Andrew Leigh

On ABC RN Drive last night, I spoke with host Waleed Aly and Liberal Senator Arthur Sinodinos about vocational training, costings gaps, boat buy-backs and more. Here's a podcast.

Find the full transcript below.







ABC RADIO NATIONAL DRIVE INTERVIEW

MONDAY 2 SEPTEMBER 2013



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Subjects: Senate preferences; campaigning; costings; Tafe and trade centres.

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WALEED ALY: I’m joined for the last time before the election campaign, and I say that with a tinge of sadness, although we might get them together after the campaign’s all over. Dr Andrew Leigh, the Member for Fraser, previously Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister, or then Prime Minister, Julia Gillard  and Arthur Sinodinos, Parliamentary Secretary to the Opposition Leader, former Chief of Staff to John Howard and according to some reports, as well as prospective Finance Minister, an endangered Senator. Gentlemen welcome and Arthur, you must be concerned!

ARTHUR SINODINOS: An endangered species indeed, well I should be protected under the EPBC Act.

ALY: Well, it’s not likely to happen that way because, now this is the story, some reports have emerged that because of the proliferation of the micro parties and the strange preference flows that pertain in the Senate and proliferation of people who have voted above the line rather than below it, you are in danger. Not much I think we can say, but some danger of being knocked off of that Senate seat in NSW by Pauline Hanson, are you worried?

SINODINOS: Oh look, as long as we maximise the Coalition vote in NSW it should be fine and people put the 1 above the line and preferences flow accordingly it will be fine. It’s a statistical possibility what you mentioned, but I mean my best bet is to maximise Liberal votes for NSW for that very reason.

ALY: Well no that’s certainly true but are you worried about it?  I wouldn’t have thought that this would start turning up in reporting from people who’ve crunched the numbers unless it was a realistic possibility.

SINODINOS: Look, it’s a mathematical possibility but I believe our vote in NSW is going to be pretty strong and I’m going to spend the next few days, as Kevin has advised, doing my best to up the vote.

ALY: Good to hear you’re taking advice from Kevin Rudd on campaigning, that’s wonderful, we need unity in politics.  Why are you…

ANDREW LEIGH: …and Waleed, just to break in briefly to say how pleased I am that no Labor votes will go to seeing Ms Hanson get elected ahead of Arthur Sinodinos.

ALY: Ah yes.

SINODINOS: (Laughs) thanks.

LEIGH: We’re definitely preferring him over her.

ALY: That’s wonderful. It’s almost schmaltzy. Hey Arthur, why would you be third on the Liberal Party’s Senate ticket? I cannot understand that.

SINODINOS: Oh well, I took over from Helen Coonan, I’m the junior Senator and seniority dictates the line up on the Senate Ticket and I was quite happy with that and it aligns my interests with the party’s interests, which is to maximise the vote.

ALY: Well, hang on, but you’re the prospective Finance Minister

SINODINOS: Well look, what happens after the election is a matter for Tony.  Let’s get there and we can worry about all that afterwards.

ALY: Andrew, if Arthur were to lose his seat, would you be happy to be paired with Pauline Hanson in debates in future?

LEIGH: That’s a truly terrifying prospect I think Waleed, but look, the real pity is that the Coalition doesn’t have Arthur as Finance Spokesperson right now.  I mean that then would’ve had them I’m sure in a position where months ago they’d brought out all of their costings and where we’re now talking about two properly costed visions of the future rather than this sort of spectacle where Mr Hockey seems to be saying to, the argument Mr Robb’s  seems to be saying to people ‘well look, we’d like to sell you this used car  but you can’t take it for a test drive and you can’t look under the bonnet  because you know, well just trust us that the coat of paint on the outside is tip top and it’ll drive just fine’.

ALY: Alright, I’ll get to a response from Arthur in a moment, but Andrew Leigh, I’m not sure that your costings are out there really are they?

LEIGH: Policy by policy they are, Waleed.

ALY: Yeah but you want them in the one place where you can actually examine them, that’s the point.

LEIGH: Well, this is an important point because it’s one of the subtleties which I think has been lost in the hurly burly of the costings debate.  In all previous elections, as Oppositions have brought out policies, they’ve shown on each occasion how they’re going to pay for them. The Coalitions’ departed from that strategy this time around. You even see the difference on the same policies. So you look at Paid Parental Leave that they released in 2010 and the one they’ve released now. In 2010 it was accompanied by a table of costings and savings, this time it’s not. We’ve shown very clearly how we’re paying for everything. The Coalition I think are raising the spectre I think of pretty savage austerity being imposed on the economy.

ALY: Well they’re not really.  I mean, this is the bone I have to pick with the way the Labor Party has run their campaign, Andrew, and that is that it seems to have been a phantom campaign against things that nobody’s proposing. You had the GST, then you had cuts in health and education, all of which have been completely ruled out.  It’s one thing to say the numbers don’t add up, it’s another thing to say oh this stuff is going to happen when actually it’s been flatly rejected.

LEIGH: But Waleed, I disagree with you there. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that the Coalition’s policies are in many cases unfunded. So it’s fine if Mr Abbott wants to spend $22 billion on an unfair Parental Leave Scheme or to give a tax cut to big miners or to give a tax cut to companies, but he can’t make all of those bold claims and not say where the money’s coming from.

ALY: Yeah, that’s fine, but that’s a different thing from you then saying: where’s the money coming from and that there will be certain cuts when they’ve specifically said there won’t be.

LEIGH: Well, I don’t think it’s unfair to speculate Waleed, I mean...

ALY: Oh no, you are, see that’s the point, you are speculating exactly on things they’ve already ruled out.

LEIGH: Certainly what is mathematically true is that the Coalition can’t pay down debt faster, spend more and tax less.

ALY: Arthur, I might get your response on this and you could perhaps work into your answer why it is that you just won’t come out with actual costings, I mean what we saw last week was not even costings it was savings and it was really a pretend document because there was no detail.

SINODINOS: No, no, no I don’t think it was a pretend document. What was put out last week was something like $31.6 billion worth of savings and that will go towards helping to pay for promises and this week you’ll have the full sonata, the full symphony if you like in terms of the spends, the saves and the contribution to the budget bottom line because all the commitments will be out by then. The point Tony Abbott was making on Sunday is there’ve been promises made including some additional promises today on defence for example and veterans and therefore, you know, until all of that is complete you can’t put out the final document.

ALY: Andrew let’s talk about the campaign launch that Kevin Rudd did mysteriously late into the election campaign, yesterday. He’s focused really on specific kinds of jobs, trade type jobs or vocational education.  This was the theme. We haven’t really seen much of that before this last week and then when we did his message on TAFEs seemed really strange to me, that if State Governments cut our funding to TAFEs then the Commonwealth is just going to ramp up its funding. Why wouldn’t every State in the country just say alright, fine, you carry the can and we’ll just cut our funding and we won’t be any worse off.

LEIGH: Well Waleed, you’ve raised an important point and this is certainly something that we’ve been talking about in the context of schools, about the importance of ensuring that as the Federal Government invests more in schools through the Better Schools Plan, that State Governments don’t take money out. But we’ve also got a responsibility to make sure that TAFE training continues and you know this issue has a pretty long lineage, we had the former Howard Government investigate trade centres, which ended up not working out. What we’ve done as a Federal Government is to expand trades training in schools and I’ve got a work experience student with me this week who has a trade training centre in his school, St Francis Xavier, and then we’ve also looked to investing in apprenticeships, boosting their completion bonuses and we want to be ready as a back stop for the TAFE system because you’ve got to invest in skills right across the board as a way of building prosperity.

ALY: That’s fine but what Kevin Rudd’s saying is that we’ll pump money into it in 2015, so some time into the future, we’ll pump money into it if the States decide to rip out their money which is an incentive for them  just to rip out money.

LEIGH: I don’t think it’s as straight forward as all of that. I think what Mr Rudd is saying is that it’s important that we maintain a strong TAFE system and that we will commit to making sure the trades training is strong. We’ve done that through investment in apprenticeships, through providing larger completion bonuses and providing more to apprentices to get their tools. The Labor story of productivity, which I know is an issue Arthur and I both care about, is that it is centrally underpinned by great education at all those three levels, schools, TAFEs and universities.

ALY: Alright, I’ll get Arthur to respond on the point in a moment, but before I do that, the campaign launch, why so late really?  I mean there’s been some positive reviews about it in the press, some but, there seems to be a consensus that it’s too late to make any kind of difference now, why wouldn’t you launch earlier and get some momentum?

LEIGH Yeah I know, in the past that there’s been differences in the timing of the launch, sometimes they’ve been two weeks out, sometimes they’ve been on week out. I don’t think there’s any great science about these things.

ALY: Oh there’s science over everything, come on Andrew.

LEIGH: Haha, I think the only science is you probably don’t want to launch on the same day, I think that’s a loss all round.

ALY: Arthur let’s hear what the Coalition has planned  for that sort of skilled manufacture, that skilled work, you know that stuff that TAFEs produce, that kind of labour that hasn’t been the focus really over the last decade while the mining boom’s been in trend.  Does the Coalition actually have a focus on that?  What’s its policy?

SINODINOS: Can I just begin on this point about the lateness of Labor’s launch. I think that was partly driven by that fact that, you know you maintain, I think, access to entitlements up until the actual launch of your party’s actual campaign, that may have played a role in their thinking.  But I think you’re right to say a week out is a bit odd and may not have left Kevin enough time to do the sort of sell job he needs to do. That said, the policy announced around TAFEs and apprenticeships and the like sound like going back to the future in the 1990s. In fact I think Kevin worked on this stuff when he was in Queensland and the National Training Authority was set up, I think it was in 1993, trying to do something similar to what’s been talked about here. What we’ve tried to do with the TAFE system over a number of years is to actually make it more contestable, more market oriented and that’s been the theme of reform under a couple of Governments, including when Julia Gillard was Prime Minister, stemming from her time as Education and Training Minister.  I mean what we’ve said on education and training is for example, we want to give loans to apprentices to help them with the expenses of getting through their apprenticeships, right, and that would supplement the other assistance we’ve been giving for employment or have suggested we’re going to give for employment and training. And importantly also taking the burden off employers, including through lower Company Tax and the like so we can actually increase the number of jobs that are potentially available for apprentices.

It was a bit tragic that when Rudd came to power in 2007, he decided to dismantle the technical colleges which we were putting into place, re-badged them and tried to replace them with trade training centres when I think it would’ve been better for the sake of continuity of policy in this area if we just refined and improved on whatever were the deficiencies of the technical college concept and got that sort of fully, if you like, implemented. Because the point John Howard made, which we should all, I think, should always have conscious of, is that not everybody is going to be interested or able to go to university and we have to have adequate alternatives for people and the proper sort of trade training system can help in that regard.

ALY: Sure but those centres need money…

SINODINOS: Sure.

ALY:    …and it’s been States that have been ripping that money out, not least of which have been Liberal Party States so Victoria and WA that have been ripping money out. Now you’ve got Kevin Rudd saying that we’ll put that money back if it goes because it’s that important. Will you come out with any sort of commitment on funding?  Will you match that?

SINODINOS: Well Susan Ley’s going to have a bit more to say on this in the next day or so…

ALY: I look forward to that…

SINODINOS: …at a conference in I think Brisbane and speaking on all of that.

ALY: Tony Abbott has said that if he wins the election he will repeal the carbon price. He’ll be able to do that because Labor will have to be acquiesce because of the walloping it gets at the polls which means that it wouldn’t dare block the repeal of the Carbon Price. So will Labor, ultimately, if they are in Opposition in the Senate, let that amendment pass given that Tony Abbott would have to be held to have a mandate for that.

LEIGH: I will fight for a carbon price with every fibre of my being

ALY: Even though there’s a clear mandate for the Coalition if they win government?

LEIGH: I don’t believe that the Coalition are as lay down as they are to win.

ALY: Yeah but if they do, this is the only circumstance in which this becomes relevant, if they do it clearly becomes a mandate.

LEIGH: If the Coalition wins, they will have a majority in the Parliament but that doesn’t tell me as a Member elected in, were I fortunate enough to be in that Parliament, which is the hypothetical that you’re giving, I would then be elected by an electorate which feels very strongly about pricing carbon, which respects the science and respects the economics of an ETS as being the lowest cost approach.

ALY: Gentlemen, I’m going to extend this just briefly because I do just want to get your reflections as we wind our way to the end of the campaign, Arthur I’ll start with you. Has this been a good campaign? What are the highs and lows that you’ve seen so far?

SINODINOS: Ah look, I’ll believe it’s a good campaign if we win. That’s the only test of a good campaign. If you’re asking me highs and lows, the highs are when you’re out there actually talking to real people as it were, on the street, and trying to respond to their questions, trying to come up with proper responses, and the thing that always strikes you is how interested people are in what’s going on and the outcome and how well informed they are. The lows of the campaign, is when there’s misinformation about what your party’s going to do and I’ll be fighting that until election day.

ALY: Not the James Diaz controversy earlier on?  I’ve had that as a suggestion for a low in the campaign you might have nominated, Arthur.

SINODINOS: Well, I suppose Labor would nominate that as a high in the campaign, I’m not sure.

ALY: (Laughs) and I’ve always wanted to know what a real person is, am I not real, Arthur? Is that what you mean?

SINODINOS: Waleed, you are one of the most real people I’ve ever met.  I’m talking about those I meet in the flesh.

ALY: Alright, OK, nicely handled, still offended.  Andrew? Your highs and lows?

LEIGH: Well I think Arthur put it nicely there in terms of the importance of the ideas that you wrote something a while back, Waleed, where you talked about poisonous politics being the politics of teams, not the politics of ideas. And I really enjoy the conversation on the street, the couple that came up to me and said: “so tell me why Labor’s going to be the best choice for my three year old daughter”, or the woman I spoke to yesterday from Florey in my electorate who’s a part time public servant who’s worried not just about the quality of our public services, but also about her future employment. If you were going to nominate a low, I think I’d go with the politifact wisdom and nominate the boat buy back as being that.  But it’s been just a tremendously invigorating campaign for me on the ground in North Canberra. I’ve got nearly 140,000 electors, biggest electorate in Australia, so getting to as many mobile offices, community forums and hitting the phones and door knocking has been wonderfully invigorating.

ALY: But Andrew maybe if you bought all those boats we could relocate them to a naval base in Brisbane.

LEIGH: (Laughs) Three quarters of a million boats in South East Asia, Waleed, I think we’ll need a significant sum of money particularly as they can probably build boats faster than Mr Abbott could buy them.

ALY: I don’t know, that’d be a hell of a Navy, that would be an amazing Navy, that many boats. Oh well we’ll just have to go and think about whether or not this can be bipartisan.

LEIGH: A flotilla rather than an armada?

ALY: Arthur, Andrew, it’s been one of the genuine highlights for me in this election campaign having the chance to speak to you, I hope we get an opportunity to do it again. Thank you so much for your time and I’ll let you get back to campaigning.

LEIGH: Thanks Waleed.

SINODINOS: Thanks Andrew, thanks Waleed.

ALY: Arthur Sinodinos, perhaps threatened NSW Senator.  Pauline Hanson may be in the frame to take his seat, but perhaps not, he’ll be Finance Minister if the Coalition wins, and Andrew Leigh, who’s the Member for Fraser in the Lower House for the Labour Party.

ENDS

Below is a list of the polling places in the Fraser electorate, courtesy of the AEC website (which has volumes of useful information, if only you know where to find it).

Election day polling places in the electorate of Fraser, ACT, 2013 Federal Election

Opening times
AINSLIE	Ainslie Pre-school Baker Gdns	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
AINSLIE	North Ainslie Primary School Sherbrooke St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
AMAROO	Amaroo School Katherine Ave	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
ARANDA	Aranda Primary School Banambila St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
BELCONNEN	Lake Ginninderra College Emu Bank	8am - 6pm	Yes
BONNER	Neville Bonner Primary School Mabo Blvd	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
BRADDON	Ainslie School Donaldson St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
BRUCE	Calvary Hospital Haydon Dr	8am - 6pm	Yes
CAMPBELL	Campbell Primary School Chauvel St	8am - 6pm	Yes
CANBERRA CITY	Pilgrim House 69 Northbourne Ave	8am - 6pm	Yes
CHARNWOOD	St Thomas Aquinas Primary School Lhotsky St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
DICKSON	Daramalan College Cowper St	8am - 6pm	Yes
DOWNER	Downer Community Centre Frencham Pl	8am - 6pm	Yes
EVATT	Evatt Primary School Heydon Cres	8am - 6pm	Yes
EVATT	Miles Franklin Primary School Alderman St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
FLOREY	St Francis Xavier College Barnard Crct	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
FORDE	Burgmann Anglican School Forde Francis Forde Blvd,	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
FRASER	Fraser Primary School Tillyard Drive	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
GIRALANG	Giralang Primary School Canopus Cres	8am - 6pm	Yes
GUNGAHLIN	Burgmann Anglican School The Valley Ave	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
HALL	Hall Pavillion Gladstone St	8am - 6pm	Yes
HARRISON	Harrison School Wimmera St	8am - 6pm	Yes
HOLT	Kingsford Smith School Starke St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
JERVIS BAY	Assembly Hall Dykes Ave	8am - 6pm	Yes
KALEEN	Kaleen Primary School Ashburton St	8am - 6pm	Yes
KALEEN	Maribyrnong Primary School Alberga St	8am - 6pm	Yes
LATHAM	Latham Primary School O'Loghlen St	8am - 6pm	Yes
LYNEHAM	Lyneham Primary School Hall St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
MACGREGOR	Macgregor Primary School Hirschfeld Cres	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
MACQUARIE	Macquarie Primary School Bennelong Cres	8am - 6pm	Yes
MELBA	Mt Rogers Primary School Alfred Hill Dr	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
NGUNNAWAL	Ngunnawal Neighbourhood Centre Yarrawonga Street	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
NGUNNAWAL	Ngunnawal Primary School Unaipon Ave	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
NICHOLLS	Nicholls Joint Facility Kelleway Ave	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
O'CONNOR	St Joseph's Primary School 62 Boronia Dr	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
PAGE	St Matthew's School Stutchbury St	8am - 6pm	Yes
PALMERSTON	Palmerston Primary School Kosciuszko Ave	8am - 6pm	Yes
PARKES	Old Parliament House 18 King George Tce	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
REID	Reid Preschool Dirrawan Gdns	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
SCULLIN	Salvation Army Hall Cnr Ross Smith Cres & McIntosh St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
TURNER	Turner School Condamine St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
WATSON	Majura Primary School Irvine St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
WEETANGERA	Weetangera Primary School Southwell St	8am - 6pm	Assisted access
WRECK BAY	Community Office Wreck Bay Rd	8am - 6pm	Assisted access

I joined ABC666's outside broadcast from Urban Roast cafe in Belconnen at 7.10am this morning, and spoke with Ross Solly about the campaign trail, the risks Coalition cuts pose to public and private sector jobs in Canberra, and what the parties' policies say about their core values. Here's a podcast.

I appeared on ABC Lateline with host Emma Alberici and Liberal frontbencher Christopher Pyne to discuss the Coalition's hide-and-seek game with their policies, how their announced policies will disproportionately benefit the top 1%, naval bases and Labor's plan to invest in productivity through infrastructure and education.



A transcript (thanks to Lateline) is over the fold.

Transcript

EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: Back to the election campaign and our Friday Forum. Joining me from Canberra is Labor MP Andrew Leigh, Opposition spokesman for education Christopher Pyne is in our Adelaide studio.

Welcome to you both, gentlemen.

ANDREW LEIGH, LABOR MP: G'day Emma.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE, OPPN EDUCATION SPOKESMAN: Good evening Emma, good evening Andrew.

EMMA ALBERICI: Andrew Leigh, let me start with you. You're an economist by background. Shouldn't you have known better than to be releasing Parliamentary Budget Office advice you knew to be out-dated and not an accurate reflection of current Coalition intentions?

ANDREW LEIGH: Well, Emma, all costings are based on assumptions behind them. You can change those assumptions and you get different costing results. What I used in having one of the Opposition policies costed - a policy that would do tremendous damage to my own electors - was what I thought was the most reasonable set of assumptions based on what was out there in the public domain.

Now of course you can make the results differ if you use unreasonable assumptions, for example, it now looks as though in the case of raising superannuation taxes on low-income workers, the Coalition want to, rather than using the reasonable assumption that that starts on the first of July next year, make the much more unreasonable assumption that it's retrospective. But if they're using these unreasonable assumptions then we need to see the detail.

If you go to the Parliamentary Budget Office website you'll see requests for 46 Labor costings, you'll see a bunch of Greens costings there, you'll see no Liberal party costings.

It's almost as though what the Coalition are doing in this campaign is trying to make the Greens party look respectable in terms of their economic management and their willingness to stand up to public scrutiny.

EMMA ALBERICI: Christopher Pyne, reasonable, these costing analyses by Labor? Of your policies?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, Emma, what we've seen and no amount of trying to gild the Lily by Andrew Leigh will detract from the fact that what we've seen is Labor tried to get away with one lie too many in this election campaign by claiming yesterday a $10 billion black hole in the Coalition's savings measures that were announced on Wednesday.

And tried to cloak that lie in the clothes of the department of finance, Treasury and the Parliamentary Budget Office and in the most unprecedented action that I've ever seen in eight elections that I've been running for Sturt, the heads of the Treasury, Finance and the Parliamentary Budget Office specifically repudiated and humiliated the Prime Minister and said that they would not be used for base political reasons with one of Labor's scare campaigns and lies in this campaign.

And all day today Labor's been trying to create a smokescreen about how this is something to do with the Coalition's costings. This issue is about the credibility of a Prime Minister who has lied and scared the electorate for the last four weeks. It's about credibility, it's about trust. That is the only issue that we're discussing in terms of this complete fiasco in which Kevin Rudd now has egg on both his faces.

EMMA ALBERICI: Andrew Leigh, first Kevin Rudd continued to repeat the $70 billion figure when it's been fact-checked exhaustively and found to be comprehensively wrong. Now this so-called $10 billion black hole has been entirely discounted by three of the country's most senior members of the public service. This does present a credibility problem for Labor, doesn't it?

ANDREW LEIGH: I disagree with that statement, Emma. What the heads of Treasury and Finance have said is no more and no less than the exercise of costings depends on its assumptions.

EMMA ALBERICI: No, they actually did say it was in appropriate for the Government to have claimed that the Parliamentary Budget Office had costed the policy of any other political party.

ANDREW LEIGH: Well, certainly what we have done is done our best attempt at letting the Australian people know what the Coalition's policies will cost.

EMMA ALBERICI: But it wasn't what you purported it to be, you'd have to admit.

ANDREW LEIGH: We have used the best information that's out there and the most reasonable assumptions to have a go at working out what the Coalition's policies will cost. If they're making unreasonable assumptions, if they're thinking about retrospective taxation, if they're thinking about getting into firing public servants within weeks, then they need to come clear and say that, Emma.

I don't want to be having this costing debate. I would rather be discussing the kind of future that Christopher and I want to build for our kids. This is an anodyne debate, not one we should be having but we're forced into this position because the Coalition has a massive black hole.

Whether it's the $30 billion that Saul Eslake says or the $70 billion Andrew Robb and Joe Hockey were saying...

EMMA ALBERICI: That was quite some time ago and as I just pointed out, it's been exhaustively fact-checked.

Mr Pyne, Joe Hockey has said publicly that the Coalition has 200 policies fully costed. If that's the case, why won't you reveal that information to the public? Already we know half a million Australians have already cast their votes and they weren't privy to information that would have helped them make that very critical decision.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: It's a perfectly fair question, Emma. The truth is that by mid next week, all of our policies will have been released. Now, as you would know in every election campaign there are upwards of over 200 policies released and we have over the last four weeks, with our policies, released savings measures and on Wednesday brought that together at the National Press Club and Joe Hockey released $31 billion worth of savings, but by mid to late next week of course all our policies will have been published...

EMMA ALBERICI: Excuse me for interrupting but when you say "mid to late next week", is it going to be Wednesday, Thursday or Friday?

EMMA ALBERICI: Tony Abbott said today that by mid next week you could expect all of the Coalition's policies to be announced and therefore you could get a Budget bottom line.

EMMA ALBERICI: Can you tell us which day?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No, of course I can't tell you which day because I'm not privy to that particular piece of information but I can tell you that all the policies will be released by mid next week and you can then expect a Budget bottom line.

But we won't do what Labor did in 2007 under Kevin Rudd and 2010 under Julia Gillard and that is release our entire costings document at 5pm the night before the election.

And honestly, with Kevin Rudd having hit the wall so badly today over this humiliating issue to do with the there are $10 billion, I'm starting to wonder whether the Labor party wished they'd kept Julia Gillard as the Prime Minister.

They might have actually had a better run in the election rather than the faintly hysterical Kevin Rudd that we witnessed today at his press conference in Perth where even one of the people the fainted after having to leave his press conference because it was so hysterical and long-winded and faintly boring.

EMMA ALBERICI: Andrew Leigh, I'll give you a chance to respond.

ANDREW LEIGH: This isn't a game. We're not playing hide the costing. This isn't a pea and thimble trick in which the Labor Party says, "We've done our best to cost your policy based on reasonable assumptions," and you say, "Ah ha. No, we've made other assumptions. We won't tell you what the assumptions are but we come up to a different answer."

That is a crazy game do be engaging in and what it means is that ultimately there are cuts being hidden from the Australian people. We know the Coalition has a set of policies which are disproportionately going to advantage the top one per cent.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: You don't really believe this rubbish!

ANDREW LEIGH: Absolutely, Christopher. Let me talk you through some of the rubbish you're proposing.

You're proposing to give the private health insurance rebate back to millionaires and billionaires to pay them $75,000 when they have a child and to get rid of the mining tax and you're paying for that by raising the superannuation taxes on low-income workers, by taking away the school kids bonus from kids in their first day of school and by potentially driving the country into a downturn as we've seen in the UK and in Queensland when you cut too hard you cost jobs.

So you're going to benefit the top one per cent with your policies but the bottom 99 per cent are going to pay for it. It would just be nice if you were clear with the Australian people about exactly how it's going to add up.

EMMA ALBERICI: Christopher Pyne...

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I think it's sad Andrew, honestly I think it's sad that you genuinely - if you genuinely believe that complete tripe you're spouting on national television, I think it's particularly sad and you really need to get out in the real world and actually read what's going on in the real world rather than tell bald-faced lies on national television about somebody else's policies.

ANDREW LEIGH: Which of those was a lie, Christopher? Where did I mischaracterise one of your policies? The top one per cent have done very well over the last 30 years. Their income share has doubled. They don't need $75,000 to have a baby. We don't need to restore the private health insurance rebate to billionaires and we certainly don't need a huge tax cut for Gina Rinehart and Clive Palmer paid for by taking my money from kids on their first day of school.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: You've been caught red-handed lying about the Coalition's costings in the last two days and you're still doing it. If you wanted to be honest you'd remind the audience that 1.7 per cent of women in the workforce earn more than $100,000 a year so in fact 98 per cent of women earn less than $100,000 a year in the workforce and as a consequence, they are the biggest winners from a paid parental leave scheme that treats them like adults and says if you're on holiday you should be paid your full wage, if you're on long service leave you get your full wage and if you go and have a baby you'll get your full wage for 26 weeks so that you can spend that time nurturing your child and knowing you can still pay your bills.

It is remarkable to me that Labor is opposed to one of the most significant social and economic reforms that has been proposed in this country. I actually think you would like to propose it yourself but now embarrassed that the Coalition's proposed it, have to diss it when your heart's not really in it.

EMMA ALBERICI: Christopher Pyne, I'm interested to know your view on The Economist magazine's editorial coming up this weekend. They're barracking for Kevin Rudd in this election. How big a blow is that for the Coalition?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: It's not a blow at all. In a free country, in a democracy like ours, newspaper editorials or magazine editorials can plumb for which ever political party they want and if The Economist wants to support Kevin Rudd, well, good luck to them.

ANDREW LEIGH: The Economist certainly noted the use of market-based mechanism to deal with carbon pollution and quickly poo-pooed Direct Action and, as you'd expect from a magazine with that title...

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Obviously the Economist doesn't care about people lying before elections.

ANDREW LEIGH: They noted the benefits to Australia of the rapid fiscal stimulus which saw us avoid recession. The alternative to that fiscal stimulus would have been the kind of sluggish growth that we've seen elsewhere in the world. That's what we would have got if we had a Coalition Government in place when the global downturn hit.

So it's appropriate that The Economist magazine recognises our strong economic policies and of course it would be remiss of me not to mention that internationally it's been Labor Treasurers who've gotten the Euro Money magazine award for world's best Finance Minister.

EMMA ALBERICI: Andrew Leigh...

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well I'm sure that the average voter in Australia is really sitting there in their lounge room tonight thinking how important it is that the Euro Money magazine gives awards to Australian treasurers or the view of the Economist.

EMMA ALBERICI: I know you'd like to talk amongst yourselves but I would like to get a couple of questions in here.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Of course Emma.

EMMA ALBERICI: Andrew Leigh, a number of announcements from Labor this week did seem like policy on the run at a time when Defence spending is being cut, tell us how does it make sense to spend six billion dollars on moving the Garden Island naval base from Sydney to Brisbane? How is that a priority given the current state of the Budget?

ANDREW LEIGH: Emma, we know Garden Island faces some challenges and there's - in terms of our strategic posture, the Government's view is that it makes sense to have a look at options based out of Queensland.

EMMA ALBERICI: But the Defence White Paper in May thought it was too expensive. What's changed?

ANDREW LEIGH: We're certainly looking at various options here and recognising that Australia's Defence posture always has to be adjusting. There's going to be a variety of views on these sorts of issues but exactly where we structure our naval bases is absolutely vital.

I think if you look at the strategic situation for Australia, our naval forces are probably the most important part of our military posture and so having them located in the right bases is really vital. We want to be able to help out in the region. We've been doing a good deal of stabilising operations in places like the Solomon Islands and then we also want to have the capacity to respond to international challenges. For those reasons, the Government thinks that these - the basing out of Queensland makes some sense.

EMMA ALBERICI: Christopher Pyne, this seems to have come as a surprise to the Liberal Premier, Barry O'Farrell?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Absolutely, Emma. If we just review the week very quickly, we've had five lovely Kevin Rudd slightly hysterical thought bubbles.

On Monday he announced $115 billion for a very fast train.

On Tuesday he announced he was moving Garden Island from Sydney to Brisbane without consultation with anybody.

On Wednesday he announced a crack down on foreign investment which his Minister for Agriculture said he hasn't discussed with anyone at all.

On Thursday he said he was bringing forward two naval supply vessels two years with non-existent billions of dollars.

And on Friday he was repudiated by the department of Treasury, the department of finance and Parliamentary Budget Office for telling bald-faced lies about had Coalition's costings.

So Kevin Rudd has not had a very good week and the Garden Island one was a real doozy. That's on top of the Northern Territory company tax cut to 20 cents in the dollar which was, again, not discussed with anyone so when he came back to Prime Ministership, Kevin Rudd said he was a new Kevin Rudd, he was going to be consultative and have Cabinet government and all we've seen is the old Kevin Rudd treating people poorly, whether it's the make-up artist Lily Fontana or the hostess on the VIP jets, announcing policies on the run, thought bubbles, no consultation, all money pushed out past the forward estimates.

Frankly, the Australian public are sick of it. They want adults running the Government and have their chance next Saturday to make that choice.

EMMA ALBERICI: Andrew Leigh?

ANDREW LEIGH: Certainly the two parties will be presenting very different visions to Australia on seventh September. The Coalition are clearly planning savage austerity. We know from estimates that John Quiggen has done that for every $10 billion they take out of the economy, the unemployment rate is going to rise half a per cent and we know the impact that that sort of a slump would have on the jobs and the life prospects of Australians leaving school.

Our view is that with an economy moving out of the mining investment boom, it's appropriate to invest in schools, to fund the Better Schools package for six years not four years and demand states don't withdraw money from schools. To continue investing in universities and of course to build the national broadband network.

Mr Abbott talks about being an infrastructure Prime Minister but it's Labor willing to spend on rail, it's Labor willing to take fibre to the home. Done lot of door-knocking and I'm yet to find anyone on my door-knocks who would prefer the fibre stopped in the cable down the street rather than coming all the way to their home.

Australians want the 21st century investments and want to be sure those trades training centres are going to stay in our schools. They want to be sure we're going to expand university places as the demand goes up and that we're going to continue to invest in the underpinnings of prosperity not simply regard productivity as being a case of cutting back wages and conditions and going back to the old WorkChoices model. That's not the solution for building prosperity in the 21st century. Productivity is about skills, education and infrastructure and that's what Labor will deliver.

EMMA ALBERICI: We're running out of time.

Christopher Pyne, notwithstanding a major mishap by Tony Abbott this last week of the campaign, it looks like he will be the Prime Minister in just a little over a week's time. Apart from getting rid of the carbon tax and the mining tax, tell us how will Australians notice a difference in your first 100 days in Government? What will be the most telling change?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, Emma, of course we will abolish the mining tax and the carbon tax which will help reduce electricity prices and secure people's jobs. We'll immediately move to genuinely protect our borders and stop the people smugglers from filling our humanitarian intake of refugees by bringing back temporary protection visas, turning back the boats where it's safe to do so and having rigorous off-shore processing.

EMMA ALBERICI: I guess I'm asking you how it will feel different for Australians in the first 100 days rather than these things which might not necessarily reap rewards for you in the first 100 days.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I think it will feel different because people are sick to death of watching the television news and seeing unauthorised boats arriving, captained by people smugglers and losing control of our borders. You might dismiss that as not very important but I actually think out in the electorate, talking to people, they want their electricity prices down, they want to get rid of the carbon tax, they want their jobs to be secured, they want to have some faith in the economic management of the country and after the debacle of the last 24 hours, with the Prime Minister verballing the departments of finance, Treasury and the PBO, I think that's the last straw and they do want our borders to be protected. You might not think that is a big change but for most mums and dads who are trying to pay their mortgages and pay their bills, just knowing they can do that and that our borders will be protected will be a very big change.

EMMA ALBERICI: Thank you both, gentlemen, for coming in this evening.

ANDREW LEIGH: Thanks Emma.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: It's a great pleasure.

On 29 August, Andrew Leigh MP appeared on Sky PM Agenda with host David Speers and Liberal MP Josh Frydenberg. Topics included the Coalition's secrecy over releasing costings, and the situation in Syria.

Today in my electoral office I was delighted to meet local beneficiaries of the Creative Young Stars program. With financial support gained, Year 11 student Gabrielle Carter is heading to Glasgow to compete in an international ballet competition. Alison Plevey travels to dance festival in England and Jacob Niessl will be able to pursue his passion for music, competing in eisteddfods and community concerts with Canberra Youth Music.  My congratulations to all the winners.

MEDIA RELEASE

Twelve creative and aspiring young people have received Australian Government grants of up to $3000 to help them develop their  talents and chase their dreams.

The grants have been awarded under the Creative Young Stars program which provides individual grants of $500 and group grants of  $3000 to assist students and young people participate in creative, cultural, academic and community based activities, events or  training.

Two community groups in the electorate of Fraser are also beneficiaries of the program.

Member for Fraser, Dr Andrew Leigh, today congratulated the grant recipients and thanked all applicants, noting that the quality of young talent was outstanding.

“Our community is full of young people with many great talents. The exceptional contribution they make to our community and beyond will only increase with the chance to develop those talents further,” Dr Leigh said.

“The Creative Young Stars grants help young people of primary, secondary and tertiary school-age to participate in events such as competitions, eisteddfods, public speaking tournaments and other cultural, artistic or academic events.

“We want these young people to feel supported, and to have their talent and hard work recognised so their confidence and creativity develops.

“These grants do this but also support our young people in a practical way to make achieving their dream a little easier.”

On MixCanberra this morning, Liberal candidate Zed Seselja and I discussed optimism and talking with kids, kangaroos and roadside signs, Miley Cyrus and high-speed rail, and which Canberra agency will be forcibly relocated to the Central Coast if the Liberals win. Unfortunately, we didn't get an answer on all these issues, but here's a podcast.

Campaign Media Release

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus

Member for Fraser Andrew Leigh

NEW GRANTS FOR NATIVE TITLE ANTHROPOLOGY

The Rudd Labor Government is providing over $1.75 million to attract a new generation of anthropologists to native title work and to    encourage senior anthropologists to stay on in the field.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus QC and Member for Fraser Dr Andrew Leigh today visited the Australian National University to  announce Native Title Anthropologist Grants for the next three years.

“I congratulate the successful recipients and welcome their contributions to the native title anthropology sector,” Mr Dreyfus said.

“These projects will provide a range of programs, including training for junior anthropologists, field work programs, an Indigenous internship and research placements.”

The successful recipients are:

• The Australian National University Centre for Native Title Anthropology


• The Aurora Project


• Yamatji Marlpa Aboriginal Corporation


• James Cook University


• South West Aboriginal Land and Sea Council


• A joint project between La Trobe University and Native Title Services Victoria

“These applications best addressed the program’s priority areas of need and will benefit the native title anthropology sector as a whole,” Mr Dreyfus said.

The ANU’s Centre for Native Title Anthropology will receive $677,050 over three years to expand the capacity of groups working with native title claimants around Australia.

“The funding will ensure representative bodies working on native title with Indigenous communities are more responsive,” said Dr Leigh.

“Better cultural mapping and recording ‘on country’ will help speed up the native title process.”

Since 2007, the Rudd Labor Government has invested in education and employment services across the country.

The Coalition must disclose if this funding will be one of the cuts Tony Abbott will make if he becomes Prime Minister.

A total of $1,751,000 over the financial years 2013-16 is available in this funding round and is already included in the Budget.

The priority areas of the Native Title Anthropologist Grant Program are:

• Training and development for anthropologists to smooth the transition from study to native title field work.


• Professional development and support for anthropologists working in the native title sector.


• Strengthening linkages between academic and applied anthropological work.

Details of all projects funded over the first four years of the program are available on the Attorney-General’s Department’s website under: Native Title Anthropologist Grants Program.

CANBERRA

27 AUGUST 2013

Campaign Media Release

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus

Member for Fraser Andrew Leigh

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus QC and Member for Fraser Andrew Leigh today announced new funding for the Women's Legal Centre ACT and the Welfare Rights and Legal Centre ACT.

The Rudd Labor Government will provide an extra $200,000 to the Women's Legal Centre ACT for the next four years and an extra $240,000 for the Welfare Rights and Legal Centre ACT over the same period.

“Access to legal advice and support is essential to strengthening our local communities and our democracy,” said Mr Dreyfus.

“The Rudd Labor Government is deeply committed to a fair go under the law and this funding for the Women's Legal Centre ACT and the Welfare Rights and Legal Centre ACT will make a real difference to people in Canberra.

“Legal services have not yet fully recovered from savage cuts under the former Coalition Government but, in a tough budgetary period, this is a significant boost.”

“This additional funding means the centres can help meet demand for domestic violence, anti-discrimination, property and family law services,” Dr Leigh said.

“This will make a big difference especially to Indigenous women and clients of non-English speaking background.”

“The Women's Legal Centre ACT and the Welfare Rights and Legal Centre ACT will be able to employ more frontline lawyers and staff to help with family law, mortgage stress, employment law, child protection and care matters, and consumer law,” Dr Leigh said.

“Having briefly volunteered for the Welfare Rights and Legal Centre ACT back when I worked as a lawyer, I know first hand the valuable work they do for the Canberra community.”

This funding is included in the budget and is part of an extra $33.5 million over four years for community legal centres across Australia.

The new funding for community legal centres is in addition to the $32 million already provided annually under the Australian Government’s Community Legal Services Program.

27 AUGUST 2013

CANBERRA





Communications Unit: T 03 8625 5111 www.alp.org.au





Authorised by G. Wright, Australian Labor Party, 5/9 Sydney Avenue, Barton, ACT, 2600

On 26 August 2013, Bill Shorten delivered the 13th Fraser Lecture on the topic “The Battle of Ideas and the Good Society”. The video begins with an introduction from me, and concludes with Bill taking questions. A full transcript of the speech is over the fold.

Introducing Bill Shorten’s Fraser Lecture
Andrew Leigh MP
26 August 2013

I acknowledge the Ngunnawal people, on whose lands we meet today.

Thank you to our hosts for today: ANU Labor Students’ Club, and their president Charlotte Barclay.

One of the standard tropes you hear in election campaigns is that there’s no difference between the parties – that it’s a choice between the Popular People’s Front of Judea and the People’s Popular Front of Judea.

But elections do change history. Imagine if the Howard Government had remained in office for the past two terms.

We wouldn’t have DisabilityCare and a seat on the UN Security Council

We would not have apologised to the Stolen Generations, tripled Australia’s marine park network and raised universal superannuation.

Our economy would be smaller, and unemployment would be higher, as we recovered from the recession of 2009.

Perhaps no issue better illustrates the differences between us and the Coalition than parental leave.

We introduced parental leave – a fair and affordable scheme, which has been used by over 300,000 families. Every parent gets the same deal.

But the Coalition don’t want equal treatment.

When they see a kid born with a silver spoon in his mouth, their first thought is – what he really needs is a gold spoon to go with it.

And by the way, here’s a plastic one for the working class kids.

Last year, Joe Hockey lectured us from London about the need to end ‘the age of entitlement’.

Now, the Liberals tell us that millionaire families deserve $75,000 for having a child because ‘it’s not welfare – it’s an entitlement’.

It’s a window into their thinking.

When a minimum wage worker gets a hand up, it’s welfare.

But when a millionaire gets money from the government, it can’t possibly be welfare – it must be their ‘entitlement’.

* * * *

Now, to our speaker for today.

In 1940, George Orwell wrote an essay about Charles Dickens in which he points out that for all the discussion of working class life that you get in novels like Great Expectations and A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens never really seemed to regard slum-dwellers, servants, criminals and agricultural labourers as equals.

Orwell makes the same criticism of Tolstoy – someone who seemed fascinated on the problems of poverty, yet averse to breaking bread with the poor.

I used to think this didn’t matter much. But now I do.

There’s a story that the people who clean the Prime Minister’s suite were not invited to the PM’s Christmas Party for 11 years from 1996. Then in Christmas 2007, they were invited, and have been ever since.

Here in my electorate of Fraser, I’ve seen Bill Shorten chat comfortably with people with disabilities – making them feel at ease immediately.

I’ve seen him speak to building workers in Belconnen, talking about the economic incidence of company taxes. Bill told me afterwards: ‘Andrew, don’t ever underestimate your audience’.

And I’ve been with him in Civic, at an event in the kitchen of a local hotel. We were there to talk with the chefs, but Bill immediately went over to introduce himself to the man washing the dishes.

Bill has been at the centre of many of the government’s big reforms.

He’s thoughtful, articulate and funny.

But what’s most important is that for him, progressive reform isn’t just about passing laws – it’s also about helping people.

Reaching out.

Hearing their stories.

And acting on them.

Ladies and gentlemen, Bill Shorten.

Minister for Education and Workplace Relations Bill Shorten

2013 FRASER LECTURE

‘THE BATTLE OF IDEAS AND THE GOOD SOCIETY’

AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, CANBERRA

26 AUGUST 2013

*** CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY ***

Introduction

I am honoured that Andrew Leigh has asked me to deliver the 2013 Fraser Lecture.

Andrew is a big ideas man and someone who advances those ideas in the public sphere.

Andrew is what I call a warrior for Labor on the great national battlefield of ideas.

Last Friday I had the honour to share a stage with another big ideas man.

One of the giants of the Australian Labor Party – Paul Keating - at my Maribyrnong campaign launch.

Keating was in vintage form: smart, funny, incisive.

Paul reminded us that Labor was on the side of the “angels”.

“The angels”, he described as “the men and women of Australia … who make the place what it is, the ones who've got nothing to sell but their labour, nothing to sell but their time. No capital, particularly, and who need the support of the political system to give them a better standard of living, a better way of life and a better future.”

How right he is.

Ask yourself: who made the reforms and investments necessary to ensure that the political system gave the men and women of Australia “a better standard of living, a better way of life and a better future” and did so by opening up the economy?

As Keating remarked, memorably, Australians moved up from the Commodore to the Audi.

We did of course.

The Australian Labor Party did.

We’re the dreamers, doers and fighters.

We have ideas, and we don’t just want to talk – we’re prepared to fight to make them a reality.

That’s what we do.

We don’t slavishly follow overseas fashions.

The Power of Ideas

That’s why Australia avoided the excesses of Thatcherism and what in America became known as Reaganism.

Ideas are powerful. They can change the world. But in the wrong hands, they can be dangerous.

When Sir Keith Joseph, the so-called power behind Margaret Thatcher’s throne, addressed the 1976 British Tory Conference he said:

‘Scorn not the vision; scorn not the idea. Power grows out of the barrel of a gun. A gun is certainly powerful, but who controls the man with the gun? A man with an idea.’

When he said those memorable words, Joseph was mocked, not least from within his own party.

But Joseph enjoyed the last laugh.

Thatcherism took the free-market theories of Hayek and Friedman from the eccentric fringe to mainstream reality.

I’m not anti-market by any stretch of the imagination.

In fact, I’m pro-market, pro-competition, pro-innovation.

But I don’t think the economy has to be at the expense of society.

On the contrary, I believe the two are linked – that you can’t have a strong economy without a strong society.

Friends, make no mistake: we are at a crossroad.

Once again, people are telling us we have to prioritise either the economy or the society.

And the correct answer is not either / or, but both.

And that’s why – unless we want to risk the Australian way of life and end up with the lack of social mobility that we can see in Britain and America – Labor has to prevail in this battle of ideas.

The stakes are high. Our nation’s future is on the line.

Today I want to talk about four fronts of the battle of ideas.

First, I want to talk about why ideas are so important to our democracy.

Second, I want to talk about why ideas are so central to the labour movement we hold so dear and why our ideas are more often than not superior to those of our opponents.

Third, I want to talk about why the Labor Party was put on this earth: to build the Good Society.

And finally, I want you to know what this Rudd Labor Government has been doing to win the battle of ideas.

Because we need to clear about why our Labor ideas are right for Australia.

Because our ideas have a vision, an over-the-horizons purpose to build the Good Society.

We know, Margaret Thatcher declared there was no such thing as society.

Many of her Conservative Australian disciples still feel the same.

Labor feels differently. Always have, always will.

We pursued free-market reforms.

We led the way – floating the Australian dollar to financial deregulation and opening up the Australian economy.

But, unlike Thatcher, we didn’t declare war on working people.

Hawke working with Bill Kelty and the labour movement and business, built a consensus around his government’s policies.

Just like Kevin Rudd is doing with the BCA and ACTU now.

Labor introduced a ‘social wage’ – Medicare, superannuation, expanded higher education and cut tax.

Australian Labor invented what Bill Clinton and Tony Blair later called ‘the Third Way’.

As economist Tim Harcourt has recently argued, the Third Way is really the Australian Way.

And the Australian Way works.

Australia is the best performing economy in the OECD.

No recession for 22 years despite the global financial crisis which was really a global recession for many nations.

By contrast, Britain has an unemployment rate of 7.8 per cent, compared with our rate of 5.7 per cent.

In the United States, it’s 7.4 per cent.

In Spain, it is an astonishing 26.3 per cent.

Their youth unemployment comes in at 56 per cent.

We’ve retained our AAA rating.

Interest rates are at record lows.

Inflation is under control.

The other night Paul Keating reminded us about one of the enduring legacies of his government.

He reminded everyone about how much real wages have improved since 1991.

Real wages have gone up 36 per cent – at a time when they have stagnated or gone backwards in many other developing economies – including the United States and Britain.

We’ve got bigger profits, more cooperation and better productivity.

And who made all that possible?

Labor’s Australian Way.

It wasn’t about luck.

It’s about better ideas and people.

Labor ideas and people.

Australian Labor: A Movement of Ideas

From day one, in 1891, the Australian Labor Party has been a movement of ideas.

Simple but important ideas.

Like our belief in a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.

And bigger, sweeping nation-building ideas.

Like the National Broadband Network – lifting superannuation to 12 per cent – the Better Schools Plan – and the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

Like Gough Whitlam and the Family Law Act, bringing troops home from Vietnam and engagement with China.

Like the plans for industrial expansion drawn up by John Curtin and Ben Chifley during the dark days of World War Two.

Like Andy Fisher – one of Labor’s early and greatest Prime Ministers - building a transcontinental railway.

We’re the dreamers. The doers. The fighters.

William Kidston, then a humble Rockhampton bookseller who became the world’s first Labor treasurer, summed up our creed.

In 1891, he wrote a poem for the striking shearers gathered under the Tree of Knowledge in Barcaldine.

He urged them to shun extremism and seek ballot-box justice.

The title of his poem consisted of five simple words.

‘The ballot is the thing’.

Five simple words, one magnificent idea.

Claim your democratic rights.

Form a Labor party.

Win government.

Make Australia a better place.

Australia must be the Good Society.

Just eight years later, Queensland Labor stunned the world by forming the world’s first Labor government.

It only lasted a week but it whetted the appetite of our predecessors.

Five years on, Chris Watson formed the world’s first national Labor government, albeit a minority one.

In 1910, Andy Fisher’s party won government in its own right, another world first.

Then, as now, that year’s federal election was not simply the pursuit of power for power’s sake.

Of deciding who would form the next government of the Commonwealth of Australia.

William Spence, a fellow former AWU national secretary and Labor MP, boasted at the time:

“[t]he Labor movement in Australia has now become an almost dominant factor in the political life of the community.”

He argued that this coming triumph entailed more than churning out vote-winning policies.

Spence insisted that Labor was “a political as well as a propagandist movement.”

In other words, Labor had to have the better ideas and be able to communicate that to voters.

Labor must not aspire to be a party that merely reflects public opinion.

Voters needed to believe in our ideas.

It was ever thus.

And you know this belief – call it faith if you like – informs my political outlook.

I can think of three great causes in my life.

The first is my absolute conviction that we are born equal and unique. Each of us has something special within.

Our individual humanity deserves to be expressed fully, not stifled because of the postcodes and circumstances of one’s life.

And then there is my family. They give me my passion to look forward 10, 20, 30 years ahead.

Beyond the 24 hour media cycle.

My other cause is the Australian Labor Party. I joined at the age of 17.

I’ve devoted all of my entire adult life to serving the nation through this great Australian institution.

I joined because it was in my family’s DNA.

My Dad, a Geordie-born seafarer, had unionism and dockside politics pulsing through his veins.

My mum, the eldest daughter of a printer and trade unionist, was a freethinker who led an amazing career as a high school teacher and Supreme Court prize winner and historian.

So joining Labor was a gut feeling, a decision of the heart.

But my decision also came from the head because Labor was and remains the great Australian party of ideas.

From an early age I knew that elections weren’t just about power, or who gets what.

Or defending privilege and resisting change.

But about which side of politics has the ideas to confront the challenges that Australians faced.

Who has the ideas that can address the problems that Australia will confront in 10, 20 and even 50 years from now.

I was seduced by the Hawke-Keating-Kelty vision of consensus. By the length and depth and breadth – not to mention ambition – of their ideas.

Labor wanted the men and women of Australia to have a fair go.

A fair share.

A better future.

That was our ambition. Still is.

Labor wants Australians to get ahead in life.

And – unlike our opponents – we recognise that no one ever gets by just on their own.

We all need support.

We need strong families and strong communities if we’re going to have a strong economy.

And our opponents can’t beat that.

For them, it’s all about the individual.

For us, it’s all about the individual and the community.

Only Labor can do both. Only Labor.

Our values, our traditions, combine a belief in individual aspiration with the knowledge that we are all together in this life.

As the influential British Labour thinker Maurice Glasman recently said of his party: ‘Our tradition is our future.’

My favourite motto is the great Jesuit dictum, ‘be a man for others’.

It’s the ideal that I’ve always sought to live up to.

And it goes to the core of what I see as Labor’s enduring mission in political life.

What it was put on this earth for.

What the Rudd/Gillard Labor governments of the past five and a half years have pursued.

Building the Good Society.

It’s the reason I got into politics in the first place.

To leave this place a better place then we found it.

What is the Good Society?

First and foremost the Good Society is a prosperous, productive, competitive and diverse economy.

An economy where men and women are working in good jobs, treated decently, and are reasonably remunerated.

So that they can raise their children and lead long lives full of meaning.

Where well-being and resilience are central.

Where entrepreneurs and innovators can turn ideas into successful enterprises.

A Good Society means that people don’t merely work hard for their whole adult lives, only to retire poor.

A Good Society sees a cooperative relationship between business and unions as crucial to the creation of a competitive, dynamic Asia-focussed 21st century economy.

Housing should be affordable, whether people are buying their own homes or renting.

Our Good Society should have the best health system in the world, accessible to all, regardless of an individual’s wealth.

A Good Society must look out for those most in need –unemployed, Indigenous, pensioners and the disabled and their carers.

A Good Society means equal treatment of women.

A Good Society reveres education and the special role of teachers.

We also want our communities to be multicultural, tolerant and safe places sustained by respectful relationships, free from fear.

We want our communities to be well served by transport and infrastructure.

We want a clean environment so that our kids can one day dream of creating their own good society.

And not have to remedy problems their parents neglected to address.

Government cannot possibly ensure that nothing bad ever happens to people.

But we can help build resilient families and communities to get us through when life’s shafts of fate strike.

The Good Society is there to ensure that all are empowered to, lead meaningful lives.

Labor has played a leading role in building the Australian Good Society over 122 years.

And our mission is never finished.

We must continue to put ideas into action.

Ideas into Action: The Work of this Labor Government

There is a case to be made for the re-election of Labor on September 7.

Let’s look at education.

Labor legislated for Better Schools, initiated by Julia Gillard and Peter Garret, followed through by Kevin Rudd.

These are the most far-reaching educational reforms in decades.

It’s based on a simple idea – Labor believes in the transformative power of education.

Education has always been the door through which national and personal progress has been made.

For Australia to take advantage of its greatest opportunity since the Gold Rush – the Asian Century – education is the key.

So we believe that funding should be based on need for every student in every school.

We believe that education means that young people will:

Have a better job

Earn more

We know that the hourly wage gain from an additional year of schooling for Year 12 alone is around 11 per cent.

When participation effects are taken into account, annual earnings are 30 per cent higher.

But it’s not just the individual benefits that are profound.

A highly educated workforce is more productive which benefits all of us.  But it’s not all dollars and cents.

Investing in higher levels of education means our children are more likely to:

Be healthy

Live longer

And be more fully engaged in society.

Education is about discovery, friendship, excitement, pleasure, a sense of identity and cultural enrichment.

Education teaches us how to live together and to work together to build a better future.

In short, building the Good Society.

Now consider the National Disability Insurance Scheme known as DisabilityCare – an idea that I had the privilege to collaborate on.

Again built on a simple yet powerful idea – that all Australians deserve to be treated with dignity, to be full citizens and we are all worse off if their potential is wasted.

We’ve also introduced Australia’s first Paid Parental Leave Scheme.

Based upon the simple idea of equality for all women.

Then there’s the Labor invention of superannuation.

Based upon the simple idea that people should retire with dignity.

Oh and carbon pricing.

Based upon the simple idea that our planet is precious.

Our Prime Minister began the National Broadband Network.

Based upon the simple idea that our economy, and equality of opportunity, will flourish or wither on the vine of technology.

We put WorkChoices where it belonged – in the wheely-bin of Australian history.

We provided unfair dismissal protection for 7 million Australian workers.

The first ever national asbestos strategy.

Finally doing something about workplace bullying.

All based upon simple Labor ideas.

Because of the efforts of Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan we saved 200,000 jobs during the GFC, and created nearly a million new jobs since coming to power in late 2007.

And we now have a plan to grow jobs, build up new industries and invest in our economy beyond the China mining boom.

By contrast here are the ideas that the Liberals believe in:

They believe in ending fundamental workplace rights.

They believe in stalling and taxing superannuation.

They hate the idea of reducing our carbon footprint.

They believe in a Labor-lite Better Schools Plan. Christopher Pyne calls it a ‘Conski’ but a few days later supports us.

They are threatened by ideas of change. And don’t have the plans or burning ambition to build the Good Society.

When you wake up, hung over or not, happy or not, on Sunday September 8.

Whoever has won, if even Clive Palmer or Christine Milne or Barnaby Joyce has won, in the world you wake up to, one thing won’t change.

Labor will still be the party of ideas fighting for the Good Society.

Conclusion

You know, conservative writers, and vested interests, shout we can’t win on September 7.

They cry out that Labor has had its day.

They attack unions as no longer relevant.

They say working people have nothing to worry about.

They allege that the Good Society is a given.

But they’re wrong.

I believe, and you believe, Labor’s best days are yet to come.

The work of a great progressive movement – such as ours – can never be done.

Must never be done.

Never forget William Kidston’s words:

‘The ballot is the thing’

Five simple words which tell us what Labor is all about.

Five simple words which tell you how Labor changed Australia.

Five simple words which, I hope, tell you what I am fighting for.

Friends, right now the fight before us is this federal election.

We have 11 days to go.

11 days to win another election that many consider unwinnable.

We have a conservative Coalition hungry for power – contradicting themselves with a bleak ‘cut at all costs’ philosophy, masked by a reject shop sale of slogans.

To abolish the mining tax.

Create an unfair, unaffordable paid parental leave scheme.

Pay cash for boats.

We must fight tooth and nail to explain what we as Labor women and men are doing and why we are right.

Because if anyone says that to fight doesn’t get you anywhere, that politics can’t make a difference, that all parties are the same.

Then let them look over what our great Australian Labor Party has achieved over 122 years.

And over the past five and a half years.

So we over next 11 days must win every argument, great and small, and win the greatest battle of them all.

The battle of ideas.

We’ve done it before. We can do it again.



ENDS