more airplay and so forth because he hasn’t used his five and half years to define himself well, I can only say that’s his fault. I mean I am available, I mean I come regularly onto your programme, I answer all questions. I am a regular appearer on the media. I am very happy to be cross-examined. I repeat I was more accountable in the Parliament than either Mr Hawke or Mr Keating and we are having a debate as we did last time and I think that is perfectly appropriate.

FAINE:

Two and half minutes to nine. A few quick things, former Liberal Premier Jeff Kennett is offering to campaign either with you or for you. Is that a threat or a promise?

PRIME MINISTER:

Look I am happy to receive any support, people….Jeff and I may have had our differences in the past but we had quite a pleasant chat on the phone the other day so I was pleased to hear from him. He did great things for Victoria, I think he was a very good Premier of this state.

FAINE:

And Peter Costello yesterday was saying that he is only prepared to continue delivering budgets for so long and you said I understand that you would not leave the Parliament even if you lost the election.

PRIME MINISTER:

No what I said was that if we won the election I’d remain the Member for Bennelong. Look my position….

FAINE:

There is nothing more ex than an ex-Prime Minister

PRIME MINISTER:

Well Jon, well who said I was going to be an ex.

FAINE:

All right well we will take that one on notice.

PRIME MINISTER:

You’re just making assumptions, I am fascinated can I say that Mr Beazley’s main preoccupation in this election campaign so far is that I may not be around forever. I am flattered by that.

FAINE:

There is evidently several hundred protesting building workers outside the ABC Studios here Prime Minister waiting to tell you what they think of your Building Royal Commission that is about to commence. Are you concerned about that?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well people have a right to put their point of view in a lawful fashion, and providing it is done lawfully and done without violence to other citizens then I respect their right to do that. It won’t change the Government’s attitude, it won’t change the Government’s attitude at all.

FAINE:

The Building Royal Commission is going ahead and starting I think tomorrow.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well that is a matter for the Royal Commissioner when it starts. I wouldn’t tell him when it ought to start but so far as the Government is concerned it is going ahead.

FAINE:

And it is a marathon not a sprint Prime Minister thank you for joining us at the start of an election campaign. I look forward to speaking to you on other occasions between now and the tenth of November.

PRIME MINISTER:

I hope so.

FAINE:

And of course we will be spending time with the Opposition leader Kim Beazley, we spoke to his office this morning and expect that he will be able to join us one day next week in the studio when he also is campaigning in Melbourne. Prime Minister thank you for your time.

PRIME MINISTER:

Thank you

FAINE:

And good luck, the Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard

(ends)

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