Topics: Coalition Government’s first 100 days in office.
E&OE
Justin Smith:
…it has been 100 days of the Tony Abbott Government and we’ve been collecting one word to sum it all up, let’s see if we can do it with this fellow. Senator for Victoria Scott Ryan is on the line, Senator good morning.
Scott Ryan:
Good morning Justin.
Smith:
I’ve collected a couple here for you if you don’t mind. We’ve got unchallenged, we’ve have amazing, cringing, spin, fantastic and honest, all words to try and sum up the government. How would you sum it up?
Ryan:
Well, I like the guy who said ‘honest’ and that you gave him the ham. It’s not one word but I’ll go with ‘hardworking’.
Smith:
Okay, alright. So tell me why?
Ryan:
Well, the transition into government is always difficult Justin and we were left with a number of big issues we had to deal with quickly. We have the situation in my own portfolio where Labor stripped over a billion dollars out of education, so students in some parts of the country weren’t getting the national funding deal that Labor had claimed in other parts., And tomorrow we’re going to see from Treasurer Joe Hockey the true state of the books after Labor’s five years in office.
Smith:
We will get to the state of the books in a moment because we’re talking a fair whack of cash here. Supporters of both sides of politics are very keen on blaming the previous government; it does wear thin after a while. I think you’ve got about a year of that, are we going to expect more of that in the next 12 months, pointing back to Labor?
Ryan:
Well, the Prime Minister said yesterday and he reaffirmed again today that tomorrow’s midyear update is really Labor’s last budget. We have turned our mind into bringing the budget back to balance and Labor has actually been voting against some of the measures that they promised to introduce to improve the budget, as well as the measures we promised to introduce. And they blocked even a vote in the Senate on the repeal of the carbon tax and the mining tax, which is a tax that costs the budget money, that doesn’t actually collect any money. We are making clear that tomorrow is Labor’s last budget. Every year that Labor was in office we were seeing spending blow-out after spending blow-out. Every six months Wayne Swan would come out and say, “I’m sorry’” and make some other excuse. So tomorrow we’re drawing a line under it and saying that’s Labor’s last report card and we are continuing our work to do what is one of the most important things a government can do, which is live within its means.
Smith:
I know that this isn’t your portfolio but what’s the real bad news in all of this and what’s it probably going to mean to us?
Ryan:
Well what it means is we know we are already paying just under $10 billion per year in interest payments. Now imagine what that would do for our health and education systems, and that’s just interest payments for the money Labor borrowed to build school halls and put insulation in people roofs. I’m not privy to the midyear budget update tomorrow Justin, the Treasurer will announce it. And from that point forward we’ve got the Commission of Audit next year and we’ve got our budget next may. We’ve made it the highest priority of this government, to make the government live within its means. It’s not fair that our kids are going to be paying back debt that we’ve accrued in our generation.
Smith:
I agree with you. You mentioned a figure there of $10 billion of interest that we are paying, if you had that $10 billion extra what would you do with it? Where would you stick it? You mentioned health and education, specifically what would you do?
Ryan:
Well, Justin it took the Howard government nearly 10 years to actually pay back the debt that Keating had accrued just in the last few years of office, so I don’t want to kid people that this is going to be easy. This is actually going to take time, we are looking at deficits left by Labor in the order of $40 billion as being reported by the media, which is what was delivered over the last few years of Labor, and you don’t turn those around quickly.
Smith:
Yeah but what would you do with it, with the $10 billion?
Ryan:
I’ll be honest Justin I haven’t turned my mind to it. I tend to think that personally, and as the previous Coalition Government has done, we want to cut taxes to leave more money in people’s pockets.
Smith:
Alright thank you, you had a few more than one word but that’s just fine but no ham for you.
Ryan:
Merry Christmas.
Smith:
Senator if I don’t speak to you before Christmas have a lovely time.
Ryan:
Thank you.
(Ends)