Sky News - Showdown

SUBJECTS: Next federal election; political positions; Malaysia Solution; carbon tax

E&OE… 

Peter Van Onselen: Mr Pyne thanks for your company. 

Christopher Pyne: Good to be with you, Peter. 

Van Onselen: Are you worried that when you’re Manager of Government Business, assuming that the polls are accurate, things are going to be pretty nasty from the other side of the house, the current Government, given the way that you’re treating them now? 

Pyne: I think it depends on who the next Manager of Opposition Business is, but I don’t count my chickens before they hatch.  That’s a very dangerous thing to do in politics.  I’m not assuming that we have the next election in the bag.  There’s a long way to go before polling day.  I think we’re obviously in poll position at the moment because the Government is so bad and so divided and trying to introduce a carbon tax and can’t resolve their border protection woes and so on. 

This is a hung parliament, which makes it very difficult, but if we are lucky enough to win the next election and fortunate enough to get the people’s support, I hope that I will be the Leader of the House.  Whoever the Manager of Opposition Business is I shall treat them as kindly as Anthony Albanese has treated me. 

Van Onselen: You may not want to argue that you’re avoiding hubris let’s not put it that way.  But let’s be honest, you concede for the Government to win the next election, it would be the single greatest comeback in Australian political history? 

Pyne: Well, Peter, nobody realised that the Government would be so foolish as to neck a Prime Minister.  If they neck a second Prime Minister I think they’ll throw up their hands in horror and say let’s get some adults in the room to run the country because at the moment confidence is very low, people are very concerned and everyone is holding onto their money because they are worried about what’s going to happen under this Government. 

Van Onselen: Hence my question in fairness.  You talk about removing another Prime Minister.  It feeds into the woes, whether it’s a perception or a reality of what’s happening.  You’d agree for them to lose the next election would be the biggest and most painful defeat in the history of Australian politics? 

Pyne: If the poll were to be believed and if there were an election this Saturday, then the Government would very much struggle to win, but as you would well know in politics hubris is a poison and we are just getting on with the job of presenting as an alternative Government that has the unity, the stability and the policies to become a reasonable Government should we be lucky enough to win.  I hope the Government will hold an election.  They should hold one because they are introducing a carbon tax they don’t have a mandate for, but that’s really in their boat.  We just have to keep going on with our campaign ensuring we hold this Government to account because that’s what our supporters expect and judging by the on the ground evidence that I pick up people are very much wanting a change of government and an election. 

Van Onselen: Well, the Opposition are very much wanting this election.  You’ve just said it.  It’s said repeatedly by Mr Abbott.  If that’s the case, shouldn’t you have more policies good to go now so that the public and indeed commentators have more time to pick over them and work out whether they’re viable or not? 

Pyne: Well, there are a couple of points to be made there.  Number one, every policy we took to the last election – there were 314 policies – remains current until that policy is changed so if there was an election tomorrow, we would be in a position to implement a program.  Putting those specific policies to one side though, I think the Australian public know that the Liberal Party has had basically the same principals for 60 years.  We believe in strong border protection, we want to balance the budget, we believe in spending cuts to take pressure off interest rates, to take pressure off inflation and to lower the Australian dollar and we believe in a strong US Alliance. 

Our basic platforms have always been the same and the Australian public know that.  They know we’re not going to go on frolics that the public don’t regard as high order issues.  They know we’re interested in the cost of living because most of us with families and those of us who are seeing what’s happening in our electorate know that people are concerned about the prices of fruit, vegetables, electricity, gas and so on and the carbon tax is only going to add to that.  Our principals are the same and the public know what they are. 

Van Onselen: You mention principals.  Let’s go back to political philosophy for a moment before we get back to some of the particulars that are in the debate this week, carbon tax and so forth.  You’re considered to be by a lot of people a Liberal moderate.  Firstly is that true and secondly if it is what are the sort of issues you see yourself as being moderate on rather than “Capital C” conservative? 

Pyne: Look, Peter, I just see myself as a sensible member of the Parliamentary Party.  I don’t attach tags to myself or my colleagues.  Certainly on some issues I’m closer to the centre of the political spectrum than to the right. 

Van Onselen: So what are some examples.  Give us a few?  

Pyne: Well, for example I believe in an Australian head of state.  So I’m a republican.  Obviously Tony Abbott and I don’t share that view, he’s still a strong Monarchist but we work extremely well together we’re very close friends we don’t have to agree on everything.

Van Onselen: Let’s look at that subject then. How passionate are you about an Australian Head of State, how prepared are you going to be in Government to take your leader on about getting a referendum sooner rather than later?

Pyne: Well look I believe very fervently that every Australian should have the capacity to be the Head of State, the opportunity to be the Head of State which they don’t have at the moment but it’s very much a second order issue, I’m just giving you an example of an issue which I’m probably closer to the centre than to the right.

Van Onselen:  OK so we’ve got a second order issue that you’re closer to the centre rather than the right, what about a first order issue because let’s face it, I’m being fair here you are widely regarded as one of the leading moderates in the Liberal Party, as one of the leading moderates what’s a first order issue that you’re moderate on?

Pyne: Look Peter as much as I would love to give you and the media ammunition to say that there are splits in the Coalition, I’ve been around long enough to know that…

Van Onselen: This isn’t about splits it’s about whether you can pick issues that define who you are which is the way everything that gets written about you defines who you are which is being moderate. I’ve had other moderates in the Liberal party tell me how there’s a lot more personnel at the top ranks that are now part of the party, yourself, Hockey, George Brandis the list does go on but what I haven’t had any moderates do is tell me what the issues are that these senior moderates are actually changing the direction of a very conservative Liberal Party at the moment.

Pyne: Well I don’t think we’re any more conservative today than we’ve ever been. I mean we very much represent both the liberal and  conservative strains of philosophical tradition in the Westminster system. That’s one of the reasons we’ve been in Government for 40 of the last 60 years. The Australian public share our values generally; they’re not socialists, so if you’re talking philosophically obviously the Coalition is an amalgam of different views on different things. I am one of those people, on life issues for example, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, you would have to say that I have a pretty conservative view of things and I have a very good voting record on those issues if you agree with that position. But on other things, I don’t believe in government not playing a roll and ensuring those people who are finding it tougher to get support, I believe very fervently in the safety net and that those people who need more assistance to get the same opportunities that I’ve had for example should be given that assistance. I’m not in favour of cutting programs that are targeted assistance to people for example from low socio economic status background in the education portfolio or from Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander background, people who speak English as a second language at home, people with literacy and numeracy issues, in all those areas I would be - and I’m sure I would have the support of my colleagues - somebody who believes government has a roll to play.

Van Onselen: OK but would you agree, and this is a criticism of, if you like, the left within both major parties, would you agree that since 2001, vis-a-vis Tampa when a number of moderates were quite outspoken at various moments before being shut down about concerns about treatment of asylum seekers, on that particular issue whether you’re in the left of the Labor Party or a small L Liberal in the Liberal Party there seems to be a pretty broad consensus these days which is capital C conservative on how to deal with asylum seekers.

Pyne: Well I think that’s a very good issue you’ve raised because it highlights how the Liberal Party, with many liberals in it, and conservatives, believe in a border protection policy that has protections for asylum seekers. One of the splits in the Government at the moment between us and the Government is that Labor wants to send including the Labor left, they want to send unaccompanied minors and other asylum seekers to Malaysia which has no protection.

Van Onselen: And I think that is a disgrace I agree with you.

Pyne: It is.

Van Onselen: But I also think it’s a disgrace that you want to tow boats back to Indonesia which equally doesn’t have protections. Indonesia not only isn’t a signatory to the UN Conventions that Malaysia isn’t but there’s not even a non legally binding agreement in place there which there at least is for Malaysia.

Pyne: But in the Howard Government the Liberals in the party managed to do a number of things, one of those was to get children out of detention. When we lost Government in 2007 Peter, there were no children in detention and there were only four other people in detention.

Van Onselen: You’d concede that took years and years for that to happen?

Pyne: But hang on, also when we set up the Nauru processing centre and Manus Island a number of basic protections were put in place and the UNHCR did the processing with the Government of asylum seekers, now that showed that the Liberal and Conservative strains of the Liberal Party understood how important it was for individuals who are reasonably defenceless to have protections as well as being processed, about whether they should come to Australia or not – 43 percent came to Australia, 57 percent didn’t. Under this Government, under the Labor Government we are in the extraordinary situation where people like Melissa Parkes who was a human rights lawyer for the United Nations is voting on Thursday for children to be sent to Malaysia which is neither a signatory to the UN Convention nor has any protections been put in place to ensure that those people are given the same kind of support that they would have had if they were sent to Nauru.

Van Onselen: Let’s move on. The contemporary debate over the carbon tax that is going on, now it’s no secret that you were pretty close to Malcolm Turnbull; you were one of his lieutenants. You managed to re-craft yourself and be a key person around Tony Abbott as well, what about the issue though, that fact that he was fundamentally in favour of an ETS which was not that different in its fixed price on carbon to this particular scheme yet now the entire centre of the universe in this debate between the government and the opposition is about how bad the carbon tax is.

Pyne: Well I remain a good friend of Malcolm Turnbull, I wasn’t an old friend, I have remained a friend and I have always been a good friend of Tony Abbott’s.

Van Onselen: Just not a policy friend of Malcolm Turnbull anymore, on this particular issue

Pyne: I remain a friend of Malcolm Turnbull on all fronts. Can I just say in terms of Malcolm Turnbull’s position on the Emissions Trading Scheme that I supported as a member of his front bench and I supported it genuinely as well, even if I hadn’t been a member of his front bench. That changed when Copenhagen failed to reach any agreement internationally. We are now in a position where we are in the post Copenhagen world and no other country is introducing an economy wide carbon tax.

Van Onselen: Ok I accept that but I can’t entirely let you off on that because Malcolm Turnbull was prepared as you were and other members of the Coalition were to pass the ETS before Copenhagen; there was an opportunity then to say no, now that’s what the Abbott forces ended up doing. But the Turnbull forces if you like of which you were a part, were advocating at the time to pass it before Copenhagen. Now Greg Hunt told us on this programme the other week that that for him was essentially, and I don’t think I am verballing him, that it was essentially for him a loyalty to Turnbull than the policy itself, was that the same for you?

Pyne: I believed that we should pass the ETS before Copenhagen and I believed that Copenhagen would reach some kind of international agreement. I was absolutely sure that the rest of the world would move on an Emissions Trading Scheme or some kind of programme for dealing with emissions. I was as shocked as anybody that Copenhagen was so manifestly unsuccessful, but it was manifestly unsuccessful. We are now in a position where even George Osborn, the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Brittan is saying that Brittan won’t ruin their economy in order to move further ahead then the rest of the world with respect to reducing their emissions and they account for 2% of the world emissions. Now we have to deal with the reality with the current situation. Australia is the only country that is introducing an economy wide carbon tax, we have the alternative of Tony Abbott’s Direct action plan which would achieve the same outcome without destroying the manufacturing sector, the steel industry, the coal industry and pushing up electricity prices by at least 10%.

And if beggar’s belief Peter that the Labor party would be so stubborn, so proud, that they would refuse to accept that they are instituting policy that is going to wreck the economy, cost jobs, destroy communities. They should be hanging their heads in shame that they passed this Bill this afternoon because far from delivering an achievement as Greg Combet keeps trying to tell us, it is actually the end of the duplicity in the House of Representatives before tomorrow morning because they lied to the Australian people before the election that they wouldn’t introduce it. The only mandate that this government has is not to introduce a carbon tax and that’s why we are back at the same point that we must have an election so the public can have the final say.

Van Onselen: And presumably that’s also partly why they have so woeful polling numbers. But when you say that you were shocked, manifestly shocked that Copenhagen would fail as it did, maybe we have found something that you really are a true moderate on because I have never had any faith in international systems or organizations being able to achieve consensus outcomes. I had no faith that Copenhagen would be able to. You can’t be serious, that you were so naïve, someone who is as well read as you are on foreign affairs that you didn’t think that that would be a failure as a conference, you must have realised it was a tough one?

Pyne: Well most commentators around the world were indicating, even people in the Chinese government were indicating that they would go to Copenhagen with good faith to bring about an outcome. The United States said it, Europe said it, and we said and so did most of the other third world or developing countries. It was manifestly derailed for a whole host of reasons, but once it was derailed, the circumstances changed. And Australia is now acting alone and all this carbon tax will do is export our emissions, export our jobs and cost Australian familles their livehoods, and it’s quite frankly vandalism for the government to go ahead with it knowing as they do what we all know.

Van Onselen: one final quick question before we let you go Mr Pyne. Do you concede that if you win the next election that it is more likely to be because of problems in the government rather than great alternatives from the opposition? I know that you have alternate polices, that there are a number that the leadership group are passionate about, but do you agree with the old adage that it’s not oppositions that win elections it’s governments that losses them?  

Pyne: Well I think the public will make an assessment on Election Day that the Liberal party is a better party to manage the economy, that they are a better party to reduce cost of living pressures, interest rates, inflation and the Australian dollar. That they are a better party to protect our borders, to ensure that we don’t have to cut defence spending because of this governments profligate spending, to assure that we have a strong alliance with the United States and that we are working with our partners in Asia, like Indonesia, like Malaysia, Thailand and at the moment the government is busily trashing all of those relationships.

ENDS