Transcript

Credlin | 24 June · Credlin

0:02
Speaker 1: Peter Krandlin live on Skying's Australia.
0:08
Speaker 2: Thanks Chris, good evening, Welcome to the show. By god,
0:11
Speaker 2: it's cold mean back here in Melbourne. Great to be
0:13
Speaker 2: back on the show. Though, I'll give you an update
0:16
Speaker 2: at the end of the show as to what I
0:18
Speaker 2: got up to on my three weeks break. Pretty fascinating time.
0:21
Speaker 2: It was on my bucket list. I'll tell you exactly
0:24
Speaker 2: what I did. Here's what's coming up tonight on the program.
0:26
Speaker 2: Though he might be still in the New South Wales
0:29
Speaker 2: Parliament as a Liberal, but today the Prime Minister named
0:32
Speaker 2: Matt Keane as his government's new climate change zah, no doubt.
0:36
Speaker 2: Later I'll see this as a big blow to the coalition.
0:39
Speaker 2: But Conservatives have known for a long time this bloke
0:42
Speaker 2: is a liberal.
0:43
Speaker 3: In name only, and today we've been proven right.
0:47
Speaker 2: Speaking of energy, there's a very real prospect we could
0:50
Speaker 2: run out of gas before the winter's over. Nowhere is
0:54
Speaker 2: this more pronounced than in Victoria, where the governments run
0:57
Speaker 2: a war on gas production.
0:59
Speaker 3: I'll speak to an expert in a.
1:00
Speaker 2: Moment about just how bad it could get and what
1:04
Speaker 2: must be done. Plus, the former head of the Australian
1:08
Speaker 2: Building and Construction Commission has called on Labor to sever
1:11
Speaker 2: tize with a militant CFMU will talk to John Lloyd
1:16
Speaker 2: about why he's demanding this move and the massive migrat
1:20
Speaker 2: influx into Melbourne that's been labeled a recipe for disaster
1:24
Speaker 2: in a new report today, we'll also take a look
1:27
Speaker 2: at the two hundred thousand dollars pay rise for Labour's
1:31
Speaker 2: new Governor General and busy parliament today. Parliament fortnite sitting
1:36
Speaker 2: kicked off today Labor applying pressure on the Coalition to
1:40
Speaker 2: reveal costings for their nuclear plan, despite the fact the
1:44
Speaker 2: Labour's Green agender itself is uncosted.
1:48
Speaker 4: From Minister, what is the total cost of the Government's
1:50
Speaker 4: energy plan and what will the capacity investment scheme cost
1:53
Speaker 4: tax payers?
1:54
Speaker 5: With the cost of between one point three and one
1:58
Speaker 5: point five truly dollars? Prime Minister, what is the total
2:04
Speaker 5: system cost of the Government's plans?
2:10
Speaker 2: But first I should say how pleased I am to
2:12
Speaker 2: be back on deck. Just as Peter Dutton has created
2:15
Speaker 2: the real political contest that's been all too rare in
2:18
Speaker 2: recent times. The Opposition leader's commitment to emissions free nuclear
2:23
Speaker 2: power is the only way to get to net zero
2:26
Speaker 2: and keep the lights on. Means that there's now a
2:29
Speaker 2: clear difference between the two major parties on an issue
2:33
Speaker 2: that really matters, As is clear from today's headlines when
2:37
Speaker 2: it comes to energy, it can't be business as usual
2:42
Speaker 2: without change. There will be blackouts or all our heavy
2:45
Speaker 2: industry will head offshore and take jobs with them, because
2:49
Speaker 2: you can't run an industrial economy on intermittent power plus
2:53
Speaker 2: a couple of hours of battery life. Now the hysteria
2:57
Speaker 2: of the government's attack on Dutton is reverely I mean,
3:01
Speaker 2: how can nuclear power be as dumb as labor says
3:05
Speaker 2: if it's exactly what labour wants to use to power
3:08
Speaker 2: our next generation of submarines. How can nuclear be totally
3:12
Speaker 2: uneconomic when just about every other G twenty major economy
3:17
Speaker 2: is using nuclear. How can it be unsafe when there's
3:21
Speaker 2: been a nuclear reactor at Lucas Heights in suburban Sydney.
3:24
Speaker 3: For more than sixty years.
3:26
Speaker 2: And how can nuclear take too long when something like
3:30
Speaker 2: Malcolm Turnbull's snowy two point zero it was supposed to
3:34
Speaker 2: take five years to build and cost US two billion dollars,
3:37
Speaker 2: it's now taking more than ten years to get going.
3:40
Speaker 2: And will cost more than twelve billion. Today, the Prime
3:44
Speaker 2: Minister thought he'd scored a coup with the announcement that
3:47
Speaker 2: former New South Wales Liberal energy Minister McKean would be
3:51
Speaker 2: the next head of the Climate Change Authority. Today, Keane
3:56
Speaker 2: said that nuclear was uneconomic, no doubt, to impress his
4:01
Speaker 2: new political masters.
4:03
Speaker 6: In order to bring nuclear into the system, it would
4:06
Speaker 6: take far too long and would be far too expensive.
4:11
Speaker 2: I know this was in his view back in twenty
4:13
Speaker 2: twenty one when he said that nuclear power had a
4:16
Speaker 2: role to play.
4:18
Speaker 6: Into the future. Will nuclear have a role to play?
4:21
Speaker 6: I think so and I hope so, But right now
4:24
Speaker 6: I can't bet on technology that isn't readily available.
4:29
Speaker 3: Now.
4:29
Speaker 2: Abel will think this appointment of Keen with some sort
4:31
Speaker 2: of political master stroke, but all it's done is vindicate
4:35
Speaker 2: people like me have always said Keen is no liberal.
4:39
Speaker 2: In fact, Galvianes has just given me a win. I've
4:42
Speaker 2: always said Keen was a turncoat, and here is the
4:45
Speaker 2: proof for the Liberal base. It will also continue to
4:49
Speaker 2: highlight the weakness the turpitude of moderate liberals. Lino's like
4:53
Speaker 2: Keen Liberals in name only to Peter Dutton's long term
4:58
Speaker 2: benefit and It's likely to persuade large numbers of voters
5:01
Speaker 2: that this whole renewable push has been a stitcher by
5:04
Speaker 2: the political class and woke of big.
5:06
Speaker 3: Business to rip them off.
5:09
Speaker 2: It was Keen, after all, who rejected the plan to
5:12
Speaker 2: keep the giant and araring Colfive power station open to
5:15
Speaker 2: keep the lights on in Sydney.
5:17
Speaker 3: Instead, Keene said.
5:19
Speaker 2: A two our battery would do the job. Well, thank
5:22
Speaker 2: god Chris Mins has overturned that dumb decision and New
5:25
Speaker 2: South Wales at least has a secure power supply for
5:29
Speaker 2: now today.
5:31
Speaker 3: At the start of.
5:31
Speaker 2: Sitting Fortnite, the government demanded that the opposition provide costings
5:35
Speaker 2: for its nuclear policy, but the government won't cost its
5:40
Speaker 2: own energy policy.
5:43
Speaker 7: We know that the cheapest form of new energy is renewable.
5:51
Speaker 2: The government wants costings from Darden, but refused to do
5:54
Speaker 2: their own. And this government has embarked on what it
5:58
Speaker 2: admits is the biggest economic transformation since the Industrial Revolution,
6:03
Speaker 2: converting from fossil fuels to renewable energy in just eight
6:06
Speaker 2: years without a costing at all. It promised to cut
6:11
Speaker 2: your power bill by two hundred and seventy five dollars
6:14
Speaker 2: per year on the basis of reputex modeling that was
6:17
Speaker 2: before the last election. Well that's been completely discredited by
6:21
Speaker 2: subsequent massive power price rises, in some cases up to
6:25
Speaker 2: one thousand dollars per household. In fact, the government's policies
6:29
Speaker 2: have been costed by the tri University study net zero
6:33
Speaker 2: Australia at up to one point five trillion dollars by
6:38
Speaker 2: twenty thirty. Then there's the environmental issues associated with placing
6:42
Speaker 2: vast numbers of wind turbines in pristine areas or coastal
6:46
Speaker 2: waters and the associated impact on birds and marine life.
6:51
Speaker 2: Let's never forget that the start of the Albanesi government's life,
6:55
Speaker 2: Energy Minister Chris Bowen said they're getting to eighty two
6:58
Speaker 2: percent renewables would require the installation of twenty two thousand
7:03
Speaker 2: new solar panels every single day, plus a construction of
7:07
Speaker 2: forty large wind turbines every single month for eight years,
7:12
Speaker 2: all of which will have to be paid for, plus
7:15
Speaker 2: twenty eight thousand kilometers plus of new transmission lines. At
7:19
Speaker 2: pre election, they said would cost US eighty billion dollars.
7:24
Speaker 2: So while the costings that Dutton has promised pre election
7:27
Speaker 2: will undoubtedly be high compared with the never disclosed costs
7:32
Speaker 2: of the government's own policies though we both reasonable and feasible.
7:38
Speaker 2: For instance, the new nuclear reactor that the mrarieties have
7:41
Speaker 2: just installed to supply a quarter of air electricity, well
7:46
Speaker 2: it took fifteen years from initial decision to full operation
7:50
Speaker 2: and cost about thirty billion. Now there's no doubt that
7:54
Speaker 2: Peter Dutton's taken a big risk by backing nuclear power,
7:59
Speaker 2: but he also took a bit risk opposing the voice.
8:02
Speaker 2: That's leadership and frankly we need more leadership and less
8:07
Speaker 2: meet tourism in politics right now. I reckon it's now
8:11
Speaker 2: game on for the next election. Than Dunton has given
8:14
Speaker 2: himself every chance to win.
8:18
Speaker 3: We just look at the government's.
8:18
Speaker 2: Double standards, demanded that the coalition cost its policies but
8:24
Speaker 2: refusing to cost its own. We're going to move to
8:27
Speaker 2: nuclear instead, and they've done it without a costing.
8:30
Speaker 4: I mean, seriously, he can't provide key details.
8:33
Speaker 8: I think they know better than the CSIRO, but they
8:36
Speaker 8: won't release their cost So this.
8:37
Speaker 2: Is economically insane what they are seeking to do. This
8:44
Speaker 2: government's writing for fall hypocrisy. Thy name is labor. As
8:53
Speaker 2: I said at the top of the show, We've kicked
8:55
Speaker 2: off as sitting Fortnite today and we'll go there now
8:57
Speaker 2: for the headlines Skins political reporter Caman good Evening.
9:02
Speaker 4: New South Wales Liberal MP Matt Kean has been appointed
9:05
Speaker 4: to a top climate role by the Albanese government. The
9:08
Speaker 4: former State treasurer announced his retirement from politics only last week.
9:12
Speaker 4: As Chair of the Climate Change Authority, he'll play an
9:15
Speaker 4: integral role in setting Australia's twenty thirty five emissions target.
9:20
Speaker 6: I'll be making decisions and providing advice to the government
9:22
Speaker 6: based on facts and I'm really looking forward to getting
9:24
Speaker 6: into the facts.
9:25
Speaker 4: His appointment receiving a mixed reception from coalition colleagues.
9:29
Speaker 3: The Liberal members would be quite disappointed.
9:31
Speaker 9: Matt Kean's obviously on team Reckless Renewables.
9:35
Speaker 3: I think this is just a distraction.
9:36
Speaker 10: This guy is treacherous.
9:38
Speaker 4: Matt Keen, expressing a dim view of Peter Dutton's nuclear
9:42
Speaker 4: power plan.
9:43
Speaker 6: It would take far too long and would be far
9:45
Speaker 6: too expensive for New South Wales. Now I didn't want
9:48
Speaker 6: to bankrupt the state.
9:49
Speaker 4: New polling shows broad support for including nuclear in the
9:53
Speaker 4: energy mix. The News Corps survey indicates sixty to forty
9:56
Speaker 4: support for getting nuclear into the grid. But that's port
10:00
Speaker 4: dips in communities earmarked for reactors, especially in the New
10:04
Speaker 4: South Wales Hunter region.
10:05
Speaker 10: The Poles are showing that that's the sensible approach to
10:08
Speaker 10: do this.
10:08
Speaker 4: The scare campaign well underwagh first three eyed Blinky Bill
10:12
Speaker 4: now concerns about natural disasters.
10:15
Speaker 6: There have still been earthquakes in Australia over the b years,
10:18
Speaker 6: it hasn't necessarily been at the level that we saw
10:20
Speaker 6: in Fukushima.
10:21
Speaker 4: Australia's next Governor General is set to receive a bumper
10:24
Speaker 4: pay rise. The government is looking to give Samantha Moston
10:27
Speaker 4: a forty three percent pay increase, taking her salary to
10:31
Speaker 4: more than seven hundred thousand dollars.
10:34
Speaker 9: The comparator that we have used is to make it
10:36
Speaker 9: as close as possible to the Chief Justice of the
10:39
Speaker 9: High Court.
10:40
Speaker 4: Cameron Reddin's Sky News, Canberra.
10:44
Speaker 2: All right, let's go to the other big stories today
10:46
Speaker 2: with National editor for The Australian Dennis Shanahan. Great to
10:49
Speaker 2: see you again at Dennis. We've had a couple of
10:52
Speaker 2: days to let this whole nuclear policy from the coalition
10:55
Speaker 2: sink in. I'm keen to your assessment about not just
10:58
Speaker 2: how it's been received in Canberra. But how you see
11:02
Speaker 2: Labour's response. Some of the early childish memes we saw
11:05
Speaker 2: go out in social media in the first couple of days,
11:07
Speaker 2: there's not been a real serious attempt before today today
11:11
Speaker 2: that of course they got into the costings debate, But
11:13
Speaker 2: how do think Labour's tackling this been pushed by Peter Dutton?
11:19
Speaker 3: Well, Peter and welcome back.
11:21
Speaker 10: Look.
11:22
Speaker 8: I have written online in The Australian today that I
11:26
Speaker 8: find it hard to believe that after almost two years
11:30
Speaker 8: of Peter Dutton saying that he was going to have
11:33
Speaker 8: a nuclear debate and that he was going to propose
11:37
Speaker 8: putting nuclear sites at Culifide power stations, we've known this
11:44
Speaker 8: has been coming, and yet the reaction from the government
11:47
Speaker 8: has been a bit incoherent and it hasn't been concentrated.
11:54
Speaker 10: It's lack of focus.
11:56
Speaker 8: What it has said is that apart from all the
11:59
Speaker 8: childish memes and so on, is it's about cost that
12:03
Speaker 8: it's economically insane, it can't be you just can't be
12:08
Speaker 8: pursued and it's not worth the money. There has been
12:12
Speaker 8: some suggestion from Murray Watt in particular that it may
12:16
Speaker 8: not be safe now, of course, because we've got a
12:20
Speaker 8: decision which the Albanazy government is pursuing to have nuclear submarines,
12:27
Speaker 8: all of these arguments are compromised. They can't say it's
12:30
Speaker 8: safe in a nuclear submarine and not safe on land.
12:35
Speaker 8: So there are real problems here for Labor how to
12:38
Speaker 8: sell it. So what they're concentrating on is the cost.
12:42
Speaker 8: They're saying it is too much and that the market
12:46
Speaker 8: wouldn't support it. Well, why not let the market actually
12:51
Speaker 8: make a decision, lift the ban and say will people
12:56
Speaker 8: invest If they won't, the market's decided.
13:01
Speaker 2: I think that's in part what Labor was trying to
13:03
Speaker 2: do with this appointment of Matt Kean to the role
13:05
Speaker 2: as a chair of the Climate Change Authority. I think
13:08
Speaker 2: they don't have a reasonable rational argument against nuclear I
13:13
Speaker 2: mean it's there in most G twenty nations. I was overseas,
13:16
Speaker 2: and and most of the nations I was in had
13:18
Speaker 2: no problems with power on a hot day because they
13:21
Speaker 2: used nuclear. So they've got an issue there that your
13:24
Speaker 2: argument there about submarines is absolutely valid. So they're changing
13:28
Speaker 2: the conversation. They're trying to start a war inside the
13:30
Speaker 2: Liberal Party with his appointment of Keen Keena might dadd
13:33
Speaker 2: is in the New South Wales Parliament until August. I
13:37
Speaker 2: find that bizarre, if not very unorthodox, that he's taken.
13:41
Speaker 3: This new job.
13:42
Speaker 2: And of course he's got a natural conflict of interest
13:46
Speaker 2: as any Dennis if it was to ally this government
13:49
Speaker 2: role with maybe making money out of the renewable sector
13:54
Speaker 2: in a commercial role as well at the same time.
13:58
Speaker 8: Well, obviously this was a highly political appointment. Matt Kean
14:02
Speaker 8: has been unpopular with Liberals in New South Wales for
14:05
Speaker 8: a while.
14:06
Speaker 10: He's also inconsistent.
14:08
Speaker 8: There have been times when he's been pro nuclear, he's
14:11
Speaker 8: now anti nuclear. He said the shutting down or the
14:15
Speaker 8: keeping open, I'm sorry, of the Urarran power station would
14:19
Speaker 8: cost three billion dollars. Chris Mins came in, had a
14:23
Speaker 8: quick check and said no, rejected the whole idea. So
14:27
Speaker 8: here is Chris Mins, the New South Wales Labor Premier,
14:31
Speaker 8: rejecting what the previous Energy Minister had said about a
14:35
Speaker 8: coal fired power station, and today the Energy Minister without
14:40
Speaker 8: any public consultation.
14:44
Speaker 10: It was a captain's call.
14:45
Speaker 8: Chris Bowen appoints him as the czar in Canberra, and
14:49
Speaker 8: as you say, this is only it's not a full
14:51
Speaker 8: time job, so he does have to be careful about
14:55
Speaker 8: what he does and the standard of the previous the leaders,
15:01
Speaker 8: as my colleague Jeff Chambers has pointed out in The
15:04
Speaker 8: Australian today, is much higher than a professional first of
15:10
Speaker 8: all political staffer and then politician. It is designed to
15:14
Speaker 8: be a distraction and a division for the Liberals. I
15:19
Speaker 8: don't think Peter Dutton is falling for it, and I
15:21
Speaker 8: think he is keeping the focus on what he sees
15:26
Speaker 8: as cost of living, reducing the cost of energy in
15:29
Speaker 8: the long term with nuclear and in the short term
15:33
Speaker 8: with gas. You've got to remember Peter Dutton put up
15:37
Speaker 8: a dual policy more gas than labor is proposing and
15:41
Speaker 8: long term nuclear energy.
15:46
Speaker 2: This next selection, regardless of all of this talk about
15:48
Speaker 2: nuclear power, will be about cost of leading. I have
15:51
Speaker 2: not moved off that view. It will be absolutely bread
15:54
Speaker 2: and butter economic issues. And they've got the government out
15:58
Speaker 2: there today announcing a two one hundred thousand dollars pay
16:01
Speaker 2: rise for the new Governor General. Her salary will be
16:05
Speaker 2: just over seven hundred thousand dollars. I think it's about
16:08
Speaker 2: forty five percent more than the current Governor General. I
16:13
Speaker 2: don't care how they try and justify it. I don't
16:15
Speaker 2: think you can justify it. I think at the time
16:17
Speaker 2: it comes out as people are doing it tough.
16:19
Speaker 3: It's a shocking. Look.
16:22
Speaker 8: Well, today in Parliament, Tony Burke was talking about workers
16:27
Speaker 8: getting a thirty eight dollars a week rise as a
16:31
Speaker 8: result of tax cuts and pay increases. And yet the
16:35
Speaker 8: government is approving a two hundred thousand dollars forty three
16:40
Speaker 8: percent pay rise for a governor general. And this is
16:45
Speaker 8: by a Republican labor government and it is insensitive, to
16:50
Speaker 8: say the least, with Jim Charmers today saying we know
16:54
Speaker 8: people are doing it tough, we know the cost of living.
16:57
Speaker 10: Has to be addressed.
16:58
Speaker 8: Look, Anthony alban won the last election on cost of living.
17:03
Speaker 8: We all remember him carrying around that dollar and it
17:06
Speaker 8: was talking about what people would get out of the
17:09
Speaker 8: Albanese government. Well, you know what they've got today is
17:13
Speaker 8: a weak economy, the prospect of ongoing high interest rates
17:18
Speaker 8: and a governor general getting a two hundred thousand dollars
17:23
Speaker 8: pay rise to go with two houses, a plane and
17:28
Speaker 8: laid on board and living and that house, one of
17:32
Speaker 8: those houses is just the best house in Sydney. So
17:37
Speaker 8: let's just think about the insensitivity of this action. It
17:43
Speaker 8: looks bad. They're trying to justify it by adjusting it
17:46
Speaker 8: with a High Court. You know, she has to get more,
17:49
Speaker 8: apparently than the Chief Justice of the High Court from
17:54
Speaker 8: a Republican government police.
17:58
Speaker 2: I think they're scrambling das. I think this is the
18:00
Speaker 2: stuff that cuts through. Thank you, great to have you
18:02
Speaker 2: on the show. As always, Let's go to some other
18:04
Speaker 2: issues though we're talking about energy. I think this is
18:07
Speaker 2: really important because it's not just this future debate about nuclear.
18:11
Speaker 2: We've got a real crisis on the East Coast right now.
18:13
Speaker 2: The Energy Market Regulator AEMO has said there's a perfect
18:17
Speaker 2: storm of cold weather gas supply interruptions and ongoing low
18:22
Speaker 2: contributions from renewables at the moment, so not enough wind,
18:26
Speaker 2: not enough sun, which could mean no heating this winter.
18:30
Speaker 2: Particularly down in Victoria, where the government's long held a
18:33
Speaker 2: vandetta against gas, it's particularly acute. The state's main storage
18:38
Speaker 2: gas plant is set to run out of supply by
18:41
Speaker 2: the end of winter. The drawdown from the Iona gas
18:45
Speaker 2: plant in Victoria has been halved for around four hundred
18:49
Speaker 2: terror dules a day to an average of two hundred.
18:51
Speaker 2: It's done that deliberately to avoid it running dry. For
18:55
Speaker 2: more on this now, in sense of just how bad
18:57
Speaker 2: things called get, energy market analyt Cavonic wels I wish
19:03
Speaker 2: we were talking under warmer climates and in better times.
19:08
Speaker 2: But these predictions that will actually run out of gas
19:12
Speaker 2: in Victoria, how true are they?
19:19
Speaker 9: Unfortunately they're very true. I mean, as a starting point,
19:23
Speaker 9: prices are already up between one hundred and two hundred
19:26
Speaker 9: percent from normal levels, and everyone's going to feel that
19:29
Speaker 9: in time as it comes through to their bills. But
19:32
Speaker 9: this time around, Anthony Albanezi and Chris Bowen can't blame
19:36
Speaker 9: the Ukraine War for the spiking prices like they did
19:39
Speaker 9: in twenty twenty two. We're looking at a point where
19:43
Speaker 9: by the time we get to the end of this month,
19:45
Speaker 9: storage could be down closer to fifty percent levels of
19:48
Speaker 9: normal levels at IONA, and that only leaves us potentially
19:52
Speaker 9: with a few weeks of storage left if we get
19:56
Speaker 9: those high withdrawal rates, and we only one month into
20:00
Speaker 9: a three month winter. And so speaking with quite a
20:04
Speaker 9: few industry folk over the weekend, most are of the
20:07
Speaker 9: view that we're going to require a bit of hope
20:09
Speaker 9: and a lot of luck where we see wind generation
20:13
Speaker 9: cold generation firm back up again and long for deliver
20:16
Speaker 9: really well and we have a summer, warmer winter in
20:21
Speaker 9: order for us to not run short. And if we
20:24
Speaker 9: do run short, we're going to very quickly end up
20:26
Speaker 9: in the socialist world of rationing, where the government's going
20:28
Speaker 9: to determine where the gas goes, who gets it, who doesn't.
20:33
Speaker 2: How does industry cope with this? I mean, they absolutely
20:37
Speaker 2: need gas, particularly heavy industry needs gas. It's expensive as
20:42
Speaker 2: it is in Australia, but now there's a scarcity issue.
20:45
Speaker 2: Is this likely to impact business decisions to stay in
20:48
Speaker 2: Australia or take their money and go offshore.
20:51
Speaker 9: Well, we're already hearing from most gas intensive manufacturing saying
20:54
Speaker 9: that this kind of these kind of price spikes and
20:57
Speaker 9: potential scarcity. This is even before the scarcity it right,
21:00
Speaker 9: It's just the price spikes like this are going to
21:02
Speaker 9: be make manufacturing unsustainable and it's very hard to have
21:06
Speaker 9: a future manufacturing a strategy. For strategy, you can't keep
21:09
Speaker 9: the existing manufacturing base going. It's I think very important
21:14
Speaker 9: to remember why we are in the situation we are
21:17
Speaker 9: in today. I recall It's almost eighteen months to the
21:20
Speaker 9: day that Labor round its gas price cap Police three
21:24
Speaker 9: through Parliament a few days before Christmas. At the time,
21:28
Speaker 9: everyone in the industry warned it would result in less
21:31
Speaker 9: gas supply, particularly less gas supply from Longford and bass
21:35
Speaker 9: straight for Victoria within a year. And you'll remember the
21:40
Speaker 9: government the time just miss those concerns. Well, here we
21:42
Speaker 9: are eighteen months later. I just want to be really
21:45
Speaker 9: clear that policy is the reason we are where we
21:49
Speaker 9: are today, because Longford would have additional capacity and would
21:52
Speaker 9: be having more gas to put into the grid if
21:55
Speaker 9: it wasn't for the halt and investment is a result
21:57
Speaker 9: of Labour's gas price cap policy, which wh're still in place.
22:01
Speaker 9: In addition to the tax hike they've put on gas,
22:04
Speaker 9: the safeguard carbon imposts they've put on cass and the
22:06
Speaker 9: government funded bring larfare that is still going underway against
22:10
Speaker 9: getting new gas supply into the market, and.
22:15
Speaker 3: They're bed in the house.
22:16
Speaker 2: All the cards are all bet against renewables. I mean,
22:20
Speaker 2: I'm picking up this report from AEMA last week and
22:23
Speaker 2: this goes to the point with wind power. If you
22:25
Speaker 2: look at Victoria state with higher than average higher than
22:28
Speaker 2: average wind capacity In the three days to June twenty
22:32
Speaker 2: wind generator just twenty one percent of the state's energy
22:35
Speaker 2: usage loads in some places of just two point five
22:38
Speaker 2: percent during that period.
22:40
Speaker 3: Now, there are flaws in renewables, but.
22:42
Speaker 2: You've got the government out there today sprooking that they've
22:45
Speaker 2: had this massive response to their fourteen billion dollar Capacity
22:50
Speaker 2: Investment Scheme, which of course is people running down the
22:53
Speaker 2: street waving a check at the government saying we want
22:56
Speaker 2: more subsidies that will of course you're going to have
22:58
Speaker 2: a demand for that taxpayer thrown at at projects. How
23:02
Speaker 2: was to understand what's happening?
23:03
Speaker 9: He saw, well, there's two things. I mean, the idea
23:08
Speaker 9: of a capacity mechanism of itself is not a problem.
23:11
Speaker 9: But the best form of capacity is gas, but that's
23:14
Speaker 9: been ideologically excluded by the federal government from this mechanism,
23:18
Speaker 9: which leaves you which much higher cost or less effective
23:21
Speaker 9: forms of capacity. But I think what the government's kind
23:25
Speaker 9: of touting here success is actually the policy's failure. So
23:28
Speaker 9: when they talk about this that the Capacity Investment Scheme
23:32
Speaker 9: or cis being oversubscribed seven times, what that actually means
23:37
Speaker 9: is there's a lot more projects out there that would
23:40
Speaker 9: have been developing in the private sector, but have now
23:42
Speaker 9: all stalled and aren't going ahead because they're waiting on
23:45
Speaker 9: the outcome of the CIS auction. And this is the
23:48
Speaker 9: whole issue with when Chris Bowen announced the CIS, which
23:52
Speaker 9: was a made up policy on the fly. Again, a
23:54
Speaker 9: lot of people in the key departments had found out
23:56
Speaker 9: about that policy in his press release. When you do
24:00
Speaker 9: it risks crowding out a lot more private investment than
24:03
Speaker 9: actual public supporting investment that it's going to underpin and
24:07
Speaker 9: ultimately still end up with the worst of system with
24:11
Speaker 9: less generation going into the grid, even after the success
24:15
Speaker 9: of the auction.
24:18
Speaker 2: It's grim Sorcavoni, thank you for your time. I just
24:22
Speaker 2: made the point there. Sorkovonic is not a political commentator.
24:24
Speaker 2: He advises markets and shareholders and companies about the state
24:28
Speaker 2: of energy policy in Australia.
24:30
Speaker 3: And that's some pretty frenk talk, isn't it. All?
24:32
Speaker 2: Right after break, why Victoria is going bastard? The state
24:35
Speaker 2: becomes the dumpy ground for the big Australia policies out
24:38
Speaker 2: of Canberra. Plus the former public servant calling on labor
24:41
Speaker 2: to have the guts to do what's in the national interest.
24:44
Speaker 2: And cut ties with the militant CFMU. All right, great
24:53
Speaker 2: to have your company. I want to bring in now
24:56
Speaker 2: someone who knows very well the whole issue of the CFMU.
25:00
Speaker 2: He's called today for the Albinezer government to sever its
25:02
Speaker 2: ties with the Militant Union following a vitriotic campaign against
25:06
Speaker 2: the AFL to ours head of umpiring Stephen McBurnie, a
25:10
Speaker 2: former Australian Building and Construction Commissioner. Just today the Workplace
25:15
Speaker 2: Relations Minister Tony Burke introduced legislation that would pave the
25:19
Speaker 2: way for a potential split in the CFMU, but doesn't
25:22
Speaker 2: go far enough when both the PM and the Victorian Premier,
25:26
Speaker 2: Justin to Allen, have been reluctant to really criticize the
25:30
Speaker 2: Militant Union or its leader. I'm joined now by the
25:33
Speaker 2: former head of the Australian Building and Constructed commission mister
25:37
Speaker 2: John Lloyd. John, thank you for your time. You've had
25:41
Speaker 2: to deal with the CWU and John Seca in the past.
25:44
Speaker 2: Were you surprised by this campaign essentially holding the AFL
25:48
Speaker 2: to ransom over one of its employees.
25:53
Speaker 11: No, I wasn't really surprised at Peter in the past
25:58
Speaker 11: has targeted employees of the ABCC. In twenty seventeen, there
26:04
Speaker 11: was a notorious case where they said they would alert
26:08
Speaker 11: people who live in the same street as a former
26:11
Speaker 11: ABCC employee and let them know that they were living there,
26:16
Speaker 11: that they would make their parents ashamed for their parent
26:21
Speaker 11: for the work they'd done. And also they turn up
26:24
Speaker 11: at local football games to let others know that they
26:28
Speaker 11: had an abc C officer living in the vicinity.
26:32
Speaker 10: So they have form.
26:34
Speaker 11: This is rather extraordinary though, that they have taken on
26:38
Speaker 11: a large public organization, the AFL, and call for a sacking.
26:44
Speaker 11: Of course, if Steve mcbeernie had been sacked, it'll have
26:47
Speaker 11: a lot of legal raifications for the AFL.
26:53
Speaker 3: Lawlessness.
26:53
Speaker 2: As you say there at CFMU, well, it's well documented.
26:56
Speaker 2: Last week we had a federal court judge. Lately the
26:59
Speaker 2: CFU well resourced recidivist offenders. This is after three construction
27:04
Speaker 2: officials were fined over a range of workplace relations breaches.
27:09
Speaker 2: The ABCC when it was in existence, pulled in more
27:13
Speaker 2: than sixteen million dollars in penalties against the CFMU in
27:17
Speaker 2: seven years, but nothing seems to deter its stuggish behavior.
27:22
Speaker 2: Is this why you're calling for labor to formally disassociate
27:26
Speaker 2: itself from the CFMU.
27:30
Speaker 11: Yes, Peter, there's been, if you like, many attempts to
27:34
Speaker 11: reign in the conduct of the CFMEU. The abc C
27:39
Speaker 11: I think has been successful in changing their conduct and
27:44
Speaker 11: reducing it, but the culture has never been affected. And look,
27:50
Speaker 11: I think that the penalties. Of course, there is another
27:55
Speaker 11: issue here that under as you mentioned, the number of
28:00
Speaker 11: finds have been levied under the ABCC. Well, now the
28:04
Speaker 11: penalties are going to be reduced by about a third
28:07
Speaker 11: going forward from twenty twenty two, so there's less chance
28:11
Speaker 11: to rain in this conduct. Also, as you mentioned, judges
28:17
Speaker 11: continuously criticize the repeat defender nature of their conduct, and
28:25
Speaker 11: nothing ultimately seems to generate substantial and ongoing change.
28:33
Speaker 2: Well, we've had a lot to say, John this year,
28:35
Speaker 2: in particular about the housing crisis. I mean, how much
28:38
Speaker 2: does the behavior and the inflated costs of the c
28:41
Speaker 2: IFVERU impact the housing crisis.
28:47
Speaker 11: Yeah, well it has a number of effects that there
28:50
Speaker 11: are some direct effects of course, where you're building a
28:53
Speaker 11: large multi story building for homes and dwellings, well then
28:58
Speaker 11: the CFMU will control on that site. They have, as
29:03
Speaker 11: you know, very high pay recently increased in Victoria, New
29:07
Speaker 11: South Wales by over twenty percent. Numerous allowances and the
29:12
Speaker 11: payments and levees on employers, so the costs are very high.
29:17
Speaker 11: We're finding that projects are delayed, they're running over budget.
29:23
Speaker 11: And also I think that the large infrastructure constructions occurring
29:29
Speaker 11: in a number of states, but particularly Victoria, is leading
29:33
Speaker 11: to a scarcity of materials and therefore increased costs, and
29:38
Speaker 11: also of course the scarcity of labor. The salaries are
29:43
Speaker 11: so massive that workers who might normally work in the
29:47
Speaker 11: housing sector of course, are attracted to work on these
29:51
Speaker 11: long protracted projects.
29:55
Speaker 2: I'll leave it there, John, thank you, and good on
29:59
Speaker 2: you for speaking up. I know it's never easy taking
30:01
Speaker 2: on the CFMU, but you've done that for many years.
30:04
Speaker 3: Thank you, John Lloyd.
30:05
Speaker 2: Right nowhere is the federal government's big Australian migration policy
30:08
Speaker 2: hurting more than in the state of Victoria. On the
30:10
Speaker 2: latest statistics, Victoria's got the highest or second highest net
30:15
Speaker 2: overseas migration, second only of course to New South Wales. However,
30:18
Speaker 2: the problem, as a new report from the Australian Population
30:22
Speaker 2: Research Institute highlights, is that the Victorian government is peakheadedly
30:26
Speaker 2: pursuing a big infrastructure bill to meet surging population rather
30:32
Speaker 2: than demanding a decrease in the overall intake. We'll see
30:36
Speaker 2: the hand of the CFMU here as well. It's a
30:39
Speaker 2: terrible mix of the federal government addicted to the Ponzi
30:41
Speaker 2: scheme of high immigration, and a state government that's now
30:45
Speaker 2: got deficits and debt as far as the eye can see,
30:48
Speaker 2: due in no part to these infrastructure cost blowouts. Joy
30:53
Speaker 2: to me now for more Shadow Immigration Minister Dan Tian
30:57
Speaker 2: Well Dan. This report today says Victoria's popular expected to
31:01
Speaker 2: hit eight million people in just a few years time, instead,
31:05
Speaker 2: of course, will be one hundred and eighty eight billion
31:08
Speaker 2: in four years time. We've talked about an energy crisis,
31:12
Speaker 2: We've talked tonight about a housing crisis. It's pretty crooked Victoria.
31:17
Speaker 2: Why on earth aren't we winding back migration.
31:22
Speaker 7: Well, we're not winding it back because it's the only
31:25
Speaker 7: way that the Victorian state government thinks it can grow
31:28
Speaker 7: the economy. And that is the problem with this Victorian
31:32
Speaker 7: state government. As you know, they're only spending infrastructure money
31:37
Speaker 7: on one major project, the suburban rail loop.
31:40
Speaker 10: It's very hard.
31:41
Speaker 7: To see how that's going to fix the broader infrastructure
31:45
Speaker 7: issues that Victoria are now facing, These issues with the
31:49
Speaker 7: Victorian health system are there's issues with the Victorian economy,
31:54
Speaker 7: and yet they.
31:54
Speaker 10: Seem to want to bring in more and more people.
31:57
Speaker 7: And we're in the middle of a per capita GDP
32:01
Speaker 7: recession the last five quarters of seen us go backwards.
32:06
Speaker 7: Yet the Victorian state government want more people. It beggars
32:09
Speaker 7: belief and it does seem to be just a Ponzi
32:12
Speaker 7: scheme for the Victorian state government and the cfmeau.
32:16
Speaker 10: At the expense of all Victorians.
32:21
Speaker 2: Well, and then Victoria's not the only state that spending
32:24
Speaker 2: are big. I mean, in the same analysis, it says
32:26
Speaker 2: that total spending by the states will be in fact
32:29
Speaker 2: eighty percent.
32:30
Speaker 3: Higher than it was a decade ago.
32:33
Speaker 2: So it's projected to go from two point twelve two
32:36
Speaker 2: one hundred and twelve billion in fourteen fifteen that financial
32:40
Speaker 2: year to projected three hundred and eighty three billion this
32:44
Speaker 2: financial year. All of the mainland states, of course, led
32:47
Speaker 2: by labor well, let's give Chris Mins a leaf pass
32:51
Speaker 2: is only just got there, but the others have been
32:53
Speaker 2: in power for some time. Migrations also part of their
32:56
Speaker 2: Ponzi scheme.
32:57
Speaker 3: Isn't it, Dan.
33:00
Speaker 7: It is and you know, the Albanesi labor government have
33:04
Speaker 7: joined in on this scheme in a big way, in
33:06
Speaker 7: a way that we've never seen in our history. Nearly
33:10
Speaker 7: a million people have come into Australia in the first
33:14
Speaker 7: two years under Anthony Albanesi, and that's to grow to
33:18
Speaker 7: nearly one point seven million over five years.
33:23
Speaker 10: This is growth we have never seen the like of.
33:26
Speaker 7: And they're doing it at a time when they're cutting infrastructure,
33:29
Speaker 7: when state governments health systems are under enormous pressure. So
33:35
Speaker 7: the only way that Anthony Albanesi is or seems to
33:40
Speaker 7: think that he can grow the Australian economy is by
33:42
Speaker 7: putting more and more pressure on Australians every day as
33:48
Speaker 7: they go about trying to live their lives. And as
33:51
Speaker 7: you know, this is also occurring during a cost of
33:54
Speaker 7: living crisis, so people's ability to be able to access
33:58
Speaker 7: services at this time it's.
34:00
Speaker 10: Getting harder and harder for them.
34:02
Speaker 7: And you know, it's no wonder that people are saying
34:04
Speaker 7: to me that it is very, very hard to afford
34:08
Speaker 7: anything under this Albanese labor government.
34:14
Speaker 2: What did you make of Matt Keane's appointment today is
34:16
Speaker 2: that new climate czar for the Albanezer government.
34:22
Speaker 7: Well, I've got to say I wasn't shocked, but what
34:25
Speaker 7: I was shocked was the way that he has changed
34:28
Speaker 7: his mind on nuclear. There was that interview with him
34:33
Speaker 7: saying that he thinks nuclear needs to be part of
34:35
Speaker 7: the mix and needs to be part of a sensible discussion,
34:39
Speaker 7: and then when he's standing there next to Anthony Albanesi
34:42
Speaker 7: and Chris Bowen, they seem to have miraculously changed his mind.
34:46
Speaker 7: I think that said it all. And really for us,
34:50
Speaker 7: what we've got to do is just continue to make
34:52
Speaker 7: sure that we prosecute the case as to why we
34:55
Speaker 7: need a sensible mix, which should include looking at nuclear.
35:00
Speaker 7: We've done the right thing. We've announced the seven proposed sites.
35:05
Speaker 7: Obviously costings will follow. And it was very very interesting
35:09
Speaker 7: in question time today because we asked the Prime Minister
35:14
Speaker 7: to reveal his costings of his renewables only approach and
35:19
Speaker 7: he couldn't do it.
35:20
Speaker 10: So we've seen a lot of hypocrisy today.
35:22
Speaker 2: Peter spot On down I picked that up as well.
35:26
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time. Right still to come. How
35:30
Speaker 2: the reality of so called green jobs has been exposed
35:33
Speaker 2: by the nuclear push with very little work for Australians
35:36
Speaker 2: actually involved in the renewables rollout. Plus and one of
35:40
Speaker 2: the Defense force is struggling. Potential new recruits now being
35:44
Speaker 2: asked about their preferred pronouns.
35:46
Speaker 3: More than that, shortly, don't forget older.
35:53
Speaker 2: Give you a little glimpse into what I did in
35:56
Speaker 2: my break that's coming up, and first that's bringing my
35:58
Speaker 2: panel for tonight and Joy Sky, youth contributor for how
36:02
Speaker 2: At Government Minister Gary Hargraves an LMPMP, Keith Pitt, Gents, welcome,
36:07
Speaker 2: great to have you back on the show, my dynamic
36:09
Speaker 2: duo for a Monday. We'll start with the big Coalition
36:14
Speaker 2: nuclear Thank you gentlemen. The nuclear announcement by the coalition
36:18
Speaker 2: and this is the plan to see nuclear power plants
36:20
Speaker 2: put at seven existing coal five power station sites. Experts
36:25
Speaker 2: of course saying that coal workers such as electrical engineers
36:29
Speaker 2: that's your mom bear Keith and mechanical engineers could easily
36:33
Speaker 2: transition across into the nuclear energy.
36:36
Speaker 3: Now, I reckon this is a hell of a.
36:37
Speaker 2: Lot more realistic than these ephemeral green jobs we hear
36:41
Speaker 2: about that never really materialize because there's not much in
36:45
Speaker 2: the way of permanent work once you erect these imported
36:49
Speaker 2: wind turbines and put in place these imported solar panels,
36:53
Speaker 2: is there.
36:53
Speaker 3: Keith, Well, that's exactly right, Peter.
36:57
Speaker 12: It's an absolute nonsense and I had a piece in
37:00
Speaker 12: the Australian earlier in the year. Effectively, the wind turbines
37:03
Speaker 12: are maintained generally by subcontractors like vestas you will have
37:08
Speaker 12: in a power station, a culified power station, a whole
37:11
Speaker 12: heap of technical expertise in well paid jobs like engineers
37:15
Speaker 12: like condition monitoring, and experts like people who work on
37:18
Speaker 12: steam turbines and some very technical pieces of equipment, and
37:21
Speaker 12: Labour's offers for them to go and become solar panel
37:23
Speaker 12: installers on the rooftops of houses, or maybe drive the
37:27
Speaker 12: tractor that runs the slasher on thousands of hectares of
37:30
Speaker 12: solar panels, and guess what, they don't want to do that.
37:33
Speaker 12: So our proposition means they get to keep those jobs
37:36
Speaker 12: in those regions where they've built those skills for literally decades,
37:40
Speaker 12: and they'll keep those high paid jobs, and they will
37:42
Speaker 12: continue to do the same work, and we'll train even
37:45
Speaker 12: more of them into the future. And I just think
37:46
Speaker 12: that is one of the main reasons this is the
37:49
Speaker 12: right proposition for our country and the future of energy
37:51
Speaker 12: in our nation.
37:54
Speaker 3: Garry I was interested to read that advance.
37:57
Speaker 2: This is the mob that was very active in the
38:00
Speaker 2: campaign against the Voice referendum. They're launching a pre election
38:04
Speaker 2: campaign against the Greens. They're calling the campaign Greens Truth.
38:09
Speaker 2: They don't think voters really understand what the Greens are about.
38:12
Speaker 2: They say there's a lot more that's radical about the
38:14
Speaker 2: Greens beyond their environmental policies, and of course if we're
38:18
Speaker 2: headed for minority government, the Greens will be absolutely key players.
38:24
Speaker 3: What do you make of this push.
38:27
Speaker 1: I think it's really important because the Greens used to
38:29
Speaker 1: like koalas. Now they're killing them because they're policies now,
38:34
Speaker 1: their anti Australian approach to everything, and on the energy
38:37
Speaker 1: front alone. You know, their plan is to lop off
38:39
Speaker 1: the tops of hills and fill our farm lands with
38:43
Speaker 1: these solar installations. The hills are going to have the
38:46
Speaker 1: wind turbines, the farmlands are going to have the solar installations.
38:50
Speaker 1: They don't like Australian, the Greens. The Greens actually hate
38:54
Speaker 1: the West and they're promoting every cause that deals with
38:58
Speaker 1: the demeaning of our Western civilization. And you know they
39:02
Speaker 1: used to be nice when they were dealing with little
39:04
Speaker 1: environmental causes and we're all alight greener as a result.
39:08
Speaker 1: But Peter, we cannot kill off our economy in order
39:11
Speaker 1: to follow some international thing. That means that the elites
39:15
Speaker 1: will do fine, thank you very much. They'll be the
39:17
Speaker 1: billionaires or the millionaires who want to be billionaires, as
39:20
Speaker 1: Peter Dunton said over the weekend. They'll do just fine,
39:23
Speaker 1: thank you very much. They're not affected by the increasing
39:26
Speaker 1: cost of everything, driven by the increasing cost of electricity.
39:30
Speaker 1: The Greens don't care because they're all having a great time,
39:32
Speaker 1: thank you very much. And they do not like Australia.
39:36
Speaker 1: I don't think Australian should like them. We can't trust them.
39:38
Speaker 1: They're extreme left and they're controlling the extreme left of
39:42
Speaker 1: the Labor Party and frankly the extreme left of the
39:45
Speaker 1: Liberal Party, of which there's a much smaller number, but
39:47
Speaker 1: they do exist.
39:51
Speaker 3: Hey, Kvy.
39:51
Speaker 2: If I was to sign up for the military today
39:54
Speaker 2: the ADF, the first question on my form would ask
39:58
Speaker 2: me what are my preferred not, how fit I am,
40:01
Speaker 2: how tall I am, what I weigh? All of that
40:03
Speaker 2: stuff that I thought would be relevant. They want to
40:05
Speaker 2: know if I'm a hee him or is she her?
40:07
Speaker 2: Or are they them? Or don't have to disclose if
40:10
Speaker 2: I don't want to actually, And then they ask me
40:12
Speaker 2: if I am lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, interoseex queer.
40:17
Speaker 3: All of that's at the top of the form.
40:20
Speaker 2: Surely we've got bigger things to worry about the ADF
40:23
Speaker 2: than this.
40:26
Speaker 12: What on earth is going on? How does this happen?
40:29
Speaker 3: Ridiculous?
40:30
Speaker 12: The people who are not our friends, our enemies. They
40:33
Speaker 12: don't care what your pronoun is. I don't care how
40:35
Speaker 12: you describe yourself. I don't care about your sexuality. But
40:38
Speaker 12: I tell you what I do care about. I care
40:40
Speaker 12: about the fact that you love your nation enough to
40:42
Speaker 12: defend it. But when it matters, you'll stand with your
40:45
Speaker 12: when you have to. You'll hold fast that you'll wear
40:48
Speaker 12: the Australian flag and you'll do it with pride. And
40:50
Speaker 12: what is wrong with that? In our defense force? Since
40:53
Speaker 12: when did they become this woke organization that's more interested
40:56
Speaker 12: in getting your pronouns right than actually defending our country
40:59
Speaker 12: from all three And I want to congratulate every single
41:02
Speaker 12: person that's out there in our armed forces serve in
41:04
Speaker 12: our country who are putting up with this nonsense. We
41:08
Speaker 12: need more of them, not less. A defense needs to
41:10
Speaker 12: fix this, and they need to fix it fast.
41:14
Speaker 2: All the ministers to stand up, Gary, what about this
41:18
Speaker 2: work push for workers to get an extra week of
41:20
Speaker 2: annual leave, so five weeks. We've got some big companies
41:24
Speaker 2: like Bunnings in Big w they've already done this. We
41:27
Speaker 2: have a sick leave, we've got printer to leave, we've
41:29
Speaker 2: got DV leave, we've got menstrual leave.
41:32
Speaker 3: How on earth you.
41:33
Speaker 2: Run a small business if you get another week of
41:34
Speaker 2: annual leave?
41:37
Speaker 1: How all the Greeks have just told everyone is a
41:39
Speaker 1: six day working week because they haven't got enough people.
41:41
Speaker 1: I mean, we can't find forty three hundred extra people
41:43
Speaker 1: to go into the defense force. That's how undernourished they are.
41:46
Speaker 1: And now they want us to have more holidays. Heavens above,
41:49
Speaker 1: how will anybody stay in business in this country? How
41:52
Speaker 1: will foreign investment come to this country if they know
41:55
Speaker 1: that's the terms and conditions associated with being in this country? Peter,
41:59
Speaker 1: we are killing our cells economically. The Greens are driving it,
42:02
Speaker 1: the left of the Labor Party are driving it, and
42:04
Speaker 1: This country is perilous in its circumstance right now, and
42:08
Speaker 1: energy security is the heart at fixing it. And that's
42:10
Speaker 1: why Peter Darton has got to be supported by any
42:13
Speaker 1: reasonable minded Australian and I'm sory will be.
42:18
Speaker 2: The election can't come soon enough, Jens. I'll leave it there,
42:21
Speaker 2: see you both next week or after break.
42:23
Speaker 3: An insight into what I was doing over my break.
42:32
Speaker 2: Welcome back now a little change of pace, because it's promised.
42:35
Speaker 2: I want to give you a bit of an insight
42:37
Speaker 2: into how I spend much of my recent leave and
42:40
Speaker 2: it was doing something I've always wanted to do but
42:43
Speaker 2: until now haven't been able to find the time needed
42:46
Speaker 2: to do it properly. And by that I mean visit
42:48
Speaker 2: the Great War battlefields of Flanders and the Somme visit
42:53
Speaker 2: in Belgium and northern France. Now we've all got a
42:56
Speaker 2: bucket list of sorts, and this visit to the Western
42:58
Speaker 2: Front has all always been at the top of mine.
43:03
Speaker 2: In the past, I've been really privileged. When you work
43:05
Speaker 2: for a Prime Minister, you get to see a lot.
43:07
Speaker 2: I've seen the beaches of Normandy where the Allies changed
43:11
Speaker 2: the course of the Second World War, and I visited
43:13
Speaker 2: Australia's First World War memorial at Villas Brettneur in northern France.
43:18
Speaker 2: But to do it justice, I really reckon, you've got
43:21
Speaker 2: to find time to properly walk the fields where over
43:24
Speaker 2: forty six thousand Australian soldiers lost their lives in the
43:28
Speaker 2: defense of freedom. I had a great grandfather who enlisted underage.
43:33
Speaker 3: To fight in this war.
43:35
Speaker 2: In the end, his father signed his papers to let
43:38
Speaker 2: him go, and he actually wrote on the elispin form
43:42
Speaker 2: I can't stop him.
43:43
Speaker 3: He wants to go.
43:44
Speaker 2: His brothers five brothers are already fighting overseas now, like
43:49
Speaker 2: so many families, I didn't know much more about his
43:52
Speaker 2: service than that.
43:53
Speaker 3: I know he.
43:53
Speaker 2: Survived, But like many soldiers, he returned and didn't want
43:58
Speaker 2: to talk about what he had seen. I now understand why,
44:02
Speaker 2: because visiting the graves and the many museums and the
44:06
Speaker 2: landscape still scarred today, what he witnessed, what others witnessed,
44:11
Speaker 2: was quite literally hell on earth. It's an alien, lunous
44:16
Speaker 2: sort of landscape in all the pictures of the times,
44:20
Speaker 2: devoid of little else but trenches, mud and death, weeks
44:24
Speaker 2: and weeks of fighting. I don't think I understood this properly,
44:27
Speaker 2: a tremendous loss of life, and if you were lucky,
44:31
Speaker 2: an advance of perhaps a few meters. We know the
44:34
Speaker 2: stories of the trench horror, but to see the land firsthand,
44:38
Speaker 2: the hilltops, we took the valleys where we lost a
44:41
Speaker 2: generation of heroic men. To read the inscriptions on the headstones.
44:45
Speaker 2: To do that was something very, very moving, something I'm
44:49
Speaker 2: glad I've done, And to be honest, I'm more than
44:52
Speaker 2: a little embarrassed it's taking me so long to get
44:54
Speaker 2: there and to make this visit happen. I was likely
44:57
Speaker 2: to go with a wonderful tour group led by Matt
44:59
Speaker 2: mcglock and a former British soldier he's now a historian,
45:03
Speaker 2: Pete Smith. I thought I had a good understanding of
45:05
Speaker 2: the big battles of Possier, Passiondale Men and Roe lahamel
45:10
Speaker 2: A Villa's brett Nerve. But at every battlefield, at every
45:14
Speaker 2: wargrave cemetery, I learned so much more. Now this isn't
45:19
Speaker 2: an advertisement for Matt McLaughlin tours. I hastened Dad. I
45:21
Speaker 2: paid my way, as did my husband, as did my brother,
45:25
Speaker 2: a former Army officer and former PM Tony Abbott was
45:29
Speaker 2: amongst others in our group. I just want to acknowledge
45:32
Speaker 2: how much my experience was enhanced by expert guides. I've
45:37
Speaker 2: always felt you can't understand your present if you don't
45:41
Speaker 2: understand your past, and you certainly can't make sense of
45:44
Speaker 2: your future if your past is ignored. Now I can't
45:48
Speaker 2: be the only Australian who has stood in the fields
45:51
Speaker 2: of the Palm or in the flatlands of Flanders and
45:54
Speaker 2: wondered aloud whether we still had their blood in our veins,
45:57
Speaker 2: if we were worthy descendants of the amazing men.
46:01
Speaker 3: Would we do what's needed when.
46:03
Speaker 2: And if we are called upon to defend the freedoms
46:07
Speaker 2: they gave their lives to protect. Do we speak up
46:11
Speaker 2: as we should, or do we stay silent because that's
46:14
Speaker 2: easier to keep our friends, or, in these increasingly woke times.
46:21
Speaker 3: Easier to keep our jobs.
46:23
Speaker 2: Would we wear a uniform if our country needed us
46:26
Speaker 2: in the future? What line would we draw and declare that,
46:30
Speaker 2: if crossed, our nation must fight? Ten years ago these
46:35
Speaker 2: observations might have been the stuff of a poetical reflection.
46:41
Speaker 2: Today they are a real question to ask real flesh
46:44
Speaker 2: and blood Australians so we face an increasingly dangerous world
46:49
Speaker 2: and the most turbulent.
46:50
Speaker 3: Era in our history, at least since the end.
46:53
Speaker 2: Of the Second World War. Now, there are two observations
46:55
Speaker 2: I want to share with you. The first the new
46:57
Speaker 2: Sir John Mona Center that sits just behind our majestic
47:01
Speaker 2: World War Memorial World War One Memorial at Phillisbrettnair in France.
47:06
Speaker 2: The minor centers close to my heart because it was
47:08
Speaker 2: conceived by Tony Abbott when he was PM, and I
47:11
Speaker 2: worked very closely on its design and development, without any
47:15
Speaker 2: way diminishing the Gallipoli story. Abbot was always dismayed that
47:20
Speaker 2: young people had a good understanding of our great defeat
47:23
Speaker 2: in Turkey, but almost no understanding of our great victories
47:27
Speaker 2: in Europe, and how in particular Australian soldiers and an
47:32
Speaker 2: extraordinary Australian Jewish general and Saint John Monash helped turn
47:37
Speaker 2: the tide of the war on the Western Front. The
47:39
Speaker 2: Minash Center, with its film vision and displays all very
47:43
Speaker 2: accessible to people of all ages and lots of knowledge
47:47
Speaker 2: or no knowledge at all. Well, that's about changing that
47:50
Speaker 2: lack of understanding, and it does it so very well.
47:53
Speaker 2: It's a real critic to everyone involved. I was thrilled
47:56
Speaker 2: to see it in person, and what a wonderful tribute
47:59
Speaker 2: it is to those who fought in the Great War,
48:02
Speaker 2: and it's a fine legacy of the Abbot government as well.
48:06
Speaker 2: The second observation I want to leave with you is
48:08
Speaker 2: about the graves of our dead, and specifically the work
48:12
Speaker 2: of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Now you cannot visit
48:17
Speaker 2: the graves of our dead and not be proud of
48:20
Speaker 2: how magnificently they are maintained. The perfect green lawns, the
48:25
Speaker 2: ivory headstones, the cottage gardens, the plants around the grays
48:30
Speaker 2: designed to replicate the family gardens of our dead men
48:34
Speaker 2: that were thousands and thousands of miles away from home.
48:38
Speaker 2: As a country, we fund the Commonwealth War Graves Commission
48:42
Speaker 2: to do its work alongside the UK, Canada and New Zealand,
48:45
Speaker 2: South Africa and others. In a world where we're often
48:49
Speaker 2: critical that taxpayer dollars don't deliver results or that there's waste,
48:54
Speaker 2: I just want to report to you tonight how impressed
48:57
Speaker 2: I was with the beauty of the cemetery is and
49:00
Speaker 2: the care and dedication of the gardeners who in Almost
49:04
Speaker 2: every cemetery I visited must have been close to twenty
49:08
Speaker 2: five of them were hard at work in all of them.
49:12
Speaker 2: There's a lot of system doesn't get right, but this
49:14
Speaker 2: is something it does get right, and does it with
49:17
Speaker 2: great dignity to the memory of those men and those
49:20
Speaker 2: who love them. It was Charles Being, the World War
49:24
Speaker 2: One journalist, story and writer, and the driving force behind
49:28
Speaker 2: the creation of our war memorial in Canberra, who said
49:32
Speaker 2: of our great war record, it rises as it will
49:37
Speaker 2: always rise, above the mists of time, a monument to
49:42
Speaker 2: great hearted men and for their nation, a possession forever.
49:48
Speaker 2: As I said on my bucket list, it's now done,
49:52
Speaker 2: and if you can spare the time and the money,
49:55
Speaker 2: I urge you to walk in their shoes as I've
49:58
Speaker 2: just done. All right, great to be back, looking forward
50:01
Speaker 2: to seeing tomorrow night at six up next to the
50:04
Speaker 2: Bolt Report.