E&OE……………………….……………………………………………………………

 

 

Mark Riley, Seven Network. Mr Abbott, thanks very much for your address. I just want to take to your part of it… take you to a part of it where you talk about the Medicare-funded dentistry at $4 billion a year being an aspiration and not a commitment. People, I think, at the moment are finding it hard to believe government commitments. How can they believe in aspiration of $4 billion a year? It doesn't just mean it’s unaffordable or is this a new way of ensuring that you can't be held accountable for breaking a promise, you just don't make it in the first place? But one promise that you have held there is the paid parental leave scheme in saying that you're going to lower taxes and that business is doing it so tough. Why is it the right time for business to be hit with a $2.7 billion new tax?

 

 

Thank you Mark for that question and it is good to see that the tough questions are being asked here at the Press Club, particularly by you, Mark. Look, I think it is very important that people understand that we put in the hard yards to deliver a stronger economy for a reason, for a reason. Governments don't try to go into surplus because they like seeing money in the Reserve Bank. Governments go into surplus because it then enables them to give better services to the Australian people, including tax cuts.

 

Now, I think this is very important. In the end, we are in government to deliver a better life to the Australian people and paid parental leave will be better for the Australian people. It will demonstrate, apart from anything else, that the Coalition finally gets it when it comes to the rights and aspirations of women in the work force. Better disability services are important, very important, if we are going to give to vulnerable Australians the better life that they need and, yes, a better dental service is important too, very important. It has been important to me for a very long time, particularly since my time as Health Minister, when I was able to make a start in this direction.

 

Now, the important thing to remember is that we can only have these better services if we get the economy right, if we get the fiscal situation under control. But there’s got to be a light at the end of the tunnel and that is what I want the Australian people to understand – that there will be a light at the end of the tunnel. I think the next few years are going to be very tough. I think this is going to be a very tough year for our economy. I think getting the fiscal position under control is going to be very difficult but we aren't just doing it because we are bean counters, we're doing it because we're patriots and we want to build a better Australia.

 

 

Mark Simkin, ABC News. Mr Abbott, you're an Opposition Leader that is sometimes criticised for opposing. This speech was billed as a positive vision but you still have managed to call the Government lazy, deceptive, complacent and…..

 

 

….and you’re disputing that, are you?

 

 

I’m simply trying to reconcile the motivation for the speech. Do you see the need for some sort of political reinvention, some sort of Tony 2.0 or do you see this year as, looking at the polls, more of the same?

 

 

Look, I’m certainly not going to be a commentator on the polls because there are lots of people in this room who are employed to be commentators on the polls. I certainly think that the Coalition has been very good at demonstrating to the Australian people that this is the worst Government in living memory. We even had a situation the other day when Robert Manne, no friend of the Coalition, no kind of knee-jerk conservative described the current Prime Minister as the least impressive incumbent since Billy McMahon. So, we do have a seriously deficient Government. What I want to do today is to encourage people to believe that it doesn't have to be this bad. That if they change the Government, they won't just be changing from one bunch of squalid fixes to another, but they will be changing to a government which is competent, which is adult, which is principled which is inspired by high ideals and which has good experience so that you can trust us to practically competently deliver the things that people expect of a decent Australian Government.

 

 

Laura Tingle from the Financial Review Mr Abbott. You’ve quoted Abraham Lincoln in your speech, saying that he knew in the marrow of his bones that government should do for people what they can't do for themselves and no more. You’ve also talked about an ambition to permanently reduce the size of government. Just doing a rough calculation of spending cuts and new spending commitments, you're talking about cutting spending by about $12 billion and increasing spending by about $10 billion. My question to you is; when you say you want to permanently reduce the size of government, are you talking about a profound change in the role of government in Australian society or are you talking about just getting rd of waste? And when you talk about more tax cuts, are you talking about more personal income tax cuts beyond cutting the carbon tax and mining tax?

 

 

Well look, I believe, as all members of the Liberal National Coalition do, in smaller government, lower taxes and greater freedom – that’s just part of our DNA. Now, I also accept, as all members of the Coalition do, there is an important role for government but government should be slow to get involved in new areas, unless it is convinced, first, that there is a real problem, and second, that there is a real problem that government action can realistically, practically, feasibly improve.

 

Now, one of the reasons why I am dead against the carbon tax is that it will involve a permanent one percent increase in the size of government. Now, I think there are much better ways of tackling emissions, much better ways of tackling climate issues than permanently increasing the size of government. Ditto the mining tax – the mining tax will permanently increase the size of government.

 

So I think government should be as big as it needs to be to realistically address problems that only government can solve, but no bigger than that and that’s the sensible, pragmatic, small ‘c’ conservative approach that I want to bring to the problems of Australian Government.

 

 

The second half was just about more tax cuts beyond mining tax and carbon tax?

 

 

Well, the point about more tax cuts is that you have got to be able to pay for them and that means that the budget has got to be in a vastly better position than it is in now. I mean at the moment, the Government is still borrowing $100 million every single day and borrowing for tax cuts strikes me as a very poor piece of public policy.

 

 

Mr Abbott, Phillip Hudson from the Herald Sun. In your speech you devoted a section to economic management where you talk about taking pressure off households and you say that you want there to be less upward pressure on interest rates. I’m wanting to clarify, are you pledging that interest rates under an Abbott government will be lower than they are under a Gillard Government and is that a promise, an aspiration or a guarantee?

 

 

Well, I can certainly promise that spending under an Abbott government will be less and that means that borrowing should be less and that means that there should be less upward pressure on interest rates. Obviously interest rates at any one time are a function of market forces, but it is not a market which is uninfluenced by government, and if government is out there borrowing big time, as the current Government is, that obviously means that there is less money available to private businesses, less money available to home buyers.

 

 

G’day Mr Abbott. Welcome back to the Press Club.

 

Thank you for having me Phil.

 

 

Just back on tax cuts, you said in your speech by the end of your first term you wanted more tax cuts in prospect and then just what you told Laura, that you’re going to have to pay for them. Are you saying that those tax cuts you have promised people, in the absence of a carbon tax, will have to wait until the budget is back in surplus? Whereas the Government is saying they’re going to introduce them from May this year. You’re not going to introduce them….minus the carbon tax, until you’ve got a surplus budget?

 

 

We will deliver tax cuts without a carbon tax. The precise timing and the precise quantum is something that we will announce in good time before the next election.

 

 

Hi Mr Abbott, Matthew Franklin from The Australian. You're not in government but you are one of the nation's political leaders. You have refused to deal with or been unable to find a deal with the Government over the issue of boat people. My question to you is; given that the Labor Government has bent over backwards to compromise its own policy to try and find common ground with you, doesn't your refusal to do so simply confirm Julia Gillard's claim that you are Dr No and that you feel you have no responsibility to the national interest in this issue?

 

 

Well, Matt, I just reject your statement that the Government has bent over backwards to accommodate the Coalition. This is completely wrong, completely, utterly and absolutely wrong. Wayne Swan said, just before Christmas, that the Government would never, never, introduce temporary protection visas – and they are a critical element of our plan. If the Government had been serious about reintroducing the Nauru detention centre, they would have been over there before Christmas talking to the Nauruan Government. They weren't, instead, they have plucked an utterly fanciful figure out of the air for the cost of rebuilding the centre – rebuilding the centre is going to cost a tiny fraction of the $1.5 billion plus that the Government is saying – the Government seriously expects us to believe that it is going to cost more to rebuild and run a processing centre on Nauru than it would to build the Fiona Stanley Hospital in Perth. I mean, it is just completely, utterly, implausible. So look, they are not serious at all. They were never serious. They were just going through this charade of trying to involve the Opposition in their problem, of trying to fit up, if you like, the Opposition with a failure which is absolutely and utterly of their own making.

 

Now, the point I make in conclusion is that it is the responsibility of the Opposition to support good policy. It is not the responsibility of the Opposition to support bad policy from a bad Government and the Malaysia people swap is bad policy and it will never be supported by this Coalition.

 

 

Chris Johnson from The Canberra Times, Mr Abbott. You touched briefly in your speech on foreign policy, particularly you said that you want to avoid the big talk without the actions to match and that you wanted a foreign policy that would have a Jakarta focus, not a Geneva one. Does that mean that any government that you lead will downgrade Australia's participation in some of the larger multilateral [inaudible] that we are currently a part of?

 

 

Well, you shouldn't assume that focusing on our region and areas where we can make a difference will mean a downgrade in our participation in international organisations because sometimes, sometimes participation in those international organisations strengthens our regional clout, it doesn't reduce our regional clout. But I’ve got to make this basic point, that in the end, everything we do will be guided by our interests and our values and the problem with some of the international organisations is that for all their good intentions, for all the worthy sentiments that they espouse, they aren't really that good at promoting the deep and lasting values of our people, our culture and our civilisation.

 

 

Paul Bongiorno, Ten News, Mr Abbott. There’s no doubt that the optics of minority governments are disconcerting for the Australian electorate, if you can believe all the published opinion polls.  But just getting away from optics and perceptions, how do we condemn a Government for being incompetent when it has AAA credit ratings by all three rating agencies, when interest rate are 4.25 percent now, compared to 6.75 per cent when the Howard Government lost office and the Government points out that that is a $3,000 a year saving for people on an average mortgage of $300,000? By these yardsticks, and maybe there are others, the Government is politically incompetent, I would happily concede, but economically, it is delivering.

 

 

Paul, my response is that no competent Government would have been responsible for the pink batts programme. No competent Government would have rushed out with the school hall programme. No competent Government would have dreamt up the National Broadband Network on the back of a coaster in a VIP aircraft because the Prime Minister wouldn't take the time to see the Minister to have a proper discussion. I mean, really and truly this Government is almost a poster child for ineptitude and failure of process and if our economic position is strong, and relatively speaking it still is, it owes everything to the reforms of its predecessors and nothing to the spending spree of the current Government.

 

 

Mr Abbott, Shane Wright from The West Australian and a declaration of interest. I am a P&F treasurer here in Canberra and I am asking you about the education refund proposal that you’ve got and you’ve mentioned in your speech about the iron law of economics. If you, under your proposal to allow people to claim school fees, aren't you just telling two million households who get Family Tax Benefit A and their schools, that it is alright to raise fees because the Federal Government will pay for that? Isn't it an inflationary problem that you are going to create by allowing people to claim school fees?

 

 

Well, I’m not against aspiration. I think aspiration is very important. I think one of the real problems with the current Government is that everyone who tries to get ahead suddenly becomes a target. Private health insurance, earning more than $100,000 or $150,000, you're a target. Child care user, earning more than a certain amount, you're a target. I think this is a Government which needs to understand that encouraging people and institutions to change for the better is a good thing, not a bad thing.

 

Now, I know that a lot of people pay school fees – sometimes they're the fees that are necessarily incurred if you go to an independent school, sometimes they're the voluntary fees that you incur at a state school, but one way or another they're a cost and I think that it’s right to give people some help to deal with the costs of giving their kids the best possible start in life.

 

 

Paul Osborne, from Australian Associated Press, thanks for coming back Mr Abbott.

 

 

Thank you Paul.

 

 

The Shadow Cabinet is due to meet, I believe, on Thursday. One of the issues may be industry policy which has been the subject of some, sort of, backroom chat and some media stories over the past few months. Just wanting to get your view on why do you see that industry assistance is something that needs cutting in order to balance the budget and, when there is….seems to be some evidence that it supports many direct and indirect jobs in manufacturing, particularly in the car industry?

 

 

Well look, I’m a big supporter of the car industry. I think it would be a tragedy for Australia if we didn't have a car industry. I think a car industry is one of the signs that we remain a first world economy. So, I want to see the car industry flourish. All the Coalition has done is say that the automotive transformation scheme should have the same quantum of funding now as the Howard Government believed it should have, that the $500 that the current Government put in that scheme, as part of its panicky overreaction to the first global financial crisis, is not necessary.

 

So, I am in favour of car industry support, I just think it needs to be based on long-term rational decision-making, not on panicky overreactions to short-term events. I should make two final points about car industry support. The only political party in this country that has reneged on clear commitments to the car industry is the Labor Party, which has reneged on $1.4 billion of pledged assistance and the best thing you can do for the car industry is not to have a carbon tax, because a carbon tax will add more than $400 to the price of every car produced in Australia and, obviously, that gives foreign cars a big advantage over the locally produced model.

 

 

Mr Abbott, Kieran Gilbert from Sky News. I did have a question on costings, but I’ve got an email from a parent, a viewer who is a father of a kid with disability, cerebral palsy, and he asked me to ask you a question, so I thought this was a better question than I had. He says, can you please ask Mr Abbott why he's putting the National Disability Insurance Scheme on the backburner, describing it as an aspirational policy until the budget is back in the black? He says that you're contradicting your own words, that society is judged on how it treats its most vulnerable. He is worried that if it is on the backburner, that that would simply torpedo the proposal. What do you say to him and people like him?

 

 

Well, there is a process which the current Government has announced and which the Coalition supports. There is a scoping study currently under way. There are various studies and work being undertaken by the Council of Australian Governments because this does have to involve both the states and the Commonwealth and let's wait and see what comes out of that process. I think this is an important and necessary reform. I think it really is a test of our quality as a society what we can do, more and better, for people with disabilities, but we do have to accept that, in the end, everything has got to be paid for and it would be so much easier to pay for important and necessary reforms, like disability insurance, if we didn't have the waste and extravagance which we have seen almost every day from the current Government.

 

 

Michelle Grattan from The Age. Mr Abbott, can I take you back to indigenous affairs. Do you see any realistic chance of getting agreement on the wording of a referendum to recognise indigenous people to be put either before the election or at this next election? If you don't, would you commit to, as prime minister, restarting the process to put such a referendum?

 

 

Well Michelle, first point I want to make is that I think it would be better if any such referendum could be a stand alone vote. I think that the question of indigenous recognition, anything to do with the long-term reconciliation of Australian-to-Australian is best pursued outside the partisan ranker of an election campaign – so that is the first point I want to make.

 

The second point I want to make is that the Coalition is a long time, long-term supporter of indigenous recognition – it is often forgotten that that was part of the preamble that was put to the people in 1999 along with the constitutional question…. along with the Republic question – and then in 2007, in one of the last significant commitments he made before the election campaign, John Howard committed us to this back then. So look, we are long-term supporters of this.

I would like to think that any question that was put to the people would be a unifying moment rather than a divisive issue in our national life. I think the aspiration would have to be the kind of coming together that we saw over the 1967 referendum question and my fear, at the moment, is that the recommendations that we have got from the committee rather overreach.

 

Now, we have indicated a desire to take this process forward, but to do so in a way that is likely to gain overwhelming consensus support and George Brandis and myself, Senator Scullion and myself will be happy to engage with the Government, will be happy to engage with indigenous people, will be happy to do what we can to try and make this happen, but the worst thing that we could do right now would be to put a referendum forward on such a sensitive subject and have it fail.

 

 

Mr Abbott, Richard Davis from SBS TV News. I wanted to ask you an introspective question and at

the risk of it sounding like a job interview…

 

 

….do I look like an introvert Richard?

 

 

Not at all, no. As a politician, what do you think is your greatest strength and what do you think is your greatest weakness?

 

 

Look, my first boss in politics was John Hewson and John Hewson had a phrase, he said "don't practice open heart surgery on yourself in public”. So, I am going to take the Hewson advice on that and decline. Lane, I think you're the lucky last, aren't you?

 

 

Mr Abbott, Lane Calcutt from the Nine Network. Given that Andrew Wilkie has indicated he would only support a no confidence motion on matters of, I think he said serious misconduct. I’m just wondering if you have spoken to him about that, as to what he thinks constitutes that. Do you think there are at the moment grounds to move one and will you move one next week?

 

 

Lane, the short answer is no, I haven't specifically raised this with Andrew Wilkie. I have a good dialogue with Andrew Wilkie. I think he's a decent human being. I think he's an honourable man, by his own lights, and I applaud the way he's stood up for the things he believes in over the last couple of weeks. Look, I would never lightly move a motion of no confidence in the Government. My fundamental objective is not to win votes in the Parliament, it is to deliver a better government to our country and my problem with a no confidence motion in the near future is that Julia Gillard is firewalled by the presence in the parliament of a certain Craig Thomson, Member for Dobell.

 

Now, I just want to dwell on this for a moment, because there are very serious allegations against Mr Thomson. The 70,000 lowly paid workers of the Health Services Union really do deserve to be treated with more respect than I think our system has currently treated them. The Fair Work Australia investigation has now been going for three long years. Now, the Fitzgerald Royal Commission in Queensland went for, I think, well under three years, the Wood Royal Commission in New South Wales, again, well under three years, the Cole Royal Commission into the building industry, just 18 months;  I fail to see why this investigation is taking so long. I fail to see why there has apparently been such lack of cooperation between Fair Work Australia and the New South Wales and Victorian police and I just make the point that, as things stand, as things stand, this looks like an institutional go slow to help the Government.

Now, I think that is not a very happy judgement to pass on important institutions and I think while Mr Thomson stays in the parliament, it is highly unlikely that the numbers would be there for a successful no confidence motion.

 

[ends]