STEVE CANNANE, PRESENTER:
Now for our regular Friday night forum with Opposition spokesman for Finance, Tony Burke, and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer, Steve Ciobo. They joined me earlier in our Sydney studio.
Steve Ciobo, Tony Burke, thanks for joining us.
CIOBO:
Pleasure.
BURKE:
G'day.
CANNANE:
Let's start with the debt ceiling. Now Steve Ciobo, Joe Hockey says he has no choice but to bring in massive cuts to Government expenditure if Labor does not approve the $500 billion debt ceiling but he could accept the $400 billion figure Labor has agreed to or he could publish the economic forecast so the Parliament can make a decision based on those numbers. Is the Treasurer manufacturing a crisis?
CIOBO:
You know Steve it's extraordinary this is Labor's position on this. I have actually got with me, from PEFO, the economic statement, we see here $370 billion of peak debt that's predicted under Labor and this is a Treasury minute that was actually tabled by the former Treasurer, the Member for Lilley, from the Australian Office of Financial Management which makes it very clear that they need a $40 to $60 billion buffer.
So $370 plus $60 is $430 - right there, and that's before we even deal with the fact that, for example, we've had to pump nearly $9 billion into the Reserve Bank reserve fund because Labor kept pulling extra special dividends out of the Reserve Bank.
So the simple fact is this - Labor is playing politics with our debt limit, Labor is driving us towards a situation using Tea Party style politics where Australia now has uncertainty surrounding the circumstances of what will happen with our debt limit and the simple reality is Labor needs to face up to the task that we do not intend to govern like them.
We want to visit the issue once, we want to get it up to $500 billion because we know it's more than adequate cover and that way we don't have to visit the issue again unlike Labor.
And we saw yesterday the Shadow Treasurer saying, "Well this will get you through December." We don’t want to get through on a month by month proposition, we want to deal with it once and settle it.
CANNANE:
Tony Burke, it was your side of politics who brought the debt ceiling in and during the Rudd-Gillard Government it went from $75 billion to $300 billion. Why are you being so obstructionist on this when you were in the situation yourself of wanting to raise the debt ceiling.
BURKE:
It's hardly obstruction, what Steve didn't read on the first bit of paper is what year the $370 applies to and the year I think you'll find is ‘16/17.
CIOBO:
But why do you want to visit this, Tony.
BURKE:
This is really simple. All Joe Hockey has to do as Treasurer is release the full budget update. He's saying he's going to wait until December. He brings it forward, releases a full budget update and if that provides the information to justify it then fine, if not there's no urgency.
CIOBO:
But see, this is the point, Steve-
BURKE:
Is there any chance you're going to go to $400 soon? Any chance?
CIOBO:
This is what Labor doesn't get, Steve. The Labor Party says, "This isn't going to happen for another two years so we don't need to worry about it."
Labor doesn't get that we want to provide certainty and stability to the financial markets at a time of economic tumult, frankly the last thing we need is to have this hanging over our heads so let's stop playing politics, Tony. Your side needs to get we want to deal with this once and put it behind us. Don't play politics on this, on your own numbers it's $430 billion. We had to put money into the Reserve Bank. There's $440 billion so stop playing games, let's deal with it once and then it's done.
BURKE:
Steve, two things. First, there's an argument about how much money you had to put into the Reserve Bank and your Treasurer's still refusing to release the letter of that being requested...
CIOBO:
So you think it should it stay at the three or four per cent...
BURKE:
I didn't talk over you and you're not going to talk over me, Steve. The second issue, though, is that the $400 that's on offer is more than enough-
CIOBO:
It's not.
BURKE:
It's more than enough for your current purposes and to say, to say as you just did, that what the Government wants is to give the market certainty and stability, if that's the case, why is the Treasurer talking the language of crisis?
Why is the Treasurer - you used the Tea Party analogy, the difference here is it's the Treasurer threatening to bring down Government services. He's the one who's actually saying he'll have to do all of the shutdown for a limit that couldn't possibly be reached on all the information we have anywhere near 16/17.
CANNANE:
Alright, to many economists this whole debate is a complete farce. Already our Parliament scrutinises the budget bills and Australia's survived 107 years without a debt ceiling. Why do we have one?
CIOBO:
I think this is an important distinction between economic theory and practical politics. The reality is this Steve, that the reason you have a debt ceiling is to prevent Australia from getting into a situation that's akin to what we've seen with debt to GDP ratios in excess of 100 per cent in European nations and the United States and countries like that.
We want a debt ceiling because we want there to be restraint on Government's opportunity to borrow money. Labor largely was unfettered. That's the reason we went from net assets to now having a mountain of debt approaching $400 billion and expected to exceed $400 billion on Labor's own figures.
That's the reason why we say let's deal with this issue once, let's not play politics. We don't want to kick the can down the road. What Tony's basically saying is let's kick the can down the road and deal with it again in another year or two. That's what they did in the US. We don't want that.
CANNANE:
Tony Burke, you were a member of the Rudd government, you're a minister of the Rudd Government when they brought in the debt ceiling, the respected economist Saul Eslake thinks too many of you were watching too much of the 'West Wing' at the time. Why do we need one when it causes all this chaos?
BURKE:
It provides an extra level of discipline on Government and both sides of politic agree that's a discipline worth come having.
CANNANE:
A lot of economists say you don't need it. Chris Richardson, Saul Eslake.
BURKE:
That's right, that's right and there were more who came out today, lots of economists have the view. The thing that has been extraordinary here is that after spending the whole lead up to the election campaign railing against debt and using lines like, "If debt's the problem, more debt's not the solution," nobody thought that the people saying that would then have as one of their first actions that they'd ask permission to take debt to half a trillion dollars.
CIOBO:
What a - this is a disingenuous argument because the former Treasurer, the Member for Lilley himself admitted the debt ceiling would have to go up purely as a consequence of Labor's legacy so for it to be claimed the $200 billion is all Liberal party, is ridiculous.
CANNANE:
Alright, I want to talk about the Parliament. This week Tony Abbott promised a grown-up Government. This week Christopher Pyne, the Leader of the House, was calling the new Opposition Leader Electricity Bill in the Parliament. Is that an act of a grown-up Government?
CIOBO:
We used to have again the Labor Party talking about Sloppy Joe and these sorts of comments. I'm not going to be lectured to by the Labor Party. The reality is we all believe that parliamentary standards should improve.
CANNANE:
Should the Speaker have over ruled that and said that was unparliamentary?
CIOBO:
I'm not going to revisit and reflect on what the Speaker's done. The reality is that what we're going to do is we supported the Speaker. The reality is what we're going to do is make sure we raise the standard of Parliament. I'm not going to say to you that every single time it's going to be wonderful but we genuinely want to see an improvement in parliamentary standards and we hope Labor will join us in that.
CANNANE:
Tony Burke, you called this title Electricity Bill being named in the Parliament as it was as "cheap schoolyard name calling", was it any worse than you likening the new Speaker Bronwyn Bishop to Deloris Umbridge the cruel witch turned head mistress in the Harry Potter books?
BURKE:
I actually likened the entire Parliament to Hogwarts and used an invisibility cloak reference.
CANNANE:
And you said that Deloris Umbridge is running the school so I take it you're referring Bronwyn Bishop there.
BURKE:
That's right, so and when you're talking about, when you use a Harry Potter reference everyone is going to be like that.
The difference was look, what Christopher Pyne said wasn't the worst insult that's ever been thrown around the Parliament. The difference was he wasn't asked to withdraw it when it was raised. Normally something like that's said, if someone takes offence - and there's no evidence from what I've seen that Bronwyn Bishop took any offence at all to what I said. But if someone takes offence, normally they're asked to withdraw and they withdraw and gets on with it.
The difference this time, he wasn't asked to withdraw, when it was raised and the dissent motion was taken t was ruled for the first time that that sort of name calling now is going to be considered okay even if people take objection -that - is a big shift.
CANNANE:
The Government is pushing for changes to rules governing the parliamentary procedures including allowing only Ministers to move a motion suspending standing orders. Isn't this a bit rich given that you had close to 100 suspensions of standing or attempted suspensions of standing orders during the last Parliament?
CIOBO:
Steve, if I listened to Tony Burke I'd think that was an accurate summation but the reality is it was the same motion put on the notice paper by the Labor party when Labor was in Government and in fact was a motion that was put on the paper under the previous coalition Government under John Howard so there is absolutely nothing new about this.
Tony's been out the trying to make hay and trying to claim this is in some way a startling new revelation and an example of this Government being keen on secrecy and controlling the Parliament. That's not the case. This is a standard motion that's been moved under the Labor Party and under the Coalition previously. Labor needs to take a cool drink of water, calm down and get on with the program.
BURKE:
Sorry but are you saying therefore the standing orders won't be changing? It's just there on the notice paper but like what has happened in previous parliaments, there won't be an attempt to enforce it?
CIOBO:
I'm saying you shouldn't be hypocritical Tony, because what I think people have had enough of is the Labor Party being hypocritical. They've had enough of, for example, you saying you want a better Parliament and yet you were happy to use and abuse parliamentary rules so the vice president of Indonesia was kept waiting for 45 minutes to meet with the Prime Minister while you yourself played games on the floor of the Parliament. That’s what people have had enough of.
BURKE:
The Prime Minister could have left at any point. Do you think there was any danger of you losing your majority?
CIOBO:
The Prime Minister couldn't have left at any point because the very next thing the Prime Minister had to do was introduce the bills in Opposition to repeal the carbon tax.
BURKE:
You're in charge of your legislation.
CIOBO:
He was there waiting to do that purpose.
BURKE:
You could have switched the legislation at any point or Christopher Pyne could have stood up, said, "To help the Parliament I withdraw," and it was all over. The taunting and teasing was more important to you guys than keeping to the time for the Indonesians.
CIOBO:
The Leader of the Opposition never asked for a withdrawal and that's a key point, never ask for withdrawal.
TONY BURKE:
I did.
CANNANE:
I want to move on and talk about asylum seekers. Today we saw a very different kind of Friday briefing on asylum-seeker policy. Lieutenant General Angus Campbell gave more information about why secrecy was important to the operations than he has previously. There was a bit of a move as well from the Minister to distance Defence from the political aspects of these briefings and Scott Morrison's tone was a little bit different he was less dismissive to journalists asking questions. Were these changes an admission by the Government that they haven't got the briefings right in recent week?
CIOBO:
Look Steve, you're applying a whole bunch of assumptions and reading of the tea leaves in terms of the way you've put the question.
Let's talk about what's going on with Australia's border sovereignty. As you know we introduced a military-led operation, Operation Sovereign Borders, and let's look at what's happened because in the last couple of days we've seen Labor trying to claim credit for a reduction in the number of boat arrivals. In the last eight weeks the number of asylum seekers coming to Australia by boat was around 700.
In the previous eight weeks, before we were sworn in, under Labor, the number was 3,400. We've gone from 3400 to 700. Labor says, "Hang on, this is all because we introduced new regional processing arrangements."
Well you know what, that's not the case because the eight week period that I talk about where there were 3,400 was after that announcement so we're comparing apples with apples and the stark fact is this, there has been a 79 per cent decrease in the number of boat arrivals into Australia and that's comparing eight weeks under us with eight weeks after Labor after the announcement.
CANNANE:
Tony Burke, when you were Immigration Minister you wanted to stop the boats. Is the Coalition doing a better job than you were?
BURKE:
They're implementing the policies that we started. The policies they took to the election like going around fishing villages and buying back boats they haven't been doing, the turn-arounds they haven't been doing.
If you look at the figures Steve referred to, the impacts of the policy change we had was you had week on week a significant reduction in the numbers. By the final two weeks lead nothing to the election campaign it was down to one boat a week.
In the last week there's been three boats, I'm not going to claim that's an increase from us. Effectively what's happened is the numbers have gone right down, it happened by the time of the election campaign it was down to one boat a week by then.
What they've doing is they have realised, as we told them, that the crazy policies they had about buying up fishing vessels and doing the turn-arounds and tow backs weren't going to work. What they had to do was implement the regional arrangements. That is actually what they're doing. They've changed the media strategy, I'll give them that but that's all.
CANNANE:
I want to talk about a specific issue because this week it was revealed there was an asylum-seeker who was separated from her newborn baby boy who was in hospital in Brisbane with respiratory issues. Apparently she could only visit her baby for six hours a day. Do you think that is inhumane?
CIOBO:
I think what's happened there is regrettable and I notice that today the Minister has indicated he's asked his department to undertake further review of the situation and investigate what's exactly transpired. It is regrettable what's happened. But the simple fact is this, that in relation to this particular area there's been no policy change under us to what there was under Labor and I would certainly hope that Labor doesn't attempt to point score out of this because there's been no policy change. The incident's regrettable, we'll get to the bottom of it. The Minister's undertaken to do that.
CANNANE:
Will the Minister make sure this won't happen again?
CIOBO:
I would hope that is the case and I have no doubt that will be the situation going forward.
CANNANE:
Tony Burke, could this have happened under Labor?
BURKE:
I'm not going to grandstand on this. If they are staying it shouldn't have happen then I agree with that. If they're putting steps... issues in place to make sure that it doesn't happen again, then that's good. I'm not going to try to point score on everything.
CANNANE:
Kevin Rudd decided to leave the Parliament to retire from politics this week. Now Mark Latham channelled Paul Keating in his column for the Fin Review saying Bill Shorten has had a rainbow hit him in the back side with the departure of Kevin Rudd. Is that a fair description?
BURKE:
I just think so much has been said and I'm one of the people who's made comments about Kevin over the years. I think at the end of his political career, he's a former Prime Minister, we can all show a bit of grace and wish him well, wish him and his family well and look at the sorts of positives like the Apology, like the handling of the global financial crisis, like the extraordinary political victory over John Howard and I think that's the right way to deal with it.
CANNANE:
Steve, have you got nice things to say on your fellow Queenslander on his retirement from Parliament?
CIOBO:
I mean the fact is he was Australia's 27th Prime Minister and he's deserved and accorded respect having reached the pinnacle of Australian politics and the leadership of our nation. I'm not going to be quite so flattering and saying everything he did was wonderful.
There is a very serious legacy we've got to deal with. There were unfortunately some very poor policy examples that took place under his leadership but that notwithstanding, this is hardly the time or place to go on the attack on those things and I have no intention of doing that.
CANNANE:
Gentlemen we've run out of time. Thank you for joining us.
CIOBO:
Thank you Steve.
BURKE:
Thanks.