Transcript

Credlin | 15 May · Credlin

0:02
Speaker 1: Peter Kredlin live on sky Ingins Australia.
0:08
Speaker 2: Good evening, Welcome to the show. Well tonight, I'll do
0:11
Speaker 2: my best with my team and experts to pull apart
0:13
Speaker 2: the detail in last night's budget and to help you
0:16
Speaker 2: sift through the spin to work out how you and
0:18
Speaker 2: your family will be impacted. We'll also speak tonight with
0:21
Speaker 2: Opposition leader Peter Dutton for his reaction to the budget
0:25
Speaker 2: as he also gets ready for his big speech to
0:27
Speaker 2: the Parliament tomorrow night. In the budget address. In reply,
0:31
Speaker 2: here's what's coming up on Kredline. Plenty of voter reaction
0:34
Speaker 2: from the budget. I'll show you how the major media
0:37
Speaker 2: players covet it as the government looks open to calling
0:40
Speaker 2: an early election if all the handouts last night help
0:44
Speaker 2: it pick up in the polls. Lot to talk too
0:47
Speaker 2: about Labour's power bill subsidy today, leaving it to one side.
0:51
Speaker 3: That it's not means tested.
0:53
Speaker 2: What's most galling as Labour's now giving everyone three hundred
0:57
Speaker 2: dollars when power prices under their war she risen by
1:01
Speaker 2: nearly forty percent forty percent plus more money in the
1:05
Speaker 2: budget for bought protection and to address a rising terror threat,
1:09
Speaker 2: which says to me that Labor those things are tougher
1:11
Speaker 2: head yet on defence know any of the money needed
1:14
Speaker 2: to address the growing China threat. Greg Sheridan will join
1:18
Speaker 2: me too and afirevery day in question time with confirmation
1:21
Speaker 2: from the budget papers. But despite promises from the Prime Minister,
1:25
Speaker 2: Labor will bring in over one point six million new
1:29
Speaker 2: migrants over the next four years.
1:33
Speaker 4: The Albanisi government is brought in almost one million people
1:36
Speaker 4: into our country. Only two hundred and sixty five thousand
1:39
Speaker 4: homes have been built. We have people who are living
1:41
Speaker 4: in cars and tents at a record level, and yet
1:45
Speaker 4: nothing in this budget provides support to those people. Why
1:48
Speaker 4: does this government have the wrong priorities and why is
1:52
Speaker 4: this Prime minister so weak that it can't provide support
1:56
Speaker 4: to Australians in need at first?
1:59
Speaker 2: Last night budget confirms at Anthony Almeneasy's running the most
2:02
Speaker 2: green left government. We've ever had, more handouts, more debt
2:07
Speaker 2: and more picking winners so much. The Prime minister's pre
2:10
Speaker 2: election pledged that he represented safe change.
2:15
Speaker 3: On top of the.
2:15
Speaker 2: Epic incompetence and migration and border protection, those workplace changes
2:20
Speaker 2: to buy off the unions to failed attempt to entrench
2:24
Speaker 2: racial difference in our constitution via the voice and broken
2:28
Speaker 2: promises on tax and superannuation will now go on as
2:32
Speaker 2: any pretense of budget responsibility. With terms of trade at
2:37
Speaker 2: a once in a century high and with unemployment at
2:40
Speaker 2: a once in half a century low, the budget now
2:44
Speaker 2: should be in massive surplus. Instead, there's a way for
2:48
Speaker 2: thin nine billion dollar surplus largely on the back of
2:52
Speaker 2: fossil fuel exports that the government wants to stop, to
2:56
Speaker 2: be followed then by a long run of defics between
3:00
Speaker 2: one and two percent of GDP based on baked in
3:03
Speaker 2: spending some three hundred and fifteen billion on the so
3:07
Speaker 2: called care economy. Plus there's eighty billion in off budget
3:12
Speaker 2: spending student loans, low income housing, more green projects, and
3:17
Speaker 2: another seven billion on that boondoggle a snowy hydro two
3:21
Speaker 2: point zero. But even with so much spending off budget,
3:25
Speaker 2: net debt well, it's still expected to grow by another
3:28
Speaker 2: two hundred billion over the next five years.
3:32
Speaker 3: All the old budget rules.
3:33
Speaker 2: Such as keeping tax under a certain percentage of GDP,
3:37
Speaker 2: capping growth in spending, and insisting that any news spending
3:40
Speaker 2: is offset by savings that helped Peter Costello deliver ten
3:45
Speaker 2: straight budget surpluses, Paul Keating two. He got there with
3:49
Speaker 2: those rules to four surpluses, or they've now been scrapped
3:52
Speaker 2: in favor of the creative accounting that Labor dresses up
3:56
Speaker 2: spending as investment.
3:59
Speaker 5: In a future made in Australia and expanding business investment.
4:04
Speaker 5: We're also investing six point two billion dollars in new investments.
4:09
Speaker 5: We're investing in vital projects, investment now economy focusing investment
4:13
Speaker 5: to lift private investments. We will create a front door
4:16
Speaker 5: for investors that adds discipline to investments in the national
4:19
Speaker 5: interests and streamline approvals across environmental planning, cultural heritage and
4:25
Speaker 5: foreign investment.
4:28
Speaker 2: It's spending, not investment. That's just Treasurer's spin. What this
4:33
Speaker 2: budget conclusively proves is that Labor has monumentally failed to
4:37
Speaker 2: grasp that a government can't spend a dollar that it
4:40
Speaker 2: doesn't get from taxpayers, either as taxes now or taxes tomorrow,
4:45
Speaker 2: to pay for today's debt. As always, Labor thinks that
4:48
Speaker 2: government's much smarter at spending your money better than you are.
4:53
Speaker 2: All the average Australia will gain from this budget. That's
4:56
Speaker 2: new is the non means tested three hundred dollars electric
5:00
Speaker 2: to hand out that won't nearly compensate anyone for the
5:03
Speaker 2: spike in power costs, and for low income renters some
5:07
Speaker 2: extra help that won't nearly compensate them for the extra
5:10
Speaker 2: migration and the interest rate driven rise in housing costs.
5:15
Speaker 2: Even then, too, these are essentially the government putting money
5:18
Speaker 2: in one pocket that it's taken out of your other pocket.
5:22
Speaker 2: The only real surprise in the budget was the brazenness
5:25
Speaker 2: with which the Treasurer Jim Chalmers abandoned any fidelity to
5:29
Speaker 2: the fiscally responsible pro market legacy of Keating and Bob
5:33
Speaker 2: Hawke to trumpet the virtues of green interventionalism. The relentless
5:39
Speaker 2: boosterism of Charmers sits uneasily with the fact that Australians
5:42
Speaker 2: are struggling with their mortgage repayments, repayments that have doubled,
5:47
Speaker 2: and they don't feel the government has helped them in
5:49
Speaker 2: any way. As reason poles show that as have well
5:52
Speaker 2: and truly noticed that GDP per person, well, that's fallen
5:56
Speaker 2: for four straight quarters, meaning that whatever the head numbers
6:00
Speaker 2: might say, ordinary families or they're in.
6:04
Speaker 3: A deep recession now.
6:06
Speaker 2: Even if these handouts temporarily masks some of the policy
6:10
Speaker 2: driven cost increases. Struggling families are much more likely to
6:14
Speaker 2: spend on necessities and keep the money in their pocket,
6:18
Speaker 2: Hence the overall inflationary pressures that so worry the Reserve
6:21
Speaker 2: Bank and have led to the sustained rise and interest
6:24
Speaker 2: rates that might even increase again. The budget has only
6:29
Speaker 2: intensified the paradox of the Reserve Bank tapping the economic
6:33
Speaker 2: brakes while the government's pushing the accelerator, so much so
6:37
Speaker 2: that economists are now tipping more interest rate rises. It
6:41
Speaker 2: seems undeniable that the biggest impact of this budget will
6:45
Speaker 2: be keep rates higher for longer, with even the budget
6:49
Speaker 2: papers now forecasting there's no drop in the cash rate
6:53
Speaker 2: before the middle of next year. Now, don't forget. We
6:56
Speaker 2: were promised a rate cut by the middle of this year,
7:00
Speaker 2: then it was pushed out to Christmas, and now Jim
7:03
Speaker 2: Chalmers says in his own budget papers, you will not
7:06
Speaker 2: get relief if you get it at all before well
7:09
Speaker 2: into next year.
7:11
Speaker 1: Two point seventy five percent inflation by Christmas a Stephen
7:15
Speaker 1: Kennedy prediction or a Jim Chalmers prediction.
7:19
Speaker 5: We don't sit in our office and write the forecasts
7:22
Speaker 5: are the Treasury team of very professional, very diligent people
7:26
Speaker 5: do that.
7:26
Speaker 3: Work as well.
7:29
Speaker 2: There's permanently high wages for age care workers and childcare workers.
7:33
Speaker 2: As I've said, fine, if they deserve an increase, they do, sure,
7:37
Speaker 2: but why are you, as a taxpayer paying the wages
7:39
Speaker 2: of people in the private sector. There's been no serious
7:43
Speaker 2: attempt in this budget to rate in skyrocking NNGIS COSTSIDA.
7:47
Speaker 2: All they've done is stop the cost shifting from the
7:51
Speaker 2: States to the Commonwealth. It's still the one taxpayer footing
7:54
Speaker 2: the bill, and it's far from clear that the government's
7:57
Speaker 2: serious about big cuts to migration, apart from the fact
8:00
Speaker 2: it needs continued high imgration to pump up the overall
8:04
Speaker 2: economic growth numbers and to avoid a technical recession, and
8:08
Speaker 2: even on its own figures, it still expects to keep
8:11
Speaker 2: immigration at double the average of the how it is,
8:15
Speaker 2: there still is yet no specificity about how it'll cap
8:19
Speaker 2: oversees student numbers or require those educational institutions to house
8:25
Speaker 2: the students they import. But this has become a characteristic
8:29
Speaker 2: of the Albanezer government to declare an objective without any
8:33
Speaker 2: detail about its implementation, and then to act as though
8:37
Speaker 2: wishing it makes it happen given the woke obsessions of
8:41
Speaker 2: our universities. Is the government's announced objective to graduate eight
8:47
Speaker 2: out of ten Australians by twenty fifty So eight out
8:50
Speaker 2: of ten of us I've got to have a university degree,
8:52
Speaker 2: says Labor. Is it about making us more productive as
8:55
Speaker 2: opposed to creating more green left voters. Then there's some
9:01
Speaker 2: twenty three billion in various future Made in Australia programs,
9:05
Speaker 2: all designed to make us a renewable energy superpower. Because
9:09
Speaker 2: the Treasurer insists the world's committed to that zero, Well
9:12
Speaker 2: they're not. China and India are not, or at least
9:16
Speaker 2: not as quickly or as convulsively as here in Australia.
9:20
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter how often the government asserts it. The
9:22
Speaker 2: notion that Australia has a comparative advantage here as if
9:26
Speaker 2: other countries don't have wind.
9:28
Speaker 3: Or sunlight what hardly stands up to scrutiny.
9:33
Speaker 2: There may be a case for some assistance to the
9:35
Speaker 2: strategic minerals area that we need for battery making, especially
9:40
Speaker 2: given China's attempt to corner this market, but it's hard
9:44
Speaker 2: to credit that we should invest in green hydrogen that's
9:47
Speaker 2: completely unproven at scale, or that we can somehow outsubsidize
9:52
Speaker 2: the US or the EU. Given that many of the
9:55
Speaker 2: big players in this area are billionaires, such as Twiggy Forest,
9:59
Speaker 2: why is the government relieving them of the need to
10:01
Speaker 2: commit more of their own money.
10:03
Speaker 3: Why is labor.
10:04
Speaker 2: Bank rolling billionaires but making ordinary families scrimp and save.
10:10
Speaker 3: It's now a.
10:11
Speaker 2: Decade since the last budget that attempted serious economic reform,
10:15
Speaker 2: when the Coalition tried to roll back entitlements and rein
10:19
Speaker 2: in some of this government spending, but with no obvious
10:23
Speaker 2: cuts to anything last night, in an abundance of giveaways,
10:27
Speaker 2: this budget is all the feel of a pre election budget,
10:31
Speaker 2: something the Treasurer today refused to rule out.
10:35
Speaker 1: Is it an interest rate cut? Is it an election victory?
10:38
Speaker 2: Because those budget papers have election ridden all over them.
10:42
Speaker 5: A lot of you have asked me, you know, is
10:44
Speaker 5: this the last budget of the parliamentary term. My answer
10:49
Speaker 5: to that is I'm expecting to do another one, but
10:52
Speaker 5: that's in the hands of Prime ministers.
10:56
Speaker 2: Weasel words, perhaps backed with war war all government advertising.
11:01
Speaker 2: These budget handbaids might be enough to aneathetize voters, but
11:06
Speaker 2: if a government does run to a premature election before
11:09
Speaker 2: the end of next year or before it does another
11:11
Speaker 2: full budget, it will expose its fear that the overall
11:16
Speaker 2: economy is just going to get worse.
11:23
Speaker 3: As I said, very busy time in Canberra.
11:26
Speaker 2: Will go there now for the headlines, Skynews political reporter
11:29
Speaker 2: Cam Reddin.
11:30
Speaker 6: Every household in the country will have their energy bills
11:33
Speaker 6: slashed by three hundred dollars as the Coalition agrees to
11:37
Speaker 6: back Labour's budget relief support for Australians.
11:41
Speaker 4: All Australians will support the bill of the government's putting through.
11:45
Speaker 4: I don't understand why you and I on high incomes
11:48
Speaker 4: would be getting three hundred dollars.
11:50
Speaker 6: Rebates will not be means tested, so everyone gets it
11:54
Speaker 6: regardless of their income.
11:55
Speaker 4: The Prime Minister is giving billions of dollars to billionaires.
11:59
Speaker 3: It's fair.
12:00
Speaker 7: The Fox outrage.
12:01
Speaker 6: The Treasurer is adamant his plan will bring inflation below
12:05
Speaker 6: three percent by Christmas.
12:07
Speaker 5: Now Treasury forecasts for inflation factor in what we're doing
12:11
Speaker 5: with the cost of living package.
12:12
Speaker 8: You have to make sure that as you rearrange the pain,
12:16
Speaker 8: you don't add to the inflation, and the government did
12:18
Speaker 8: the first it didn't really do the second.
12:21
Speaker 6: Looking beyond the inflation fight, Jim Chalmers is turning his
12:24
Speaker 6: mind to investment. The much hyped Future Made in Australia
12:28
Speaker 6: plan will invest over twenty two billion dollars in a
12:31
Speaker 6: range of emerging industries.
12:33
Speaker 9: Mobilizing Australian industry, Australian manufacturing to make the things that
12:38
Speaker 9: will help us to get zero.
12:41
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that it's going to be enough to
12:42
Speaker 1: really drive that's sort of new investment.
12:45
Speaker 6: Highlighted by cost of living measures, business incentives and optimistic forecasts.
12:50
Speaker 6: Labour's third budget has raised expectations of an early election.
12:54
Speaker 5: That's in the hands of prime ministers.
12:57
Speaker 10: On the election as due in twenty twenty five.
13:00
Speaker 6: But it could be held as early as August, avoiding
13:03
Speaker 6: the need for another budget next year, which would likely
13:07
Speaker 6: deliver a deficit.
13:09
Speaker 4: I think they're setting themselves up for an election this year.
13:11
Speaker 4: I think they're worried about the economy deteriorating.
13:13
Speaker 5: I'm expecting to do another one.
13:15
Speaker 6: Cameron Reddin's Sky News Canberra.
13:19
Speaker 2: I'm going to get into all the politics of last
13:21
Speaker 2: night's budget in a moment, quit in financial detail. I
13:24
Speaker 2: want to make sure that you are across and to
13:26
Speaker 2: help me do that, let's bring in our budget Gurusky
13:28
Speaker 2: and his business editor Ross Greenwood. Well, Ross, this is
13:31
Speaker 2: a bit like a grand final for you budget week.
13:35
Speaker 2: I want to get your top line summary if I can.
13:38
Speaker 2: What are your big takeaways from the budget?
13:40
Speaker 7: I guess the reality is it's what it does to
13:43
Speaker 7: inflation and therefore the pressure that the government is putting
13:45
Speaker 7: onto the Reserve Bank by saying that basically it can
13:48
Speaker 7: continue to spend at a significant rate, but at the
13:52
Speaker 7: same time also allege that it's going to reduce inflation
13:55
Speaker 7: during that time. Now, the real worry of that is
13:58
Speaker 7: that the inflation reduction could around as a result of
14:01
Speaker 7: a significant fall in Australia's economy and at the same
14:05
Speaker 7: time arise in the unemployment rate. And that's not good
14:08
Speaker 7: for families, not good for the government, it's not good
14:10
Speaker 7: for the nation. So you really hope that's not the case.
14:13
Speaker 7: But if you go even to the three hundred dollars
14:16
Speaker 7: sort of handouts to every household for energy relief, well,
14:20
Speaker 7: in that particular case, the reason why that is said
14:23
Speaker 7: to be not inflationary is because if you do take
14:26
Speaker 7: it out, it's part of the CPI, same as rentle
14:29
Speaker 7: assistance as well. And so what you're starting to see
14:32
Speaker 7: is a real divergence between where the Reserve Bank thinks inflation,
14:36
Speaker 7: economic growth, employment is going to go to in the future,
14:39
Speaker 7: and you can see it here. But one thing to
14:42
Speaker 7: recognize is that the Reserve Bank has effectively come out
14:46
Speaker 7: with its own forecast just a week ago. So it's
14:48
Speaker 7: not as though these are history somewhere in the distant past.
14:53
Speaker 7: These are very fresh forecasts from the Reserve Bank. And
14:56
Speaker 7: this is at odds in many ways with where the
14:58
Speaker 7: Government and Treasure think our economy is going to.
15:04
Speaker 2: Do you think because the government have just port a
15:07
Speaker 2: point to the new governor that they think that perhaps
15:10
Speaker 2: she's not as independent as previous governors, that they can
15:13
Speaker 2: sort of from the bully pulpit of politics talk her
15:16
Speaker 2: into keeping rates where they are now, not perhaps increasing them.
15:19
Speaker 2: Because that's the tussle that's going on at the moment.
15:22
Speaker 2: We've seen the Treasure in the last four or five
15:24
Speaker 2: days really talk down the ability of the RBA to
15:27
Speaker 2: get these inflation forecasts right, is talking out Treasury getting
15:31
Speaker 2: them right. And the tussle, I mean I called it
15:34
Speaker 2: just said in the editorial. It's like the government's got
15:36
Speaker 2: its foot on the accelerator, the RBA has got its
15:38
Speaker 2: foot on the brake, and we know that's.
15:40
Speaker 3: A car crash.
15:41
Speaker 7: I've got to tell you that's the reality. But then
15:44
Speaker 7: go back to the basics of this. You cannot spend
15:47
Speaker 7: this much money, plus having tax cuts coming which are
15:49
Speaker 7: worth close on twenty five billion dollars without having people
15:53
Speaker 7: spend the money. I mean, it's pretty basic. If you
15:56
Speaker 7: get the money and all of a sudden there's a
15:58
Speaker 7: cost of living crisis, you are going to consume that
16:01
Speaker 7: money you need to. And so this is what families
16:03
Speaker 7: around Australia will do. This is what businesses around Australia
16:05
Speaker 7: will do. And so as a result, guess what the
16:08
Speaker 7: temptation will be there for business to raise prices or
16:11
Speaker 7: to hold prices, not to cut prices, knowing that this
16:14
Speaker 7: money is coming towards them. What does that do for inflation?
16:17
Speaker 7: It doesn't bring it down. It's going to leave it
16:19
Speaker 7: exactly where it is, or maybe have it to rise.
16:21
Speaker 3: And as I say, the.
16:22
Speaker 7: Real drama of this is if you do believe that
16:25
Speaker 7: inflation is going to come down, it will probably come
16:28
Speaker 7: at the cost of economic growth and therefore, as a result,
16:31
Speaker 7: unemployment starts to rise. And Heaven help me if I
16:35
Speaker 7: think that a labor government we're actually encouraging employers large
16:38
Speaker 7: and small to shed workers. That should be the basic
16:41
Speaker 7: mantra of a labor government. But that is also potentially
16:45
Speaker 7: an achilles heel for this government if that is starting
16:48
Speaker 7: to unwind and an employment starting to rise as you
16:51
Speaker 7: get out towards an election later this year or in
16:54
Speaker 7: the next year, and.
16:57
Speaker 2: I think it's tough paying in theem we'll good to
16:59
Speaker 2: now I give how much have gone up. It's impossible
17:02
Speaker 2: if you lose your job. One of the things that
17:04
Speaker 2: I think is really interesting in the budget. This is
17:06
Speaker 2: a budget where government spanning is a share of the
17:09
Speaker 2: economy is forecast rise to its highest levels outside the
17:13
Speaker 2: pandemic in forty years. So the deficits ahead of us,
17:16
Speaker 2: they are all structural. Now explain what that means for taxpayers.
17:21
Speaker 7: So let's say, for example, if I'm going to give
17:23
Speaker 7: you a good example of this is the three hundred dollars.
17:26
Speaker 7: The three hundred dollars effectively comes and goes. But then
17:30
Speaker 7: if you go out and you say give wage rises
17:33
Speaker 7: to certain parts of the economy. If you give tax
17:36
Speaker 7: cuts to the economy that's baked in that's not easily
17:40
Speaker 7: able to be clawed back by government. Now it can be,
17:43
Speaker 7: but it will come at a political cost. And so
17:45
Speaker 7: what you can see here with the outlooks from where
17:48
Speaker 7: they were in twenty twenty three, then looking out into
17:50
Speaker 7: those out years, you can see how significant those budget
17:54
Speaker 7: deficits are, so they mount. So what that means is
17:57
Speaker 7: if we go to some of the fastest growing piece,
18:00
Speaker 7: this is an expenditure in the government's you know sort
18:02
Speaker 7: of book right now, we're talking about interest costs rising
18:06
Speaker 7: basically ten percent. We're talking about the INDIEI is rising
18:10
Speaker 7: more than nine percent. So there are big areas of
18:13
Speaker 7: this budget that simply are very hard for the government
18:16
Speaker 7: to be able to control. And so really that means
18:20
Speaker 7: they've got to find more taxes, which is a reason,
18:23
Speaker 7: as you point out, that not only is this government
18:25
Speaker 7: a big spending government, but it's also a very big
18:29
Speaker 7: taxing government as well, largely as a result of bracket creep,
18:32
Speaker 7: where inflation has pushed people into higher tax brackets. And
18:35
Speaker 7: so when they say we're giving you these tax cuts back,
18:38
Speaker 7: remember this is your money it's not actually the government's money.
18:42
Speaker 7: It's your money they're virtually returning to you courtesy of
18:45
Speaker 7: what has been the high inflation and the tax system
18:48
Speaker 7: pushing you into higher tax rates as well.
18:53
Speaker 2: This Future Man Australia scheme, they like to paint it
18:55
Speaker 2: as a manufacturing scheme, it's not really. It's dominantly fixated
19:01
Speaker 2: on green projects. And when you look at the detail,
19:04
Speaker 2: when you look to who is getting up in these grants,
19:07
Speaker 2: I mean it's a cash cow for billionaires if they
19:11
Speaker 2: want to back green energy, people like Twiggy Forest, Malcolm
19:15
Speaker 2: Turnblin others.
19:16
Speaker 3: What's wrong with you using their own money? Well, there's
19:18
Speaker 3: nothing wrong with that at all.
19:19
Speaker 7: And in fact, the reality is that this is almost
19:22
Speaker 7: a carot and stick approach that the government's got because
19:25
Speaker 7: this money that they've put twenty two point seven billion
19:28
Speaker 7: dollars over ten years. I pressed the treasure on this
19:30
Speaker 7: is it's on balance sheet, off balance Shet. What he
19:32
Speaker 7: can see is effectively it's production credits that those in
19:36
Speaker 7: critical minerals and green hydrogen are going to receive, So
19:40
Speaker 7: they don't actually receive the credits until they produce the product.
19:44
Speaker 7: So it's almost an incitive building to business plans to
19:47
Speaker 7: allow them the confidence to go ahead and really create
19:51
Speaker 7: the plants. But then again, remember it's not actually cash
19:54
Speaker 7: that the government is outlaying. It's actually money that they
19:57
Speaker 7: would full go if and when these ever got off
20:01
Speaker 7: the ground. So the truth is, if these plants never
20:03
Speaker 7: get off the ground, then the likelihood is the government
20:06
Speaker 7: won't ever spend the money. But the government has got
20:09
Speaker 7: to be seen to be doing something here because the
20:11
Speaker 7: message they're hearing loud and clear from business right now,
20:14
Speaker 7: and it doesn't matter whether you're Ourica making explosives in
20:17
Speaker 7: ammonia and fertilizer, whether it's BHP or whether it's Brickworks,
20:22
Speaker 7: or whether it's other big companies. They're saying, we have
20:25
Speaker 7: a choice right now, and we can invest in America
20:28
Speaker 7: where they will give us genuine subsidies where the gas
20:32
Speaker 7: prices are basically accorded to a third of the price
20:34
Speaker 7: of Australia and wages there are also under control, so
20:38
Speaker 7: their returns are greater in America than in Australia right now.
20:42
Speaker 7: And part of the structural problem the government has not
20:45
Speaker 7: really addressed at all is that we have become less
20:48
Speaker 7: competitive and therefore less profitable as a nation to do
20:52
Speaker 7: business in and that is a fundamental problem that government
20:55
Speaker 7: has got to address.
20:58
Speaker 2: Terrific risters have said to the Guru, thank you for
21:00
Speaker 2: all of that. We're right across what we need to know.
21:02
Speaker 2: We'll get into the politics now with Andrew Clenowll thank
21:04
Speaker 2: you Ross Greenwood. He joins me now a sky on
21:06
Speaker 2: his political editor, Andrew Cleanell. You're obviously in Canberra, Andrew.
21:11
Speaker 2: We'll get to the punters out there, the voters in
21:14
Speaker 2: a moment. But how has this gone down around the
21:15
Speaker 2: halls of Parliament House. Has Labor got a spring in
21:18
Speaker 2: a step?
21:20
Speaker 1: There's absolutely no doubt about that. They do have a
21:22
Speaker 1: spring in their step. They feel like they're up mojo wise.
21:27
Speaker 1: It's a bit like when they did the Stage three
21:29
Speaker 1: tax cuts rejig and that was well received. I guess
21:32
Speaker 1: that glow only lasted the three or four weeks, although
21:35
Speaker 1: would also got them through Dunky. So that definitely is
21:39
Speaker 1: the case from the opposition's point of view that there
21:41
Speaker 1: are many there who are now convince still be an
21:43
Speaker 1: election this year.
21:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'll get to that at a moment. I want
21:47
Speaker 2: to look at how it was sold to budget out
21:49
Speaker 2: there in newspaper land. You're an old newspaper man, so
21:51
Speaker 2: I thought this is worth putting up on the screen
21:53
Speaker 2: for people. The Australian Or they ran a caricature of
21:56
Speaker 2: Jim Charms this morning.
21:58
Speaker 3: They had the headline bang.
21:59
Speaker 2: It on us to pay, that's the course, referring to
22:01
Speaker 2: all the spending being added to our nine one hundred
22:04
Speaker 2: billion dollar debt. The Sydney Morning Herald it was critical
22:07
Speaker 2: are the three hundred dollars energy rebates, saying that labour
22:11
Speaker 2: can't subsidize its way to lower inflation without impacting interest rates.
22:15
Speaker 2: Frost Green would made that point just now the Herald Sun,
22:18
Speaker 2: where they ran charmed and dangerous, putting the handouts in
22:23
Speaker 2: one column and the fact that the government's glossing over.
22:25
Speaker 3: The debt burden in another. Tough or fair? Do you
22:30
Speaker 3: think Andrew this morning the Prince.
22:33
Speaker 1: I think a lot of it's pretty fair because there
22:35
Speaker 1: is a fair bit of political trickery in this budget
22:37
Speaker 1: and we both know that, Peter. But maybe it'll work.
22:40
Speaker 1: I mean they think they've played a political blinder. I
22:43
Speaker 1: don't think there's any Australians who are going to be
22:45
Speaker 1: unhappy they get three hundred off their energy bill. There's
22:47
Speaker 1: cynicism whether that actually cuts inflation. These guys are saying
22:51
Speaker 1: it does really anyway, and they've got tax cuts coming
22:57
Speaker 1: at the same time, and they're delivering a surplus in
22:59
Speaker 1: a way get a better economic story for Jim Charmers.
23:02
Speaker 1: You certainly wouldn't get a better story if you went
23:05
Speaker 1: to a budget again in March before an election in May,
23:07
Speaker 1: which is why I'm in the camp that it's highly
23:09
Speaker 1: likely or at least likely that they will go to
23:12
Speaker 1: an election this year.
23:15
Speaker 2: Well, the Prime Minister doesn't even pay his power bill,
23:18
Speaker 2: as we know taxpayers paid at the lodge and care
23:20
Speaker 2: abillity I think is a long time he's paid one.
23:22
Speaker 2: If you think three hundred dollars, it goes anywhere near
23:25
Speaker 2: covering the increases. Just on the election issue, because you
23:29
Speaker 2: and I both picked up the fact that we were
23:31
Speaker 2: promised an interest rate cut about now, then it was
23:34
Speaker 2: pushed out to Christmas. Now the budget papers say there
23:38
Speaker 2: is no rate cut forecast at all until the middle
23:42
Speaker 2: of next year. You pin the Treasurer on this today.
23:46
Speaker 2: We've played that a little earlier on. So you say
23:50
Speaker 2: there's a lot of flexibility in this budget for them
23:52
Speaker 2: to go early. Look at the handouts. I think that's
23:54
Speaker 2: probably right. We've got a state pole in October. We've
23:59
Speaker 2: got a WA election in March. The next budget's due
24:03
Speaker 2: in March. I reckon they'll call it at the end
24:05
Speaker 2: of this year or next year, and they can do
24:09
Speaker 2: it around the time of WA and still avoid another budget.
24:14
Speaker 3: What do you think, I reckon?
24:16
Speaker 1: I reckon more likely December seven, November thirty. I don't
24:19
Speaker 1: think you want to get calling it at the same
24:22
Speaker 1: time as Wa. That would be in a bit of
24:24
Speaker 1: an affront to Wa. There's actually provision I think to
24:27
Speaker 1: get the Wa election moved. But Wa is such a
24:29
Speaker 1: key swing seat for state. Should I say for them?
24:33
Speaker 1: They won't want to be annoying Wa. So there's only
24:36
Speaker 1: a couple of windows. You could go after Wainsland.
24:39
Speaker 3: You can call it after Wa. That's well, they call
24:41
Speaker 3: it after Wa. I still missed the budget.
24:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, but then you promised to budget in March, so
24:49
Speaker 1: WA is about March. Whatever it is. If you don't
24:51
Speaker 1: have a budget there, people aren't going to going to
24:54
Speaker 1: say where the hell's your budget? So no, I don't
24:56
Speaker 1: think that works either. They'd have to produce a budget
24:59
Speaker 1: then go in April or May. So look, I just
25:03
Speaker 1: think it's geared towards it. I'm not saying they've even
25:05
Speaker 1: Albaneze made up his mind, but gee, he changed his
25:09
Speaker 1: language this morning, and it's just it just looks obvious.
25:12
Speaker 1: Peter to be frank, I mean, look at the alternative.
25:15
Speaker 1: I mean there's a risk with any scenario, right, you
25:17
Speaker 1: could call an election and then the Reserve Bank could
25:20
Speaker 1: hike rates, for example. But as things stand, if they
25:24
Speaker 1: wait for May, there's every chance, from what we see
25:27
Speaker 1: in these numbers and what we see in the economy
25:29
Speaker 1: and what we hear from Michelle Bullok, there's no rate
25:32
Speaker 1: cut before May. Now how are people going to be
25:35
Speaker 1: by May? They're going to be happy, They're going to
25:37
Speaker 1: be prepared to give you a chance more in November.
25:40
Speaker 1: So look at ratchet's up from here. Peter Dutton's got
25:44
Speaker 1: this budget reply, and I understand a big housing policy
25:48
Speaker 1: coming tomorrow night, and so you know that'll be keenly watched.
25:52
Speaker 1: It's always in that last year, or perhaps less in
25:55
Speaker 1: this case, of that three year cycle, that everything ratchets up,
25:58
Speaker 1: and I very much have that feeling this week we're
26:01
Speaker 1: an election made already almost.
26:05
Speaker 3: It just quickly.
26:06
Speaker 2: I want to point out migration too. They said they'd
26:08
Speaker 2: bring it down. They've got these soft caps, they call
26:10
Speaker 2: them an international student. But if you look at the
26:13
Speaker 2: numbers last night, you could see they've already had to
26:16
Speaker 2: uplift or revise their forecast upwards for migration numbers this
26:20
Speaker 2: financial year. In my EFO in December, they said net
26:23
Speaker 2: overseas migration would come in at three seven five thousand,
26:27
Speaker 2: one hundred thousand. There it's now I expected that number
26:29
Speaker 2: is going to be close to four hundred one thousand.
26:32
Speaker 3: They say it all.
26:32
Speaker 2: Then four two hundred and sixty thousand, and then it'll
26:36
Speaker 2: fall again to two hundred and fifty five thousand. Well,
26:40
Speaker 2: none of these numbers they've landed at all. And even
26:43
Speaker 2: when you get out to two hundred and thirty five
26:45
Speaker 2: thousand in the out years, I mean that's the biggest
26:48
Speaker 2: numbers we've ever seen before this government in Australia's history.
26:52
Speaker 2: They occurred under Big Australia. Kevin Rudd, I mean this
26:56
Speaker 2: is a shocker. And overall I think the numbers are
26:58
Speaker 2: one point six million people coming over the next four years.
27:04
Speaker 1: Well, how could you have any confidence that they reached
27:06
Speaker 1: the two sixty when the last two years they've had
27:08
Speaker 1: five hundred and eighteen and three ninety five and they
27:10
Speaker 1: predicted three seventy five. That's your point. And the other
27:14
Speaker 1: interesting aspect to that is the Treasurer himself has admitted
27:17
Speaker 1: that one of the reasons he's able to come up
27:19
Speaker 1: with this optimistic inflation forecast is because they're putting the
27:22
Speaker 1: brakes supposedly on migration. Well, I think it takes a
27:26
Speaker 1: while for the wheels to go in motion for those
27:28
Speaker 1: breaks to be on, so it's just such a rubbery forecast.
27:34
Speaker 1: I got to say, i'd probably, you know, take a
27:37
Speaker 1: bit more stock of the Reserve Bank's forecast, which is
27:40
Speaker 1: bad news for any of us with mortgages.
27:44
Speaker 2: Good tip there on Peter Dutton, I've got him coming up.
27:46
Speaker 2: We'll see what he can tell us. Thank you, Andrew Clenell.
27:49
Speaker 2: All right, after break, as I said, Peter Dutton, he'll
27:51
Speaker 2: join me both for his assessment on the budget, what
27:54
Speaker 2: the coalition is like and to support or not, and
27:57
Speaker 2: where he is expected to go tomorrow night in his
27:59
Speaker 2: budget addressed in reply, plus Labor's pumping more money into
28:03
Speaker 2: border security and into terrorism. That tells me things are
28:07
Speaker 2: pretty serious and it shows me how asleep at the
28:10
Speaker 2: wheel the government's been.
28:17
Speaker 3: Welcome back still the carm.
28:18
Speaker 2: I'll get into the details of what's in the budget
28:20
Speaker 2: for national security given the serious threats we face, including
28:23
Speaker 2: speculation that the mothballed Christmas Island Detention Center is about
28:28
Speaker 2: to be reopened. But first, one thing that was abundantlyclear
28:32
Speaker 2: from last night's budget is that Jim Chalmers has one
28:35
Speaker 2: eye squarely on the next federal election, even if he
28:38
Speaker 2: wants to pretend he hasn't.
28:41
Speaker 6: The Prime Minister didn't really rule out the chance of
28:44
Speaker 6: an early election off this budget this morning.
28:46
Speaker 3: He sort of danced around it a bit.
28:48
Speaker 7: Will you rule out an early election?
28:50
Speaker 5: I'm assuming that we go full term and I'll be
28:52
Speaker 5: ready to go for a fourth budget and it will
28:54
Speaker 5: be another responsible budget. I'll be ready and raring to
28:57
Speaker 5: go to hand down the budget whenever my Prime Minister
28:59
Speaker 5: tells me.
29:02
Speaker 2: That anyone believes labor anyway after they've broken tax carts.
29:06
Speaker 2: Promise joining me now the Opposition leader Peter Dutton. Well,
29:10
Speaker 2: Peter Dutton, thank you for your time. I know it's
29:11
Speaker 2: a busy week for you. This looks very much like
29:14
Speaker 2: a pre election budget. It looks like Labour's trying to
29:17
Speaker 2: buy off voters with handouts. Do you think an early
29:20
Speaker 2: elections on the cars and if they go early, doesn't
29:24
Speaker 2: these just expose their fear that the economy is going
29:28
Speaker 2: to get worse, not better.
29:32
Speaker 4: Well, Peter, it's great to be on the show and
29:34
Speaker 4: I think you're spot on. I think they are very
29:37
Speaker 4: worried about a deterioration in the economic circumstances. I've had
29:41
Speaker 4: now two budgets and a third one last night to
29:44
Speaker 4: get the economic settings right. Instead, all they've done is
29:47
Speaker 4: make decisions that's made it harder for Australians, not easier.
29:50
Speaker 4: They've driven up inflation and therefore interest rates have stayed
29:54
Speaker 4: higher for longer. And I think a lot of Australians
29:57
Speaker 4: understand that there are two plusses at the governments now deliver.
30:01
Speaker 4: But really that's what they will bequeathed by the Coalition
30:04
Speaker 4: when we're in government. Through good economic management, they get
30:08
Speaker 4: surpluses in the first two years and then when Labor
30:10
Speaker 4: really starts to take over after having made the decisions,
30:14
Speaker 4: we're going to deficits for as far as you can see.
30:17
Speaker 4: So the debt that's accumulated will be phenomenal, and I
30:20
Speaker 4: think they do want to go to an election for
30:22
Speaker 4: for Australians realize just how bad they have mucked up
30:26
Speaker 4: the economy and how hard they've made it for small
30:29
Speaker 4: business and families across the country.
30:33
Speaker 2: Look a lot of criticism today about that one of
30:35
Speaker 2: three hundred dollars payment on energy bills. A lot of
30:38
Speaker 2: the focuses on the fact, of course it's not means tested.
30:41
Speaker 2: But I think what's been lost in the commentary is
30:44
Speaker 2: the fact that the last election they promised everyone a
30:46
Speaker 2: two hundred and seventy five dollars cut, an ongoing cut
30:50
Speaker 2: to our power bills, not a one off payment. And
30:52
Speaker 2: because it's a handout, what's coming out of our pocket anyways, taxpayers,
30:56
Speaker 2: and it goes nowhere near close to offsetting how much
31:01
Speaker 2: they've driven power prices up anyway.
31:06
Speaker 4: Exactly. The Prime Minister promise before the last election on
31:09
Speaker 4: ninety seven occasions that he'd reduced people's power prices by
31:13
Speaker 4: turning in seventy five dollars per year. So it wasn't
31:16
Speaker 4: just turn it in seventy five dollars over the turn
31:18
Speaker 4: And what we know is that for the average household
31:20
Speaker 4: now the cumulative effect of Labour's energy price increases. Electricity
31:25
Speaker 4: price increases, I mean that people have paid about one
31:28
Speaker 4: thousand dollars more. So there's no way in the world
31:31
Speaker 4: that they can be compensated in the way that the
31:33
Speaker 4: Prime Minister committed to that. He promised that, he said
31:37
Speaker 4: his word meant something. That's what people thought before the election.
31:42
Speaker 4: Of course, when he says that now, people just don't
31:46
Speaker 4: believe it anymore. And I think a lot of Australians
31:50
Speaker 4: are really getting to know what it means for renewables
31:53
Speaker 4: only policy power prices are going to continue to go
31:55
Speaker 4: through the roof under this government.
32:00
Speaker 3: Greenwood.
32:01
Speaker 2: Peter Adt was at the top of the show. I mean,
32:02
Speaker 2: he says it's economic one oh one. If you put
32:04
Speaker 2: all of this money out there into the economy, people
32:08
Speaker 2: will spend. And if people spend, that's inflationary. The Treasurer says, no,
32:12
Speaker 2: that's absolutely wrong. But when you consider federal spending is
32:16
Speaker 2: going to hit twenty seven percent of GDP in the
32:18
Speaker 2: next financial year, how is that not inflationary? And there's
32:22
Speaker 2: this concession anyway in the budget papers that there will
32:25
Speaker 2: be no rate cut. Now it was forecast for this
32:28
Speaker 2: year but the government's own papers say we will not
32:31
Speaker 2: see a cut in interest rates until next year at
32:35
Speaker 2: the earliest.
32:38
Speaker 4: Well, Peter, I think you find two things in this budget.
32:41
Speaker 4: One is that they're trying to buy votes through the
32:43
Speaker 4: cash splash, which is inflationary, as you point out. And
32:47
Speaker 4: I think they're trying to buy themselves a rate cut
32:50
Speaker 4: this year before things start to really deteriorate under this
32:53
Speaker 4: government next year. And that circumstance, we know that the
32:58
Speaker 4: Reserve Bank and all of the credit economists who have
33:02
Speaker 4: made comment overnight panning this budget, I'd frankly take their
33:06
Speaker 4: word over the word of Jim Charmers and Anthony Albanezi,
33:09
Speaker 4: because it is inflationary and it is always the case
33:14
Speaker 4: under a labor government that they tax and spend and
33:17
Speaker 4: that results in higher registrates and interest rates will always
33:19
Speaker 4: be higher under a labor government. History has demonstrated that,
33:23
Speaker 4: and unfortunately the lessons of history haven't been learnt by
33:26
Speaker 4: this government.
33:29
Speaker 2: For all that talk about dropping migration too, I mean,
33:31
Speaker 2: if you look at the budget detail that to revise
33:34
Speaker 2: up the current years forecast, but we're still going to
33:36
Speaker 2: have one point six million new migrants arriving here at
33:41
Speaker 2: the same time as we're in the middle of the
33:42
Speaker 2: housing crisis. I mean, that's the reality in the budget.
33:46
Speaker 2: What's the government say.
33:47
Speaker 4: To that, Well, they keep saying that they're going to
33:51
Speaker 4: reduce the number of migrants coming into the country. But
33:55
Speaker 4: the trouble is when you get the actual figures, they
33:57
Speaker 4: always increase. So you're right, one point sixty seven million
34:00
Speaker 4: in people over five years. That's bigger than the population
34:03
Speaker 4: of Adelaide. And we know that over the last couple
34:06
Speaker 4: of years it's about nine hundred thousand people who have
34:09
Speaker 4: come in through the migration program and we've only built
34:12
Speaker 4: about two hundred and sixty five thousand homes as a country.
34:16
Speaker 4: So you ask yourself, why is there a housing crisis,
34:18
Speaker 4: why is there a rental crisis in this country? It's
34:21
Speaker 4: because of the decisions of the Albanezy government. No labor government,
34:25
Speaker 4: no liberal government in our history has had those sorts
34:29
Speaker 4: of numbers. And it's not just housing, Petter. I mean,
34:31
Speaker 4: people know, when you move into a new area, you
34:33
Speaker 4: try and roll your kids in the local kindergarten, or
34:36
Speaker 4: enroll your kids in the local school, try and get
34:39
Speaker 4: a new GP, turn up for elective surgery or to
34:43
Speaker 4: an emergency department. Everything is just choc a block, jump
34:47
Speaker 4: in your car and drive to work or run the
34:49
Speaker 4: kids to school in the morning. The roads are gridlocked,
34:52
Speaker 4: and it's because there hasn't been proper planning. And it's
34:55
Speaker 4: because this government really has brought in people at a
34:58
Speaker 4: record number. We're a great country because of migration, but
35:01
Speaker 4: it needs to be properly managed and the government hasn't
35:04
Speaker 4: done that.
35:07
Speaker 3: Now.
35:07
Speaker 2: I'm not stupid enough to think, having been in an
35:09
Speaker 2: opposition leader's office, that you've got to announce policy changes
35:13
Speaker 2: or detailed tonight ahead of your big speech tomorrow night.
35:16
Speaker 2: But Andrew Clanell says there's a rumor that you might
35:19
Speaker 2: have a housing announcement in the mix tomorrow night.
35:23
Speaker 3: Could you at least confirm that.
35:27
Speaker 4: Well, I think housing is one of the biggest issues
35:29
Speaker 4: facing our country at the moment. I think the energy
35:31
Speaker 4: crisis that labor's creating, the housing crisis that labour's created,
35:35
Speaker 4: and the security crisis that labor's created. I think they
35:38
Speaker 4: are three priorities for our country, and you can expect
35:41
Speaker 4: that I'll have a lot to say on those issues.
35:44
Speaker 4: I think people feel less safe in our country. There
35:47
Speaker 4: are three voat arrivals last week, so our boarders aren't
35:50
Speaker 4: as secure as they used to be. We see that
35:53
Speaker 4: the government's released one hundred and fifty two criminals from
35:56
Speaker 4: immigration detention. Some of them have committed egregious attack and
36:00
Speaker 4: crimes against Australians already. We know that this government's delivered
36:04
Speaker 4: twelve interest rate rises. Inflation here is a bigger problem
36:08
Speaker 4: than what it is in most other comparable nations. And
36:11
Speaker 4: we know that in terms of the Australian made policy
36:13
Speaker 4: that the government's got, the only thing that you get
36:15
Speaker 4: Australian made under a labor government is inflation. And Australian
36:19
Speaker 4: families at the moment of thirty five thousand dollars worse
36:22
Speaker 4: off under mister Albanesi. And I think the housing crisis
36:26
Speaker 4: that they've created means that we've got people living intense
36:29
Speaker 4: and in cars. At the moment, Homelessness is at a
36:31
Speaker 4: record level because of the government's migration program, and I
36:37
Speaker 4: just don't think it's fair. And at the same time
36:39
Speaker 4: they're handing out billions of dollars to businesses that frankly
36:43
Speaker 4: should be able to thrive in an environment where there
36:46
Speaker 4: is massive demand for critical minerals.
36:49
Speaker 3: The world over.
36:52
Speaker 2: We'll leave there, Peter Dutton, good luck for tomorrow night.
36:54
Speaker 2: We'll be watching it here on Sky News at seven thirty.
36:56
Speaker 2: Of course we'll see then. All right, let's go to
37:00
Speaker 2: that issue national security and defense. We'll bring in Greg Sheridan,
37:04
Speaker 2: foreign editor at The Australian. Greg fifty billion, they trumpeted
37:08
Speaker 2: in defense spending sounds big, sounds exactly what we need.
37:12
Speaker 2: But you look at the budget papers last night, only
37:15
Speaker 2: five point seven of that is in the four year
37:18
Speaker 2: forward estimates, which I think's pretty appalling. What's your takeout
37:23
Speaker 2: in a national security sense in the budget?
37:28
Speaker 3: Well, Peter, great to be with you.
37:30
Speaker 11: You've had a terrific program tonight, full of information about
37:33
Speaker 11: the budget. Look, I think this is in many ways
37:36
Speaker 11: the most scandalous failure of this government of all. Richard
37:40
Speaker 11: Marles ought to be prosecuted under truth in advertising legislation.
37:46
Speaker 11: So two simple facts about the defense budget. First of all,
37:50
Speaker 11: Marcus Hellier from Strategic and Analysis Australia, you know, the
37:55
Speaker 11: pre eminent defense budget analysts in Australia, says defense has
37:58
Speaker 11: lost about eight percent of its purchase power because of inflation.
38:02
Speaker 11: It doesn't get compensated for inflation. It does get compensated
38:05
Speaker 11: for currency movements. So under the Albanesi government we've had
38:08
Speaker 11: a real cut in defense spending. Now, the five point
38:12
Speaker 11: seven billion dollars which Richard Marles says is going to
38:15
Speaker 11: come over the forward estimates, it turns out that even
38:19
Speaker 11: of that amount, almost all of it comes in the
38:22
Speaker 11: last year of the forward estimates, so it's not until
38:25
Speaker 11: the fourth year the three point eight billion of that,
38:29
Speaker 11: frankly quite trivial amount of money comes. Now, assuming Andrew
38:34
Speaker 11: Clanell is right and we get an election this year,
38:36
Speaker 11: that means that will be in the first budget of
38:40
Speaker 11: the third term of the Albanesi government before you even
38:44
Speaker 11: get a notional increase of that three point eight billion dollars.
38:50
Speaker 11: So all of these sky high figures Richard Males talks about,
38:54
Speaker 11: it's like a bad episode of Utopia. He's talking about
38:57
Speaker 11: spending in ten years time and in twenty years time
39:00
Speaker 11: and so on. A small thing the forecast that he
39:04
Speaker 11: said he was going to go up to two point
39:05
Speaker 11: four percent of GMP in ten years time. Something's come
39:09
Speaker 11: back to two point three percent. But none of that
39:11
Speaker 11: is real. It's all blooney. I am a bit mystified
39:14
Speaker 11: why the opposition doesn't eviscierate him more. I think it's because,
39:18
Speaker 11: frankly speaking, they had such a shocking record themselves in
39:21
Speaker 11: government and they they're going to have to make a
39:23
Speaker 11: real commitment about dollars themselves. But quite soon NDIS will
39:28
Speaker 11: be a bigger expenditure item than defense, where spending starting
39:33
Speaker 11: to spend billions of dollars on nuclear subs. We're going
39:36
Speaker 11: to cripple all the other programs. And the nuclear subs
39:40
Speaker 11: are at least ten years away and probably more. And
39:43
Speaker 11: the final thing is we're four and a half thousand
39:46
Speaker 11: short of our numbers. Now next year we're going to
39:48
Speaker 11: be five thousand short of our troop numbers. So this
39:52
Speaker 11: is a debarkle in defense. And I'm surprised that, as
39:57
Speaker 11: I say that, the government doesn't pay more of a.
39:58
Speaker 3: Penalty for it. I did think of you last night, Gregorz.
40:03
Speaker 2: I was listening to the government sort of squirm a
40:05
Speaker 2: little bit when people said, well, why couldn't you have
40:08
Speaker 2: targeted that three hundred dollars energy payment?
40:10
Speaker 3: Why are millionaires getting it? Why does it go to
40:12
Speaker 3: we everybody?
40:13
Speaker 2: And they said, oh, look it's the systems can't work.
40:16
Speaker 2: It's too complex. To have worked out who's rich and
40:19
Speaker 2: who's poor.
40:20
Speaker 3: To target it.
40:21
Speaker 2: This is the same government who says we can build
40:23
Speaker 2: nuclear submarines in Australia and I can't work out who's
40:27
Speaker 2: rich and who's poor to hand out three hundred dollars.
40:29
Speaker 2: But in their last night too, I picked up there
40:32
Speaker 2: was six hundred million for border security, seventy six million FORASIO.
40:37
Speaker 2: Now this says to me they've got a problem on
40:39
Speaker 2: their borders. They're now admitting it, at least in fiscal terms.
40:42
Speaker 3: But ASIO.
40:43
Speaker 2: This is the same ASIO that they won't let come
40:46
Speaker 2: in and sit at the National Security Committee of Cabinet.
40:50
Speaker 2: That's also telling.
40:54
Speaker 11: Now you're absolutely right, Peter. So one other final footnote
40:57
Speaker 11: about the gross defense spend. As you rightly say, the
41:01
Speaker 11: government is just spewing money out of the moment. It's
41:04
Speaker 11: look like it's got fire hydrants going full pump, just
41:08
Speaker 11: spewing dollars out of enormous amounts between state and federal government.
41:12
Speaker 11: There's going to be twenty billion dollars new money in
41:14
Speaker 11: the economy next year, and they won't increase defense spending
41:19
Speaker 11: by any meaningful amount at this moment. Now, in five
41:24
Speaker 11: or six years time, we're going to be in a
41:26
Speaker 11: world of pain with debt and terms of trade not
41:29
Speaker 11: as good and everything, and yet they pretend that they're
41:32
Speaker 11: going to suddenly make heroic massive increases in defense spending.
41:36
Speaker 11: Then the increase to border security in ASIO is obviously
41:41
Speaker 11: something the government doesn't want to do because they honestly,
41:44
Speaker 11: like Joe Biden, they just don't believe national security is
41:46
Speaker 11: their issue. They're not going to get any votes of it.
41:49
Speaker 11: Out of it, the money doesn't go to their mates,
41:52
Speaker 11: and these are immediate increases in spending which they are
41:56
Speaker 11: being forced to make. You can see the beginning of
41:59
Speaker 11: the boats again. You can see the increase in the
42:02
Speaker 11: terror threat within Australia. Now they have humiliated ASIO and
42:08
Speaker 11: ASIS by kicking them off the National Security Committee, but
42:11
Speaker 11: that's who they're going to turn to to protect Australians
42:14
Speaker 11: from the terror threat. So I think these expenditure increases
42:18
Speaker 11: they're welcome, but they're through gritted teeth and they're dictated
42:21
Speaker 11: by dire necessity. I would say over the next twelve.
42:25
Speaker 2: Months spot on Greg Sheridan, thank you, I'll read or
42:29
Speaker 2: your analysis in The Australian on the intrails as we're
42:33
Speaker 2: all working our way through the budget.
42:34
Speaker 3: Thank you, Greg. All Right, we'll get back.
42:35
Speaker 2: To those rumors on national security after the break that
42:38
Speaker 2: the Mothball Christmas Island Attention Center is about to be
42:41
Speaker 2: back in business, meaning the people's smugglers are too, and
42:45
Speaker 2: this worry about the demolition of an ANZAC monument in
42:50
Speaker 2: order to make way for a win farm a little
42:57
Speaker 2: later Cal Richards, of course, but let's get into things
42:59
Speaker 2: with my shadow Environment Minister, Senator Jonathan Duniam and senior
43:04
Speaker 2: fellow at the Menses Research Center the Australians. Nicator Well,
43:08
Speaker 2: I want to start if I can, with some exclusive
43:10
Speaker 2: footage of a pro Palestinian encampment at the University of Melbourne.
43:14
Speaker 2: They've been asked to shut down and go, but look
43:18
Speaker 2: what happened when the Deputy Vice Chancellor Piper Nicholson asked
43:21
Speaker 2: them to peacefully move.
43:23
Speaker 8: On your intention please, my name is Pip Nicholson'll get
43:40
Speaker 8: you in peace, to respect the peers.
43:45
Speaker 3: Across the universe.
43:48
Speaker 8: I've typically traumatized by the ongoing installation.
43:58
Speaker 2: With dot know that's from today. Pretty shocking, Peter, it is.
44:09
Speaker 9: I mean they're supposed to be a university for education,
44:12
Speaker 9: not in doctrination and to see that sort of behavior,
44:15
Speaker 9: this loving, peaceful, tolerant approach they're taking to this, I
44:18
Speaker 9: think is just appalling, and good on the Vice Chancellor
44:22
Speaker 9: for stepping in to try and bring some sense of
44:25
Speaker 9: What was more alarming today, though, Peter, was the pre
44:28
Speaker 9: organized approach taken by a senator, a Labor senator who
44:32
Speaker 9: gave a speech to a group of Assembly journalists to
44:35
Speaker 9: call out her Prime minister to stand up for Palestine,
44:40
Speaker 9: calling out Israel as perpetrators of genocide, and that we
44:44
Speaker 9: must stand up to this evil. The fact that we
44:46
Speaker 9: now have a parliamentarian willing to stand up in a
44:49
Speaker 9: pre organized speech to say these sorts of things means
44:52
Speaker 9: that there is something very wrong in our country and
44:54
Speaker 9: the Prime Minister actually now needs to show some spine
44:57
Speaker 9: and address this head on and not try and have
44:59
Speaker 9: a bet each way. It's too late now and he's
45:00
Speaker 9: got to fix this.
45:03
Speaker 2: You're not wrong, hey, nick I mentioned before Christmas Island.
45:06
Speaker 2: The talk is that they're taking out of moth balls.
45:09
Speaker 2: A whole lot of interpreters have turned up. They've been
45:12
Speaker 2: there for five days. Residents are spotting border force activity
45:16
Speaker 2: around the Old Center. This tells me, they are now
45:20
Speaker 2: admitting the people smugglers are back in game.
45:25
Speaker 10: This is chilling, Peter. I mean, I just hope that
45:28
Speaker 10: place would never be opened again, because you know, it
45:31
Speaker 10: just carries those terrible memories of that boat being dashed
45:34
Speaker 10: ashore at the rocks and people dying before our eyes.
45:37
Speaker 10: We don't want to see this. And the fact that
45:39
Speaker 10: laborers let our borders get out of control, to appointment
45:42
Speaker 10: they're having to reopen Christmas Island really tells you something.
45:45
Speaker 10: As you know, it's a very expensive facility to run.
45:48
Speaker 10: It's not the ideal way to a border policy, but
45:53
Speaker 10: that's what you're driven to do if things get out
45:55
Speaker 10: of control. And so I think the fact that they're
45:56
Speaker 10: opening it is a clear sign that things are out
46:00
Speaker 10: their control and they just don't know what to do
46:01
Speaker 10: about it.
46:04
Speaker 2: John, it might sound like a little issue, but it's
46:07
Speaker 2: really important. Locals in Oberon are up in arms that
46:12
Speaker 2: an Anzac monument, which is an avenue of trees that
46:15
Speaker 2: was planted they are one hundred years old now in
46:17
Speaker 2: honor of fall and diggers will be bulldozed in order
46:21
Speaker 2: to put in a wind farm.
46:25
Speaker 9: This is not a little issue at all.
46:27
Speaker 3: Or where do we stop.
46:28
Speaker 9: Where do we draw the line with what expense is
46:31
Speaker 9: appropriate to foot When it comes to this pursuit of
46:34
Speaker 9: transition to renewables in Victoria, we sort of just cinder
46:38
Speaker 9: Allen saying that we will destroy a ramps are listed wetland,
46:41
Speaker 9: trash the environment, to save the planet, to build this
46:45
Speaker 9: terminal for an offshore wind farm.
46:46
Speaker 3: And now in.
46:47
Speaker 9: Oberon it's okay to desecrate a monument to our fallen diggers,
46:51
Speaker 9: people who sacrifice their lives for our freedom and liberties
46:54
Speaker 9: for a wind farm. Like, honestly, the world has gone crazy.
46:57
Speaker 9: If we're going to allow that to happen, there is
47:00
Speaker 9: again something very wrong that needs to be addressed, and
47:02
Speaker 9: the premier should actually take some action.
47:06
Speaker 2: That boondog all from Malcolm Turnbull. If I can, Nick
47:09
Speaker 2: snowy two point zero promised we were told it would
47:12
Speaker 2: cost two billion dollars. Another seven billion in the budget
47:16
Speaker 2: last night. I think the total is something like twelve
47:19
Speaker 2: billion dollars.
47:21
Speaker 3: You're in Finland.
47:22
Speaker 2: They've just opened up their latest nuclear reactor last year.
47:26
Speaker 3: That's obviously the way to go.
47:30
Speaker 10: Yeah. I was at the Okoloto three reactor on Monday
47:34
Speaker 10: talking to the people from TVO, which is a finish
47:37
Speaker 10: leg consorting run it. It's entirely private sector, it's entirely
47:40
Speaker 10: one hundred percent finish owned. And I said to them, well,
47:42
Speaker 10: how much of this this baby cost? You know, we
47:44
Speaker 10: came online last year. It was very it was late.
47:47
Speaker 10: It took longer to build. Five point six billion euro
47:50
Speaker 10: that's nine point six billion Australian dollars at the current rate.
47:55
Speaker 10: I considerably cheaper.
47:56
Speaker 3: Than Snowy Hydro.
47:58
Speaker 10: And for that you get a state of the art
48:00
Speaker 10: generation pressurized water reactor, the best in Europe, and it's
48:05
Speaker 10: producing one point six gigawad of power, which is, you know,
48:09
Speaker 10: like a s fair sized coal fired power station twenty
48:11
Speaker 10: four hours a day.
48:12
Speaker 1: So we are.
48:13
Speaker 10: Obviously going for second best. And Chris Bowen's continual claim
48:17
Speaker 10: that reasonables are cheaper just doesn't stack up, stack up
48:21
Speaker 10: as soon as you get to a country like Finland
48:23
Speaker 10: where they're actually doing the sensible thing and pushing ahead
48:27
Speaker 10: with nuclear.
48:29
Speaker 2: She's well lucky to have you on the ground there
48:31
Speaker 2: at the moment. Nick, thank you as always, gents you
48:33
Speaker 2: both next week. Hey, just before we go to a break,
48:36
Speaker 2: there's been this furor today about what Jim Chalmer's wife,
48:39
Speaker 2: Laura was wearing last night.
48:41
Speaker 3: It was a Carla zan Patty outfit.
48:43
Speaker 2: I'm told two thousand dollars odd jacket and a top
48:47
Speaker 2: or jacket an a dress. Now I have to say
48:50
Speaker 2: this is just over the top. The woman has a job,
48:53
Speaker 2: I mean, she's privately employed. What she chooses to spend
48:56
Speaker 2: her money on. That's old fashioned to think the bloke's
48:59
Speaker 2: buying everything just because we pay his wage. We're going
49:02
Speaker 2: to say in what his wife spends her money on.
49:05
Speaker 3: I don't know, Laura.
49:06
Speaker 2: I don't think I've even better, but I think that's
49:08
Speaker 2: a that's a bit rich.
49:09
Speaker 3: All right, we'll leave it there.
49:10
Speaker 2: Coming back after break, kel Richard with words, I'm conscious
49:17
Speaker 2: of the clock. Let's bring him straight in kel Richards
49:19
Speaker 2: joining me as he does every Wednesday. A bit of
49:22
Speaker 2: a budget flavor with the first one. Kel Kathy wants
49:25
Speaker 2: to know, why don't we always say the treasurer brings
49:28
Speaker 2: down the budget?
49:30
Speaker 12: Well, let's compound verb. To bring something down is to
49:32
Speaker 12: bring it from a higher level down to a lower level.
49:34
Speaker 12: I mean, I suppose that might be from the executive
49:37
Speaker 12: arm of government down to the legislative arm of the government.
49:40
Speaker 12: But I suspect this is me guessing it's much older.
49:43
Speaker 12: It goes back to the days when parliaments were just
49:45
Speaker 12: advisors to the king, and so Henry the eighth would
49:49
Speaker 12: send the Chance of his Exchequer to bring down the
49:52
Speaker 12: budget to his advisors in the Parliament. I suspect it's
49:56
Speaker 12: that old.
49:59
Speaker 3: I feel like this.
50:00
Speaker 2: Tonight on the show, we're being very, very busy. Raymond
50:02
Speaker 2: wants to know the meaning of under the pump.
50:05
Speaker 12: Yes, and the Treasurer keeps talking about people being under
50:08
Speaker 12: the pump. There are four It means obviously being under
50:11
Speaker 12: high pressure and at risk and working hard and worrying.
50:15
Speaker 12: There are four suggestions. Eric Partridge thinks it comes from
50:18
Speaker 12: an old sort of punishment where people were dunt under
50:21
Speaker 12: the village pump. Another one says it's just the fact
50:23
Speaker 12: that pump's so pressure. Another one says it goes back
50:26
Speaker 12: to construction sites where they pump concrete and you've got
50:28
Speaker 12: to work fast. But I think the correct one is
50:31
Speaker 12: goes back to the days of sailing ships when they
50:33
Speaker 12: started to take water. It was all hands to the pump,
50:37
Speaker 12: working hard, at risk. I think that's where it comes from.
50:42
Speaker 2: Well, you're always like that I'm sometimes like that would
50:44
Speaker 2: certainly been like that tonight Calbriches, thank you as always,
50:47
Speaker 2: see you next week.
50:48
Speaker 3: That did for me.
50:49
Speaker 2: Tomorrow more budget analysis Peter Dutton, of course, Tomorrow night
50:53
Speaker 2: up next to the Bolt Report.