Subjects: Labor’s Jobs and Skills Summit talk fest; workforce shortages; the Coalition’s plan to let older Australians keep more of what they earn; immigration; Labor’s broken promise to reduce electricity bills by $275; Labor’s first 100 days in office.
ERIN MOLAN
This week Anthony Albanese’s much-hyped Jobs Summit will take place. My exclusive chat with the PM next, but first up, what needs to happen next week to ensure this isn’t just a box-ticking talkfest. Leader of the Opposition, Peter Dutton joins me now. Thank you so much for your time, what are your thoughts?
PETER DUTTON
Well, great to be on the show, Erin, thank you very much. Look, I agree, I mean it can’t be a talkfest because the issues are too important and in June I announced a Coalition policy, which was to allow pensioners and people on service pensions as well – those who had served our country – to be able to work more part-time work if they chose to do so, and there’s a ready workforce of about 400,000 people there.
So, firstly, I hope the Government takes up that initiative and that could really roll out into workplaces tomorrow. The second objective of course, is that it can’t be a winner-takes-all for the union movement: as we know the links between the union movement and the Labor Party are well documented, particularly the CFMEU, and we can’t have an outcome that doesn’t include reform of the CFMEU. They are driving up the costs of construction sites around the country by tens of thousands of dollars for people who are going into a unit or construction of roads or hospitals or aged care facilities and it can’t be a win against small business. So, small business won’t be properly represented here and yet they might be the ones that end up paying a big price for any deal done at the big end of town.
ERIN MOLAN
I think you’re spot on and the penalisation of pensioners – I’ve been talking about this for a very long time. The Kiwis actually, look, I don’t like to give them credit – they do it better than anyone in this space, and it’s a force we really should be tapping into.
Immigration and skilled migrants. Where do the Coalition sit on this issue and is it purely numbers based or do we need more of a strategy?
PETER DUTTON
We certainly need more people and I agree with the Prime Minister that we need to cut down on the processing without compromising on the integrity of the program. There are a lot of people who put in false paperwork, false claims, that takes time to process and we need to establish the bona fides and the identity of the individual making the application. So, we want to condense – as best we can – in a safe way so that people can get here as quickly as possible. But the quickest way to do it is to access the workforce that we’ve got here. As you point out, it’s the pensioners, it’s the veterans, it’s the people who are on Newstart for example: innovative ways in which the Government could allow those people to work without their benefits being affected in the near term, I think is probably the most realistic way to get people into workplaces where they’re desperately needed right now. We’re missing out on a huge productivity piece here and if you want to increase that productivity and increase the participation rate, then that’s something that really should come out of this Summit.
ERIN MOLAN
And will we, off the back of that, see real wages growth?
PETER DUTTON
Well, that was the commitment that the Government gave at the last election. Now, they’ve walked away from one of their key promises – to reduce power prices by $275. The Prime Minister promised that 97 times during the course of the campaign and has never mentioned it since being elected. But what we do know, of course, is that Anthony Albanese is no Bob Hawke and Sally McManus of course is no Bill Kelty. So, there is a huge expectation on both the Prime Minister and the union movement to get this right, but I do worry that it’s going to fall short of the public’s expectation. The Government’s promised to fix this problem, and we’ll see whether what they announce actually fixes the problem or whether it makes a bad situation worse.
ERIN MOLAN
The Greens of course have laid out their list of demands, are they holding the Government to ransom?
PETER DUTTON
They obviously hold the Government to ransom in the Senate. They have a block of votes there along with one or two others that can deliver any left-wing reform that this Government wants. Don’t forget that Anthony Albanese has been the leader of the Left his whole life, so his natural tendency will be to go down that path and the Greens making absurd propositions and demands which of course can’t be met. I mean, it would drive the economy into the ground. The most recent announcement in relation to capping rents and essentially forcing landlords to sell their homes would be a disaster for the individual homeowners, but of course, for the economy more generally. So, I hope that he doesn’t listen to anything the Greens have got to say. But the left of the Labor Party and the Greens movement are very close in terms of their ideology and if that plays out then that will mean a huge increase to the debt that we have and probably not the outcomes that we would want to for our economy.
ERIN MOLAN
I don’t generally think they make a good point in many ways, but I guess the issue when it comes to these traditionally female dominated industries – like childcare and aged care and nursing and that kind of thing. Do we need to give them extra attention to try and make it a more attractive profession because they’re leaving in droves?
PETER DUTTON
They certainly are. I mean, you’ve got childcare centres at the moment who are turning parents away from a second or third or fourth day. You’ve got aged care facilities where people just aren’t getting the attention that they need. As I said back in June, we’ve got a workforce of 400,000-plus people who I think you could incentivise back into the workforce. So, I hope the Government takes up that policy.
ERIN MOLAN
Before I let you go, a couple of things; tomorrow the PM notches up 100 days in power. I sat down with him yesterday and asked him to rate his performance out of 100. What do you give him for his first 100 days?
PETER DUTTON
Well, in terms of the most important issue, I think, at the moment, that is cost of living and trying to reduce those pressures on families, which as I say, he promised every day during the election that he had a plan to do that. It was demonstrated in the last sitting fortnight: out of the 68 questions they had, three were on cost of living in terms of the Dorothy Dixer questions they asked themselves. So, it shows that they’ve been distracted by other issues. So, on the most important issue for Australians at the moment, on cost of living, I think they rate very low.
I think in terms of their engagement internationally, putting pressure on China, the Review around our Defence Force needs – I think they score highly on that, to be honest and I give credit where it’s due. This is the most important issue and we’ve offered bipartisan support on this very important issue.
But they’re about to put petrol prices back up. They have promised to reduce electricity prices and electricity prices and gas bills are only going up under this Government. I worry particularly with families that have got high mortgages or small businesses that have got big overdrafts – they are really going to find it difficult. The fundamentals of our economy are incredibly strong and we should avoid recession in our country over the next couple of years and certainly I hope that we do, but Labor would need to get it really wrong over the course of the next couple of years for there to be a significant economic downturn, even though that’s what we’re going to see in Europe and certainly I think what we’re going to see in the United States as well.
ERIN MOLAN
Okay, well, you said credit where credits due. I’ve got to give you credit for a very, very good birthday present – the cupcakes. You came on my radio show last week and we laughed at you about the way you ate a Dagwood Dog and you certainly returned serve. So, thank you very much and thank you so much for your time tonight. We really appreciate it.
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