ABC 891 Adelaide

UBJECTS: Repeal of Carbon Tax; Increase in the Debt Limit; Holden. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Joining us now from Canberra is Christopher Pyne, Liberal MP for Sturt. He’s Education minister. If you were watching the first day of Parliament yesterday, you would have seen his smiling face in the Government benches, behind Tony Abbott. Chris Pyne, good morning to you. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Good morning, gentlemen. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: And Mark Butler, Labor MP for Port Adelaide – I think he was smiling on the Opposition benches – and Opposition spokesperson on the Environment and Climate Change. Good morning to you, Mark Butler. MARK BUTLER: Good morning. Not as broadly as Christopher was, I don’t think. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: I think that’s fair comment. DAVID BEVAN: No, winners are grinners. Chris Pyne, first day back, in terms of the hard business, today… you also have the important job of Leader in [of] the House. Can you explain to our listeners what will be happening from 8:30 Adelaide time? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, the Prime Minister will attend in the House and introduce the repeal of the carbon tax bills, which of course was one of our major promises in the election campaign, and we hope that Labor will facilitate its passage but, if they want to attach themselves to the carbon tax forever more, that will be a political decision that they’ll have to make and then we’ll have the standing orders debate because we need to alter the standing orders slightly from the 43rd Parliament where obviously the crossbenchers were in alliance with the Government but the new Government has a clear majority of its own, so there’s a few changes that we’ll need to make, and introduce a couple of inventive ideas which I think will make the Parliament more spontaneous and interesting and then we’ll have the debt ceiling increase legislation, which… because of Labor’s financial mismanagement we are soon to reach the $300 billion debt ceiling and therefore we’ll need to increase that and we want to get that through soon to give stability to the economic markets and to the economy. DAVID BEVAN: Okay. With the carbon tax repeal bill, is the Government planning on letting the debate just run in the Lower House – you’ve got the numbers – or will you try and limit that and then get it up to the Upper House? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, today we have to get our debt ceiling bill through the Parliament. We’ll also have to have ‘maiden speeches’, of course, because there are 31 new Coalition Members of Parliament and I think there’s about a dozen or so new Labor Members of Parliament, so there’s lots of things to do and we also have to introduce the mining tax repeal bills, so I assume the carbon tax repeal bill will be through the Lower House next week rather than today or tomorrow. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Mark Butler, has there been any shift in the Labor Party’s opposition to repealing the carbon tax? MARK BUTLER: Well, our position hasn’t shifted and the position that we outlined at the election, the position we have today, is to support the termination of the carbon tax but not throwing out the baby with the bathwater. I have a look at the legislation list and there are even more bills listed now including the abolition of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation that’s been doing extraordinary work helping the development of large-scale wind power, large-scale solar power over the last couple of years, so it’s not just the termination of the carbon tax that’s before the Parliament. If it were, we’d happily support it. A whole range of other really important elements of a clean energy future for Australia are also in these bills and we’re simply not going to support Tony Abbott throwing the baby out with the bathwater. DAVID BEVAN: Christopher Pyne, will it reach a point where the Government will be expected by the population to achieve what is achievable and that is: focus on the carbon tax and then all of this other stuff which the Labor Party’s going to oppose in the Upper House… let it go? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No, we won’t be doing that. We went to the election campaign with a very clear policy with the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. Our policy was to abolish that because we don’t believe in the way that the Labor Party has set up a $10 billion fund to pick winners, to make unviable businesses viable. That’s no way to run a market economy. We made promises to the Australian public, we won the election and the public expect us to introduce those policies. If Labor intends to go through the election and keep pretending that they’re still in government then the public will mark them down very badly in three years’ time when the election is held. DAVID BEVAN: Not earlier, for a double dissolution; in three years’ time? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, I expect that the carbon tax repeal bill and all the other bills that go with it will pass both Houses of Parliament either in the next few months or in the months following June 30 next year but I doubt very much that Labor will want to continue to shackle themselves to a very unpopular tax which is destroying jobs, increasing prices and sending manufacturing industries overseas. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Okay, so it’s set positions here, isn’t it, and it’s going to have to be decided in the Upper House? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, it was decided at the election campaign. We won the election, which was a referendum on the carbon tax. Labor is now saying, ‘Electricity Bill’ Shorten is saying he’s going to ignore the will of the people. I think that’s very surprising. MARK BUTLER: Well, part of the challenge is that the Government, quite trickily, is putting these things, whether it’s the carbon tax or the mining tax, into these big omnibus bills that do a whole range of other things as well. I mean, take the mining tax, for example, that’s being presented today. The abolition of the mining tax is buried in legislation, for example, that also abolishes the Schoolkids Bonus for 1.2 million families around Australia. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, that’s because the Schoolkids Bonus was paid under the mining tax. MARK BUTLER: It was not paid by the mining tax. It’s fully budgeted. It’s something you want to cut. Be honest, be upfront, separate it out from the mining tax and have a debate about cutting that rather than trying to bury these things. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: If you want to also oppose the abolition of the mining tax, good luck to you. You know, what Labor is saying to the Australian public is ‘there was an election, we were reduced to 55 seats out of 150, we had our worst result since 1903, our worst Senate result since the Senate increased to 12, but we’re going to ignore all that, we’re going to say to the public ‘you got it wrong, we’re right and we’re going to keep pretending we’re in government’’. Well, if you want to do that in the Labor Party, you’ll be in opposition for a very long time and ‘make my day’. DAVID BEVAN: Mark Butler, the debate over the debt ceiling, which the Government wants to lift from $300 billion to $500 billion… is the tactic here really to force the Coalition to come back and increase the debt level just before the next election? MARK BUTLER: Well, the tactic here is to force the Government to be upfront about the books. One of my colleagues said yesterday that hypocrisy is the new black in Canberra. I saw Tony Abbott say that they’d happily helped us lift the debt ceiling while we were in government. Either he had a faulty memory or was deliberately trying to mislead the community because on a couple of occasions the Government – the Opposition, now the Government, the Liberal Party – voted simply to oppose a lift in the debt ceiling. What we’re saying today is we’re happy to support a lift in the debt ceiling by a third today, from 300 billion to 400 billion which, even on the Government’s own figures, takes them through to 2016. If they need to come back, be upfront, show us the books. The idea that you would lift the debt ceiling by two-thirds… MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Don’t you know what the books are? You’ve only been in opposition for a month or so! MARK BUTLER: Well, they’re saying… this is the Opposition that said to the community ‘we’ll pay off the debt’, you know, ‘when we get into government we’ll pay off the debt’. Now they’re saying they need the credit card lifted by two-thirds without telling the Australian people or the Parliament why that is the case. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Are you saying you wouldn’t have had to do that? MARK BUTLER: Well, I’ll say… well, we would have had to come back to the Parliament, it would appear, to deal with the debt ceiling if we were re-elected but, see , I think we would argue… lifted by 400 billion DAVID BEVAN: If you were expecting to come back and lift the debt ceiling, there’s no surprise here – just pass it. MARK BUTLER: Well, we are saying we would lift it by a third, happily, today. The idea that we should just happily lift it by two-thirds, by $200 billion, without any idea… DAVID BEVAN: And that gets back to my question. That’s because the debt tactic here is to get the Coalition Government to come back just before the next election and have to ask for another increase. MARK BUTLER: The tactic is to get the Government to come to the Parliament and indicate why it needs another lift in the debt ceiling. Last Parliament they opposed… MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Is this like the ‘Billy Tea Party’? You know, like, these are the games that the Tea Party arm of the Republican Party are playing. Is this a sort of a Down Under version of it, Mark Butler? MARK BUTLER: Well, I don’t remember you saying that when the Opposition – the Liberal Party – opposed any lift in the debt ceiling in the Parliament last time, twice. We’re saying we’ll lift it by $100 billion, by a third. We’ll do that today, very happily, very constructively. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Chris Pyne, $100 billion is not small change, is it? That’s a reasonable… CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, no, it’s not. This is the whole problem. Labor has left us in such a terrible state financially that we have to take quite dramatic action to address the emergency in the Budget but, listening to Mark Butler, the public could be forgiven for thinking that he still believes he’s running the Ministerial Wing in Parliament House. Truth is: Labor lost the election. The public rejected Labor’s medicine for our economy. They believe that they were a failure, not only a disunited rabble but also economically illiterate and dangerous to the Australian economy and yet this Mark Butler and ‘Electricity Bill’ Shorten are still pretending that they’re calling the shots. Now, at some point… I mean, I’ve been through opposition twice. At some point, the Opposition will realise that they’re on the other side of the House and they don’t get to run the country any more. MARK BUTLER: This, flat out, from someone who voted against any lift in the debt ceiling when in opposition, twice. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Chris Pyne, on a local issue here… well, it’s a national issue as well and that is General Motors-Holden [GM Holden Ltd]… the global head of General Motors, the head of international operations, Stefan Jacoby, arrived in Adelaide [Australia], as I understand it, over the weekend... according to reports… he did not come to Adelaide, did not meet with union officials even though they were prepared to fly to meet him, did not meet with workers. Did you have a meeting with him? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No, I didn’t. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: And did Tony Abbott have a meeting with him? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I don’t know. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Our understanding, our information is that Tony Abbott’s office pleaded to have a meeting with Stefan Jacoby and that General Motors wasn’t interested in meeting with the Prime Minister. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, how General Motors handles their Australian operations is really a matter for them. I think that… MATTHEW ABRAHAM: But if that was the case, and we understand it is the case… if that was the case, do you think it’s a funny way for a company that wants I think another quarter of a billion dollars from the taxpayer to behave? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, it’s a very good question and I think the Australian public and South Australian public will probably be asking that question as well. I think it’s a very unusual move for the chief executive of Holden in Australia to be moving to Hong Kong right in the middle of these very important negotiations, so what Holden does is really a matter for them. The Coalition will do everything it can in Canberra to keep Holden manufacturing but, of course, we need a willing partner in Holden. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: And if they’re not even willing to meet… and I’m saying this is from our information. We’re quite happy for you to check with Mr Abbott’s office if you have different information but our information is that he wasn’t able to get a meeting with the head of General Motors-Holden. Do you think that’s a funny way for them to behave, if that’s the case? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Ah, well, that’s a matter for Holden. I don’t want to give Holden advice on their negotiating strategy. DAVID BEVAN: But that would be an ominous sign? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, I’m not going to let you put words in my mouth, fellas. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Okay. Mark Butler? MARK BUTLER: Well, I don’t know anything about those arrangements, obviously, but I think an ominous sign is the fact that the new Government wants to cut some hundreds of millions of dollars from the existing car industry plan [Automotive Transformation Scheme] and throw into great doubt any possibility of support beyond 2016. This is a critically important issue for South Australia and, frankly, you know, arrangements around… about meeting times between ministers and the Prime Minister and the company are of secondary importance. What they need to do is make a very clear commitment to support the existing car industry plan. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, what Labor wants to do is run down the road chasing Holden with a blank cheque. Now, I don’t think anybody thinks that is an adult way to spend the Australian taxpayers’ money. We will do whatever we can to keep Holden open but we won’t do what Labor does which is run down the street chasing them with a blank cheque, which quite frankly when Labor was in power didn’t keep Ford open and Jay Weatherill’s Government’s been in power for 12 years and Holden is still facing this bleak future. What has Jay Weatherill’s Government done about it? MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Chris Pyne, thank you – Liberal MP for Sturt, he’s Education minister – and Mark Butler is the Labor MP for Port Adelaide, Opposition spokesperson on Climate Change and the Environment. Thanks to both of you. MARK BUTLER: Thanks, gentlemen. MATTHEW ABRAHAM: And that’s how things will be playing out in Parliament today in Canberra. Ends