2GB

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
Interview – 2GB Ben Fordham with Anthony Albanese
Wednesday 25 November 2015

SUBJECTS: South Australian fires; Downing of Russian Jet over Turkey; Newspoll

BEN FORDHAM: They are the odd couple, Christopher Pyne from the Liberal party, Anthony Albanese from the Labor party, gentlemen good afternoon to you both, lovely to hear your voices.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Good afternoon

BEN FORDHAM: We were going to start with matters overseas but instead I’m going to start local because Christopher as we go to air this afternoon there is a bushfire emergency in your home state of south Australia this afternoon we’ve just learnt that two south Australian firefighters have serious burns there are some reports that up to10 people have been injured apart from the two south Australian firefighters. They’ve got a real dilemma on their hands and a real emergency on their hands in south Australia today.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yes they have unfortunately, it’s an area I know very well in the mid north of South Australia, I spent a lot of my childhood in Clare which means I went many times through this part of the world I fact I was only up there about two weekends ago. We obviously hope that the two firefighters emerge as unscathed as possible from hospital after they’ve been treated and that there are no fatalities unlike the disaster in Western Australia in Esperance where we lost four Australians. But it seems that there are several fires burning in South Australia there’s one at Lameroo as well in the south east so we have quite a few challenges as we enter into the bushfire season.

BEN FORDHAM: Well we send our love to everyone in south Australia anyone whose listening from south Australia this afternoon lets go to overseas matters, Australia is calling for a clear and precises investigation into the downing of a Russian war plane over the Turkey-Syria border the Russian fighter jet was shot down by turkey after he has allegedly violated Turkish airspace 10 times within a 5 minute period. Russia insists the fighter jet was inside Syrian territory, the US military has backed up turkey’s claims saying Turkish pilots warned the jet 10 times but failed to get a response, the Russian president Vladimir Putin has said it’s a stab in the back hes warned of serious consequences for Russian-Turkish relations, the two plane’s pilots ejected by parachute right before the jet exploded they crashed in northern Syria both pilots were apparently shot dead as they descended Russia’s defence ministry and NATO are investigating the incident. You get the feeling Anthony Albanese that this is just really fired things up over there?

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Well this is indeed an unfortunate incident because it complicates what’s already an extraordinarily tense and dangerous situations in and around Syria, it is a time for sober reflection and discussion rather than sabre rattling but unfortunately one of the positive developments that we’ve seen in the region are people starting to get, well countries Russia and the united states and other countries including ourselves opposed to ISIS and who acknowledge that essentially we need to wipe ISIS out cooperating and heading towards a more coordinated response and it is really unfortunate that this has occurred, I mean we need to, my big concern is not just for the specifics of the incident but that it will diminish that cooperation that’s so vital for the defeat of ISIS.

BEN FORDHAM: Alright we know that ISIS or ISIL is the focus for the moment in this part of the world Christopher Pyne let me switch back to you for the moment, we can feel that there’s been a bit of a shift in the coalition government about the way that they are at least talking about Islamic state, Malcolm Turnbull’s taken a much softer tone than Tony Abbott does that mean that we’ll have a softer response militarily?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Not at all, in fact we have the second largest presence in the international coalition in the Middle East after the United States, not even on a per capita basis, this is in real terms. And that will continue. Malcolm made a very strong statement to the parliament on Tuesday about this. What is important though as well as having a plan to defeat ISIS militarily is to have a post war humanitarian plan, a diplomatic plan, a political plan, and to engage our greatest asset at home in the protection of Australian citizens which is the Muslim community, if you had the briefings from ASIO and the AFP that we’ve had here, your listeners would know that in fact that most of the time that there’s been an attempted action by a terrorist organisation in Australia or a terrorist person in Australia that’s been thwarted in the last year or so it’s because of information provided by the Muslim community to the authorities, we want that to continue and to gain even more strength.

BEN FORDHAM: Albo lets go back to you, your boss is struggling, Bill Shorten is the least popular Labor leader in more than a decade, the opposition leader has only 15% support as preferred PM, a 49 points behind Malcolm Turnbull, I made the point yesterday not that I want to go into too much detail of the tobacco excise increase, but he’s now picking on smokers as well, even though I think it’s quite noble to try and get people to smoke less and its important, if you increase the price of it people are probably going to buy less smokes. But he’s not Mr popular at the moment he’s Mr 15%, the last time Labor took on smokers in this way they suffered. Could Mr 15% become Mr 14% or dare I say it Mr 13%?

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Look let’s see how Malcolm Turnbull goes…

BEN FORDHAM: No, no I’m talking about Bill Shorten

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Well we’re talking about preferred Prime Minister figures between Mr... the figures that you quoted were preferred PM figure and the fact is that Malcolm Turnbull is having a political honeymoon, that tends to happen when there’s a change of Leaders and therefore, that’s having adverse consequences for Bill’s figures but we’ll wait and see when Mr. Turnbull actually does something. He says he wanted a national conversation about the GST (inaudible)

BEN FORDHAM: So you still think there’s a race to be had here Albo?

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Absolutely. We’re hanging in there and Bill made it very clear yesterday he’s hanging in there and

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I think you’ll find Anthony’s coming up on the outside of the field.

ANTHONY ALBANESE: In terms of the debate, in terms of the debate we’ll wait and see what happens when Mr Turnbull actually has to produce a Budget in May or whether he runs away from having a Budget and has an election before then

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I think if Bill looked over his shoulder he’d find Anthony very close behind him on the outside lane.

BEN FORDHAM: Well Anthony Albanese has been very loyal to Bill Shorten that must be said. Now, just quickly, there are journalists who are intrigued by these gatherings of Tony Abbott supporters in Parliament House. They gather in a meeting room that’s known as the monkey pod which is named after the hardwood table…

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Attached to Christopher’s office …

BEN FORDHAM: Is that right, so they meet in the monkey pod room, these are fans of Tony Abbott – parliamentary members who still wish that Tony Abbott was the Prime Minister – Tony Abbott at the last gathering even bought along a cake that he said was baked by his land landlady who is Peta Credlin. Now Christopher, I’m guessing that despite the fact that your office is right next door your invitation to these gatherings was lost in the mail?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I’m sure I would be very welcome to attend.

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Yeah like taking notes of who’s there and dropping it to the media!

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: People have lunches and dinners in this place all the time, I don’t think you want to read too much into that.

BEN FORDHAM: Hang on Albo you reckon because Christopher’s office is right next door he’s the one who must be telling the media who’s turning up to the meetings?

ANTHONY ALBANESE: That’s my old office and of course before that it was Tony Abbott’s office, the meeting room that’s attached to the leader of the house’s office and I would be at all surprised in Christopher Pyne is outside the office in a disguise…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: With my great coat…. My moustache, my big nose, and my glasses?

ANTHONY ALBANESE: Taking down names, taking photos… a little hat and glasses that’ll be Christopher

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yeah the only people around here who’ll be doing that is your supporters watching poor Bill Shorten’s every move

ANTHONY ALBANESE: He’ll be trying to pop out of a cake soon

BEN FORDHAM: Gentlemen it’s always good talking to you, we’ll talk to you next week.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I’m the last person anyone would want to see popping out of a cake!

ANTHONY ALBANESE: I agree but Tony Abbott’s got weird taste

BEN FORDHAM: Well we’ve seen Christopher in a wetsuit I think that was enough

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: You loved it.

BEN FORDHAM: Good on you, Anthony Albanese and Christopher Pyne.

[ends]