| Topics: Coalition’s First Home Buyer Deposit Scheme; East West Link; Election result
E&OE:
GREG JENNETT:
Thank you, and everything is falling nicely into place here now at the Liberal or Coalition, we have to keep reminding ourselves, that the Nationals are jointly involved in this launch here today, from the Melbourne Convention Centre and Andrew Probyn is with us again. Joined now by South Australian Senator and Trade Minister Simon Birmingham. Welcome, Senator.
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Good to be with you.
GREG JENNETT:
We were commenting before your arrival, the strong, almost folksy theme of the storytelling around this launch, it was, to borrow a phrase, the “ScoMo show”.
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Well, it’s about connecting with Australians, Australian families, Australia households and the choices and the challenges that they face, and we know that Australian families don’t see government has being the solution to all their woes and they want government to be there when required – in times of drought or flood. To help them get ahead. To provide the safety nets, to provide the lifesaving medicine that is they need. But they don’t want government or believe that government can go on a reckless, big-spending binge, and can solve their problems by taxing them more or by taxing their neighbours more.
ANDREW PROBYN:
It was very much folk used on Scott Morrison, the man. Is this a tactic so that we – voters out there forget what preceded in August?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Well, it’s about the future. I mean, at this election come next week, we will have one of two people as Prime Minister of Australia. We’ll either still have Scott Morrison, or we will have Bill Shorten and that is the choice for the next three years, and potentially beyond and there’s a very stark choice when you look at the policy differences between the two competing teams. You heard the Prime Minister today outlining strong plans for how it is we keep the economy strong, continue to generate jobs, a further 1.25 million jobs in the future. How we reform the tax system to help keep that economy strong, but to give people more incentive to work harder, better opportunities to get ahead, as well as the plans for targeted investments to help young Australians buy their first home. To ensure that we deal with the scourge of youth suicide. These are strong plans for the future but they’re careful plans for the future as well, and that’s the contrast to the very reckless spending plans of Mr Shorten.
GREG JENNETT:
All right can we can we pick up on the homeownership where you’ve spoken already about defining the role of government, the size of government, where and when it is and isn’t appropriate and yet, this is a pretty direct intervention into the mortgage market on face value, isn’t it? Why, is the question. Why is the Government seeing a role for itself in this deposit scheme?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
It goes very much to the core of traditional Liberal values of wanting to help people establish their own economic security. We know that buying a home is one of the best things that people can do to set themselves up for the future and we know though and we hear on the ground, that hitting that 20 per cent deposit target is a real challenge for many young Australians in getting themselves set up. That’s why we made the changes over the last couple of years to enable people to use superannuation as a vehicle for saving for that deposit. We still think that we would be able to do more. Not to be able to give away money, but to be able to just help people access the loans required to be able to then buy their first home so that they don’t have to wait so long to build the 20 per cent deposit, but to be able to get there sooner, quicker and therefore, of course, be able to start paying that loan and building the equity in their future.
ANDREW PROBYN:
You’ve also put $4 billion towards a project that the state premier says won’t be built. Why would you do that?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Because this is about delivering for the people of Melbourne, and particularly the people in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, the type of congestion-busting, life-changing infrastructure that we’re seeing being built elsewhere around the country. Now we hope and ask that the Victorian Government reconsider, putting a new offer forward in terms of how it could be done, in a way in could be done without them having to stump up as much cash as they did in the past, because we want to see that infrastructure delivered so that people get home faster, so that people get to work faster, so people get to spend more time with their families and less time stuck in cars.
GREG JENNETT:
So just to be clear how much? We know how much the Commonwealth is putting on the table. How much is it that you would reasonably expect from a Victorian Labor Government?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Look, let’s have proper negotiations there around what type of model they might be willing to come to the table with….
GREG JENNETT:
…what if it was zero?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
There are different scenarios that can be canvassed in terms of potential private sector support for the delivery of this. Ideally, the Victorian Labor Government would not have gone down the path of axing this project, of wasting $1 billion in doing so, when the Labor Government was elected here. They did. That’s in the past. We want to look to the future. We want to work cooperatively with Dan Andrews to see the project realised, because it will make a difference to the lives of many Victorian families.
ANDREW PROBYN:
Can you confirm that it hasn’t been budgeted in the federal costings?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
We’ve made clear that there was already money, significant money, provisioned for this project, and, of course, as with everything we do, it will be fully costed.
ANDREW PROBYN:
It’s not in the budget papers, is it?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
No. Andrew in the contingencies and so on, this project has been provisioned in the past, consistently, because the money has always been there. We’re now making sure that it’s a different model and approach, hopefully to secure it.
ANDREW PROBYN:
But it is not there by name in the budget papers?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
It’s there in terms of being provisioned as part of the contingencies.
GREG JENNETT:
Can we segue then, that was a specific announcement here at the launch and it lays a platform for the final week. Why don’t we start in Victoria as we step away from launch into campaign mode again? We heard references specifically to Deakin, to Casey. What is the latest you’re picking up on the belt of seats, particularly through the eastern side of Melbourne?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
I think that there were references to seats, to members, to locations right around the country. This is a national campaign…
GREG JENNETT:
…particularly Victoria, though…
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
…and we have to make sure that we win everywhere. Our campaign headquarters is based in Queensland. The first debate happened in WA. Scott Morrison is from New South Wales and here we are doing the campaign launch in Victoria. Everywhere matters to this election. We want to make sure that we hold every Liberal-National seat around the country. We see many opportunities to be able to win seats off the Labor Party…
GREG JENNETT:
So where?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Well, there are certainly opportunities in terms of Tasmania and the Northern Territory, parts of regional Queensland, parts of suburban and regional New South Wales. These are all key areas, and I think the message for every Australian as we head into the last week is – this is going to be a close election. Every seat is going to count. Every vote is going to matter, and people genuinely have the power themselves to determine whether they get Scott Morrison – lower taxes and a stronger economy or Bill Shorten – higher taxes and fewer jobs in the future.
ANDREW PROBYN:
Your path to victory is very narrow. There are opportunities, as you say. Do you have enough opportunities to offset the losses that might come?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Well I don’t concede that there will be losses that come but we absolutely see…
ANDREW PROBYN:
…there are some…
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
…we there are seats that we can take off of the Labor Party, as well as seats that we are defending. That’s what makes this a very competitive race. I know that at the start of the campaign, Mr Shorten and others thought that this was a coronation election, and that he was just going to move straight into The Lodge. That’s proven not to be the case as he has been shown up to not be across the detail, to be unwilling to talk about the costs of his policies and the impacts they will have on retirees, on homeowners, on all of those who will pay higher taxes. It’s been shown up time and time again, and that has helped to create the circumstance where we go into the final week with everybody knows it’s a close race, and that everybody should think very hard about the choice in that contest.
GREG JENNETT:
You’re absolutely in it to win it, and yet, you may or may not be aware that there are people in our own ranks who say things like, “an acceptable result” for Scott Morrison under the circumstances in which he found himself, is – is an honourable loss, one with a number of seats in the high 60s, for instance. Is that something you’re prepared to counter at the moment? An honourable defeat, but one that just fell a fraction short?
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
No, because the only result that’s going to be acceptable to Australians is the re-election of the Liberal-National Government with Scott Morrison at the helm. That’s the only way that Australians can guarantee the maintenance of the strong economy, that gives them more jobs, lower taxes, targeted, careful, prudent investment in programmes to help first owners get a house, to tackle youth suicide, to deal with mental health and create more apprenticeships, all without the type of higher taxes that targets retirees, homeowners, those saving for the future.
GREG JENNETT:
Well, Simon Birmingham, I assume like the rest of us, we all have other commitments looming in the hours ahead, so we’ll thank you and farewell you for now. As campaign spokesman, I guess viewers and listeners are going to a lot more of Simon Birmingham before the campaign is out.
SIMON BIRMINGHAM:
Thank you very much guys and happy Mother’s Day to my mum out there, too.
GREG JENNETT:
There he is, never one to miss an opportunity. Simon Birmingham, who plays the role, not just as SA Trade Minister, but as campaign spokesman for the Liberal Party. And Andrew Probyn, I think that that does bring us to a natural conclusion of our coverage of this launch from the Melbourne Convention Centre.
[ENDS]
Media Contact: Coalition Campaign Headquarters: T: (07) 3557 7533 / E: media@cchq.org.au |
