Latest / Steve Price / Steve Price | 28 November

Transcript

Steve Price | 28 November · Steve Price

0:00
Speaker 1: Live. This is Steve Price. We're going to Friday Night's
0:08
Speaker 1: will a pack program tonight, including any updates that we
0:11
Speaker 1: might have from that horrendous disaster in Hong Kong. The
0:14
Speaker 1: deathtop continues to rise. It stands at ninety four, many
0:17
Speaker 1: people still missing. Fire investigators looking at all the likely
0:20
Speaker 1: causes like bamboo, scaffolding and plastic coverings. Truly horrendous story.
0:25
Speaker 1: Will keep you updated as we go through the evening.
0:27
Speaker 1: Coming up on the program, though another parliamentary year all
0:30
Speaker 1: but over, and twenty twenty five likely to go down
0:33
Speaker 1: as the year Labor and Anthony Albanezi entered their dominant period,
0:38
Speaker 1: a massive House of Rep's majority, a Green friendly Senate mainly,
0:42
Speaker 1: but what sort of Australia are they now actually running?
0:45
Speaker 1: Liberal Mary Aldred will Joemy in the studio shortly also tonight.
0:49
Speaker 1: In some breaking news this afternoon, Donald Trump, President Trump
0:53
Speaker 1: reacts to the shooting of those two National guardsmen. One
0:56
Speaker 1: of those has tragically died. He's announced a plan to
0:59
Speaker 1: permitly pause Third World migration into the United States. Will
1:04
Speaker 1: talk that as well. We'll have the fallout from Barnaby
1:07
Speaker 1: Joyce ditching the Nationals to sit now at least as
1:10
Speaker 1: an independent. That continues with Senior as today suggesting they're
1:14
Speaker 1: going to use the summer break to talk him out
1:16
Speaker 1: of it. Good luck trying to do that, Campbell Newman,
1:19
Speaker 1: join us and discuss the ramifications and just how unsafe
1:23
Speaker 1: and out of control is crime ridden Melbourne with its
1:27
Speaker 1: youth crime numbers through the roof Sky's John o' lee
1:30
Speaker 1: has been taking a look and even ambushed former Premier
1:34
Speaker 1: Daniel Andrews seeking an answer to his special which goes
1:38
Speaker 1: to air on Sunday night. We'll have a preview with
1:40
Speaker 1: johno coming up, but first, as all aop MP's all
1:45
Speaker 1: full of hubrious and bristling with confidence pumped up by
1:49
Speaker 1: their election victory and choker block numbers in Parliament head
1:53
Speaker 1: off for an inordinately long eight week break. I think
1:56
Speaker 1: a photograph published on the front page of The Australian
2:00
Speaker 1: this week tells us a lot it had disastrous climate
2:05
Speaker 1: change Minister Chris Bowen at the dispatch box and sitting
2:09
Speaker 1: there behind him front benches like Housing Minister Clare O'Neill,
2:12
Speaker 1: how's that housing plan going? Patanya Plibosec and a laughing
2:16
Speaker 1: elbow all cheering Bowen on as he defends that new
2:20
Speaker 1: part time job running negotiations for the UN and kop
2:24
Speaker 1: The ministers behind him thought he was hilarious, rolling back
2:28
Speaker 1: in their seats in hysterics. That picture, for me sums
2:32
Speaker 1: up where we are at as twenty twenty five comes
2:35
Speaker 1: to an end. We have a government incredibly happy with itself,
2:39
Speaker 1: stuck in the camera bubble of backslapping, while out there
2:42
Speaker 1: in the real world things are grim. For so many
2:45
Speaker 1: Australians have listened to Bowen defending his chaotic rollout of
2:50
Speaker 1: renewables this week.
2:51
Speaker 2: Perhaps it will be helpful to the opposition if I
2:54
Speaker 2: explain what a transition actually is. It's a gradual move
2:57
Speaker 2: towards worial energy happening in Australia. It's happening in Australia
3:03
Speaker 2: with October being the first month in Australian history that
3:06
Speaker 2: we've got fifty percent of our electricity from renewals.
3:09
Speaker 1: That's what a transition looks like. It takes time. Time
3:14
Speaker 1: and again. Bone was asked about that election promise made
3:17
Speaker 1: hundreds of times about two hundred and seventy five dollar
3:20
Speaker 1: cuts to power bills. Remember this during the campaign.
3:24
Speaker 2: Reducing power prices by two hundred and seventy five dollars.
3:26
Speaker 3: By twenty twenty five. Two hundred and seventy five dollars
3:29
Speaker 3: a year.
3:30
Speaker 4: One hundred and seventy five dollars a year will get.
3:33
Speaker 3: Power prices down by two hundred and seventy five dollars
3:36
Speaker 3: a year.
3:38
Speaker 1: Seriously, you just shake your head. The reality is, as
3:40
Speaker 1: certainly asked again in Parliament, power bills have never been
3:44
Speaker 1: higher for households or for business his years.
3:48
Speaker 5: Next Wednesday marks the four year anniversary of the day
3:51
Speaker 5: that the Prime Minister promised to reduce power prices by
3:55
Speaker 5: two hundred and seventy five dollars in twenty twenty five,
3:59
Speaker 5: a promise made almost one hundred times on the final
4:03
Speaker 5: sitting day of the year. Can the Prime Minister finally
4:07
Speaker 5: give a straight answer and just admit that he misled
4:11
Speaker 5: the Australian people.
4:14
Speaker 1: Well. At the same time, inflation started to take off
4:16
Speaker 1: again and the Canberra Christmas gift to all mortgage holders
4:19
Speaker 1: and business borrowers was, of course, the prospect of not
4:22
Speaker 1: only no early rate cut in twenty twenty six, but
4:26
Speaker 1: the possibility of a rate hike. Treasurer Charmers glibally batted
4:29
Speaker 1: that away when asked about inflation during the week.
4:33
Speaker 3: Obviously, what we want to see is lower inflation. We've
4:36
Speaker 3: got inflation down, We've made a lot of progress. That's
4:39
Speaker 3: given the Reserve Bank the confidence to cut interest rates
4:42
Speaker 3: three times this year.
4:45
Speaker 1: Well, look, yes, employment figures, unemployment figures are good. Labors
4:48
Speaker 1: managed to get low paid workers pay rises this year.
4:52
Speaker 1: But day after day, month after month this year I
4:55
Speaker 1: read a business collapses and a day doesn't pass without
4:58
Speaker 1: news of mass redundancies in banking, construction, the media, and
5:02
Speaker 1: especially in hospitality. Our shopping strips of peppered with boarded
5:07
Speaker 1: up shops and for leae signs all over them. Rents
5:10
Speaker 1: are through the roof for people wanting to rent. In
5:12
Speaker 1: our major capital cities and regionally, there's an open war
5:16
Speaker 1: on now between resident farmers and renewable developers wanting to
5:19
Speaker 1: ram transmission lines through farms, even if the owners want
5:24
Speaker 1: no bar of it. Work from home, especially among public servants,
5:27
Speaker 1: has hollowed out our once great CBDs and sent small
5:31
Speaker 1: retailers working there to the wall. In Victoria, the health
5:34
Speaker 1: systems crumbling, emergency departments are overrun. Police are now forced
5:38
Speaker 1: to combat crime by putting a ring fence around Melbourne
5:42
Speaker 1: and introducing special search powers to stop teenagers stabbing each
5:46
Speaker 1: other with machetes and innocent shoppers being bashed. Life's tough
5:50
Speaker 1: for many people. I see more and more homeless on
5:53
Speaker 1: our streets, and yet our government keeps the floodgates of
5:56
Speaker 1: immigration open that falsely pumps up their budget numbers with
6:00
Speaker 1: increased revenues from taxation. That picture for me some thing's up.
6:06
Speaker 1: Highly paid, protected species of politicians kidding themselves that everything
6:11
Speaker 1: will be all right, laughing at the questions about power bills,
6:15
Speaker 1: ignorant of the real world as they head off on
6:17
Speaker 1: their taxpayer funded two month break. I should stick that
6:21
Speaker 1: picture up on the wall and look at it right
6:23
Speaker 1: through Christmas. As I just mentioned, Parliament has wrapped up
6:31
Speaker 1: for the year and won't resume until February three next year.
6:34
Speaker 1: Joining me now in the studio as Liberal MP for
6:37
Speaker 1: the Gips and seat to Monash Mary Aldred, Mary Good,
6:40
Speaker 1: see you again.
6:41
Speaker 6: Great to be with you again, Steve.
6:42
Speaker 1: Am I being too tough on labor.
6:44
Speaker 7: Not at all that make you think that Australians have
6:47
Speaker 7: never had it better. And the reality is that there's
6:51
Speaker 7: a whole heap of families right across our country, right now,
6:53
Speaker 7: sitting at their kitchen table, staring at an energy bill
6:56
Speaker 7: stuck to their fridge, wondering how they're going to pay it.
6:59
Speaker 7: Mortgage Holders paying eighteen hundred dollars more a month thanks
7:02
Speaker 7: to this government, energy's gone up nearly forty percent, and
7:06
Speaker 7: as you say, regions like mine are bearing all of
7:09
Speaker 7: the burden of the renewables roll out and having none.
7:11
Speaker 6: Of the benefit.
7:12
Speaker 1: When you sit there watching that backslapping and laughing, I mean,
7:14
Speaker 1: I don't know what you made of that picture, but
7:16
Speaker 1: when I saw that in the Australian I think it
7:18
Speaker 1: was on Wednesday morning after question time on Tuesday, it
7:21
Speaker 1: made me feel ill. There's quite a few of the
7:26
Speaker 1: hubris is incredible now.
7:28
Speaker 6: It's amazing.
7:29
Speaker 7: There was high fiving and hugging and backslapping this morning.
7:32
Speaker 7: They brought us back in for thirty five minutes this
7:35
Speaker 7: morning in Parliament to pass two pieces of terrible legislation.
7:41
Speaker 7: And you might say that Chris Bowen and the PM
7:45
Speaker 7: exceptionally pleased with the way they've turned out, but there
7:48
Speaker 7: just seems to be a complete lack of empathy, a
7:50
Speaker 7: complete divorce from the reality that many Australians are facing
7:55
Speaker 7: right now.
7:55
Speaker 1: There is a camaraderie between politicians. I mean we know that.
7:58
Speaker 1: I mean plenty of people who've had mates on either side.
8:03
Speaker 1: Is it harder when one side had such an advantage
8:07
Speaker 1: and continually during question time ram it down the opposition throat?
8:12
Speaker 1: Does that make things difficult in the House.
8:15
Speaker 7: I've been in the building for six months, Steve and
8:17
Speaker 7: I went in with a really deliberate attitude of throwing
8:21
Speaker 7: out respect and courtesy to everybody right across the chamber
8:24
Speaker 7: on the other side. Nine and a half times out
8:26
Speaker 7: of ten, outside of that chamber.
8:28
Speaker 6: You get it back.
8:28
Speaker 7: You've got to work on committees and there's other opportunities
8:31
Speaker 7: as well. But the hubris, the lack of respect, the
8:34
Speaker 7: talking over the top, the backslapping, the cat calling, and
8:37
Speaker 7: it's all on that side, Predominantly on our side, we're
8:40
Speaker 7: pretty respectful.
8:41
Speaker 6: I mean, there's.
8:42
Speaker 7: Sometimes one line is to get your point across, but
8:45
Speaker 7: we listen in respect and courtesy and none of that
8:48
Speaker 7: is delivered back from this government. They are just so
8:51
Speaker 7: high on their own hubris. It's unbelievable.
8:54
Speaker 1: You ran in the opposition, ran a number of questions
8:57
Speaker 1: in question time this week, using real life exit samples
9:00
Speaker 1: of what power builds are doing to people and how
9:03
Speaker 1: percentage of increases year on year. He didn't get a
9:07
Speaker 1: straight answer back at all from anyone on the other side,
9:10
Speaker 1: particularly Bowen. Are they afraid to talk about the reality
9:16
Speaker 1: of power builds. I mean they're trying to dodge it,
9:18
Speaker 1: but they can't. Surely it was a promise made one
9:21
Speaker 1: hundred times two hundred and seventy five dollar cut and
9:23
Speaker 1: everyone's bill's gone up.
9:25
Speaker 6: They're really flat footed.
9:26
Speaker 7: I mean Chris Bowen, who part time minister with his
9:29
Speaker 7: new presidency role, but he is really flat footed on
9:32
Speaker 7: those questions because he's been promising for years and years
9:35
Speaker 7: that you know, all of these renewable answers, they're all free,
9:39
Speaker 7: everybody's going to be part of the transition and benefiting.
9:43
Speaker 6: But the reality is they're not. Omissions are flat lined.
9:46
Speaker 7: I mean the Coalition when we were in government were
9:48
Speaker 7: able to reduce emissions by twenty eight percent on two
9:51
Speaker 7: thousand and five levels and grow the economy. They flat
9:54
Speaker 7: lined at that amount. While I've thrown seventy five billion
9:57
Speaker 7: dollars at it. Power price are going up. I've got
10:01
Speaker 7: food manufacturing businesses in my electric that are really struggling,
10:04
Speaker 7: and you know what's going to happen if they can't
10:06
Speaker 7: keep their head above water, those jobs will go overseas.
10:10
Speaker 1: The Environment Bill that passed, and I don't think it
10:13
Speaker 1: finally got the tick of approval today. If you hold
10:16
Speaker 1: a regional seat, what impact have you had a chance
10:20
Speaker 1: to read through it? And then it's a massive.
10:21
Speaker 6: Piece of fifteen hundred paper bill.
10:23
Speaker 1: What impact might it have on your constituents?
10:26
Speaker 5: Do you think?
10:27
Speaker 1: Well?
10:27
Speaker 7: I think you've just got to look at the friends
10:29
Speaker 7: that this bill's got, like the Environment Victoria, Environment Australia,
10:35
Speaker 7: the Australian Conservation Foundation, to see how bad it is.
10:39
Speaker 7: I'm particularly of all of the things that I'm really
10:41
Speaker 7: concerned about. I'm particularly worried about our timber industry in Victoria.
10:45
Speaker 7: The state government, particularly Lily Down Brosio, have nearly killed
10:49
Speaker 7: off the timber industry through closing down.
10:51
Speaker 6: The native hardwood sector.
10:54
Speaker 7: She's almost the Minister for third world forestry because we're
10:57
Speaker 7: now importing a lot of that timber because people still
11:00
Speaker 7: on the products.
11:00
Speaker 1: But we're going to build houses unique timber and it's.
11:03
Speaker 6: The ultimate renewable source.
11:04
Speaker 7: But we're just seeing you know, trees being cut down
11:08
Speaker 7: in rainforests overseas with a rangutangs still attached to them,
11:11
Speaker 7: or we're bringing in logs from Tasmania, putting them on
11:14
Speaker 7: a truck at the port in Melbourne, taking them to Gippsland,
11:18
Speaker 7: manufacturing them there and putting them back on a truck
11:22
Speaker 7: back to Melbourne. What this bill is going to do is,
11:25
Speaker 7: instead of sensibly reforming the state managed regional forestry agreements,
11:29
Speaker 7: it's going to pull all of those agreements into this legislation,
11:33
Speaker 7: which will hamstring it and wrap it around red and
11:36
Speaker 7: green tape. I'm seriously worried about timber workers and regional communities,
11:40
Speaker 7: particularly in my electric well.
11:42
Speaker 1: The Bowen Plan doesn't seem to have any problem putting
11:46
Speaker 1: massive transmission tails through the mid of state forests.
11:48
Speaker 7: Oh, it's quite happy to criss cross a whole heap
11:51
Speaker 7: of transmission tailers through prime agricultural farmland. What I'm concerned about, though,
11:57
Speaker 7: is things like new gas projects. It's going to put
11:59
Speaker 7: those in slow approvals laying instead of fast tracking them.
12:03
Speaker 6: Now. That will put the cost of energy up.
12:05
Speaker 7: It will make the cost of construction at the price
12:10
Speaker 7: of it go up. It will take longer, so fewer jobs,
12:13
Speaker 7: higher costs and longer project times.
12:17
Speaker 1: You almost got the perfect storm when you're see because
12:19
Speaker 1: as you said, you've got food manufacturing, you've got the
12:21
Speaker 1: forest industry, you've got gas, and you've got coal.
12:25
Speaker 7: Yeah, and where a food bowl where Australia relies on
12:28
Speaker 7: us to grow dairy, food, horticulture, a whole lot of
12:32
Speaker 7: those things.
12:32
Speaker 6: Because we've got the best soil anywhere.
12:34
Speaker 7: So why would you choose to dump a whole heap
12:36
Speaker 7: of renewable projects there?
12:38
Speaker 6: Really worried about our timber sector.
12:40
Speaker 7: We've also got we had four we've now got three
12:43
Speaker 7: coal fired power stations. Your lawn alone contributes up to
12:47
Speaker 7: twenty two percent of Victoria's baseload electricity. Now that's due
12:51
Speaker 7: to shut in a couple of years time. I want
12:53
Speaker 7: to give a shout out to all the people that
12:55
Speaker 7: work there.
12:55
Speaker 6: I represent a.
12:56
Speaker 7: Number of them, but we don't have any serious plan
12:59
Speaker 7: to implement that energy right now.
13:01
Speaker 1: Just before you go, Jess Wilson, the new leader. You're
13:03
Speaker 1: a senior Liberal, you're a Victorian, and you're a woman.
13:07
Speaker 1: How's she going?
13:08
Speaker 7: She has a great plan to get Victoria back on track.
13:12
Speaker 7: She's going to focus on the economic mess. She's got
13:14
Speaker 7: the skills, the credibility, She's thought deeply about the serious
13:18
Speaker 7: problems that we've got and I think she's going to
13:21
Speaker 7: make a great premier.
13:22
Speaker 1: Mary, thanks for coming in again. Appreciate you have a
13:23
Speaker 1: good parliamentary break.
13:25
Speaker 6: Thank you.
13:25
Speaker 1: Mary. Aldred there joining me now our Friday regular former
13:27
Speaker 1: Queensland Premier Campbell Newman Campbell, great to see you. I
13:31
Speaker 1: want to talk about Barnaby Joyce. I think he's been
13:34
Speaker 1: talked about a lot over the last twenty four hours.
13:36
Speaker 1: He hasn't said yet that he's going to go to
13:38
Speaker 1: One Nation, but he's going to lead the Nationals. Do
13:42
Speaker 1: you think he probably will put his hand up for
13:44
Speaker 1: a New South Wales Senate seat for One Nation? That
13:47
Speaker 1: looks likely, doesn't it, Steve? Who knows?
13:52
Speaker 8: I'd say at the moment he is engaging in a
13:55
Speaker 8: fair bit of careful calculations as to whether his prospects
14:01
Speaker 8: are boosted by being with One Nation or brand. Barnaby
14:04
Speaker 8: Joyce is enough to carry the day with disgruntled Coalition
14:10
Speaker 8: voters across New South Wales, so I think he's going
14:12
Speaker 8: to think long and.
14:13
Speaker 1: Hard about it.
14:15
Speaker 8: It has been a bit of a political strip to
14:17
Speaker 8: his hope. Hasn't it made? It's sort of the dance
14:20
Speaker 8: of a thousand vales. Isn't that what Someone had this
14:24
Speaker 8: sort of thing once before?
14:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, it has. But he's such a great retail politician.
14:29
Speaker 1: I mean, really, the Coalition should be doing everything that
14:32
Speaker 1: convince him to stay. I mean, clearly he doesn't get
14:35
Speaker 1: on with David Little Proud. I think he probably in
14:38
Speaker 1: the end when he threatened to quit, he was hoping
14:40
Speaker 1: maybe there'd be another leadership spill in the NATS and
14:42
Speaker 1: Little Proud and get rolled. Matt Canavan is working hard
14:46
Speaker 1: to try and keep him there. I mean you can't.
14:48
Speaker 1: I mean, whatever you em think about Barnaby, he's a
14:51
Speaker 1: human headline. Yes, but he's a very good retail politician
14:55
Speaker 1: and he has got a lot of good things done
14:57
Speaker 1: in his thirty years in parliament. He certainly has.
15:02
Speaker 8: And I think that the trouble is a lot of
15:05
Speaker 8: personalities have got in the way of this one and
15:08
Speaker 8: he should have been employed in some way in a
15:12
Speaker 8: job on the effectively on the front bench, doing good
15:18
Speaker 8: work for the Coalition in regional Australia. I mean, that's
15:21
Speaker 8: the practical way to have retained him. But I think
15:25
Speaker 8: I think you've seen mad has progressed far too far
15:29
Speaker 8: to be reclined to be very surprised, and that he
15:31
Speaker 8: looks like he's crossed the rubicon for sure.
15:33
Speaker 9: Mate.
15:35
Speaker 1: I saw David Chris fully talking this morning the Queensland
15:38
Speaker 1: Premiery about this by election that's taking place in the
15:42
Speaker 1: Queensland seat of Hinchinbrook. That's on Saturday. That's when Kata's
15:46
Speaker 1: Australian Party member. I think Nick Demetto he's gone up
15:50
Speaker 1: to become the mayor of Townsville. What's what's the numbers
15:54
Speaker 1: like there on in that that seat? Who's going to
15:57
Speaker 1: win it? Well, very quickly?
16:01
Speaker 8: Just for viewers from interstate, this is an era from
16:03
Speaker 8: the northern suburbs of Townsville right up to some great
16:07
Speaker 8: country through Ingham to Tully, a great part of Australia
16:12
Speaker 8: and Queensland, and of course Christoph Faley's hometown is Ingham. Look,
16:16
Speaker 8: the KAP took this seat last time with the matter
16:20
Speaker 8: with the primary of about forty six percent and the
16:24
Speaker 8: LNP on he got twenty eight. So yeah, I don't
16:27
Speaker 8: think the len P have got any hope of getting
16:30
Speaker 8: the seat. What it's all about is how well there
16:34
Speaker 8: or otherwise the LNP do. It's the usual thing. If
16:36
Speaker 8: the lnp's primary vote goes down, if they don't do
16:40
Speaker 8: as well as the last election, everyone will be saying
16:42
Speaker 8: that it's you know, it's a reflection on the government,
16:45
Speaker 8: repudiation of the Premiere. I don't think they can do
16:48
Speaker 8: much worse with the primary.
16:49
Speaker 3: Of twenty eight.
16:50
Speaker 8: The candidate for KAP this time is a very strong candidate,
16:56
Speaker 8: former Deputy Mayor Malaccino, and I just think he's going
17:02
Speaker 8: to clean up. That's my prediction. But I don't think
17:06
Speaker 8: the LNP could go back from a primary of twenty eight.
17:10
Speaker 1: Speaking of the Premiery, he is taking a swipe at
17:12
Speaker 1: the and I was just talking to Mary Aldred about this.
17:14
Speaker 1: The federal government's environmental law reforms which they passed green
17:19
Speaker 1: sticked it off in the Senate. Here's what the Queensland
17:22
Speaker 1: Premier had to say this morning.
17:24
Speaker 4: It's effectively rolling out the green carpet to enable people
17:29
Speaker 4: to kill projects, not by saying no, but by delaying.
17:32
Speaker 4: And it's not just agriculture, it's even in the way
17:35
Speaker 4: that we will do roads and buildings and mining and tourism.
17:41
Speaker 4: It's just another layer of green tape designed to strangle
17:44
Speaker 4: people who want to have a go and try and
17:47
Speaker 4: create opportunities, and we're just not comfortable with it.
17:51
Speaker 1: I don't know if you agree with that. I mean,
17:52
Speaker 1: because the federal government, if you listen to the way
17:54
Speaker 1: they explain what this bill is going to do, that's
17:56
Speaker 1: exact opposite. Is Chris A. Fahlly right, Christ of Fall
18:01
Speaker 1: is one hundred percent right.
18:02
Speaker 8: And I'm not sure if the federal government being deliberately
18:07
Speaker 8: dishonest about it or totally delusional. This is really really
18:11
Speaker 8: bad news. The premiere is right in terms of what
18:13
Speaker 8: it will do to coal and gas projects, for example,
18:18
Speaker 8: but the inconsistencies in this just breathtaking. I mean, you know,
18:24
Speaker 8: you've got a restriction on logging of native forests that
18:27
Speaker 8: the commentators are saying, we'll see an end to logging
18:30
Speaker 8: of native forests, but it's okay for renewables projects, say
18:35
Speaker 8: in Queensland, to blast the tops off mountains and clear widespread,
18:41
Speaker 8: large areas of forest that are essentially wilderness areas. I mean,
18:45
Speaker 8: it's just insane, Steve, and just so logically inconsistent. I mean,
18:51
Speaker 8: and you know, for a government that will be under
18:53
Speaker 8: increasing pressure on energy prices, the idea that they'd make
18:57
Speaker 8: it even harder to get gas out of the ground.
19:00
Speaker 8: It's just crazy. I mean, you're talking about Hubris before
19:03
Speaker 8: on your previous interview. We are seeing it now. All
19:06
Speaker 8: the ingredients are there for this government to come a
19:09
Speaker 8: real cropper. The Liberal and National parties won't be in
19:14
Speaker 8: disarrayed forever. They will sort it out, and if they
19:18
Speaker 8: get their act together by midnext year, there is so
19:20
Speaker 8: much ammunition to take the fight to Labor. It's not
19:24
Speaker 8: true this government have shot the country through the foot
19:28
Speaker 8: in the last few days, but for them, they've shot
19:31
Speaker 8: themselves in the foot as well.
19:32
Speaker 9: Mate.
19:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, I reckon, that's a great assessment, CAMPBELLI was good
19:35
Speaker 1: to catch up on a Friday. Thank you very much,
19:37
Speaker 1: my friend. I'll talk to you next week. Now, coming
19:39
Speaker 1: up after the break, we'll have a preview of a
19:41
Speaker 1: special investigation into Victoria's crime crisis one year out from
19:45
Speaker 1: the state election. That is going to be on Sunday
19:48
Speaker 1: night on Sky. We'll talk to John on Lee about
19:50
Speaker 1: that after the break. Welcome back, Thanks for joining us
19:56
Speaker 1: now this time next year almost exactly, actually, as i've Saturday,
20:00
Speaker 1: Victorians are going to have the chance to vote out
20:02
Speaker 1: a labor government drowning in debt, overseeing the worst teenage
20:06
Speaker 1: crime crisis in Australian history. It's truly appalling. It should
20:09
Speaker 1: be a no brainer for the opposition, but with three
20:12
Speaker 1: different leaders the Opposition have had in less than a
20:14
Speaker 1: year and in fighting on an industrial scale the bookies
20:18
Speaker 1: can you believe it? And I checked it today still
20:20
Speaker 1: have labor in front, which would mean sixteen years in
20:23
Speaker 1: Victoria of unbroken labor rule. Now on Sunday Skies National
20:28
Speaker 1: Affairs correspondent Jonathan Lee, he's running a special on Victoria's
20:32
Speaker 1: crime crisis. Here's a taste of what you're going to
20:35
Speaker 1: see on Sunday. Melbourne's CVDA is safe one year round
20:43
Speaker 1: from the Victorian election.
20:44
Speaker 10: They're angry, they're scared, They're worried about the safety of
20:47
Speaker 10: these suburbs here.
20:48
Speaker 1: With yelling about bashing me. We don't feel safe anymore.
20:52
Speaker 6: People are starting to think about how they defend themselves.
20:55
Speaker 1: How will a legacy of policy failures affect the people's vote.
20:59
Speaker 1: I've got him to say it all, how bad is
21:00
Speaker 1: crime in this state if you can't talk about it?
21:02
Speaker 1: Out of control? The Victoria's crime crisis Sunday, seven point
21:06
Speaker 1: thirty pm. Jonathan Jones just doesn't seem that Daniel Andrews
21:12
Speaker 1: was all that happy to see you, johno.
21:14
Speaker 11: Oh good evening. Friends come and go it enemies accumulate.
21:19
Speaker 1: He wasn't very conversational. He didn't want to talk about it.
21:23
Speaker 11: No, he didn't want to talk about it, and just
21:25
Speaker 11: cinder Allen. The Premier also didn't want to talk about
21:28
Speaker 11: whether she had been given instructions or was consulting Dan
21:30
Speaker 11: Andrews about the new legislation which she's proposed for Victoria.
21:35
Speaker 11: Some credit perhaps needs to go to the state government
21:39
Speaker 11: for recognizing there was a crime crisis and now attempting
21:42
Speaker 11: to move swiftly. But the real question here is why
21:45
Speaker 11: has it taken the better part of two years. How
21:47
Speaker 11: many home invasions, carjackings, homicides and murders does the state
21:51
Speaker 11: need to see before everyone starts to realize they have
21:53
Speaker 11: to act. I feel desperately sorry for the likes of you, Stephen,
21:57
Speaker 11: those in Victoria fathers who are out at nighttime patrolling
22:00
Speaker 11: their suburbs because they feel desperately unsafe. Taxi drivers telling
22:05
Speaker 11: me that they don't lock their cars anymore in their
22:07
Speaker 11: suburban suburbs because they get broken into anyway, it's easy
22:11
Speaker 11: to keep their cars unlocked. A university student who was
22:15
Speaker 11: just out getting his medicine from a chemist at about
22:19
Speaker 11: eight o'clock at night, I think it was, was beaten up,
22:22
Speaker 11: punched and then had a machete, he says, swung at
22:25
Speaker 11: his throat and nearly cut his arm off. It goes
22:28
Speaker 11: on and on, people breaking in the homes to steal
22:31
Speaker 11: car keys. When did it become the Australian way to
22:33
Speaker 11: have the discussion about where you leave your car keys
22:36
Speaker 11: so that the home invaders know where to take them
22:39
Speaker 11: and not attack you, your wife and your children. It's extraordinary.
22:42
Speaker 11: This conversation has been had in Queensland and it's now
22:44
Speaker 11: happening in Victoria. It's a very sad state of affairs.
22:47
Speaker 11: It's not to attack one side of politics or the other,
22:50
Speaker 11: but the opposition is equally inept here. We interviewed Brad Batten.
22:54
Speaker 11: Six days later he was gone and we sat down
22:55
Speaker 11: with Jess Wilson. So there's all sides of blame.
23:00
Speaker 1: You're normally based not in Victoria, and I am and
23:03
Speaker 1: myself and Peter who are Victorian based, and Andrew we
23:06
Speaker 1: talk about this issue of crime over and over again,
23:09
Speaker 1: and I'm so happy that Sky has now gone and
23:13
Speaker 1: done a deep dive on it. When you were talking
23:16
Speaker 1: to the victims, and when you were talking to the
23:17
Speaker 1: people running the state and talking to the people who
23:20
Speaker 1: in police, and I note the you talk to the
23:22
Speaker 1: former Chief Magistrate of Victoria. Could you get a sense
23:27
Speaker 1: of why is it happening so bad? Why is it
23:30
Speaker 1: so bad here compared to say New South Wales or
23:34
Speaker 1: even Queensland.
23:36
Speaker 11: Oh look my take on it. And what many people
23:38
Speaker 11: seem to think is the inept bail laws, the fact
23:40
Speaker 11: that you've got people out to break in bail forty
23:43
Speaker 11: and fifty times and reoffending, and you seem to get
23:46
Speaker 11: this escalation that when people break the rules once and
23:49
Speaker 11: they're not dealt with appropriately, or they remain in the community,
23:53
Speaker 11: they continue to break those rules, they become emboldened. We've
23:57
Speaker 11: got vision after vision of people breaking their homes or
24:01
Speaker 11: smashing their way into homes with machetes. Now we can
24:03
Speaker 11: call them a machete, but what it is really is
24:06
Speaker 11: effectively a meet along sword. You've got people in shopping
24:08
Speaker 11: centers having machete fights. It's outrageous. I couldn't believe how
24:14
Speaker 11: bad it was in Victoria. And people at home might
24:17
Speaker 11: be thinking do we watch it on the weekend or not?
24:19
Speaker 11: Please sit down and watch it. Melbourne is a beautiful city.
24:23
Speaker 11: It's not my hometown, but it is a beautiful city
24:26
Speaker 11: and it will deeply shock you what is happening down there.
24:30
Speaker 11: And you need to make sure this doesn't happen in
24:33
Speaker 11: your community. This is what's important.
24:36
Speaker 1: We just saw some vision there, John O of those
24:39
Speaker 1: machete bins huge costs foot outside police stations around metropolitan Melbourne,
24:45
Speaker 1: something in the regional Victoria. They're outside of police station
24:49
Speaker 1: with a CCTV camera aimed at them. What lunatic actually
24:54
Speaker 1: believes that some kid is going to wake up one
24:57
Speaker 1: day and go, oh, well, I did a home invasion
24:59
Speaker 1: last night. I used my machete. I might go and
25:01
Speaker 1: hand it in today. I mean seriously, yeah, I might
25:04
Speaker 1: just drop it off.
25:06
Speaker 11: Look, apparently they are having some success with people handing
25:09
Speaker 11: in weapons, and if that's the case, good luck to
25:12
Speaker 11: the authorities in doing it. It's incredible that people think
25:16
Speaker 11: that it's appropriate to have them, or that they can
25:17
Speaker 11: get away with having them. There's a whole discussion we
25:19
Speaker 11: need to have here, Steve, about how we discipline children.
25:23
Speaker 11: As one parent put us, this is a problem which
25:24
Speaker 11: has been coming for the better part of twenty or
25:26
Speaker 11: thirty years now. We've become exceptionally soft on crime and
25:30
Speaker 11: giving chance after chance to young children who are committing them.
25:34
Speaker 11: We need to come up with a better way to
25:36
Speaker 11: punish children and provide those rules and boundaries that the
25:39
Speaker 11: state can afford. If you're putting a child behind bars
25:42
Speaker 11: at the better part of two hundred thousand dollars a year,
25:45
Speaker 11: there's a significant disincentive for a state government to be
25:48
Speaker 11: doing that because it is so expensive. We need to
25:50
Speaker 11: find a way to reach these children to deal with
25:53
Speaker 11: their problems. Might be the fact they don't they have
25:55
Speaker 11: broken parents, might be the fact they don't have fathers.
25:58
Speaker 11: They've come from war torn nations. But we need to
26:00
Speaker 11: find a way to deal with discipline that is more
26:03
Speaker 11: affordable for a state. That's not something any state goverman
26:06
Speaker 11: is ready to have yet.
26:08
Speaker 1: I think I'm sure you were surprised. The age profile
26:12
Speaker 1: is extraordinary. We've got kids as young as ten to
26:14
Speaker 1: eleven years old with knives.
26:16
Speaker 11: And not just with knives, killing other kids with those knives.
26:22
Speaker 1: Unbelievable. I look forward to watching it, JOHNO, thank you
26:24
Speaker 1: very much for joining us tonight. Now make sure you
26:26
Speaker 1: check out John O's special out of Control Victoria's Crime Crisis.
26:30
Speaker 1: That's at seven thirty pm on Sunday night right here
26:34
Speaker 1: on Sky News Australia. Make sure you make an appointment
26:37
Speaker 1: to go and watch it with important viewing. Now after
26:40
Speaker 1: the break, Donald Trump, well he's announced plans. Can you
26:42
Speaker 1: believe this to pause Third World migration after those deadly
26:46
Speaker 1: shootings in Washington, DC. Will find out what that is.
26:50
Speaker 1: Plus we'll get the verdict on UK's labor budget, delivered
26:53
Speaker 1: this week to scathing criticism. So what does that mean
26:57
Speaker 1: for jobs, growth and productivity in the UK? Welcome back
27:06
Speaker 1: in breaking news. I'm sad to bring this for you.
27:08
Speaker 1: That at a tragic update on that horrific fire that
27:11
Speaker 1: ripped through Hong Kong yesterday. That death toll has now
27:14
Speaker 1: risen from ninety four to one hundred and twenty eight.
27:18
Speaker 1: Authority say of twenty three hundred firefighters have now been
27:22
Speaker 1: involved in the response. It's just one of the most
27:26
Speaker 1: horrendous things you've ever seen. I mean, and you can
27:29
Speaker 1: only imagine that death holl is going to go higher.
27:31
Speaker 1: There's still people missing, and where are those people who
27:33
Speaker 1: have actually survived. Where are they actually going to go
27:36
Speaker 1: now and live in one of the most crowded cities
27:39
Speaker 1: in the world. Talking about the global news, let's jump
27:42
Speaker 1: into some of the global news happening beyond our borders
27:45
Speaker 1: with the Skott News contributor Adrian Hayes joins us on
27:48
Speaker 1: a fortnightly basis. He's back in Dubai tonight. Adrian, welcome.
27:52
Speaker 1: I mean you've been to Hong Kong plenty of times.
27:54
Speaker 1: I've been there plenty of times myself. It's almost too
27:57
Speaker 1: painful to watch that vision, isn't it.
28:01
Speaker 10: Yeah, the ultimate nightmare of a fire in a massive
28:04
Speaker 10: tarer block caused largely by bamboo scaffolding. It is very sad,
28:08
Speaker 10: but of course that's you know, if you get a fire,
28:11
Speaker 10: that's what's going to sadly tragically happen in these very
28:14
Speaker 10: crowded tarbox.
28:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is, and you know the UK's dealt with
28:21
Speaker 1: it themselves. And I remember going past that building on
28:25
Speaker 1: a train just after it happened, and the damage there
28:29
Speaker 1: was extraordinary, and the world started talking about you know,
28:32
Speaker 1: what he can do about these sort of high rise
28:34
Speaker 1: tower fires. But let's turn our attention to Donald Trump.
28:37
Speaker 1: He's now come out today on Truth Social So it
28:40
Speaker 1: was late at night. He's down at Mara Lago. I
28:42
Speaker 1: think he's been playing golf. Today. We had the tragic
28:45
Speaker 1: death of the two of one of the two National
28:47
Speaker 1: Guards people. It was a woman outside in Washington who
28:51
Speaker 1: was gunned down. He's announced a migration from third world
28:54
Speaker 1: countries completely. Now he's going to stop it dead. How's
28:59
Speaker 1: he going to do this? I mean, I'm not quite
29:00
Speaker 1: sure what's the definition of a third world country? And
29:03
Speaker 1: how's he actually going to stop this?
29:06
Speaker 10: Yeah, I mean you raised one point. I mean, look,
29:07
Speaker 10: let's say some people will scream racism straight away. Some
29:11
Speaker 10: people will say it's a knee jerk reaction to a
29:14
Speaker 10: tragic against them, as you said, But there is this
29:16
Speaker 10: definition of what is a third world country and also
29:20
Speaker 10: what exact is a permanent pause. But on the other hand,
29:23
Speaker 10: he's like it all over them. I keep saying this,
29:25
Speaker 10: he's not prepared to take a bold and courageous decision.
29:28
Speaker 10: He's cut you know, a legal immigration, legal immigration into
29:32
Speaker 10: the US really down to near zero. And I think,
29:36
Speaker 10: look at one of the main roles of leaders to
29:39
Speaker 10: secure borders and the safety on the streets, and he's
29:42
Speaker 10: shown he's not prepared to to sort of chushion that
29:46
Speaker 10: in any way.
29:48
Speaker 1: Adrian, the first thing I thought of when it turned
29:51
Speaker 1: out that the gunman was out of Afghanistan came there
29:55
Speaker 1: after the collapse of Cabul and the and the chaotic
29:59
Speaker 1: American would draw or I just couldn't help myself going
30:02
Speaker 1: back to that vision of those aircraft taking off from
30:05
Speaker 1: the Bagram air Base with people hanging off the wings.
30:08
Speaker 1: The Americans under Biden and the way that they conducted
30:12
Speaker 1: themselves getting out of Afghanistan is a complete not a disaster,
30:15
Speaker 1: and some of that's now come back to haunt them.
30:19
Speaker 10: Yeah, it has, Steve, I mean it was it was
30:22
Speaker 10: an embarrassment, I mean reminiscence of Saigon nineteen seventy three.
30:27
Speaker 10: But look, it's unfortunate for Afghanis. I've been there quite
30:31
Speaker 10: a few times, by the way, but that's showing themselves
30:36
Speaker 10: in the UK, the number of sexual crimes by Afghanese
30:40
Speaker 10: by Somalians era tens is really is ten times what
30:44
Speaker 10: they are for other nations. So we have got a
30:46
Speaker 10: problem and I know some people will say, what about
30:48
Speaker 10: the human rights of these people? As I said just
30:51
Speaker 10: now that the human rights are the rights of citizens
30:54
Speaker 10: of any country, So it has to come parent before
30:58
Speaker 10: you start looking at the rights of those from the
31:01
Speaker 10: so called Third worlder coming to our shores illegally or legally.
31:06
Speaker 1: And you are having a very spirited debate, largely driven
31:08
Speaker 1: by Nigel Faraj in the UK, about who does come
31:12
Speaker 1: as a migrant. I mean, on one hand you've got
31:15
Speaker 1: a problem of illegal immigration and people flooding across the
31:18
Speaker 1: channel who shouldn't be allowed in. But on the other hand,
31:21
Speaker 1: you're still bringing migrants in from some of those countries,
31:23
Speaker 1: And we want to have the same debate in this country, argue,
31:26
Speaker 1: but we all get shouted at and we're told we're
31:28
Speaker 1: racist because we go, well, are we bringing the right
31:31
Speaker 1: people in from the right places to fit in with
31:34
Speaker 1: our society? What's wrong with having that debate?
31:37
Speaker 10: Yeah, Look, there's many good reasons for sustainable immigration. I'm
31:42
Speaker 10: not anti migration, nor are you sustainable though the right
31:46
Speaker 10: quality of people what the country needs, but also for
31:50
Speaker 10: economic reasons, for society reasons.
31:52
Speaker 1: For environment reasons.
31:53
Speaker 10: These are never sort of touched We have got forty
31:56
Speaker 10: six hours or so of come this year across the Channel,
31:58
Speaker 10: if I got my figures right. We don't know where
32:00
Speaker 10: these people have come from. Now, that is just one
32:03
Speaker 10: of the arguments. But also on our legal immigration, we've
32:06
Speaker 10: been running about nearly a million a year the size
32:09
Speaker 10: of two big cities in the UK. You just cannot
32:11
Speaker 10: sustain that for public services, for society, environment, As I
32:15
Speaker 10: just said, it's got to be a sensible debate.
32:17
Speaker 1: Thankfully the world is now debated.
32:19
Speaker 10: Politicians have ignored it for so long, but the pressure
32:22
Speaker 10: from people, I'm sure it's the same in Australia as
32:24
Speaker 10: is in the UK.
32:25
Speaker 1: They are needing to address the issues.
32:27
Speaker 10: So there's perhaps a positive in the negative atmosphere around
32:31
Speaker 10: this subject.
32:33
Speaker 1: I didn't think Sakis Starmer could get any worse, but
32:35
Speaker 1: his flagship pledged to grow the economy and raised living standards.
32:40
Speaker 1: He's delivered a budget that really doesn't look like it's
32:43
Speaker 1: going to boost productivity at all, and it's gone down
32:46
Speaker 1: like a bustard lemit, hasn't it.
32:49
Speaker 10: You're right scathing about this budget. Look, you know they
32:52
Speaker 10: pledged there wondn't be any tax risers. They've actually put
32:55
Speaker 10: up forty three tax rises in this last project.
32:58
Speaker 1: Now the problem the UK.
33:00
Speaker 10: He's got a problem, and it's the same with many
33:01
Speaker 10: Western countries. We are spending and living beyond our means.
33:06
Speaker 1: And you know, and I.
33:07
Speaker 10: Think it's not a right versus left argument about cutting
33:11
Speaker 10: public spending, about cutting debt, about cutting borrowing. It's a
33:15
Speaker 10: right versus wrong argument. And they don't get it because
33:19
Speaker 10: the government is so ideologically driven that they can't even
33:21
Speaker 10: bring themselves to cut anything that would limit that public
33:25
Speaker 10: spending purse. It's just gone well beyond control. And remember,
33:30
Speaker 10: governments don't have anybody. They only have the money that
33:32
Speaker 10: the public give them in taxes, and corporations given in taxes.
33:37
Speaker 1: Adrian, it sounds like you're describing Australia. They're good on
33:39
Speaker 1: your mate. I'll talk to you in a couple of
33:40
Speaker 1: weeks time. Adrian's insurance is there from Dubai that Hong
33:44
Speaker 1: Kong tower block, I said, one hundred and twenty. I
33:47
Speaker 1: just still can't, absolutely can't believe that that has happened,
33:51
Speaker 1: the number of people that have died, and we imagine
33:54
Speaker 1: sadly it's going to go up again. Now. I talked
33:56
Speaker 1: at start of the program about the cost of living
33:58
Speaker 1: crisis that many fit politicians seem to think doesn't exist.
34:02
Speaker 1: I mean, there they are in Canberra this week slapping
34:04
Speaker 1: each other on the back. Federal parliament's up, they're going
34:06
Speaker 1: to take eight weeks off now, they won't be back
34:09
Speaker 1: until February. But in Victoria, the Victorian government will, the
34:14
Speaker 1: parliament will, It'll sit into the first week of December,
34:17
Speaker 1: and I think on December nine the Premier to Cindra
34:20
Speaker 1: Allen has set aside another apology to Indigenous Victorians for
34:24
Speaker 1: the impact of colonial settlement. I'm not sure how many
34:28
Speaker 1: times this needs to happen. I mean, Daniel Andrews did it.
34:31
Speaker 1: Kevin rudda apologized in Canberra, as we know, and there's
34:36
Speaker 1: increasing anger about this. I mean, okay, we've got a treaty.
34:39
Speaker 1: We always knew it was going to be a problem.
34:41
Speaker 1: But why don't you do what we want you to do,
34:43
Speaker 1: fix up the pothold roads and stop this renewable craziness
34:47
Speaker 1: that's going on. Victorian Nationals leader Danny O'Brien joins us.
34:51
Speaker 1: He says Premier just Cina Allen's own seat of Bendigo
34:54
Speaker 1: East could be a target. Danny welcome, good to see
34:57
Speaker 1: you again. Good evening, Steve, and listen, have you got
35:02
Speaker 1: your candidate for Bendigo East yet?
35:05
Speaker 12: Not locked in yet, Steve, but we certainly will be
35:08
Speaker 12: having a red hot crack at the seat of Bendigo East,
35:10
Speaker 12: the Premier's own seat next year. We had a fantastic
35:14
Speaker 12: result with Andrew Letlin, our federal candidate at the federal
35:16
Speaker 12: election earlier this year, with a ten percent swing against
35:20
Speaker 12: the tide of what happened across the nation, and we
35:23
Speaker 12: think that the Nationals have got a really strong showing
35:25
Speaker 12: in a regional seat like Bendigo and absolutely we're keen
35:28
Speaker 12: to put the premier to the blowtorch.
35:31
Speaker 1: The margins what around fifteen.
35:34
Speaker 12: I rad about eleven I think for the premier and
35:36
Speaker 12: so it's a tough ass. There's no question to defeat
35:39
Speaker 12: someone who's been there, will have been there for twenty
35:41
Speaker 12: seven years, been premier for the last couple. But we
35:45
Speaker 12: think there's a mood for change right across regional Victoria
35:48
Speaker 12: and certainly in Bendigo. We saw that in the federal election.
35:51
Speaker 12: And Andrew Lethleyan was a great candidate there. We're certainly
35:54
Speaker 12: talking to him and we hope that he might have
35:56
Speaker 12: a future with our party as well, but we'll be
35:58
Speaker 12: certainly putting up a strong showing in the premier's own seat.
36:02
Speaker 1: Jasandra Allen, what does she delivered actually for Regional and
36:05
Speaker 1: Rural Victorian Committee since she came to power. I mean,
36:07
Speaker 1: Daniel Andrews tried to convince regional Victorians that he was
36:12
Speaker 1: in love with them and he was going to put
36:13
Speaker 1: the Comalth Games in all of these places Bendigo, Ballarat,
36:17
Speaker 1: Sheppard and et cetera, and then renegged and cost a
36:20
Speaker 1: fortune to get rid of the games, but not even
36:23
Speaker 1: staged them. The regional Victorians get sick and tired about
36:27
Speaker 1: this constant talk about all these massive infrastructure projects for
36:31
Speaker 1: Melbourne but nothing for the Bush.
36:35
Speaker 12: Absolutely, Steve, We've seen fifty billion dollars of blowouts on
36:39
Speaker 12: the big projects in Melbourne. And look, some of those
36:41
Speaker 12: projects needed to happen, some of the level crossings and
36:44
Speaker 12: the like worthy projects. But it's the mismanager management of
36:49
Speaker 12: them and the massive blowouts that we've seen that have
36:51
Speaker 12: added to our debt and to the cost of interest
36:54
Speaker 12: that we're all experiencing at the time when regional Victorians
36:57
Speaker 12: literally are driving around on goat track. So we've got
37:01
Speaker 12: terrible roads, we've got a housing crisis, we've got unaffordable housing.
37:05
Speaker 12: We literally heard this week that rental affordability is worse
37:09
Speaker 12: in regional Victoria than it is in Melbourne. We can't
37:11
Speaker 12: get an ambulus to turn up when it's needed. And
37:14
Speaker 12: we've got a big new emergency services tax for the
37:16
Speaker 12: pleasure of it, a new three billion dollar tax that
37:19
Speaker 12: is particularly going to hit farmers and regional Victorians. And
37:22
Speaker 12: that's an issue that people are angry about and certainly
37:26
Speaker 12: one that I think will be in front of mind
37:28
Speaker 12: when people head to the polls next year.
37:30
Speaker 1: I live part time in Melbourne, but I don't even
37:32
Speaker 1: know where the metro tunnel goes to or from, and
37:35
Speaker 1: whether I'll ever ever use it. I mean, it might
37:38
Speaker 1: be a wonderful, shiny new piece of infrastructure, but what
37:41
Speaker 1: exactly it doesn't do. I mean, it bypasses the old
37:45
Speaker 1: city loop. I understand that. But they built this massive, new,
37:49
Speaker 1: brand new station opposite the Shrine of Remembrance. Who gets
37:53
Speaker 1: on and off trains there?
37:55
Speaker 12: Well, there may well be people in Melbourne, but it's
37:57
Speaker 12: certainly not going to be a great benefit for regional
37:59
Speaker 12: Victoria and the Premier has tried to spend that a
38:01
Speaker 12: number of times, with both the Metro Tunnel, but also
38:05
Speaker 12: with the suburban railroop, which is you know, probably a
38:08
Speaker 12: minimum fifty billion dollar project. Even the government technologies, it's
38:11
Speaker 12: at least thirty four and a half billion dollars. These
38:14
Speaker 12: are big, big projects for the city that will rarely
38:17
Speaker 12: have much benefit for regional Victorians. And we're crying out
38:21
Speaker 12: for infrastructure investment, whether it's in our roads, whether it's
38:23
Speaker 12: in our hospitals. You know, we've had train line upgrades
38:26
Speaker 12: over the last ten years, mostly funded by the former
38:29
Speaker 12: coalition federal government, and they still haven't delivered additional services
38:32
Speaker 12: or benefits to us as yet. So these are some
38:35
Speaker 12: of the things that we're waiting to see actually benefits
38:37
Speaker 12: for us in regional Victoria because so much of the
38:39
Speaker 12: money has just been spent in Melbourne and nothing happening
38:42
Speaker 12: beyond the tran tracks.
38:44
Speaker 1: People with long memories like you and I Danny would
38:48
Speaker 1: warn the Premier. Perhaps you wouldn't, but someone or a
38:50
Speaker 1: warner that won. Jeff Kennett lost an election in Victoria
38:55
Speaker 1: when he was hugely popular, and he lost it because
38:57
Speaker 1: he ignored country people.
39:00
Speaker 12: And look, I was a journal like you at the time, Steve,
39:02
Speaker 12: and I remember it well interviewing some of the candidates
39:05
Speaker 12: in places regional seats in nine ninety nine. And absolutely
39:09
Speaker 12: it's an issue that the government should be aware of.
39:12
Speaker 12: There discontent in rural areas. I think there's growing discontent
39:17
Speaker 12: even in the regional cities over the lack of attention
39:20
Speaker 12: and also over the mismanagement. As I said, we're heading
39:24
Speaker 12: for twenty nine million dollars a day in interest payments
39:27
Speaker 12: under this government. Imagine what that can do for schools,
39:31
Speaker 12: for hospitals, for roads, for investment in police. Crime is
39:35
Speaker 12: just such a massive issue, not just restricted to masheti
39:38
Speaker 12: attacks and home invasions in Melbourne. These things are happening
39:41
Speaker 12: in regional towns in my electorate as well, and that's
39:44
Speaker 12: a real issue that we could be addressing if we
39:46
Speaker 12: weren't spending so much money on Labour's interest.
39:49
Speaker 1: Bill one hundred percent. Danny, good to catch up with you,
39:52
Speaker 1: have a good weekend. Thanks for joining us now after
39:53
Speaker 1: the break. No surprise here with former Prime Minister Malcolm
39:57
Speaker 1: Turnbull using the unveiling of his official portrait at Parliament
40:01
Speaker 1: House in cambera this week. What did he do? Of course,
40:03
Speaker 1: he had a crack at the party he once led.
40:06
Speaker 1: Plus what a bludge. One reports only one third of
40:09
Speaker 1: public servants are actually showing up to the office five
40:12
Speaker 1: days a week. Our Friday Night Panel after the break.
40:20
Speaker 1: Rondine coming up after me. Let's get into our Friday
40:22
Speaker 1: night panel. Research fellow at Institute of Public Affairs, Mere
40:25
Speaker 1: Schlipp joins us and scott News contributed Joe Hilda Ran.
40:28
Speaker 1: Great to see you both. I want to start with
40:31
Speaker 1: one of my favorite ex people, not for my liberal
40:34
Speaker 1: Prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull. He could never help himself, could
40:40
Speaker 1: He went up to Canberra and they unveiled a portrait.
40:42
Speaker 1: Because he's an ex prime minister. They hang him in
40:45
Speaker 1: a gallery there somewhere. I must say, you know, I
40:48
Speaker 1: quite like the artist, but I hate the painting and
40:50
Speaker 1: she didn't have much to work with, to be honest.
40:52
Speaker 1: But he had a crack at the party he once led.
40:55
Speaker 1: What a surprise from the miserable ghost. Have a look.
40:58
Speaker 9: There are a group of people there by now I
41:01
Speaker 9: think essentially majority who think the object of politics is
41:06
Speaker 9: to win the approval of a relatively narrow part of
41:10
Speaker 9: the What you might call the right wing media you
41:13
Speaker 9: know the sky and sky up the dark and you know,
41:16
Speaker 9: fellow travelers in social media and radio and so they're
41:21
Speaker 9: running on cultural war issues, on reality denial.
41:26
Speaker 7: You know that.
41:27
Speaker 1: It's like, it's really sad, Joe. This for a bloke
41:31
Speaker 1: who knife Tony Abbott. Abbitt won sixteen seats at the
41:35
Speaker 1: election that got him elected. Malcolm managed to lose all
41:38
Speaker 1: of them. Bar one hid in his house on the
41:41
Speaker 1: harbor on election night, didn't come out till about two
41:43
Speaker 1: in the morning. I know because I was on TV
41:45
Speaker 1: commentating on the election and he's talking about narrow paths.
41:49
Speaker 1: I mean, seriously, Malcolm Police, just shut up.
41:54
Speaker 13: Yeah.
41:54
Speaker 14: I think the turbol prime ministership was clearly one of
41:58
Speaker 14: the great what ifs of Australian political history, as in,
42:01
Speaker 14: what if he'd actually done something, what if he'd actually
42:04
Speaker 14: you know, come back with a new tax plan or
42:08
Speaker 14: a big bold reform. It seemed to just be a
42:10
Speaker 14: sort of a handful of sort of words in search
42:15
Speaker 14: of a meaning. In many ways, what was it? Continuity
42:18
Speaker 14: with change?
42:20
Speaker 1: It was even even.
42:22
Speaker 14: Satirized by the popular political satire Veep. So I think
42:28
Speaker 14: the problem for Malcolm is he hasn't been able to
42:30
Speaker 14: bend the Liberal Party to his will, nor was he
42:33
Speaker 14: able to show it that electorally his brand of moderate
42:38
Speaker 14: centrist politics, which I'm much much closer to myself. His
42:42
Speaker 14: analysis isn't wrong, but he had an opportunity to show
42:45
Speaker 14: how that could win, and unfortunately he squibbed it. And
42:49
Speaker 14: as is often the case with people who get brought
42:52
Speaker 14: down by themselves, they blame everybody but themselves for it.
42:57
Speaker 1: Me or I think he's partly to blame for the
43:00
Speaker 1: coalition becoming Labor light. I mean that's what he turned
43:04
Speaker 1: the coalition into. And you know, Tony Abbott had shown
43:08
Speaker 1: what a successful, committed politician with clear policies could do
43:12
Speaker 1: in winning all those seats. Malcolm then tried to turn
43:15
Speaker 1: them into a lighter version of the Labor Party, which
43:18
Speaker 1: was him. How we ever became a liberal prime ministers
43:21
Speaker 1: completely beyond me. But should he were some of the
43:25
Speaker 1: blamers to where the coalition is right now?
43:29
Speaker 6: Yeah?
43:29
Speaker 13: Absolutely, I think he needs to wear some of that blame.
43:32
Speaker 13: I mean, I actually thought this portrait was quite fitting
43:34
Speaker 13: because it was a lackluster portrait for a lackluster former
43:38
Speaker 13: prime minister. I thought the only way we could improve
43:40
Speaker 13: it was perhaps by painting the background a nice teal color.
43:43
Speaker 13: I think that probably would have been a bit more fitting.
43:46
Speaker 13: But I'm glad you brought up Tony Abbott because I
43:48
Speaker 13: think it shows a perfect example of you've got two
43:51
Speaker 13: sets of former prime ministers. You've got one former prime
43:54
Speaker 13: minister in Tony Abbot, who has spent his time committed
43:57
Speaker 13: to writing a proud history of Australia so that a
44:00
Speaker 13: legacy is left for Australians to celebrate this country. And
44:03
Speaker 13: that's what he's dedicated his time to.
44:05
Speaker 10: And then you've got a.
44:06
Speaker 13: Former prime minister in Malcolm Turnbull, who has spent the
44:09
Speaker 13: whole time either talking about himself, he wrote a book
44:12
Speaker 13: about himself, or he runs around disparaging the party or
44:16
Speaker 13: disparaging the country. It's night and day and it just
44:19
Speaker 13: presents plain as day who this man is.
44:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've got to say of the recent prime ministers,
44:24
Speaker 1: I'd have to say that Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard
44:28
Speaker 1: are the ones that have shown how you should be
44:29
Speaker 1: an next prime minister rather than people like Kevin Rudd
44:32
Speaker 1: and Malcolm Turnbull. This is working from home debate me.
44:35
Speaker 1: I mean I'm very interested in this. I mean the
44:38
Speaker 1: public service apparently now you know, less than two thirds
44:42
Speaker 1: turn up to the office five days a week, which
44:45
Speaker 1: is quite extraordinary. How can the government continue to justify
44:50
Speaker 1: hiring hundreds and hundreds and hundreds more bureaucrats and public
44:55
Speaker 1: servants and not even tell them that they they need
44:57
Speaker 1: to go back to the office.
45:00
Speaker 13: Well, they can't, they can't justify, they can't just fight
45:02
Speaker 13: at all. The ballooning public service is an issue that
45:05
Speaker 13: absolutely needs to be addressed. I thought it was really
45:08
Speaker 13: unfortunate in the federal election campaign that the Liberals back
45:11
Speaker 13: down from the argument and didn't prosecute the case, because
45:14
Speaker 13: it's an issue that certainly does need to be addressed.
45:17
Speaker 13: It is simply out of control. But to me, these
45:19
Speaker 13: numbers actually made a lot more sense because you know,
45:21
Speaker 13: we've got mainstream Australians all the time who are running
45:24
Speaker 13: around complaining about valid issues such as the out of
45:27
Speaker 13: control migration intake at the moment, because you know, the
45:31
Speaker 13: way it affects their commute to work, the way it
45:33
Speaker 13: affects social infrastructure, the way it affects transport. And we've
45:36
Speaker 13: got those in government and the public service who seem
45:39
Speaker 13: to not be understanding it. Well, now I understand why
45:42
Speaker 13: they don't get it because they're all at home. They're
45:44
Speaker 13: not out there living in the real world, so of
45:47
Speaker 13: course they can't relate to the issues that mainstream Australians
45:50
Speaker 13: are trying to get them to understand because they live
45:53
Speaker 13: in these life little bubbles where they're sitting at home
45:55
Speaker 13: doing Zoom meetings in their pajamas. But I do wonder
45:59
Speaker 13: just how many welcome to countries they are all still
46:01
Speaker 13: performing on their zoom meetings in the morning.
46:04
Speaker 1: Joe, as I tipped over another homeless person this morning
46:07
Speaker 1: and had to avoid a drug craze person with a
46:09
Speaker 1: machete wandering down Chapel Street, I was very shocked to
46:13
Speaker 1: read that apparently tourism in Victoria has surged this spring,
46:17
Speaker 1: gone straight past New South Wales and Chapel Street. Would
46:21
Speaker 1: you believe it is proving a big draw card. A.
46:24
Speaker 1: I don't know who did the survey, and B I
46:26
Speaker 1: don't know who they ask, Joe, because Chapel Street is
46:30
Speaker 1: a mere shadow of what it used to be. And
46:33
Speaker 1: I'm not kidding, and I live two blocks off at
46:35
Speaker 1: when I live in Melbourne. If you go there after dark,
46:38
Speaker 1: you take your life into your own hands. It's a
46:40
Speaker 1: dangerous place.
46:42
Speaker 14: Yeah, it's really surprising, and I can't quite know, but
46:44
Speaker 14: maybe it's people sort of believing the spin that Melbourne
46:48
Speaker 14: puts on itself that is the capital of cool still
46:51
Speaker 14: as opposed to the capital of crime. And they're rocking
46:54
Speaker 14: up and they you know, they see what they see
46:56
Speaker 14: and then they just high tail it out of there.
46:58
Speaker 14: But you've sort of managed to tick the box. Or
47:00
Speaker 14: maybe they're just in. Maybe it's like, you know, grunge tourism.
47:03
Speaker 14: Maybe it's come to Melbourne. How famous you know, our
47:06
Speaker 14: famous graffiti alleys. It used to be ironic, but now
47:09
Speaker 14: there's actually real criminals there. Go and have a look.
47:13
Speaker 14: It is baffling. But I'm quite happy here in Sydney.
47:15
Speaker 14: Thank you Pricey.
47:17
Speaker 1: Well me and you live here, I mean you will
47:19
Speaker 1: have experienced Chapel Street. It used to be fantastic. It
47:22
Speaker 1: is now a dangerous place. I mean, I'm not making
47:24
Speaker 1: this up. I see it on a daily basis. My
47:27
Speaker 1: local liquor land shop got the door locked. The poor
47:30
Speaker 1: girl who Witk's in the seven eleven on the corner
47:32
Speaker 1: of High Street and Chapel Street. She locks the door.
47:35
Speaker 1: I have to knock on it to go in there
47:36
Speaker 1: and buy the paper.
47:39
Speaker 13: No, you're certainly not making up. I mean, just ask
47:41
Speaker 13: how many residents who are paying for private security to
47:44
Speaker 13: protect their homes and protect their businesses. I mean, crime
47:47
Speaker 13: in that area is out of control. But I did
47:49
Speaker 13: have to kind of laugh at this article because there's
47:51
Speaker 13: a section in it that says, you know, tourism around
47:53
Speaker 13: Chapel Street is going so well because spending has increased
47:56
Speaker 13: in the area, something about you know, spending in cafes
47:59
Speaker 13: has gone up seventy percent or something like that. I'm thinking, well,
48:02
Speaker 13: no wonder, because five years ago I could buy a
48:04
Speaker 13: cup of coffee for three dollars and now I'm spending
48:07
Speaker 13: seven dollars, So no wonder spending has gone up. I'm
48:09
Speaker 13: not sure if that's any indication that more people are
48:12
Speaker 13: enjoying their times in Chapel Street or just prices are
48:14
Speaker 13: out of control, cost of living's out of control, crimes
48:17
Speaker 13: out of control.
48:17
Speaker 6: It's it's terrible.
48:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is out of control, and we run out
48:21
Speaker 1: of time. Sadly, because I wanted to ask Joe about
48:23
Speaker 1: the famous El Janna garlic sauce because the chicken shop
48:28
Speaker 1: is sold to the United States. It is the best
48:31
Speaker 1: chicken in Sydney and we've now got one in Melbourne.
48:33
Speaker 1: Thank you both for joining us. All was appreciated. And
48:36
Speaker 1: Chapel Street, I tell you I do spend a lot
48:38
Speaker 1: of time there and it is a dangerous place and
48:40
Speaker 1: it needs to be cleaned up. We need more police
48:42
Speaker 1: there for sure. Coming up, go nowhere because the world,
48:45
Speaker 1: according to Rowan Deane, is up next.