PM: We've seen so many good people come out today to honour this bloke's life, Chris O'Brien. Extraordinary man, extraordinary life story, but also an extraordinary inspiration to all Australians who have had to deal with a cancer diagnosis. He's an inspiration to us all, I've met him many times now, and we've had many yacks over the years. Good man, great future, big contribution.
On the policy of it, what Chris talks about in terms of comprehensive cancer centres is really important for Australians to get a hold of, and here I talk about all health systems in the country. How do you best bring together research and clinical trials and treatment of patients in an integrated facility and centre, because each of those disciplines helps to bring breakthroughs to the other. Now that's what he's on about, and you know something? He's right. So, we've put some money behind the one which he proposes here in Sydney, I think it's a model for the future. As I said in my remarks before, we'll be doing more. One other thing, then happy to take a question or two, then I've got to zip.
The global financial crisis is affecting all economies around the world. Part of the challenge we face is to make sure the world summons the political will to bring about a common set of regulations for financial markets for the future. Wayne Swan, the Treasurer is in Washington now for a meeting of the International Monetary Fund and for a meeting which has just been called of the G20 finance ministers. The G20 represents some 85 per cent of the world's banking system.
Confidence needs to be restored across global financial markets. Part of that means ensuring there's liquidity in those markets. That requires unprecedented international cooperation. The other part of the confidence equation is to ensure that we've got commonly agreed, consistent rules for financial markets as well. That's why, the G20 is so important, that's why Australia will be putting forward concrete proposals to the meeting of G20 finance ministers, consistent with the proposals I put to the United Nations General Assembly a week or two ago in New York. Over to you folks.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: We're in to a negotiation with the states, and it's going to be tough and hard. We want to get good outcomes for schools, good outcomes for education, good outcomes for health and hospitals, and guess what, there'll be a lot of argy bargy on the way through, there normally is.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: Well, the Government's committed to long term reform of the pension after 12 years of neglect. To reform the pension long term takes a lot of money and we're determined to deliver that by the time of the next Budget because pensioners are hurting.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: Argy bargy doesn't mean the end of cooperation, argy bargy is argy bargy. I presume you have a bit of argy bargy in your news rooms from time to time. Oh, I'm sorry, that never happens. It's just life you know.
JOURNALIST: In light of the financial crisis, what guarantees can you give the Australian public that their bank deposits will be protected? Is the Government going to move (inaudible)?
PM: My answer to this is very simple. First of all, the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority, APRA, advises the Government that our banks' balance sheets are in good condition. We are different to banks around the world, our banks are in a strong position. First and foremost, everyone needs to understand that point.
The second is this: for a long time, Australia has had a depositors-first scheme, whereby if any bank ever got in to trouble at any time, depositors have first recourse.
And the third element is this, and that is, quite some months ago, before this crisis burst onto the newspaper front pages of the world, the Government prudently put forward a proposal for a new financial claims scheme. That's been the subject of discussion between the finance community and the Treasury, and once that's concluded, very soon we'll be introducing legislation for a new financial claims scheme on top of that.