2GB Luke Grant

E&OE

LUKE GRANT:

Nice to meet you finally Minister, I hope you are well.

MINISTER MORRISON:

I am very well Luke and it is good to be here in person with you here today. Have a good break Ray and I hope you are enjoying it, and Alan and everyone else.

GRANT:

Absolutely, you have had a bad weekend – Waratahs gone but Cronulla great weekend.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Outstanding! Great win for the Sharks up there in Townsville, wasn’t so good for Southern Districts against Warringah down there at Forshaw Park but – not a good weekend for the rugby on my part but a great weekend for the NRL.

GRANT:

Yeah good stuff. The front page of the Tele today confirms something we have been worried about – we all have for some time now. Australia’s welfare bill seemingly is spiralling out of control. New figures reveal more than 14 million; I will get you to explain that for me in a moment, welfare applications were approved last year resulting in $150 billion plus to taxpayers. It is expected to blow out to $190 billion a year over the forward estimates. Already working on reducing the bill with changes to the pension but do we get it? I mean this is a big thing for you to do, it is alright to increase taxes and get money in that way but when you’ve got this spirit of “hey I get this stuff for free from the government, I go and apply for this and they give me these numbers of dollars.” But you have got to say “hey hang on this has got to stop,” and convince people – many of whom don’t want to be convinced.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well it takes eight out of ten income taxpayers to go to work every day to pay for our social services bill.

GRANT:

Eight out of ten?

MINISTER MORRISON:

Eight out of ten income taxpayers are going to work every day – all the taxes they pay and the value of all that is what it takes to pay for our welfare bill. Now we have made quite a few changes since coming into government. For example for the DSP you have to go and see a government doctor now, you can’t just go around and see your mate who can sign something off.

GRANT:

Smart.

MINISTER MORRISON:

What we have seen as a result of that is the flow of people into the DSP has fallen. We still have a large number of people on the DSP, some 830,000, but we are slowing the rate of people going on to the DSP and with the other payments it is the same sort of thing. It is about having an eligibility that is fair which ensures that people who really need help can get the help but for those who think they are just entitled to it or those who want to game it well it is our job to ensure that we are dealing with reducing the eligibility and shutting it out of those who want to game the system.

GRANT:

The other part of that is you then need, if you want to make changes that you think are fair and right, the help of the Parliament to get them through. You’ve got hands tied everywhere?

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well that is true…

GRANT:

Except I think you are Mr Negotiator, you seem to get things done.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well we were pleased to get the pension change through the Senate. We are currently talking to the Senate about some other changes in the Family Tax Benefit area. But every dollar paid in welfare is a dollar that has to be paid in taxes by someone. Somehow the nexus between these two things gets lost along the way. It is as if the money falls out of the welfare tree and it doesn’t, it is paid for by other taxpayers. I don’t agree that we should be running around jacking up taxes. I’d like to see taxes lower, so would the Prime Minister and the Treasurer, and one of the ways you can take the burden off taxes is by getting the welfare spending under control. Now we are doing a lot to achieve that but we still have a lot more to go and we want the people who need it most to get it.

GRANT:

You see 14 million welfare applications I am assuming some people made more than one application or what is it two thirds or more of Australians are actually applying for stuff that is available? We have too many options for people.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Look, there are multiple payments and there are multiple supplements that are out there and people can apply for these depending on their circumstances – parenting payments, carers payments, supplements, and the DSP and all of these sorts of things and it all adds up. People can have an eligibility for a number of different payments. One of the things that Pat McClure did when we asked him to do a report for us in all of this was try and break a lot of that down and get it a lot more simpler and so there wasn’t the same opportunity to apply for multiple levels of payments. I have seen that story about the woman who apparently says she is getting $4000 a month in these payments.

GRANT:

This is on ACA tonight on Channel Nine; she won’t work for anything less apparently.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well she is not working for anything. That’s the point.

GRANT:

But she won’t come off the benefit unless she can get that sort of money. That’s a tough one isn’t it?

MINISTER MORRISON:

And it is and while an individual payment like NewStart is only linked to CPI – I don’t think people would say the NewStart payment is an overly generous payment, it is a very basic payment – it’s less than the pension. But when you add that to a range of other things that are available then these things can stack up and the important thing is these are benefits that people are receiving. They are not earnings, they are not wages, they are not I would even say entitlements. I mean the only entitlement you have is the entitlement to have a fair go and we want to give people a fair go if they have a go but if you are not going to have a go well I think we can do things on eligibility and we are.

GRANT:

Just on to another issue, I was quoting the Immigration Minister Peter Dutton, your successor, you both handled that portfolio with distinction and the attacks on the weekend – I was in here for Ray on Saturday morning and we had news of the three attacks in Tunisia, France and Kuwait and all those people dying. You hear commentators, perhaps to the left, or I think even Joel Fitzgibbon made the comment yesterday that the Prime Minister – some of his words on Saturday morning shouldn’t have been uttered on air before 9pm – almost like you are out there inflating the whole situation. But as a taxpayer I want you to be frank with me and if it is bloody dire tell me it’s dire. Just in the language about what is going on we have the right to think that things aren’t like they used to be and these bastards roam the world with knives and other things and it is just not as safe anymore.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well the government has to be candid with people about the threats that are there and the risks that are there and I think we have down that as a government, the Prime Minister in particular has done it. The terrible events overseas over the weekend are very distressing but this is what has happened and this is the world in which we are living and there are people living in this country who would seek to do Australians harm and we are doing everything within our power – $1.3 billion we have put into our various security and other agencies to ensure that we can protect against this threat but there are no guarantees in this area and the Australian people have got a government who are taking this dead serious. We are working with the Opposition in the Parliament on these things in as bipartisan a way as is possible but people can’t kid themselves that this isn’t a reality – it is a reality and I am not surprised that the Australian people I think feel more comfortable with the government on these issues because I think we have the track record. I mean not just under the Abbott Government but under the Howard Government as well, I mean the Coalition has always had a very strong track record on these things.

GRANT:

You talk about border support; you have previously, turning back the boats stopping the boats. This is exactly where we want our borders to be as secure as possible so I think people probably have the feeling that given you could do what they said couldn’t be done it is likely that the current government is better at keeping us safe than perhaps the Opposition given what they did when they were in power. Let me ask you this, has Barrie Cassidy lost the plot?

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well Malcolm certainly made that point very well. But before I answer that just going back Peter Dutton has made an excellent point in the Parliament over and over again. That is if you can’t manage the borders then you can’t be trusted on national security either and I think Peter has done an outstanding job picking up from where we left off on Operation Sovereign Borders. What we saw from Joel Fitzgibbon, the odd man out it would seem on turn backs in the Labor Party, and they don’t get it, they have lost the plot on this, they don’t understand that the people smugglers want to – they are only going to be diverted by people who have a singularity of purpose. I don’t think there was any doubt whatever criticisms people had of Tony Abbott and I or others on this area from the left or wherever else. They had no doubt about unanimity of purpose of the Party.

GRANT:

You believed in it.

MINISTER MORRISON:

We believed in it, we did it; we were at one with it. The Labor Party is all over the shop. Now even – let’s say something fanciful happens and they decide to back turn backs at the National Conference which I think is unlikely, I wouldn’t believe them if they said it anyway because Kevin Rudd said it the day before the 2007 election, he’d turn boats back. So even if they say it they will never do it and frankly if they tried it they would probably stuff it up anyway.

GRANT:

How much trouble is Bill Shorten in?

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well I will leave it to others but I said last week he huffed and puffed all over the place and then he blew his own house down at the end of the day with the way he managed both the policy and the politics of whether it was the pensions issue or the ridiculous hypocrisy of questioning the government over turn backs and then their own experience in government was brought to light. So look the guy has always been quite superficial on issues and people always had a question mark about trust – all this stuff before the Royal Commission at the moment I suppose if union members couldn’t trust their union boss how will the Australian people trust a Prime Minister who has that sort of form.

GRANT:

It’s a good point. So when you add all those things up together plus his sliding popularity in the polls do you think you will face him when we come to the next election?

MINISTER MORRISON:

I believe so but Bill Shorten’s problem is what does he stand for? Who knows anymore? He stands for Bill Shorten we are pretty sure about that because that is the only consistency you have seen in his political and broader career. He always stands for Bill Shorten, every single time.

GRANT:

Will you go on Q&A when next invited?

MINISTER MORRISON:

No I haven’t been on Q&A for a long time. It hasn’t been my practice to spend that hour on a Monday night doing that for a very long time. So I am not changing my practice there.

GRANT:

Ok, and gay marriage – we had what happened in the USA on the weekend with the Supreme Court ruling. I think there were 14 states who opposed it now you and Ray have discussed this at length. What will that do to the gay marriage debate in Australia do you think? I see many people now saying “oh now America is with Ireland, what the hell is Australia doing?”

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well both the US and the Irish situations were different to ours in that one was dealing with a constitutional question which doesn’t present in Australia and the other one was dealing with a court decision which is not what is presenting in Australia. Look there is a respectful debate which is going on inevitably or the presumption that there is only one question to be answered here I don’t think – I don’t share that view. I still think there are a lot of Australians who have deep reservations about this and I certainly respect their views and I share them. But that is a debate that will continue and I hope it continues in a respectful way. There is a very strong argument out there that Australians should have their say about this ultimately. It is a big change and I don’t think we can under play the scale of this change and what it means. I mean there are many migrant ethnic communities in Australia for whom religion and their culture is inseparable and those who from the left who like to argue about multiculturalism and all of these sorts of things I mean there is some very strong views being put in a lot of ethnic communities by religious leaders whether it is in the Maronite community here in Sydney or in other parts. A lot of Middle Eastern Christian communities have very strong views about this, a lot of Hindu communities have very strong views about this so I think we need to continue to have a respectful debate and not allow overseas developments to somehow seek to force anyone’s hand here. Let’s just keep going in the modest respectful way we are going but my view hasn’t changed and it’s not likely to.

GRANT:

Before you go you mentioned a plebiscite – referendum whatever you want to call it. But the idea that we individual Australian’s have the question and get to actually have our say, I quite like that notion more than perhaps inviting you as a local member – as a Minister and local member to come up with some conscience vote. Are you more sympathetic to the PM’s view which is that Parliament will decide or do you have some sympathy for the view that we Australian voters should decide?

MINISTER MORRISON:

Well I think this idea has become part of the debate now. The debate now is also about what process you would follow to make a decision like this. Now the Prime Minister was referring to a referendum. Now a referendum is a very different concept to a plebiscite. So that’s – they were his comments. But I make this point it was the Liberal Party – National Party Coalition policy that put the current definition in place, so that remains Coalition policy. There is a fair way to go before those issues are resolved before you even get to issues of potential votes or alternatives such as plebiscites and things of that nature. So look I think this has a lot further to go than some appreciate and I think we have to appreciate that out of respect for all Australians.

GRANT:

Great stuff, have a good day. Good to see you.

MINISTER MORRISON:

Thanks a lot Luke.