http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.auRSS feeds for Malcolm Turnbull MP60http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/395/Where-do-you-stand-on-funding-for-public-education.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=395http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=395&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/395/Where-do-you-stand-on-funding-for-public-education.aspx The Opposition is committed to supporting a strong education system, promoting excellence in both the public and non-government sectors. During the previous Government’s term in office, funding was continually increased to all Australian schools – in its last year $3.5 billion was committed towards public schools and students, a 122% increase over 1996 funding levels. In Government the Coalition introduced the “Investing in our Schools” program – $1.2 billion that went directly into supporting the projects that local schools identified as priorities, to make up for state government shortfalls.  The Opposition started the development of a world-class National Curriculum that will be available for all schools.  And we have always supported a focus on improved literacy and numeracy, introducing testing at years 3, 5, 7 and 9 to identify those students needing extra help. Our record demonstrates a commitment to education.  We continue to believe that access to a great education is the most important factor in allowing all Australian children to achieve their potential. malcolmFri, 27 Feb 2009 05:56:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:395http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/331/Interview-with-Luke-Grant-Radio2HD-Newcastle.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=331http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=331&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/331/Interview-with-Luke-Grant-Radio2HD-Newcastle.aspxSubjects: Pacific Brands; employment; Labor’s debt train; Joel Fitzgibbon’s SAS pay scandal.   E & O E GRANT:   He’s on the line, morning Malcolm.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Good morning Luke.   GRANT:   Thanks very much for your time today. What do you intend to do when you’re in the region today?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we’re always meeting people, listening to the local community, getting good feedback, it’s particularly important to understand the implications of these job losses for Cessnock and the lower Hunter. And that’s why we’re meeting with the community leaders, with the Mayor, Alison Davey, and the Deputy Mayor Dale Troy and the Council. And also getting out and meeting with small business people and members of the community.   GRANT:   Yeah, given the report in the Telegraph today in relation to what the directors have allegedly voted themselves, that increase, you can understand there’s a fair bit of anger in the community about this today.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Not only can I understand it, I share it. I have been advocating changes to the way executive remuneration is set for a very long time. In fact many years ago, more than 15 years ago I took one of the big listed companies in Sydney, Fairfax which publishes the Sydney Morning Herald and of course the Newcastle Herald, I took them to court when they were giving themselves options exercisable at a dollar when the share price was $1.50. They were giving themselves cash.   [line drops out]   GRANT:   He’s back on the line now.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Sorry about that I don’t know what happened. So I was just saying that in the past I took the directors of Fairfax to court to stop them overpaying themselves and I believe there’s a very straightforward reform that we could make now and Mr Rudd should make now if he’s fair dinkum about this issue, which is to say that senior executives’ pay must be approved by the shareholders. Now at the moment the senior executive remuneration package, if you like, goes to the shareholders and they can express an opinion but it isn’t binding. But it should actually be voted on by the shareholders and that will see a great deal more moderation and circumspection in some of these salary increases.   GRANT:   You would certainly hope so because right now all of us think well, we’ve given that company something like $17 million and a year later after receiving that money in two licks they practically double their directors’ bonuses and they sack nearly 2,000 people. It just doesn’t seem to be right. But what about this issue, where we’ve got – now it’s out there for everyone to understand they’re going to let those workers go. But if those workers leave today because there’s a job down the road that suits them today they’ll lose their entitlements. There’s got to be some protection for those people don’t you think?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Absolutely and this is one of the issues I look forward to discussing with the company and I don’t [inaudible] major political issue out of the very, very [inaudible] circumstances of these workers. Our concern is that the Government has good economic policies that promote jobs and lower wherever possible the cost of employment. Now we believe the Government’s economic policies since they have come in have actually made a difficult economic situation a lot worse. We have a different view, we recognise people, you know there’s a legitimate range of debate about that but that’s our view that they talked up inflation last year, contributed to higher interest rates last year. They have blasted away a lot of money in spending which is all borrowed money, all of which will have to be paid back but which has been done in a way that does not, and is not obviously contributing to employment. So they’re spending a lot of money ineffectively.   But as far as the particular workers involved here are concerned, they must be treated fairly and generously, and whatever we can do to assist them and protect their interests with the company, we will do.   GRANT:   The average bloke in the street or average lady in the street hearing people like you talk and the Treasurer talk, and we hear the world financial turmoil which gets the blame now for everything that exists in a negative way on planet earth. We hear things like the Industry Minister say ‘no job is safe’ and a lot of people nod and say ‘yeah, that’s right given what we hear.’ Was he wrong to say that yesterday or right to say that yesterday?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well it was an absolutely reckless and destructive thing to say Luke. You know the key element here is confidence. Kevin Rudd is like the coach of a football team that is struggling a bit at half time. And instead of going into the dressing room and saying ‘guys, you can walk through brick walls, you can walk over broken glass, you can tear the hearts out of your opponents, you can win, you can do anything, you’re supermen.’ Instead of talking, instead of doing that he’s like a coach who goes in there and says ‘we’re doomed, we’ve lost, give up.’ All he does is talk down the economy.   You know the other day in parliament I sat there, I was stunned to hear him talk about the global financial crisis, this is what he said, I’m paraphrasing but this is essentially what he said; he said ‘it is an economic cyclone that is going from country to country, devastating nations, crushing industries, destroying jobs.’ Anyone who listened to that and believed it would just want to go and hide. What you need is confidence. The fact is jobs are being lost, but the fact is most Australians have still got their jobs and a year from now will still have their jobs, the vast majority.   What we need is confidence and a belief in ourselves, a recognition that we have a strong economy. Kevin Rudd inherited a very strong economy, a Commonwealth Government that had paid off all the previous Labor Party debt. He was dealt by John Howard the very best economic cards he could have ever asked for. And what he has been doing now is talking down the economy from the day he got into office. He undermines confidence and he is making a difficult – it is a difficult situation – he is making it a lot worse. That is my criticism of him.   GRANT:   But doesn’t Joe Hockey also talk it down when he talks to the fact that they’ve now gone into so much debt, or the Government has gone into so much debt it will take forever to pay off? I mean isn’t that more gloomy talk there, the stuff that Joe Hockey [inaudible]   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I think you’ve got to build up confidence but the reality is Luke, I’m afraid to say Joe is telling the truth there. It’s not pleasant but it is true, if the Government runs up $200 billion of debt which they’re doing, everybody knows it will have to be paid off. Whether you run up $200 billion of debt as a government, or $200,000 as an individual you know you’re going to have to pay it off at some point.   GRANT:   Yeah.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   And the fact is it will be our kids and our grandkids that will be paying it off.   GRANT:   I’ve only got a minute to go, apparently Joel Fitzgibbon, the local member here and Minister for Defence has said that your party has misrepresented a blank payslip in its dealings with the SAS pay dispute this week, and that you owe them an apology. Do you?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Joel Fitzgibbon has said again and again in parliament that he didn’t know what was going on. He’s corrected himself frequently about his blunders but Joel has totally mishandled this. The fact of the matter is, and there’s a story on the front page of The Australian quoting the partner of the soldier concerned, there was a soldier, there is a payslip – it was from January – where there are so many deductions clawing that money that had been previously paid that the payslip ended up with a zero on it.   Now the reality is that what Joel Fitzgibbon is now doing is he is seeking out, trying to find out the people who have complained about this so they can be victimised. And this is a very shabby exercise. Now Joel is a nice bloke and a good guy to have beer with and all of that stuff, but he has completely mishandled this situation and the SAS and every member of the Defence Forces know that if John Howard had been prime minister, if Brendan Nelson had been defence minister or Robert Hill had been defence minister, this problem would have been fixed up in an afternoon. There’s not a lot of men involved, it’s a relatively small number of men, in the context of the defence budget a relatively small amount of money, they could have fixed it up in an afternoon and Joel has allowed it to go on for months and months. Frankly he’s just not competent enough to fix it up.   GRANT:   I’ve got to leave it there. Thanks for your time, have a good day up here today.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Thanks.   [ends]      malcolmFri, 27 Feb 2009 05:34:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:331http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/330/Burke-reveals-ignorance-of-Land-Management-Report.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=330http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=330&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/330/Burke-reveals-ignorance-of-Land-Management-Report.aspxYesterday in Parliament, Agriculture Minister Tony Burke showed he was incapable of understanding an important recent report on forestry produced by leading CSIRO scientists led by Dr Phil Polglase.   In the report Dr Polglase demonstrated the wide range of opportunities for forestry in Australia – including forestry for saw log and other production and for carbon sinks.   As one scenario (out of an infinite possible range of scenarios) he showed how with a carbon price of $20 per tonne of C02e, plantings on 9 million hectares would abate each year about a quarter of Australia’s emissions (143 million tonnes).   I referred to his paper and to this scenario in my recent speech on climate change (24 January) as one of a number of examples of where biocarbon or “green carbon” strategies can be used to materially reduce Australia’s net CO2 emissions.   Mr Burke either wilfully misrepresented the report or was incapable of understanding it.   First, he said that the scenario (referred to on p. 80 of Dr Polglase’s paper) would involve carbon plantings on sugar cane land in North Queensland.   That is false. The scenario screened out all sugar cane land – indeed it screened out all high rainfall land – which is why on the East Coast almost all the land referred to in the scenario is west of the Great Divide. It appears that Mr Burke was referring to the wrong map in the report – but that is for him to explain.   Second, he suggested that the scenario involved removing prime agricultural land from food production.  This is also not correct, because the scenario assumes that the carbon plantings with a $20 per tonne carbon price would be at least $150 per hectare per annum more profitable than the pre-existing agricultural operations. In other words, the land referred to is assumed to be of modest economic productivity.   Third, the Minister seems to be in complete ignorance of what is actually going on in rural Australia. He complains that tree planting could occur “between Launceston and Hobart”. He only needs to drive between those two cities with his eyes open to see that there is thriving forestry industry there now.   Fourth, he complains that the scenario models potential for carbon forestry in the Western Australian wheat belt.  He should know that environmental plantings are occurring there now and that they deliver considerable additional benefits including reducing rising saline water tables.   Finally, and this perhaps is the most disappointing part of Tony Burke’s comic routine, he shows a complete and utter ignorance of land management in rural Australia. Most tree plantings in rural Australia, and most plantings for carbon sinks, will be done as part of an integrated land management strategy by land owners who will plant tree lots in positions where they offer stock and pastures shelter from the wind, add to bio diversity and, in many places, offset rising water tables and salinity.   As I said in my speech on 24 January, a Green Carbon strategy will allow Australia to materially reduce its CO2 emissions at a relatively low cost, deliver significant additional environmental benefits and enhance, not reduce, agricultural productivity and food security.    malcolmFri, 27 Feb 2009 04:34:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:330http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/346/Doorstop-Interview-Cessnock.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=346http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=346&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/346/Doorstop-Interview-Cessnock.aspxSubjects: Pacific Brands; F3 link; executive remuneration; Rudd meeting with President Obama; self-funded retirees; Labor’s panic on ETS.   E & O E …………………………………………………………………………………...   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We’re here today with the Mayor and the Deputy Mayor discussing the job situation here in Cessnock, particularly in the light of the 83 job losses at Bonds. Every one of those is a tragedy. It’s important to ensure that we have a strong economy everywhere so that where jobs are lost there will be other job opportunities opening up.   Now right here in the lower Hunter there is a great, shovel ready infrastructure project which should be under construction now. If the Coalition had been re-elected it would be being built right now, and that is the F3 link. Now the previous government committed $887 million towards that, the vast bulk of the cost – almost all of the cost. The land acquisitions have been completed, the planning is completed. It is ready to go. It will provide an adrenalin shot to the lower Hunter, it will provide a lot of jobs over the six years of construction, naturally, but even more jobs in terms of increased economic activity.   Now if the Rudd Government, and if Joel Fitzgibbon in particular, are serious about jobs in this part of Australia the F3 link should be started straight away. It was a commitment of our government, Labor said they supported it but since they have been elected they have had plenty of committees but they haven’t started work, and work should start now.   QUESTION:   There’s news today that the board of Pacific Brands gave themselves a pay rise last year. What was your reaction to that?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I was as horrified as every other Australian to read that in the Telegraph today. Look the reality is executives have been overpaying themselves for a long time. Now I have actually taken executives to court for overpaying themselves, many years ago I took the whole board of John Fairfax to court for trying to issue themselves as options exercisable as a dollar when the share price was $1.50. So I have a track record of activism in taking on this type of overpayment.   Now we have proposed a very simple, concrete reform which would deal with this and that is to make senior executive salaries only able to be increased or varied with the approval of the shareholders. Now at the moment the senior executives’ remuneration package goes to the shareholders and they can give an advisory opinion on it but it’s not binding. Now we say change the law so that the shareholders vote. If the chief executive can persuade his shareholders that he’s entitled to a big salary well, sobeit, it’s their company, they can do that. But I don’t think any of us have any doubt that if the shareholders had to vote on these salary increases then you would see much more modest increases and directors would be a lot more circumspect in proposing increases.   QUESTION:   How likely [inaudible] shareholders approve any salary increase? There’s no reason for them to [inaudible]   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well ultimately every employer has to pay what the market requires to get the people they want, whether it’s people on big salaries or modest wages. But the problem at the moment is that you’ve got this situation, and look I have to say this is a debate that’s been going around for a long time, I have always taken a particular view on it and I have shown my commitment to making directors accountable by my own action, by taking them to court years ago in that case involving John Fairfax. But really it’s a very simple reform and Mr Rudd likes to talk about executive salaries but he doesn’t do anything about it. All you need to do is change the law so the senior executives, the chief executive and say the next two or three people, their salaries must be approved by the shareholders. Yes or no, if the shareholders approve it well, it’s their company, they can pay their staff, high and low, what they wish.   QUESTION:   What about a cap, that’s been floated, the idea of putting a cap on salaries?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I think you will get a better result by giving the shareholders the say. I don’t believe the Government should tell companies what to pay their employees. I don’t think that’s right. Let the shareholders decide and you will find that it will have a very beneficial impact.   QUESTION:   In what instance would shareholders approve a pay increase? What’s in it for them? It would never happen.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No that’s not necessarily the case. It would depend on productivity, whether the shareholders think they’re getting value for money. Ultimately the shareholders will make decisions that they believe will increase the value of the company’s shares.   QUESTION:   Pacific Brands was getting assistance from the Government, what does that say about management or the Government’s role in determining their salaries?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Look it’s not for the Government to determine salaries. But you do raise another question, if the Government is providing support for companies it is entitled – because historically it hasn’t done this, governments haven’t done this – but governments that provide support for companies aren’t entitled to put conditions on that support. Now you’ve seen in the United States President Obama has said that where the federal government is providing capital for banks it will insist that those banks limit the amount of money they’re paying their executives.   Now that is not, to my way of thinking, I don’t object to that because that is, like any person who is asked to invest in a company, is entitled to put conditions on their investment. So the government or an institution, a pension fund or whatever is entitled to say ‘if you want so many millions of dollars from us to invest in your company we’re happy to give it to you but there are a few conditions.’ And you can either take it or leave it, so I think what President Obama has done is quite reasonable in that context. But as a general principle shareholders should be deciding what executives are paid and if they do make that decision I think you will see, you will not see as many of these huge pay packets as we have seen.   QUESTION:   Kevin Rudd has secured a meeting with Obama in March, what’s your response to that?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I welcome that. I hope that he listens very carefully to President Obama because President Obama is doing things very differently to Mr Rudd. Firstly he is not talking down the US economy. President Obama’s message is always one of optimism and hope. He demonstrates the power of positive thinking in a very, very persuasive way. We have had extraordinary examples of the Rudd Government talking down our economy, it’s only yesterday we had the Industry Minister say nobody’s job was safe, nobody’s. That no one in Australia’s job was safe. You can imagine what that does to business confidence, to small business confidence. So he’s got a lot to learn from President Obama and I hope he takes plenty of notes.   QUESTION:   Woolworths is creating 7,000 jobs, is that a sign the stimulus package is working?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well the stimulus package has not been effective. The simple fact of the matter is that these one off cash payments are not an effective economic stimulus, that’s been demonstrated in Australia. We’ve asked Mr Rudd, who said that the first cash splash in December would create 75,000 jobs, to demonstrate where one job was created. He could not demonstrate one, let alone 75,000. Now the reality is the second cash splash will be just as ineffective. So the same experience has been had in the United States too. If you want to use government monies to promote jobs and promote economic activity, invest in infrastructure, particularly if it is like the F3 link and it’s infrastructure that you can start on immediately. A lot of these big infrastructure projects are very worthwhile but they’ll take years to get started. This is one that’s ready to go so why isn’t it underway? How can Mr Rudd and Julia Gillard and Joel Fitzgibbon stand up there and show lots of sympathy and empathy with jobs being lost in Cessnock, and yet they’re sitting on their hands and doing nothing about the one bit of infrastructure that everybody knows has been budgeted for by the previous Government, the money’s there and we know it will create thousands of jobs.   QUESTION:   If retail is so bad and the economic stimulus package isn’t working, how can 7,000 jobs be created by Woolworths?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, we’ll see. You should address that question to Woolworths I think.   QUESTION:   How would you describe the behaviour of these company directors for taking this pay increase in this financial climate and when they’ve just sacked so many jobs?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   It’s a poor decision by Pacific Brands, you’ve got to say that. They know they’re going to take a hit in terms of their public image by laying off 1,850 Australians. That’s going to hurt them, and to do that at the same time as they’re jacking up their own pay is obviously going to make it even worse so it’s not a smart move on their part. But I get back to the fundamental question, which is, who’s in charge? I believe shareholders should be in charge of setting senior executive salaries. Now, the fact is that the biggest shareholders are, in many companies, are often super funds that are partly controlled by trade union representatives. So the labour movement has not been sufficiently active in terms of shareholder activism, in terms of representing the interests of the people whose savings are invested in their funds and I think a little bit of shareholder activism will make a world of difference.   QUESTION:   Do you think Sue Morphett’s pay rise from $680,000 to more than $1.8 million [inaudible]?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I’ve made my point. I think it’s a matter for the shareholders. That is the one reform. Mr Rudd could do that. That could be through the Parliament in a day or two. It’s very, very straight forward reform. Give the control over the salaries to shareholders, very simple reform and it would have the desired effect.   QUESTION:   What about immediately, isn’t there anything more that the Government should be doing to help the workers?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I think the critical thing they’ve got to do is to make sure they keep the economy strong. You see, at any stage of the economy, even if you’re in a boom, companies will close down, people will lose jobs, people lose jobs, get new jobs all the time, we understand that. But the most important thing is that when people do lose their job and that is a tragedy, there are other jobs available. That’s what we’ve always got to seek to achieve.   Now my concern is that the Government’s policies have made our economy worse than it otherwise would be. In other words, they’re making a difficult situation worse. That is because they talked down the economy last year, they talked up interest rates, that had a negative impact. They’re blasting tens of billions of dollars away on poorly conceived policies that will load enormous debt onto our shoulders and particularly the shoulders of our children in years ahead and they’re not creating jobs, lower the cost of employment.   So, what did we propose? Bring forward the tax cuts, that benefits everybody, benefits business right across the board. Rebate a portion of the superannuation guarantee contribution for small businesses, directly lowers the cost of employing people. That’s the type of innovative policy that we’ve proposed which will promote employment and create jobs. What Labor’s done is spend a lot of money for political solutions, not economic solutions.   QUESTION:   [Inaudible]   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I’ll just say this about the question of self-funded retirees. Self-funded retirees have been doing it very, very hard, very, very hard indeed. They haven’t benefited from Mr Rudd’s cash splashes, they’ve seen their interests in their savings and their super funds if they’re in the share market, they’ve taken an incredible dip, a huge hit. In some cases down 30 per cent, 40 per cent, 50 per cent, depending on what shares they’ve held. And of course if they’ve had money in the bank and they’ve been living off interest, interest rates have come too. So I haven’t seen the detail of what’s proposed, I don’t think any of us have because we haven’t seen the report but I just say this, self-funded retirees have been doing it very hard, and it would be a very rash government, a very harsh government, that would consider making life even harder for them today.   QUESTION:   [Inaudible]   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well that is exactly what we’ve been proposing. What we have said, and we said this in 2007 when we proposed an emissions trading scheme, we said it shouldn’t start until 2011 or 2012, and that was before the global financial crisis and obviously a lot of things have changed since then. But the reason why you should not finalise any emissions trading scheme, any emissions trading scheme before 2011, 2012, not simply because of the economic situation, but because of the fact that you’ve got to know, to do the job properly, what the United States is going to do. You’ve got a new Administration, you were always going to have a new Administration and that was present in our thinking in 2007. And of course you’ve got know what the rest of the world is going to do in Copenhagen. There is a real risk that Mr Rudd will set up an emissions trading scheme that costs a lot of jobs, especially in this part of Australia, does very little to reduce emissions, so it’s economically damaging, environmentally ineffective, and it may be completely out of sync with what the rest of the world is doing. So for the sake of a year or two rushing into it, he’s putting our economy at very grave risk for no environmental gain.   Thank you.   [ends]   malcolmFri, 27 Feb 2009 00:00:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:346http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/316/Minister-for-Defence-puts-soldiers-in-the-frontline-while-he-puts-their-families-on-the-breadline.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=316http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=316&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/316/Minister-for-Defence-puts-soldiers-in-the-frontline-while-he-puts-their-families-on-the-breadline.aspxCensure Motion - Parliament House  Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Leader of the Opposition) (3.02 pm)—by leave—The Minister for Defence is putting the soldiers in the frontline while he puts their families on the breadline. I move: That this House censures the Minister for Defence for: (1) his failure to protect the wages and conditions of Australia’s elite fighting SAS soldiers who are in the frontline in the most dangerous part of the world, fighting for freedom against the Taliban, under our flag and wearing our uniform; and (2) in particular, the Minister’s: (a) failure to honour his guarantee to this House four months ago that these salary problems would be fixed; (b) failure to ensure the families of serving SAS soldiers did not suffer hardship; (c) failure to obtain full information about the nature and extent of the problem; (d) failure to intervene to prevent retrospective action that has resulted in soldiers being hit with debts of tens of thousands of dollars and large salary cuts; and (e) actions in undermining the authority of the leadership of Australia’s armed forces.   The SAS is in the frontline in the battle against terror. They are in the frontline fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan and we have a minister here who knows nothing about their affairs. Twice he was asked how much their pay had been docked. He said he did not know. It is bad enough that he did not know, but the worst part of it is he does not care. He has put those soldiers on the frontline and their families have received payslips with nothing at all—soldiers on the frontline, families on the breadline. How can we ask these men to put themselves in harm’s way? How can we ask them to fight the most ruthless enemy when we have such an incompetent Defence minister, a man who is indifferent to the hardship their families are suffering as he wanders lost through a maze of excuses? Excuses do not pay the mortgage. They do not pay for the groceries. Excuses may serve to protect this incompetent minister for a few more months from the wrath of the Prime Minister but they do not defend the integrity of the obligation all of us owe to our armed forces. There is no greater or more solemn obligation for an Australian government than to do everything in its power to safeguard the welfare of those we ask to serve us in war, in our uniform, under our flag in the most difficult and dangerous conditions one could ever imagine.   What we have seen revealed in this House is an incomprehensible saga of bungling and incompetence which for almost a year has seen these elite forces let down by an extraordinary, unprecedented example of ministerial ineptitude and incompetence. The Australian people are asking today: how could the families of our men fighting in Afghanistan, taking on the most dangerous, most ruthless enemy in the world in the frontline in the battle against terrorism open their pay packets and find there is nothing in them? How could it be that their wives and children back at home could be left to fret and worry over whether this pay debacle could leave them unable to pay their mortgages, in danger of being thrown out of their own homes? This is a national disgrace. It is a scandal and what is most scandalous of all is that this minister comes into the House this week and will accept no responsibility at all for a fiasco that has occurred entirely under his watch. We had the incredible spectacle just a moment ago when, on the second occasion the minister was asked how much had been deducted from their pay, he finally said, ‘I don’t know.’ He said that he had no idea. He did not know how much had been deducted from their pay; then he started to provide figures of some deductions that had occurred years ago. Who does he think he is? A military historian or the Minister for Defence?   We need a Minister for Defence who knows what is going on today. Our soldiers in Afghanistan need a minister  for Defence whom they know stands behind them as securely, loyally, devotedly and courageously as we are asking them to stand in the line of battle against the Taliban in Afghanistan.   He has betrayed our soldiers with his incompetence. He is a minister who promised more than four months ago that this problem would be fixed. But, unbelievably, he has not fixed it, not by a long way. We are not talking here about pay anomalies involving 20,000 people. We are talking about a relatively small number of men upon whose shoulders the heaviest responsibilities have been placed—placed by us, the people of Australia and its government. We put those responsibilities on them—to stand firm in the face of terror— and we have a minister who has let them down. It is just a small number of men. A competent bookkeeper— a competent minister, indeed—could have sorted this out in a few hours, as could even this minister if he had shown the slightest energy or willpower. He could have sat down with the records, worked out who had been paid, who had not been paid and sorted it out himself. We are talking about dozens, not hundreds, of people. We are talking about a relatively small number of men. But what has he done? He has dithered and he has dissembled. He has blamed it on computers. He has blamed it on his own department. He has blamed it on everybody but himself. We perhaps saw the most contemptible example of the minister’s readiness to blame everybody but himself today, when, so desperate to wriggle out of this scandal, he twice—not once—tried to use a courtesy in the Senate extended by the shadow minister for defence, Senator Johnston, to our men in uniform as a fig leaf to hide behind. I can tell you that Senator Johnston’s appraisal of this minister’s competence is the same as that of everybody on this side of the House and that of every Australian.   This debacle arose after a ruling by the Defence Force Remuneration Tribunal in May last year, which reconfigured the terms and conditions under which some classifications of SAS soldiers would receive their pay entitlements. The change in arrangements was backdated to the previous August, in effect retrospectively revising their pay entitlements. This is not a case of mistaken payments where somebody suddenly finds millions of dollars dropped into their bank account or where the wrong address is given and suddenly they find all this money that they know has got nothing to do with them. These are men who were being paid in a way which the Army thought was appropriate at the time and which they thought and believed was appropriate at the time. They had no reason to believe they were being overpaid at all. I have very real doubts whether the Army properly, legally—certainly morally— should be docking their pay or questioning their pay at all.   The opposition raised this scandal at a Senate estimates hearing on 22 October—that is, more than four months ago. On the same day, this incompetent defence minister stood in this House and pleaded  ignorance of the issues raised but then guaranteed to the Australian people that he would fix the problem  immediately. He said, ‘I can guarantee to the House that this problem will be fixed.’ That is what he said, standing opposite me. The Prime Minister sat beside him at the dispatch box as he delivered that pledge. By rights, if the Prime Minister cared as much about the welfare of our soldiers as he should—if he really cared about supporting our soldiers as he should—he would have been apoplectic about this outrageous dereliction of responsibility. He would have taken this incompetent defence minister back to his office and demanded in no uncertain terms that the problem be fixed and fixed immediately. By rights, he should have also called in the Chief of the ADF to insist the problem be fixed immediately— no ifs, no buts, no more excuses.   I say again: the families of these brave men cannot eat this incompetence and these excuses. They cannot pay the mortgage with this incompetence and these excuses. These men need to be rewarded, they need to be paid and they need a government that stands behind them, a government that does not throw everything aside into a sea of excuses—‘Oh, it’s all too hard.’ You cannot throw the fighting men of Australia into the too hard basket, Minister. You threw them into the front line of battle; then you sent their families onto the breadline by sending them a pay packet with a big zero in it. That is what this minister sent them.   True to his style, the Prime Minister shirks the hard decisions—and he shirked this one too. He sought to assure the House yesterday that he had taken a keen  interest in bringing an end to this fiasco. But when exactly did the Prime Minister discover his sense of urgency about this appalling state of affairs? There was a moment that demanded resolute, principled leadership. I remember when John Howard was Prime Minister. People would raise issues with him and, when he explained that there were challenges associated with resolving them, people would look him in the eye and say: ‘You’re the Prime Minister. Fix it,’ and John Howard always set out to fix it. Everyone on this side of the House knows that, if the Prime Minister were John Howard, this issue would have been fixed immediately. There would have been a speedy resolution, a speedy announcement and it would have been fixed. Instead, we have a Prime Minister who does not care. Instead, the Prime Minister has gone missing in action on the men we send into action.   We send our soldiers into harm’s way to take on this challenge of terrorism, to take on the most dangerous enemies in the world, and the government is so indifferent, so unconcerned, that the minister will stand up in October and say, ‘I will fix the problem,’ and in January payslips are received with nothing on them: nothing to pay for the mortgage, for the rent, for groceries— nothing. That is what they got. We talk in this House all the time about the gratitude of the nation to our men in uniform. We talk about the thanks of a grateful nation. Well, the SAS can say to this minister, Thanks for nothing.’ That is what they got from him: nothing at all. More than four months after guaranteeing he would fix this problem the Minister for Defence has delivered nothing. His promise to fix the issue has not been fulfilled, and we know from the testimony of the Defence chiefs in estimates today that this promised resolution cannot and will not be fulfilled until May at the earliest. They have to wait until May. And the minister tries now to excuse himself and to seek absolution because the mess that he has presided over will be resolved at some point in the future. That is not good enough.   The fact is that a minister who has let down our fighting men once will let them down again. Our soldiers know about loyalty. They know about character. A minister who does not have the character to fix this problem immediately, who does not have the character to fix this problem when he said it would be fixed, will not have the character to stand by them again. Our men in uniform know that the only reason anything is being done is that the opposition has raised this matter again and again in this parliament. Let us be quite clear: the minister said, on 22 October, that he would fix it. Yet the directive that the Army issued to resolve the issue, so he claims, is dated 18 February. Is there anybody here, is there any soldier in Australia or serving us abroad, who does not understand that the only reason this directive was issued was because the minister knew he was going to be called to account by the opposition in this House for his incompetence? That is the measure of this minister: incompetent, slovenly, lazy and careless about the best that Australia can offer, the best that Australia can put into the field against the worst, the most dangerous and the most ferocious enemy. He sends them onto the front line. Soldiers on the front line, families on the breadline—that is the defence policy of this minister.   More than a year after these decisions to reconfigure the pay scales and allowances of the SAS were made, the problem remains unresolved. Why should our elite troops in the battle line have to be worrying about whether their families back home can make mortgage payments? Why should they suffer the distress and anxiety of receiving a payslip with nothing on it? Why should they be issued with debt notifications of tens of thousands of dollars, not due to an accidental overpayment as the government would have us believe— that would be bad enough—but through the retrospective stripping of those soldiers of their full pay entitlements? It is only now, after the opposition has brought to light further evidence of the ongoing hardship and distress of these soldiers and their families that we finally get a commitment that no financial disadvantage will be suffered. Only now do we get a promise that when the time finally comes that all of this is tidied up, none of those families affected will be asked to repay the debt. But what we do not get, a year after this debacle began to affect our fighting men and their families, is immediate and unconditional action to waive all penalties imposed and debts incurred through this fiasco— not in April, not in May, but today. All we have from the minister is a form of weasel words designed not to fix the problem but to rescue his job. The only jobs package he is interested in is his own job. It is too little too late. It is much too late. The damage has been done. The trust has been betrayed.   We know that this incompetence is so great that the Prime Minister can have no confidence in a minister who blames everybody but himself—a Minister for Defence so cowardly that he will not take responsibility for any element of this fiasco. The one consistency we have had from this minister is that it was not him. He will not take the blame for anything. He asks our soldiers to stand in the front line, to stand up against the shells and missiles of the enemy, but he will not stand up for anything. He passes the buck. He passes the blame around as generously as he is stingy with dollars for our soldiers. He gives our soldiers nothing in their pay packets. Imagine that, Mr Speaker! Just reflect on that.   I ask all Australians to reflect on the character of a Minister for Defence who can say on 22 October that this problem would be fixed and in January dock all of the pay of one of our finest fighting men so there is nothing on the payslip—nothing. Talk about the thanks of a grateful nation! There is no thanks from this minister. The minister should have fixed this long ago. We all know that. He said he would, but he has not. The problem will continue and drag on for months. It is an outrageous dereliction, an abandonment of duty by a minister of the Crown. This minister, if he were honourable, would resign today and not trouble the Prime Minister. And if he will not do the right thing, if he will not accept responsibility for his incompetence, if he will not be prepared to say that he got it wrong—that he has failed and that he is too incompetent and slovenly to have this job—then the Prime Minister must act and sack him.  malcolmThu, 26 Feb 2009 03:30:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:316http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/314/Doorstop-Interview.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=314http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=314&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/314/Doorstop-Interview.aspxSubjects: Joel Fitzgibbon’s SAS pay scandal.   E & O E   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Joel Fitzgibbon is blaming everybody but himself for this appalling SAS pay scandal. The SAS are Australia’s elite fighting force. They are in the frontline in the most dangerous part of the world, fighting for freedom, under our flag, wearing our uniform, fighting against the Taliban.   And Joel Fitzgibbon’s incompetence has undermined the morale of the SAS, it has undermined the morale of the entire ADF. He has, by his incompetence, allowed a situation to continue where soldiers, troopers in the SAS, are having their pay docked – some are getting no pay. So while they are taking the fight up to the Taliban they are having to worry whether they can meet their mortgage payments; their families are back at home with no income. It is an extraordinary example of ministerial incompetence.   And we have to ask whether this incompetence is so great that Mr Rudd can any longer have confidence in this minister who blames everybody but himself. He is the minister. He could have fixed this up long ago. He said he would. He hasn’t. The problem continues and it’s entirely his fault.   QUESTION:   Is it a sackable offence?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well that’s a matter for the Prime Minister. I have to say it is a remarkable display of incompetence. The idea, the idea that men could be fighting in Afghanistan, taking on the most dangerous enemy in the world and have nothing in their pay packets, have their wives anxious about whether they’re going to lose their houses – it’s an incredible situation. The fact that he has allowed it to continue for so long, the fact that he has allowed it to continue for months and months, let alone any amount of time. This is something that should have fixed instantly.   QUESTION:   When he says he can’t answer any of your questions about it because he doesn’t have access to the information, shouldn’t he just get someone to go around to the SAS and ask them who has been…   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well of course he should. He blames it on the computers. I mean we’re not talking about 20,000 people here. We’re talking about a relatively small number of men upon whose shoulders very heavy responsibilities are being placed by our nation. A small number of men. A competent bookkeeper could sort this out in a matter of hours. But Mr Fitzgibbon blames it on the computers, blames it on his own department, blames it on everybody but himself. He could go in and fix it up himself if he had the energy and the will to do it.   QUESTION:   The Auditor General over a number of years going back four, five, six years has been pointing to these problems with IT systems at Defence, both payroll systems and the inventory management systems. Doesn’t the Coalition bear responsibility for that given that these systems, these problems in the systems go back four, five, six years?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well let’s get back to the fundamental responsibility. Mr Fitzgibbon is the minister. He is the Minister for Defence. Under his time as Minister for Defence members of the SAS who are taking on the most dangerous roles, fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan on behalf of our nation have been having their pay docked to a point where they are unable to pay the mortgages on their homes.   Now that is an incredible scandal. It’s incredible because it is almost impossible to believe that a minister could be so incompetent.   QUESTION:   In principle, if a soldier is overpaid should he not be required to repay the money?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I think there are very real issues about whether these men have been overpaid at all. I mean this is not one of those cases where somebody accidentally has a million dollars credited to their bank account. These are men who were being paid in a way that the Army thought was appropriate at the time, they thought was appropriate at the time, they had no reason to believe they were being overpaid. And I have very real doubts whether the Army properly, legally – certainly morally – should be docking their pay at all.   QUESTION:   But that sort of thing happens all the time, you’re a person who has been in business, surely you would know that?I mean it happens in my company too.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we’re talking about the SAS here. We are talking about the elite fighting force of our defence forces in Afghanistan taking on the most difficult, dangerous enemy in the world and we have a Defence Minister who is leaving them with nothing in their pay packet. And when asked to give an account of that he blames the computers, he blames the Defence Department, everybody but himself. The Minister has to take responsibility.   Thanks very much.   [ends]     malcolmWed, 25 Feb 2009 05:22:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:314http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/315/42-Billion-Spending-Package.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=315http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=315&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/315/42-Billion-Spending-Package.aspx Normal 0 false false false EN-AU X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} The Coalition demands that Rudd Labor does not use its $42 billion spending package as a Labor pork-barrelling fund.   Already Labor has been busy buying public support with cash hand-outs that deliver popularity but little bang for the taxpayer’s borrowed buck.   Now we must ensure that their infrastructure and education spendathons don’t favour Labor and marginal seats at the expense of Australians living in Coalition held seats. The Coalition opposed Rudd Labor's $42 billion spending package because we considered it was not in the national interest.   It contains too much spending, imposes too much debt and contains measures that are not effectively targeted and will not protect jobs.   The massive burden of debt Labor intends to impose on Australia raises the spectre of higher taxes in the future.  And it leaves too little room in the public purse to address an extended economic downturn.   However, the Coalition accepts that the Parliament has passed the initial legislation to give effect to the package.    Our job now is to ensure that the moneys appropriated are spent as wisely as possible and to hold the Government to account over the efficacy and efficiency of the package.   The Australian people expect us to do this and ensure that any future stimulus package is well designed.   They also expect us to fight for the allocation of these funds fairly around Australia. Accordingly, Coalition MPs will be carefully watching to ensure that distributions for construction activities for schools and housing are spent equitably and fairly across Australia and in all electorates.  malcolmMon, 23 Feb 2009 19:55:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:315http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/301/Interview-with-Lyndall-Curtis.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=301http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=301&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/301/Interview-with-Lyndall-Curtis.aspxSource: AM Programme Subjects: emissions trading; the Coalition’s Green Carbon Initiative.   E & O E   CURTIS:   Malcolm Turnbull, welcome to AM.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   It’s good to be with you.   CURTIS:   You said when the Government called its inquiry that it was having second thoughts about an emissions trading scheme, are you?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We certainly are having second thoughts about the Government’s proposed emissions trading scheme and we’d be Robinson Crusoe if we weren’t. Everybody is concerned about it. Industry believes it is too complex and is going to seriously disadvantage Australian industries and export jobs overseas and those people who want……   CURTIS:   ….but do you still believe an emissions trading scheme is the way to go?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Let me just finish what I was saying. Those people who want to reduce Australia’s emissions, including us, including me, in particular, feel this is going to be an ineffectual scheme because the cut in emissions is going to be very low. Now in answer to your question – do I believe an emissions trading scheme can be a useful part, one useful tool in the climate policy toolbox? The answer is yes – if it is well designed – but it has to be well designed and it has to be able to work effectively with other schemes internationally and that’s one of the reasons why we don’t believe the Government should finalise its ETS design until we know what the Americans are going to do, until we know what is happening at the Copenhagen summit at the end of this year.   CURTIS:   So you’re not attracted by calls to switch from an emissions trading scheme to a carbon tax?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Look, I’m certainly going to pay very close attention to them. There are merits for an ETS and we were persuaded by those when we were in government and also there’s merit on the side of a carbon tax – greater certainty because you know exactly what the price is.   There are arguments both ways. But the real problem is it’s not just ETS verses tax, it is: is this ETS going to be effective to reduce emissions? You see what Mr Rudd has done, and this is a characteristic of the Prime Minister, he has completely lost sight of the real objective. The objective is to reduce Australia’s CO2 emissions. It is not to have an ETS. The object is to reduce emissions. And so he’s come up with an incredibly cumbersome, economically damaging – so we are told by industry – ineffectual – so we are told by people concerned about climate – emissions trading scheme, which seems to disappoint everybody. There is almost unanimous criticism of it.   CURTIS:   So Australia shouldn’t make any moves until either the US makes a move or there’s an agreement at Copenhagen?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well certainly we would be able to make a much more informed decision after the US has worked out what its policy will be and after the decision in Copenhagen. Our policy, and we stand by this position, our policy has been for some years now that we should not finalise the design of any scheme, any emissions trading scheme, until we know what the US is going to do and in particular what the rest of the world is going to do at Copenhagen.   Now it was Mr Rudd who for purely electoral reasons, political reasons, said ‘I’m not going to have a scheme starting in 2011 or 2012 because I’m greener than those Liberals, I’m going to start mine in 2010’. And so for purely a political flourish in an election year he painted himself into a corner where he’s building an emissions trading scheme in the dark as to the intentions of the most important players whose efforts are going to be absolutely critical to anything in Australia being effective.   CURTIS:   Your Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey says the Government’s target is very low, do you believe there should be a higher target?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well certainly we should cut our emissions by more than what Mr Rudd has proposed and I’ve set out how we can do that. I gave a speech in January which showed how we could, at relatively low cost and with great additional benefits to our environment, cut an additional 150 million tonnes a year by 2020 and do that very, very realistically, without rocket science technology.   CURTIS:   But some of those technologies, things like carbon capture and storage aren’t proved yet?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No well that’s not what I was talking about. Carbon capture and storage, you’re quite right – there won’t be a lot of that happening much before 2020. I was talking about biocarbon, promoting soil carbon – that’s the biggest carbon sink – forestry, environmental forestry, but in particular the technology that is completely overlooked and is extremely effective is bio-char – the business of turning crop waste and forestry waste or whatever, you know, straw, wheat straw into in effect charcoal, returning that to the soil, so you get in effect biosequestration of carbon and at the same time you materially improve the productivity of the soil.   You see what we’ve got to try to do always is to increase our agricultural productivity. One of the biggest failures of the Labor Government, and you see this in the way they approach water and the way they approach climate, is that they are undermining the agricultural productivity of Australia. The world needs more food; it will need more Australian food. We have to put a bigger and better effort into improving our food security.   CURTIS:   There are some in your party who are concerned about an emissions trading scheme and concerned about a tougher version……   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   When you say some, I think there’s everybody, I mean I don’t know anyone that is happy with Mr Rudd’s emissions trading scheme other than him and Penny Wong.   CURTIS:   But you would no doubt acknowledge there are differences of opinion in your own party about an emissions trading scheme, the worth of it. Given you had an outbreak of fighting last week over party positions, how do you avoid a fight over a policy like this?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We will have a discussion about the emissions trading scheme. Let’s be quite clear; we don’t even know what Mr Rudd’s scheme is yet. He’s had a green paper, he’s had a white paper; they’re already announcing changes from what was proposed in the white paper. Until you actually see the legislation you won’t be sure where they finally land.   So of course there will be a debate about it and there will be discussion about it and there’ll be a public debate about it by the way – and that’s why having an inquiry is so important because that way you can ventilate different views from the public, you can get the major players, many of whom have got the access to top economic analysis, to come in and let those debates be had in public. Let the public have a say.   CURTIS:   Are you open to the Greens suggestion for a wider terms of reference including looking at the science?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we’ll see. I don’t know what they’re proposing. But obviously we need the minor parties’ support to have the inquiry. So they have a bit of leverage, so plainly.   CURTIS:   You’d be looking to putting what was a bad week behind you this week, how do you do that especially when you have people like former leader John Hewson buying in again and saying that Peter Costello should go?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Look the Australian people are sick of all these political games. They’re focussed on jobs, they’re focussed on the economy, they’re focussed on issues like climate change. You know, how do we reduce our emissions in a way that is environmentally effective and economically responsible? Those are the issues I’m talking about. I’m not here to comment on political games and personalities.   CURTIS:   Malcolm Turnbull, thank you very much for your time.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Thank you.   [ends]    malcolmMon, 23 Feb 2009 05:04:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:301http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/369/Address-to-National-Day-of-Mourning-Rod-Laver-Arena-Melbourne.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=369http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=369&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/369/Address-to-National-Day-of-Mourning-Rod-Laver-Arena-Melbourne.aspxThe fires’ fury spared neither the wisdom of the old nor the innocence of the young. We mourn those we have lost. We are united in our sorrow for those who loved them. To those who lie in suffering from burns, we pray for your return to health. To the men and women who stared back in to the blazing eyes of that hellfire and saved the lives and homes of others – we thank you and we honour you for your selfless courage and service. Already you are rebuilding – you are as resilient as you are courageous. Already we see kids back at school. At places like Flowerdale and Callignie, the backhoes are hard at work beginning the reconstruction. At the Kinglake footy ground, you voted unanimously to get the Lakers back onto the field this season. And at Steels Creek – less than a week after the fire – we let he tennis club back on the court ready to resume the local competition. In all of this, you are true to the Australian spirit of standing strong in the face of adversity. To all your hopes for better times, we bind the resources of a generous nation and a compassionate people. The measure of our support for you – indeed the measure of our love for you – must be “whatever it takes”. Whatever it takes to put you back on your feet. Whatever it takes to heal broken bodies and soothe broken hearts. We love you, we stand by you. God bless you. Whatever it takes.    malcolmSun, 22 Feb 2009 05:29:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:369http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/320/Doorstop-Interview-Melbourne.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=320http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=320&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/320/Doorstop-Interview-Melbourne.aspxSubjects: Employment; bank deposit guarantee; ETS; Liberal Party; IR; Kevin Rudd’s socialism essay.   E&OE   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I’m here with Helen and Andrew to listen to small business about the big topic, the big economic topic of our times, which is jobs. We are reaching out to the Australian business community, the small business community, the enterprises that employ most Australians, and asking them what they believe government should do for them, how government can make it easier for them to employ Australians, to keep people on the payroll. We’ve taken that feedback and turned it into policies already, and we’ll keep doing that. We do it through our website, Jobs for Australia, and we’re doing it through these meetings. And around the country we’ll be holding meetings like this.   You saw last week in the debate about the $42 billion package, we proposed alternative policies that would have lowered the cost of employing Australians for small business. We proposed that government could rebate, should rebate, a portion of the superannuation guarantee contribution for small business, thereby directly reducing the cost of employing Australians. Now that is the type of idea, and the type of policy, that we are getting back from the community, back from the business community. So we’re here to listen, and we’re here to learn.   QUESTION:   Recently the GM job cuts, which will no doubt flow on to Holden, what does this suggest about the effectiveness of the Government’s $6 billion automotive industry package last year?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   This is a commentary, a consequence, in part, of the Government’s mismanagement of our economy. You’ll recall that last year the Government decided to offer an unlimited guarantee on bank deposits. Now this became extremely damaging very quickly, and you’ll remember the Reserve Bank Governor begged the Government, begged the Treasury Secretary in an email that was subsequently published, to impose a cap, and the lower the better. One of the consequences of the unlimited bank deposit guarantee was that the flow of money to the finance companies that finance the motor industry dried up. And right around the country motor dealers, car dealers, are struggling to find the finance to fund their floor plans, and of course the finance to enable people to buy the cars that they’re offering for sale. So it did enormous damage to the motor industry. The Government, recognising this damage, said it would set up with the banks a new finance company to fill in the gap. As far as we’re aware, no money has flowed from that at all. Nothing has happened. So the car industry is facing challenging times, no doubt about it, but the times it is facing are tougher, tougher than they ought to be because of the economic mistakes of the Rudd Government.   QUESTION:   In recent times it seems like Andrew Robb is possibly pointing at a shift from a carbon pollution reduction scheme more to a carbon tax. Can you clarify the Opposition’s policy in this area?    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Our policy is the same as it was when we were in government. In government we proposed an emissions trading scheme, in fact we started to legislate for it. It was very different to the emissions trading scheme proposed by the Rudd Government, because it would not have cost Australian jobs. The Rudd Government’s emissions trading scheme is very complex, it is not going to be effective, as far as we can see – of course we haven’t seen the final form of it yet – and it is certainly going to do a lot of damage to our trade-exposed, our big exporting industries. Now, having said that, it is a moving target, because they haven’t produced the final legislation yet, and in fact they’re referring the whole question of whether there should be an emissions trading scheme to the House Economics Committee, so quite where the Government is going to land up it’s hard to say.   QUESTION:   But where are you standing at the moment?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   As I said, our policy is as it was at the time of the last election. There is a lot of debate around the world about the merits of emissions trading, on the other hand, and of a carbon tax. The economic arguments, I can restate them if you like; an emissions trading scheme works by putting a cap on the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted. And then people have to buy permits to emit CO2. The price of those permits is determined by the level of demand, so it’s a traded permit and so the price can go up and down and fluctuate. So you’ve got certainty about the amount of emissions but uncertainty about the price of the permit. A carbon tax on the other hand sets a fixed price, it’s a tax of so many dollars a tonne, that you have certainty on the price but of course you don’t have certainty on the amount of CO2 that will be emitted. Both approaches have their proponents, there’s a debate going on in many countries including the United States about it, both arguments have their merits.  The view that we’ve taken when we were in government and remains our policy today is that on balance an emissions trading scheme is more effective. But it has got to be a well designed emissions trading scheme and what the Government has put up as far as we can tell is not a well designed scheme.   QUESTION:   On another topic, do you think Peter Costello should clarify his future as Brendan Nelson has done?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Peter Costello has made his position very clear. He has said that he has no interest in returning to the front bench, he has no interest in a front bench position or a leadership role. So he has made that abundantly clear and that is the end of the issue.   QUESTION:   He was still your first choice for shadow treasurer and now you’re wanting Alan Stockdale to be replaced with Shane Stone. Is this a case of the Liberal party living in the past?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Can I just correct you there, Alan Stockdale has my full support. I know Alan Stockdale very well, I work very closely with him, he is doing a fine job as President of the Liberal Party. Not only is there no move against Alan Stockdale but as far as I’m aware there is nobody who has expressed any interest in replacing him. So this story about Alan Stockdale has no basis in fact, Alan Stockdale has the full support of the Liberal Party as President and he is doing a very good job.   QUESTION:   There are suggestions that you’re ignoring Victorians in any sort of leadership role or within the Liberal Party, and have become quite Sydney-centric. Do you agree with that?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well…   HELEN KROGER:   That’s a good question when we’re in Victoria, we’re standing in Victoria.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Senator Kroger is here standing on my left. Here I am in Victoria.  I think that gives you an indication of how committed I am to the Party in this state. Look Victoria - people often describe Victoria as the jewel in the crown of the Liberal Party. As the leader of the federal Party I should say it is one of the brightest jewels, without discriminating against other states. But Victorians play a critically important role in the Liberal Party and it is just simply ridiculous to suggest that there is anything less than enormous respect, reliance upon the strength of the Victorian division of the Liberal Party. It is a vital part of our federal Party, it is a vital part of Australia, Australia’s economy, Australia’s energy and enterprise. You know, Victoria is at the centre of our party’s work, always has been and always will be. But we are a national organisation, and so we have strong divisions right around the country. But there is no division stronger or more respected than that of Victoria.   QUESTION:   Just on the Fair Work Bill, considering the worsening economic situation, are you going to seek significant amendments to what the Government’s put forward?    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Look, the Senate committee, as you know, is concluding its considerations. We’ll be looking very closely at the report from the Senate committee, and we’ll be considering amendments very, very carefully. But the Senate committee hasn’t finished its work yet.     QUESTION:   How secure is Julie Bishop as Deputy Leader?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Julie Bishop has the total support of the party as Deputy Leader. She’s an outstanding Deputy Leader.   QUESTION:   How damaging has all the recent events been to the Liberal party?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I’m not going to run a political commentary. I’m happy to answer questions of fact, but I’ll leave the commentary to you.   QUESTION:   I’m wondering, Mr Turnbull, whether you’re considering penning an essay in response to Kevin Rudd’s.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well it’s interesting. Over the Christmas holidays Mr Rudd and I both spent some time doing some writing. I wrote a long speech – it wasn’t 7,700 words – but I wrote a long speech about climate change, about climate policy, about biocarbon, about how Australia could more effectively reduce its CO2 emissions at a lower cost and with greater benefits to the environment. That was the piece of work I did. And it’s quite a long and detailed piece of work with a lot of research behind it. At the same time Mr Rudd, instead of reading fiction, which of course is what a lot of people do over the holidays, was writing fiction. And his essay is just a long, ideological rant. It’s the product of his own imagination – that is, other than the bits that he copied from other articles. So it really has nothing useful or interesting to contribute to political debate.   And let me just underline one point. I responded to this, I might say, in a speech I gave in Sydney yesterday. Mr Rudd says that the Liberal Party was part of a long tradition of free market extremism, that it was opposed to regulation and allowed financial markets and the free market to rip, doing great damage around the world, and he pointed to the Howard Government as being part of that. And yet at the same time as he published this article, his own Deputy Prime Minister was in Davos at world economic conference saying that Australia’s financial and prudential regulation was better than world class, and that our banks were secure, and stable, and well-capitalised and the best in the world in these difficult times. All true, everything she said was true on that occasion. But who put that regulation in place? Of course it was the Liberal Government. So Mr Rudd’s created this political fantasy; I hope he enjoyed writing it; I don’t think anybody has been informed at all by reading it.   Thanks a lot.   [ends]     malcolmThu, 19 Feb 2009 01:05:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:320http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/328/Interview-with-Leon-Byner-Radio-5AA-Adelaide.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=328http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=328&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/328/Interview-with-Leon-Byner-Radio-5AA-Adelaide.aspxSubjects: Labor’s debt train; securing our economic future; RBA Assistant Governor Malcolm Edey’s speech; Murray-Darling Basin.   E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………...   BYNER:   Let’s talk to a bloke who was one of those who said, ‘nup, we’re not going to buy this stimulus package.’ He’s the Leader of the Opposition Malcolm Turnbull. Malcolm thank for joining us today.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   G’day Leon.   BYNER:   Are you still adamant that the Government’s stimulation package is wrong?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No Leon my position is, and the Opposition’s position is, that the Government’s stimulus package is too big, it incurs too much debt, it throws too much debt onto the shoulders of our children. And it is composed of elements that are not going to deliver enough value for money.   BYNER:   Okay.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   In other words too much.  Can I just summarise; too much debt, too few jobs.   BYNER:   Alright.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Too much debt, too few jobs.   BYNER:   What are some of the things they’re doing with some of this money that you think are really inadequate or wrong?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   The standout is that one-third of the package is going in a cash splash in March. Now you’ll remember we had a $10 billion cash splash in December which the Government said would create 75,000 jobs. There is no evidence offered by the Government or anyone else that it created any jobs.   They’re now going to hand out close to $14 billion in March. And again the simple point is that while that money will no doubt be gratefully received by everyone that gets it, and most Australians will get some of it, and most Australians I imagine will use it to pay down debt or put away as a saving, it is not going to create jobs. These one off payments, and the experience both from December in Australia or from the middle of last year in the United States when the Bush Administration did a similar thing, the experience is in times like this they are not an effective economic stimulus.   BYNER:   Okay, would you have had tax cuts instead would you?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   What we suggested – the answer is yes - they would have cost a lot less. The Government is spending close to $14 billion on a cash splash.  What we suggested was that the tax cuts that are already scheduled to come into effect on the 1st of July this year and the 1st of July in 2010 be brought forward to January. So they are permanent tax cuts and that is the…some of your listeners may have seen the American economist John Taylor on Lateline the other night who was explaining how permanent increases in income from permanent tax cuts have a much greater stimulatory effect, and there is plenty of evidence for that.   BYNER:   Alright.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   So while these are permanent tax cuts they are not a permanent drain on the budget because they’re already budgeted in from July 1 this year and July 1 next year.   BYNER:   Malcolm there is a fundamental problem with this whole theology and I’ll tell you what it is, and I’m sure as a former…a very successful banker you will understand this. Most economists when you talk to Robert Carling at the Centre for Independent Studies, or you go to someone like Quentin Grafton at ANU, the first thing they will tell you is that the borrowings of a federal government which are significant will ultimately mean that taxes will have to go up to pay for them.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   This is exactly the point I’ve been making, that the more the Government borrows today the higher the taxes our kids will have to pay.   BYNER:   So to borrow anything significant, okay, as far as I can read what you were saying is that you wouldn’t have spent $42 billion, you probably would have spent half that, right?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We said a package between $15 billion and $20 billion, better designed, so to spend less and to spend it more effectively. And we can go through the other elements of it if you have time.   BYNER:   Yeah alright, so surely no matter what you’re going to borrow if it’s significant amounts of money, $21 billion or $42 billion, someone has got to pay for this at some point?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No question. It all has to be paid for.   BYNER:   So what’s the point of giving a tax cut when down the track you’ve got to give it back and probably put taxes back up again to pay for what you’ve borrowed?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Leon the point is that you’re obviously trying to balance the need to have as little…incur as little debt as possible today and also provide an economic stimulus. The virtue of cutting taxes, as long as it’s done responsibly, is that it increases incentives to work, increases incentives to invest. And you can take a couple of paragraphs out of Wayne Swan’s speech in February last year when he legislated for these tax cuts and I could quote that today. I mean everyone understands the reason for lowering marginal rates is to increase incentives to work. And so it’s an economic positive but you’ve got to balance that off against the cost to the revenue.   BYNER:   What sort of debt are we going to be faced with? I mean what will the interest bill be a year, because the Government have said…see a lot of the publicity at the moment is going on the $42 billion or $43 billion. But remember that the federal Government has got a mind to borrow somewhat more than that. What’s the interest bill on this going to be? And when does it have to be paid?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well the Government is going to run up $200 billion worth of debt in fairly short order. So pick whatever interest rate you assume, it’s pretty easy to work out. If you think the Government…this money will be borrowed for a long time but if it’s borrowed for example at, you know, four per cent interest, you can work it out pretty easily – it’s a huge amount of money.   BYNER:   Well a couple of billion a year.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well four per cent on 100 is $4 billion and four per cent on 200 is $8 billion.   BYNER:   Yeah, so the question is; can the nation afford it or is the Government banking on the fact that some of the money that they’ve invested or all is going to have a multiple affect where somehow it will stimulate the economy? For example, do you like the package spending the money on the schools?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We certainly support spending money on schools and we invested a huge amount of money in schools when we were in government. But what the Rudd Government has said it wants to do is spend $14 billion over two and a half years largely on assembly halls and libraries in primary schools.   Now I’m all in favour of investing money in primary schools or indeed secondary schools – and there’s an element of their package that goes to secondary schools too – but I am very sceptical about the ability of state governments to deliver that level of investment efficiently in that timeframe and if you doubt me on the basis that I’m a Liberal/federal politician, Michael Costa, who was until recently the Labor Treasurer of New South Wales, has made exactly that point in an article in The Australian not so long ago.   So what we said, again, because we are more prudent and more careful about spending other peoples money and raising taxes; what we’ve said is that instead the….what we would support is a $3 billion school investment program, $3 billion over three years.   Now of course if there is greater demand than that, and you can spend more efficiently, governments can look at it.   Let me just wind back to another fundamental point Leon, we all recognise that our economy is a lot stronger than just about any other developed country – I can’t think of another developed country which has an economy as strong as ours. Unemployment has been going up, but it is still 4.8 per cent, so it is not up towards…heading up towards eight per cent as it is in the United States and other countries.   Because of the 11 and a half years of good government under the Coalition debt was paid off, so Labor is taking us heavily into debt, but they didn’t start off with a big debt like most other countries did.   So all in all we are in a relatively stronger position and yet we are spending more as a percentage of our Gross Domestic Product, a percentage of our GDP, as a stimulus than any comparable country – and in case people doubt me on this, Malcolm Edey who is the Assistant Governor in charge of economic policy for the Reserve Bank has given a speech today, it’s on the Reserve Bank’s website: www.rba.gov.au and there he sets out in a table there the discretionary fiscal easing in selected countries as a per cent of GDP in 2009 – he has US over two, UK over one, Germany one and a half, Japan one and a quarter, China, South Korea and Taiwan over two, Australia two and a half. So there we are; we are at either higher or as high as any other country.   Now all of those countries have got economic circumstances much more difficult than ours and so our criticism is they are spending too much money at this time. They should be spending less money more effectively and of course you’ve always got the option to spend more at a later date if that is required.   BYNER:   Do you believe that this stimulus package, which is 2.5 per cent of our Gross Domestic Product, is going to wrestle us away from recession?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I don’t believe that it is going to be effective for the money that is spent. There is no doubt that a percentage for example of the cash splash will be spent but it will be a very small percentage.   The history and experience with these sorts of cash payments is that you know somewhere in the order of a quarter of it tends to get spent. Now you saw - the figures aren’t yet in for the cash splash in December - but if you look at the retail figures, the Government was cock-a-hoop that after spending $10 billion retail sales had gone up by $700 million in December.   Now that is not much of a return and of course much of that money, perhaps most of it was spent on imported goods anyway. So the real question has got to be; is this going to be effective? How many jobs will it create?   BYNER:   Malcolm are you enamoured of Nick Xenophon’s initiative to bring forward some…about a billion dollars to the Murray-Darling Basin?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I’m pleased that he’s stirred up some action from the Government. As you know the whole Murray-Darling plan was our initiative. I was the Water Minister at the time. The whole idea of the Federal Government taking over water management in the Murray-Darling Basin, committing $10 billion was an initiative of our government – it wasn’t even an idea proposed by Labor.   BYNER:   So you think Nick did the right thing?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Look, Nick did the right thing in pursuing his agenda, yes. It’s not something that we could have done because we had a more fundamental objection to the package. But I have been criticising Labor ever since they came in for the way they have dropped the ball on water and water management in the Murray-Darling Basin.   You know there is no shortage of money to invest Leon. John Howard put in $10 billion, it’s all in the budget, it’s all budgeted for, it’s all there. What Labor has done is fail to follow up with investments in irrigation infrastructure that will enable us to produce more food with less water.   BYNER:   Malcolm one obvious question; are you going to try as hard as you can to get Peter Costello back onto the frontbench?    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Leon, I think the issue is closed. Peter’s position is unequivocal and he’s made it very clear he’s not interested in a frontbench or leadership role.   BYNER:   Alright. Malcolm, thank you for joining us.   [ends]     malcolmWed, 18 Feb 2009 01:20:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:328http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/298/Brendan-Nelson.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=298http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=298&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/298/Brendan-Nelson.aspx Brendan Nelson has announced that he will retire from parliament at the next election. Over six years as a Cabinet minister in the Howard Government, Brendan was responsible for significant reforms in both the education and defence portfolios from which Australia will benefit for many years to come. Brendan worked extremely hard as Leader of the Opposition following the Coalition’s election defeat in November 2007. He began the process of rebuilding our party in challenging times and we owe him a debt of gratitude for his service. As Australia’s Minister for Defence, Brendan secured record government investment in the Australian Defence Force including average three per cent real annual increases in Defence expenditure to 2015/16. Brendan oversaw the deployment of Australian troops in our region which helped to restore stability to the Solomon Islands and East Timor, and implemented far-reaching reforms to boost recruitment and retention in the ADF. Brendan was also responsible for major defence acquisitions such as the Air Warfare Destroyers, amphibious ships, C-17s and Abrams tanks, all of which will be vital in protecting our people, interests and values well into the future. As Australia’s Education Minister, Brendan’s achievements include implementing much needed reform of Australia’s higher education sector, putting in place an agenda for higher standards and greater consistency in Australian schools, and delivering a greater focus on the importance of numeracy and literacy and the teaching of boys. Brendan entered parliament in 1996 following a distinguished career in medicine which culminated in him serving as President of the Australian Medical Association. Throughout his career he has displayed an outstanding commitment to public service, which I am sure will continue in his life after politics. Brendan Nelson has been a tireless worker and passionate advocate for his party, the electors of Bradfield and the Australian people. On behalf of the Coalition I thank Brendan for the last thirteen years of service to the Liberal Party and I wish him and Gillian well for their future. malcolmTue, 17 Feb 2009 03:44:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:298http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/347/Interview-with-Michael-Smith-Radio-4BC-Brisbane.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=347http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=347&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/347/Interview-with-Michael-Smith-Radio-4BC-Brisbane.aspxSubjects: Liberal Party; economic management, Labor’s debt.   E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………...   SMITH:   Malcolm, G’day.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   G’day Michael, how are you?   SMITH:   Well thanks. Can you just clear up a little bit of doubt about this, did you offer the Shadow Treasury role to Peter Costello?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Michael, I’m not going to go into private conservations.   SMITH:   You’re not going to answer me?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No, no, I am going to answer you, but let me just put this to you. Both I as Opposition Leader and indeed Brendan before me, have offered Peter on several occasions or invited him to come onto the frontbench and both of us as Leaders of the Opposition would have welcomed him onto the frontbench. He has declined and said that he has no interest in a role on the frontbench or indeed a leadership role. That’s the position he’s taken and I respect that and he is serving the people of Higgins as a backbencher.   SMITH:   Well is his presence destabilising you in the fact that people like me are going to ask you that question endlessly?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   He’s doing a good job Michael as the Member for Higgins. It is his prerogative to decide how he wants to serve in the Parliament. I have certainly invited him to come onto the frontbench and indeed so did Brendan and he has declined. His position has been quite consistent, which is that he does not have an interest in a frontbench or leadership role.   SMITH:   So is there any agreement between you and he that he won’t challenge for the leadership?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Michael what I’ve said to you is his position. So that is….you know…if he says he has no interest in a frontbench or leadership role then that answers the question doesn’t it?   SMITH:   Wayne Swan has today pointed to the Reserve Bank’s endorsement of his stimulus package and says that’s confirmation the size of the package was right. You opposed the package, were you wrong?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No we were right. The package was very large. It was large relative to similar measures in other countries, in other countries whose economies are much weaker than ours and it was also very poorly constituted.   There simply will not be enough jobs coming out of this package. This is all borrowed money Michael; we’ve just got to focus on that. This is $42 billion of borrowed money which our children will have to pay back. They are going to have to pay higher taxes and or probably get fewer government services or less government services in the future in order to pay this debt back.    SMITH:   What’s left to sell off to pay it back? Is there anything…there’s no Telstra, no Commonwealth Bank?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   There’s not a lot left, no that’s right, that’s right and that is an extremely good point because in order to pay-off Labor’s debt, obviously we ran solid surpluses, but we were also able to sell Telstra.   Now if you just get back to the…so we make the point this is all borrowed money and it will have to be paid back by our kids, of that there is no question – even Wayne Swan would have to admit that.   The next question is; is the money being wisely spent?  Well, let’s have a look at it.  One-third of it is going in cash payments, cash handouts, in March.  Now, we did a similar exercise, or the Government did a similar exercise in December, that so-called cash-splash of $10 billion.  There is nobody who believes that created any jobs.  The Government said it would create 75,000.  They have not presented any evidence it created one.  And so the big question – and this is really the key question – is, just focusing on that, if you spent $10 billion of borrowed money in December on the basis it would create 75,000 jobs and you cannot prove it created one, why are you backing up and doing the same again, plus some, that’s for about $14 billion in March?   SMITH:   Anna Bligh in this State says she’s creating 119,000 jobs attendant to the spending of $17 billion in infrastructure this year.  Do you think those numbers add up?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well she’s got to stack them up, Michael.  You know, it doesn’t sound very convincing to me.  But the onus when politicians stand up and say this will create jobs, so many jobs, the onus is on them to prove it.  Now, the fact is, Wayne Swan and Kevin Rudd said we are going to give away $10 billion in December and it’s going to create 75,000 jobs.  Where are they?   SMITH:   Did they say create or changed that to support, Malcolm…   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No, they said create…   SMITH:   …originally?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   They said create.  They haven’t changed that as far as December was concerned.  Now, with the $42 billion package they changed their language slightly and they said it would support 90,000 jobs – whatever that meant.   SMITH:   Yeah.  Do you think Malcolm that the politics at present would suggest that, you know, voter support is with the Government?  The polls seem to suggest that.  Have you got the politics wrong?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, I believe we’ve got the policy right.   SMITH:   The politics, though?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Michael, if the polls show the Government is ahead, well, they speak for themselves.  The simple fact of the matter is this, we were not elected, none of us, were elected to parliament just to do things that are popular in the short-term.  We’ve got to think of the long-term.  We’ve got to have a vision for the type of country we want to leave our children.  I do not want to leave this country burdened with huge debts that are going to cripple us financially and cripple our children and their children financially for decades to come.  And that is why you will find the Liberal Party standing up to the Government and saying, “stop, don’t spend any more than you absolutely need to, don’t spend money that is not going to be effective in creating jobs, use the taxpayers’ money and, in particular, our children’s credit card prudently, sparing and efficiently”.    SMITH:   Malcolm Turnbull in the interests of time we’re going to have to leave it.  Thank you very much for speaking with me.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Thanks so much Michael.   [ends]   malcolmTue, 17 Feb 2009 00:02:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:347http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/299/Shadow-Ministerial-Changes.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=299http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=299&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/299/Shadow-Ministerial-Changes.aspxI today announce changes to the Shadow Ministerial line-up. The changes include three movements within the Shadow Cabinet, and an additional responsibility for one Shadow Minister and the Senate Opposition Whip. The Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party, Julie Bishop, will assume the role of Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs.  I reiterate my great appreciation to Julie for her work as Shadow Treasurer and look forward to continuing to collaborate closely with her as Deputy Liberal Leader. Joe Hockey will take on the responsibility of Shadow Treasurer. Senator Helen Coonan will be Shadow Minister for Finance, Competition Policy and Deregulation. Joe and Helen, both of whom served in Treasury portfolios in the previous Coalition government, will present a formidable team to take on the Rudd Government over its mishandling of the economy and bungled response to the Global Financial Crisis.   Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training, Christopher Pyne, will take on the additional responsibility of the Manager of Opposition Business in the House of Representatives. Given the heavy responsibilities of the Shadow Finance Minister in the Senate, Senator Stephen Parry will take over responsibility as Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate in addition to his role as Opposition Whip. These changes to the Shadow Ministry strongly position the Coalition to continue to hold the Rudd Government to account for its misguided economic decisions – most recently the poorly targeted $42 billion spending package which will not create jobs, saddles future generations with an enormous debt, and leaves us less secure as a nation.  malcolmMon, 16 Feb 2009 03:49:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:299http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/402/SBS-Funding.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=402http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=402&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/402/SBS-Funding.aspx The Coalition recognises the important role that SBS plays in Australia as an independent national broadcaster providing multilingual and multicultural radio and television services.   While in Government, the Coalition ensured that the SBS was well-resourced and able to meet the challenges of the future including the transition to digital radio and digital television.   Funding for the SBS increased by 126% under the Coalition, in recognition of the unique and valuable contribution of SBS to Australian broadcasting. The Coalition also provided increased funding to SBS for the purchase of sports rights and in preparation for the switch-off of the analog TV signal.   In 2006, the Coalition announced the current base-level of funding for the SBS under the triennial commitment, which included funding for the current year of some $190 million.   SBS’s triennial base funding will need to be renewed by Labor in the context of the next Budget.   The Coalition continues to support funding for the SBS to allow the broadcaster to fulfil its core obligations to the Australian community.   Particularly, the Coalition believes that it is vitally important to ensure that the SBS is prepared for the transition to digital radio and television transmission.   The Coalition will continue to push the Government to ensure that the next triennial funding commitment shows due recognition of the challenges facing SBS.   malcolmSun, 15 Feb 2009 03:18:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:402http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/307/Victorian-Bushfire-Appeal-and-Queensland-Floods.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=307http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=307&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/307/Victorian-Bushfire-Appeal-and-Queensland-Floods.aspx Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Leader of the Opposition) (3.11 pm)—I thank the Prime Minister for his remarks and in particular thank the members for Gippsland and Indi for their very moving and  compassionate speeches full of compassion and indeed full of common sense reflecting their very great insight into their communities, particularly in these very terrible times of fire. I also thank the members for Kennedy, Dawson and Herbert for their reports on the floods in North Queensland. The Prime Minister and I were able to meet this morning, and I thank the Prime Minister for that opportunity. In these very troubled times Australians look to their leaders to work together in a common purpose. It is vital that wherever we can we aim to collaborate and work in a bipartisan way, because we do have a common purpose of putting these communities back on their feet. I say again, as I have said all week, we will support whatever it takes to put these communities back on their feet after this terrible tragedy. In that spirit there are a number of practical measures that I have raised with the Prime Minister that I will raise now in the House because they are important issues that the House should consider, that the public should consider. We would propose that a special commissioner for disaster insurance should be appointed for a fixed term to oversee the response of insurers to the natural disasters both in Victoria and in North Queensland, to act as an advocate for those making claims and to act speedily on complaints from insured persons. The commissioner would report to the parliament and to the government quarterly. As we know, very often victims of bushfires have had to wait for a very long time to get their claims paid. We should do everything we can to ensure that the insurance industry responds quickly. I commend the Assistant Treasurer for his actions already, but nonetheless we believe a commissioner of this kind would add additional force and authority, and indeed impartiality, in this effort. Equally, it is important to ensure that government contributions are directed to those in need and do not substitute for payments from insurers. In other words, government funds should not be directed in a manner that actually relieves the obligation of insurance companies; they should be directed to those in need. The Prime Minister has established with the Premier of Victoria a joint Commonwealth and Victorian bushfire reconstruction authority, and we certainly commend him on doing that. That is, we understand, to supervise and coordinate reconstruction efforts. That should be a genuinely bipartisan effort, and it should include parliamentary representation. We would propose that the member for McEwen, the Hon. Fran Bailey— whose community, as the Prime Minister has just said, has been most gravely affected—should be appointed to that authority. We also propose that a joint select committee should be established to review these tragic events in the Victorian bushfires, especially taking into account the findings of other recent inquiries into bushfires, including the report of the Nairn committee inquiry into the 2003 Canberra bushfires. We appreciate that the Victorian government has established a royal commission, and we welcome that. There will be great public interest in the identity of the commissioner or commissioners and, indeed, in the terms of reference, but we welcome the principle. But we all understand in this place that royal commissions can take several, often many, years before they reach a conclusion. There has been a great deal of work done on bushfires in the past. That should be reviewed again in the light of these events,  and it should be reviewed by this  parliament. This parliament should take action here. The royal commission should not be a mechanism that puts parliamentary action on hold for years and suspends public debate and parliamentary inquiry. Those are a number of practical matters that I would encourage the Prime Minister and the government to take on board now. The Prime Minister and I discussed a number of other matters, which we will no doubt continue discussing and which will no doubt be the subject of debate or discussion here in this House on another occasion. I say in conclusion that the nation that we are privileged to represent in this parliament is totally united in its commitment to restore these communities and put them back on their feet, and we should resolve to work together in a bipartisan way, as Australians, in ensuring that justice is done to the victims of this dreadful tragedy.  How you can help the victims of the Victorian Bushfires:  Donate to the Victorian Bushfire Appeal Fund - call 1800 811 700 or online blood donations are needed urgently. Government Assistance: Contact Centrelink Victorian Bushfire Information Line  - 1800 240 667 Official Government information and updates Bushfire Family Hotline - 1800 727 077 How you can help the victims of the Queensland Floods: Donate to the  Queensland Floods Disaster Relief Appeal Government Assistance: Contact Centrelink Official Government information and updates  Photo by Freddie Leong malcolmThu, 12 Feb 2009 06:32:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:307http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/339/Doorstop-Interview-Parliament-House-Canberra.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=339http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=339&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/339/Doorstop-Interview-Parliament-House-Canberra.aspx Normal 0 false false false EN-AU X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} Subjects: Securing our economic future.   E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………...   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   The Opposition has voted against Kevin Rudd’s $42 billion spending package because we believe it is bad policy. It imposes enormous debt on future generations, huge debt. It will not create jobs. It is not an effective use of tax payers’ money and it is imposing debts on our children and our grandchildren.   We need to have economic policies that are prudent, that are measured, that are effective and that will create jobs. And we’ve provided some suggestions of an alternative policy that could do that.   We’ve invited Mr Rudd to talk with us. He sought our votes but he has not been prepared to talk to us at all and now his economic policy is in tatters. It’s been rejected by this Parliament and he has only himself to blame.   We saw in the House today the extraordinary contempt, the extraordinary contempt that the Labor Government treats anybody that disagrees with them. They describe Warwick McKibbin, one of the world’s leading economists, one of Australia’s leading economists and a member of the board of our own Reserve Bank, they described Warwick McKibbin as not being in the mainstream of economic thinking – and it’s extraordinary, extraordinary contempt.   And yet what did Warwick McKibbin say? And I just cite Warwick McKibbin here. This is a member of the board of our own Reserve Bank, somebody the Labor Party now says is not in the mainstream. He said: “my view therefore is the current package is too large and should be something less than two per cent of GDP.”   Now that is something less than $20 billion. In other words it coincides with what we have suggested as a prudent level for a package at this time – between 15 and 20 billion dollars. And he also criticises, as have many others, the effectiveness of these payments; how much bang will the tax payer get for Mr Rudd’s buck? A buck he’s borrowing from our kids – so little bang that one economic writer described it as less of a bang than a dull thud.   That’s why we’ve opposed this package but we remain open to discuss a new package, to work with the Government to frame a new package if they are prepared to talk. The only reason Australia does not have fiscal stimulus package is because of Mr Rudd’s intransigence.   QUESTION:   Why don’t you move amendments tonight Mr Turnbull if you say you’re willing to negotiate? There have been plenty of major amendments moved in the past against government legislation?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well Paul, thank you for that. Well obliviously our amendments would not be carried. Realistically, this is a matter that should be dealt with around a table.   There are some very big issues here. There are very real questions about the prudence of taking… let’s be quite clear, Mr Rudd spent one per cent of GDP in December in a cash hand out which he said would create 75,000 jobs. There is no evidence of any jobs being created. He’s now proposing to borrow money from future generations to mail out a cash handout of an even greater size.   Now these are issues that really need to be discussed around a table in a constructive way. He’s prepared to talk to the Greens, to Senator Xenophon, to Senator Fielding, but he’s not prepared to sit down and talk to the Opposition whose votes he demands.   QUESTION:   But they didn’t announce they were going to vote against it?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We said we would vote against this package but we indicated that we would support a fiscal stimulus package that was differently constituted, both in terms of its size and its composition, and we said we were prepared to negotiate.   Mr Rudd said it’s either my package or nothing. I didn’t say it’s our package or nothing. I said this is an indication of what we would support, what we are seeking and we look forward to discussing it with the Government.   QUESTION:   Is no package at all better then the package they have on the table?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well there’s a range…   QUESTION:   Is that what you seem to be voting for?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No, there’s a range of views about that, but the only reason there’s no package is because Mr Rudd has said it’s either his package or nothing. Now he has the ability, if he chooses to take it up, of talking with us and reaching agreement on a package that would be effective and there are a range of views about this. Let’s face it. Australia’s…    QUESTION:   Is it better to have a package or no package? What’s your view?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   This package, as it stands, is not good policy.  It is not good policy.  It is a very large expenditure.  It’s coming out of borrowed money.  And let’s be quite clear – and this is made very clear in the Senate committee’s report – this represents a larger percentage of GDP as a stimulus than many other countries whose economies are in much worse shape.  And I make the point that many economists have made, including Dr McKibbin, that we should not be undertaking such a large stimulus with borrowed money today if for no other reason than if we believe this economic downturn is going to get worse we should keep some of our fire power back to be able to use it in the future.  I mean, this is a very imprudent financial package that the Government is proposing.   QUESTION:   Mr Turnbull, are you prepared to shoulder the blame if this package goes down and Australia enters a recession?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   If there is no package that is entirely the Prime Minister’s fault.  Let’s be quite clear about this.  We have said we would support a package in the order of $15 to $20 billion, so Mr Rudd knows he can get support for a package of that level.  He has cited the IMF as saying that there should be a stimulus of two per cent of GDP.  Dr McKibbin has made the point that given Australia’s relative strength relative to other countries our package should be somewhat less than two per cent – the two per cent is about $20 billion – so he knows that he has got an Opposition that is open to agreement on a package of that kind.  So the only reason Australia is not going to have a stimulus package equal to two per cent of GDP or thereabouts is because of the intransigence of the Prime Minister.   QUESTION:   But Mr Turnbull, are you going to continue to talk in generalities?  I mean, so far we know that you would support a $15 to $20 billion package that has tax cuts in it but we don’t know much beyond that.  Have you got a package ready to roll with some alternatives to the one the Government’s got on the table or are you going to continue just to talk in generalities?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, we’ve talked actually – I’m sorry you missed the speech I gave last week in the House of Representatives because I spoke in some specifics.  Bringing forward the tax cuts – the cost of that has been estimated by the library at $6.5 billion.  We’ve indicated we will support spending of $3 billion on schools over three years.  We’ve supported a less expensive, better targeted program for insulation.  And we’ve indicated that we would support, within the framework of $15 to $20 billion package, the Government reimbursing small businesses for a portion of the superannuation guarantee charge.  That puts cash into the hands of small businesses – all of them – and is a much more effective stimulus.  It lowers the cost of employment so it promotes jobs and it’s much more effective than the accelerated depreciation measure proposed by the Government.  And we’ve proposed other elements too.    But the reality is that we did not want to get into a debate of our package is better than there package.  What we wanted to do was to give an indication of the type of measures that we believe were appropriate and engaged in an open and constructive discussion with the Government.    Now remember, it was the Prime Minister who said, as he demanded our vote, that we should get out of the way, that we should get out of the road.  Now his bulldozer has stalled and he’s got to work out whether he wants to stay there, stalled in the middle of the road, or whether he wants to talk.  And we are open to talk.  The only reason Australia is not going to have, as we stand here today, a fiscal stimulus package is because of the intransigence of the Prime Minister.    Around the world other governments are negotiating.  Look at all the negotiations in the United States.  They’ve been going on for quite a while.  The President has been negotiating with his Republican opponents.  The House has been…   QUESTION:   He only got three Republicans, they split.  Maybe three Liberals could help out here.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, Mr Rudd who, like all of us, so admires President Obama has a lot to learn from him and not just in terms of his great oratory and his political skills – we can all learn a lot from President Obama in that regard – but the big lesson for Mr Rudd at the moment is to learn the simple lesson that if you want people to support you, you’ve got to be prepared to sit down and work with them.    And Mr Rudd has treated the Opposition with contempt.  He’s insulted us.  He’s insulted us. He has said we’re irrelevant and we should get out of the road.  We’ve stood up for what we believe, which is prudent, sound economic management, policies that create jobs and, above all, we’ve stood against the reckless imposition of hundreds of billions of dollars of debt on our children and our grandchildren.    Thanks very much.   [ends] malcolmThu, 12 Feb 2009 05:56:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:339http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/306/Victorian-Bushfires-Condolence-Motion-in-Parliament.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=306http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=306&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/306/Victorian-Bushfires-Condolence-Motion-in-Parliament.aspxIt is with a very heavy heart that I rise to support the motion so eloquently moved by the Deputy Prime Minister. We live in a very beautiful country, but surely it has a terrible beauty and we have seen the full terror of that beauty in the last few days. And to see it in such a beautiful part of Australia is so awesome. The towns of the Yarra Valley were carved out of the mountains to service the rush to the goldfields in the middle of the 19th century. These are beautiful towns that have become so loved by generations since, because of their beauty and because of the friendliness and the hospitality of their people. It is a rite of passage for Melbournians to drive from the suburbs of their great city into the Yarra Valley, to drive through those mighty forests. The towering mountain ash, the giant tree ferns and the manna gums and on to the alpine regions. Marysville, Kinglake and Narbethong have served as the base for the Lake Mountain ski resort, where many Victorian children get their first taste of the snowfields, build their first snowman and throw their first carefree snowball. In autumn and spring they have offered the beauty of the Mystic Mountains and the glorious Cathedral Ranges, walks through quiet forest glades, the beauty of spectacular waterfalls and even occasionally the sight of a lyrebird. From the 1920s these towns have become popular tourist resort destinations and loved by people from all over Australia and all over the world. But at the height of the Australian summer, amidst all of this natural beauty, this serenity, there is a looming menace, because on those hot February days, especially when the northerlies come down like a blast from a foundry and the forests begin to wilt, then there is a real menace: truly nature at its most menacing; nature at its most terrible. Last Saturday was such a day. There were freakishly high temperatures and ferocious winds. It was a savage brute of a day, the like of which Victorians have never seen and would hope never to see again. That is the cruel paradox of the land in which we live. Never before have we witnessed fury such as this, such havoc and such devastation inflicted on any of our communities. Never before has there been a tragedy on a scale as great. This is the terrible side of the beauty of Australia. Down in Whittlesea today Phil Edmunds and his wife were relieved that they had escaped with their lives. They lived at Kinglake. They had seen the fire 10 kilometres away. Five minutes later it was upon them. It was travelling at 120 kilometres an hour. When we were at Whittlesea today, survivor after survivor told Fran Bailey and me that the fires have been moving at 120 kilometres an hour. Who, how can you outrun a menace like that? Phil – or ‘Smiley’, as he is known – escaped. His neighbours were one minute behind him. One minute. Later he saw their burnt out car. He does not know for sure whether they escaped alive or not. One minute – was that the difference between life and death, between life and a holocaust of fire and wind of 120 kilometres an hour? Smiley has lost all his possessions but I could see in his eyes, as in those of so many others today, a sense of amazement and wonder: ‘How did I make it? Why did I make it when so many of my friends did not?’ We sat last night with Peter McWilliam, who is the president of Fran’s FEC. And he’s used – as are all FEC presidents, all branch presidents in all political parties are – he is used to ringing up branch members. He was calling last night to see who had lived and who had died. What a tally, what a job, what a terrible few days; the capricious brutality of this fire has swept everything before it. There was another man there, too – a survivor. Immigrants to this country; they were there too, reflecting on their survival. The husband said to me, ‘We think we are so smart, with all our science and our plans, and then Mother Nature comes along and stamps upon us’. And then there too, sitting quietly against the wall, there were two grandparents, their faces racked with a quiet anguish. Their youngest child, their son, lives in Kinglake with his own family. They have not been able to find him. The grandmother was sitting there, her hands in her lap, quietly knitting and unknitting her fingers with an anxiety that spoke more powerfully of her terror than tears or words could ever do. It is impossible to speak too highly of the courage and commitment of the firefighters, the police and the other emergency workers battling this terror. There are no words that are adequate to convey the praise, the admiration and the support that we owe these men and women. The Country Fire Authority’s volunteers have stood up in the face of the fiercest fires any of them have ever seen. One veteran of 45 years’ service as a volunteer fireman – he has seen them all – told us late last night that the intensity, the heat and, above all, the speed of the fires was without any precedent. But they were in good heart. Whether they were the men and women at Diamond Creek CFA brigade last night or at Whittlesea today, they were in good spirits. They were tired, they were exhausted, but they knew they had fought a good fight. They knew that there were hundreds of lives and properties that had survived this terrible fire because of their efforts. Some of the volunteers we met had lost their own homes. They had lost their own homes while they were defending the lives and the homes of other Australians. Truly, these men and women embody the very best of the Australian spirit of self-sacrifice in the service of others. Being country people, many of the survivors are very keen, very acute observers of nature. One man from Humevale noted, and explained at great length, the different speed at which the fire had travelled when it went through ungrazed land at 120 kilometres an hour, like a speeding car, from when it struck land that had been grazed, and moved, he said, at only a walking pace. We are only beginning to understand the nature of this horror. There was a quiet young officer from police forensics there today. He was talking of how people had died, how people had died when the fireball had sucked all the oxygen out of the air and left them with nothing to breathe but fire itself. This truly has been a tragedy that has brought out the most terrifying side of nature –the most terrible side of nature – but it has brought out the best, the best in us, in Australians, because confronting the adversity of nature at its fiercest has been part of our national story: Cyclone Tracy, Black Friday, the Maitland floods, Ash Wednesday. And, of course, today, as Victorians grapple with this firestorm, their fellow Australians in North Queensland face a flood. And these are the extremes. We are the land, indeed, of ‘drought and flooding rains’. And the land that we love so much, in the words of Dorothea Mackellar, we love ‘her beauty and her terror’. We have always known it and we have always feared it and respected it, but we have always fought back. And today we offer our heartfelt prayers for the families who have lost their loved ones, and extend our unstinting admiration to the men and women who have defended the lives of so many Australians in this terrible tragedy. And we cannot hold back anything that is required. The three words that should define our national response to this tragedy must be ‘whatever it takes’: whatever it takes to put these people back on their feet, to enable them to rebuild their homes, to enable them to restock their farms, to enable them to recover their lives and grow again, because they did not deserve this. Nobody deserves a tragedy like this. But they deserve our loyalty and support and they will get it. Soon enough, we will begin the task of recovery and rebuilding. That will demand resilience and resourcefulness. It will demand courage and tenacity and determination. And the communities in Victoria – all of them, all of them right across the state – will require the solidarity and support of their fellow Australians and they will get it. But let there be no doubt about the people we have spoken of today, and the people we have visited today—the people of the Yarra Ranges. They are a very hardy lot. I cannot count the number of times I was told by people who had lost everything they owned that they would pick themselves up and start again. We already know of their will to fight, because we have seen it before. Think of this: you only need to make the trip back down through the Black Spur and across the Dandenong Ranges to the town of Cockatoo. Think of the town of Cockatoo. The people of Kinglake know that trip. When the Lakers play the Brookers as part of the annual fixture on the Yarra Valley Mountain District Football League, they make that trip. So they know that town well. On Ash Wednesday, 16 February 1983, Cockatoo was wiped out by fire: 300 homes destroyed, seven lives lost, a small hillside town. But the people of Cockatoo were not beaten. Passionately, they rebuilt their houses. Out of the ashes, Cockatoo came back. By 1986, the population was over 2,000. By 1991, it was nearly 3,000. And today, more than a quarter of a century after the devastation, Cockatoo has more than doubled in size. With grit and fighting spirit, Cockatoo came back, bigger than ever. So, too, will Marysville, Kinglake and Narbethong, because nothing can wipe these places off the map. They live in the hearts of the brave people we met today, and so many others. And they must live and be rebuilt in our hearts too. The Opposition will give the Government all the support that we can. We must do everything we can together, as a parliament, as a nation, to give these people whatever it takes to restore their communities and to build them stronger and safer in the years ahead. This is a terrible country in its terror and its fire. It is a beautiful country in its wonderful nature and gifts. As we deal with that terror, as we respond to the terror of Australia, so we forge the strength, the resilience, the courage and the determination that is Australian.malcolmMon, 09 Feb 2009 06:29:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:306http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/302/Kevin-Rudds-plan-to-lump-every-Australian-with-9500-in-debt.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=302http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=302&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/302/Kevin-Rudds-plan-to-lump-every-Australian-with-9500-in-debt.aspx  Kevin Rudd is planning to plunge Australia deep into debt with a poorly considered and ineffective  $42 billion "fiscal stimulus" package.   He is proposing to run up $200 billion in debt - $9500 for every man, woman and child in Australia.   It took us ten years to repay Mr Keating's $96 billion of debt. How long will it take to repay Mr Rudd's $200 billion?   Why should we mortgage the future of our children and grandchildren to fund gigantic cash handouts today?   Mr Rudd demanded the Parliament approve his plans within 48 hours and has refused to discuss let alone negotiate the package with the Opposition.   Mr Rudd claimed that unless the package was passed by the Parliament this week, his latest $11 billion cash splash would not be able to be paid in March. And only this morning the CEO of Centrelink has told the Senate Committee inquiring into the package "If the parliament passes this legislation as currently presented, we will be able to implement for 11 March."   So the whole demand for Parliament to approve the package in 48 hours was based on a falsehood.   What else does the Government have to hide?   Now, we believe this stimulus package is too big and it is ineffective.   We have asked Mr Rudd again and again to sit down and discuss the matter with us so we can agree on a package both sides of Parliament can support.   He has refused to do that. As a consequence we have no choice but to vote against it in the House and the Senate.   In a speech in Parliament on Wednesday I set out the reasons for voting against the package and indicated the type of changes to it we would favour. You can also see my opinion pieces in the Daily Telegraph and Sydney Morning Herald here and my Message to the Nation and YouTube message here.   We know this decision will not be popular, but it is the right decision.   We consider that the package is poorly targeted, ill-thought through and irresponsible in today’s economic climate.   At this stage we believe a package of between $15-20 billion would be more affordable and appropriate.     The objective of any package must be to protect and create jobs, support small business and strengthen our economy.  This package will not achieve this.   We have said time and again that the most important issue this year is jobs.   We look at this package and we see little evidence that it will underpin the jobs of Australians.   There is no evidence the Government’s $10.4 billion spending package before Christmas created any of the 75,000 jobs Mr Rudd promised.   Almost all economists agree that the downturn has a long way to go.  And yet the Rudd Labor Government is panicking, firing all its bullets at the first engagement.  And even with his reckless cash hand-outs and massive, debt-fuelled spending, the Prime Minister’s package predicts unemployment will top 7% in just over a year – another 300,000 Australians out of work.   Mr Rudd’s plan asks the Parliament’s permission to take the nation $200 billion into deficit – $9,500 debt for every Australian.   In offering to negotiate a revised package with Mr Rudd I have indicated the different approach we would take.   It is an approach which clearly outlines the difference between the Coalition and Labor. It is an approach borne out of a predisposition towards experienced, prudent economic management.   It is an approach which recognises the reality of a Budget deficit but aims to minimise public debt.   We propose that the permanent tax cuts currently scheduled for 1 July 2009 and 1 July 2010 be brought forward, and backdated to 1 January this year.   By the middle of 2010 this would leave a two-income household earning $80,000 approximately $1700 better off.   Perhaps the largest gap in the Government package is the lack of measures that directly and broadly support employment – particularly employment in the small business sector.   While accelerated depreciation has some merit, the Coalition believes measures that more directly, immediately improve the cash flow position of small firms and help them protect and create jobs are preferable.   One proposal the Coalition is seeking to discuss with the Government is the Commonwealth paying a portion of the Superannuation Guarantee Levy on behalf of small employers (those with 20 or fewer staff) for the next two years.  This measure will directly improve the cash position of small firms, directly reduce the costs of employment, and so directly contribute to preserving jobs.   These measures are not only fairer.  They also represent a better targeted and more effective stimulus for the economy.  They better protect jobs.   We support investment in infrastructure if it is well targeted and well managed. We have proposed that $3 billion be committed to school upgrades by reinstating the Coalition's very successful Investing in our Schools Programme.   Unlike Mr Rudd we do not believe we have all or indeed the only answers. That is why we invite the Government to sit down and discuss alternative stimulus measures which would be responsible and allow sufficient capacity in public finances to meet emerging challenges.   The Coalition is committed to sound economic management and to ensuring that Government spending is of high quality and reduces the burden on Australian taxpayers and their children.  malcolmFri, 06 Feb 2009 06:14:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:302http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/309/Rudds-splurge-is-too-much-too-soon.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=309http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=309&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/309/Rudds-splurge-is-too-much-too-soon.aspx Source: Sydney Morning Herald Thursday, 5 February 2009 The Coalition will vote against the Rudd Government's latest $42 billion expenditure package because it is poorly targeted and unnecessarily large. It is being jammed through Parliament with unseemly haste and, together with the cash splash of last December, amounts to the largest real increase in Commonwealth spending in 35 years. We know this decision will not be popular or earn us good ratings in the opinion polls, but it is the right decision for Australia. The objective of any package at the present time must be to protect and create jobs, support small business and strengthen our economy. But we see scant evidence that it is the most efficient way to underpin Australian jobs. There is no evidence the Government's $10.4 billion spending package before Christmas created the 75,000 jobs the Prime Minister promised - the only objective measure he provided to judge its success or failure. Likewise, there is no indication this package will maximise job creation. Perhaps this is why Wayne Swan's claim - that it will "support" 90,000 jobs over two years - is so modest considering the vast cost. Each job apparently requires an annual outlay by the Commonwealth of $233,000. Most of December's cash handout was saved by households, acting entirely appropriately given the Prime Minister's dire rhetoric and their own circumstances, whereas permanent tax reductions are not only more likely to be spent, but increase incentives. Household saving is prudent - and represents a return to values of thrift that eventually need to be restored in any case - but if everybody saves, the stimulus will be diminished. Too much of this package involves commitments delivered through … incompetent state Labor administrations. Does anyone really believe this money will be spent in a timely, efficient fashion? Can Nathan Rees really get it done? There are legitimate questions about the scale of the deficits and borrowing being contemplated, given the uncertain economic outlook and federal Labor's track record. Almost all economists agree this downturn has a long way to go, but the Rudd Government is firing all its bullets at the first engagement. Labor is good at getting into deficit, but not very good at getting out. The Keating government left behind $96 billion in national debt, and it took the Australian people a decade to repay this debt. Now, Mr Rudd has asked Parliament for permission to take us $200 billion into debt - $9500 for every Australian. Mr Rudd says our deficit will be lower than that of other countries. But unlike most other large industrialised economies, we depend heavily on foreign savers to finance our current account and do not possess a reserve currency supported by global investors regardless of domestic economic policies. And we face substantial intergenerational fiscal challenges. This is why it is so important that the Commonwealth borrow with great care. Even after all the free spending, the package still forecasts that unemployment will top 7 per cent in just over a year - another 300,000 Australians out of work. Given uncertainty over the economy this year, we believe a package of between $15 and $20 billion is more appropriate. If the situation deteriorates further, more can be done, but it is impossible to undo a one-time stimulus once spent. We propose the permanent tax cuts scheduled for 1 July this year and 1 July next year be brought forward, backdated to 1 January this year. By the middle of 2010, this would leave a two-income household earning $80,000 about $1700 better off. Second, perhaps the largest gap in the Government package is the lack of measures that directly and broadly support employment - particularly employment in small business. Accelerated depreciation has some merit but there are measures that would immediately improve the cash flows of small firms and protect jobs, such as the Commonwealth paying a portion of the Superannuation Guarantee Levy on behalf of small employers. This would directly cut the costs of employment, and preserve jobs. Third, we support infrastructure spending but smaller, better-targeted programs will be more cost effective. Unlike the Prime Minister, we do not believe there is no alternative to our approach and we invite the Government to sit down and discuss alternative stimulus measures, which would be responsible and allow sufficient capacity in public finances to meet emerging challenges. It is up to the Prime Minister to follow the lead of the Obama Administration and engage in a discussion about how to confront the crisis, rather than deriding any alternative opinion to his own as "neo-liberal extremism". malcolmThu, 05 Feb 2009 06:59:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:309http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/308/A-debt-burden-to-shame-Keating.aspx#Comments1http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=308http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=308&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/308/A-debt-burden-to-shame-Keating.aspx Source: Daily Telegraph EVERY time I meet a school group visiting Parliament House, I tell them how every MP and senator is working hard to make Australia a better place for them to grow up. As of today, there is nobody who can look those children straight in the eye to tell them their economic future is secure. Not when the Rudd Government's latest $42 billion spending package includes provision to borrow up to $200 billion - that is, a total of $9500 for every man, woman and child in Australia. It is important we understand exactly what Mr Rudd is threatening here: the single biggest spending binge since the Whitlam years, and a debt burden that would put the Keating Government to shame. And it is a package that doesn't do enough to protect and create jobs, support small business and strengthen the economy. When in government, we in the Coalition delivered 2.2 million jobs. This was the result of rigorous, well-crafted policies to create one of the strongest, most successful and prosperous economies in the world. We sought to remove financial burdens from coming generations, and we did so. We recognised that every billion dollars spent, every billion dollars of extra debt incurred, would have to be repaid by our children. So, from 1996, we paid off $96 billion of Labor debt. This was hard work, involving tough decisions. Mr Rudd has made not one hard decision since coming to office. He has wanted to be Santa Claus - everybody gets a prize. The problem with everybody getting a prize today is that our children will be carrying a very heavy penalty in the years to come. This is why we will vote against this package. That is why we do not support a further round of cash handouts. We know this will not be popular. But it is the right thing to do. Somebody has to stand up for future generations, and not cruel their chances in life by weighing them down with staggering levels of debt. We in the Coalition do not reject the need for a stimulus at this time. But our judgement is that $42 billion is too much right now. The Government is looking increasingly like a frightened soldier who fires off all his ammunition in a panic in the first minutes of a battle. This downturn may be very long lasting. We cannot afford to spend so much all at once. We need to keep a few shots in the locker. A more appropriate stimulus would be in the order of between $15 billion and $20 billion dollars. As part of that, we would support the bringing forward of the July 1 tax cuts to January 1 this year. Our plan would benefit all taxpayers, most significantly those on low and middle incomes. It is very well targeted. It would not put $950 in everybody's pocket today. But it would increase permanent income and create greater incentive to work and to invest, providing a bigger economic boost than public spending. We have said again and again that we are prepared to sit down and discuss with the Prime Minister the range of responses to deal with the economic challenges we face. All of our offers have been rejected. For my part, I am committed to ensuring every dollar is spent wisely. Most Australians will know in their hearts nothing comes for free and that, one day, somebody has to pay. malcolmThu, 05 Feb 2009 06:57:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:308http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/326/Interview-with-Helen-Kapalos-Ten-News.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=326http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=326&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/326/Interview-with-Helen-Kapalos-Ten-News.aspx  Subjects: Securing our economic future; Kevin Rudd's plan to lump every Australian with $9500 in debt; executive salaries.   E&OE………………………………………………………………………………......   HELEN KAPALOS:   And the man who's leading the fight against the stimulus package, Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull, joins us now from our Canberra studios. Good morning, Mr Turnbull.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Good morning Helen.   HELEN KAPALOS:   The Coalition obviously spent fifteen hours last night at a marathon session arguing against the $42 billion spending spree before it was eventually passed in the Lower House early this morning. So what did you achieve?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well that's democracy, Helen. Parliament is there to debate these issues, and obviously the Government has the numbers in the House, so they won the vote. But now it goes to the Senate, and the Senate will submit this plan to real scrutiny.   HELEN KAPALOS:   But what if the minor parties end up supporting those measures in the Senate?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Helen, we'll see what emerges. But can I just say this to you – we support the Government taking action to stimulate the economy. But it has to be effective. Mr Rudd's package is too big, it's too much money, it is being used ineffectively. It is going to drive us deeper and deeper into debt – debts that our children will be paying high taxes to pay off. It is not going to create jobs. It is not an effective stimulus. So that's why we're opposing what he's doing, and we would propose to take action which would cost less and would be more effective.    HELEN KAPALOS:   From where you're sitting though, it's obviously a higher-risk strategy to stand between Australians and a bucket full of money. Your stance isn't going to make you very popular.    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I’m pretty sure it will make me very unpopular, and I'm sure the opinion polls will be very bad. But the reality is we are here to do what is right. Now this is $42 billion that is not being spent wisely. Just ask ourselves this question: just before Christmas, Mr Rudd spent nearly $10 billion in a handout which he said was going to create 75,000 jobs. Where are they? Nobody believes that that was an effective stimulus, and now he's proposing to do that and much more again.    HELEN KAPALOS:   Mr Turnbull, do you have the full support of your party? There are reports coming out of Canberra today that some of your own MPs claim your stance is political suicide.    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Helen, the party room is completely united behind this approach. We had a very extensive debate about it. We take these issues very seriously. The first time the Labor Party knew about this package was when they read about it in the press. We discussed our response at great length in our party room and in our Shadow Cabinet, and we are completely united in taking this stand because we know it is right for Australia, it's right for our children, it's strong economic management, it's being responsible with taxpayers' money.    HELEN KAPALOS:   As part of your response though, you say you'd also be prepared to go into debt. So aren't you also prepared to mortgage the future?    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well Helen, I don’t think there's any doubt that, with the decline in Government revenues that we see, that the Budget will be in deficit. And if that continues over a period of time, obviously the Government will go into debt. But it's a question of how much debt. I mean, all of us know the difference between having a little bit of debt and having too much. Mr Rudd wants to take us up to $200 billion of debt. One of the bills we voted against this morning was one which allows the Commonwealth – the Commonwealth Government which had no debt, and indeed had cash in the bank a year ago – they want the Commonwealth to be able to borrow up to $200 billion. That's a very big limit to put on the national credit card.    HELEN KAPALOS:   Obviously a late night for you, but not for the Prime Minister?    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, he presumably had a good night's sleep and he'll no doubt be feeling very bouncy as a result of that. But if this issue is of such great importance – and it is – and if this package is of such great urgency, then it is a real pity that he and the Deputy Prime Minister weren't able to stir themselves from their slumbers and come into the House to vote on it this morning.    HELEN KAPALOS:   Now in the United States Barack Obama is moving to cap executive pay packets to half a million for businesses that have been bailed out by the Government. Is that a measure you'd support here?    MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, I certainly support strong action being taken to curb excessive salaries. Now, just to mark a big difference between me and Mr Rudd: Mr Rudd talks about this but does nothing. Long before I was in Parliament I took action as a shareholder of a public company to stop excessive remuneration being paid to directors. I have proposed that every director's remuneration – every senior executive's remuneration – should be subject to a vote by the shareholders. They should be able to approve it or not. Now, Mr Rudd has declined or refused to adopt that, and yet that simple change would put real restraints on excessive payments to directors and executives of big companies. And it puts the say in the hands of the people that own the company – the shareholders, large and small.     HELEN KAPALOS:   We'll have to leave it there. Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull, thank you for your time.    MALCOLM TURNBULL:    Thanks Helen.    [ends]    malcolmThu, 05 Feb 2009 01:15:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:326http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/305/Coalition-opposes-42-billion-expenditure-package.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=305http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=305&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/305/Coalition-opposes-42-billion-expenditure-package.aspx The Coalition will oppose the Rudd Government’s latest $42 billion expenditure package because it is not a responsible or sustainable way to run the national economy. We know this decision will not be popular, but it is the right decision. The Prime Minister yesterday demanded that the House of Representatives approve $42 billion in expenditure within 48 hours: almost a billion dollars an hour. We consider that the package is poorly targeted, ill-thought through and irresponsible in today’s economic climate. At this stage we believe a package of between $15-20 billion would be more affordable and appropriate.   The objective of any package must be to protect and create jobs, support small business and strengthen our economy.  This package will not achieve this. We have said time and again that the most important issue this year is jobs. We look at this package and we see little evidence that it will underpin the jobs of Australians. There is no evidence the Government’s $10.4 billion spending package before Christmas created the 75,000 jobs Mr Rudd promised. Almost all economists agree that the recession has a long way to go.  And yet the Rudd Labor Government is panicking, firing all its bullets at the first engagement.  And even with his reckless cash hand-outs and massive, debt-fuelled spending, the Prime Minister’s package predicts unemployment will top 7% in just over a year – another 300,000 Australians out of work. We believe the Senate should sit next week to ensure proper detailed scrutiny of this package, which contains the largest increase in government expenditure in 35 years. The previous Labor Government left a legacy of $96 billion in government debt and the Budget had been in deficit for six successive years.  It took the Australian people a decade to repay this debt. Now, another Labor Government is asking us, on behalf of those hard working Australians to agree to plunge headlong back into large deficits and significant debt.    Mr Rudd’s plan asks the Parliament’s permission to take the nation $200 billion into deficit – $9,500 debt for every Australian. Today I outline an alternate response which will be more effective in protecting Australians from the effects of the financial crisis. It is an approach which clearly outlines the difference between the Coalition and Labor. It is an approach borne out of a predisposition towards experienced, prudent economic management. It is an approach which recognises the reality of a Budget deficit but aims to minimise public debt. We propose that the permanent tax cuts currently scheduled for 1 July 2009 and 1 July 2010 be brought forward, and backdated to 1 January this year. By the middle of 2010 this would leave a two-income household earning $80,000 approximately $1700 better off. Perhaps the largest gap in the Government package is the lack of measures that directly and broadly support employment – particularly employment in the small business sector. While accelerated depreciation has some merit, the Coalition believes measures that more directly, immediately improve the cash flow position of small firms and help them protect and create jobs are preferable. One proposal the Coalition is seeking to discuss with the Government is the Commonwealth paying a portion of the Superannuation Guarantee Levy on behalf of small employers (those with 20 or fewer staff) for the next two years.  This measure will directly improve the cash position of small firms, directly reduce the costs of employment, and so directly contribute to preserving jobs. These measures are not only fairer.  They also represent a better targeted and more effective stimulus for the economy.  They better protect jobs. The Coalition invites the Government to sit down and discuss alternative stimulus measures which would be responsible and allow sufficient capacity in public finances to meet emerging challenges. The Coalition is committed to sound economic management and to ensuring that Government spending is of high quality and reduces the burden on Australian taxpayers and their children. malcolmWed, 04 Feb 2009 06:26:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:305http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/329/Response-to-the-Governments-42-billion-expenditure-package.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=329http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=329&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/329/Response-to-the-Governments-42-billion-expenditure-package.aspx Every time I meet a school group visiting this place I tell them that every member and senator is working hard to make Australia a better place for them to grow up in. I say that we often disagree but that everybody is focussed on them and I tell those children that this parliament belongs to them, that everyone is committed to a better future for them. I wonder today if I can say that to them again, because every billion dollars that we spend, every billion dollars of debt that we incur will have to be repaid by those children.   In government, we sought to take financial burdens off the next generation, and we did so. The Future Fund did just that, relieving those schoolchildren of the burden of over $100 billion of future payments for public sector pensions, and now a Labor government is piling those burdens on those children once again. In four years, net debt will be $70 billion, around $3,300 for every man, woman and child, and the government has asked for the right, just a moment ago, to borrow up to $200 billion—$9,500 for every man, woman and child in Australia.   The plan we were presented with by the Prime Minister yesterday reeks of nothing more than panic. Far from a steady hand at the tiller we have a government led by a man who lurches from one ill-considered, ill-thought-out economic decision to another. We have seen the catastrophic unlimited bank deposit guarantee develop without even speaking to the Reserve Bank. We have seen the enormous harm that it did through the community—the hundreds of thousands of Australians whose savings were frozen as a consequence, the finance companies who could not raise money and the motor dealers who could not get finance. All of that flowed from an ill-considered decision. But there have been so many others. We saw the cash splash just before Christmas. We have the incredible proposal of the Ruddbank to prop up commercial property values for the benefit of the big banks and their profits.   In the light of all of that, all of those errors—acknowledged errors, not in dispute; even the Prime Minister’s defenders acknowledge that he has made mistakes but hope that he will make fewer in the future— instead of carefully compiling a comprehensive response to this crisis over the summer, the Prime Minister spent his time writing a bizarre ideological treatise. It was as though he stepped into another world, a parallel summer fantasy dimension where Australia’s economy has been wrecked by lack of regulation by Liberal governments. Anybody reading his treatise could reach no other assumption and yet we see his own deputy, the Deputy Prime Minister, saying that Australia’s financial and prudential regulatory system was better than world-class and we see his small business minister writing in the Australian today ‘that Australia’s financial regulation is the envy of the rest of the world’. His own ministers are boasting of the stability of a financial system and its prudential and financial regulation that were put in place by the very men and women that their leader denounces as neo-liberal extremists committed to letting the market rip and opposed to any form of regulation. It says a lot about the delusional nature of the Prime Minister at this time that not even his own ministers are prepared to sign up to his rantings.   We have said again and again that we are prepared to sit down and discuss with the Prime Minister the form of the responses to this economic situation. All of those offers have been rejected. Yesterday the government presented Australia with its package at 12 noon. We were briefed by a handful of bureaucrats who were not able to answer even basic questions about the details of the package. They are still coming back to us on some of those issues. At 2.30 pm the Prime Minister read his statement, which we had been given at 1 pm. The government then went on the attack. It was irresponsible of the opposition not to immediately endorse the $42 billion package. Moreover, it had to be passed through the House and the Senate by Thursday. In other words, the Parliament of Australia would be given about 48 hours to consider and approve the expenditure of $42 billion.   We support the Senate coming back next week, deferring estimates, to go through this plan in the greatest detail. It is vital that we do so. One can well imagine those schoolchildren of today who, as adults years hence, are paying high taxes to pay off the debt. When they complain about the high taxes they will be told by governments, by ministers, ‘Well, we’ve got this big debt. You’ve got to pay higher taxes to pay it off.’ They will ask us, ‘What were you thinking when you spent all that money? Why did you do that?’ We will have to answer, ‘Well, we didn’t have much time to think about it at all really.’   The opposition will vote against this package in the House and in the Senate. We know that this is not going to be a popular decision, but it is the right decision. The Prime Minister has made one easy decision after another. He has not made a hard decision since he took up that high office. But somebody has to stand up for what is right. Somebody has to stand up for fiscal discipline. Somebody has to stand up for the taxpayers of Australia and ensure that we do not impose staggering levels of debt on future generations. We will make that stand and we will make it knowing it is unpopular but recognising that the Australian people expect us to do what is right, and we will do that.   This stimulus represents about four per cent of GDP, almost all of which is spent over the next two years, following up on the one per cent of GDP cash splash in December last year. Despite the protests of the Treasurer, the fact that this stimulus follows so hard on the heels of the earlier one indicates that the December cash splash did not work. The general view among economists is that at least two-thirds of it was in fact saved. I am sure that most of the balance was well spent but not all of it was, as poker machine and hotel takings demonstrate. The fundamental problem, which the government refuses in its arrogance and in its blindness to acknowledge, is that, if you give people one-off windfall lump sums in uncertain times, they are more likely to save it than to spend it. That is a perfectly rational and prudent response. Indeed, the Prime Minister’s call at the end of last year on Australians to ‘spend, spend, spend’ is jarring. It was a jarring statement because most Australians—all of us, I am sure—know full well that at the core and instigation of this global recession was too much debt. In other words, whether governments like to hear it or not, a good old-fashioned conservative value of thrift and saving is going to come back into fashion, it is coming back into fashion and it ought to come back into fashion.   We do not reject the need for a stimulus at this time. The first question is: how big should the stimulus be today? Our judgement is that $42 billion is more than is appropriate right now. The government is looking increasingly like a frightened soldier who fires off all his ammunition in a panic in the first minutes of an engagement. This downturn may be very long lasting and we cannot possibly afford to spend larger and larger sums like this every quarter. Just think about it. If this package goes through, the government will have spent about one per cent of GDP in a cash splash in the December quarter and then there will be, just in the cash payments alone, another one per cent or somewhat more spent in the March quarter. It should not be overlooked by anybody that, just as the government times its announcements to coincide with Newspoll, so it is timing its handouts on a quarterly basis to avoid, no doubt, a quarter of negative growth. But where is that going to lead us? If we look at the cash handouts alone that the government is proposing to give away in March and that it gave away in December, what are we to expect in the budget and beyond? Are we going to rack up $40 billion or $50 billion a year in cash handouts alone?   We do not have access to any more financial information than that contained in the government’s Updated Economic and Fiscal Outlook which, as I said, we were given yesterday afternoon. But if the Prime Minister wants our support to a fiscal stimulus then he must be prepared to sit down and talk with us, he must be prepared to put the cards on the table and he must be prepared to negotiate. His current political hero, President Obama, probably the most popular political leader in the world, sits down with his political opponents. He is prepared to negotiate. He is prepared to engage the members of his legislature. This Prime Minister is so vain, so arrogant and so convinced that he and he alone is right that he is not prepared to do any more to his political opponents than hold a gun to their head and say, ‘Stand and deliver and you’ve got two days to do it’.   Unlike the Prime Minister, we do not contend that the approaches we favour are the only way to go. There is an infinite range of policy options available at this time and all of them have detractors and supporters. None of them are certain of success. Let me give the House an indication of our views of the particular elements in this package and the elements that we believe would be more appropriate. This is a basis for negotiation with the government. First, as I said a moment ago, we believe the package is too big. We do not rule out supporting further stimuluses in the future depending on the economic circumstances and their composition. We need to keep a few shots in the locker. Our judgement is that a more appropriate level of stimulus is in the order of 1½ to two per cent of GDP, or between $15 billion and $20 billion dollars. That is a matter of judgement. There is no mathematical formula that gives you the right answer here, but our judgement is that that is the band within which the stimulus should be. If people believe that we are more prudent, more conservative in spending taxpayers’ money and we err on spending less than more then they are absolutely right. That is our philosophical approach to these issues. It is not a question of letting the market rip; it is a question of taking other people’s money seriously, guarding it, protecting it and ensuring that it is spent wisely and well. That is our commitment.   We do not support a further round of cash handouts. That is a very unpopular thing to say and I acknowledge that, but it is the right thing to say. I think most Australians will recognise in their hearts that it is the right thing to say. It is extraordinary that the government would embark on this when there is no basis for concluding that the cash splash of December was effective. At the very least, the impact of the December payments needs to be taken on board. We need to know precisely what it is. Bear in mind that these handouts were paid two weeks before Christmas, and I said at the time that this was an interesting economic experiment. If ever a one-off handout, a one-off cash payment, was going to be largely spent it would be this one because the timing, being just before Christmas, was perfect for those people who wanted that outcome. Nonetheless, it appears that it was largely not spent, and bear in mind, the recipients in December were, for the most part, on low incomes—pensioners and others.   The beneficiaries of the payments in the government’s package today will include many Australians at middle income levels. Furthermore, the economic climate is much more uncertain—or more uncertain, at least—than it was in December. The incentives to save rather than to spend are therefore a lot greater. So we would support as an alternative the bringing forward of the 1 July 2010 tax cuts to 1 January this year. This will have a budgetary cost. It is obviously spread over time and it is not as much as the cash payments in the Prime Minister’s plan, but it is temporary. It is a timing difference. It will benefit all taxpayers, but it will benefit most significantly those on low and middle incomes. It is therefore very well targeted. It does not put $950 in everybody’s pocket today, but that is the point. It increases permanent income and it therefore provides a greater incentive to work and to invest. And by the middle of next year, households will have more money in their pocket and the prospects of more money to come. They will have more money in their pocket immediately, of course.   The Prime Minister and the Treasurer have tried to portray anybody who doubts their analysis of quick cash handouts as some kind of economic quack. That just underlines both their lack of reading in this area and their incredible arrogance. There are many voices all around the world questioning whether the immense scale and scope of the fiscal measures being hastily implemented by many governments are the appropriate response. There are many reputable economists who wonder whether those measures will be effective and whether they represent the best use of taxpayers’ money. The Treasurer yesterday derided the views of the Stanford economist John Taylor as irrelevant and extreme. It is very interesting that the Treasurer of the Commonwealth of Australia would so personally and viciously attack one of the most distinguished economists in the world. Given the influence Taylor has had on central bank thinking around the world, this is simply outrageous. But, more importantly, there are plenty of other economists who are similarly sceptical over the headlong rush to huge deficits and heavy debt. They include Robert Lucas and Ed Prescott—both past winners of the Nobel Prize for Economics—Robert Barro, Eugene Fama and Gregory Mankiw among many others. These are not quacks. These are not extremists. These are not irrelevant. These are great economic thinkers who have a view that is respected around the world but not, apparently, by the all knowing Treasurer that we have on the other side of the House.   Nor is it right to portray as ignorant extremism the coalition’s stance that tax cuts often provide a larger boost to the economy than public spending. Indeed, one of the most powerful and persuasive empirical studies in the United States, which has been much quoted in the financial media, saying that tax cuts have a high multiplier—that is they provide a larger bang for the buck to the economy than outlays—comes from none other than Christina Romer, now a senior economic official in the Obama White House. Now, clearly these are very difficult times and there are a range of economic opinions and interpretations. Nobody has all the answers. So it is the height of arrogance and intolerance for the Prime Minister and the Treasurer to declare that the only way is their way. It just indicates a lack of willingness to engage in a constructive way both with the wider community and a wide range of views, not to speak of the views of other members of this parliament.   The next large element in the plan is an investment in schools. In government, we very heavily invested in schools. Indeed, one of our most successful and, I would say, popular programs was the Investing in Our Schools Program which the Rudd government has terminated. The $14 billion schools investment component of this package seems to have been selected largely because the government believes this building can be undertaken quickly. Experience suggests this will not be the case. The plan to work hand in glove with state governments reinforces everybody’s scepticism about that. We would welcome a renewal, indeed acceleration, of the Investing in Our Schools Program. However, we have to ask this question: is the most urgent infrastructure deficiency requirement in Australia primary school assembly halls and libraries? What about hospitals? What about nursing homes and aged care? What indeed about the National Broadband Network? What about water infrastructure, and what about expanding, and above all maintaining, our National Transmission Network? Labor’s response to this, of course, will be that there is more money to come for these measures, but there is the point. The finances of the Commonwealth are not a magic pudding. Everything has to be paid for at some time. Think of the faces and look into the eyes of those schoolchildren that come to parliament every day and remember that as these debts are piled up, billion upon billion, it is they who will have to pay them off.   In an indication of the specific responses we would bring to this plan, we would support a renewed Investing in Our Schools Program. Based on our experience, we believe that $3 billion over three years could be, and would be, well spent and, depending on demand, and of course on the economic conditions, consideration can always be given to allocating more funding. That is a very important point. The parliament is not going into perpetual recess. The parliament is always here. We can come back and if circumstances require a greater stimulus of a different kind and a different time, we can do that. The Prime Minister is in a panic. He is firing off all his ammunition at once. We need to keep more in reserve—prudence demands that.   The biggest gap in this package by far is jobs. The three top priorities this year must be jobs, jobs, jobs. Where is the assistance for small business in keeping employment high? The government will say that the insulators and the builders will be supported by these programs, and so they will. But most small businesses will not benefit from these spending measures. Fiscal stimulus should aim to invest in the Australian economy in a way that makes the whole economy more productive, efficient and competitive. Picking off one sector after another will always result in dislocations and discrimination against the sectors that are not privileged. That of course is why tax cuts are so effective, because every business and household benefits.   We believe an element of a stimulus package should that it lowers the cost of employing Australians. A key focus should be making it easier to keep Australians in their jobs, especially for small business. The accelerated investment allowance proposed has some merit, but a small-business which is struggling with declining revenues would be better off with additional cash flow that it can deploy as it sees fit. We want to discuss practical measures with the government that will put cash into the hands of small businesses. One proposal which we have seen and which has considerable merit would be for the Commonwealth to cover, for a period, a portion of the superannuation guarantee levy. Appropriately costed within the framework of a more prudent stimulus, this would provide support for small business, lower the cost of employment and provide an incentive across the board to every small business.   We welcome the government paying attention to the value of insulation. It is a great disappointment, as I noted in my speech a few weeks back, that the government’s election policy on insulation was left in complete abeyance. Nothing was done on it at all. Indeed, as of 20 January the government’s website dismally told anyone who was interested that the program details had not yet been developed—so much for efficiency. Insulation, however, is an energy efficiency measure that pays for itself, and government subsidies for insulation should recognise that. The $1,600 subsidy will, according to Mr Peter Ruz of Fletcher Insulation, who is quoted in the newspapers today, mean that over 90 per cent of jobs would be completed at no cost to the owner. The subsidy is not means tested. We would support an insulation subsidy of a lower amount and I would suggest for the government’s consideration one that is, for example, $500 for all houses, increasing to $1,000 subject to a means test. That would reduce the cost of the measure considerably but remain a very significant incentive to the insulation industry. A similar approach could be taken to solar hot water.   This stimulus has to provide the appropriate level of economic stimulus, so it has to be directed in a way that is effective. While the cash handouts will be popular, we do not believe they will be an effective economic stimulus. We believe that bringing forward the 2010 tax cuts would cost less and have much greater economic effect. They would benefit households and small businesses right across the board. We believe that the key issue for the government is the scale of this stimulus, the size of it. We believe it is too large and not composed of sufficiently effective measures. I have given some indication of ways in which the measures could be more effective. Above all, the government must ask itself as it looks at this and no doubt other measures it will bring forward: are they going to provide a benefit across the board? Are they going to make Australia’s economy more efficient, more productive and more competitive? If they do not do that, the money will not be well spent. The reality is that while these times call for governments to invest more than they normally would—and we recognise that—the investment and spending decisions must be of the highest quality. We should not be investing in measures or programs which do not stand on their own merits. They have to be measures that we would invest in in good times or bad. Otherwise, we are literally wasting taxpayers’ money at a time when, depending on the development of this global recession, we may find ourselves in greater need of those resources in the years to come.   I recognise that much of what I have said will not be popular, but it is right. We must stand up for prudent financial management. Every dollar that this parliament approves to be spent belongs to somebody else. We are dealing with other people’s money. More significantly than that, we are dealing with the future of the young Australians who come here to visit this parliament. I do not want to have to look into their eyes and say: ‘When you grow up you will be paying higher and higher taxes because of the debt your parents’ generation racked up today.’ We recognise these times call for investment and action by government. But it must be the right action, and governments must be prepared to take tough decisions, be prepared to take the right decisions and have the courage of discipline. The Prime Minister has shown none of that. He has wanted to be Santa Claus—everybody gets a prize. The problem with everybody getting a prize today is that the children of today will be carrying a very heavy penalty in the years to come. We are committed on our side of the House to ensure, insofar as we can, that every dollar that is spent this year and in the years to come is spent wisely and always remembering those children, because it is those children who will have to pay off Labor’s debt.   [ends]   malcolmWed, 04 Feb 2009 02:48:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:329http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/327/Interview-with-Jon-Faine-ABC-Radio-Melbourne.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=327http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=327&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/327/Interview-with-Jon-Faine-ABC-Radio-Melbourne.aspxSubjects: Securing our economic future.   E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………...   FAINE:    Malcolm Turnbull, the Leader of the Opposition, joins me briefly from Parliament House in Canberra. Mr Turnbull, good morning.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Good morning.   FAINE:   Why will you not support Kevin Rudd’s stimulus package when we’re told there’s great urgency to its implementation?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We believe it is too much, too much money. It’s imposing too heavy a burden on future generations. We believe it is poorly made up and it will not be an effective stimulus. It will not give tax payers enough economic bang for their buck.   FAINE:    What would you do instead?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we would have a stimulus that was smaller. We want to discuss this Jon with the Government, and we’re not, unlike Mr. Rudd, we don’t believe that the only alternative to our proposal is to do nothing. He said the only alternative to his proposal is nothing. Well that’s clearly nonsense. There is an infinite range of alternatives and options that could be undertaken. So we want to talk to them about it and we’re happy to negotiate. We believe, our judgement is that a stimulus in the order to 15 to 20 billion dollars is more appropriate at this time. We think he’s firing off too much ammunition too early in the battle.   FAINE:   What’s wrong with over-stimulating an economy that’s in trouble?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, Jon, I’m amazed you would asked me that…   FAINE:    Well I think many people will be wondering. I think I know what you’re going to say,  but let’s put it to the test.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well, it’s obvious that you, for a start, you run up a huge amount of debt, unnecessary debt that’s inappropriate. You put a heavy burden on future generations, and depending on the circumstances you could actually start to fuel inflation. But really what we’re talking about here is other people’s money, tax payers’ money.   FAINE:   The risk of inflation is regarded by many commentators and economists as the lesser of two evils.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No, Jon I agree, that’s why I said in certain circumstances. Look, the fundamental…   FAINE:    If you’re facing losing your job and there’s 7 percent unemployment built into the Reserve Bank’s projections then you’ve got to do something now. If you spend less then you get less back.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well that’s not right Jon, because you’ve got to spend it well. The sad reality that Mr Rudd refuses to recognise is that while one-off handouts are very popular, and I know that the position we’re taking is going to be very unpopular, but believe me Jon it’s right, because one-off handouts will, in this climate particularly, be saved or used to reduce debt.   Now in the case of each household that would no doubt be a very prudent thing to do, but they do not provide an effective fiscal stimulus in uncertain times, and most economists estimate that two thirds of the $10 billion cash splash before December was in fact saved and not spent. Now what is missing from this package are measures that are directly focused on jobs and increasing productivity, efficiency, competitiveness, employment across the economy. That’s why we’re bringing forward…   FAINE:   Okay, so do you support the infrastructure investment? Do you support the schools program?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Jon what we’ve said is that the $14 billion is a very large amount of money to be focused largely on, as you know, primary school assembly halls and libraries. We’re puzzled why there is no reference to aged care, the needs of aged care, or the needs of hospitals. As far as schools are concerned we believe passionately in investing in schools, and of course as you know when we were in government we did so in a very big way. Now we would support the reinstatement of our Investing in Our Schools program, and we’ve suggested, not in a dogmatic way, but as a suggestion, that within that 15 to 20 billion dollar framework you could afford a $3 billion over three year Investing in Our Schools program. Now that would put a lot of money into schools, and I believe that is money that can be, and would be well spent. A lot of people, Jon, are very sceptical that you can spend $14 billion in this timeframe.   FAINE:    Yes, it’s a difficult thing to try to do. I’d love to have the challenge, personally, myself, even just a fraction of it.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   A Jon Faine Memorial Assembly Hall (inaudible) across the nation.   FAINE:   Just finally, Malcolm Turnbull, because my time with you is very strictly limited. You and others have called for the spirit of bipartisanship to extend to consulting with the Opposition in the sort of Obama-style call for bipartisanship, but bipartisanship was never a feature of the Liberal Party when it’s been in office over the last however, what, 12 years? Why should Kevin Rudd do what the Howard Government, of which you were a senior member, refused to do?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well Jon that’s what Kevin Rudd says actually, that’s interesting, I don’t know whether that’s the point he made to you, but that is definitely his attitude. He says, ‘John Howard didn’t consult with me, so I’m not going to consult with you’.   FAINE:   And you haven’t got used to the fact that now you’re in Opposition.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   No, I’m very aware of that, but you see I think we’ve got to move on. I think Australians want to see a new style of leadership and they want their leaders to work together. Now I am prepared to do that. I have, can I tell you, I have contacted, particularly with respect to the bank guarantee, contacted directly Lindsay Tanner and Wayne Swan, pointed out problems they had in the design of their bank guarantees and facilitated legislation to fix them up.   So I’ve reached out to the other side, and though they’d never admit it, they know that on my initiative problems or shortcomings in their legislation were improved. So I’m prepared to do that, and I’m very happy to sit down with Kevin Rudd and look at all of this objectively, because there are a wide range of measures that we can undertake. Australians want to see leaders that will work together.   Look Kevin Rudd, there he goes, he spends the summer writing a essay which is just this vicious sort of almost fantastical attack on his political opponents saying that the years of Coalition government resulted in dreadful damage to our economy because of failure to properly regulate the financial sector, and yet his Deputy Prime Minister was in Davos the other day saying the financial and prudential regulation of Australia’s banks and financial sector was better than world class. Well who did that?   FAINE:    Alright, and just finally, Malcolm Turnbull, you’ve got Peter Costello on Lateline last night and popping up in The Age newspaper opinion page today. Is he undermining you?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Peter Costello is playing a great role. He has chosen to be on the backbench, to stay on the backbench, and he’s playing a great role bringing his years of experience as Treasurer to bear, and I think makes very good contributions in the public arena and I welcome his contributions both privately – we consult privately, naturally – and also when he makes them publicly. So, it’s you know more strength to his pen, I say.   FAINE:   My time with you is up, and I think it’s been most productively spent from my perspective. I hope it has been for you too.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Jon I’ve enjoyed it immensely.   FAINE:    Thank you.   [ends]     malcolmWed, 04 Feb 2009 01:19:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:327http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/317/Coalition-opposes-42-billion-expenditure-package.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=317http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=317&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/317/Coalition-opposes-42-billion-expenditure-package.aspxThe Coalition will oppose the Rudd Government’s latest $42 billion expenditure package because it is not a responsible or sustainable way to run the national economy.   We know this decision will not be popular, but it is the right decision.   The Prime Minister yesterday demanded that the House of Representatives approve $42 billion in expenditure within 48 hours: almost a billion dollars an hour.   We consider that the package is poorly targeted, ill-thought through and irresponsible in today’s economic climate.   At this stage we believe a package of between $15-20 billion would be more affordable and appropriate.     The objective of any package must be to protect and create jobs, support small business and strengthen our economy.  This package will not achieve this.   We have said time and again that the most important issue this year is jobs.   We look at this package and we see little evidence that it will underpin the jobs of Australians.   There is no evidence the Government’s $10.4 billion spending package before Christmas created the 75,000 jobs Mr Rudd promised.   Almost all economists agree that the recession has a long way to go.  And yet the Rudd Labor Government is panicking, firing all its bullets at the first engagement.    And even with his reckless cash hand-outs and massive, debt-fuelled spending, the Prime Minister’s package predicts unemployment will top 7% in just over a year – another 300,000 Australians out of work.   We believe the Senate should sit next week to ensure proper detailed scrutiny of this package, which contains the largest increase in government expenditure in 35 years.   The previous Labor Government left a legacy of $96 billion in government debt and the Budget had been in deficit for six successive years.  It took the Australian people a decade to repay this debt.   Now, another Labor Government is asking us, on behalf of those hard working Australians to agree to plunge headlong back into large deficits and significant debt.      Mr Rudd’s plan asks the Parliament’s permission to take the nation $200 billion into deficit – $9,500 debt for every Australian.   Today I outline an alternate response which will be more effective in protecting Australians from the effects of the financial crisis.   It is an approach which clearly outlines the difference between the Coalition and Labor.   It is an approach borne out of a predisposition towards experienced, prudent economic management.   It is an approach which recognises the reality of a Budget deficit but aims to minimise public debt.   We propose that the permanent tax cuts currently scheduled for 1 July 2009 and 1 July 2010 be brought forward, and backdated to 1 January this year.   By the middle of 2010 this would leave a two-income household earning $80,000 approximately $1700 better off.   Perhaps the largest gap in the Government package is the lack of measures that directly and broadly support employment – particularly employment in the small business sector.   While accelerated depreciation has some merit, the Coalition believes measures that more directly, immediately improve the cash flow position of small firms and help them protect and create jobs are preferable.   One proposal the Coalition is seeking to discuss with the Government is the Commonwealth paying a portion of the Superannuation Guarantee Levy on behalf of small employers (those with 20 or fewer staff) for the next two years.  This measure will directly improve the cash position of small firms, directly reduce the costs of employment, and so directly contribute to preserving jobs.   These measures are not only fairer.  They also represent a better targeted and more effective stimulus for the economy.  They better protect jobs.   The Coalition invites the Government to sit down and discuss alternative stimulus measures which would be responsible and allow sufficient capacity in public finances to meet emerging challenges.   The Coalition is committed to sound economic management and to ensuring that Government spending is of high quality and reduces the burden on Australian taxpayers and their children.      malcolmWed, 04 Feb 2009 00:59:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:317http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/348/Message-to-the-Nation-Securing-our-Economic-Future.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=348http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=348&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/348/Message-to-the-Nation-Securing-our-Economic-Future.aspxE&OE…………………………………………………………………………………..   Tonight, I want to talk to you about our economy, our future and our security.   You know, I often meet school groups visiting Parliament House and I always tell them that while we often have differences of opinion here, it is important to remember that every MP works hard to make Australia a better place for them to grow up in.   Tonight, I wonder if I can keep saying that.   The Prime Minister has unveiled a plan to borrow $70 billion over the next four years. More than that, he is asking Parliament to allow him to increase our national debt to $200 billion - a level never seen before.   That is a $9,500 debt for every Australian, a debt our children will have to pay off years into the future.   In an unprecedented move, the Prime Minister has given the Parliament only 48 hours to consider and approve the expenditure of $42 billion.   That isn’t sensible or prudent.   It is an insult to Australian taxpayers.   We in the Opposition will vote against this package.   We know this will not be popular with many people.   But we are determined to do the right thing for Australia and its future.   Somebody has to stand up for strong financial management.   Somebody has to stand up for taxpayers.   Somebody has to stand up for future generations.   We do not reject the need for a stimulus at this time.   But our judgement is that $42 billion is too much right now and $200 billion is too much debt.   This is not a time for panic.   It is the time for sound calm judgement.   There is no evidence that last year’s $10 billion cash hand out was an effective economic stimulus.   It did not create the jobs the Government said it would.   So we oppose rushing to another cash splash.   Rather, we propose bringing forward permanent tax cuts for Australians.   This will make many families more than $1700 dollars better off over the year.   It allows them to keep more of their own hard-earned cash into the future.   We support other areas of spending, including in schools, but our package will amount to less than half the amount the government is proposing - half the additional debt burden.   We will focus on areas that will stimulate the economy and generate jobs, the most important challenge at this time.   We have said again and again that we are prepared to sit down and discuss the package with the Prime Minister.   All of those offers have been rejected.   We believe this is the time to work together, because this is taxpayers’ money, and our children’s future.   [ends]     malcolmWed, 04 Feb 2009 00:05:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:348http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/321/Doorstop-Interview-Canberra.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=321http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=321&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/321/Doorstop-Interview-Canberra.aspxSubjects: accelerated depreciation for energy efficient buildings; weekend sitting; employment; working together; stimulus package; insulation.   E&OE MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We’ve just seen a great example of a five green star building and an example of what smart technology and good design can do to save energy, save water and obviously reduce emissions. Now a little while ago we proposed that there should be an additional tax break for investments like that that improve energy efficiency – more efficient lighting, more efficient water use and so forth – that would double the rate of depreciation. And those types of investments are obviously very useful in a new building like this but they can also be put into old buildings and of course the vast majority of our building stock is old.   So if you want to drive employment, if you want to drive jobs – and our focus is on jobs, jobs, jobs – then encouraging building owners like the gentlemen we’ve just been speaking with to invest in energy efficiency in their existing buildings is very valuable. So I hope Mr Rudd includes energy efficiency measures in his stimulus package that he’s going to announce today.   Now we are committed to working with Mr Rudd. We seek to cooperate with Mr Rudd on this new stimulus package. We want to go through it, and we will go through it, line by line, dollar by dollar in a very detailed and intensive way, because we have got to make sure that it’s right and that it’s effective. Not all of his measures have been effective so far. He has made some quick decisions which have not worked very well at all.   So we will work very closely with him. We’re prepared to sit all night, over the weekend, we’ll put all the time into it that it needs to go through this very, very carefully. Our commitment is to work with him cooperatively. I’d like to sit down with him across the table and work through these ideas, his proposals, our proposals and see if we can reach common ground. If he is not prepared to do that then we will nonetheless apply great scrutiny in a very constructive way to this stimulus package when he presents it.   QUESTION:   When you say common ground, what do you mean? I mean, isn’t it the simple case that you will see the details and decide yea or nay on whether or not you support it?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we will look at the detail and we may seek to amend it, we may seek to change it. Some of it we may not agree with. We will go through it very carefully. The great opportunity that Mr Rudd is letting slip is the opportunity to work constructively and cooperatively. You see you can look behind us here, you can see the jobs, the men and the women that are working there could be joined by thousands of other men and women working to make our buildings more energy efficient if the Prime Minister were to take up our proposal to create green jobs and greener buildings – a win-win. He could take up that suggestion. I don’t know whether he will.   But it would make a lot more sense if we were able to sit down and talk about these things constructively.   QUESTION:   What about the insulation measure. I mean that will create a lot of jobs and energy efficiency?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I’m pleased that Mr Rudd is focused on insulation. It’s about time. I raised the issue of insulation in my speech on climate on the 24th of January and made the point that it represents probably the single biggest opportunity for straightforward, easy gains in energy efficiency. So it’s a very important area.   But you know Mr Rudd promised a $500 rebate in his election in 2007 and as of a few weeks ago they hadn’t paid any of those rebates because according to the Government’s own website the programme details have not been finalised. So if he’s actually getting on with the programme that he promised that would be a good thing. But we’ll have a look at it in great detail and make sure that from our point of view it’s right before we give it a tick off.   QUESTION:   What about more generally though, what would you like to see, what would the Opposition like to see as part of this package? You said that you’ll wait and see and look at the detail but what would you like to see in there?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we’ve made a number of proposals for measures that would add considerably to jobs, to economic activity, that would make our economy stronger. We’ve talked about bringing forward the tax cuts from July 1, bringing them forward so that people got that tax break or those tax cuts earlier. We’ve talked about accelerated depreciation for green buildings. We just discussed that now. We’ve talked about and proposed that there be changes to our insolvency laws so that when companies and businesses get into trouble, instead of going into a fire sale and everyone losing their jobs, there’s an emphasis on reconstruction and rehabilitation.   There’s a whole range of measures that we’ve canvassed. Governments have got to look at the whole range of opportunities, as do oppositions, and we’ll scrutinise what Mr Rudd presents. But we’ve made a number of proposals, concrete proposals. We’ll see whether he takes any of them up.   QUESTION:   The International Monetary Fund encouraged developed economies including Australia to inject stimulus, further stimulus, that’s exactly what the Government is doing today, so in simple language is it something that you endorse given the International Monetary Fund does?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   We certainly support the Government taking effective action and we’ve proposed a number of effective actions for the Government to take. But we’re not giving Mr Rudd a blank cheque. We will scrutinise in great detail what he proposes. We’ll go through it line by line. We’re prepared to sit through the night and all weekend if necessary to make sure that it is given the fullest scrutiny.   QUESTION:   Can you actually promise a united Coalition response to this package? Coalition unity hasn’t been there in the past on some elements that the Rudd Government has put before the Opposition.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   The approach that I have just outlined is the approach the whole Coalition will take.   QUESTION:   If I could just draw you on one thing. The AOC Commissioner John Coates wants an extra $100 million a year for the Australian Olympic team heading towards the Olympics, what do you think about that?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I haven’t seen that proposal. I’ll have a look at it and we’ll respond to that after we’ve considered it carefully.   Thank you.     [ends]       malcolmTue, 03 Feb 2009 01:07:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:321http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/375/Rudds-rescue-plan-is-unnescessary-and-counterproductive.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=375http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=375&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/375/Rudds-rescue-plan-is-unnescessary-and-counterproductive.aspx THIS year the three top priorities should be jobs, jobs, jobs. Every element of Government policy should be focused on keeping Australians in jobs. That's why we have been consulting widely - including via our www.jobsforaustralia.com.au website - with small and medium businesses on the policies they believe will help them keep their employees on the payroll.   And yet for the past week the Rudd Government has been trying to sell its latest economic initiative, which will have no impact on employment other than perhaps creating a job for the National Australia Bank executive who proposed it.   Rudd is planning to put billions of dollars of taxpayers' funds at risk in a new "Ruddbank", whose purpose it is to refinance foreign bankers who choose to withdraw from lending to Australian property companies.   The purpose of the Ruddbank is to prevent commercial property values falling to a level where the main Australian lenders would lose money on their existing loans.   Australians who have suffered heavy losses on their share portfolios and superannuation accounts and seen the value of their homes decline will wonder why the big four banks and commercial property are deserving of such privileged attention from Government.   The Ruddbank is not designed to finance construction. It is, as the banks have made abundantly clear, designed to refinance foreign loans made on existing, built commercial properties.   So the Government's claim that Ruddbank will save 50,000 jobs is nonsense, a figure plucked out of the air to get a headline.   Equally outrageous is its claim that by propping up values in the commercial property market, residential values will be supported. Housing expert Christopher Joye exposed the total lack of evidence for such a connection in The Australian last week.   It is perhaps hardly surprising NAB made this proposal, after all if you don't ask you don't get. What is incredible is that the Government has gone along with it.   There is no evidence foreign banks are withdrawing from the Australian market. Indeed they increased their loans to non financial corporations by more than 15 per cent over the past year.   But if they were tempted to reduce their exposures, nothing is more likely to help them do so than a Government offering to refinance the loans they abandon. After all, once the Ruddbank is in place, the taxpayer will fill the gap, so they can scale back their syndicated loans without fear the venture will collapse, which would have forced them to take a loss on any amount they are still owed.   Bad enough that Rudd once again shows himself incapable of understanding the law of unintended consequences. But the real scandal is that it is the taxpayer who will pick up the tab.   Ruddbank is to be a joint venture between the Government and the four major banks. The conflicts are enormous. Consider a syndicated loan secured on an Australian office building. Valuations have declined in line with the market and in the normal course of events the lenders are likely to choose to stay with the credit rather than risk forcing a sale and a possible loss on their loans.   However, thanks to Ruddbank, the foreign lender knows that if he demands his money back and threatens to force a sale the Australian lenders will lean on their Government partner to secure a replacement loan from Ruddbank.   After all, the Australian banks don't want a forced sale because they might lose money. Better to get the Government to take out the foreign bank and ensure a lower value for the building is not realised with all of the implications that may have for their other property loans.   In the commercial world in circumstances like these, "new money" has a lot of leverage and can demand priority over existing loans. But in Ruddbank the "new money" of the Government is going to be guided by the conflicting vested interests of the "old money" of the big four banks.   It's a game in which the taxpayer is being set up to lose.   So it comes as no surprise that Ruddbank was dreamed up without consulting the Reserve Bank of Australia or that the chairman of the Future Fund and former chief executive of the Commonwealth Bank, David Murray, had grave concerns.   But it follows a disturbing pattern of naive and impulsive policy by the Rudd Government.   After all, it is only a few months ago that Rudd gave an unlimited guarantee of all bank deposits. He did so without discussing the proposal with the Reserve Bank and within days governor Glenn Stevens was pointing out the growing dislocation in financial markets the rash decision had created and begging the Government to impose a cap "the lower the better".   The dislocation was considerable and has not been reversed. Some 250,000 Australians saw their investments in mortgage funds and cash management trusts frozen. Finance companies were unable to raise short term finance with the consequence they could not continue to finance car dealers.   And so the Government moved to set up a finance company to provide finance to the vehicle retailers. Nearly two months later it is yet to start financing and car dealers around Australia are struggling to stay in business.   Rudd is keen to be seen to be doing something about the global financial crisis, but that is no excuse for doing anything.   Of course Rudd, who was an "economic conservative" in 2007 is now a reborn socialist, claiming the 11 1/2 years of Coalition government left Australia ill-prepared for the downturn.   Really?   Rudd inherited a Treasury with all Government debt repaid and billions of cash in the bank. The only reason Rudd has been able to splash cash around without having to go into debt is because of the Coalition's good economic management.   And let us not forget that the Australian banks did not plunge into sub-prime loans like their US counterparts and that the regulatory system that ensured this was put in place by the coalition government.   So far Rudd has given us an ill thought out and damaging unlimited deposit guarantee. We have had a pre-Christmas fiscal stimulus, or "cash splash", which however much appreciated by the recipients of the $9 billion does not appear to have been an effective stimulus at all.   We have had an angry Treasurer claiming tax cuts have no place in a fiscal stimulus strategy; he prefers Australians to line up for a one-off handout than let them keep more of what they have earned.   And now we have Ruddbank, designed to prop up commercial property values for the benefit of the big four banks. Rudd should drop the Ruddbank idea. It's unnecessary and counterproductive.   Wayne Swan says he is not interested in what the Opposition thinks. That doesn't surprise me. All we are thinking about are jobs for Australians. Swan and Rudd are only interested in their own.    malcolmMon, 02 Feb 2009 04:23:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:375http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/349/Interview-with-Steve-Price-Radio-2UE.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=349http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=349&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/349/Interview-with-Steve-Price-Radio-2UE.aspxSubjects: tax cuts; green depreciation for energy efficient buildings; Kevin Rudd’s socialism essay; Ruddbank.   E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………...   STEVE PRICE:   Malcolm Turnbull thanks for your time.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Great to be with you Steve.   STEVE PRICE:   What level of tax cuts would you look at? I mean what rates would be slicing into?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well Steve you’ve got to make sure that the cuts are ones that provide real incentives to work and to invest. At this time the most effective places to cut income tax will be to provide incentives to low and middle income earners. Now that benefits all tax payers of course – if you lower tax rates at the lower thresholds everybody benefits. So there is an across the board benefit but it’s particularly important to help low and middle income earners.   STEVE PRICE:   Well it’s giving people back the money that they earn anyway. I mean why do you think the Government has such an aversion to taking rate cuts anywhere above those people on the lowest incomes?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Look I can’t speak for Mr Swan. His position has been so contradictory. They seem to be in a state of real confusion, Steve. The Treasurer says tax cuts are out of the question and attacks me for suggesting that they could form an important part of any fiscal stimulus. And then a day or two later he is saying he is going to have tax cuts, but apparently he is still trying to suggest that they’re different from what were talking about. It’s very hard to follow what Wayne Swan is on about.   STEVE PRICE:   Would you also be advocating business tax cuts?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well I already have. Last week I advocated and committed the Coalition, when elected to government, to double the rate of depreciation for investments in green buildings, if you like. Energy efficiency and water efficiency measures in buildings so that if for example a building owner wanted to install a new efficient lighting system or a new system for recycling water to improve their water efficiency and their energy efficiency, the rate at which they could depreciate that would be doubled. So that’s a tax break, that’s a good example of a direct tax break for business which is obviously good for the environment but also will be great for jobs.   Steve I just talked about confusion a moment ago, but Mr Swan’s confusion is nothing compared to Mr Rudd’s. This is a guy who was buying ads on television in 2007 to say he was an economic conservative and now he’s a reborn socialist. He seems to want to go back to the Whitlam era of big government, high taxes, heavy regulation. He says the last 30 years, apparently, of free markets and capitalism has been a complete failure.   STEVE PRICE:   Is that about politics? Is that them trying to wedge you and suggest that look, the problem the world is in right now came about because of John Howard and George Bush and Margaret Thatcher following this way of doing things? And so when it comes to the next election he can say look it was Turnbull’s mob that caused the trouble? Is that what he is trying to do, do you think?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well Steve he can try to do that but it doesn’t withstand a second’s scrutiny if you think about it. We didn’t have a sub-prime crisis in Australia because we’ve had a very well regulated financial and banking system. Who regulated it? The Coalition, the government John Howard led.   If you look at the fiscal position, our public finances, we ran very strong surpluses in government as you know, paid off all Labor’s debt, left Mr Rudd with an enormous war chest that he has been able to splash around in cash handouts. He wouldn’t have been able to do that without the good economic management of his predecessors. So quite why he thinks he can make a case that the Coalition failed as economic managers when in fact our performance as a country was so much better relatively than others, it’s difficult to see how he think he can get away with that.   STEVE PRICE:   Is it wishful thinking on my part to yearn for some sort of bipartisanship on this? I mean the country and the world as you well know is in a huge mess. Why can’t governments get together and work out how to get out of this problem?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well Steve as you know I have been urging Mr Rudd to do this from the moment I became Opposition Leader. Barack Obama, with the highest approval ratings of any person elected to high office that I can recall, nonetheless went down to the Congress personally and sat down with his republican opponents to talk through his stimulus plan with them. He has reached out to them and sought to work with them.   Mr Rudd has refused every offer we have made to sit down and discuss appropriate strategies to deal with these financial challenges. He hasn’t been consultative. Look, I shouldn’t feel slighted by this – he didn’t even bother to call the governor of the Reserve Bank about the unlimited deposit guarantee, which has done so much harm. And he clearly ignored the Reserve Bank on his latest scheme to prop up commercial property values with the so-called Ruddbank scheme which will only benefit the balance sheets and the profits of the big four banks.   STEVE PRICE:   You’re very opposed to that, why?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well it’s a very poor use of $30 billion of tax payers’ money. The simple fact of life is this: there is no evidence that foreign banks are pulling out of Australia, in fact at the moment they are increasing their commitments here. If you have a syndicate of banks which have lent money on a commercial property and you have the Government standing there saying ‘we’re prepared to replace the foreign banks who wants to leave’, you give that foreign bank a real incentive to go.   So as I pointed out in an article in The Australian today and as a number of other people have pointed out, the Ruddbank idea is not only based on a false premise – that is to say the foreign banks are pulling out – but is counterproductive in that it’s likely to encourage them to go when you actually want people to hang in there and stick with their credits.   And finally of course it’s based on a complete fraud. Mr Rudd said it’s going to save 50,000 jobs, as the banks have made very clear, the big Australian banks have made very clear, this is not for construction finance. It’s not going to fund one job. It’s simply there, so Mr Ahmed Fahour has said, from the National Bank, in his paper that this is all based on, it’s there to stop commercial property prices declining. Well why should the Government be propping up values for one asset class? What about declining residential housing values? What about everybody’s superannuation fund and declining values in the share market?   You know Mr Rudd…   STEVE PRICE:   And small business falling over.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well exactly. Here’s the contrast: on Friday I was out at Parramatta sitting down with small and medium businesses talking about the challenges they face and how government could help them to stay in business and to keep their employees on the payroll. Mr Rudd was sitting down with the National Australia Bank, with Mr Ahmed Fahour working out a way to prop up their balance sheets, to hold up commercial property values and support their profits. So, so much for somebody who claims to be a social democrat. He seems to be focusing all his attention on supporting the very top end of the big end of town.   STEVE PRICE:   Appreciate your time, thanks a lot.   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Thanks Steve.   [ends]     malcolmMon, 02 Feb 2009 00:07:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:349http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/322/Doorstop-Interview-Sydney.aspx#Comments0http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/RssComments.aspx?TabID=85&ModuleID=403&ArticleID=322http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20NewsArticles/Tracking/Trackback.aspx?ArticleID=322&PortalID=0&TabID=85http://archive.malcolmturnbull.com.au/FAQs/tabid/85/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/322/Doorstop-Interview-Sydney.aspx Subjects: Tax cuts; budget deficit; economic management.   E&OE   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we’ve had a day of confusion from the Government. The Prime Minister doesn’t seem to know whether he’s an economic conservative or a reborn socialist or perhaps he was never an economic conservative at all.   And as for the Treasurer, a few days ago he was castigating us for suggesting that tax cuts would play an important role in any fiscal stimulus. He said that was out of the question and today he’s proposing that tax cuts should be part of the stimulus. Well, all we can say is: will the real Kevin Rudd please stand up? What is it – economic conservative or reborn socialist?   And as for Mr Swan he better decide what’s in his fiscal stimulus. We believe that tax cuts will play an important role in giving Australians the stimulus, the incentive to invest, to hire, to keep employees on the payroll.   QUESTION:   So I assume you’d be pretty pleased about these proposed tax cuts then?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we’ll see what they are. We have proposed some tax breaks ourselves of course in the last week which will have a very direct impact on employment, promoting employment and promoting investment – these are the tax breaks we proposed to encourage people to invest in energy efficiency measures and water efficiency measures in buildings. That’s a very good example of a well targeted tax break. QUESTION:   Should the focus be on the business tax cuts?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I think you’ve got to look at the most effective tax cuts, the best targeted ones and tax breaks, tax concessions, right across the board. Clearly there’s got to be a business element in it, but obviously households – and every business ultimately is owned by families – and families need to be part of that tax break policy.   QUESTION:   Will tax cuts have an immediate effect or a long term effect in stimulating the economy?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Tax cuts provide a permanent increase in income and the one thing that we’ve learned, and Mr Rudd should have learned, is that one-off handouts do not provide an effective fiscal stimulus because in uncertain times if you give somebody a pile of cash, they are more likely to save it or use it to reduce debt. That was the experience in the United States in the middle of last year – all of the numbers are in on that; there’s no doubt about that – and the early signs are that’s what happened to the cash splash in December.   The people that received the money appreciated it – and I have no doubt the vast majority used it wisely – but was it an effective economic policy to stimulate economic activity? And this is really the key – Mr Rudd has to ensure that every dollar of tax payers’ money that he spends is effective and well targeted to get the result and to pursue those three key goals for 2009, which are jobs, jobs, jobs.   QUESTION:   (Inaudible) with tax cuts for individuals, just for pensioners and low wage earners, what would your response be to that?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear that question….   QUESTION:   ….tax cuts for pensioners and low wage earners. If the Government went ahead with such a plan for such a (inaudible) your response?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   Well we will look at the proposal. Tax cuts that effect lower and middle income earners are particularly effective because they improve the incentives, they add to the incentives for people to work, and that is what we need, and add to the incentives of course for small businesses to employ people and keep them on the payroll.   QUESTION:   The Government has said a temporary deficit might be the necessary medicine for the nation. Do you agree?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   There’s no doubt that we are seeing great pressure on revenues at the moment but the Government has said that it plans to run a deficit. What they have to do – and they say its temporary deficit – what they should do is explain how they propose to make sure it is temporary.  What we need to see is not a leave pass, a blank cheque to Mr Rudd to run as big a deficit as he likes. He’s going to have to make very tough decisions, very careful decisions and make sure that every dollar he spends is well targeted and cost effective – that is the key.   We know that the cash splash before December was not effective as an economic stimulus. We know his plan to put $30 billion of your taxes at risk to prop up commercial property values for the benefit of the big four banks is equally not a wise decision. That is a bad policy and he should abandon it. And we know that his unlimited guarantee on bank deposits did a great deal of harm.     So Mr Rudd has made a number of big errors in responding to the financial challenges we face. We need now to see Mr Rudd carefully assess every new step along the way and make sure that it is cost effective and well targeted – that he gets the best and the biggest bang for the tax payers’ buck.   QUESTION:      So running a budget deficit at this time, what’s you opinion, is it a good move given the current economic circumstances?   MALCOLM TURNBULL:   The critical thing is the quality of the spending. I get back to that point. You just think about it, it’s no different to a household, to a family or to a business. Every dollar that is spent by the Government, every dollar of revenue that is forgone through tax breaks or tax cuts must be well targeted – jobs, jobs, jobs.   That’s the ruler we’ll be running over every element of Government policy. Is it going to promote employment? Is it going to be effective to deliver on those three priorities for 2009 – jobs, jobs, jobs.   Thanks very much.   [ends] malcolmSun, 01 Feb 2009 01:08:00 GMTf1397696-738c-4295-afcd-943feb885714:322