Sky News
E&OE
Subjects: NDIS; Redress, Dastyari
DAVID SPEERS:
Big news from the west today on a long-running standoff over Western Australia’s participation in the NDIS – the National Disability Insurance Scheme. The Labor Government there under Mark McGowan has now signed an agreement with the Turnbull Government federally that will see WA finally come within the fold and join the nationally delivered NDIS.
The minister federally responsible for this Christian Porter, the Minister for Social Services, and he joins me now from Perth. Thanks for your time this afternoon. So the Barnett Liberal Government held out, wanted a state-administered scheme. What’s been the tipping point, I suppose, that’s finally seen the Labor Government in WA come on board?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Well, we’ve had near on a year of negotiations, and I might just look a little bit back in history when Malcolm Turnbull became Prime Minister a little over two years ago, he signed the first bilateral with New South Wales, and now just outside of two years he’s signing the final bilateral with WA. So it really is, over two years, a pretty significant achievement on behalf of the Prime Minister.
The WA situation was, as you noted, that the Collin Barnett Government determined effectively to go their own way – in a consistent fashion, but their own way nonetheless and we’d been negotiating to have WA come back into the national scheme. Very productive negotiations with the Premier Mark McGowan. They’ve concluded, the bilateral has been signed – the NDIS, as of today, is completely national. It’s very good and pleasing news in WA, and I might say, particularly as a federal minister from WA, it really is a great day over here.
DAVID SPEERS:
Yeah. I mean, what does it mean practically, Minister, for those families who’ll want to access the NDIS? What difference does it make?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Well, we’ve tried to make sure that the transition makes as little difference as possible. So the West Australian estimate of numbers is about 39,000, and we expect to be at or close to that estimate in about 2020. So what happens is we will move all of the people who have gone into the WA scheme, which is about 8300. They will transition into the national scheme by the end of December in 2018. We take full control on 1 July 2018 and we start moving in those tens of thousands of people into the scheme.
So we’ve tried to organise it so that there is as little disruption for people who have already gone into the WA scheme, that we’re as swift as possible in moving everyone into the new scheme, and that there’s minimal fuss for providers who, at the moment, most of them are registered both under a national scheme and a state scheme.
But this is going to mean greater consistency, certainty, and also better care, and it means great job growth for WA as well. We estimate that this will create 8000 new full-time jobs in WA, to a total of 17,000 people working in disability service and care in the state.
DAVID SPEERS:
It also seems to mean a pretty decent saving for the State Government. Premier McGowan says the state will benefit from $1.3 billion in avoided costs over the next three years. Is that right?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
They’re WA State Treasury figures, I’ve got no reason to dispute them, but I would say, David, that does not mean automatically that there’s that much extra cost for the Commonwealth, because we already have …
DAVID SPEERS:
Why not?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Because we’ve got economies of scale, effectively. We have the NDIA in place, we have our staff, we have our IT systems, we have our administration. So we’d leverage off all of those things to ensure that we produce consistency, but they’re already sum costs for us, so they’re already things that we maintain.
DAVID SPEERS:
But $1.3 billion over three years sounds like a lot of saving in terms of economics of scale. Is that really all it is? There’s no less money going into the needs of families?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
No, no. Well, it’s an uncapped scheme David. So the reality is that all of these costs are budgeted for. The costs are driven by demand. But what you need to understand is that WA made a decision under the previous government to go it their own way, with consistent parameters, but to go it their own way. The observation I think that the present Premier is making is that was an expensive decision, and I think that’s likely true, but that’s a decision now that’s been reversed and WA are coming into the national scheme.
DAVID SPEERS:
Now, on another matter, on Friday, as you know, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse will be handed to the Governor-General. You have been trying to set up – or encourage the states and the churches to join a national redress scheme, worth around $4 billion. Where is that up to?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Yes. So that announcement was made about this time last year. Since then we have, in the last budget, provided all of the money necessary for the administration of the Commonwealth scheme. We’ve prepared the legislation after exhaustive consultation with the states and the territories, the churches and the charities. That’s before Parliament. We don’t expect any difficulties in having that passed early next year so that the scheme can be up and running next year. Of course, as you noted, what we are waiting for is the states, the territories, the churches and the charities to make the critical decision to opt in. I’m very optimistic that we’ll see the first state jurisdictions do that in the not-too-distant future.
But I would also note that we have now done everything that we possibly can in terms of creating the structure and the architecture for a fair and consistent regime for survivors right across Australia, and it is effectively at this point up to the states, the territories, the churches and the charities to do the right thing by survivors, to whom they owe an obligation and a duty to provide redress, and for those organisations to make the decision to opt into the scheme, of which now we are well and truly well-advanced.
DAVID SPEERS:
Is it fair to say that the release of this royal commission will be a point at which pressure can rightly be applied to the states, the churches, the charities to get on board with this?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Well, I think the pressure comes from three sources. It’s the moral pressure to do the right thing on behalf of survivors, which we, the Commonwealth, have done with respect to the survivors who suffered these terrible instances of abuse, sexual abuse in Commonwealth settings. We’re there, we’ve done that, we’ve legislated for that, and in a way that allows all the other jurisdictions to opt in.
The second pressure is, of course, I think going to be the release of the final report, which happens later this week.
But the third pressure is that there is really very little now that can be done in terms of providing yet more information. What’s known about the Commonwealth scheme, really, is sufficient to start making decisions inside these organisations to come and opt in. So I think we’re reaching a very critical point, where the time for excuses minimises down to very little or nothing, and decisions have to be made very much sooner rather than later.
DAVID SPEERS:
Now, Minister, if I can turn finally to Sam Dastyari, the big political news of the day. He’s leaving Parliament, as the Government had demanded. He’s now on his way out. He won’t be there when Parliament resumes next year. It’s cast, of course, a big spotlight on the issue of Chinese donations that have gone to both sides of politics. Yesterday we saw revelations about a Liberal fundraising vehicle in your state, in WA. The 500 Club having Chinese Government officials address an event where people are encouraged, businesses encouraged to pay to come along. Were you aware of that event? Are you comfortable with that sort of event?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Look, I wasn’t, but you say it’s thrown a spotlight on certain issues.
I think there are three distinct issues here: there are political donations from foreign organisations and individuals; there are foreign organisations and individuals and, indeed, governments speaking at public events; and then there was the situation in which Senator Dastyari put himself in where he was receiving personal gifts, in effect, to pay for personal expenses, travel and other types of expenses in the guise of what was no more than cash for comments.
Now, the situation that Sam Dastyari put himself in was totally improper, and he was right to resign, and Bill Shorten was wrong not to force that resignation much earlier.
At the other end of the scale, the 500 Club event – I wasn’t aware of it personally. But I think having organisations address other organisations in Australia is not in and of itself something that we should be overly concerned about. I mean, we want to watch it closely …
DAVID SPEERS:
No, but when it’s used for fundraising purposes, that’s the issue, isn’t it? Foreign governments lending their presence to fundraising purposes.
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Well, correct, but my understanding – and I’m not an expert on the 500 Club event, as it was not a fundraising event. It was a presentation information event – but in the middle, you’re right, and we are a government who now, through Mathias Cormann, …
DAVID SPEERS:
Hang on. Sorry, are you saying there was no money from this event going to end up in Liberal Party coffers?
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Well, I don’t have that information, but from what I’ve read about it – and my information on it is probably no better than yours, David, it’s what I’ve read in the media. I understood it to be an event where there was an invitation from Chinese businesses to basically speak to business people in WA. And, of course, WA has had a very long connection with Chinese business, particularly through the resources industry, so that, in and of itself, is not an unusual thing.
But in the middle, where you have foreign entities, corporations and individuals donating for the purposes of influencing Australian politics, it’s quite wrong, and we are the government that has now brought in the strictest legislative framework to prevent that from happening. We very much hope the Opposition will support that, but it’s this Government that is preventing those types of donations flowing in a way that creates undue foreign influence in Australian politics. And the legislation that we’ve now introduced is the strongest legislation of its type in Australia’s history.
DAVID SPEERS:
Alright. Social Services Minister Christian Porter, appreciate your time this afternoon. Thank you.
CHRISTIAN PORTER:
Thank you, David. Cheers.