Latest / Inside Politics / Falsities, nastiness and the Trump ‘vibe’ tapped: Hanson at the Press Club

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Falsities, nastiness and the Trump ‘vibe’ tapped: Hanson at the Press Club · Inside Politics

0:01
S1: I'm Jacqueline Maley, and you're listening to Inside Politics from
0:04
S1: the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
0:08
S1: Our usual correspondent, Paul Circle, is on special assignment at
0:11
S1: the Soccer World Cup, by which I mean he's on holidays.
0:15
S1: But we do have a special guest in his stead,
0:17
S1: our chief political commentator, James Massola. Welcome to the podcast, James,
0:22
S1: and thank you for being here.
0:23
S2: Good day Jaques. It's great to be here.
0:25
S1: Clearly, your dedication to politics and the political arena is
0:29
S1: greater than your dedication to soccer, unlike some people.
0:32
S2: Yeah, indeed. Look, I'd give my right arm to be there,
0:35
S2: but my my wife might have some objections to that.
0:39
S2: First of all being, why aren't I there as well?
0:41
S1: Yes, yes, it does look fun, but actually the hottest
0:45
S1: ticket in town in terms of Australian politics this week
0:48
S1: was in Canberra. It was Pauline Hanson's historic first address
0:51
S1: to the National Press Club, which happened on Wednesday. Can
0:54
S1: you just explain briefly to our listeners why it's a
0:57
S1: big deal that she appeared at the Press Club?
0:59
S2: Yeah. Of course. Jack. So the Press Club was set
1:02
S2: up in the early 1960s. The first person to address
1:04
S2: it was a then external affairs is now called a
1:07
S2: foreign minister. Minister, a guy called Garfield Barwick, who went
1:11
S2: on to be a sir and a High Court judge.
1:13
S2: It's one of the pillars of the establishment, if you like, Jackie,
1:16
S2: you know. It's where people go, you know, business leaders,
1:20
S2: captains of industry, prime ministers and opposition leaders other than
1:23
S2: Peter Dutton, they go they make a case in about
1:26
S2: half an hour. They give a speech, then they face
1:28
S2: 30 minutes of questions from the press. And it really
1:31
S2: is a kind of a ritual, a rite of passage,
1:34
S2: if you like. For any aspiring politician, particularly one aspiring
1:39
S2: to lead the country or be opposition leader to go
1:42
S2: and do that. It is the antithesis of what Pauline
1:46
S2: Hanson has stood for in her 30 year political career.
1:49
S2: She's the outsider. She's the consummate outsider, Jackie. So for
1:53
S2: her to make the decision to go and address the
1:56
S2: Press Club, to face the reptiles of the press, as
1:59
S2: it were. It's a big deal. And it's, I think,
2:02
S2: at least to some extent, her way of saying, I'm here,
2:06
S2: I'm not going anywhere. And I'm, I'm, I'm mainstream now.
2:09
S2: Like I'm not a fringe. I don't let a fringe
2:11
S2: political party anymore. We're the real deal.
2:14
S1: I mean, I would say I would say it's a
2:15
S1: cornerstone of sort of civic debate in our country, because
2:18
S1: it is the one opportunity where the entire Canberra Press
2:20
S1: gallery gets to really interrogate and to question in detail
2:25
S1: political leaders, political aspirants, people of public importance. And it
2:30
S1: is really, in that sense, it's quite an important institution
2:33
S1: in our democracy. Pauline Hanson came in and made it
2:36
S1: very clear, I would say, that she didn't particularly respect
2:40
S1: the values of the institution, and she didn't particularly buy
2:44
S1: into the whole thing, even though she was appearing there.
2:46
S1: What were the sort of main themes of the speech?
2:49
S2: The main themes of her speech were, well, she focused on,
2:52
S2: I should say, policy areas that she's been focusing on
2:55
S2: for decades. What does that mean? It means immigration. It
2:59
S2: means multiculturalism. Or, you know, her dislike of multiculturalism. And indeed,
3:03
S2: she said.
3:04
S3: We cannot be a multicultural society. We are a multiracial society,
3:12
S3: but we must be monocultural.
3:16
S2: She focused on, you know, the failings of the government.
3:19
S3: The government shovels out millions of dollars of taxpayers money
3:23
S3: just to justify their failing energy policy.
3:28
S2: She focused on the reasons why she believes, you know,
3:32
S2: the current housing package that we've seen proposed last month
3:36
S2: in the budget, why that wouldn't work.
3:39
S3: Punishing ambitious and aspirational young people who are trying to
3:42
S3: build a future, to build wealth, to build independence and
3:45
S3: to invest in Australia. Albanese and Chalmers are heading in
3:49
S3: the wrong direction.
3:52
S2: And she kind of, uh, how do I say it?
3:55
S2: She she she hit the familiar lines that we've heard
3:58
S2: from her for 30 years. There were no surprises, really,
4:00
S2: in the speech, jacki. There was no major new policy.
4:03
S2: It was the kind of best of Pauline speech, if
4:07
S2: you like, and I will slightly, if you'll forgive me,
4:10
S2: disagree with you. I think she in terms of, um,
4:13
S2: whether she wanted to be there or not, I, I
4:16
S2: think there was part of her that was thrilled to
4:17
S2: be there. Um it was. Yeah. And you know, Rob Harris,
4:21
S2: her colleague, said this in his comment piece in a
4:23
S2: funny way. She, she sort of revealed that she was
4:26
S2: more of a respecter of institutions than, say, a Donald Trump,
4:31
S2: for example. Like she, I think she understood the import
4:34
S2: of going there. I don't think she necessarily liked this
4:38
S2: journalist or that question or whatever, but I think part
4:41
S2: of her felt or seemed to feel. And I, you know,
4:44
S2: maybe I'm projecting or whatever, but I don't think I'm
4:46
S2: wrong that she was. Yeah. She was, she was sort
4:48
S2: of proud to be there, you know, that she'd arrived,
4:50
S2: if you like.
4:51
S1: I mean, I guess I would we can talk later
4:54
S1: about the way that she treated the journalists who were
4:56
S1: her hosts, and who are the members of that club.
4:58
S1: And the, I would say, Trump ification of aspects of
5:02
S1: her dealing with the media, which I think is a very,
5:04
S1: very damaging and pernicious sort of trend that we're seeing
5:08
S1: from One Nation. We can talk about that later. But
5:10
S1: I mean, certainly the entire speech in itself, as you say,
5:13
S1: it ran through the main themes, which are her chief
5:17
S1: political complaints. So obviously top of the list is immigration.
5:20
S1: I'd never heard her say before, or anyone in Australia,
5:22
S1: in Australian politics say before that they want a monoculture.
5:25
S1: So that to me was was an entire rejection of
5:28
S1: what I would see as the one of the basic
5:31
S1: rules of or basic sort of precepts of modern contemporary Australia,
5:34
S1: which is that we're a pluralist society, that we accept
5:37
S1: all cultures and we we're broadly sort of okay with that.
5:41
S1: That was quite new. She didn't say what the monoculture
5:43
S1: would represent, but I guess we can surmise what it
5:46
S1: might mean. She was certainly very damning of Muslim immigration.
5:49
S1: She said, you know, she said basically she wants to
5:51
S1: cut that back dramatically. She said that climate change was
5:54
S1: a hoax. She basically said she would cut all, all
5:57
S1: renewable energy projects to coal fired power stations. She said
6:01
S1: she wants, I think, in South Australia. And the other
6:03
S1: one was perhaps in Queensland. And she also said that
6:06
S1: she would build a nuclear power reactor. She didn't answer
6:09
S1: questions about whether or not that would be publicly funded.
6:11
S1: She said that they would seek private funding, but she
6:13
S1: didn't give any exact detail on immigration numbers. She touched
6:18
S1: on transgender issues so that there was a transgender insurgency.
6:23
S1: She said she'd sacked the sex discrimination commissioner, Anna Cody,
6:28
S1: and also, I think, the human rights commissioner as well.
6:30
S1: For me, the big headlines of the speech in terms
6:34
S1: of policy were her pledge to overhaul industrial relations. Can
6:39
S1: you just tell us a little bit about that?
6:41
S2: Yeah. So basically what Miss Hanson said was that the
6:45
S2: industrial relations system isn't working for Australians in particular. It's
6:49
S2: not working for bosses out there, she said.
6:52
S3: Businesses also tell me you can't sack people these days.
6:56
S3: They're on their phones. They don't work, they don't turn up.
6:59
S3: They actually are lazy.
7:01
S2: And the balance is wrong, especially in the industrial relations system.
7:06
S2: And it should be easy to fire people, which I
7:09
S2: must say I found to be quite an extraordinary statement,
7:12
S2: sort of party of the battlers siding with the bosses, essentially.
7:17
S1: We've seen in the lead up to this speech and
7:20
S1: in the last few weeks, I would say labor has
7:22
S1: kind of tried to hone its attack line on on
7:25
S1: Hanson and make it very tangible to the voters who
7:29
S1: might be defecting from labor to one. Hanson. Right. And
7:33
S1: that attack line has been all around industrial relations and
7:36
S1: workers rights. So it seemed to me like she just
7:38
S1: opened herself up. She basically just gave them a quote
7:42
S1: that they can take out and use in advertising. When
7:44
S1: she's calling workers lazy and saying that it's too hard
7:47
S1: to sack them. I mean, was that not an extraordinary
7:50
S1: misstep on her part if she's trying to get Labour
7:52
S1: voters over to One Nation.
7:54
S2: Look, I don't know that she would see it like that, but,
7:56
S2: I mean, I think on the face of it at least, yes,
7:58
S2: it seems to be. And this is the thing this
8:01
S2: is the kind of tension. You know, I've been thinking
8:04
S2: about this just this morning, writing, writing a piece about
8:07
S2: Miss Hanson. Like there's this fundamental tension between what she
8:12
S2: says about being on the side of ordinary Aussies and
8:16
S2: how she actually conducts her business. Right. So no ordinary
8:21
S2: Australian has a friend, for example, who just gives them
8:24
S2: an aeroplane so they can travel around the country and
8:27
S2: campaign politically. You know, Pauline Hanson does Gina Rinehart, the
8:31
S2: mining billionaire, gave her a plane. I don't understand, like,
8:35
S2: there's a real cognitive dissonance between her arguing that she's
8:38
S2: on the side of the workers and what she's actually
8:41
S2: saying in terms of policy. Similarly, on the industrial relations,
8:45
S2: she said the childcare system was broken and that it
8:47
S2: needs Investigation and that the childcare workers shouldn't have got the.
8:52
S2: Several billion dollars pay rise across the sector. Obviously not
8:56
S2: per worker, that they shouldn't have got the several billion
8:58
S2: dollars pay rise that they were handed out in a
9:01
S2: judgment right now. I just. Could you point me, Jackie,
9:05
S2: to the you know, the mum or dad who thinks,
9:08
S2: you know, who's got a kid in childcare who thinks, oh,
9:10
S2: you know, those childcare workers are so overpaid? Like, oh
9:14
S2: my God, it's it's hard work. You know, who would
9:17
S2: begrudge a childcare worker a pay rise?
9:19
S1: There are probably I agree with you, but there are
9:21
S1: probably a lot of parents who think that childcare is
9:24
S1: too expensive and that wages are feeding into that. So
9:27
S1: maybe she's onto something there. She also sort of seemed
9:30
S1: to I not exactly denigrate the profession, but say basically
9:33
S1: I looked after children and I didn't need a degree
9:35
S1: to look after them. Now, that is a bit of
9:38
S1: a misinformation because it's not like every childcare worker has
9:40
S1: a degree. That's absolutely not the case. Um, she also
9:44
S1: just on sort of, I guess, you know, family issues.
9:46
S1: She also talked about abortion, late stage abortion. This is
9:49
S1: something that we've seen kind of come up as it's
9:51
S1: a bit of a totemic. It's almost like a culture
9:53
S1: war issue now. It's obviously a huge feature of the
9:56
S1: American political debate. It hasn't been, thankfully, in Australia so much,
9:59
S1: but it is starting to rear its head a little
10:01
S1: bit here. She said she thought late term abortions were
10:03
S1: absolutely disgusting. She talked about people being able to abort
10:07
S1: babies one day before delivery date. I just want to
10:10
S1: really nail I don't. It's kind of bugging me that
10:13
S1: in all of the press that I've seen about this,
10:14
S1: nobody has pointed that out as being a gross, gross
10:18
S1: falsity and an absolute nonsense. The idea that that's happening
10:21
S1: in Australia is ridiculous. I mean, is she going to
10:25
S1: get anywhere with that? Because, you know, one nation that
10:28
S1: that that that issue of late term abortion, they tried
10:31
S1: it on in the last Queensland election. The coalition tried
10:34
S1: it on as well, and it was absolute electoral poison.
10:37
S1: I mean, this is a real vote turner for some people,
10:38
S1: isn't it?
10:39
S2: Yeah, it absolutely is. And look, I actually think she
10:43
S2: um how do I put this. I don't think she
10:45
S2: wants to be talking about this issue either. Now, I
10:48
S2: heard a report polling from the Australia Institute, something like 84%
10:52
S2: of Australians support a woman's right to choose. It is
10:56
S2: just not an issue here in the same way that
10:59
S2: it is in the States. I hope it never, ever
11:02
S2: becomes an issue here. Now, in the last couple of weeks,
11:05
S2: I reread a book called Off the Rails by Margo Kingston. Jackie.
11:09
S2: She was a former Herald journo. She wrote the definitive
11:12
S2: book of the 98 campaign. She travelled with Pauline Hanson
11:15
S2: for weeks. It's a terrific read, well worth tracking down
11:18
S2: if you. If you haven't already read it. And in
11:20
S2: the book she talks about Hanson and abortion, and she
11:22
S2: has this conversation with Pauline Hanson and essentially works out
11:27
S2: that Hanson supports a woman's right to choose. So to
11:30
S2: my point about why doesn't she want to talk about this,
11:33
S2: I think there's a fairly decent chunk of her support
11:36
S2: who probably don't like abortion, who probably want it restricted
11:41
S2: or perhaps even made illegal, I don't know, but you
11:45
S2: know who would like to see it wound back? Not
11:48
S2: that it's at particularly high levels in Australia at all.
11:50
S2: I think Hansen recognises that, and I thought that was
11:53
S2: a good question to ask her, because she's caught between
11:55
S2: saying what she thinks and what her supporters want her
11:58
S2: to say.
11:58
S1: But it seemed to me like she really was trying
12:00
S1: to muddy the waters. And that's what some some actors
12:02
S1: in this debate do and try to make out that
12:04
S1: late term abortion is a prevalent practice in Australia and
12:08
S1: that it's some sort of barbaric practice, when in fact,
12:10
S1: it's a you know, it's a it's a medical event
12:13
S1: that is treated with enormous sensitivity and the highest sort
12:16
S1: of ethical constraints by both the doctors, not to mention
12:18
S1: the women whose bodies are at stake. I just seem
12:22
S1: to me like she was trying to have a bob
12:23
S1: each way. As you say, she's never going to actually
12:25
S1: attack abortion rights in any real sense, but she's trying
12:28
S1: to sort of almost set up a straw man and say, well,
12:30
S1: there are people having abortions, women having abortions a day
12:33
S1: before the due date. And that's absolutely abhorrent. I mean,
12:35
S1: who wouldn't agree with that?
12:37
S2: Yeah, of course, but this is the other thing. Jack's
12:39
S2: like all throughout the speech, there were there are examples
12:42
S2: of her saying things that aren't actually true, or that
12:46
S2: don't have a source or that aren't factually accurate. So,
12:49
S2: for example, Hansen said that there are 18000 people on
12:53
S2: an ASIO watch list, and of them, about 200 of
12:57
S2: them are sort of high risk or really severe risk.
13:01
S2: I went and checked with various security agencies yesterday. There's
13:05
S2: no watch list. There's literally not a watch list. There
13:08
S2: is no source for that information.
13:11
S1: It's just no, it was complete misinformation. The other sort
13:14
S1: of area that she talked about a lot obviously, was
13:16
S1: Muslim migration and Muslim. She sort of she doesn't seem
13:20
S1: to accept that that Islam is actually a religion. She
13:24
S1: doesn't seem to observe that there is any distinction between
13:28
S1: what she calls radical Islam or extreme Islam and the Muslim,
13:31
S1: you know, the Muslim religion, which is peaceable and followed
13:35
S1: by billions of peaceful, upstanding people around the world. Um,
13:39
S1: I mean, what do you make of those comments?
13:43
S2: Well, I tried to draw out yesterday, Jackie, 30 years ago. Um,
13:47
S2: Miss Hansen said that Australia was in danger of being
13:49
S2: swamped by Asians. Yeah. Which she has since sort of
13:52
S2: kind of apologized for, but not really. But some of
13:56
S2: my supporters are now Asians. Like it's don't even go there. Um,
14:00
S2: I asked her, is Australia being in danger of being
14:03
S2: swamped by Muslim immigration? And she immediately said, oh, well,
14:07
S2: you know, not if I have anything to do about it.
14:09
S2: And then went on to say how Muslims, you know, so-called,
14:14
S2: you know, don't integrate in Australia to the extent that
14:16
S2: they should be doing so that they're, you know, they're
14:19
S2: sort of cultural values are distinct or contradictory to our own.
14:23
S2: Those sorts of things. Like it wasn't it wasn't a
14:26
S2: convincing answer. Jackie. It was a vibe. And that's so
14:29
S2: much of what Hanson runs on is the vibe, you know?
14:32
S1: Yeah. And she sort of she talked about Bondi in
14:35
S1: the context of Muslim immigration. So I mean, that's another example,
14:38
S1: I think of a straw man argument because she, um,
14:40
S1: she said, you know that she gets very, very, obviously
14:43
S1: very head up and very emotional. She talks in very
14:45
S1: extreme language. And she said that, you know, Islamic extremism,
14:48
S1: extremism is utterly at odds with Australian values. Well, I
14:51
S1: think that's a statement that 99.99% of Australians would agree with,
14:56
S1: including most Muslim Australians. Just one more thing. She also
15:00
S1: made some very extraordinary comments. I thought about some of
15:03
S1: our closest allies talking about Canada, France, Germany and England.
15:08
S1: At least some of whom we've fought alongside in two
15:11
S1: major world wars. And what did she what did she
15:13
S1: call them?
15:14
S2: She called them assholes. She, um again, this is in
15:17
S2: response to that question I'd asked her. She kind of said, oh,
15:20
S2: I can't say it. Oh, they're assholes. Now, that to
15:23
S2: me was channeling Donald Trump back in 2018 when he
15:27
S2: was talking about, you know, so-called shithole countries where he
15:30
S2: didn't want immigrants to be coming from to move to
15:33
S2: the United States. In that case, he was talking about
15:36
S2: mostly African nations. I think she was kind of quite
15:39
S2: deliberately tapping the vibe of Trump, which is that, you know,
15:43
S2: the sort of traditional allies of Australia and of the US,
15:47
S2: you know, they're essentially failed or failing states that that
15:51
S2: they're sort of leading now and that we can't rely
15:53
S2: on them and that they've been overtaken by, you know,
15:57
S2: swarms of Muslims. And again, obviously, I'm not saying I
16:00
S2: believe that myself and that they're broken societies, you know,
16:04
S2: and I think.
16:05
S1: Because of because of untrammelled immigration, basically.
16:08
S2: Yeah. And there'd be a cohort of her support, a
16:11
S2: significant chunk of her support who would think, yeah, that's right.
16:14
S2: You know, these these once great countries are no longer, um,
16:19
S2: which is evocative, but it's not really true.
16:22
S1: No. And it's also an extraordinary thing for a political leader,
16:26
S1: an Australian political leader to say about our closest allies.
16:29
S1: Let's just put that out there. She also so she
16:32
S1: did pretty well. I thought in her speech it was
16:34
S1: very long afterwards. Of course, it goes over to questions
16:37
S1: and all of the the press gallery journalists get to
16:39
S1: ask questions. You ask the question, how did that go
16:42
S1: for her? She was less articulate. I thought, what did
16:45
S1: you think?
16:46
S2: Oh, look, I think there were a few questions where
16:48
S2: she just didn't know the answer and she kicked down,
16:50
S2: kicked the answer down the road. Um, to some extent,
16:53
S2: I think that's fine. I mean, I'd rather a politician
16:55
S2: say we haven't finished developing that policy or whatever, rather
16:58
S2: than bluffing and then going, oh, hang on. Actually trying
17:02
S2: to recount it, I thought the most difficult thing for me, Jax,
17:06
S2: was the way she spoke to Sarah Martin from The
17:09
S2: Guardian and Anna Henderson from the SBS. So Sarah's been
17:13
S2: doing some terrific work looking into the finances of One Nation,
17:16
S2: where the funds get raised, where the money gets channelled,
17:20
S2: those sorts of things. And her question was completely reasonable.
17:23
S2: Pauline Hanson's daughter, Lee Hanson, ran in the Senate last
17:26
S2: term in Tassie for One Nation. She's running again for
17:29
S2: the Tassie Senate seat. This time she lives in Tasmania.
17:32
S2: She's employed by a New South Wales senator. She's rarely
17:35
S2: seen in Parliament House. basically. Sarah said, well, did you
17:38
S2: have a hand in her getting hired and why is
17:40
S2: she in Tassie working for a New South Wales senator?
17:42
S1: The sort of query being that because she's working for
17:44
S1: a New South Wales senator, her salary is covered by
17:48
S1: the New South Wales taxpayer. However, the allegation or the
17:52
S1: implication is that she's just not doing the job so much.
17:55
S1: She's using the taxpayer salary to campaign for her own
17:58
S1: campaign in Tasmania, which should be covered by the party.
18:02
S2: Yeah, yeah, that's that's exactly right. And that's how Sarah
18:05
S2: framed the question. And instead of answering it, Miss Hanson
18:08
S2: basically told Sarah she was a trashy journalist.
18:11
S3: You never give up. I've never seen a person that's
18:14
S3: such a trashy journalist, you know, and what you put
18:19
S3: out all the time, you've got this obsession with constantly
18:22
S3: trying to pull down myself, my party or Mrs. Rinehart.
18:25
S3: Whatever you do, you will be banned from my answering.
18:29
S3: I'll answer you this question today, but I'm telling you now,
18:32
S3: don't come near me.
18:33
S2: It was a real kind of, um.
18:36
S1: Johansen moment she tore strips off her. I thought I
18:39
S1: thought it was extraordinary, I absolutely thought Sarah Martin has
18:43
S1: got nerves of steel. I thought she was amazing to
18:46
S1: withstand that barrage in not just amongst her peers, but
18:51
S1: under the eyes of the nation, because it's being televised
18:53
S1: to a national audience. I thought the level of incivility
18:57
S1: and nastiness was quite extraordinary to see in our press club, which,
19:01
S1: as I say, is a place of civil debate, to
19:03
S1: which Pauline Hanson was invited as an honoured guest and
19:07
S1: to her very hosts, the members of that club, the press.
19:10
S1: She was terribly rude. It wasn't just Sarah Martin that
19:13
S1: she tore strips off. It was also Anna Henderson of SBS.
19:17
S1: She told Anna Henderson that she'd be out of a
19:19
S1: job because she was going to axe SBS if she
19:21
S1: was ever in power. I certainly I just think it's
19:25
S1: worth calling out. It's worth noting that if, you know,
19:29
S1: we have. In the United States under President Trump, a
19:33
S1: culture of denigrating journalists, of humiliating, particularly female journalists in
19:37
S1: press conference situations. And that, to me was a straight
19:41
S1: import of that. And I this is editorializing now. I
19:45
S1: think it's awful. I think it's nasty. I think it's
19:47
S1: so pernicious on our public debate. And I just really,
19:51
S1: really wanted to note it because I haven't seen it
19:53
S1: really noted strongly enough anywhere yet.
19:55
S2: No, I look, I haven't seen anything like that at
19:57
S2: the Press Club. And, you know, I mean, like, you jackass,
20:00
S2: I've been doing this for about 20 years. Um, it's
20:02
S2: a nadir, there's no question. And it's also and let's
20:06
S2: not forget this. Partly it's why it happened. It's catnip
20:09
S2: for Pauline Hanson's supporters. They'd love to. At least some
20:12
S2: of them love to see her taking on the journos, because,
20:15
S2: you know, we are as a profession, as an industry,
20:19
S2: you know, not always respected or loved or trusted. Certainly
20:23
S2: not to the extent that we were, let's say, 20
20:25
S2: years ago. You know, there's been a as we've discussed previously,
20:28
S2: sort of a collapse in the agreed set of facts
20:32
S2: that we base our arguments and public debates over. Those
20:37
S2: sorts of attacks on journalists undermine that public debate has
20:40
S2: already been undermined. Hansen. You're absolutely right. What she did
20:44
S2: was of a piece with what Donald Trump does, and
20:47
S2: I just think it's corrosive to democracy and it's unnecessary.
20:50
S1: I just I just think we as journalists, we have
20:53
S1: a duty, a particular onus on us to, to kind
20:55
S1: of call it out. It's not the first time that
20:57
S1: we've seen this from one from Pauline Hanson herself from
21:00
S1: from One Nation representatives. We had a One Nation representative
21:03
S1: tell a female journalist to shut up not so long ago. And, um,
21:06
S1: Pauline Hanson herself called a female journalist a bitch, I think. Um,
21:10
S1: so I just really, really questioned whether or not we
21:13
S1: want to, we want to sort of tolerate and not
21:16
S1: call out that sort of level of incivility in our,
21:19
S1: in our political forums.
21:20
S2: Absolutely. Jax. But there'll be people listening to this now saying, oh,
21:23
S2: listen to those journos whinge about other journos being attacked.
21:27
S2: They can dish it out, but they can't take it.
21:29
S2: They deserve scrutiny too. Like we're in a different moment
21:32
S2: and we have to recognize that. And that in no
21:35
S2: way is me saying, oh, well, therefore it's fine for
21:38
S2: what the senator did yesterday. Of course it's not. But, um,
21:42
S2: you know.
21:42
S1: I guess it's just a sort of, um, there's a
21:45
S1: sense of there should be a sense of shared values
21:47
S1: in the sense that we, um, we disagree robustly, but
21:50
S1: always with civility. That doesn't always happen. But to me
21:52
S1: that was a real line that was breached yesterday. James
21:55
S1: I want to move on. And just quickly because the
21:58
S1: PM this week did on Thursday announced changes or sort
22:01
S1: of a back down to to his proposed capital gains
22:03
S1: tax reforms, which they obviously announced in the budget. The
22:08
S1: main one was that basically, they're going to raise the
22:13
S1: ceiling for small businesses who can have an exemption from
22:17
S1: the CGT. And so we'll still be able to claim
22:19
S1: the 50% CGT discount at the moment. Previously that's been
22:23
S1: a sort of businesses with a turnover of 2 million.
22:26
S1: He's going to raise that right up to 10 million
22:27
S1: which is quite a big raise. So they will be
22:30
S1: exempt from the changes and be able to operate under
22:33
S1: the old system. That will apparently affect about 2.7 million businesses,
22:38
S1: according to his figures. And he also said that income
22:42
S1: from discretionary testamentary trust will be exempt from the CGT changes.
22:46
S1: So their trusts, at about 10,000 people in Australia have
22:50
S1: that are usually set up within a will, essentially. James,
22:54
S1: how surprising are these back downs? Are they going to
22:56
S1: help how the budget goes down? Are they going to be,
22:58
S1: you know, are they going to placate some of the
23:00
S1: biggest critics of the budget?
23:03
S2: Oh, it will go part of the way to placating
23:05
S2: people who have criticised these budget measures. So Sky um
23:10
S2: cappuccio from the Council of Small Business of Australia, she
23:13
S2: was there was a two day inquiry this week, a
23:15
S2: Senate inquiry this week into these changes. She's the head
23:19
S2: of the Cosboa. She spoke at length during that hearing, jacki,
23:23
S2: about the need to go from 2 million to 10
23:27
S2: million in terms of that cap, she said. It hasn't
23:29
S2: moved in years. This is a huge problem. Many small
23:33
S2: business owners, you know, they don't necessarily pay themselves superannuation
23:37
S2: or they don't take a lot of leave or they
23:39
S2: underpay themselves a salary, certainly when they're getting underway, just
23:43
S2: essentially to keep the business solvent. And the payoff at
23:47
S2: the end of that is that, you know, at the
23:49
S2: age of 60 or 65, whatever it might be, when
23:51
S2: they choose to retire, they can sell that business. And
23:54
S2: they know that there is a tax, not a tax windfall,
23:58
S2: but it's a generous tax arrangements. Yeah. Concession. Thank you.
24:01
S2: That's the word I'm looking for that there's generous tax
24:03
S2: concessions that mean they will make a profit and then
24:05
S2: a little bit more. And that will set them up
24:07
S2: for retirement. They can go and buy a holiday home
24:09
S2: or put it in shares or whatever it is they're
24:11
S2: going to do. That was her number one issue during
24:14
S2: the hearings. So I think the Council of Small Business
24:16
S2: will be very pleased with that. As for the other
24:19
S2: CGT changes, I think they're the sort of minimum that
24:21
S2: we could have expected from the Albanese government. They won't
24:24
S2: placate all critics, but it goes some way towards ameliorating
24:29
S2: the complaints that have been made about the tax package.
24:32
S1: Okay. And the package has already passed the lower house,
24:35
S1: I think. And obviously it went into the Senate inquiry
24:37
S1: this week. So when is it likely to be passed
24:39
S1: and made into law.
24:42
S2: So the PM's been really clear about this. Their plan
24:45
S2: is that it will be passed in the next sitting fortnight,
24:47
S2: which starts next Monday, basically. It'll get through the Senate,
24:52
S2: presumably with the support of the Greens, perhaps David Pocock,
24:55
S2: perhaps Jacqui Lambie. It's not actually contentious whether or not
24:58
S2: it'll go through. Um, yeah.
25:00
S1: Okay. So like it or not, these changes are coming
25:03
S1: for you.
25:03
S2: I think the government's calculation there, Jacqui, and it's important
25:06
S2: to note is that they just want it passed. Then
25:09
S2: they want to start operating these laws. They want to
25:12
S2: sort of demonstrate that the world won't end or hasn't
25:15
S2: ended because of these changes. And the gamble is that
25:19
S2: by the time the next election rolls around in 2028,
25:22
S2: these will be long forgotten. And, you know, a few extra,
25:25
S2: you know, people will be able to buy a home,
25:27
S2: you know, youngsters, you know, first home buyers.
25:29
S1: Yeah. They'll be baked into the electoral pie. And Jim
25:31
S1: Chalmers can credibly claim that he's done some tax reform.
25:35
S1: We'll see how it goes. James thanks so much for
25:37
S1: being with us. It was a really interesting episode and
25:39
S1: particularly interesting to talk about Pauline. It was a it
25:42
S1: was a real watershed moment in Australian politics to have
25:44
S1: her at the Press Club. So it was interesting to
25:46
S1: dissect it with you. Thank you.
25:48
S2: Thanks, Jack. Good to be with you.
25:52
S1: You can read all of our political news on our websites,
25:55
S1: theage.com.au or smh.com.au. Today's episode was produced by Kai Wong
26:02
S1: with help from Debbie Harrington. Our executive producer is Tammy Mills,
26:06
S1: and our podcasts are overseen by Lisa Muxworthy and Tom McKendrick.
26:10
S1: Before you go, please follow Inside Politics and leave a
26:13
S1: review for us on Apple or Spotify. I'm Jacqueline Maley,
26:16
S1: thank you for listening.