Topics covered: Wayne Swan’s attack on vested interests, new Gillard ministers, next election
LYNDAL CURTIS: We’ll hear first from the treasurer Wayne Swan, and his battle against the billionaires
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CURTIS: Graham Perrett is this nothing more than the Treasurer’s attempt to appeal to the Labor base, some of whom at this stage according to the opinion polls are not going to vote for you at the next election?
GRAHAM PERRETT: Well I think that might be a bit cynical Lyndal, I think Wayne Swan has been talking about this for a long time I think his book Postcodes, which I haven’t read, has laid out some of these concerns a long time ago and certainly when he was the Treasurer charged with implementing a fair return on our resources, and he saw those forces lined up against him and the media power that they wielded, I think it shocked him a little bit and so he has been forced to come out along these lines. Now I’ve also seen the full page ads in the paper today where these, you know, mining media people are saying ‘we are not powerful’ which seems to be a rather specious argument
CURTIS: Scott does the prospect of being in government and having railed against you a few people or companies who have got a lot of money to spend and can change the public debate worry you at all?
SENATOR SCOTT RYAN: Well Lyndal, the biggest interest group in this country is the interest group that owns the Labor Party. I mean Wayne Swan’s thuggish behaviour, first of all in attacking Kevin Rudd in very personal terms and now going after people who provide jobs to tens of thousands of Australians just shows that he doesn’t want to talk about his own particular record. A good government with strong policy and the ability to argue its case doesn’t have any fear from public debate.
CURTIS: So there’s no prospect that a strong government could be knocked off centre? Could have to give in? Could have public opinion swayed by people who have money to spend?
RYAN: I’m a big believer that good arguments and good policies are good politics. What Wayne Swan is complaining about is that people thought that Labor’s botched mining tax was bad for them, bad for their shareholders, bad for employees and bad for the country, he’s just upset that they won the argument.
CURTIS: Graham, isn’t it true that governments in the past have always faced vested interests and that strong governments who are confident of their policy have been able to fight back and have been able to turn public opinion in favour of good policy?
PERRETT: Yes, and I’ll say that in the risk of being obsequious, God bless the ABC because it has always had that role in terms of keeping the other media barons honest and sort of recalibrating the messages. But look it’s been the eternal lament of politicians for the last 100 or so years that the media, the fourth estate isn’t giving them a fair go, and that’s a fair criticism. But you know, when you have media and mining interests conglomerating around one idea because it’s basically, and Scott didn’t mention this in his list of people affected by the mining tax, the bottom line affecting the owners of these companies. That’s really what we are talking about here. Now these minerals belong to all Australians, and they pay a royalty, a royalty because it belongs to the Crown, and the Crown and the government come together. To suggest that they belong to Gina or Clive or Twiggy is ridiculous. The reality is that they are our minerals and we should be getting as much of a benefit from them as possible and giving a fair return to the people who dig them out, but a fair return to all Australians who own the minerals.
CURTIS: Isn’t the problem though that the government with Kevin Rudd as prime minister and Wayne Swan as treasurer botched the first iteration of the mining tax and they brought some of the opprobrium from the miners on themselves?
PERRETT: Well look I’ve had a fair bit to do with the mining industry. I’ve worked in the mining industry here in Queensland, and I know that there is always tension, tension between getting the fair return for the people and also making sure that the companies, and you know most of these multinational companies, well some are multinational companies, making sure the shareholders and the employees get a fair return as well. But look it was an amazingly swift turn around when this proposal was put forward in terms of the an idea that had been around since the 80s. Remember Hawke had already brought this in in terms of offshore petroleum so it wasn’t a radical idea, but when it was applied onshore that’s when the mining companies said “hey we can do something about this, we can buy into media with our money and our influence and change things”. And we saw Tony Abbott get on board quick smart with that idea .
CURTIS: Scott …
RYAN: I just want to address a couple of things Graham said there. That wasn’t the same as the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax that Bob Hawke and Peter Walshintroduced. In fact, Peter Walsh actually said that there is rarely, if any, economic rent in iron ore in his book. This was very different; this was an attempt to bring in sovereign risk and change the rules of the game after investments had been made, and all these companies were doing was quite frankly putting their case before the public. The fact that the government lost that argument does not justify Wayne Swan’s thuggish attacks on them.
CURTIS: Although Scott, hadn’t the mining industry through the minerals council actually argued in its submission to the Ken Henry Tax Review in favour of a national profit based tax?
RYAN: A national profits-based tax is very different to what the RSPT that Wayne Swan announced without even speaking to Colin Barnett as we saw in Andrew Robb’s piece today. That was an attempt to effectively nationalise part of the profits of the mining sector after investments had been made, without the commonwealth bearing any particular risk and that was a massive and profound change to our tax regime done without any consultation.
CURTIS: If we could move on, the Governor General has sworn in most of the new ministry today. Bob Carr will be sworn in as foreign affairs minister after he gets the tick for the Senate spot, Graham Perrett are you hopeful this is the ministry that will take you to the next election?
PERRETT: Very much so, and what a wonderful team we have got there, I’m looking forward to working with Foreign Minister Carr, he has a gravitas and a knowledge and some deep roots into history and the world that are quite awesome, so I’m looking forward to working with him. It’s obviously a great asset to the ministry to have him come in and compliment the team.
CURTIS: Scott will having a ministry that is settled and in place for possibly up to 18 months until the next election begin to make life harder for the opposition if the ministry is settled and focussed on its job?
RYAN: Well that’s a very big assumption, that’s what we heard only a few months ago in December when the Prime Minister botched that particular reshuffle, now we’ve got another reshuffle. The personnel are not necessarily the problem with this government; they are not the only problem. The problem with this government is a lack of honesty and its policy direction. You can put a new salesman out there, but if the product you are selling, particularly when it comes to issues like lie that provided the carbon tax, that’s at the core of the problems of this government. New personnel aren’t going to change that.
CURTIS: Scott do you believe, is there a sneaking suspicion anywhere that the problem is not with the messenger but with the message? Sorry to Graham. Sorry
PERRETT: Look the reality is we do have a great story to tell, we do have a fantastic story to tell. You know if Scott in his heart of hearts looked at the way the Howard government approached pricing carbon, pricing pollution he would know, and he would admit that there was always going to be a fixed price on pollution under the CPRS, the one that the Liberal Party had signed up to support until you know Tony Abbott, well he sort of had a 50/50 split but then he went with well supported himself and ended up wide ending the CPRS and breaking the deal, and we would have had that rolled out before we went to Copenhagen. Now things-
RYAN: Well Graham you tell me …
PERRETT: We had a different parliament. We had a different Parliament after the last election. We respect the view of the Australian people, unlike Tony Abbott’s comments today, we respect the view of the Australian people, the parliament they gave us, and we had to work with that and that’s how we were able to price pollution. And from the first of July all those shrill comments from Scott and the Coalition are going to sound, you know, ridiculous, ridiculous.
RYAN: Well Graham what we …
PERRETT: And I’m looking forward to seeing the look on their faces …
RYAN: What we are seeing as ridiculous is you trying to explain that there is a carbon tax in place despite the explicit words of the Prime Minister, unqualified down the barrel of the camera. You tell me how many leaflets you put out to your constituency at the last election where you said you were going to introduce the carbon tax and I guarantee you that the numbers are zero.
PERRETT: This many Scott, this many… I’m not sure you can see that but it’s a big fat zero. I said we were going to price pollution and that was the deal we had as was the deal with John Howard in 2007 …
RYAN: The Prime Minister said there would be no carbon tax under a government she lead
PERRETT: Sorry Lyndal …
CURTIS: If we could move on because we have probably had this argument once or twice before. Scott, Tony Abbott said at the weekend that he is confident he will be the next Prime Minister, John Howard when he was Prime Minister always used to warn, the Coalition used to warn his colleagues against complacency. Is Tony Abbott being a bit complacent about what is going to happen in 18 months time?
RYAN: Not at all Lyndal, all Tony Abbott was saying was that the people should get to decide who the Prime Minister is, not the faceless men of the Labor Party, not a secret backroom deal. The only people running away from an election at the moment are the Labor Party, the Independents and the Greens.
CURTIS: But isn’t it the case that as in the Labor Party, so in the Liberal Party that it is the party that chooses the leader and people vote for the party?
RYAN: Yes, the Liberal Party has never assassinated a first term prime minister Lyndal. The Liberal Party does not do backroom deals like that. Tony just made the point that it is up to the people to choose at an election and Labor are the ones running away from that.
PERRETT: Ask, ask Patrick Secker that Scott.
CURTIS: Graham, the Coalition, if you agree with the comments of Tony Abbott is very confident that they are going to win the next election, how hard is the fight going to be over the next 18 months?
PERRETT: Well I think it’s a bit premature to put the champagne on ice 18 months out. I think there is a lot of work to be done, and you know for Scott and his gang to be sitting around with their tape measures, measuring the drapes in The Lodge.
RYAN: No one is saying that Graham …
PERRETT: It’s very premature, very premature. Well sorry I thought it was reported yesterday that Tony Abbott has already declared himself to be the next elected Prime Minister of Australia.
RYAN: No he hasn’t, not at all.
PERRETT: Well sorry it must be an inaccurate quote in the paper then, I’m sorry. Now the reality is, we have a long way to go in terms of going to the next election and we are racing to the next election, but it is bound by time that is the normal electoral cycle. Now the reality is, Tony Abbott, sure he has been you know it’s been the longest dummy spit in history I think that basically saying “We need an election, we need an election, we need an election”. The reality is the Australian people delivered us the parliament we have, it’s been a very effective parliament, already delivered more legislation than under John Howard in the previous parliament before, so we are getting on with the job, we are doing incredibly tough things, we have to consult a lot more, we have to do a lot more work but that has never been anything that people in the Labor Party are scared of. So to put that champagne on ice and say “let’s put our feet up and wait for the next election”, I think it’s a bit foolhardy, and very proud and presumptuous of the Coalition.
RYAN: You can stop the confected outrage Graham, the point Tony was making was that the Australian people should get to choose who the Prime Minister is, not the factional chiefs in the Labor Party.
CURTIS: Scott, Tony Abbott says that he thinks he will be the next elected prime Minister of Australia, if he thinks that now should he be more proactive in putting policies and costings out?
RYAN: We’ve got policies out there, Tony has got a strong paid parental leave policy, and we’ve lead the debate on mental health for years. The only point Tony was making was that it is not up to the unelected factional chiefs of the Labor Party to choose who the prime minister is and it is the Labor Party is running scared.
CURTIS: And …
PERRETT: Scott, that’s rubbish, there was an election in 2010 where I had Julia Gillard’s corflute in every yard and alongside mine. So to suggest that she was not an elected Prime Minister is an insult to the people of Australia. Now there is nothing confected about this Scott, that is an insult to the people of Australia.
CURTIS: Sorry gentlemen that is where we will have to leave it. Graham Perrett, Scott Ryan thank you very much for your time
RYAN: Thank you Lyndal and thanks Graham
PERRETT: Thanks Lyndal, thanks Scott