Latest / Inside Politics / A national address, nailing down the budget, and Hastie’s ‘striking’ interview

Transcript

A national address, nailing down the budget, and Hastie’s ‘striking’ interview · Inside Politics

0:00
S1: My fellow Australians. By nature, we're an optimistic country, but
0:05
S1: I understand that right now it's hard to be positive.
0:09
S1: The war in the Middle East.
0:11
S2: Okay, guys, I've got Paul and Shane right in the
0:13
S2: studio with me. I want to hear from them on
0:15
S2: a Winston Churchill scale of 1 to 10, how do
0:18
S2: we rate the Prime Minister's address to the nation on
0:21
S2: Wednesday night?
0:23
S3: Well, it was no, I will fight them on the
0:25
S3: service station front line. It was a very well short
0:29
S3: of that tenor.
0:31
S2: Yes. And Paul, what did you make of it?
0:34
S4: Well, the Prime Minister's not Barack Obama. It wasn't quite
0:37
S4: the Gettysburg Address, but it served an important purpose, I think,
0:42
S4: for many voters out there, they haven't actually heard a
0:45
S4: clear message from the government yet. It's felt messy. The
0:48
S4: government was a little bit late to get its tone right.
0:51
S4: There is a realization now that this will dominate the
0:53
S4: government's agenda for weeks, if not months, probably months. And
0:57
S4: so I think the government was keen to get its
0:59
S4: voice into the public discourse for Albanese to be able
1:03
S4: to say, I took it very seriously from the start
1:05
S4: to condition for what comes next and to, you know,
1:09
S4: reassure but also warn about what the future might hold.
1:13
S4: The knock on the speech or the address will be
1:15
S4: that by actually calling a national address early in the
1:18
S4: morning and having a day of speculation about what might
1:20
S4: be in it. It served the opposite effect to actually
1:22
S4: instil fear. There's some anecdotal reports about queues at service stations,
1:27
S4: which clearly was not the government's intent. There'll be days
1:30
S4: of questions, and I imagine the Prime Minister will have
1:32
S4: to justify his decision to to go forward with such
1:35
S4: a big set piece that may not have had the
1:38
S4: desired outcome.
1:39
S2: Yeah. I mean, I didn't see it as sort of
1:42
S2: badly as that. I just sort of thought that he
1:44
S2: was under a bit of criticism last week for being
1:47
S2: a bit flat footed in his response to the crisis,
1:50
S2: and that they weren't sort of, you know, grasping the
1:53
S2: the bull by the horns in terms of people's expectations.
1:57
S2: And there is a bit of public anxiety out there,
1:59
S2: maybe a lot of public anxiety. So I feel like
2:01
S2: he was just kind of trying to reassure people and say, look,
2:04
S2: keep calm, carry on, we're all over it. And there
2:07
S2: might be some more drastic measures coming down the pike,
2:10
S2: but we'll tell you when we get there or we'll
2:11
S2: tell you well before we get there, we're going to
2:14
S2: talk about that this week. I'm Jacqueline Maley, you're listening
2:17
S2: to Inside Politics from the Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.
2:20
S2: And if you haven't already guessed, I'm joined by our
2:22
S2: chief political correspondent, Paul Satchell, and our special guest star
2:26
S2: and favourite of the podcast, chief economics correspondent Shane Reisz. Gentlemen,
2:31
S2: it's good to have you on board.
2:33
S3: You had me at Special Guest Star. You didn't have
2:35
S3: to embellish.
2:36
S2: I know, I know, but I couldn't help myself such
2:39
S2: my my cup overfloweth when you're.
2:41
S3: On, you're only you're only human. That's right.
2:44
S2: That's right. So the PM, as discussed, sort of shifted
2:47
S2: more to crisis footing this week. And he's announced two
2:50
S2: important measures. Let's just briefly cover off what they were. Paul.
2:54
S4: Yeah. The first was the major announcement was a halving
2:57
S4: in the fuel excise, which is the levy that's paid
3:01
S4: on every litre of fuel. Is it $0.52?
3:03
S3: $0.52 until it until midnight? It's on April Fool's Day.
3:08
S4: That's right. And this did actually have a pretty quick
3:11
S4: tangible effect on petrol prices. There was a sense that
3:13
S4: it might take days or weeks to kick in, but
3:15
S4: there was an immediate reduction in a lot of service
3:17
S4: stations of about 15 or $0.20 across the country, which
3:21
S4: is good news, but fuel prices might just continue to increase.
3:25
S4: And so this might offset slightly the increase, but is
3:28
S4: not going to bring prices down over the next few
3:30
S4: weeks as the supply crunch looms. And there's also a
3:34
S4: question about whether, you know, reducing the price of fuel
3:37
S4: actually counteracts the price signal, which is telling people not
3:41
S4: to buy fuel when we need to conserve.
3:42
S2: And we know that Shane Wright has very strong views
3:44
S2: on that. I'm going to ask him about that in
3:45
S2: a sec. And the PM, the PM also cut the
3:48
S2: heavy vehicle road user charge. So basically that's helping out
3:51
S2: Truckies who you know, usually have to pay this charge
3:54
S2: and are really doing it tough at the moment.
3:56
S4: And one other big move just we should get in
3:58
S4: is a $2 billion fund, which is. Which will allow
4:02
S4: the government to effectively. Scour the globe with Australian firms
4:06
S4: trying to bring oil into the country to underwrite purchases
4:09
S4: of tankers. The spot market is obviously increasing oil prices
4:13
S4: by two, three, four times.
4:14
S3: And most people don't understand. There's a big difference between, say,
4:18
S3: if I tell you that the the barrel price at
4:20
S3: the moment, it's actually fallen a couple of bucks over
4:23
S3: the last two days. It's about 100 US. But on
4:27
S3: the spot market you are looking 130 140. There is
4:31
S3: a big difference between these the contracted and the spot prices.
4:34
S3: And this is what's really driving the announcement that they've.
4:37
S2: Made because everybody's trying to scrambling to get oil right now.
4:40
S2: Shane tell us you think the fuel excise cut is
4:43
S2: very bad policy. Why do you think that? Please explain.
4:47
S3: Well, I know for all those motorists out there who
4:49
S3: are fueling up thinking, you beauty, I've saved $0.26 a litre,
4:53
S3: which is about 19 bucks on 60 65 litre tank.
4:58
S3: I get that, but that's the problem. You are saving
5:01
S3: money at a time of inflation which will get spent
5:05
S3: somewhere else. And this is what the reserve Bank will
5:07
S3: be having. Kittens. Uh, in fact, I'm reliably informed there's
5:11
S3: a birthing suite for the kittens kittens in Martin Place
5:14
S3: at the moment, because this is in the wrong direction
5:17
S3: for them. They want money being taken out of the economy.
5:20
S3: The the big lift in petrol prices is doing that.
5:24
S3: But you've actually given some of that back. And as
5:27
S3: much as both sides of politics say, well, this will
5:31
S3: only have a little bit of impact on demand, like
5:33
S3: the classic supply and demand curve, you reduce a price,
5:37
S3: the demand for something goes up. Even Jim Chalmers admitted
5:40
S3: this week it'll probably have an impact 1 to 2%
5:44
S3: increase in demand. His argument is that the big increase
5:48
S3: in prices so far has cut demand by 10%, although
5:52
S3: that's that's really at loggerheads with the argument that there's
5:55
S3: been this huge surge in demand anyway. But we're in
5:59
S3: We're in stupid times when people are racing out, filling
6:03
S3: watering cans with fuel. So that's my real concern about
6:08
S3: putting money back in. This is a hit to the
6:11
S3: budget at the end of the day, at a time
6:14
S3: of high inflation. And that's what will have the reserve
6:17
S3: Bank concerned.
6:17
S4: Your shift to a full on inflation hawk this week? Shane.
6:21
S3: I suspect an inflation hawk, my friend.
6:23
S4: I suspect the government would argue privately that the potentially
6:27
S4: quite marginal effect on inflation that this measure might have
6:30
S4: is outweighed by the imperative to use one of the
6:34
S4: few levers the government has to provide cost of living relief.
6:37
S4: Many other nations around the world are doing similar tax changes,
6:40
S4: and I think the pressure on the government to be
6:42
S4: seen to be doing something has outweighed the inflation concern.
6:45
S3: And that's the difference between politics and economics. Politics.
6:48
S2: I need to.
6:48
S3: Be seen to be doing.
6:49
S2: Apart from politics and economics. I want to bring in
6:51
S2: psychology and just sort of sort of make. Oh, look,
6:54
S2: I know, I know, I know it's a it's not
6:56
S2: a science that you might recognize Shane, but.
6:59
S3: It's doctor Mayalee, I love this. This switch.
7:02
S2: Jacqueline. Psychoanalyze me. Yeah. Um, no, I think that there's
7:06
S2: probably a strong argument for the psychological effect that it
7:09
S2: has on a population that's a little. That was already
7:11
S2: feeling the pinch. I'm already feeling very anxious about rising
7:15
S2: interest rates. And they've got a little bit of relief.
7:17
S2: So they might be able to relax a little bit.
7:19
S2: Whether or not we relax so much that we then
7:21
S2: go out and spend and push up inflation, I don't
7:23
S2: know if I if I think that that will be
7:25
S2: the psychological effect. Anyway, I am interested in the kind
7:29
S2: of the impact you think all of this is going
7:31
S2: to have on the budget, because we were going to
7:34
S2: be having a pretty ordinary or, you know, maybe a
7:37
S2: bit of a slightly ambitious reform budget that Jim Chalmers
7:40
S2: had been talking about on May the 12th. And now, obviously,
7:43
S2: global events have intervened. Chalmers is sort of saying, on
7:48
S2: the one hand, that's not going to stop us from,
7:51
S2: you know, making ambitious reform. In fact, it's an even
7:54
S2: greater reason to go hard on reform. But on the
7:56
S2: other hand, Shane, he seemed to say this week that
7:59
S2: whatever extra money the government or tax revenue that the
8:04
S2: government might reap from inflation will basically be fed back
8:09
S2: to people via cost of living measures, and that we
8:11
S2: might see even more government money rolling around in the economy.
8:15
S2: Can you decipher any of this for us?
8:18
S3: Yeah, I can. I'll I'll attempt, but I won't do
8:20
S3: it in a psychological manner. I'll do the outside my bailiwick,
8:24
S3: that one. Yeah. Look, I think when he talks cost
8:26
S3: of living. I'd be very wary thinking there's going to
8:29
S3: be some sort of handout. I think that's there's real
8:32
S3: resistance in Treasury because as much as like Chalmers has
8:37
S3: been talking about, we're going to be making decisions later
8:40
S3: in the budget cycle than we normally do. The starting
8:43
S3: point was always, this is the budget we're going to
8:45
S3: have to make changes on. So do.
8:47
S2: You mean cuts like are they going to cut back
8:49
S2: the budget in some of those structural pressures that we've
8:52
S2: talked about.
8:52
S3: Before? Look, if I like the NDIS is clearly one
8:55
S3: area where they're going to. They have to make savings.
8:59
S3: They know that. And the the politics of the situation.
9:03
S3: What's the number of seats that Albanese has in the House?
9:06
S3: The make up of the Senate has not changed, despite
9:09
S3: what's going on in the Middle East. So that core
9:12
S3: piece of politics is still there, which means if you're
9:15
S3: going to do it, you do it in this budget,
9:18
S3: which is their first budget since the election. And even
9:21
S3: on Thursday, Albanese has used his speech to the National
9:25
S3: Press Club to really double down on. We are going
9:28
S3: to be reforming in this, uh, in this budget.
9:33
S4: First time he's used the same language as Chalmers in
9:35
S4: this big press club speech on Thursday to say to
9:38
S4: match the treasurer, to say this will be the most
9:40
S4: ambitious budget yet. It's not the time to pull back.
9:42
S4: It's the time to go forward.
9:43
S3: And I think that's a really that's really important that
9:46
S3: we we see the treasurer and the Prime Minister using
9:50
S3: the same terminology clearly. So that tells you. Right. So
9:54
S3: we know productivity reforms. There's going to be changes around
9:57
S3: the tax system, particularly say in the corporate tax space.
10:01
S3: I think you will see some sort of investment, uh,
10:05
S3: system put in place to get businesses to become more
10:08
S3: productive by investing in plant and, and kit. That's going
10:11
S3: to happen. You will see savings. So the NDIS is
10:15
S3: clearly in the target, but I think you'll see a
10:18
S3: lot of smaller cuts like that. Try and spread out
10:22
S3: a bit of the pain. And then you get into
10:25
S3: the into the tax reform proper. That's where there's going
10:29
S3: to be cost. Anything you do in that space. But
10:32
S3: say the CGT that we've been talking about for it
10:35
S3: feels like forever negative gearing. That issue hasn't disappeared. There
10:39
S3: hasn't been a killing off of that by either the
10:42
S3: treasurer or the prime Minister. So I think those things
10:44
S3: are definitely still on the cards. But it's clear that
10:49
S3: Chalmers so much is in flux right now trying to
10:53
S3: nail down exactly what the budget will say is like
10:57
S3: it is the most difficult budget to piece together. I
11:01
S3: think since the late 2008, during the depths of the
11:05
S3: global financial crisis, when Wayne Swan actually had to put up,
11:09
S3: put out a separate update to the budget, just like
11:12
S3: 8 or 10 weeks after a mid-year update. It's that difficult.
11:15
S2: So it'll actually be exciting when we're in the lock up.
11:17
S2: Genuinely exciting to see what's what's unveiled.
11:19
S4: Big lock.
11:19
S2: Up. What what will we make of the forward estimates though.
11:22
S2: Like they're just they're going to be even more fictional
11:25
S2: than usual don't you think?
11:27
S3: Forward estimates are always there's always a bit of fiction.
11:29
S3: There's always um, but this is it. Like how do
11:33
S3: you predict like they haven't been able to predict the
11:36
S3: iron ore price for the last 15 years. So how
11:38
S3: you would predict what's going on with oil prices and
11:40
S3: LNG prices? Look, I've got I've got a chocolate wheel here.
11:44
S3: I'll spin it and well, it may do as good
11:46
S3: a job as anything else.
11:47
S4: And the contradiction on the messaging from the Prime Minister
11:49
S4: on Thursday and Chalmers is that they're on the one hand,
11:53
S4: talking up the cost saving element of the budget, the
11:55
S4: productivity element. They want to take money out of the
11:58
S4: the economy because the inflation problem has not been fixed.
12:01
S4: But on the other hand, they're already taking measures that
12:04
S4: go against it. With the fuel excise cut, and they're
12:07
S4: forecasting some more in the cost of living relief space,
12:11
S4: even though we don't expect handouts. So it's a really
12:15
S4: tricky balance. And on the tax reform question the treasurer
12:18
S4: has been talking about the crisis being a reason to
12:20
S4: go harder and faster. There are some others in the
12:24
S4: cabinet who say well, okay, it might provide impetus to
12:28
S4: do more around potentially investing in oil reserves or other
12:32
S4: measures that actually address this crisis. But how does it
12:34
S4: add to the case for fixing negative gearing or capital
12:38
S4: gains tax? And I think people around the treasurer are
12:40
S4: now thinking about how they sell those tax reform measures
12:44
S4: with a different framing that addresses the current crisis. And
12:47
S4: one of the one of the pieces of just one
12:50
S4: of the thoughts around that is that you could pitch
12:52
S4: these measures not just, as, you know, fiscally sound and
12:57
S4: and beneficial to the housing market, but also as measures
13:00
S4: that kind of win trust of voters, that push against
13:04
S4: the rise of populism and that kind of instill this
13:07
S4: sense that the government is making the society fairer and
13:10
S4: trying to boost social cohesion. So putting a social cohesion, security,
13:14
S4: framing around intergenerational equity.
13:16
S2: I don't know, I don't know if any punter has
13:18
S2: ever kind of accepted a tax reform on on the
13:20
S2: grounds of social cohesion. I think that the fairness argument
13:24
S2: is so, so much easier to make in the current environment. And,
13:28
S2: you know, I think that the coalition I've said this
13:30
S2: before on the podcast, I think the coalition is going
13:32
S2: to be really hard pressed to argue against these tax
13:35
S2: reforms that we think they'll make, you know, in the
13:38
S2: current environment, with housing affordability being where it is. And
13:41
S2: as you say, with the rise of one nation and
13:43
S2: the the sort of, I think the starting point of
13:45
S2: many people who are switching their votes to one nation,
13:48
S2: which is the system's kind of rigged against me no
13:50
S2: matter how hard I work, you know, I pay my taxes,
13:53
S2: I'm trying to raise my family and I just can't
13:55
S2: get ahead. And, you know, so burn the whole thing down.
13:57
S2: I want to I want to ask you guys about
13:59
S2: sort of fuel security and energy security because we have
14:03
S2: touched on this before, but I just wonder if we're
14:05
S2: going to be having a national debate sort of into
14:07
S2: the future about what our fuel security and energy security
14:13
S2: will look like because and will it just get everyone
14:15
S2: to double down on their positions? So people who are like, look,
14:19
S2: this shows more than ever, this whole crisis shows that
14:23
S2: fossil fuels are an unreliable source of energy. Other people
14:28
S2: will say, all it shows is that we need to
14:30
S2: be mining and exploiting the fossil fuels, including oil reserves
14:34
S2: that we have here in Australia. Shane, what do you
14:37
S2: think about where the debate's going to go on that?
14:39
S3: Well, there's two points. One is that the term sovereign capability,
14:43
S3: which is being tossed around, they are the two most
14:46
S3: frightening words I've been listening to for some time, because
14:50
S3: it can mean all manner of things. Are we going
14:51
S3: to start building our own refinery? Like if you listen
14:55
S3: to some people in that space, that's where you end up.
14:59
S3: You've got the drill, drill, baby drill types. Out. There
15:02
S3: you go. But that oil needs to be refined. And
15:06
S3: we don't have the facilities on there. There are some
15:08
S3: if you once you go down this. We have to
15:10
S3: have great supply lines. We have to produce stuff domestically,
15:14
S3: which this government has been talking about, uh, and their policy.
15:17
S3: The future made in Australia is that policy. The Nats
15:21
S3: and the Liberal Party are still are talking the same game,
15:24
S3: but there hasn't been the whole discussion of, well, this
15:27
S3: means big economic choices by this country that have to
15:30
S3: be made. No one's been up front about the amount
15:33
S3: of cash that we'd have to go into. The fact
15:35
S3: that you don't have enough people to do what you
15:37
S3: want to do. There will be some areas of the
15:39
S3: economy cut off if you go down that path.
15:41
S2: As in, if you go down the path of exploiting
15:43
S2: oil resources or trying to more in Australia.
15:47
S3: Not just like the private market is the one that's
15:51
S3: deciding whether to explore for oil or not in this country.
15:54
S3: And for the last ten years, they've gone, no, there's
15:57
S3: no case at the moment. There is, however, and we've
16:00
S3: seen some great data in the last like even the
16:03
S3: last 2440 eight hours about EVs. For instance, the. There
16:08
S3: have been increases in EV. The car prices. The second
16:11
S3: hand prices for EVs. While prices for petrol driven cars
16:15
S3: are falling sharply, consumers have gone. There's a great big
16:19
S3: price signal. That's what I'll do. And there are some,
16:22
S3: especially on the right, who are saying, oh, we'll have
16:24
S3: a culture war about petrol versus EVs. The EVs are
16:28
S3: winning that culture war because it's an economic war and
16:31
S3: they just can't win it.
16:33
S2: It's a hip pocket war. Paul, what do you think?
16:36
S4: This crisis has raised up a debate around the globe
16:40
S4: about energy security and the way in which green energy
16:43
S4: and renewables could bolster that? Because obviously solar and wind
16:47
S4: farm is not affected by war many thousands of kilometres away.
16:53
S4: You heard the European leader, Ursula von der Leyen, make
16:56
S4: this point in Parliament last week. You had the IAEA
16:59
S4: director make the same point. I suspect the Labour government
17:03
S4: will start leaning into that argument when this crisis starts
17:06
S4: to subside. It would be seen as political point scoring
17:09
S4: or perhaps slightly ideological, to be leaning too heavily on
17:13
S4: that argument, given the ire and conservative ranks towards the
17:17
S4: green energy agenda of this government. But I think they
17:19
S4: will lean into that and come in months and years
17:22
S4: to say we are on the right path, and that
17:24
S4: crisis proved we're on the right path. On the other hand,
17:27
S4: as Shane mentions, the coalition will argue that we need
17:30
S4: to be doing more here to give ourselves the ability
17:32
S4: to use our own oil. So I one would suspect
17:36
S4: that it will give more weight to an energy abundance
17:40
S4: agenda in general.
17:41
S2: Yeah. Isn't it? I mean, isn't the best argument putting
17:44
S2: climate change aside because that has become an I. It's
17:47
S2: become a culture war. I mean, ridiculous as that is,
17:50
S2: it just seems like a technology argument to me because
17:52
S2: fossil fuels are like the 18th century kind of technologies.
17:55
S2: They're old, you know, old school, you have to invest
17:59
S2: enormous resources pulling them out of the ground. You have
18:02
S2: to put them on rusty old tankers, ship them all
18:04
S2: the way across the world. And the technology for wind
18:07
S2: and solar just seems, I don't know, more contemporary and easier.
18:12
S3: You're an elite, aren't you?
18:13
S4: You sound like. You sound like Malcolm Turnbull.
18:15
S2: Technology, not taxes. I know people who sound like Malcolm Turnbull.
18:19
S4: People would make not dissimilar arguments about. And people have people,
18:24
S4: you know, who are who are, you know, advocates of
18:26
S4: efficiency in the economy and who are kind of productivity
18:29
S4: Hardheads would have said similar things about our nickel refining capacity,
18:33
S4: our copper making capacity, aluminium. And you see the Labour
18:38
S4: government now in a really substantial shift to pump billions
18:42
S4: of dollars into these sectors to keep them alive against
18:45
S4: the wishes of economic hardheads, because according to the Labour
18:49
S4: government and you hear this, see this agenda on the
18:51
S4: right as well, through people like Andrew Hastie, if we
18:54
S4: lose these industries, we lose our ability to fend for
18:56
S4: ourselves in time of war.
18:58
S2: Yeah, that's kind of a national security argument, which I
19:01
S2: suppose you can divorce a little bit from an economic argument,
19:04
S2: but I mean, you know, the energy resources and, you know,
19:08
S2: the form of energy that we use is just, it
19:10
S2: seems to me an entirely an economic argument or it
19:13
S2: should be. I want to talk about the US alliance
19:16
S2: because Albanese has had to sort of tread such a
19:21
S2: fine line on this one. We saw the Canadian Prime minister,
19:24
S2: Mark Carney, come out with some really quite strong comments
19:27
S2: against President Trump and the Iraq war here in Australia.
19:30
S2: We're not doing anything near to that. The Prime Minister
19:33
S2: went on 730 this week and sort of talked about
19:36
S2: he made his strongest comments to date. So he talked
19:38
S2: you know, he said people want to see how this ends.
19:40
S2: He wanted to see a de-escalation, a time frame or
19:43
S2: a clearer objective. And then also in the next sentence
19:45
S2: sort of said that the objectives had been achieved, whatever
19:48
S2: that means. Paul, do you see this as a hardening
19:50
S2: of rhetoric? I mean, there are some people out there
19:52
S2: who might who might actually want the government to, to
19:55
S2: call this for what it is, you know. Which is a,
19:59
S2: you know, a very erratic, non strategic and increasingly sort
20:03
S2: of terrifying war.
20:05
S4: Yeah. The Albanese is obviously hardened his rhetoric over the
20:08
S4: last fortnight. It started in a press conference I think
20:11
S4: about two weeks ago, where he made the point of
20:14
S4: saying that largely the US's objectives in this war have
20:18
S4: been to varying extents achieved. And he urged Trump to de-escalate.
20:24
S4: And then this week, you've seen him also call for
20:28
S4: greater certainty around the end game. And he also made
20:33
S4: the point quite firmly that Australia is not obligated to
20:36
S4: be more heavily involved in this war because we weren't
20:39
S4: consulted by Trump. So, echoing some of the language out
20:42
S4: of European allies, less sharp, uh, language, but similar sentiment.
20:47
S4: And I think he would be channelling what he believes
20:51
S4: to be popular sentiment on that.
20:52
S2: Yeah. So he's, he's sort of got a like, tread
20:55
S2: a fine line doesn't he, because he wants to be
20:57
S2: seen in in step with, I think, the Australian public,
21:00
S2: which is kind of horrified by what's happening and what
21:03
S2: Trump's doing. But at the same time, you can't sort
21:05
S2: of openly piss off the Trump administration unnecessarily.
21:10
S3: Well, that's that's the price of the Australian-American alliance. Like
21:13
S3: if you if you wanted an Australian prime minister to
21:16
S3: have a huge crack at the US president, let's go
21:19
S3: back to Gough Whitlam. And that ended exceptionally well. Yeah,
21:22
S3: that that sort of tension that that is not where
21:25
S3: like people talked about how Andrew Hastie was up front. Yes.
21:30
S3: Talking for everybody. Go. Hold on. Here's a shadow shadow
21:35
S3: industry spokesman for the opposition which is nowhere near government.
21:38
S3: That person can say stuff. A prime minister, the government,
21:43
S3: the government.
21:43
S2: Cannot and I wouldn't. I don't think the Australian public
21:45
S2: would necessarily want to see the Prime Minister, you know,
21:48
S2: have a have an open crack at Trump, whatever their
21:50
S2: views about him. But you mentioned Hastie there. He made
21:52
S2: those comments on insiders last Sunday. So if any listeners
21:55
S2: hadn't watched and missed them. He basically said.
21:58
S5: This is a bad. I think this was a huge miscalculation. Um,
22:02
S5: Iran has managed to pretty much hold the whole world
22:06
S5: economy to ransom. And because we're at the end of
22:09
S5: a very long supply chain, we're going to experience pain now.
22:12
S2: And he said, I don't know why we went in there.
22:15
S2: And he said, you know, I'm a close friend of
22:16
S2: the United States, but I think we should be able
22:18
S2: to ask hard questions. And as you say, it's sort
22:21
S2: of easy for him to say that because he's like
22:22
S2: a renegade sort of on the fringes of the Liberal
22:25
S2: Party with very obvious intentions to become its leader. He
22:29
S2: did say some stuff about tax policy. So, Shane, I'm
22:32
S2: really interested in what you have to say on that
22:34
S2: because he said that basically he was open to the
22:38
S2: Liberals should be open to property tax reform and increasing
22:40
S2: tax on gas companies. This is like a shot across
22:44
S2: the bow of, you know, neoliberal economic policy, isn't it.
22:48
S3: He's been in this space for some time because the
22:51
S3: electorate he represents on the outer suburbs of Perth is yeah.
22:56
S3: Interest rate, mortgage pain central. Yeah. So he and remember,
23:01
S3: there aren't that many of those in the Liberal Party
23:03
S3: left after the disaster of the last election campaign. So
23:07
S3: he has always been a bit more open in terms
23:10
S3: of the argument around CGT and negative gearing, because that
23:14
S3: is what he's hearing from his community. And he he
23:18
S3: is not nearly as an ideologue around taxation or around
23:24
S3: the propertied class as some other members of of his
23:27
S3: of his opposition.
23:28
S2: Like the leader, the leader of.
23:30
S3: Like the leader. Yeah. That's right. Like every time he, we,
23:34
S3: he you hear from Angus Taylor it's you don't if
23:37
S3: you don't, you don't put a tax on something if
23:40
S3: you want more of it, except you've got this overwhelming
23:42
S3: economic argument by people who know far more about the
23:45
S3: Australian housing market and the taxation system of it, saying
23:49
S3: the interaction of CGT and negative gearing is an issue.
23:53
S3: It's not the driving issue, but it's a factor in
23:55
S3: the way that we've got higher priced houses in this
23:57
S3: country and you're into the intergenerational issue. Hastie understands that
24:02
S3: it's partly because he is younger, as well as representing
24:05
S3: an outer suburban seats. He has a young family and
24:07
S3: he has sees it up front.
24:09
S2: He gets it. Yeah, I just think that's fascinating because
24:12
S2: it's like he's on the side of the people. And
24:14
S2: and he said that Paul, he said that very explicitly.
24:17
S2: He said, we need to overhaul the whole system.
24:19
S5: We either fix the system or it's torn down by
24:22
S5: people like Pauline Hanson. No one's going to reward us
24:24
S5: for a final last stand for neoliberal politics. Okay, um,
24:29
S5: there's no medal for that.
24:31
S2: What did you make of those comments? Because he's not
24:33
S2: talking like a classic liberal. He's not talking like Angus
24:36
S2: Taylor is talking. He's really going against the grain of
24:39
S2: the entire Liberal Party, isn't he?
24:41
S4: Yeah. I think this interview was really striking and will
24:44
S4: be seen as an important moment in Hastie's trajectory wherever
24:48
S4: he lands it. It exemplified where the new generation of
24:52
S4: liberals want to take the party. People like Andrew Hastie,
24:55
S4: Keith Wolahan, backbenchers like Garth Hamilton, Ben Small, some of
24:59
S4: whom will not be very well known to our listeners.
25:01
S4: They're kind of frothing at the mouth, wanting the party
25:04
S4: to talk to different groups in the Australian public. Some
25:08
S4: of them are much more right wing than are traditional
25:10
S4: liberals in some ways, but they also want to be
25:11
S4: speaking to the non-asset owning class. They also want to
25:15
S4: question the coalition's attachment, really fervent attachment to Israel and America.
25:21
S4: They want to open up new debates on national identity.
25:25
S4: And what Hastie is doing by questioning Trump's agenda in
25:30
S4: the Middle East is opening up, opening up a new
25:34
S4: nationalistic agenda for the Liberal Party, which in Hastie's vision
25:40
S4: would be much more Australia focused than US focused at
25:44
S4: this point, given the destabilising effect Trump is having across
25:48
S4: the West and given the disregard with which he treats allies.
25:51
S4: So you saw in that interview a leading voice in
25:55
S4: this new generation of conservatives who are, you know, channeling
25:59
S4: what you see in in other populist right movements across
26:04
S4: the world. Giorgia Meloni, uh, others in Europe saying the
26:09
S4: world is pretty fractious. We need to start fending for ourselves,
26:13
S4: building up our military, focusing on on getting a better
26:17
S4: lot for the working class, really looking at different coalitions
26:21
S4: with this Australia first lens.
26:23
S2: HMM. It's really interesting to me because it's almost like
26:25
S2: a generational conflict within the Liberal Party, but it's also
26:28
S2: traditionalists against the sort of populist influenced firebrands of the conservative. Right.
26:35
S2: It's fascinating. I don't think Andrew Hastie's going anywhere. It
26:38
S2: seems like he's only sharpening his claws. So we will
26:41
S2: keep following this. Shane, thank you so much for coming on.
26:45
S2: I hope you guys fill up your tanks with ease,
26:47
S2: your petrol tanks and whatever other tanks you might have
26:50
S2: with ease this weekend, this Easter long weekend.
26:54
S3: Well, that's. If we can afford the, uh, expensive chocolate. Uh,
26:58
S3: because remember, cocoa prices are still very, very high from
27:01
S3: a global shortage.
27:02
S2: I know, I feel like that's really gone off the agenda.
27:05
S2: The Easter Bunny is not immune from inflation.
27:09
S3: No, you don't want an inflated Easter bunny.
27:12
S2: You do want an inflated Easter bunny egg basket, though.
27:16
S3: Absolutely.
27:17
S2: Thanks very much, fellas. See you soon.
27:19
S4: See you soon.
27:20
S3: Cheers, Jackie.
27:25
S2: You can read all of our political news on our
27:27
S2: websites theage.com.au or smh.com.au. Today's episode was produced by Kai
27:35
S2: Wong with help from Debbie Harrington. Our executive producer is
27:38
S2: Tammy Mills, and our podcast are overseen by Lisa Muxworthy
27:42
S2: and Tom McKendrick. Before you go, follow Inside Politics and
27:46
S2: leave a review for us on Apple or Spotify. I'm
27:49
S2: Jacqueline Maley, thank you for listening.