Posted: 24 May, 2013
Tony Abbott speaks to The Hot Breakfast in the run up to the election
The Official transcript of Triple M The Hot Breakfast's interview with leader of the opposition Tony Abbott.
Subjects: Ford; car industry; Peter Costello; federal election; Hazel Hawke; Dreamtime at the G; AFL.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
We got a call during the week saying Tony Abbott was in town. We said, well, drop in and have a bit of a chat to us and he duly has. Good morning, Tony Abbott.
TONY ABBOTT:
Eddie, it’s lovely to be with you.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Good on you, Tony. What a day to have you in here. First of all, let’s have a chat about the Ford situation. It’s been on the horizon for a while. There have been a lot of government subsidies going into the car industry and we see the devastating effect of this on the communities, particularly on Geelong and Broadmeadows, but the ripple effect will continue. What now, though? Let’s, you know, without being too dispassionate about it, let’s just say, what do we do? Where we do we build our new manufacturing? That’s an old 1910s industry. Should we be, you know, hooking our wagon to the NBN or whatever form of communications they have and go for something?
TONY ABBOTT:
Well Eddie, what we’ve got to do, if we want to keep manufacturing in this country – and we should, we should be a country that makes things – we’ve got to get our costs down. So that means lower taxes, less regulation, higher productivity and that gives manufacturing a fighting chance. Now, yesterday was a dire day. I felt personally like I’d had a bit of a kick in the guts because I’ve driven the mighty Ford Territory ever since it came out virtually. It’s a terrific car and the tragedy is that Ford – unlike, to their credit, Toyota – have never really had an export plan because if you want to be economic as a car-maker, you’ve got to have production runs of about 100,000 a year and given that our best-selling car, the Mazda 3, only sells 40,000 cars here, if you’re going to economically make cars in Australia, you’ve got to export the bulk of them and Ford never did that.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
So, what do we do now? Do we say, right, ok, obviously we’ve still got Toyota and Holden here, support them, but do we start cutting tariffs and getting the price of cars down? If we’re not supporting local industry, why are we copping it in the neck? Should we cut the tariffs and just say, right, the motor industry, we’re importing and that’s it?
TONY ABBOTT:
Well, tariffs are very low now anyway. The reason why people buy foreign cars is because we like variety and you know, there are four of five locally made models, but there are 370-odd models on sale. So, the public want the variety that motor imports give them. As I said, the answer for the car industry is a strong export plan and the Coalition, should we win the election, will work with the industry, we will work to support the industry, but we want to support the industry towards a much greater export orientation.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
It all seems a bit hard, all that. So do we look now and say, right, we’ve got three years, let’s come up with something. Do we build a fast train? Do we start using these manufacturing plants to come up with new industries? As I said, do we go into the Silicon Valley model? Do we hook our wagon to NBN? Do we decide that we’re going to become the solar industry of the world? We need to start coming up with things rather than just being an adjunct to the American car industry.
TONY ABBOTT:
Yes, Eddie, but it won’t be government that comes up with the ‘you beaut’ way forward, it will be our innovators, our entrepreneurs, our businesspeople, because they are much better placed than public servants to know where the market potential is. So, if we get our taxes down, if we get our regulation down, if we get our productivity up, Australian businesses are more than capable of taking on the best and winning.
You know, I’m wearing the proverbial R.M Williams boots today. R.M Williams are still profitably manufacturing boots in Australia because it is a high end, quality, niche product, and that’s the future for us. It’s not making T-Shirts, it’s not doing something that the Indonesians and the Chinese can do at $2 or $3 an hour. No, it’s staying a couple of steps ahead of the game and we have to have faith in our initiative, in our ingenuity, in our drive. We’ve always done it in the past. We can always do it again in the future.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Enjoy those R.M Williams, I think they’re for sale at the moment and had to be bought by an American company!
LUKE DARCY:
Tony, 113 days until the election. You’re a marathon man but even by your standards that seems like a long way away. Peter Costello has said today that even if you ran naked down Bourke Street, you can’t lose the election. Are you planning on doing that or anything else?
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
You will win the election if you run down…!
LUKE DARCY:
Well exactly.
TONY ABBOTT:
Well, I’m going to spare the people of Bourke Street that spectacle. Mind you, I did ride down St Kilda Road in my lycra this morning so I guess that’s almost as bad.
LUKE DARCY:
Yeah that’d be good in the R.M Williams.
MICK MOLLOY:
Do you just get into Cabinet meetings now and when you’re addressing the staff just say to everyone, “No one do anything stupid.” Is that it?
TONY ABBOTT:
But we’re politicians, Mick, so it’s very hard to take that injunction seriously! I mean, most days someone does something silly and often enough it’s me. Look, you know, our job every day is to demonstrate to the public that we are a credible alternative government. People are, I think, a little embarrassed that the incumbents have turned out to be as they have and they want people who are competent and trustworthy in government and we’ve got to be competent and trustworthy and we’ve got to look like we know what we’re doing. Now, I think we are succeeding there. We’ve been doing a lot of thinking, a lot of planning. Our broadband policy that Malcolm brought out a month or so back, I think is an excellent policy. The workplace policy that Eric Abetz and I brought out the other day, a very middle-of-the-road, sensible centre-type policy. Just yesterday I brought out a discussion paper on an economic plan for Tasmania. It’s a great state, Tasmania, but it’s got all the worst economic and social indicators in the Commonwealth. There’s nothing wrong with the people, but we’ve had government which has held them back for too long.
MICK MOLLOY:
We should cut it loose. Sometimes you’ve got to cut of the branch to save the tree, Tony! Tasmania secedes.
TONY ABBOTT:
Oh look, they keep thinking that they need to junk the mainland. Let’s face it, it’s that northern island that’s been setting them back for years!
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Tony, I’m worried about unemployment, though. We’ve got the slowing down in the mining industry. We’ve got Ford now pulling the pin. We’ve got Shell, we’ve got all these other industries starting to pull the pin. Is this a worry for you coming in? Because it’s one thing getting the prime ministership, but then when you get there you, you get the problems with it. So what are your thoughts on unemployment in Australia? It looks good at the moment, but…
TONY ABBOTT:
Look, plainly, there have been some very worrying straws in the wind. Ford was obviously a devastating blow yesterday. But again, and I know I sound like a cracked record on this, Eddie, but taxes down, regulation down, productivity up – we will make it because our people are more than up to it. Just at the moment we’ve got too many taxes, we’ve got too much red and green tape which is holding people back. Every day you talk to people who are having a go, but people are making it needlessly harder for them. I was talking to a fellow in Tasmania the day before yesterday. He has a plan for a new on-farm hydro-electric power generating scheme. Four years, it’s taken him, just to get through the approval process, and he was held up for six months because of the alleged presence of a snail in his creek which is not endangered and now it turns out that the snail’s not there. But that’s just six months of…
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
The snail was there but it moved on!
LUKE DARCY:
Moved to France!
TONY ABBOTT:
…six months of wasting time and money because you’ve got all these bureaucrats who are in the business of saying no, not yes.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Finally, Tony. Mick’s got one.
MICK MOLLOY:
I just wanted to ask – recently we heard at a school visit in Brisbane, someone chucked a sandwich at our Prime Minister. If that happened to Joe Hockey, do you think he would try and eat it?
TONY ABBOTT:
Depends whether it was Vegemite or jam!
MICK MOLLOY:
A good Australian product like Vegemite, he would.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Tony, one final one, a sad day, a great Australian passed away overnight in Hazel Hawke, the former wife of Bob Hawke, the Prime Minister of Australia. She was a tour de force in her own right and a wonderful human being.
TONY ABBOTT:
A very gracious lady and I can remember years ago, when I was a new member of parliament, Margie read Hazel’s story and she was tremendously impressed. Look, I think Hazel Hawke was a gutsy woman. A lot of people identified with her and she was heroic in her fight with Alzheimer’s and the way she was so gutsy in coming forward and being very public about her own struggles with that affliction. A great lady who will be much missed.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Tony, thanks for dropping by. You’re going to the Dreamtime at the ‘G tomorrow night. You’ll be there, Mick will be there. Are you Essendon or Richmond? You were out at Essendon hanging around last year during the election, hand-balling and things…
LUKE DARCY:
Yeah, that didn’t go well!
TONY ABBOTT:
No, no, you know, such a tart, you know at election time! Look, being a GWS man these days…
MICK MOLLOY:
Oh, we’ve heard about this,
LUKE DARCY:
Yes, here we go!
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Don’t tumble into that…
TONY ABBOTT:
No, look, I just figured that, you know, Sydney and myself, we could grow together in our love of this great game. We could all learn together!
MICK MOLLOY:
I wouldn’t have thought you had to do much out in western Sydney right now to win that particular part of town!
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
I think I declared war on them once. Don’t do that, Tony. Hey, by the way, don’t you stick your head up, because David Evans has sent me a text, the Essendon President, he’s not happy about you calling for his assassination going into…
MICK MOLLOY:
It wasn’t an assassination.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Well he took it that way.
MICK MOLLOY:
He’s taken it out of context.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Tony, good on you, mate. Welcome to Melbourne, and you’re here for the weekend, so we’ll see you around the place, and we’ll look forward to talking to you over the next hundred and how many days?
LUKE DARCY:
113.
EDDIE MCGUIRE:
Thanks Tony.
TONY ABBOTT:
Thanks Eddie, thanks Luke, thanks Mick.
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Tags: Tony Abbott, The Hot Breakfast
