Subjects: Labor’s cost of living and homegrown inflation crisis; government waste; the Coalition’s plan for cheaper, cleaner, and more consistent energy for Australia; Labor’s energy policy shambles; anti-Semitism; Labor’s ‘nature positive/mining negative’ secret deal with the Greens; electoral donation reform; NHMRC review.
E&OE.
DAVID SPEERS:
Peter Dutton, welcome to the programme.
PETER DUTTON:
Good morning, David.
DAVID SPEERS:
So, you’ve blamed the Government for this inflation problem because they’ve been, as you say, spending like drunken sailors. So, would you cut spending?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, David, just to put it into perspective, the Government’s spent an extra $347 billion. I mean, don’t take my word for it in terms of the impact. The Reserve Bank Governor has been very clear that it has fuelled inflation. She’s referred to homegrown inflation and as we know in the US, the UK, New Zealand and Canada, interest rates have already come down and there is a lot of work still to do in the economy here.
I want to see interest rates come down as quickly as possible, because Labor’s cost of living crisis is really hurting families and small businesses. We do want to see inflation dealt with. We want to see interest rates come down and the Reserve Bank Governor ultimately will make the decisions that she sees according to the economic settings that are relevant to her decision. But there’s a long way to go before the Government can start claiming that families are much better off.
DAVID SPEERS:
Sure. Look, to be clear, the Reserve Bank Governor did also say public demand’s not the main game. But back to the question, would you cut spending?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, where we see wasteful spending, yes, we would. Putting an additional 36,000 public servants into Canberra at a cost of over $6 billion a year recurring expenditure – which is exactly the formula that Steven Miles and Annastacia Palaszczuk had in Queensland; that Daniel Andrews and Jacinta Allan have adopted in Victoria – it’s sent those two economies through the floor. It’s a recipe to try and please the unions, not to try and drive government efficiency.
So, where there’s inefficiency, yes. We supported the Government in changes that they made to the NDIS because they acknowledged that there was money there that wasn’t being appropriately spent and we supported those changes through the Senate, which has made it a more sustainable scheme for those who are most in need.
DAVID SPEERS:
Look, I guess every Opposition does talk about cutting waste, finding more efficiencies – fair enough, that has to be done. But the question is whether total spending, government spending needs to be lower to get inflation down further?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, look, our desire is to manage the economy successfully as my predecessors in John Howard, for example, did. When John Howard came into government, there was a mess to clean up after the Hawke-Keating years, he cleaned it up and managed the economy successfully. That’s exactly the formula I want to apply.
I want to make sure that we can provide further support. We’ve announced further support for training places for doctors, for Medicare services around mental health, etc.. So the frontline services we want to bolster and we want to make sure that that is being delivered because people are hurting and the band aid fixes the Government’s got at the moment with energy relief – the fact is people’s power bills have gone up by $1,000. Food’s up by 12 per cent, electricity is up by 32 per cent, and rents are up by 17 per cent.
So, if the Government’s pretending that somehow they’ve performed this miracle, the economy’s turned around and families should be grateful – I just don’t think that’s the discussion around family tables at the moment.
DAVID SPEERS:
No, but this is a question about what you would do to fix all these problems. So again, would you actually lower spending or is your approach to the economy not necessarily to lower spending?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, if we find wasteful spending, our intent is to cut it. That will result in, obviously, an overall reduction in government expenditure. If you’re saving $24 billion-plus, over the forward estimates with the public servants, that’s money that you can either use to pay off debt or you can use to put downward pressure on inflation. That’s how we help…
DAVID SPEERS:
Okay…
PETER DUTTON:
Well, there are 27,000 small businesses who’ve closed in the last two and a half years, tell them that everything’s going well.
DAVID SPEERS:
Well, that’s interesting. So you will save $24 billion by cutting all of those additional public servants in Veterans’ Affairs and Defence and NDIA and so on?
PETER DUTTON:
There are 36,000 additional places that have been put on. I made the point in my speech on Friday that we protect frontline positions, but we’re not going to allow the public service to balloon. It’s exactly what happened in the Rudd-Gillard period, although I might say by not as much. It has dramatically increased under the Albanese Government. Again, it’s to please the unions, it’s not to provide a more efficient delivery of services. I don’t think any Australian can say that their lives are easier in terms of their interactions with government agencies because of 36,000 new public servants being employed in Canberra.
DAVID SPEERS:
Well, there might be some veterans who are happy to see the backlog cleared and get their pension. But just again, are you going to cut all of those 36,000 public servants?
PETER DUTTON:
We’ve said, David, and we’ve been very clear, we are not going to have the public service sitting at over 200,000 on Labor’s projections…
DAVID SPEERS:
Right.
PETER DUTTON:
…It wasn’t that in the Rudd-Gillard years. It’s obvious that there’s a correlation between a bloated service and a lack of productivity.
The other aspect too, I might say, is that you’re drawing people from the most productive parts of the economy to put them into lesser productive parts of the economy, and that is not helping our productivity problem at the moment. It’s exacerbating it. Labor just can’t manage money. They can’t manage the economy, and that’s exactly why families are in the problem that they’re in at the moment.
DAVID SPEERS:
Would you have a spending audit like Tony Abbott did when he came in? The Tony Shepherd audit?
PETER DUTTON:
We’re not having a similar-style audit, but many of us have sat around the Expenditure Review Committee. I was Assistant Treasurer to Peter Costello many years ago. We know what we’re doing. We’re able to hit the ground running and we’ve worked with the departments, with many of the departmental heads that are there now, and I have no doubt that we’ll be able to find where Labor has put fat into the system that is not helping do anything but drive inflation.
I want to bring inflation down because not just mortgage rates, as I say, it’s every time people turn up to pay their grocery bill, they’re taking items out of the basket, out of the trolley at the moment, and not putting them through the scanner because they can’t afford their grocery bills or their power bills or their insurance bills under this Government.
DAVID SPEERS:
So, it’s not an independent audit, but you’d do your own? You’d run the ruler over all the spending yourselves, so we may not know until after the election where you’d cut?
PETER DUTTON:
We need to sit down and look through an ERC process, which would be the normal course of things. We’ll do that in government. But as we know, Labor can’t help but tax and spend – and that’s why they’re seeking to tax an unrealised capital gain in superannuation.
DAVID SPEERS:
What about a further round of energy build relief? If that’s announced before the election, would you support that or oppose it?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, David, the question is and the threshold for us is, is it inflationary? So, as was pointed out before in the clip of that interview, there has been a temporary relief because of the band aid fix that the Government put in place. If it’s fuelled inflation, it’s just kept people’s mortgage rates higher for longer, then that becomes counterproductive because as I say, you can promise $275 reduction for a period before the election then never mention it again. But people’s electricity bills are up by $1,000. We need to have some longer-term relief as well as the short-term relief. So, we’ll judge it by that criteria.
DAVID SPEERS:
Well, what do you think, though, of the previous rounds?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, inflation stayed high. That’s the reality. Core inflation is still a problem. If it wasn’t, interest rates would have come down by now. As I say, in comparable jurisdictions, in comparable economies, they have come down. That’s the big difference.
DAVID SPEERS:
But underlying inflation, core inflation has come down.
PETER DUTTON:
Well, core inflation has come down, that’s a good thing. But it hasn’t come down to within the target range and that’s why interest rates have stayed higher for longer because of Labor’s spending.
DAVID SPEERS:
So, look, under your energy plans, would power bills over the next decade before we get the first nuclear plant online, over the next ten years would power bills be lower?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, there are two points to make here. Access Economics did a lot of work and were a great organisation in their day, but Frontier Economics, I think, is the most pre-eminent body today in terms of energy modelling. They looked at our energy policy compared to Labor’s. They judge that it’s 44 per cent cheaper than Labor’s policy. Importantly, Frontier do a lot of work for Labor in government and they’ve done it for South Australia, they’ve done it for the Federal Government. Since that report has been released, the Treasurer, the Energy Minister, the Prime Minister have not punched any holes in the assumptions or the conclusions drawn from that report. So, that’s the independent analysis in terms of what the price impact will be.
Between now and when our policy rolls out, there are two points to make. One is that we’re not overbuilding the system like Labor is. So, the 28,000 kilomeres of poles and wires which cost tens and tens of billions of dollars, are not required under our model. That is being felt in and priced into power bills today and over the next decade. And secondly, we have a lot to do in the short-term, I think, particularly in relation to gas and peaking to provide support. State governments are signing up to an extension of the life of the coal fired power stations because they realise the lights are going off without that.
So, yes, power prices will be cheaper under us in the near term as well as in the medium to longer term as well.
DAVID SPEERS:
Okay, but the Frontier report you talked about, that 44 per cent lower cost is the cost of building it over the – between now and 2050. It didn’t say anything about the price impact. You just said prices will be lower over the medium term. Where are you getting that from?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, David, if you’re delivering a system that’s 44 per cent cheaper, or if you look at the US modelling, what they’ve done in their nuclear energy agency there, they say about 37 per cent, so it’s of that order. If you’re delivering a model that’s 44 per cent cheaper, that translates into cheaper power prices. Part of the reason people are paying so much for their electricity bills – we’re paying three times, at the moment, for an electricity bill compared to, say, Tennessee or Ontario, where they do have nuclear firming up renewables.
We can’t do business. There’s been a threefold increase in the number of manufacturing business closures over the course of the last two-and-a-half years and, as I say, 27,000 small businesses are closing. In part, that’s because even though we’ve got an abundance of natural resource, we’re paying the highest energy costs, the highest electricity costs in the world.
DAVID SPEERS:
So, how much cheaper will power prices be? This what households want to know.
PETER DUTTON:
Well, again, if you apply the economics – so, if there’s a 44 per cent reduction in the model of delivering an energy system, you would expect a 44 per cent reduction, or of that order, being passed through in energy bill relief. Now that comes in…
DAVID SPEERS:
In the next 10 years?
PETER DUTTON:
…I’m not pretending that comes in tomorrow. Our first investment in nuclear or the first plant – and as we say, we’ve got two in the flagship, which is the most efficient and effective way to deliver the roll out of nuclear – comes in 2035 to 2037, and in the interim, we’re going to have to do a lot more with gas, with coal in the system, as I said, for longer under Labor and making sure that we don’t have to overbuild as Labor is doing now, which will drive up prices over the next decade.
DAVID SPEERS:
Alright. But Frontier didn’t tell you that number, you’re just drawing that assumption yourself?
PETER DUTTON:
Well again, David, that’s the economics of it. All other variables being equal, if you have a 44 per cent reduction in the overall cost to deliver that model, that is going to translate into that price reduction for households and for businesses, and that’s what we must do.
We have to lower the input cost of energy in our country because we have a high wage cost compared to Malaysia or compared to the United States or our other competitor nations, and this is the one input cost that we could bring down. Instead, we’re now presiding over a system where we’ve got blackouts and brownouts, and we’re being told that that’s part of life. Well, business doesn’t operate in that uncertainty, neither do ICU units at hospitals, neither does cold storage at the local butcher or supermarket, and we can’t have intermittent power pretending that we can run a modern advanced economy.
DAVID SPEERS:
All right, look, I want to leave that energy debate because there’s a few other things I want to get to. The anti-Semitism, the attacks that we’ve seen escalating in Australia. You’ve described this as a clear campaign of terror and a national crisis. Do you think the terror threat level should be increased?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, that’s a matter for ASIO. I wrote to the Prime Minister in November of 2023 saying that we needed to have a National Cabinet because the Police Commissioners and the Police Ministers needed to hear, along with the Premiers and Chief Ministers, a very clear message from their Prime Minister that we had zero tolerance for these anti-Semitic attacks, and it was entirely predictable. We saw the protests two days after October 7 on the steps of the Opera House, and the Prime Minister has been weaving all over the road on this issue, and I think because of that lack of national leadership, we have seen a predictable escalation. I worry that people are going to lose their lives, and I think the Prime Minister needs to start taking this seriously.
DAVID SPEERS:
Have you requested a briefing with the ASIO boss about this?
PETER DUTTON:
I’ve spoken with Mike Burgess. We’ve had briefings from both the Federal Police and from ASIO. I find it astounding that the Prime Minister, it seems, didn’t find out for seven or eight or nine days after Premier Minns found out, and Premier Minns in conversations with the Prime Minister – including a visit to the childcare centre which had been attacked – clearly was told not to raise it with the Prime Minister. It’s inconceivable that in all of those conversations Premier Minns would have had with the Prime Minister that the discussion wouldn’t have come up. If the Premier was told by the New South Wales Police not to raise it with the Prime Minister – why? I don’t think there’s been a true and honest account of what’s happened here, but if the Prime Minister of our country is not across what was potentially the biggest terrorist attack in our country’s history, essentially until the public found out about it, I think that is an absolute abrogation of his responsibility. We do, I think, deserve to hear the answers.
DAVID SPEERS:
Well, the Prime Minister has not said when he found out. Have you spoken to Mike Burgess since this incident or indeed the federal police boss, Reece Kershaw?
PETER DUTTON:
No, we’ve had James Paterson and our people have had briefings in relation to it. I’ve spoken – and I’m not going to go into the private details of text messages I’ve had with Mike Burgess – but I know this space very well, David, and I can’t believe that the Prime Minister hasn’t been informed. I can’t believe.
I suspect what has happened here, if I’m being honest, is that the New South Wales Police have been worried about the Prime Minister or the Prime Minister’s office leaking the information, which is the only explanation. Otherwise, it’s inexplicable that the Premier of New South Wales would have known about this planning, this likely terrorist attack, with a 40 metre blast zone, and he’s spoken to the Prime Minister over nine days but never raised it, never discussed it. If he knew that the Prime Minister wasn’t aware, wouldn’t he have raised it with him?
I just think Premier Minns and the Prime Minister need to give an honest account of what they knew, when, and why the Prime Minister wasn’t briefed? It would have been the instinct of the AFP Commissioner to brief the Minister and the Prime Minister, as it was when I was Home Affairs Minister, and it’s inconceivable that the Prime Minister could credibly say that he didn’t know for nine days about this.
DAVID SPEERS:
Well, he hasn’t said that. Look, he hasn’t said that. Just to remind people that he’s not said when…
PETER DUTTON:
Well, why wouldn’t he say when he was briefed? Premier Minns has been prepared to do so.
DAVID SPEERS:
Look, more broadly, how would you stop these anti-Semitic attacks?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, there should have been from day one, David, a very clear message that we don’t tolerate racism and anti-Semitic conduct – whether it’s by neo-Nazi nutjobs or whether it’s by the left wing of crazy organisations on campuses. For months and months and months, people were protesting against Jewish students, against Jewish academics. To this very day, the universities haven’t given a proper account of how that was allowed to continue on. The Prime Minister did nothing about it. The marches on the streets that went on for months and months, waving flags of terrorist organisations. All of that allowed people to believe that there was no red line that could be crossed and there’s no consequence.
We’ve said that there should be zero tolerance, that there should be mandatory sentencing for people convicted of terrorist offences, and that I would have absolutely no tolerance, and I would convey that in the most certain terms to the AFP Commissioner and ASIO and the other agencies to stamp it out. The Prime Minister hasn’t done that because he’s seeking the votes of Green voters in inner city Sydney and Melbourne and South Western Sydney. He’s been driven by political motivation here and I think it is a disgrace.
DAVID SPEERS:
None of the arrests that have been made over anti-Semitic incidents in Australia so far have been visa holders, they’ve all been Australian citizens. What does that tell you? Is this a homegrown problem?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, it’s a combination of things, I’m sure. As Mike Burgess would point out, the young person sitting in front of a computer screen can be indoctrinated over a week or two because of the constant videos and bombardment of propaganda, so there’s obviously the influence of social media. There’s the influence of people who are radicalised here in our own society. Some of them may be visa holders, they may be third generation Australians, they may have been here for much longer or much shorter, who knows? And no doubt ASIO will have a better picture of who some of those people are. But the point is that it is a serious issue.
We went first from protests and doxxing online and at universities and then there were fire bombings, now a planned terrorist attack. If we think it’s going to stop there, we’re kidding ourselves. That’s why the Prime Minister, with his first duty of responsibility to take care of Australians, has failed so dismally.
DAVID SPEERS:
You mentioned social media, though, what about the responsibility of Elon Musk on his X platform, where a lot of this anti-Semitism and neo-Nazi stuff is thriving? Does he bear some responsibility?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, I’ve had a battle for over a decade against people like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg and others who are making money out of our kids, and they need to do it in a responsible way. All of us spend a lot of time online and our kids are on their devices constantly. The same rules should apply online as they do in the real world. If there’s child abuse material, which I’ve tried for years to get Facebook to take down, if there is that sort of explicit material, if there is terrorist-related advocacy and spreading of that hate message, they have the algorithms, they have the technology and now the AI to be able to clear it, but of course they don’t because they’re driven by profit. So, yes, of course it should be taken down.
DAVID SPEERS:
Couple of things just quickly with Parliament coming back. The Government’s plans for tax credits for critical minerals and rare earths, will you support that or vote against it?
PETER DUTTON:
No. We’ve been clear that, and speaking to a lot of leaders, business leaders in WA, people don’t think it’s going to have the impact that the Government’s predicting. What people are worried sick about in WA at the moment is the Nature Positive laws, which have been kept secret. If they were so good for WA, the Prime Minister would have had it out there and been proud, waving it around saying, ‘this is great’. Instead, now…
DAVID SPEERS:
Do you welcome the fact they’ve been shelved?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, instead now, people in WA, if they’re voting for Anthony Albanese at the next election, they know that they’ll get Nature Positive laws after the election from an Albanese-Bandt Labor-Greens minority government. That would be a disaster for the WA economy and mining sector, and therefore a disaster for our national economy as well.
DAVID SPEERS:
Will you do a deal with the Government on electoral donation reform?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, we’ve been in discussion, as you know, with the Government in relation to that bill. No agreement has been arrived at, but we conduct the discussions in good faith, and we’ll make any announcement in due course.
DAVID SPEERS:
And what did you make of the announcement on Friday from the Health Minister of an inquiry into gender treatment for children and adolescents? Do you support this sort of inquiry or do you share the concerns of Tony Abbott – this is going to stop states from banning puberty blockers for the next year-and-a-half?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, we welcome the inquiry. I note that we don’t know yet the terms of reference, we don’t know who’s being appointed to conduct the review and it’s due to report back in mid-2026. So, there are some caveats and I’m sure the Government will release that detail shortly, unless it’s just a stunt.
Equally, the states here have their own constitutional rights, which is why Queensland and WA – Liberal and Labor Administrations – have made decisions in relation to these matters, and I think their decisions should stand, and the inquiry can be conducted simultaneously. But if the Government’s just trying to cauterise an issue before the election, which I suspect is what they’re trying to do and just park it, then I think this is a more serious issue than that, that needs to be given proper consideration and hopefully it will during the course of the inquiry.
DAVID SPEERS:
So, that Queensland ban on new treatments for those under 18 should still be allowed to go ahead?
PETER DUTTON:
Yeah, that is a decision of the State Government, and the State Governments have a right, as the Federal Government does, where it has jurisdiction to make their decisions according to the basis on which they’ve been elected, so, and as you say, similarly for the Labor Government in WA.
DAVID SPEERS:
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, we’ll have to leave it there, but thanks for joining us on this first show of the election year.
PETER DUTTON:
Thanks, David. Take care.
[ends]