Topics: the Budget, Local Government, PPL and Patton
Laura Jayes:
Hello and welcome to Lunchtime Agenda, I’m Laura Jayes. In just a few hours’ time here in Parliament the Treasurer will hand down his sixth and possibility his final budget. It’s the last roll of the dice, four months out from an election and he’ll lay out a ten year plan for two key signature policy areas, National Disability Insurance Scheme and the Gonski school reforms.
(Clip: Wayne Swan)
Laura Jayes:
It’s a plan that will go beyond the four year estimates plan. The Treasurer Wayne Swan says it will provide certainty, but it’s also one that plans or aims to wedge the Opposition, and Joe Hockey has accused Wayne Swan of playing politics on Budget day.
(Clip: Joe Hockey)
Laura Jayes:
Those numbers will be revealed very shortly and one that everyone will be focussing on is the level of that deficit. It’s tipped to go well into the red, the double digit billions but in every budget there’s always winners and losers. We have seen announcements variously leaked over the last few weeks and this is what we know so far, the winners of course are those measures attached to the NDIS and the Gonski school reforms. We know there will also be $3 billion in infrastructure spending, $1.5 billion for Defence over the next four years to pay for the new “growler technology”. I guess you could say there’s a small win there for those on Newstart allowance, with changes to recipients of the dole being allowed to earn another $38 a fortnight. But the losers, Julia Gillard has warned that this will be a tough Budget that will go across the board, families and business will be hit. Families on Tax Benefit A, we know, at the moment will no longer get a promised three to six hundred dollar boost. An extra $1.60 per week in tax relief linked to Carbon Tax compensation will no longer go ahead in 2015. There’s an extra $900 million in savings due to changes to the superannuation and universities will be taking a significant hit with $2.3 billion worth of cuts to universities. There’s plenty to get through and joining me on the panel of politicians today is Labor MP Graham Perrett, newly elected caucus deputy whip , and of course Liberal Senator and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Scott Ryan. Now, first to you Graham Perrett this is a 10 year $100 billion plan. Is it about locking in the NDIS and Gonski school reforms to win some kind of election support?
Graham Perrett:
These measures, both of these measures are a boost to productivity in the long run. There right to do because it’s important to look after people with a disability and right to look after schools, investing in schools and I say that as someone who taught English for eleven years. The politics I’ll leave to the commentators and the gentlemen in between us, Scott, however everyone knows the way forward for the Australian economy is to sell services to Australia, to have high quality jobs and the way we do that is by investing in our schools and in our universities. Now, universities in terms of extra money we have injected into them, the taper is slightly different. It’s not a cut to universities…
Laura Jayes:
…I want to get back to this unprecedented move of the Treasurer outlining a ten year…is it a political manoeuvre?
Graham Perrett:
These are big ticket items that Australians care about and will set-up our productivity agenda, both with people with disabilities in the workplace making sure they’re productive, individuals as well as making sure they get the dignity that comes with work, as well as having control of their own destiny. Obviously schools and everyone, it’s a bipartisan issue, everyone agrees that investigating in schools and higher education sets us up for the future. I can’t see the politics in this at all the reality is we’ve got to set-up for the longer term over the horizon, not just that normal four year term of a budget.
Laura Jayes:
Scott Ryan, Joe Hockey has been calling for more details on this plan asking where the money is coming from, setting out a ten-year-plan beyond the forward estimates. He’s giving you that isn ’t he?
Scott Ryan:
Well no he says and what we’ll find out later tonight is their going to set out a ten-year-spending plan. This is from the same Treasurer who a month ago said that you couldn’t trust ten-year-forecasts because they weren’t reliable. This is from the same Treasurer that we can’t trust a 12 month forecast from. The same Treasurer who oversaw a drop, an announced drop in revenue from seven to 12 to 17 billion dollars in revenue in a matter of weeks last month, if you can’t trust Wayne Swan in a year why on earth would we trust him over ten?
Laura Jayes:
But this is about long term reform not about short term politics. Isn’t this something that the Government is always criticised over, isn’t this at least a step towards looking at the long term and not playing the short term politics?
Scott Ryan:
What the Government is criticised over is its lack of performance. What the Government is criticised over is its inability to control spending, which has led to these huge deficits. Wayne Swan will probably tonight announce the fifth highest deficit in Australia’s history for the current budget. The one that he promised in that comedy act last year was going to be the start of the return to surplus. You can’t trust Wayne Swan on spending issues and to try and announce some figures that we’re expected to rely on over ten years, when we know we can’t rely on him from week-to-week is just ridiculous.
Laura Jayes:
Graham Perrett I’ll let you respond to that because trust is a big issue here and believability, how can the electorate believe Wayne Swan going into the election four months away when the forecasts have been so wrong and six months ago he was promising a surplus?
Graham Perrett:
Wayne Swan relies on the advice provided by Treasury, the same Treasury that advised Peter Costello and John Howard. So let’s look in terms of trusting the economy rather than lines that Scotty is trotting out. What has John Howard said about our economy, the reality is it’s in perfect shape, some challenges…
Scott Ryan:
…He didn’t say perfect…
Graham Perrett:
…Well, what did he say Scott?
Scott Ryan:
John Howard was referring to the fact that Australia is not as bad as Europe or America…
Graham Perrett:
What were his words?
Scott Ryan:
He didn’t say perfect. I’m going to misquote him, he didn’t say perfect.
Graham Perrett:
Before you cut in I was going to say, but there are challenges, there are challenges and most that challenge, as an economist would know, is about setting up our productivity agenda. When we took office in 2007 productivity had been tracking at zero and it had been under both Governments admittedly. The hard heavy lifting reforms under the Howard Government that Hawke and Keating had put in place, the Howard Government sat there and said thanks very much.
Laura Jayes:
We could go over history…
Graham Perrett:
No, no what I’m saying is that we need a plan for the future and we rely on Treasury and they’re not crystal balls. They make predications based on advice that’s given and a good Government responds to the advice as it changes.
Scott Ryan:
Let’s make an important correction here. Treasury provides a range of things, forecasts and budget estimates and what’s happened over the last few years is, it’s clear Labor have taken the most optimistic positive forecast and the most optimistic positive spending forecast but the record is stark, we took a conservative approach to budgeting – leave some leeway there in case circumstances change so that’s good news not constantly coming up with excuses.
Laura Jayes:
Okay let’s look at what we do know in terms of measures already announced. Now, it looks like universities could be at the top of the losers list and this is something the Greens are unhappy about. I’ll just show you what Adam Bandt had to say today.
(Clip: Adam Bandt)
Laura Jayes:
Graham Perrett, if there’s no nasty surprises in the Budget tonight, universities will be at the top of that losers list. Losing something like three point eight billion dollars across MYEFO and this Budget, are you comfortable with that?
Graham Perrett:
Obviously budgets are about priorities and obviously when you invest in education as we have. We have a proud history you might remember the last budget in terms of money that was going into universities and I remember the 90s and the slash and burn politics of John Howard when it came to universities. I remember that starkly, I remember it. That has not been our approach, the future for Australia is in selling services and commodities as well to Asia and we do that by investing in universities. Now the angle of investment has changed slightly that’s what we’re talking about…
Laura Jayes:
…They’re still at the top of the universities list though…
Graham Perrrett:
…Well, you’re framing it in such a negative way Laura. The reality is universities have benefited from us and if you actually look at what we’ve done with universities, the uncapped university places have meet significant increases in indigenous Australians going to university, people from poor socioeconomic areas and rural and regional areas are going to universities. We are bringing in those Whitlam changes and making sure university is not just for those from power of privilege and making sure universities educate all Australians so the best and brightest get a chance. That’s what we have done already, you can tick the boxes when it comes to providing universal education in universities. We’re proud of that record, however, we’ve had to make a budget decision about where our priorities are…
Laura Jayes:
…Scott Ryan I’ll let you respond.
Scott Ryan:
I was actually at university in the 90s Graham and the worse time was actually the mid-90s during the recession Labor had to have. That’s when some real harsh funding cuts happened to universities. Graham talked about how it was important to sell services to Asia, the truth is Labor changes to our education system have cost my home state of Victoria billions of dollars of lost exports , that is our largest industry in Victoria it was our third largest industry in Australia and the irony of the Labor party cutting…
Laura Jayes:
…but your party can’t commit to reinstating this can they?
Scott Ryan:
Well no the Labor party has cut education because of its budget crisis, its cut funding to universities because of its irresponsible spending elsewhere and the eight billion dollars we pay a year in interest on the debt they’ve run up in five short years.
Laura Jayes:
Given your passionate argument them, would you be rallying for an Abbott Government them to reinstate as one of the first priorities this funding to universities?
Scott Ryan:
We can’t commit to anything we haven’t even seen the budget until tonight. We know from the past that last financial year alone Labor’s budget declined by forty billion dollars in eighteen months. We know the numbers we can trust are the ones signed-off by the officials in Treasury and Finance, not by the Ministers of Treasury and Finance and we don’t get them until 10 days into the election campaign.
Laura Jayes:
Okay we’ll take a quick break. After the break we’ll talk about some of the other budget measures, so stay with us.
(Ad break)
Laura Jayes:
It’s all about the budget today and discussing the measures today on the panel of politicians is Graham Perrett and Scott Ryan. Just continuing on from our conversation Graham Perrett, The Treasurer broke a promise on Foreign Aid and this was flagged again yesterday and again delaying the 0.5% Increase in GNI, does that sit comfortably with you?
Graham Perrett:
Look, I was very uncomfortable with it last year and made that clear in the appropriate forums both publicly and privately. The millennium development goals are something that have been embraced, particularly by younger people, and community groups across my electorate but also around Australia I’m sure Scott has spoken with similar people. Because we’re talking about saving lives and changing lives, it is a goal I’d like us to get to as a nation pretty quickly. We have seen some European nations who are in much worse dire economic circumstances calibrate their adjustments, I would certainly like us to get there as quickly as possible, as I said before budgets are all about priorities and we do have some challenges at the moment and because of that we’ve had to make that decision and I’m sure I’ll be speaking with young people across my electorate about it.
Laura Jayes:
Newstart was another area that many groups on the backbench have been campaigning the Treasurer about as well. That hasn’t happened but there has been an increase and a small change, recipients can earn an extra $38 a fortnight. That’s pretty paltry, $38 a fortnight.
Graham Perrett:
Well, remember to combine it also, we have got to put it in the context of the education payments, the Family Tax Benefit A and B that most people on the dole would have access to if they had children. This is a continuation of a policy John Howard brought in I think 06, so the reality is the best recipe for a family is to have people in paid employment. I know there are challenges in having young children but is this an appropriate policy in terms of by the time your child is eight let’s have you back in the workforce, we need as many people in the work force where possible. We have some parts of Australia crying out for workers it’s the best thing to do economically. I know it crunches some communities particularly economically when it’s hard to find work when their kids are at work (sic). It’s the best appropriate policy and I think the Opposition have been broadly supportive of it.
Laura Jayes:
Scott Ryan, there’s not a lot of sweeteners in this budget. Especially for the Labor, base we have just talked about two of them. There’s good news here for the Coalition if they win the election, there’s prudent measures the polls show in four months time your party could well be leading Australia and Tony Abbott could be Prime Minister so some of these tough decisions being made at the moment could work in your favour?
Scott Ryan:
Well I think the one thing Graham and I would agree on today is, the next election is a contest and no politician takes the electorate for granted. The result of what is I think 16 or 17 weeks away will be the result of what happens over the next 16 or 17 weeks. No one is happy at difficult decision being made particularly when they are the result of a Government who has run up record deficits. All these decisions, we can talk about universities, we can talk about a myriad of hits are all the results…
Laura Jayes:
…but Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey will have to make some tough decisions as well won’t they come four months time and still in this budget situation?
Scott Ryan:
The budget is always a challenge it’s always about priorities. Least not forget that tonight we’re probably going to see a budget that’s spent $75 Billion more this year than the last Howard and Costello budget and I don’t think anyone feels the country is getting $75 Billion dollars more value. $8 billion dollars in interest repayments imagine what that could be used to fund, it could be substantially used to fund the NDIS and that’s the direct consequence of Labor’s waste.
Laura Jayes:
Asylum Seekers is going to be a big political issue Graham, the Treasurer has consistently underestimated the spend, budget after budget. After this budget tonight, surely these figures will have to be a little bit more realistic?
Graham Perrett:
Well I still live in hope that lives will be saved by the Opposition will getting onboard with our Malaysian Solution, that is something that I still hold out hope for. I’ve spoken on this previously, the reality is if we look at the Houston panel recommendations we need Tony Abbott to stop playing politics with young kids getting on boats and embrace the panel’s recommendations. If we do that then the projections will be much more realistic. Unfortunately he’s happy to trot out a three word slogan…
Laura Jayes:
…so there’s still a stalemate, so regardless we need more realistic figures?
Graham Perrett:
Well, I still live in hope that the national interest will be the priority for the Opposition than just saying no. Now Tony Abbott at the moment is probably the most dangerous politician drawing breathe in this country…
Scott Ryan:
…oh, that’s outrageous…
Graham Perrett:
…and on the cusp of being the most dangerous politician in Australian history but this is a bloke who will do anything to grab power and if you’re someone who will do anything to grab power and say anything that can be a dangerous thing for Australia. So we need Tony Abbott to talk to the Party Room about getting on board with the Malaysian Solution it’s in the national interest to do so…
Scott Ryan:
…I’ve got to respond to that. That is an outrageous statement. You want to talk about people who are willing to do anything to get power, look at the current Prime Minister who stabbed her Prime Minister in the back…
Graham Perrett:
…rubbish there was a democratic process.
Scott Ryan:
…there wasn’t a vote, who stabbed her Prime Minister in the back and then said there wouldn’t be a Carbon Tax and then instituted one as the price of keeping the Lodge. What you’ve said Graham…
Graham Perrett:
…there was a vote…
Laura Jayes:
We’re getting off track you’ve both had your say on that. Scott, I wanted to ask you about, Tony Abbott said this Government is going to lay booby-traps for him if he becomes Prime Minister at the next election, is a referendum on recognising Local Government in the constitution. Is that a booby-trap he’s talking about?
Scott Ryan:
Oh well, look I wouldn’t describe it as a booby-trap in that sense. Would I would say is that…
Laura Jayes:
…division in your Party Room…
Scott Ryan:
No no, the Coalitions position is very clear on this. We support in principle that Commonwealth payments to Local Government are put beyond doubt, but we are critical of the approach that Labor has taken to go about this. There are 16 or 17 weeks until you expect Australians to vote on this referendum, they’ve done none of the ground work on this, they haven’t got any of the States onside, the AEC said give us 27 weeks. The Coalitions position is clear on this. What this is, is another failed Labor plan because there was a lot of discussion on this for many years Labor have just botched it yet again.
Laura Jayes:
Graham Perrett, wouldn’t it…
Graham Perrett:
…can I respond to that?
Laura Jayes:
Yes you can. I just want to ask you a question as well though. Given there’s going to be a referendum at this election, wouldn’t the priority be to recognise Indigenous people in the constitution over Local Government? There’s bipartisan support on that and there seems to be…
Graham Perrett:
…well remember that the committee looked at that and found the Australian community wasn’t ready at that moment. It will happen and I do particularly commend Tony Abbott on that and there is bipartisan support on it, he does have some runs on the board there. In terms of Local Government, this will be the third time we have taken this to the Australian people. This is not a bolt from the blue…
Scott Ryan:
…last one was 88 I wasn’t even voting…
Graham Perrett:
…well the world doesn’t revolve around you Scott. There were some people who were alive then…
Scott Ryan:
…it was 25 years ago…
Graham Perrett:
The reality is this is not a new topic. I do a lot of street corners, I’ve got a marginal seat. When I stand there with my Local Government representative and my State Government representative and Federal, 60% of the questions go to Local Government, 30% to me and 10% take up the State Government guys time. So people understand the role of Local Governments. There immediate, it’s about getting your tree cut down, rubbished removed so I think people want to get on board with this.
Laura Jayes:
I just want to ask Scott quickly about the Paid Parental Level Scheme. Amongst some backbenchers there has been dissent Alan Eggleston just the latest, business not happy either. Are you comfortable taking the PPL as it stands unchanged to the election?
Scott Ryan:
Completely. I just came from a Party Room meeting and it wasn’t raised or discussed at all. The party is entirely behind this policy, the frontbench is behind this policy and can I say outside the bubble of Canberra…
Laura Jayes:
…it hasn’t always been that way…
Scott Ryan:
…well we took it to the last election. We’re taking it to this election and if we win the election it’s going to be implemented. Outside the bubble of Canberra you hear from women and particularly small business in my portfolio who know that this will give them a better chance at maintaining their female staff because a smaller business doesn’t have the same capacity as a Coles or a Woolies or a large multinational to actually provide those sorts of supports to a young family. This is a popular policy outside of Canberra.
Laura Jayes:
Outside the bubble you say, now finally back in the bubble. John McTernan, Government Chief Spin doctor, gave a bit of a pep-talk to staffers last night, he was channelling the famous General Patton from the Hollywood movie, here’s a bit of a clip from that – you’ll get the idea.
(Clip: General Patton)
Laura Jayes:
It’s an interesting strategy from John McTernan, is that an election winning strategy Graham Perrett?
Graham Perrett:
Well I’m from a marginal seat so I’m always in a battle frame of mind so it’s nothing new for me. I can think of a lot of war movies, I’ll have to track down George C Scott’s role, I think he won an Oscar for it and handed it back. I’m not too sure how John McTernen preformed but I’ll try and track down someone who was there.
Laura Jayes:
It was for staffers not MPs I should clarify. Scott Ryan a bit of a pep-talk you would have seen a few things like that in your day.
Scott Ryan:
If you need pep-talk on a budget day if you need to G-up your staff on the most important day of the Parliamentary calendar it shows that there’s something really wrong with the Labor Party. It’s all about the battle of politics not the battle for Australia or Australians, that’s what that video portrays.
Laura Jayes:
We are about to let you go to questions time. Given the last question time and the leadership issue now we are getting into the budget measures, Tony Abbott has threatened to move a motion against the Prime Minister. It’s the first time in a while we will see some of Labors old war-horses, if you like, on the backbench for a long time in their careers. How do you think that’s going to go Graham?
Graham Perrett:
People get into this Parliament because of the Labor Party name before their name, not after their name. I’m sure that everyone whether their turning up for the next election or freshly arrived in 2010 or whatever their history will be doing whatever they can to make sure we get the best policies for the people of Australia and the only party that has a plan for Australia, that will protect jobs , that will promote growth is the Australian Labor Party, I’m sure they will be getting onboard with that program.
Laura Jayes:
Scott Ryan, we’ve only got about 20 seconds of the program left, how do you think question time will play out today. More of the same?
Scott Ryan:
I’m in the Senate so I don’t actually get to see it. What I will say is people are going to look at people like Martin Ferguson and Simon Crean and think the adults are not on the front bench.
Laura Jayes:
Well thank you gentlemen for talking over the budget measures with us today. It will be an interesting one it will be revealed in just an hours-time as Treasurer Wayne Swan hands down his sixth budget. It will be an interesting question time as well today after a long break and now our Parliamentarians are here back in Canberra.
(Ends)