Sky News AM Agenda with Kieran Gilbert
E & OE
GILBERT:
Welcome to the program. With me this morning is Liberal Frontbencher Senator Mitch Fifield and Labor’s Assistant Treasurer Andrew Leigh. Gentlemen good morning to you. Andrew first to you on this IT welfare issue it sounds like it is very much out dated now and it should be dealt with according to Scott Morrison, sounds like quite a compelling argument to do that?
LEIGH:
I think that’s right Kieran. When the current Human Services Minister Marise Payne describes the system as being like a turbo charged commodore 64 in the iPhone age, then you recognise that the Minister is taking it seriously. Part of the problem is we got locked in 2004 to a decade long contract upgrading the existing system. I think that was around the time Joe Hockey was Human Services Minister. There might have been good reasons for that at the time, but in retrospect, I think that was a mistake. The new system is struggling rolling out the existing payments, but certainly isn’t up to speed if the Government is going to go ahead with something like the McClure reforms. So we do need to see some sort of a clear proposal coming forward from the Government but the case I think has been pretty strongly made that this system to groaning under the weight of what’s being demanded of it.
GILBERT:
Senator Fifield as Assistant Minister for Social Services what’s your sense of how long this will take to deliver to make it more effective, more efficient?
FIFIELD:
Kieran, you’ve got to make sure that you’ve got a good business case and that you’ve got the best possible plan forward, and that’s what Marise Payne will be taking to Cabinet. And I’ve got to say, Marise Payne is not someone who is prone to exaggeration. So if she says something needs fixing, you know it does. This is a system that pays out in the order of $100 billion a year to more than 7 million Australians. The system is stable. It is working. But let’s face it. It’s a system that was perhaps cutting edge when Spandau Ballet were still big. It does need to change and Marise Payne is just the person to come up with a good proposition.
GILBERT:
Well that’s great to give Spandau Ballet a mention on AM Agenda too, never thought that would happen.
FIFIELD:
Always Kieran.
GILBERT:
Senator Fifield moving onto a pretty serious, grave matter in fact. I want to go to you first being from Melbourne. You know Craigieburne, the area, suburban Melbourne. This young man, 18 now reported in the front page of The Age and The Herald today that he is the individual, the young westerner photographed alongside IS forces, it’s a very disturbing story this one.
FIFIELD:
Kieran it is deeply disturbing and you can only speculate as to what is in the mind of a young man or a boy who finds himself in these circumstances. I think all of us want to be part of something that’s near and dear and that’s usually family and friends. All of us also want to be part of something bigger than ourselves, and we do have a duty as a community and as a society to make clear to young people that there are plenty of great things that are bigger than yourself, that you can be part of. But look, our officials, our law enforcement and intelligence officials, are studying this very carefully and we saw some recent success with some young fellas intercepted at an airport who may have been going off into harm’s way. This is a community effort and we’ve got to make clear to young people that there is a better way, that there are good things in our society to embrace.
GILBERT:
Indeed, these young men at the weekend or boys 16 and 17 Andrew Leigh. They were from Sydney’s South West. This individual that we’re referring to here. Jake as he’s referred to in the Fairfax papers, no surname given at the request of the family. Understandably his family worried sick. A non-Muslim family, this young man converted, left school, he’s a talented mathematician apparently, but ends up in Syria?
LEIGH:
Kieran I can only feel for how the parents are at the moment, as the father of three young boys how awful it must be for those parents. I think Mitch put it really nicely there about the importance of encouraging young people to find an outlet for their desires to make a difference in the world that are nothing like the crazy path being pursued by IS. We need to have firm controls. And full credit to the border protection people who managed to stop these two young men leaving the country. But we also need to have those community led programs. We have to bear in mind as David Irvine said to the Press Club last year, that we’re talking about a couple of hundred abhorrent souls in a Muslim community in Australia of half a million. Or as Barack Obama put it recently at a conference on countering violent extremism. We’re not at war with Islam, we’re at war with people who’ve perverted Islam. And it’s really important that we work with the billion Muslims worldwide in order to stop people joining this crazy cult.
GILBERT:
You referred to David Irvine there the former Director General of ASIO. Mitch Fifield there’s a story in the Fin Review today that David Irvine spoke of the threat to Australia’s power grid from hackers potentially and that he believes that the Chinese for example, already have the capacity to bring down our electricity grid if they sought fit to do so. He doesn’t think that will happen, he believes the threat really lies from hackers, but that’s a worry isn’t it, given the capacity in this cyber space.
FIFIELD:
There are no doubt a number of nation states who have different capacities to seek to intervene in infrastructure. But David Irvine’s broader and probably equally important point was that are no doubt a number of organisations, non-state actors, who are equally busying themselves in developing the capacity to cause disruption. That’s something our intelligence agencies are very aware of. They’re always working on strategies to counter that. David Irvine is someone who knows what he’s talking about. I have no doubt our intelligence agencies are doing everything in their capacity to have the ability to try and forestall such attempts on our infrastructure.
GILBERT:
Indeed and Andrew Leigh, David Irvine pointing out that he doesn’t see the State threat as an issue because of disciplines and rules around that and obviously mutual interest in not entering that sort of cyber warfare but hackers, groups. As Mitch characterised them there, non-state actors, They’re the real threat here.
LEIGH:
Absolutely Kieran and we need to make sure that we’re dealing with each of those challenges in a balanced and proportionate way. We recognised this in government which is why we significantly increased the funding, the personnel for ASIO and also provided them with their own purpose built facility. It’s really vital that we have the expertise needed to take on these threats into the future.
GILBERT:
Now to the Bali 9. Senator Fifield the Prime Minister has sought a conversation with President Widodo, he hasn’t had a second conversation. This was made this request last Thursday, still no response. Is this a fair reaction, treatment from the Indonesian authorities to a country which is meant to be one of our most important neighbours in the region? It seems that in some way they are treating us with distain.
FIFIELD:
Indonesia is a good friend. And the Australian Prime Minister, when he seeks to speak to the President of Indonesia, usually has that opportunity, and I’m sure that opportunity will present itself. There is no question that the Australian community, the Australian Parliament are taking every opportunity to register with the Indonesians that we respect their sovereignty, we respect their court and judicial systems, we respect their fight and their determination to tackle the odious drug trade. But what we are seeking to do as a government is to put the case that under Indonesian law there is the prerogative of mercy that can be exercised by the President. That’s the petition that we are making as a government and indeed as a Parliament. And I’m sure that there will continue to be the avenues and the opportunities for the Government and the Prime Minister to put that to Indonesia.
GILBERT:
Let’s hope so Andrew Leigh, finally less than a minute remaining on the program. But there’s no sign that Widodo is going to relent here. He’s given another interview saying that this is their policy, this is their law.
LEIGH:
The hand is ticking towards midnight Kieran but while there is life there’s still hope. I think it’s absolutely vital that we continue to reach out to the Indonesian Government making that clear message to President Widodo that each of us is better than the worst thing we’ve done. And while these young men have committed a heinous crime for which they should be punished, they shouldn’t have to pay for it with their lives. They’re a real credit to ability of the Indonesian penal system to rehabilitate. They will do good for Indonesia if they’re kept alive and I hope that plea can at the last minute fall on receptive ears from President Widodo.
GILBERT:
Andrew Leigh and Senator Mitch Fifield. Thanks so much for that across a range of topics this morning. Chat to you soon.