6 July 2021

Interview with Chris Smith, The Kenny Report, Sky News

Note

Topics: 2021 Census, Julia Banks.

Chris Smith:

Assistant Treasurer, Michael Sukkar, joins me from Melbourne. Thank you so much for your time, Michael.

Minister Sukkar:

Good day, Chris. Good to be with you.

Chris Smith:

Are you happy to be in charge of this or have you drawn the short straw?

Minister Sukkar:

No, Chris, I’m very pleased to have carriage of the Census this year. The data is so important as our advertising campaign makes clear with every stat telling a story. The data is so important, not only to government agencies who are making decisions around health, education and infrastructure, but to so many businesses around Australia who rely on ABS statistics for their own businesses and decision making and planning. The data we get out of the Census is incredibly important. Yes, there were some challenges in 2016 - some quite significant challenges - but we’ve worked very hard - the Government and the Australian Bureau of Statistics - to the greatest extent possible, mitigate against similar issues but we’ll be working very hard between now and 10th August which is Census night, to make sure we deliver a seamless service.

Chris Smith:

So do you know who is in charge of the technicalities, the online responsibility, because last time that didn’t go so well?

Minister Sukkar:

Yes, we do. We have Amazon Web Services who are integral in helping deliver the Census. We’ve been working very closely with the Australian Cyber Security Centre, the Australian Signals Directorate and other security agencies throughout government, to make sure that we can deliver a seamless service. As you said in your intro there, Chris, a slight tweak to this year’s Census is that people will be able to fill out their form in the lead up to Census night. People will receive a letter in their letterbox, most Australians will receive a letter, it will give them a unique identifying code, they can get on as soon as they’re ready to complete their Census if they know where they’re going to be on Census night, complete that form, get it done, that should take a bit of the pressure off the night. That’s not really the motivation for that, Chris, it’s a decision that we’ve taken to try and encourage people to do it and, as I said, make this as easy a process for Australians as possible.

Chris Smith:

What about if you’re not connected online, you don’t have internet access? What do those people do?

Minister Sukkar:

There’s around a quarter of people who we expect will complete hard copy forms. They will be able to request a hard copy form. Some areas of Australia will only receive hard copy forms - those with relative lack of internet connectivity. So for about a quarter of the population we think they will require forms. If you do get a letter with a code but you don’t want to fill it out online - you’d rather have a paper form - there’s a phone number you can call or you can request it online as well, a hard copy, to come to you. We will do everything humanly possible to get the answers from Australians. We have a 95 per cent response rate which is high by international standards. We’ll be striving to try and get that response rate as high as possible so we won’t allow any barriers to stand in the way. If people want a hard copy form, we’ll get a hard copy form to them.

Chris Smith:

There are a hell of a lot of Australians who wouldn’t normally be in the country who may have been expats returning, there’s a stack of people here now. Will the Census be a little bit out of whack because of the changing times or is this beneficial because you’ve got access and information from more Australians?

Minister Sukkar:

Well undoubtedly it’ll be beneficial, Chris. I think no doubt there’s been an impact due to Covid with expat Australians returning and relatively lower net overseas migration. In the end, the Census only counts the people that are here on that night or in the period, that’ll be the case this time around. I suspect where we’re be talking about material differences, the data will prove that one way or another. In the end, the impact of Covid is here and the Census will give us data that, as I said, can help inform the decision-making for the future. The impact of Covid from a population perspective is going to have long-term consequences. In a sense there perhaps isn’t a more important time to conduct a Census and it has just so happened that the five-yearly Census is this year but it will be incredibly important data.

Chris Smith:

Two quick questions about the heavy-duty allegations levelled at some government minister and also the Prime Minister by Julia Banks in her book. She’s been on most channels talking about this last night and today. She didn’t miss the Prime Minister, Michael.

Minister Sukkar:

Well Chris, I’m not sure there’s a great deal I can add. Clearly there’s some pretty strong political motivations that are going on. Julia Banks - a former colleague of mine, a failed candidate at the last election - has been a fairly relentless critic of the Government for a number of years now. She’s got a book to sell, I think we all understand that she’s out there trying to get as much support for that book as she possibly can. But clearly a very highly political agenda, Chris and I’m not sure I can speak for her motivations other than to say I think we can look at them through that prism of a very highly political agenda.

Chris Smith:

What I find interesting is that she’s quite happy to praise and show respect for the commissioner who’ll run an examination of that kind of culture and workplace behaviour inside Federal Parliament House but she doesn’t want to submit her allegations to that investigator because she doesn’t trust the process. So she trusts the person running the process but she doesn’t trust the process. Wouldn’t it be better if these allegations were ironed out and sorted out and determined?

Minister Sukkar:

Well Chris I can’t asses her motivations for the information she’s disclosing. I think really they’re questions for her and for those sorts of issues they are very personal and in a sense, she has to account for those, I’m not going to make a judgement on it. The point I’m making is a bit broader in that Julia Banks has been a staunch critic of the Government since she left it, she had a failed attempt at being elected at the last election - I suspect that didn’t help her perception of the Government - and so a lot of her criticisms of the Government I think can be seen through that prism. As for her specific allegations, really, they are personal to her and only she can really answer those questions, Chris.

Chris Smith:

Good luck with the Census in August and all the very best. Thank you for your time.

Minister Sukkar:

Thanks so much.