KIERAN GILBERT
This is AM Agenda thanks for your company this morning. With us now, the Assistant Treasurer David Bradbury who is in the Sky News centre and the Shadow Assistant Treasurer Mathias Cormann, thanks both for being here. Senator Cormann I’ll start with you, on this announcement from the government, the fact that those power generators aren’t going to be shut down, you heard the Climate Change Minister rejecting outright Frontier Economics modelling that these are going to be worse off, he’s basically used that development yesterday to say that Tony Abbott’s warnings of a disaster in the La Trobe Valley for example are a bold-faced lie.
MATHIAS CORMANN
Well I mean the government two months after the carbon tax has come in to effect is in complete chaos. They're backflipping on position after position and making changes on the run and of course, we’ve known for a long time that brown coal fired power stations would be better off than black coal fired power stations which happen to be more environmentally efficient. I’ve asked questions about this of the government in the Senate some months ago, the answer we were given at the time was that all of the compensation is going to the brown coal generators because they need more assistance in the transition whereas all of the black coal fired generators, Macquarie Generation in New South Wales, Verve Energy in Western Australia for example, they’re paying billions and billions of carbon tax, pushing up the cost of electricity of course, pushing up the cost of living...
GILBERT
You heard what the Minister said about the fact that the government at the time said they would try to get a deal done with the generators, if it wasn’t in the interest of the taxpayers it wouldn’t go ahead, and he’s making the point that this is the market mechanism at work, that the market will find the cheapest ways of finding reductions.
CORMANN
Not even the governments, not even Labor’s alliance partner in government the Greens trust what this Labor Party is doing these days so how can anyone across Australia trust what they’re doing. I mean this is the same government where the Prime Minister said before the last election there would be no carbon tax under the government that she leads, now there is a carbon tax. Not even the Greens think they can trust the commitments given by this government.
GILBERT
David Bradbury that’s true the Greens say this is a breach of faith despite the protestations there of the Minister, they say that this is a breach of faith and this is not honouring the deal done.
DAVID BRADBURY
Well I think the Minister dealt with this matter very clearly. I think people should go back and have a look what was announced at the time, what was subject to the agreement. But let’s be very clear about this point, we have been hearing from Mr Abbott and Mathias and his lot for the last two years that this would be the biggest carbon tax that the globe has ever known. That it would be a wrecking ball through the economy, that it would wipe towns off the map. I’d like a dollar, forget about compensation arrangements, I’d like a dollar for every time Mr Abbott went down to the La Trobe Valley and looked workers in the eyes and said this carbon price will cost you your job. Well he should go back down to the La Trobe Valley, he should look into the eyes of every one of those workers that he scared and were the subject of his mistruth campaign, look them in the eye and say I apologise because what I said was wrong. That's the reality of it, you can’t on one hand criticise us for being a wrecking ball through the economy and on the other hand say it doesn’t nearly go far enough. I think that’s the allegation that’s being made.
GILBERT
Let’s get Senator Cormann’s response to that, well that’s the point you’ve heard from David Bradbury and from Greg Combet as well that this actually does reflect a bit more of what the Coalition would’ve argued anyway with direct action, doesn’t it?
CORMANN
Well I mean our objective with direct action was to clean dirty power stations up, not close them down. Of course this government is all over the place they’re now chopping and changing as they go and they’re now desperate for everyone to judge the success or failure of the carbon tax two months in. They’re so confident in how well it is going that they keep changing it on the run of course as they go at the moment. If they're so confident in their carbon tax set up, why do they keep chopping and changing it?
GILBERT
Okay let’s look at Martin Ferguson’s comments on Gina Rinehart yesterday David Bradbury, he basically defended her comments regarding the comparative costs that miners are facing here as opposed to Africa and elsewhere, the Prime Minister and the Treasurer very critical seizing on that reference of low incomes paid to African workers but on the substantive argument, Gina Rinehart has got a point and if you want the projects to go ahead, you’ve got to listen to the miners concerns.
BRADBURY
I think that this is an absolute beat up. One the one hand, of course, people are always concerned about the costs that underpin any investment project in this country, of course. Name me one person that would not be concerned about those questions. But what the Prime Minister and what the Deputy Prime Minister have said very clearly and I think this absolutely reflects the consensus, the weight of the opinion out there in the community, is that if people like Gina Rinehart are prepared to come forward and suggest that we should join in some race to the bottom on wages and conditions, that we should be looking to compete with people in Africa who are being paid $2 a day, what planet are these people living on? What planet is this person living on? To be suggesting that, that is outrageous and I think most Australians would be offended by that suggestion. Now if that came from someone that was out there on the median wage then that would be one thing, but to come from someone who is obviously very successful, but to kick sand in peoples face by saying $2 a day, that’s ridiculous.
GILBERT
Let’s go to Senator Cormann, your response on that.
CORMANN
Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan deliberately misunderstood and deliberately misrepresented what Gina Rinehart said then of course David Bradbury has just done the same, what Martin Ferguson is saying, one of the most sensible Ministers in this government, is of course right. What Gina Rinehart was pointing out, she was pointing to the sorts of countries that we are competing with. Was she suggesting that we should pay people $2 an hour, of course not. What she was saying is that we are competing with countries that have very low wage costs. In Australia we’ve got to focus on what our strengths are, the problem is in recent years under this government the cost of doing business in Australia has continued to grow up and our international competitiveness has continued to go down. One of our key competitive advantages used to be access to cheap and affordable energy. Thanks to the carbon tax and a plethora of other taxes that key advantage is now less than what it was in the past and what Gina Rinehart is saying is quite right. At this point in time in the global economic cycle we’ve got to focus on being more competitive not less competitive, we should be bringing down the cost of doing business and the carbon tax and the mining tax, 18000 new regulations and the union militancy that we increasingly now observe on construction sites around Australia don’t help our international competitiveness particularly when we’re competing with investment destinations like Africa and other places around the world.
GILBERT
Alright lets finally look at something Malcolm Turnbull gave a speech last night and said that there is a crisis in trust in politics at the moment, Mathias Cormann your thoughts on that, it’s being interpreted by some as the scope of criticism is too narrow, the scope of debate is too narrow, he referred to people smuggling and the carbon tax being the entire focus of the opposition, to be fair to him as well he did say that was also an issue when he was opposition leader with Kevin Rudd Prime Minister.
CORMANN
Well just a couple of points, firstly there is a crisis of trust in Australia when you’ve got a Prime Minister who goes to an election promising there will be no carbon tax then delivers one straight after, clearly that is going to impact on peoples confidence and trust in the Australian government. Now I was in Perth on Tuesday at a lunch with Malcolm Turnbull and he gave a very eloquent speech, pointing to the waste and mismanagement and incompetence in this Labor Government, particularly in relation to the NBN project of course and he very eloquently pointed out that all of us in the Coalition, including him, are working very hard to make sure that we get a change of government and that Tony Abbott is Prime Minister after the next election.
GILBERT
Okay David Bradbury to wrap up with you, your thoughts on this speech and if you have a look at the speech in total there are some interesting points there rather than like the fact that question time should be to all Ministers not just the Prime Minister so it’s been interpreted as a slap to Tony Abbott but he also referred to his own issues when Opposition leader.
BRADBURY
Can I say I welcome more questions in question time, I look forward to a few of them coming my direction but can I make the obvious point, that what we saw from Malcolm Turnbull yesterday and what we’ve seen in the last couple of days in relation to the massive divisions that occur in relation to Cubbie Station, is that the cracks are starting to emerge within Mr Abbott’s leadership. The simple point that Malcolm Turnbull was making and this is a point that sensible people out there understand, that if your answer to every question is carbon tax and stop the boats, then at some point the questions are going to require answers that are a little bit more thought, a little bit more attention to the future interests of the country. We are approaching a point in the political cycle where all of these chickens are coming home to roost for Mr Abbott, it’s okay that he’s been out there saying no no no no no, at some point he’s going to have to confront the serious challenges that we face into the future. Whether that means slapping down Barnaby Joyce for his ridiculous comments when it comes to foreign investment, or whether it means confronting the question of how we sensibly tackle a future economy that’s not linked to increases in carbon emissions.
GILBERT
David Bradbury, Senator Mathias Cormann gents good to see you both, thanks for that.