Latest / Inside Politics / Albanese meets with Trump next week. Anything could happen

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Albanese meets with Trump next week. Anything could happen · Inside Politics

• 0:00
  S1: From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
• 0:03
  S1: This is inside politics. I'm Jacqueline Maley, it's Friday, October 17th. Well,
• 0:10
  S1: they said he couldn't do it, but he's doing it
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  S1: in a few days time. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, fresh
• 0:15
  S1: from a week's holiday, will be flying to Washington to
• 0:18
  S1: meet President Trump. So today we're going to talk about
• 0:20
  S1: what he hopes to achieve there. And we're also going
• 0:23
  S1: to delve into what really went on between the PM
• 0:25
  S1: and his treasurer, Jim Chalmers, over the super reforms that
• 0:28
  S1: Jim Chalmers abandoned this week. Paul said the treasurer had
• 0:32
  S1: his pants pulled down by the PM, which is, you know,
• 0:35
  S1: an interesting phrasing, but is he right? As always, I'm
• 0:38
  S1: joined by chief political correspondent Paul Chuckle. And also our
• 0:42
  S1: special guest star, chief economics correspondent Shane Wright is joining us. Hi, guys.
• 0:48
  S2: I'm still waiting for the music to come in for
• 0:50
  S2: my special guest appearance.
• 0:51
  S1: I know, I know, I've got I keep forgetting to
• 0:53
  S1: push the button. I do want to do a shout
• 0:56
  S1: out to Shane Wright's t shirt, which, if you're listening
• 0:59
  S1: and not watching, it's a Kate Bush tribute, which is
• 1:02
  S1: which would fetch a lot of good money in a
• 1:05
  S1: vintage store. No offense.
• 1:08
  S2: She's she's no vintage star. She's she's live and pumping
• 1:12
  S2: it all out.
• 1:13
  S1: She is, she is.
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  S3: I didn't realize my my comments to you in private.
• 1:17
  S3: Jack will make it into your intro. So I've got
• 1:18
  S3: to be a bit careful now going forward.
• 1:21
  S1: Oh, right. The pulling pants down thing. Should we. We can,
• 1:24
  S1: we can.
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  S3: No, no, I'm just joking. That's fine. I stand.
• 1:28
  S1: By it. I thought it was very colorful phrasing. And
• 1:30
  S1: we'll get into what it really means later. Um, Paul,
• 1:33
  S1: when does the Prime Minister leave for Washington?
• 1:35
  S3: He leaves on Sunday, I believe, in the afternoon. And
• 1:39
  S3: it's a quick trip because he just spent, I think,
• 1:42
  S3: nearly ten days in New York longer. Yeah. Well, it
• 1:45
  S3: was about 3 or 4 days in London, maybe ten
• 1:48
  S3: days in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, uh,
• 1:51
  S3: which was about a fortnight ago. Uh, so he's all, uh,
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  S3: jet lagged out and keen to do some domestic politics
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  S3: ahead of even more summits at the end of this
• 2:02
  S3: month at Asean and APEC. So it's a quick trip.
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  S3: He'll be in Washington for two working days, I believe.
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  S3: He meets with Trump on Tuesday at 2 a.m. Australian time.
• 2:13
  S3: So you've got to be pretty hardcore to stay up
• 2:15
  S3: that late or wake up at that time or feel
• 2:17
  S3: like a, you know, a Socceroos World Cup game when
• 2:20
  S3: just the diehards on Twitter are live tweeting through it? Yeah.
• 2:23
  S2: And there could be an interesting scoreline though out of
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  S2: this one. Yeah.
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  S3: You never reckon which which way will this be a
• 2:28
  S3: Fabio Grosso Italy versus Socceroos style national tragedy moment or
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  S3: a or a conquest?
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  S2: This is one of the great questions and as as
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  S2: I'm not going to express an opinion on the Socceroos
• 2:40
  S2: as I am not an expert in that field. But yes,
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  S2: it could. This could go any way it could.
• 2:46
  S1: I mean, and Paul Paul's got views on that too.
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  S1: I know the PM, of course, copped a lot of
• 2:50
  S1: criticism from the media about the fact that he hadn't
• 2:53
  S1: gotten a meeting with the with Trump since his inauguration
• 2:56
  S1: in January, and that it was all too late. But
• 2:58
  S1: now he's got the meeting. What form will the meeting take?
• 3:00
  S1: Do we know?
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  S3: It's not a formal state visit. There'll be no big
• 3:04
  S3: state dinner. And it will not be full of that
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  S3: kind of pomp. It's it's been called a working visit,
• 3:10
  S3: which will take the form of, you know, elbow walking
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  S3: into the Oval Office, do a quick handshake photograph and
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  S3: then a longer sit down meeting in the in the
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  S3: Oval Office. There may be a huge pack of journalists
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  S3: in there asking all kinds of questions, and it may
• 3:25
  S3: be a more rambunctious affair.
• 3:27
  S1: Yeah, but the actual meeting itself obviously takes place in private.
• 3:30
  S1: And then they ask the journalists in. Yeah. So and
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  S1: that could be a freewheeling press conference. That's sort of
• 3:35
  S1: where the fireworks happen, right, with, with a Trump press conference.
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  S1: Because you never know what he's going to say. There's always,
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  S1: I think, a little bit of tension, dramatic or otherwise,
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  S1: on the part of the foreign leader who's visiting. And then,
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  S1: of course, you've got the white House press corps, which
• 3:48
  S1: are by no means a conventional press corps anymore. So
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  S1: what does he want to accomplish in this meeting? What
• 3:53
  S1: does he need to accomplish in this meeting. He's got
• 3:54
  S1: to really make make it work for him, right?
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  S3: Yeah, there's a lot of pressure going into it, although
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  S3: I feel I mean, it's only a few days away
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  S3: now and there's not a huge amount of media speculation
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  S3: about it. I'm surprised at how long it's taken for
• 4:07
  S3: attention to turn to it. And I wonder if that's
• 4:09
  S3: because there's a bit of fatigue on on previewing this
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  S3: potential meeting, because it was meant to occur at Canada,
• 4:16
  S3: at the G7 in whenever that was June, and then
• 4:18
  S3: it was meant to happen again at the United Nations
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  S3: General Assembly. And so I wonder if people are just
• 4:23
  S3: a bit sick of forecasting what will occur.
• 4:25
  S1: Tell us quickly what he needs to do there, because
• 4:27
  S1: he wrote about that this week.
• 4:28
  S3: Well, Critical Minerals is turning into. I interviewed Richard Marles,
• 4:31
  S3: the defence and defence minister and deputy prime minister, last week,
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  S3: and I said, how big a deal is this becoming
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  S3: geopolitically for Australia as it crystallizes in the minds of
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  S3: many Western leaders, but in particular Trump and his key allies,
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  S3: that this is a core part of the contest with China.
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  S3: So to explain to listeners, critical minerals are a whole
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  S3: bunch of elements in the periodic table that are becoming
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  S3: much more in demand because they're used in modern defense
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  S3: technologies and really core to the green revolution for solar
• 4:59
  S3: panels and magnets and also semiconductors and many different new
• 5:02
  S3: modern age products. China has cornered this market for about
• 5:05
  S3: 20 or 30 years, so they mine about 75% and
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  S3: they produce about 90%. Yeah, they're not actually that rare.
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  S3: There are many big deposits in the world, but they're
• 5:15
  S3: very expensive to mine. But Australia has a tremendous amount.
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  S3: We effectively have the whole periodic table, but we've not
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  S3: invested enough in it over time to actually bring them
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  S3: out of the ground. The US now acknowledges that Australia
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  S3: is arguably the most important place it can start supplying
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  S3: critical minerals from. And so there's a huge push being
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  S3: led by Kevin Rudd in Washington, who's been doing this
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  S3: for the best part of two years to get US
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  S3: and European investment to dig it out of Australia and
• 5:40
  S3: create a non-china supply chain. And Richard Marles, his argument
• 5:44
  S3: was that, you know, this is not some second tier
• 5:47
  S3: interest of Trump. This is a core interest of the
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  S3: Trump administration brought to light last week when China started
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  S3: again restricting these exports to the US, which has sparked
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  S3: another bout in the trade war between China and the US.
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  S1: And Shane, our interests, our economic interests really align with
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  S1: the US on this. I mean, we also need these
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  S1: critical minerals and we are also reliant on China. If
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  S1: China's got more or less a monopoly on at least
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  S1: producing them because they're very dirty to produce and expensive,
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  S1: as Paul said.
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  S2: Yeah. Um, I don't know if the economic interests are
• 6:17
  S2: aligned specifically with, uh, the US as also China. Remember,
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  S2: China is still the big cash cow for this country
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  S2: with iron ore. So the context is someone there are
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  S2: two big competing forces for these these minerals. We can't
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  S2: refine them and use them because we're too small a country.
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  S2: We're too far away from the main sources, like some
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  S2: of the stuff that ends up in semiconductors, which are
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  S2: vital to the AI revolution. Like we are not going
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  S2: to replicate Taiwan and become a great producer of semiconductors,
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  S2: so ultimately we actually have a really strong position economically
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  S2: with both powers because China, yes, China does have 75%,
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  S2: but they don't have all of them. They're not as
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  S2: easy to mine in parts of China as they are
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  S2: in Australia. Like you get out into parts of Western Australia. Yep.
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  S2: Pick it up, dig it out. Off you go. A
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  S2: lot easier. So I find it really interesting that like
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  S2: at that economic power play that's going on between China
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  S2: and the US and how Central Australia is to both
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  S2: of those nations.
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  S1: So we're almost like a sort of we're a pivot
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  S1: point or we've got leverage on both sides.
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  S3: Yeah.
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  S2: Yeah.
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  S1: Paul I want to ask you about tariffs as well,
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  S1: because that's another thing that Albanese will be perhaps delicately
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  S1: raising in this meeting. What does he want to achieve
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  S1: on tariffs.
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  S3: Well we're subject to the lowest baseline tariff of 10%.
• 7:42
  S3: No country has had that has been exempted from that.
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  S1: This is an across the board tariff.
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  S3: Across the board tariff, which in a relative sense, given
• 7:51
  S3: much of the world is at a higher baseline rate.
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  S3: We are put at a competitive advantage because of that.
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  S3: And the Productivity Commission has actually said that we might
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  S3: benefit in the long run if other countries escalate and
• 8:02
  S3: do reciprocal tariffs. That hasn't quite happened yet to the
• 8:05
  S3: extent that we thought, but we're still yet to see
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  S3: the consequences of what happens with China and the US,
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  S3: which has been delayed, the consequences of that tariff war,
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  S3: in part because the US backed away from Chinese tariffs,
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  S3: because when China responded by blocking critical minerals, Ford and
• 8:20
  S3: other car manufacturers said, hey, can we not tariff them
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  S3: because we actually need these things to build cars and
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  S3: our economy will stop. So these things are all intertwined.
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  S3: Don Farrell, every time he speaks, the trade minister says,
• 8:31
  S3: you know, we still want to get rid of that 10%
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  S3: and we still want to get rid of that steel
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  S3: and aluminium tariff. I think there's there's more that's more
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  S3: of a talking point now than anything. I don't think
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  S3: the government.
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  S1: Does that mean that Albanese just won't raise tariffs, or
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  S1: will he sort of say, oh, mate, you know, what
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  S1: do you want to think about that 10% and then
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  S1: just drop it?
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  S3: I think he'll raise it because it has to be
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  S3: part of the readout. The readout being what they tell
• 8:53
  S3: the Australian public he raised. We can't be seen to
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  S3: have given up on it, but I don't think there's
• 8:57
  S3: any likelihood of dropping the 10%. There is a prospect
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  S3: if there is some broader critical minerals deal, which the
• 9:03
  S3: government is very quiet about, given the sensitivity that there's
• 9:07
  S3: a potential that we get some sort of carve out
• 9:09
  S3: in the steel and aluminium space, and maybe a deal
• 9:12
  S3: for to ensure that CSL, the drug manufacturer, doesn't get
• 9:16
  S3: caught up in the pharmaceutical tariffs. Keir Starmer got some
• 9:19
  S3: adjustments to auto tariffs and steel, I believe, when he
• 9:22
  S3: did a deal with Trump.
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  S2: But he got an adjustment. They're still paying tariffs and
• 9:26
  S2: the US budget and every like Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary,
• 9:31
  S2: keeps reminding him you actually need the tariff revenue because
• 9:35
  S2: of the huge deficit that the US because.
• 9:37
  S3: He keeps.
• 9:38
  S2: Cutting taxes. So it's like the whole argument that, oh,
• 9:41
  S2: you'll get a country like whoever, whichever political leader turns
• 9:45
  S2: up in Washington says get an exclusion on tariffs. Trump
• 9:48
  S2: cannot do that without absolutely crushing even further a terrible
• 9:54
  S2: budget situation.
• 9:55
  S1: So just really quickly, Shane, and this is probably a
• 9:58
  S1: much bigger conversation. But, you know, we heard so much
• 10:00
  S1: panic mongering amongst people like yourself, economists about the tariffs
• 10:04
  S1: and that they were going to crash the US economy
• 10:06
  S1: and they were going to push up inflation. And, you know,
• 10:08
  S1: people were even worried about a sort of global recession
• 10:10
  S1: in some cases. What has been the impact of the
• 10:13
  S1: tariffs so far that we can see.
• 10:15
  S2: It's pushing up inflation. It's starting to slow the American economy. Yeah.
• 10:19
  S2: If it wasn't for the AI data build out that's
• 10:24
  S2: occurring across the United States. The US would be in
• 10:26
  S2: recession right now. And and Trump is causing that. The
• 10:30
  S2: thing that hasn't happened and most and every economist is going,
• 10:34
  S2: thank God, is that there hasn't been the retribution from
• 10:37
  S2: everybody else. Yeah. That's that's what it all swung on.
• 10:40
  S2: Because at this point Trump is causing pain to his
• 10:44
  S2: own economy and to his own residence. And you can
• 10:47
  S2: see that as much as like we hear about how
• 10:50
  S2: successful Trump is, he is so underwater in the American polls.
• 10:54
  S2: All of the opinion polls, because of the cost of
• 10:57
  S2: living pressures that are going on, and because you can
• 11:00
  S2: see the softness in the jobs market and you can
• 11:04
  S2: see businesses are just they did bought a lot of
• 11:07
  S2: pre tariff products into the US. And they're now having
• 11:12
  S2: to start pass on that increase in prices.
• 11:15
  S1: So there's a lag effect. But it's only going to
• 11:17
  S1: kind of there's the momentum on the inflation front is
• 11:20
  S1: only going to build on the US economy. I just
• 11:22
  S1: want to switch now. Obviously we Albanese will be talking
• 11:25
  S1: also about Aukus just very quickly, because you did have
• 11:27
  S1: this interesting interview with Richard Marles that was published this week,
• 11:31
  S1: where he talked about how vice President JD Vance is
• 11:35
  S1: actually sort of like the Trump whisperer or the guy
• 11:37
  S1: that Marles really wanted to build a connection with in
• 11:42
  S1: order to sort of have an end to the Trump administration.
• 11:44
  S1: Tell us about what Miles said.
• 11:46
  S3: Yeah. Well, there was this. Much discussed trip that Miles did.
• 11:52
  S3: He was a bit secretive. He went without giving the
• 11:54
  S3: Australian media much notice in August, and it was a
• 11:58
  S3: key part of the focus from the Australian media was
• 12:00
  S3: whether he would get this formal meeting with Pete Hegseth,
• 12:03
  S3: his defense counterpart. He's met Pete Hegseth a number of
• 12:06
  S3: times before, but Miles opened up in an interview with
• 12:09
  S3: me last week on the on the real purpose of
• 12:11
  S3: that trip. And the the key thing he was seeking
• 12:13
  S3: to do was to build a political deputy to deputy
• 12:16
  S3: relationship with JD Vance. JD Vance is doing a lot
• 12:19
  S3: of one to ones with foreign leaders, Keir Starmer and others.
• 12:23
  S3: He's been seen as a kind of intellectual thought leader
• 12:25
  S3: of the MAGA foreign policy, clearly a very influential figure
• 12:29
  S3: close to Trump. Many people think he'll succeed Trump. And
• 12:32
  S3: so Miles said that that's a key relationship for the
• 12:34
  S3: government to effectively build trust, to emphasize the points of
• 12:38
  S3: Shared values, shared language, shared strategy in the Indo-Pacific with Vance,
• 12:44
  S3: and to use that as a way to pave the
• 12:46
  S3: way for Albanese to meet Trump this month. Yeah. Marles
• 12:50
  S3: as you said, Jack Aukus will be key to the
• 12:52
  S3: meeting as well. Uh, the Pentagon still reviewing it. Marles
• 12:56
  S3: said that he received only positive feedback from Marco Rubio,
• 12:59
  S3: JD Vance, Pete Hegseth, uh, and Stephen Miller, Trump's influential
• 13:04
  S3: deputy chief of staff during that one and two days
• 13:07
  S3: of meetings, which was really, um, to give Marles credit,
• 13:10
  S3: this government has copped a lot of flack for their
• 13:12
  S3: relationship with the Trump administration. Some of it justified, some
• 13:15
  S3: of it not. But to meet those four guys within
• 13:17
  S3: the space of I think it was really one day
• 13:19
  S3: is a pretty impressive swing through Washington.
• 13:22
  S1: Just coming back to the domestic front. Obviously the Prime
• 13:25
  S1: Minister's in such a powerful position at the moment. He's
• 13:28
  S1: you know, he's flying high in the polls. He's had
• 13:31
  S1: all these sort of foreign policy successes. He's almost sort
• 13:34
  S1: of like floating above domestic politics in a way at
• 13:36
  S1: the moment, but we did see this week that there
• 13:39
  S1: was the back down on the super changes. And I
• 13:41
  S1: know we've already canvassed in other podcasts, like the sort
• 13:43
  S1: of ins and outs of the actual changes themselves. It
• 13:46
  S1: was basically an abandonment of these reforms, or a partial
• 13:50
  S1: abandonment of these reforms that they were hoping to get
• 13:52
  S1: more tax from high super earners. I want to talk
• 13:55
  S1: about the politics of it, because it was reported that,
• 13:58
  S1: as Paul said, that Chalmers got his pants pulled down
• 14:01
  S1: by the PM, the PM basically overruled him and said, look,
• 14:04
  S1: you've got to you got to get rid of this.
• 14:06
  S1: Shane what happened?
• 14:08
  S2: Yeah. And ultimately, this is how past relationships between treasurers
• 14:13
  S2: and prime ministers work. Um hawke-keating Howard Costello, hockey and Abbott,
• 14:19
  S2: which a lot of people tend to forget, uh, what
• 14:22
  S2: went on there? There's always a tension. Yeah. Um, and
• 14:26
  S2: in this case, Albanese has effectively said come up with
• 14:29
  S2: something different. Yeah. And that's what he's done. The ultimate
• 14:34
  S2: end game is that the tax on high end Superannuants
• 14:38
  S2: is going up by not an inconsequential amount, but nowhere
• 14:42
  S2: near by as much.
• 14:43
  S1: And it leaves. It leaves Jim Chalmers with a problem,
• 14:45
  S1: because now he's got a hole in the budget where,
• 14:47
  S1: you know, the projections of what they were going to
• 14:50
  S1: save with those costings has sort of gone.
• 14:52
  S3: And it's really one of their only savings measures.
• 14:55
  S1: Yeah. Yeah.
• 14:56
  S2: I wouldn't call it savings measure. This was a revenue.
• 14:58
  S2: This was increasing tax.
• 14:59
  S3: Revenue measure to actually bring in cash.
• 15:00
  S2: Yeah. So this this I think rule of thumb rather
• 15:04
  S2: than say 40 billion, which is we actually have some
• 15:08
  S2: idea because the Liberal Party went to the last election
• 15:11
  S2: saying we're going to repeal this tax. So there was
• 15:14
  S2: an analysis done by the Parliamentary Budget Office which said
• 15:17
  S2: the cost of repealing that tax, the original tax proposal
• 15:22
  S2: was 43, 44 billion over the next ten years. Nothing
• 15:25
  S2: to sneeze at. Um, the cost of that was much
• 15:28
  S2: larger for the coalition because they were going to blow
• 15:31
  S2: up the whole thing. There's going to be extra government
• 15:33
  S2: debt as well. So the total cost was 750. Bill.
• 15:36
  S2: Coming back to where Chalmers has ended up the change
• 15:40
  S2: to indexation. By indexing these thresholds, he has changed remarkably
• 15:45
  S2: how much they're going to earn. I'm thinking at about half.
• 15:49
  S1: Of.
• 15:49
  S2: That.
• 15:49
  S1: But they haven't given us any official costings on, like
• 15:52
  S1: we were going to. We were saying back then that
• 15:54
  S1: we were going to, you know, save all this money,
• 15:56
  S1: but now it's actually only going to be this tiny
• 15:58
  S1: amount of money.
• 15:59
  S2: Well, I mean, you say 43 billion is a lot
• 16:03
  S2: and 20 billion is nothing like I don't know where
• 16:06
  S2: you shop, Jack, but more than.
• 16:07
  S3: Half.
• 16:07
  S2: I'm getting I'm getting worried, Jack. Jack, about your spending proclivities.
• 16:12
  S1: I know, I know. I mean, yeah, um, so am I.
• 16:15
  S1: I guess what I'm saying is, what I'm trying to
• 16:17
  S1: get at is that they had this economic round table
• 16:20
  S1: which was obviously pushed by Jim Chalmers. They were like,
• 16:22
  S1: you know, we're really interested in tax reform. We're open
• 16:24
  S1: to it. Um, it's on the table. But they're not
• 16:26
  S1: really are they?
• 16:29
  S2: No, there are there are other things coming.
• 16:32
  S1: What? There are.
• 16:33
  S2: Well? What's coming? I'm not going to give it all away.
• 16:36
  S1: Right now on this podcast.
• 16:37
  S2: I think you will see the next budget. There'll be more.
• 16:40
  S2: There'll be more changes. Okay. Like. Right. Everyone's forgotten what
• 16:43
  S2: actually went on during those three days. And we focus
• 16:48
  S2: on tax. Yeah. But say for instance, this week, a
• 16:52
  S2: big shift which the reserve Bank has been banging on
• 16:54
  S2: about is the lack of competition in the country. Yes.
• 16:56
  S2: The government's competition reforms in that space actually took another
• 17:00
  S2: step forward this week.
• 17:01
  S3: Epbc act is.
• 17:02
  S2: Epbc. There are those things like ultimately they are good
• 17:07
  S2: for the economy and for the budget, but they are
• 17:09
  S2: not nearly as sexy as write a tax change.
• 17:12
  S1: Yeah, Paul, treasurers and prime ministers have to work together.
• 17:15
  S1: Their success depends on each other. They're so interdependent. And
• 17:19
  S1: yet they do, you know, always traditionally have a rivalry.
• 17:22
  S1: Do we see any of that with Albanese and Chalmers?
• 17:24
  S1: I know they have a good working relationship. I would
• 17:27
  S1: not say. You couldn't say at the moment that they
• 17:29
  S1: have a rivalry with each other, but could there be
• 17:32
  S1: a rivalry in the future? They have very different interests,
• 17:34
  S1: don't they?
• 17:35
  S3: Yeah, there. There's a big age gap between them as well.
• 17:38
  S3: Chalmers is from the Queensland right. Albanese is from the
• 17:41
  S3: labor left. They're institutionally different characters. I mean they're both
• 17:45
  S3: they are both. I think Phil Currie wrote this this week,
• 17:47
  S3: both kind of working class guys who love rugby league.
• 17:49
  S3: So there's some similarities there. But they're from different parts
• 17:51
  S3: of the party. They have fundamentally different interests. In terms
• 17:54
  S3: of Chalmers trying to build himself up to become the
• 17:56
  S3: prime minister and Albanese trying to retain this immense power
• 18:00
  S3: and this special position he has now with this big majority.
• 18:03
  S3: But it's not you mentioned earlier, Jack, and I'm not
• 18:06
  S3: not to quibble with your language, but it's not just
• 18:09
  S3: my view that he got rolled by the PM. He
• 18:11
  S3: just he just did. Yeah. Um, Chalmers has been defending
• 18:15
  S3: this policy for two years, not giving any room to
• 18:18
  S3: the criticism that taxing paper profits might set a bad
• 18:21
  S3: precedent for the government for it to be potentially, you know,
• 18:25
  S3: if a if a negative scare campaign is launched by
• 18:27
  S3: the Liberal Party to suggest that it would be used
• 18:30
  S3: on the family home or whatever else. He gave no
• 18:32
  S3: room to that theory. The Prime Minister, before the election,
• 18:35
  S3: we reported this yesterday, started to become concerned about the
• 18:38
  S3: prospects of a scare campaign. He decided not to make
• 18:41
  S3: any changes pre-election because Angus Taylor, who was widely criticised,
• 18:45
  S3: criticised as an incompetent shadow treasurer, didn't weaponize the issue.
• 18:48
  S3: Tim Wilson then got elected after the election. Tim Wilson,
• 18:52
  S3: the master of a big scare campaign against the labor
• 18:54
  S3: tax policy. He started banging the drum through the Australian
• 18:57
  S3: Financial Review and other newspapers. The Australian became interested through
• 19:00
  S3: their economics correspondent, who was just quite dogmatic about this policy.
• 19:06
  S3: And so the campaign unusually, very unusually, came to life
• 19:10
  S3: after the election. And so this raised up the fear
• 19:13
  S3: in the Prime Minister's mind again that he had pre-election
• 19:16
  S3: and around the time of the economic roundtable, which was August,
• 19:18
  S3: which we spent a lot of time in here calling
• 19:20
  S3: Canberra's Coachella. The Prime Minister said to Chalmers, look, we're
• 19:24
  S3: not going forward with this proposal in its current form.
• 19:27
  S3: I'm not going to tell you how to suck eggs.
• 19:29
  S3: You need to own this, but it can't have these
• 19:31
  S3: components of unrealized gains and no indexation. Come up with
• 19:35
  S3: a new plan. That's my order. I was told the
• 19:37
  S3: Prime Minister barely even consulted his cabinet on this. He
• 19:40
  S3: made a call off his own judgment with some key lieutenants,
• 19:44
  S3: and Chalmers was forced to announce this on Albanese's first
• 19:48
  S3: day in the Pacific Islands on holiday. It was a
• 19:51
  S3: proverbial sandwich for the treasurer, and kind of leads to
• 19:54
  S3: questions about his authority around the cabinet table and his
• 19:57
  S3: ability to pursue reform. If this is, if he backs,
• 20:00
  S3: if he's been forced to back down on something that,
• 20:02
  S3: you know, many commentators, I think rightfully said was not
• 20:06
  S3: as big a deal as some of the critics made out.
• 20:08
  S3: Then what does that say about his ability to do
• 20:10
  S3: bigger things?
• 20:10
  S1: Well, that's what I'm sort of interested in on an
• 20:13
  S1: interpersonal level, because it's a humiliating thing to be, to
• 20:17
  S1: have to back down publicly from this policy that you've
• 20:19
  S1: been touting and really backing for two years. How does
• 20:23
  S1: that feel for Chalmers? And does that not breed some
• 20:25
  S1: resentment towards the Prime Minister, who maybe could have let
• 20:27
  S1: him know a little bit sooner, perhaps, that, you know,
• 20:29
  S1: he was not in favor of this, you know, reasonable
• 20:33
  S1: sort of change in a lot of people's minds.
• 20:36
  S3: Well, that's a good question. I can't read Chalmers mind.
• 20:38
  S3: I mean, he was pretty stony faced in that press
• 20:40
  S3: conference on Monday in the Blue Room. He's a master politician,
• 20:43
  S3: Jim Chalmers. He knows how these things work. I think
• 20:45
  S3: he did as good a job of possible as presenting
• 20:48
  S3: this new change as, um, good reform. And in some
• 20:51
  S3: ways it is good reform. What he did to the
• 20:54
  S3: top tax bracket and the low income measure to give
• 20:57
  S3: the green something the new policy is not. It will
• 21:00
  S3: have more fans than the old policy. So I think
• 21:02
  S3: he's found a good solution. But I think it Marginalises
• 21:06
  S3: Chalmers in the government, it enhances the idea that the
• 21:09
  S3: Prime Minister has ultimate control. To your point, earlier, Jack,
• 21:12
  S3: about how the special position the Prime Minister is in,
• 21:17
  S3: I don't know if I should say this, but I'll
• 21:18
  S3: say it anyway. The Prime Minister was walking out of
• 21:20
  S3: Question Time on Wednesday or Thursday last week, and there
• 21:23
  S3: was a small a small group of people in the corridors,
• 21:26
  S3: and he joked that the only thing his colleagues were
• 21:29
  S3: split on was whether he was going to serve 5
• 21:30
  S3: or 6 terms. He was absolutely joking. But it's just
• 21:34
  S3: it's a sign of where he's at. Chalmers. Chalmers has
• 21:36
  S3: been overshadowed by Tony. Tony Burke. At the moment, in
• 21:39
  S3: some ways. Right. Um, Mark Butler is growing.
• 21:42
  S2: I want to wind you back there. Marginalising treasurers. Doesn't happen. Well.
• 21:46
  S3: I'm not saying he's marginalised, but I just did.
• 21:49
  S2: You just said this marginalizes the treasurer. I'm going to
• 21:52
  S2: pull you up because historically, the guy and they've all
• 21:56
  S2: been guys who holds the finances of the country is
• 22:00
  S2: impossible to marginalize because, remember, because you've got the Treasury.
• 22:04
  S2: The Treasury itself has so along with finance, they have
• 22:09
  S2: so much control of everybody else's, like the political.
• 22:13
  S3: I just think it's happened here to some extent, to
• 22:15
  S3: some extent.
• 22:15
  S2: But to some extent. But I don't think you can
• 22:17
  S2: go it's end of days but marginalising it because ultimately
• 22:21
  S2: the budget which is pivotal to how a government runs.
• 22:24
  S2: That's that's the that's the very good treasurer.
• 22:27
  S3: Of the day. And he'll bounce back. But this is
• 22:29
  S3: a low moment.
• 22:30
  S1: Yeah, yeah. Thanks, guys. That was a very interesting wild
• 22:33
  S1: roving chat. I really enjoyed it. See you very soon.
• 22:36
  S2: It's always a pleasure to see you, Jack.
• 22:43
  S1: Today's episode was produced by Kai Wong with technical assistance
• 22:46
  S1: from Debbie Harrington. Our executive producer is Tammy Mills. Tom
• 22:50
  S1: McKendrick is our head of audio. To listen to our
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  S1: or smh.com.au. Subscribe. I'm Jacqueline Maley. Thank you for listening.