Topics: Leadership, higher education reforms, Medicare, tax reform, the budget.
E&OE…
NICOLE CHVASTEK
Scott Ryan is a Liberal Senator for Victoria he is also the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Education and Training. Scott Ryan, good afternoon.
SENATOR RYAN
Good afternoon Nicole.
CHVASTEK
How do you go about restoring confidence given what Russell Broadbent says is a diabolical loss of confidence in which you find yourself.
RYAN
Russell is a good friend and he has actually been in Parliament longer than I and he is well respected, however I wouldn’t quite use the same words. I will be honest, we are in a pretty dire political situation, you just have to look at public polls. We improve our position and the position of the Australian community by getting on with the job.
CHVASTEK
You improve your position by installing Malcolm Turnbull according to the polls and today’s newspapers.
RYAN
We can’t govern by polls and I don’t think the country and the community are served by a rolling weekly assessment of popularity. As the Prime Minister said and as all of us have said after the party room meeting this morning, our responsibility now is to focus on the needs of Australian families, small business, and communities right around the country. That is how we will build our case for re-election, by actually doing the right thing and not focussing on internal politics.
CHVASTEK
You have had seventeen months to do that.
RYAN
And I think we have done some good things Nicole…
Interrupted
CHVASTEK
Not according to Luke Simpkins from Western Australia who moved this motion and 40 percent of the party room wanted to vote for a new leader.
RYAN
I am not going to dismiss the gravity of some of the sentiments of my colleagues. They are obviously very concerned about where we as a Government find ourselves. But there are some successes from last year as well as some very serious challenges. We did deliver on our promise to stop the boats and repeal the carbon tax. They are both very successful policy initiatives…
Interrupted
CHVASTEK
Don’t you think people are getting sick of hearing that tune being chanted?
RYAN
No, what I was about to say Nicole is that we do accept that the budget we brought down surprised people and that it hasn’t received the level of community support that we had hoped. So our response to that is to listen. First of all in the case of the higher education policy is to change it in response from the feedback from the sector, and in our discussions and negotiations with the Senate cross-benchers. And as the Prime Minister made the point today with respect to the Medicare policies, is to continue the consultations that Health Minister Sussan Ley is undertaking at the moment and to only bring forward future policies in that area that will have some degree of support from within the sector.
CHVASTEK
Wasn’t it self-evident that if you hand down a budget that primarily beats up the poor, the ill, the elderly, and students that there is going to be a backlash?
RYAN
Well I wouldn’t describe the budget as doing that, Nicole. I am not going to say that the budget went down well, I am not going to say that it was widely supported by some people in the community. But we do have a grave financial situation; we do have a situation where we are borrowing $40 billion a year.
CHVASTEK
Why don’t you repair it by looking to the people who have money, rather than those who have none?
RYAN
Well I will give you an example; Australia has a highly progressive tax system. The top quarter of wage and salary earners in Australia, or top quarter of income tax payers pay more than two thirds of all tax. So Australia does have a very progressive system. The OECD does talk about how tightly targeted our tax and transfer system is.
CHVASTEK
We also have giant multinationals that pay very little tax because they’re able to shift their profits offshore. So if you are going to look for a target why not look there, rather than look towards people who can’t pay their medical bills and can’t afford to go to University.
RYAN
Let’s correct a couple of things here Nicole. Firstly the Government is looking at, through the G20 process and domestically, the profit shifting that has particularly become more troublesome in recent years. But at the same time we have to accept that getting a few multinationals to pay tax does not fix a $40 billion budget deficit. It is not that much money. It is significant, but it doesn’t fix the problem we have.
CHVASTEK
No. But you want to take people along with you. You want to show them that everyone is feeling the pain. That it is not just the sick, the poor, the elderly and students. That it is the top end of town, and it is also you guys. There are a lot of reports around about you, about politicians that are taking RAA aircraft to get to one side of the country to the other, and blowing $50,000 a shot. There are a lot of reports around about the Defence Minister blowing off $200 bottles of wine whenever he wants to. So therefore your message is getting lost in the perversity of the argument.
RYAN
The occasional story, not knowing the exact example you are referring to, that does not solve the budget problem. I appreciate that we do have to generate support. But one of the ways we are trying to generate support is to say Nicole, that people like you and I when we go to the doctor, is it unreasonable to ask us that we should make a contribution to ensure that my retired mother or the low income earners who can’t afford to make the contribution can? At the moment your access to bulk billing bears no relationship to your capacity to make a contribution.
Interrupted
CHVASTEK
So why not target the high income earners instead of those who make…
RYAN
Well high income earners already do pay a substantial degree of tax. Basically just over three quarters of medical presentations and doctors’ visits are bulked bill, if we look at the other quarter…
Interrupted
CHVASTEK
But you have got to look at it as a proportion of their income, by virtue of a proportion of their income it is the poor who are taking the burden of this budget. And there has been modelling to suggest that the poor are being disproportionally hit as a result of the budget that was handed down last May.
RYAN
Nicole, there is a difference; the more you earn the more as a proportion of your income you pay in tax. That is what the progressive tax system does.
Interrupted
CHVASTEK
If you are poor, if you have no income whatsoever then you do not have the luxury of a buffer zone, than if you are a higher income earner.
RYAN
I understand that Nicole. There has to be a limit to a tax and transfer system. Because every dollar we put in the pocket of someone, comes out of the pocket of someone else. Unless people are proposing quite radical tax increases on average income earners and slightly above average income earners, then they are not serious about actually bringing this budget back to balance.
CHVASTEK
Well Australians didn’t like the Australians that you targeted in the last budget.
RYAN
And as the Prime Minister said we do need to look at that, and that is one of the points he made in his press conference this afternoon.
CHVASTEK
Did you vote for this leadership spill?
RYAN
I made it clear last week, I actually said publically that as a member of the Ministry I voted against it.
CHVASTEK
Because you were reported in today’s press as being undeclared.
RYAN
I don’t know how that happened, I think we got a query and I didn’t respond in time. I was on air on ABC Melbourne and numerous other places last week and declared my position.
CHVASTEK
Scott Ryan, thank you for giving us your time this afternoon.
RYAN
Thanks Nicole.
**ENDS**