Latest / The Kenny Report / The Kenny Report | 5 October

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The Kenny Report | 5 October · The Kenny Report

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: This is The Kenny Report.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Ross.
• 0:06
  Speaker 3: Welcome to another week on The Kenny Report. It's good
• 0:08
  Speaker 3: to be back tonight with interest rates up, power prices up,
• 0:12
  Speaker 3: the cost of living up and the Treasurer's arrogance up.
• 0:16
  Speaker 3: The only thing going down is Anthony Albanese's popularity. We'll
• 0:19
  Speaker 3: catch up with an economist the PM set his sights on.
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: While it's tough at home, the government won't even say
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: how much its Fiji climate talks are costing. While it
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: partners with Turkey on these talks, the same country, of course,
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: that harbours the leaders of an Islamist terror group. Liberal
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: frontbencher Dave Sharma joins us on that issue. One Nation's
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: promising to jail Daniel Andrews, but Victoria's country.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Roads are full of potholes. I'll testify to that myself.
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: We'll find out just how big an issue this is
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: in the looming state election from the Shadow Roads Minister.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Lots happening in the UK.
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: I'll cross to Sophie Ellsworth and with Gemma and Caroline,
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: we'll discuss Albanese's woes and a big weekend for the
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: Minister of Sports, Rorts. It is good to be back.
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: Thanks to Steve Price for last week. Let's get into it.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: So I've had a week off, and the.
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: More things change, the more they stay the same. As expected,
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: the Reserve Bank jacked up interest rates again, further squeezing
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: families in the cost-of-living crisis.
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: And as we and Koshi had been.
• 1:29
  Speaker 3: Arguing, the RBA finally started to turn the focus onto
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: the unchecked government spending we're seeing, which is helping to
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: fuel the inflation beast. But as ever, the Treasurer, Jim Smugness-Chalmers... Well,
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: he reckons he's had it all in hand and any
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: news and bad news around the place is beyond his control.
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: Well, we've been able to get the deficits down much
• 1:52
  Speaker 4: smaller and we delivered a couple of surpluses in the
• 1:55
  Speaker 4: time in office. I think it's the pressures on the
• 1:59
  Speaker 4: budget are pretty well known and pretty well canvassed. You
• 2:02
  Speaker 4: can see that in every budget and budget update.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: So smug, isn't he? All under control. This is delusional.
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: We've got record spending outside the pandemic bailouts with no
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: plan to rein it in. Even now, as Chalmers promises
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: to find more budget savings, as he calls them, he
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: doesn't promise to improve the budget bottom line. In fact,
• 2:25
  Speaker 3: everything he's claimed as budget savings in the past has
• 2:28
  Speaker 3: been more than equalled.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: By new spending.
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: So he's found no savings at all, really, just reallocations...
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: and endless growth in government outlays. The trouble with these
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: so-called democratic socialists, as Margaret Thatcher explained to us, is
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: that eventually they run out of other people's money. There
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: has to be a reckoning at some stage, and it
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: won't be good for taxpayers or for the Labor Party.
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: In the meantime, record government spending continues... and therefore inflation
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: remains too high, so the cost of living is going
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: up and interest rates are going up as well, so
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: are small business failures, so are power bills, and so
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: are the pressures on family budgets. Yet, incredibly, against this record,
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: and despite its own broken promises and failed policies, the
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: other thing that's still going up is government arrogance. The
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: Albanese Labor government is so out of touch and so
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: full of hubris... that even as this economic disaster unfolds
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: and Labor sinks in the polls, it believes its own
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: publicity and it fails to correct any of the mess
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: it's made. They are so deluded that as we speak,
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: Anthony Albanese and his sidekick Chris Bowen are in Fiji
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: pretending to tell the world how to save the planet.
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: And by the way, they won't even say how much
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: this talkfest is costing us. Yeah, the government presiding over
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: our mess is spending our money pretending to tell the
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: world how to save the planet. I reckon satire is dead. Now,
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: this UN climate summit that Australia is co-chairing, by the way,
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: is co-chaired with Turkey, and Turkey is a country that
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: harbours the Islamist extremist leadership of the Hamas terrorist organisation,
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  Speaker 3: the same bloodthirsty outfit that deliberately started and prolonged the
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: ugly war against Israel from Gaza. Turkey doesn't even list
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: Hamas as a terrorist group.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: Turkey calls them freedom fighters.
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: Yet this is the country Australia partners with on climate talks.
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: It's difficult to comprehend how an Australian government could be
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: so unwise and amoral. This is happening the week after
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: we saw yet another shocking Islamist extremist terrorist attack, again
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: directed at Jews and Israel, this time, thankfully, thwarted. The
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: attempted hijacking of the fly Dubai flight to Israel with
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: the reported.
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  Speaker 2: Intent of crashing the plane into.
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  Speaker 3: A major building or Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv
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  Speaker 3: bears horrible similarities to the 9-11 atrocities and came just
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: a week out from the anniversary of Hamas's October 7
• 5:22
  Speaker 3: attack on Israel in 2023. This attempt at hijacking was
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: a shocking attack and a chillingly sick plan that highlights
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: yet again.
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  Speaker 2: The threat of Islamist extremism globally.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: And there is an Australian connection, with reports the accused
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: terrorist spent three years in Australia on a student visa.
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: But listen carefully to the taxpayer-funded ABC and how they
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: reported this development.
• 5:52
  Speaker 5: Federal police say they're investigating Australian links to a fly
• 5:56
  Speaker 5: Dubai pilot accused of attacking a colleague in the cockpit.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: Accused of attacking a colleague.
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  Speaker 3: That's how the ABC and other green-left media, other jihad-denying
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: media around the world, choose to report this attempted atrocity.
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: What was the cockpit attack on a colleague about, I wonder?
• 6:21
  Speaker 3: He didn't like the other pilot's playlist? They had an
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: argument about the footy? This jihad denial is rampant and
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: it is dangerous. This clearly was an Islamist extremist hijacking.
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: He hijacked a plane in a murder-suicide plot aimed at
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: killing everyone on board and more on the ground. It's
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: sickening and it's worrying. And it's a miracle the attempt
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: was thwarted. Yet so much of the media remains in denial,
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: even after 9-11 and even after the disappearance of Malaysian
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: Airlines MH370 a dozen years ago. The threat of Islamist
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: extremism is so often ignored, so often talked down and
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: so often censored. The critics of Israel, including much of
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: the media and our own government leadership, either failed to
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: comprehend the or deliberately fail to convey the Islamist nature
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: of attacks against Israel, the Islamist extremist agenda of Hamas,
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: similar groups and individuals. Instead, they pretend the Gaza issue
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: is all about Palestinian aspirations for statehood. They mouth the
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: propaganda that stems from Hamas and they demonise Israel in
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: a way that furthers the aims of the Islamist extremists.
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: Just two weeks ago, Our own Foreign Minister, Penny Wong,
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: told the United Nations that Israeli settlers in the West
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: Bank had forced the displacement of 15,000 Palestinian children. This
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: is simply not true. Perhaps 1,000 children have been affected,
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: and Wong has failed to explain where she got her
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: number from, the number that exaggerated the issue 15-fold. And
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: nor has Wong explained why she's never mentioned the 50,000
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: Israeli children, that's right, 50,000 children displaced from northern and
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: southern Israel because of terror and rocket attacks from Hamas
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: and Hezbollah. This is all of a piece with the
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: anti-Israel lies we've heard from politicians and activists, about journalists
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: being killed when in fact they were Hamas operatives, about
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: civilians being targeted when in reality extraordinary measures have minimised
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: civilian casualties, and all the other lies about famine and
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: aid being blocked and starvation.
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: Lies, lies, lies.
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: And instead of correcting the record, instead of standing up
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: for truth and reflecting reality, our own government continues with
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: its efforts to demonise Israel. This pleases the Islamist extremists,
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: no doubt. They've praised the Albanese government in the past.
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: So it is that we have the threat of Islamist
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: extremism downplayed, people chanting for Intifada at Bondi Beach or
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: on the streets of our cities, and they do so
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: with impunity. And at Sydney University, they can even campaign
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: under a banner supporting Intifada. All this continues even after
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: the Bondi terror massacre of 15 innocent people in our
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: own country. Apart from doing the wrong thing, apart from
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: showing moral confusion, and apart from letting down Israel and
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: all Jews, this means that Australia is, tragically, inviting more
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: trauma on our shores. Now, last week, we, of course,
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: got ourselves a new leader of the Greens. This super-progressive party,
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: in other words, a party of the hard left, well,
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: it loves to champion diversity. You know, it stands up
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: for women or anyone who claims to be a woman,
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: transgender rights, ethnic minorities, the whole LGBTQI plus agenda, people
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  Speaker 3: of colour, all the.
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  Speaker 2: Rest of it.
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  Speaker 3: Well, it overlooked its people of colour, any LGBTQI plus
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: members or people with disabilities. And it gave us a
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: new leader who is a middle-aged, white, straight male lawyer.
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: I guess that might be a pretty radical choice for
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: the Greens, except that for 10 of the last 16 years,
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: they've already had a couple of white.
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: Middle-aged, straight men as their leader.
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  Speaker 3: I guess quotas and forced diversity are for everyone else,
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: not the Greens themselves.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: So where David Shoebridge fits the bill for the.
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: Greens is that just like the rest of this extreme party,
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: he is suitably anti-capitalist, anti-reliable energy, anti-economic development, anti-reality and anti-Israel.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: He talks about Israel in these terms.
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  Speaker 6: And the work we do with them against the genocide
• 11:27
  Speaker 6: and against the violence and against the seamless wars that
• 11:32
  Speaker 6: are happening.
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  Speaker 2: He accuses Israel of genocide.
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: This is an absurd claim based on known facts and
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: any reasonable understanding of the term.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: Yet to counter the critics.
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  Speaker 3: It's also been clinically and systematically disproven. The term brings discredit.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: On anyone who uses it against Israel.
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  Speaker 3: It signifies a complete disregard for the facts and an
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: ideological bent against Israel. What's worse is that Shoebridge bemoans
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: the endless wars, of course, as we should all do,
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: but he fails to recognise the reason we see these wars.
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: There are endless wars in the Middle East because there
• 12:14
  Speaker 3: are endless attacks against Israel by groups who are committed
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: to the obliteration of Israel and the genocide of the Jews.
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: Groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and their backers, the
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: Islamic Republic of Iran. They are open about the genocide
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: they want, but the Greens ignore that. I guess that's
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: the Greens. That's the new leader, the same lies, the
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: same hatred, the same extremism. Now, to the other end
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: of the political spectrum, One Nation. They had their Victorian
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: campaign launch on the weekend and there was some pretty
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: alarming stuff involved in that. Have a listen first to
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: Pauline Hanson.
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  Speaker 7: So Ned Kelly gets a.
• 13:09
  Speaker 8: Mention and a bit of a cheer.
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: Look, I bought into the Ned Kelly story more than
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: most as a teenager. I read everything there was to read,
• 13:28
  Speaker 3: and I understand the mythology and the legend. But he
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: was a criminal, a horse thief, a bank robber, and
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: worst of all, a cop killer.
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: He murdered police.
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: After what we've seen in Victoria in recent times, would.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: We invoke him as a heroic figure? I think not.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: Let's listen to more as Hanson continued with the Eureka
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: Stockade theme.
• 13:57
  Speaker 7: When the miners of Ballarat raised a flag, drew a
• 14:01
  Speaker 7: line in.
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  Speaker 5: The sand and told the government, their government, enough.
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  Speaker 2: That is the Victorian spirit.
• 14:14
  Speaker 5: Tenacious, independent, fair-minded and.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: Not easily pushed around.
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: Look, the Eureka Stockade is worth invoking. To me, it's
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: not given the place in our history it probably deserves.
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: Those Ballarat miners from all over the world really took
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: up the theme of the American Revolution, no taxation without representation.
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: And it is emblematic to a degree today, I guess,
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: for all those who feel their governments have lost touch
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: and have stopped listening. But as for Victorians being independent
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: and not easily pushed around?
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: Well, in a perfect world, that all be.
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: fending off government overreach like Dusty Martin's Don't Argues to defenders.
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: But in reality, Victorians succumb to the worst overreach of
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: government in our history, the draconian and unwarranted pandemic measures
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: imposed by this man.
• 15:08
  Speaker 9: There will be a curfew on advice from the Chief
• 15:11
  Speaker 9: Health Officer from 9pm to 5am.
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: Each and every day.
• 15:15
  Speaker 9: Exercise is just that. It's not an opportunity for seven
• 15:17
  Speaker 9: families to catch up in the park.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: It's exercise.
• 15:21
  Speaker 9: So it's you and one other person from your household
• 15:24
  Speaker 9: or dependents. There will be no removal of masks to
• 15:29
  Speaker 9: consume alcohol outdoors... So you will no longer be able
• 15:33
  Speaker 9: to remove your mask to drink a cocktail at a
• 15:37
  Speaker 9: pop-up beer garden on a footpath as part of a
• 15:40
  Speaker 9: pub crawl. Playgrounds, basketball courts, skate parks and exercise equipment,
• 15:45
  Speaker 9: despite the fact that it's outdoors, will be closed. A
• 15:47
  Speaker 9: whole bunch of people down the Ryback Beach last night
• 15:49
  Speaker 9: who thought the best thing to do was to go
• 15:50
  Speaker 9: and watch the sunset. I'm sure it was a beautiful sunset.
• 15:54
  Speaker 9: That's not in the spirit or in the letter.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: Of these rules.
• 15:58
  Speaker 9: That doesn't mean you can have all your mates round
• 16:00
  Speaker 9: to home and get on the beers.
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: That's not appropriate.
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: Sorry about the flashback there. Andrews was a shocker. He
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: imposed a curfew, never forget, that was not based on
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: health advice. Also, along with his successor, Jacinta Allen, and others,
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: he presided over union-based corruption that's now being investigated by
• 16:22
  Speaker 3: a Royal Commission. It's siphoned billions of dollars of taxpayers' money.
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: So the anger at Labor is understandable. But listen to
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: how One Nation proposes to deal with it.
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: By the way, Dan Andrews, Jacinta Allen, come on!
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: Imprisoned by Christmas. Now, we love Mark Nicholson on this show.
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: He's a regular guest, of course. But pledging to imprison
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: your political opponents?
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: That's not democracy.
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: Democracy is marshalling all the votes you can to turf
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: out your opponents.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: Now, anyone who's broken the law should be prosecuted. Yes, please.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: But that's for the police, for the Royal Commission perhaps,
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: for law enforcement, not for politics. Hanson refused to walk
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: back this stuff.
• 17:13
  Speaker 10: Daniel Andrews and Jacinta Allen in jail by Christmas.
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: Do you agree?
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: Of course.
• 17:18
  Speaker 7: How can you run this country into a state that
• 17:21
  Speaker 7: it is?
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: I think they should be held to account. And that
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: goes for any member of parliament.
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: And that's from a woman who was imprisoned herself before
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: she overturned those charges on appeal. Now, we're all answerable
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: to the law and everyone should be. But politicians promising
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: to jail their opponents, that challenges the separation of powers,
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: due process, the presumption of innocence. It challenges everything that
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: makes our democracy fair and workable. It's comments like this
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: that undermine One Nation's claim to be ready to govern.
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: The state elections shouldn't be a contest between Labor and
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: mob rule.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: It should be a choice between Labor... and decent government.
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: Let's bring in now the Shadow Assistant Minister for Citizenship,
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: Dave Sharma.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Dave.
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: I want to go firstly to this attempted hijacking in
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: Israel and the reports we have that the alleged hijacker
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: spent three years in Australia.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: What do we need to know from Australian authorities?
• 18:32
  Speaker 6: Well, my understanding is that I think Israel his LinkedIn
• 18:35
  Speaker 6: profile before it was taken down. I didn't see it myself,
• 18:38
  Speaker 6: but it referenced him studying in Australia for three years,
• 18:40
  Speaker 6: studying engineering. What I expect and understand this is happening
• 18:43
  Speaker 6: is that Australian security authorities are cooperating with the investigators
• 18:48
  Speaker 6: and providing what information they might know. It seems that
• 18:51
  Speaker 6: this person, I mean, this is still, the investigation's ongoing,
• 18:54
  Speaker 6: but it seems that he was radicalised. What we don't
• 18:56
  Speaker 6: yet know is how and by whom, and was he
• 18:58
  Speaker 6: part of a broader network or was he acting on
• 19:00
  Speaker 6: his own initiative? And I think Australian authorities might be
• 19:04
  Speaker 6: able to shed some light depending on what we know
• 19:06
  Speaker 6: about what he was up to when he was in
• 19:08
  Speaker 6: Australia and whether he raised any red flags. But there
• 19:11
  Speaker 6: is a question I think here that everyone's asking is
• 19:14
  Speaker 6: why was this pilot who media reports suggest was barred
• 19:17
  Speaker 6: from flying by his own country able to get a
• 19:19
  Speaker 6: job with an offshoot of Emirates Airlines and then fly
• 19:23
  Speaker 6: obviously a high risk and sensitive route between Dubai and
• 19:26
  Speaker 6: Tel Aviv?
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: And no doubt Israeli intelligence will be Well, it'll be
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: furious with itself. The Israeli government will be furious that
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: its own intelligence hadn't picked up that fact, this point,
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: this weakness, and not that it should fall upon them,
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: but they'll be very disappointed they.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: Weren't able to pick it up.
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: We've seen a lot of media and even political commentary
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: over the past week that downplays the Islamist extremist aspect of.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: This, even the.
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: even the hijacking objectives.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: They talk about it as some sort of dispute between
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: the pilots.
• 20:03
  Speaker 11: Um.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: What are your thoughts on that?
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: You've dealt in these issues for so long. Why would
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: people try and diminish that? Why do we avoid the
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: Islamist extremist intent here?
• 20:15
  Speaker 6: Well, I don't know why people are sort of stepping
• 20:17
  Speaker 6: on eggshells around this. I mean, it's clear, you know,
• 20:20
  Speaker 6: the target here was a plane full of Jews.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 20:23
  Speaker 6: And you get a route going between Tel Aviv and
• 20:25
  Speaker 6: any other city. If you look at the hijacking from
• 20:26
  Speaker 6: the 1970s and the 1980s, it was always an aircraft carrier,
• 20:31
  Speaker 6: a flight that was originating from or going to Israel
• 20:33
  Speaker 6: because they knew they'd get the most number of Jews
• 20:35
  Speaker 6: that way. And, you know, many in the Islamist world
• 20:39
  Speaker 6: are very upset at the UAE for having normalised relations
• 20:42
  Speaker 6: with Israel and they don't like the fact that there's
• 20:43
  Speaker 6: direct flights between the two. I think that is the
• 20:46
  Speaker 6: most obvious and plausible motivation for this. No, we shouldn't
• 20:49
  Speaker 6: pre-empt any investigation.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 20:50
  Speaker 6: We shouldn't avoid drawing some pretty obvious conclusions that, one,
• 20:53
  Speaker 6: this was an attempted terrorist act. It was a terrorist act.
• 20:56
  Speaker 6: It just wasn't successful in all of its aims. And, two,
• 20:59
  Speaker 6: that the person who's conducting this act was clearly motivated
• 21:03
  Speaker 6: by a desire to kill as many Jewish people as possible.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: Now, Anthony Albanese and Chris Bowen are in the Pacific
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: now to do with COP, United Nations climate talks. Putting
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: aside that issue, the climate focus, is it appropriate for
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: Australia to be dealing so closely with Turkey, co-chairing these
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: meetings with Turkey in any forum, on any issue, when
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: Turkey has been playing host to Hamas leadership and Hamas officers?
• 21:30
  Speaker 6: Look, I take a pragmatic view on this. Turkey is
• 21:33
  Speaker 6: an important bilateral relationship for Australia. It always has been.
• 21:36
  Speaker 6: We've got important equities in Turkey, whether it's the Anzac
• 21:39
  Speaker 6: Day commemorations and the protection of Gallipoli Cove, but Turkey's
• 21:43
  Speaker 6: a NATO member. They're an important player in the war
• 21:46
  Speaker 6: against Ukraine or the Russia-Ukraine war. They've been helpful to
• 21:51
  Speaker 6: Australia in the past with... foreign fighters who've gone to
• 21:54
  Speaker 6: fight for Islamic State and infiltrated or exfiltrated between Turkey
• 21:58
  Speaker 6: and Syria. So I don't think we should hesitate to
• 22:01
  Speaker 6: raise concerns with Turkey about its support and sponsorship of
• 22:04
  Speaker 6: some of these extremist groups. But I think the best
• 22:06
  Speaker 6: way to do that is by having a relationship with them.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: Has Australia been doing that? And has NATO been doing
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: that sufficiently?
• 22:14
  Speaker 6: Look, Australia, I have seen no evidence of that, but
• 22:17
  Speaker 6: that said, I would expect these matters to be raised
• 22:19
  Speaker 6: through bilateral channels and not necessarily litigated in the open.
• 22:23
  Speaker 6: I think, look, Turkey is a difficult partner within NATO.
• 22:27
  Speaker 6: Let's be obvious here. But they have done the right
• 22:31
  Speaker 6: thing from time to time, isn't it? From time to time.
• 22:33
  Speaker 6: Other times they've caused a lot of difficulties. So, you know,
• 22:37
  Speaker 6: it's a question for NATO. Is NATO better with Turkey
• 22:39
  Speaker 6: in it or would it be better with Turkey outside it?
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: I think their view is.
• 22:43
  Speaker 6: On the balance, it's better that Turkey is in NATO,
• 22:46
  Speaker 6: not outside NATO. Look, Turkey is not part of the Russia, Iran, China,
• 22:51
  Speaker 6: North Korea axis. No, are they entirely within the Western camp? No,
• 22:55
  Speaker 6: but they are an important middle power state that at
• 22:59
  Speaker 6: times can work towards supporting Western interests.
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: All right, I want to get back to the economy,
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: the domestic economy, the fact that inflation is not quelled,
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: the fact that we've had another interest rate rise, and
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: that Jim Chalmers yesterday tells us that he's going to deliver.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: Savings.
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: Is he finally getting the message that government spending is
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: out of control? If so, why won't he promise them
• 23:20
  Speaker 3: to reduce the budget bottom line?
• 23:22
  Speaker 6: Well, I think what you've got to watch very carefully
• 23:24
  Speaker 6: is that when this government announces savings, often what they
• 23:26
  Speaker 6: do is they save from one program or one line
• 23:29
  Speaker 6: item of spending and then they spend more in another
• 23:31
  Speaker 6: line item. So in net terms, there's no savings. And
• 23:34
  Speaker 6: if you look at this government, when they came to power,
• 23:36
  Speaker 6: Commonwealth outlays, Commonwealth spending was about $ 630 billion.
• 23:39
  Speaker 9: Today.
• 23:41
  Speaker 6: Budget paper is $ 830 billion. That's a $ 200 billion increase
• 23:45
  Speaker 6: that's going into the economy, that's feeding this furnace of inflation,
• 23:48
  Speaker 6: that's making the Reserve Bank's job harder. means we're all
• 23:50
  Speaker 6: paying more for our goods and services and it means
• 23:53
  Speaker 6: that our mortgage rates keep going up and up and up.
• 23:56
  Speaker 6: That is on Jim Sharma's watch. That is on Anthony
• 23:58
  Speaker 6: Albanese's watch.
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: Dave Sharma, thanks for joining us.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: And I'll have more on that economic challenge in just
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: a moment. But next I want to talk about roads
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: in Victoria and thousands of motorcyclists have rallied outside Victoria's
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: Parliament House yesterday demanding the Carroll government fix the state's
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: pothole crisis following the death of a 71-year-old rider who
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: hit a pothole.
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: Last month, here's Nine News. Engines revving.
• 24:26
  Speaker 8: Followed by a minute's silence. For their friend, Peter Tiki Mason,
• 24:33
  Speaker 8: a keen motorcyclist killed when riding over a pothole on
• 24:36
  Speaker 8: the Western Highway last month.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: We're sick of burying our mates.
• 24:42
  Speaker 8: Thousands gathered at Parliament House, their message clear.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Fix the roads!
• 24:46
  Speaker 8: Fix the roads! Opposition leader Jess Wilson also in the
• 24:51
  Speaker 8: firing line.
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: And you've not done your job.
• 24:55
  Speaker 5: We have a plan to fix it, a $ 5 billion
• 24:56
  Speaker 5: plan to actually repair and rebuild our roads.
• 24:59
  Speaker 8: No-one from Labor attended.
• 25:01
  Speaker 10: Stop being politicians and we start being bloody human beings
• 25:04
  Speaker 10: and look after the people of Victoria.
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: Let's bring in Victoria's Nationals leader and Shadow Roads Minister,
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: Danny O'Brien.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: Danny, thanks for joining us.
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: I spent a large part of the last week driving
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: right across rural Victoria, across northern Victoria, western Victoria.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: I've got to say, I was staggered by the.
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: Condition of the roads and I've been speaking to people
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: in politics and in general. They reckon this is the
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: big issue of the state election in regional areas in particular.
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: Tell us what sort of feedback you're getting from people
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: from around the country, around the state?
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, good evening, Chris.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: It is.
• 25:40
  Speaker 11: It's probably the biggest issue in politics at the moment.
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: And we saw that with.
• 25:44
  Speaker 11: The bikey rally there yesterday that I was at as
• 25:46
  Speaker 11: well with Jess Wilson. A massive crowd of probably... 3,000
• 25:51
  Speaker 11: or 4,000 motorcyclists there. And it's not just them, it's
• 25:55
  Speaker 11: every motorist across the state. It is just out of
• 25:57
  Speaker 11: control how bad our roads have got. That's because of
• 26:00
  Speaker 11: a lack of investment, a lack of preventative maintenance being
• 26:03
  Speaker 11: done by this Labor government. And we've seen it in
• 26:06
  Speaker 11: the last couple of days, we've had two or three
• 26:07
  Speaker 11: inches of rain across most of the state. and the
• 26:10
  Speaker 11: roads have just got worse, and, indeed, they're going to
• 26:12
  Speaker 11: continue to get worse because that work hasn't been done
• 26:14
  Speaker 11: for a long time.
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: Now, just to give people an idea who haven't been
• 26:18
  Speaker 3: on these roads, you're driving along what seem reasonable roads,
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: bitumen roads. These are not dirt roads. These are bitumen
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: roads between major centres. And then you come across these
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: deep potholes. They're the sort of potholes that'll smash your
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: wheel or wreck your suspension if you hit them. If
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: you're in daylight and there's no-one coming the other way,
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: you can get around them. But I'm not surprised that
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: motorcyclers are up in arms, because if you hit them
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: in a motorcycle, you'd be finished. And I must admit,
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: there's one night we needed to drive a couple of hours.
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: We stayed in Bendigo instead because I didn't fancy taking
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: these roads on in the wet at night time.
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: It's absolutely dangerous.
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: Is it all the state government's fault or have some
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: of the regional councils dropped the ball here too?
• 27:05
  Speaker 11: Oh, look, predominantly state government, particularly those roads that you're
• 27:08
  Speaker 11: talking about, Chris, when we've got 23,000 kilometres of state-owned
• 27:13
  Speaker 11: roads in Victoria, and that's where the main problem is. Yes,
• 27:15
  Speaker 11: there's a lot of local government roads, but predominantly they're
• 27:19
  Speaker 11: your local roads and streets and gravel roads. So if
• 27:21
  Speaker 11: you're driving on the Calder Highway to Bendigo or the
• 27:24
  Speaker 11: Western Highway to Ballarat or beyond to Horsham, the Princess
• 27:27
  Speaker 11: Highway to Gippsland, as I was doing yesterday, and came
• 27:31
  Speaker 11: across exactly those sorts of potholes that you're talking about.
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: And it's not just one or two here and there.
• 27:35
  Speaker 11: You're seeing on the TV now, the pictures there, that
• 27:39
  Speaker 11: these massive gouges, they're craters in some areas, and it
• 27:43
  Speaker 11: is the state government. Yes, I'm not saying our local
• 27:45
  Speaker 11: council roads are all perfect, but... It's predominantly the state
• 27:49
  Speaker 11: government roads that are the issue. And it's because we've
• 27:52
  Speaker 11: seen big cuts to road maintenance over the last few years.
• 27:55
  Speaker 11: At a time that we've seen $ 15 billion wasted on
• 27:57
  Speaker 11: the big build, on corruption on the big build, we
• 28:00
  Speaker 11: haven't been able to get enough basic maintenance on our roads.
• 28:03
  Speaker 11: And we see that not just with the road surface,
• 28:05
  Speaker 11: but the graffiti, the grass, the over... overgrown verges, the
• 28:09
  Speaker 11: rubbish on the side of the roads not being cleaned up,
• 28:11
  Speaker 11: and it's symptomatic of a state that's been neglected for
• 28:15
  Speaker 11: too long.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a shocker.
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: So many of the roads I came across, they had
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: signs up reducing the speed limit, saying there was roadworks underway.
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: But there was no roadworks evident at all.
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: It was just a way of slowing down people and
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: a safety measure that they've got.
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: To do it.
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: But they're slowing down cars on these roads, not fixing them.
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: Of course, Victoria State, where they spend hundreds of millions
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: of dollars not to build a tunnel and not to
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: have the Commonwealth Games as well. That money all could
• 28:41
  Speaker 3: have been spent on roads as well. Before I let
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: you go, though, Danny, I want to get your thoughts
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: on what we heard from One Nation on the weekend.
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: Here's Mark Nicholson again. Dan Andrews and Jacinda Allen in
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: prison by Christmas. Do you support this call?
• 29:03
  Speaker 11: Look, I don't think that's what we want to see
• 29:05
  Speaker 11: in Australia. We've got a system of government where the
• 29:07
  Speaker 11: judicial system is separate to politicians. And look, if people
• 29:11
  Speaker 11: are found to have done the wrong thing, and particularly
• 29:13
  Speaker 11: with the Royal Commission that's underway now into corruption, then
• 29:16
  Speaker 11: they absolutely should be charged. But it's not for politicians
• 29:19
  Speaker 11: to be saying who should be thrown in jail. That's
• 29:21
  Speaker 11: not the way this system operates and we should have
• 29:24
  Speaker 11: that separation of powers between politicians and the courts. And,
• 29:29
  Speaker 11: as I said, if people are found to have done
• 29:31
  Speaker 11: the wrong thing, then they should be charged. But we
• 29:33
  Speaker 11: shouldn't have politicians saying who should go to jail.
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Danny. I appreciate it. Danny O'Brien there,
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: the Nationals leader in Victoria. We've got to get to
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: a break.
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: On the other side, more on the economy, interest rates
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: and the cost of living squeeze. Let's go again to
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: Labor's addiction to spending and its impact on inflation and
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: interest rates. Treasurer Jim Chalmers has been in denial, but
• 30:00
  Speaker 3: yesterday he suggested the purse strings would be tightened come December.
• 30:05
  Speaker 4: We are right now working on a savings package to
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: be announced this year. And that's consistent with the fact
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: that we've had eight budgets or budget updates in our
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: time in office. Every single one of them has had
• 30:17
  Speaker 4: savings in it. And the one that we release before
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: the end of the year will have savings with it
• 30:22
  Speaker 4: in it as well.
• 30:24
  Speaker 3: Well, Professor Richard Holden from the University of New South
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: Wales joins me again on the desk.
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: Good to talk to you again, Richard. This sort of
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: talk from Jim Chalmers about.
• 30:33
  Speaker 3: The $ 180 billion worth of savings that he claims in
• 30:38
  Speaker 3: the past and more savings to come.
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: They're not really savings, are they? Because they're always outdone
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: by new spending.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: Well, that's exactly right. It'll be really interesting to see
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: if they're actually net savings, not just gross savings. I
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: thought the language that was used by the Assistant Treasurer,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: Daniel Molino, during the week was revealing. He talked about
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: savings and reprioritisations. And I wrote today in the AFR
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: that if you add up over the four years, what's
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: the net number? It's $ 106 billion. in extra spending after
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: the savings.
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: So, in other words, there's been no savings. He was asked, actually,
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: yesterday whether these savings would lead to net savings, whether
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: the budget would be better off.
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: Have a look at his answer.
• 31:23
  Speaker 4: Now, we will have a savings package in the mid-year
• 31:25
  Speaker 4: budget update. I've made that very clear today. We've had
• 31:28
  Speaker 4: a savings package in every budget update so far. That's
• 31:31
  Speaker 4: how we've racked up almost $ 180 billion in savings. How
• 31:35
  Speaker 4: that all nets out with all of the intensifying pressures, including.
• 31:40
  Speaker 4: So, again, he's not guaranteeing that net government spending will
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: be curtailed.
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: In other words, we're likely to see a further increase
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: in government spending, which will surely only continue to fuel
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: inflation no matter what it's spent on.
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: That's exactly what it will do, and it'll mean... you know,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: further deterioration in our budgetary position at a time when
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: people like Philip Lowe and Ken Henry and Martin Parkinson,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: who know what they're talking about, say we should be
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: running big budget surpluses, and we're not.
• 32:12
  Speaker 3: Now, you mentioned your AFR column out today. I want
• 32:15
  Speaker 3: to go to what you wrote in the Australian Financial
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: Review last week. It was on the day that the
• 32:20
  Speaker 3: interest rates increase came out. And you said that there's
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: plenty of blame to go around for the inflation problem
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: that's at the heart of our cost of living crisis.
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: The fiscal recklessness of the federal government and its squandering
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: of an almost $ 400 billion windfall is.
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: A big factor. So very clearly there, you're laying some
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: of the blame, at least on the federal government. Tell
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: us about this $ 400 billion windfall.
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: Well, that's the change that we've had since this government
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: took office to what the Treasury call parameter variations. This
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: is high commodity prices, inflation bringing in more revenue.
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: The extra revenue they got above the early estimates.
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: $ 400.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: 8 billion over the life of this government.
• 33:06
  Speaker 3: Instead of using that money to pay down debt or whatever,
• 33:09
  Speaker 3: they've actually taken that and more and spent it.
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: Well, they've taken part of it to pay down debt,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: but a huge amount of it has gone in increased spending.
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: The real point here is that we should have taken
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: that and more to pay down debt and been in
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: a much stronger position.
• 33:24
  Speaker 3: Now, your criticism hasn't escaped the Prime Minister. When he
• 33:27
  Speaker 3: was asked about it, they seemed to know who Richard
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: Holden was and he had this to say.
• 33:33
  Speaker 10: Richard Holden's a well-known critic of the government. You know,
• 33:37
  Speaker 10: that's not surprising. His comments, what we have done is too.
• 33:43
  Speaker 10: He must have been beside himself under the former government
• 33:47
  Speaker 10: that had no budget surpluses, that left us with debt
• 33:51
  Speaker 10: figures and deficits that were much higher.
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: Well, he's taking notice, at least, Richard, and it seems
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: to be if you're a critic of the government, then
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: you're not to be regarded. But this is the common
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: refrain also we.
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: Get from Labor.
• 34:05
  Speaker 3: They keep harking back to the previous government spending. Now,
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: I would argue that the Morrison government spent way too
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: much anyway in response to COVID, but you also have
• 34:15
  Speaker 3: to recognise it was those extenuating circumstances, and it still
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: doesn't take the responsibility off Labor for us to be
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: sustainable now, surely.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: Well, absolutely. Now, I praised the fiscal spending during COVID.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: I thought the vaccine rollout was a disaster and the
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: purchasing strategy. But I praised them about that.
• 34:34
  Speaker 10: But.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: Albanese and his colleagues wanted... They did want to spend more,
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: didn't they?
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: to spend more.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: So which one is it?
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, very, very fair point.
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: Do you think, just in summary, that the Reserve Bank
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: at least is starting to get the message about government spending?
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: They were a little bit more forthright last week than
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: they had been previously.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: I think Michelle Bullock was more forthright in her press conference.
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: I think they've got the message on two counts, one...
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: Inflation's not coming back by itself and they're going to
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: have to do their part and raise interest rates. And
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: I think what we saw last week was the first
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: of two or three rises in the sort of short
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: to medium term. And they've been, you know, less sort
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: of deflecting blame from the government and sort of saying, well,
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: of course it plays a role, the government spending.
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: Indeed. Thanks for joining us, Richard. Appreciate it. Richard Holden there.
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: You can read his stuff in the AFR.
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: We're going to get to a break. We're going to
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: check in on the UK. And Prince Andrew, would you believe,
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: he's fighting back... through the courts. Plenty happening in the UK.
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: Let's catch up with News 24 contributor and correspondent for
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: News Corp in the UK, Sophie Ellsworth, joining us live
• 35:43
  Speaker 3: from London. Good to talk to you again, Sophie. Tell
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: us about the former Prince Andrew, Andrew Mountbatten. He's not
• 35:51
  Speaker 3: going to take all the attention coming his way from
• 35:55
  Speaker 3: police and others.
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: He's fighting back through the courts. What's going on there?
• 36:00
  Speaker 7: He is indeed, Chris. Look, this is a remarkable turn
• 36:03
  Speaker 7: of events over here overnight in the UK. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor
• 36:07
  Speaker 7: is now taking legal action against Thames Valley Police and
• 36:12
  Speaker 7: demanding answers to know whether or not The arrest of
• 36:16
  Speaker 7: him and the conduct in association to his arrest on
• 36:19
  Speaker 7: his birthday back in February for allegations of misconduct in
• 36:24
  Speaker 7: public office are all above board. Now, there'll be a
• 36:27
  Speaker 7: hearing here, a closed hearing later in the week. He
• 36:31
  Speaker 7: wants to know if what the police did by searching
• 36:33
  Speaker 7: his various properties was lawful. But this is Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor,
• 36:38
  Speaker 7: who has largely remained incredibly quiet since his arrest. He's
• 36:42
  Speaker 7: always vehemently denied any allegations. Chris, he is fighting back.
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's extraordinary.
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: Is he challenging the actual basis of the charges laid
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: against him or just the manner in which he was
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: arrested at home?
• 36:58
  Speaker 7: So there's no charges laid against him to date. He
• 37:01
  Speaker 7: still remains under investigation.
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 37:04
  Speaker 7: But he wants to know whether or not the police
• 37:07
  Speaker 7: conduct in relation to his arrest and in relation to
• 37:10
  Speaker 7: the search warrants at his property was lawful.
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, fascinating.
• 37:15
  Speaker 3: Yes, of course, without charges being laid, he's sort of
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: challenging the way he's been treated. I wonder if it
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: could actually expedite any charges coming his way as well.
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: What a fascinating situation to watch. I want to go.
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: To an Australian who's making news in London, and that
• 37:34
  Speaker 3: is Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah, of course, the Sydney academic professor.
• 37:39
  Speaker 3: who was famously banned from the Adelaide Writers' Festival, creating
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: all sorts of scandal.
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: Have a listen to what she said about that in London.
• 37:49
  Speaker 12: I don't know about this job, but it happened.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: They did that. They disinvited me in such a blatant way.
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: That shows the impunity of the anti-Palestinian racism.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: Now, Sophie, you recorded that yourself.
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: She's claiming victimhood again and Australia's a racist against the Palestinians.
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: She's trying to sell books. What other impact is she having?
• 38:15
  Speaker 7: Well, she was very scathing of Australia, Chris. She said
• 38:18
  Speaker 7: that Australians are nutcases. She said the universities are white
• 38:23
  Speaker 7: supremacist institutions. She said that Palestinians, their voices are tried
• 38:29
  Speaker 7: to be silenced. She was incredibly, incredibly critical of Australia
• 38:35
  Speaker 7: and she is making headlines. She then posted on social media,
• 38:40
  Speaker 7: a journalist was at the event. She gets very combative.
• 38:44
  Speaker 7: She's saying her voice is being silenced, but she's getting
• 38:47
  Speaker 7: plenty of coverage. So I'm unclear which one is it,
• 38:50
  Speaker 7: but she's definitely creating headlines over here and she's on
• 38:54
  Speaker 7: a book tour promoting her latest book. But if you're
• 38:58
  Speaker 7: sitting in Britain listening to her, you're not getting a
• 39:00
  Speaker 7: very positive view of Australia.
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, well, you know, she could always stay over there.
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: You guys could have her, but we don't need her
• 39:07
  Speaker 3: back here. But that's up to her, I suppose. Hey,
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: tell us about Prime Minister Andy Burnham and why he's
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: popular among some of the criminals in the UK.
• 39:19
  Speaker 7: Well, Chris, I wrote about this in my column today
• 39:21
  Speaker 7: in News Corp's papers. This is quite extraordinary. Up to
• 39:26
  Speaker 7: 50,000 prisoners will be released early here under a new
• 39:29
  Speaker 7: scheme in the UK to get prisoners out of jail
• 39:32
  Speaker 7: prematurely because basically the prisons over here are jam-packed, they're full.
• 39:39
  Speaker 7: And so they're really, really praising. Last week there were
• 39:42
  Speaker 7: hundreds let out early. to free up space, and they
• 39:46
  Speaker 7: came out of jail praising Prime Minister Andy Burnham. This
• 39:50
  Speaker 7: is remarkable stuff.
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think we've got a grab of one of
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: them here. Have a look.
• 39:54
  Speaker 7: What are you going to do now?
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: What's your plan? I don't know.
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go stealing again. I'm going to go
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: stealing so I'm going to.
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: Knock back in because they haven't helped me this time.
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: What are you going to steal? Whatever I get.
• 40:02
  Speaker 8: Whatever I get.
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: They're happy to be out but keen to get stealing again.
• 40:09
  Speaker 7: Well, he wasn't holding back there, Chris. He was saying
• 40:11
  Speaker 7: exactly what he's on a mission to do. There's more
• 40:14
  Speaker 7: problems here, though, because some of the criminals being released
• 40:17
  Speaker 7: early say they have nowhere to go. They don't know
• 40:19
  Speaker 7: where they were going to go. Many of them have
• 40:22
  Speaker 7: not had ankle bracelets put on them. There's also delays
• 40:27
  Speaker 7: with ankle bracelets being inserted on the ankles of criminals
• 40:31
  Speaker 7: being released out of prison. Look, if you think England's
• 40:34
  Speaker 7: got its problems, Chris, this is one of them. And
• 40:37
  Speaker 7: it's very, very serious. And the government have come under
• 40:40
  Speaker 7: fire for the release of hundreds, which will be soon
• 40:44
  Speaker 7: thousands of criminals prematurely.
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: As they should.
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: What a shambles. And yet years till an election. Thanks
• 40:50
  Speaker 3: for updating us again, Sophie.
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: Appreciate it.
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: Sophie Ellsworth there, live from London. We'll get to a
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: break afterwards. We'll catch up with Gemma and Caroline. One
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: of the things on the agenda are Anthony Albanese's woes,
• 41:01
  Speaker 3: but also the big weekend for the Minister of Sports Rewards.
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: Let's get to our panel now. And on Mondays, as ever,
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: I'm joined by Gemma Tognini on the desk. Hello, friend.
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: Good to see you.
• 41:15
  Speaker 3: And Caroline DeRusso live from Perth. Let's start on a
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: topic we haven't delved into in the program. I've mentioned
• 41:21
  Speaker 3: it a couple of times, but surprise, surprise, Anthony Albanese's approval.
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: Ratings are going down.
• 41:27
  Speaker 3: Have a look at this latest polling, which has his
• 41:30
  Speaker 3: net approval at minus 27%. It's down 10%. Chalmers has
• 41:36
  Speaker 3: gone down as well. Not very popular. And Pauline Hanson
• 41:40
  Speaker 3: and Angus Taylor, nowhere near as disapproving from the public
• 41:44
  Speaker 3: as the.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: Ratings for them. Now, Gemma, surely this is no surprise.
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, I've read some stuff on.
• 41:52
  Speaker 3: The weekend that people are trying to demonise Anthony Albanese.
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: No, I think reality is starting to hit home.
• 42:00
  Speaker 12: On what planet is this not the most predictable outcome
• 42:03
  Speaker 12: of the last three to six months of this government's
• 42:06
  Speaker 12: policy platform being rolled out?
• 42:07
  Speaker 3: And.
• 42:08
  Speaker 12: I just don't understand. It's the elbow verse, right, in
• 42:11
  Speaker 12: which everything goes except for accountability. And even, for example,
• 42:16
  Speaker 12: at my local cafe on the weekend, somebody made a
• 42:19
  Speaker 12: comment about the price of a coffee. And the proprietor,
• 42:25
  Speaker 12: quite rightly in my view, turned around and said, well,
• 42:26
  Speaker 12: you can thank the Prime Minister. And when those sorts
• 42:30
  Speaker 12: of things start happening organically in a neighbourhood, any neighbourhood,
• 42:34
  Speaker 12: and mine's a teal seat for the record, I think
• 42:37
  Speaker 12: you can safely say that this government, to use a vernacular, is... Actually,
• 42:42
  Speaker 12: I won't, because it's a family show.
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: They're not doing... They're not... Yeah, this is not surprising.
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: I'll have to ask you off-air what expression we're going
• 42:51
  Speaker 3: to use.
• 42:51
  Speaker 12: This is choice and consequences.
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: Look, I think people.
• 42:55
  Speaker 3: I couldn't believe for a long while, Caro, that... I
• 42:58
  Speaker 3: think the scales are falling from people's eyes. I mean,
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: it's been so obvious from day one that this government has.
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: No economic responsibility... no security responsibility.
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: They always play politics. And this example that Gemma mentioned
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: of the coffee, you know, the credit card surcharge, again,
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: that's not an economic reform. They did that because they
• 43:16
  Speaker 3: thought that was a political win. They'd be the heroes
• 43:19
  Speaker 3: who got rid of this charge.
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: Well, guess what? In the real world, it actually ends
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: up costing us all more. It does.
• 43:26
  Speaker 5: And sometimes these things take a while to filter through.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: And, you know.
• 43:30
  Speaker 5: Victorian Labor is a great example of how long it's
• 43:33
  Speaker 5: taken for Victorians to get over their Stockholm Syndrome to
• 43:36
  Speaker 5: realise that they are being basically held captive by a
• 43:40
  Speaker 5: really terrible government. And because everyone else is doing other
• 43:43
  Speaker 5: things in life rather than focusing closely on politics, Sometimes
• 43:47
  Speaker 5: these things do take a while to wash through and
• 43:51
  Speaker 5: the Prime Minister did himself the hugest disservice last week
• 43:55
  Speaker 5: by saying that your coffee could get cheaper because out
• 43:59
  Speaker 5: there in voter land, everyone buys a coffee. You might
• 44:03
  Speaker 5: buy one a day, you might buy one a week,
• 44:05
  Speaker 5: but everyone knows it is not getting more, it is
• 44:08
  Speaker 5: not getting cheaper. But the real giveaway here, Chris, and
• 44:11
  Speaker 5: there were comments by Jim Chalmers saying, well, the polls
• 44:14
  Speaker 5: tell us that people are.
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: Under the pump.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: Nobody.
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: The polls are telling us.
• 44:19
  Speaker 5: You're under the pump. You're under the pump because you
• 44:23
  Speaker 5: have absolutely failed Australians because you go and play silly
• 44:28
  Speaker 5: games like this, hoping to win minute, petty political points,
• 44:33
  Speaker 5: and instead you shot your proverbial off.
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: I'll tell you what tells me around the pump too is, well,
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: last time I filled up my car, it was $ 220,
• 44:41
  Speaker 3: all right?
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: And I'm not crying poor. I'm very lucky. I don't
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: have to drive a long way and I'm OK.
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: But Jeepers, if you've got a high mortgage, you're trying
• 44:48
  Speaker 3: to get a start in life and you're driving 50Ks
• 44:51
  Speaker 3: to work and home every.
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: Day, that's just a killer.
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: But I want to show you another reason why the
• 44:56
  Speaker 3: government's on the nose and this goes to arrogance. And
• 44:58
  Speaker 3: have a look at these headlines. that we've seen over
• 45:00
  Speaker 3: the past couple of weeks. It's been grand final season,
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: in case you don't know. And Annika Wells, of course,
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: the sports rights minister, she turned up at the AFL
• 45:08
  Speaker 3: grand final going back Saturday week. And yesterday, on Sunday night,
• 45:13
  Speaker 3: she was in the VIP suite at the NRL grand final.
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: And, you know, all right, she's the sports minister. You
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: say she's got to turn up. Well, Gemma, I say
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: she's got to understand..... she' s got to show remorse... She's
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: got to show.
• 45:26
  Speaker 3: An understanding for taxpayers' money and she's got to show
• 45:29
  Speaker 3: some common decency.
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: Just to stay out of the trough for a lot
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: longer than this.
• 45:34
  Speaker 12: Well, but why would she? If you're her, she has
• 45:39
  Speaker 12: been ordered by the Independent Parliamentary Office of Expenditure to
• 45:44
  Speaker 12: pay back 10 grand of money she had no right
• 45:46
  Speaker 12: to suspend. That's your money and my money. And you
• 45:48
  Speaker 12: might say, well, it's only 10 grand. It's 10 grand
• 45:50
  Speaker 12: that she'd have the right to spend. Once is a mistake,
• 45:53
  Speaker 12: four times is... questionable, and she keeps her job. She
• 45:58
  Speaker 12: keeps her job because this Prime Minister, as I've said
• 46:01
  Speaker 12: many times, is as allergic to accountability as I am
• 46:04
  Speaker 12: to dairy.
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: Well, again, which is why I mentioned it. Why would
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: she change her behaviour? That's my point.
• 46:08
  Speaker 12: There is no consequences awaiting her for her behaviour. So
• 46:13
  Speaker 12: why would she show any modicum of remorse or respect
• 46:17
  Speaker 12: for the people she works for? And I remind you, Minister,
• 46:19
  Speaker 12: and I remind you, Prime Minister, you work for us
• 46:21
  Speaker 12: and you're These polls are telling, as Chris said, these
• 46:24
  Speaker 12: polls are telling you that people are waking up that
• 46:27
  Speaker 12: you're not doing a very good job. And they'll come
• 46:29
  Speaker 12: a point, like is in any relationship, in this case
• 46:31
  Speaker 12: it's our relationship as a cohort of Australians with your government,
• 46:35
  Speaker 12: that it won't matter what remorse you have. The relationship
• 46:39
  Speaker 12: is dead and we want to divorce you. And that
• 46:40
  Speaker 12: day is fast approaching.
• 46:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, spot on, and that's why I mention it, because
• 46:44
  Speaker 3: there's no popularity poll for Annika Wells, but it ends
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: up reflecting on Albo, as it should.
• 46:49
  Speaker 2: It's all on him. Because he's the one who should
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: have sacked her.
• 46:51
  Speaker 12: Correct.
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: Let me go to something else you said just a
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: moment ago, Caro. You talked about the Stockholm Syndrome for Victorians,
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: as if they'd been locked in and broken out.
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: But, of course, remember, they were locked in. They were
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: forced in a ring of.
• 47:06
  Speaker 3: Steel and a curfew imposed by Daniel Andrews.
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: So we all know.
• 47:11
  Speaker 3: how much anger there should be against Daniel Andrews and
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: the way he ran that state during COVID. But have
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: a listen to this again from Mark Nicholson at the
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: One Nation launch on the weekend.
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: There he is.
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: Send him to prison. Now, they should break free, Victorians, Carol,
• 47:33
  Speaker 3: but what do you say of that? I mean, that's
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: a shocking look for democracy, isn't it, to campaign on
• 47:39
  Speaker 3: putting your opponents in jail?
• 47:43
  Speaker 5: No, we don't do that in this country, and I'd really,
• 47:45
  Speaker 5: really like to keep it that way, Chris. And particularly
• 47:49
  Speaker 5: when One Nation, in various ways, you know, wants to
• 47:53
  Speaker 5: be tough on crime and wants to.
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: Be rule of law.
• 47:56
  Speaker 5: Well, you can't have the rule of law for what
• 47:58
  Speaker 5: you want and then want to lock up your political opponents.
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: Look.
• 48:03
  Speaker 5: If someone has done something wrong in this country, there
• 48:05
  Speaker 5: is a suite of laws at all sorts of levels
• 48:08
  Speaker 5: from parking fines upwards. If you do something wrong and
• 48:12
  Speaker 5: someone has the evidence and then you can be charged
• 48:15
  Speaker 5: and prosecuted. And we have a whole system that is
• 48:18
  Speaker 5: not perfect, but it works very, very well and pretty
• 48:21
  Speaker 5: much better than any other country on the planet, but
• 48:25
  Speaker 5: this idea that you win government or something and then
• 48:29
  Speaker 5: you start putting away the people you don't want, you know,
• 48:32
  Speaker 5: a la locking up Hillary Clinton or whatever, I understand
• 48:36
  Speaker 5: that you are throwing red meat to your base, but
• 48:39
  Speaker 5: that base is that 6% or 7%. When you want
• 48:42
  Speaker 5: a lot more people to vote for you, you want
• 48:44
  Speaker 5: to be seen as the mainstream, you want to be
• 48:46
  Speaker 5: seen as the middle and you want to be seen
• 48:47
  Speaker 5: as capable of governing, that sort of language is not going.
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: To get you there.
• 48:51
  Speaker 5: I find it really quite disgraceful.
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree with you, Caro.
• 48:55
  Speaker 3: Caro, of course, heads up the Liberal Party of Western Australia.
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: I should point that out. You should have said that.
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: We all agree with. Thanks for joining us again, Gemma
• 49:04
  Speaker 3: and Caroline. We'll catch up with you next week. That's
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: all the time I've got for you tonight. Up next
• 49:08
  Speaker 3: is Jamie Rogers for Peter Credlin.
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: I'll see you tomorrow.