Interview with Tom Connell, Sky News
TOM CONNELL: A lot happening today, but we can't have a Friday without Hume and McAllister. Each week, Shadow Finance Minister Jane Hume and Assistant Climate Change and Energy Minister Jenny McAllister face off and fire up on the big news and political developments. Jane, Jenny welcome. Jenny we'll start with you this week. What has you fired up?
JENNY MCALLISTER: Well, Tom, this week the Parliament passed the safeguard legislation and it's a really significant moment for Australian communities and for Australian businesses and for the Australian economy, because for a decade, under the Coalition Government, we had no settled climate or energy policy and it has had real costs for the Australian people. Business had no certainty about what to plan for and how to make their investment decisions, and now they will. We were keen to work across the Parliament to gain agreement, keen to engage with stakeholders all through the community, keen to engage with business about the shape of these reforms. And we are really pleased that we have brought through a package that has the support the Australian Conservation Foundation, the Business Council of Australia, the Australian Industry Group. These groups all know that settling the climate wars, settling a climate policy for Australia really matters. The great shame is that in this, as in so many other policy areas, the Opposition, the Liberal-National Coalition, refused to engage and simply said “no”, they vacated the policy field. But we are getting on with the job, Tom.
TOM CONNELL: Jane, your turn.
JANE HUME: Tom, Anthony Albanese ten months ago, looked voters in the eye and said, you'll be better off under Labor. Well, I'm out here in Aston with Roshena Campbell this week and quite frankly, that's not at all what we're hearing from residents out here. They're telling us that when you stand outside a supermarket, that their grocery bills have gone through the roof, that the average mortgage holder out here is now paying $19,000 a year more than they were just a year ago, and that their energy bills have gone up by 31 per cent. New data today from CEDAR show that low-income families are now spending more than 50 per cent of their disposable income on housing and energy bills alone. And yet, when they look to their government for answers for help with the cost of living, they're not only getting nothing, they're seeing Anthony Albanese and his team talk about almost anything else. And the reason why they're talking about anything else is because they haven't got a plan. They haven't got an economic plan, they haven't got a plan to bring down inflation and they haven't got a plan to deal with the cost of living.
TOM CONNELL: All right, there's Jane out at Aston. We'll talk about that in a moment. She's got her finger on the pulse, by the look of it, trying to do her bit for the next Liberal MP we'll see. The Minister for Indigenous Australians, meanwhile, says the country is one step closer to making history. The long-awaited introduction of the bill to add an Indigenous Voice to Parliament was passed, another emotionally charged day in Canberra. The Coalition's response was to demand more detail.
[Footage excerpts]
TOM CONNELL: We're talking about changing the Constitution. It's a complex legal element to this, of course. Yes, the Opposition has been pushing for the Solicitor General's advice on this and the response from the PM, Jenny, has been, oh, we don't believe they really want the advice to help it pass. We think they want it to fail. But don't the Australian people who are voting on the referendum, after all, deserve to know this advice? Why not release it?
JENNY MCALLISTER: Tom, this is a simple proposition. It is about providing advice, the capacity for Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander people to provide advice about matters that impact them and also, of course, recognition. And it is a proposal that has a long pedigree. It has been consulted and discussed for nearly a decade now. It's a generous opportunity that was put before all of us as Australians at Uluru, and this year we'll have the opportunity to respond to it and I hope that Australians will respond to it positively. You're right that the Opposition is asking for the release of advice. Peter Dutton knows that it is not the practice of governments to release legal advice and the government's been very clear about this.
TOM CONNELL: Right, but it could be released. The government's choosing not to. That's what's happening here.
JENNY MCALLISTER: Australians can know that the proposition before them is constitutionally sound. They can rely on the opinions that have been offered by a range of eminent constitutional lawyers -
TOM CONNELL: But why not the government one they pay for with taxpayer dollars?
JENNY MCALLISTER: It is a simple and modest proposal to allow Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people a say about the policies that impact them. And we know from the evidence that when that happens, we get better results.
TOM CONNELL: Jane, on the Liberal Party's position on this, we saw the Nationals come out early on and say, as a party, they will oppose it. Do you think the Liberal Party needs to respect choice? There are people within your party that are passionately supporting this and some that are not. Does the Liberal Party need to be a broad church and not have a block party view on this?
JANE HUME: Tom, just let me take a step back for a moment and say that that Solicitor General's advice can easily be released. In fact, this is a Labor Government that has used Solicitor General's advice to its own advantage before. It has weaponised Solicitor General's advice in the past, and yet somehow now it's inconvenient to release something that is so fundamental to asking questions about what is a very serious constitutional change. We've approached this very respectfully from the start. In fact, the idea of Indigenous recognition in the Constitution is something that the Liberal Party, the Coalition, has spoken about for decades now. We want to see better outcomes for Indigenous communities right around the country, whether they be urban, regional, remote and rural. But the problem is, of course, with this referendum is that that does raise an awful lot of very legitimate questions and we want to have those questions answered. The idea that they would be dealt with either by downplaying them or ridiculing them, that's actually contemptuous of genuine and legitimate concerns as to what the implications -
TOM CONNELL: Okay but just to that question of Liberal Party agreement. Because we are almost out of time on this -
JANE HUME: The Liberal Party will make that decision - particularly well, so the good news is now we have a question. We know that it's very broad reaching. We know that there are an awful lot of implications from the question that's being proposed that's now gone to a Joint Select Committee and there are a number of Liberal representatives as well as National Party representatives on that Joint Select Committee. And it will ask those questions and get some answers. When that happens, it will come back to the Liberal Party party room and to the Coalition party room, and a decision will be made then. Once we understand what the implications are, that's the sensible way of going about this, and we want to do that and we want to make sure that all Australians have access to their questions, too.
TOM CONNELL: Would have thought you could still perhaps say, up to the party room, given it's such a passionate issue. But look, we'll ask down the track. Jane, Jenny, stay there. We'll talk through Aston, where Jane is right now after the break.
TOM CONNELL: One day to go for the Aston by-election, triggered by Liberal MP Alan Tudge's resignation last month. It's poised to be the first test of Opposition Leader Peter Dutton's leadership. Labor hopes it will be first seat in a century to be snatched from the Opposition at a by-election. Nominating university union organiser Mary Doyle to contest the once liberal stronghold, the Liberal candidate, City of Melbourne Councillor, barrister Rashina Campbell. So, it's high stakes. Here's how it unfolded.
[Footage excerpts]
TOM CONNELL: We will, of course, have full coverage tomorrow night, 6:00pm in the Aston by-election. But first, to you on this, Jenny? I'm just intrigued that the PM is really firing up on this. Richard Marles is going to be attending the Labor function. Are you setting the bar pretty high here? If you don't win this, it'll be disappointing?
JENNY MCALLISTER: Well, Labor would have to defy history to win this seat, Tom. I think it's been 100 years since a government took a seat off an opposition at a by-election. And in fact, the more usual practice in a by-election of this kind is for there to be a swing to the Opposition. And that's what Peter Dutton really ought to be hoping for. I imagine Peter Dutton's possibly sweating on it because ordinarily an Opposition would expect to swing in the order of 4 per cent. Be very interesting to see if that unfolds on Saturday night, because my best guess is that voters will be looking at Mr Dutton and thinking, 'this is a group of people who have not learnt a thing since the Federal election'.
TOM CONNELL: All right, Jenny, we know you've got a very tight schedule this morning. You get to leave. Jane, you've got you're very lucky. You get two or three more minutes with me to spruik the Liberal Party's chance in Aston. So, Jenny will talk to you next week.