BRIDGET ARCHER:
It’s great to have the Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, here in Launceston again. He’s been here last night, yesterday afternoon and again this morning, talking with local Mayors and General Managers. We had our politics in the pub session last night and we’ve been here talking with business leaders in the Chamber of Commerce this morning. So, welcome, Treasurer.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Thank you, Bridget. Well, it is a great pleasure to join Bridget Archer here in Launceston. Bridget is doing a fantastic job on behalf of her community, brings a great deal of experience to the Parliament having been a farmer, having been a local mayor and she’s deeply respected by her local community and will be a wonderful advocate for her local community. Here in Launceston, we met with Bass Mayors from Georgetown to Dorset and in between. That was a good opportunity to talk about their local priorities and how the Commonwealth Government is working with them. We had a politics in the pub session last night and this morning I addressed the Launceston Chamber of Commerce, with business leaders representing a whole series of industries, talking about the Government’s economic plan but also the great opportunities for Launceston as a hub of innovation, agriculture, technology, forestry and tourism. And there are great opportunities here for the local community.
We talked a lot about the Launceston City Deal; $198 million contribution from the Commonwealth Government which is focusing on investing in the Civic Square, investing in the University of Tasmania, investing in the rivers health, as well as a whole series of other projects which were announced in the lead up to the election. But the Prime Minister visited Tasmania many a time and got a very warm welcome here and that, obviously, was reflected in Bridget’s election to the Parliament where she’ll do an outstanding job.
QUESTION:
Have you approved waiving Tasmania’s historic public housing debt?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Yesterday I had a good chat with Tasmanian Treasurer, Peter Gutwein, about this issue and Michael Sukkar, the Housing Minister, continues to talk to key stakeholders. This is an important issue but I do want to emphasise that the Commonwealth is providing $165 million to Tasmania over the next five years under the Housing and Homelessness Agreement. And as a Government, we spend over $6 billion a year on housing. So this is a really important area of focus for us and we’ll continue to provide good support to Tasmania for this important issue. On that particular topic that you raised, we continue to have discussions.
QUESTION:
What came out of those talks with the state government yesterday? Where are you going to from here?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, there was two of us in those discussions and you weren’t one of them. So, we’ll keep it between the two of us, but they were productive discussions about what is an important issue to Tasmania and, obviously, it is an issue that has been raised repeatedly before.
QUESTION:
Infrastructure Australia is warning that the cost of congested roads and public transport will double unless governments do more than just play catch up on projects. Does the plans your government has in place, will they address these issues and can you free up more funding for further projects if needed?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, we acknowledge this report and it does identify the population growth challenges that are being posed for communities and the need for investment and infrastructure. We have $100 billion pipeline of infrastructure projects which is the most significant investment in infrastructure in Australia’s history. Let’s not forget that Labor was spending about $6 billion a year, we’re now spending over $10 billion a year and the states are also investing heavily in infrastructure. And where the report identifies priorities, we’re investing in them. So for example, road safety, we’re making a $2.2 billion investment in road safety initiatives. We’re spending over $4.5 billion on improving freight routes. And this report, as the Deputy Prime Minister has pointed out, did not include the $23 billion of spending that we announced in the budget and did not take into account 160 congestion-busting projects that we’ve also announced. So, there is a very strong pipeline of projects. We’ll continue to invest more in infrastructure and I will look on a case-by-case basis what projects can in fact be brought forward if that is appropriate. But what we are focused on is delivering a record amount of spending on infrastructure so that Australians can get to work sooner and they can get home sooner and safer as well.
QUESTION:
We saw Nazi memorabilia being sold at auction here in Launceston last week. Do you have a personal view on that sort of thing being sold in Australia and would the Government ever consider implementing a ban on sales on that in particular?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Look, I understand Will Hodgman had a few comments to say on that. I find Nazi memorabilia abhorrent as many Australians would. We saw reports yesterday of a promotion for a theatre production in Melbourne of the Diary of Anne Frank being daubed with swastikas. Now, this is simply unacceptable. It’s more than insensitive, it’s disgraceful. It’s a criminal act and these criminals have no shame and no sense of history. Unfortunately, we have seen a rise in antisemitism across Australia and, indeed, across many parts of the world. We are now seeing more criminal acts of vandalism and swastikas being daubed across posters and banners in Melbourne and elsewhere. My election banners were daubed with swastikas. My neighbouring colleague, Katie Allen, who is not Jewish, her posters were daubed with swastikas. Julian Leeser in Sydney had a similar experience. I know Scott Morrison feels very strongly about this and he has spoken out about it and I’m sure Daniel Andrews feels equally strongly about this, as well as Will Hodgman. It’s up to the law enforcement authorities, it’s up to our police and our intelligence agencies to ensure that this type of behaviour is stamped out because it is unacceptable in our community. Particularly when you think about the many Australian lives that were lost fighting Nazi tyranny and Nazi oppression and we fought for our values; our values of freedom, democracy, equality and these were protected and enhanced by the defeat of the Nazi war machine. So now for people in our country to be daubing promotions of a theatre production of The Diary of Anne Frank is just completely unacceptable.
QUESTION:
(Inaudible – Tasmania’s public housing debt)
BRIDGET ARCHER:
Look, I’ve had ongoing conversations with Ministers about this, including Minister Sukkar and most recently as well with the homelessness Minister, Luke Howarth. There is a range of complex issues when it comes to housing and homelessness and the housing debt that Tasmania experiences is one part of that and there are ongoing discussions- I was also not in the room- with those two people yesterday but we’ll be having ongoing discussions about what the federal Government may be able to do to assist in relation to homelessness and housing pressure in Tasmania.
QUESTION:
In those conversations, are you asking the Government or your colleagues to forgive that debt?
BRIDGET ARCHER:
Look, what I’m looking at is the complexity of the issues across the board and I accept that the housing debt is one part of that but I’m not convinced that it’s the only part of that that needs to be addressed, so we are continuing to have vital discussions.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
I can say that Bridget, as well as the other Tasmanian colleagues, are pushing hard for Tasmania’s interests to be advanced and protected and as I said earlier, this is an ongoing discussion. We are very conscious of the importance of this issue. In my phone conversation with Peter Gutwein yesterday, because he has torn a hamstring, I don’t know if you know that, but I shouldn’t be revealing the dangerous habit he has of skateboarding, but it’s put him out of service for a little bit. But we had an important discussion yesterday about this important issue. Thank you.