ABC 891
26 Mar 2014
Transcipt E&OE TRANSCRIPT
Interview - ABC 891 Adelaide with Matthew Abraham and David Bevan
26 March 2014
SUBJECTS: A new honour for pre-eminent Australians; South Australian State Election; Racial Discrimination Act.
COMPERE:
Good morning Christopher, or should I say Sir Christopher?
MARK BUTLER:
He’s blushing.
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
You flatter.
COMPERE:
And Mark Butler,
MARK BUTLER:
Good morning.
Maybe a Duke. Labor MP for Port Adelaide, Opposition Environment and Climate Cane Spokesperson. Welcome to the both of you. Chris Pyne, there are many people who might be thinking that the nation might have more urgent and pressing problems than making people Dames and Sirs, would that be a fair call?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well, we are able to walk and chew gum at the same time, Matthew. So obviously the Prime Minister wanted to make sure that Quentin Bryce and Peter Cosgrove were properly recognised as the incoming Governor-General and the Outgoing Governor-General, and Knights and Dames already formed part of the Australian Honours System, this is an Australian honour, not a British honour. It is exactly the same as the ACs, AMs and OAMs that are given on the Queen’s Birthday Honours and on Australia Day. And I think that is a reasonable recognition of the role that the Governor-General plays.
COMPERE:
What do you mean it is an Australia honour, we have no history of Knights and Dames, it is an honour conferred from the Queen, is it not, I mean just because it is on the list?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
So are all of the other honours, the AC, OAM, the AM, the AK, the Knight of the Order of Australia is a, or the Dame of the Order of the Australia, is an Australian honour not a British honour.
COMPERE:
Sure but you didn’t have many Orders of Australia people pouring boiling oil on the advancing hordes currant trying to climb up their castle, did you?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well that tis a very exciting word picture you have just constructed, Matthew, but I am not sure it is very relevant to the discussion we are having this morning.
COMPERE:
It is probably been a while since Knights and Dames in England have poured boiling oil in …
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
I think that is large leap. Saturday afternoon at the movies, kind of leap.
COMPERE:
Mark Butler, are you happy with this because all the Prime Minister is doing a reviving something that is already there, he is able to do it with Prime Ministerial prerogative. It is sitting there, he can do it, what’s wrong?
MARK BUTLER:
Well we may well be able to do it; I don’t think anybody has actually looked at this statute except the Prime Minister for decades. I just think it is an unimaginable thing to do and I think it is regrettable this morning that we are all spending so much time talking about. I think it and other things that the Government is trying to prosecute this week like the changes to the Race Hate laws says some very bad things about this Government’s priorities... [inaudible] … very serious challenges and we are talking about this silliness.
COMPERE:
Your leader’s mother-in-law happily accepted it to become our first Dame for some time.
MARK BUTLER:
Well I don’t know why she did that, whether she thought that was appropriate whether she was flattered, I think objectively though most people would see this as unimaginably silly and nothing but a cynical distraction by the Prime Minister.
COMPERE:
Mark Butler, Dennis Shanahan on the front page of The Australian today raises the issue that we have raised with you previously and that is how can Labor take the high moral ground on the bigotry issue when it played the race card in the South Australian election campaign. Now he is raising that on the front page of the paper, how would you answer him?
MARK BUTLER:
Well I think that these are very, very bad laws and I have heard reports of the Attorney-General finally saying that the laws that were published yesterday might be open to negotiation with the Government between the Government and community organisations because the Prime Minister has been completely unable to present a single community organisation that supports the changes that the Government has put forward. Now I think most of us thought this was going to be simply a bit of a sop to the Liberal barracker Andrew Bolt and his allies who have been calling for this but we saw the extraordinary proposition from the Attorney-General in the Senate earlier this week that people have a right to be bigots, to use his words.
COMPERE:
Well, don’t they?
MARK BUTLER:
Well no, we just fundamentally disagree with that.
COMPERE:
Why should it be illegal to be a bigot?
MARK BUTLER:
Well of course there is a prime facie right to free speech in a democracy like Australia’s. But it has never been absolute, it has never been absolute. These laws have served Australia very well now for twenty years, they curtail the right to free speech, to the extent that it damages people who are subject to this bigotry. Now it is all well and good for white men like us who aren’t often subject to bigotry to pontificate like the Attorney-General has done about the right to be a bigot, but these laws have served us well, there is not a single community organisation affected by these laws that are supporting the changes that the Prime Minister made. And I hope that the Attorney-General’s comments this morning indicate that they are going to back down on these changes.
COMPERE:
Chris Pyne, are you a little squeamish about this?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well Labor is being hoisted on its own petard, Matthew, because of course they can’t lecture the Coalition about racism when they played the race hate card in the Elder election with Carolyn Habib who they attacked for having a Lebanese surname. And this is the problem for Labor, they are a pack of hypocrites, they can’t lecture us on ministerial standards because they protected Craig Thomson for years when they knew that he was a bad egg and they can’t lecture on that because of Eddie Obeid, and Ian Macdonald and Michael Williamson and they can’t lecture us on issues to do with bigotry or racism because they quite conically attacked Carolyn Habib about her surname to try and win a seat. So I find that poor Mark Butler is hoisted on his own petard as I said earlier on.
MARK BUTLER:
I think it is quite telling that Christopher is not able to mount any sort of defence to the substance to the changes that are being made.
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well I am rebutting your…
MARK BUTLER:
Not a single defence…
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
I am rebutting your outrageous taking of the high moral ground when you are the party of the Carolyn Habib leaflet, and you …
MARK BUTLER:
Why don’t you mount an argument to the proper balance between free speech and protecting people against racial vilification?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well I believe in free speech and I don’t believe in political censorship. Now, I know that Labor loves political correctness but the simple truth is that these changes to the Racial Discrimination Act are an exposure draft, they will go out to community consultation and then we will land at a spot where the community thinks that it’s reasonable to balance freedom of speech with curtailing that freedom of speech in order to protect people’s wills and liberties.
COMPERE:
So you think it has gone a bit overboard?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
No it is an exposure draft, it is designed to be a point of discussion between us and the community and we will listen to what they have to say.
COMPERE:
Christopher Pyne, are you going to punish South Australia for having a Labor Government?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
No, of course not.
COMPERE:
You have referred to it as illegitimate, your colleague yesterday Jamie Briggs said on this show said, well look if Jay Weatherill has promised to underwrite Nystar, we don’t have to worry about it. You are sending clear signals, hostile signals, towards the Labor Government?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Look the situation is that we will have to deal with the State Labor Government because they have a majority on the floor of the House.
COMPERE:
So they are not illegitimate?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
No they are illegitimate, but that doesn’t change the fact that they have a majority of the floor of the House because they have a conservative seat, independents supporting them. They have 23 seats to our 22 and one member of Parliament is on extended health leave. But unfortunately for Jay Weatherill he won’t be remembered for a worthwhile contribution to South Australia, he will be remembered as a Premier who governed without the support of the people in defiance of the popular will and that’s why they are illegitimate.
COMPERE:
Chris Pyne, do you concede there were some own goals kicked by the Liberal Party I mean you had Rob Kerin who did not need to retire for any known reasons in any way, created a b-election which Geoff Brock won in what should be a Liberal Seat, you had Iain Evans who mounting a campaign against Bob Such, unnecessarily, because they weren’t going to win that seat at this election and there’s a text here from a Liberal Party member who says he is a Colton branch member: “I request that you ask Chris Pyne why he at the eleventh hour moved a motion to re-open nominations for pre-selection in Colton, he then used his factional weight to install his left-leaning candidate into that position, Joe Barry, who is a nearly sixty year old public servant with zero campaign experience and no local identity in the community over our star candidate who had two campaigns under her belt and had achieved significant swings against Labor in the past all because she wasn’t in her faction. I hold Chris Pyne personally responsible for us losing in Colton because of his factional meddling”.
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well there is always disaffected branch members unfortunately and that person should put their name to that text because of course it is grossly defamatory and entirely untrue and I think that you should read out their name on radio and then I will be able to sue them.
COMPERE:
Well which bits aren’t true?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well, all of it is untrue; I didn’t do anything of the sort. The State Executive made correct decisions about the Colton pre-selection and for you to read that text out without naming the person so I can’t sue them, I think is grossly unfair.
COMPERE:
You are saying there is no factional meddling by you…you’re saying
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Of course not.
COMPERE:
You had no role in any of the… any say…
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
None whatsoever.
COMPERE:
...in any pre-selections?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Only as a member of the State Executive.
COMPERE:
Well what do you mean, only as a member of the State Executive, that is a fairly…
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well there is eleven members of the State Executive and I think that reading out disaffected branch members’ text messages on radio without naming is grossly unprofessional.
COMPERE:
How is that defamatory, Chris Pyne?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Because it is utterly untrue, and I have said so, and you continue to ask me questions about it. It is utterly untrue, I refute it completely and I am sure that in terms of Rob Kerin retiring from Frome, it is very regrettable that he retired and the Liberals lost the by-election. It is also regrettable that I think they mistreated Bob Such for such a long period of time. And I think that is very regrettable and I like Bob Such very much and I am sorry that he is not well, and I wish he would support the Liberal Party when he gets better but simple truth is that what’s happened, and both of those seats are conservative leaning seats and both of those members in my view should be supporting a Marshall Liberal Government.
COMPERE:
Will you be encouraging Steven Marshall to take a hard line with Jay Weatherill in much the same way that Tony Abbott took a hard line with Julia Gillard?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well I think that Geoff Brock should be treated with the respect that he deserves as a Member of Parliament. I think Jay Weatheril should be held to account with governing with 47 per cent of the popular vote.
COMPERE:
Should he take a hard line, an aggressive approach to being Opposition Leader?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
He should take an aggressive approach as appropriate to hold a Government to account that insists on governing with 47 per cent of the vote. And Jay Weatherill will always be remembered as the premier who governed in spite of the popular will being against him and I think that is a very unfortunate for his legacy and I will be reminding him of it at every opportunity.
COMPERE:
Now Chris Pyne we know you have an engagement so you need to go.
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Thank you, I do.
COMPERE:
You feel you have had an ample opportunity to respond to that text we’ve read out?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Well I know that you are very keen to make sure that I have, but I think you have given it great amplification.
COMPERE:
Christopher Pyne, thankyou. Now we like to let our listeners have a say.
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Yes but you should name your listeners when they defame people on radio.
COMPERE:
Well, we will run it past our lawyers, how’s that?
CHRISTOPHER PYNE:
Why don’t you do that.
COMPERE:
Christopher Pyne, thank you, Federal Liberal MP for Sturt. And Mark Butler, how do you respond though to this, and we have been on air, you know, right up to the election and on election night and then since then and I can tell you that there is quite a flow of concern about people feeling that well this is not fair that people wanted a change, there was almost 52 per cent of the two party preferred, we don’t have the formal figure yet, it may fall a little short of that, and yet you have a Labor Government.
MARK BUTLER:
Well these are the laws that were set twenty years ago and I don’t remember Christopher using the very inflammatory term of illegitimate when John Howard won a majority of the seats in 1998 with a minority of the popular vote, but I think there will be a period, clearly, where Christopher is going to hold his breath and stamp his feet about the result but I think that more sensible people at the end of the day will realise that Australia, South Australia sorry, needs a constructive working relationship between the Commonwealth and State Governments. That doesn’t mean there won’t be very robust debate over the things like Jamie Briggs wanting to introduce toll roads into South Australia or Joe Hockey taking propositions to the Treasurers’ meeting in the next several days for us to sell our remaining private, publicly owned assets like SA Water. There will be robust debate but people I think realise in South Australia that in a very difficult four years that we are facing with the closure of the car industry, the end of the defence projects and such like, we need stable Government and politics at the end of the day is a context of ideas, not tantrums.
COMPERE:
Okay, Mark Butler, thank you, Labor MP for Port Adelaide and Opposition Environment and Climate Change spokesperson.
[ends]