BEN FORDHAM, HOST: Now the Prime Minister is heading overseas. He'll attend three conferences in Asia with some of our closest allies. But of most interest is the global event starting on November 15 in Bali, the G20 Summit. It looks like the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, will be a no show but the US President, Joe Biden, is set to be there and the same goes for the Chinese President, Xi Jinping. Anthony Albanese will be taking off today. But first, he's on the line. PM, good morning to you.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning, Ben. Good to be with you.
FORDHAM: Are you looking forward to catching up with the Chinese President?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we'll wait and see. I will be at the same summit as him, at the G20 being held in Indonesia. It's an important summit, it comes at a really difficult time for the global community. We know that the economy is facing headwinds, we see global inflation rising as a result of Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine. We have challenges of climate change to deal with. And, of course, we have the strategic competition that's occurring in the region and a rising of tension in some areas of the Indo-Pacific. So that's a difficult backdrop. But I look forward to engaging constructively at the G20, as well as with our neighbours of the East Asia Summit and the APEC meeting being held in Thailand afterwards.
FORDHAM: While you're jumping on the plane, Aussies are having panic attacks over power bills. We know that you promised a $275 cut to power bills by 2025. Your own Treasury department now predicts a 50 per cent increase in electricity bills by the end of 2023. PM, is now a good time to reset those expectations around the vow to bring the prices down by $275 by 2025?
PRIME MINISTER: Well Australians know that we're not immune from the impact of this Russian illegal invasion that's pushed up energy prices globally and is leading to global inflation. We're seeing double digit inflation in parts of North America and Europe. So we're dealing with that challenge as well as we're dealing with the 22 different energy policies, none of them landed, from the former government. But we're getting on with co-operative investment. The fact is that the Commonwealth and the states and territories are coming together to work towards solutions here. And, as well, we have an immediate challenge, which the Government is working through with our departments, with industry as well. We know that some windfall gains have been occurring at the same time as businesses and households are under pressure. So we'll work through those issues and land on a solution going forward prior to Christmas in order to put some downward pressure on those increases that have been foreshadowed.
FORDHAM: I've got a message from Dale that I promised to read next time you’re on. It came through about a month or so ago. You just mentioned the previous government, which is timely because he said: “Next time you speak to Anthony Albanese, can you ask him this? The cost of living has gotten to the point now that I've had to cut back to one meal a day in order to make ends meet. What is the PM planning to do about this mess? So far all he does is blame the Morrison Government for their mistakes.” So what are you going to do? Are you going to introduce price caps on gas?
PRIME MINISTER: Look, that is one of the options that is under consideration. We know Western Australia, for example, isn't dealing with the same pressures that are here on the east coast. But I've been working constructively, and we will with the New South Wales Government as well as with the Queensland and Victorian Government, on these issues. We know there are medium-term solutions, including an increase in supply in gas. But we know that there are these pressures due to the global price increases that are occurring. But we're looking at measures that that put downward pressure and relieve cost of living pressures that are on people. We have provided in the Budget for cheaper medicines, cheaper child care, for investments that grow the economy and provide that cost of living relief.
FORDHAM: Just on the power crisis, is one of the things you're looking at a short-term tax on the mining industry? Because there's a report in The Australian today that Cabinet will consider a new tax on gas and thermal coal and the idea is that money will then go towards power bill relief for Australian households. Is that on the table?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, what we have said is that all sensible measures remain on the table. We're working these things through, including talking with industry themselves. But we need to provide relief. We can't just sit back and watch this occur while you have these extraordinary profits being made at the same time that households and businesses, particularly manufacturing, are under pressure.
FORDHAM: And for the avoidance of doubt, one of those options that's on the table, and you say many things are on the table, would be a mining tax?
PRIME MINISTER: No, because I'm not quite sure what a mining tax is besides a slogan.
FORDHAM: We had, once upon a time, a super profits tax that the Rudd Government tried to bring in. So I don't know. But this is one of the things you are considering, according to The Australian.
PRIME MINISTER: No, we're not looking at an MRRT. And that was just speculation by The Australian. The Secretary of Treasury, Steven Kennedy, has made it clear in Senate Estimates this week that we will look at sensible options. There are some limits on what we can do. We have contracts with other nations for supply. We don't intend, of course, to interfere with any of that. So that limits what options are on the table. But we'll work issues through and we'll work them through in a way that provides maximum relief for people that we can achieve in a practical way. One of the issues we're dealing with, of course, is that a lot of these issues relate to states. In Queensland, the assets themselves are owned by the state government. In New South Wales, there's a lot of regulatory measures that have to be dealt with as well. And so we're working through cooperatively. We can't act alone. But we will act in conjunction with state and territory governments, particularly on the east coast, as well as with industry.
FORDHAM: Just on renewables, I know that Chris Bowen, your Energy Minister, says over and over renewables are the cheapest form of energy. Is that something you believe wholeheartedly, that renewables are the cheapest form of energy? Because I look at the plans to get to 82 per cent renewable energy by 2030, the current rate’s about 30 per cent. To get there we're told that that requires the building of 220,000 solar panels a day, 40 giant wind turbines a month, eventually up to 28,000 kilometres of high transmission power lines across the country. So hand on heart, you believe all these things are possible? And you believe that renewables are still the cheapest form of energy?
PRIME MINISTER: So does every economist in Australia who examines it. So does every state government. In New South Wales, the Liberal Party as well as the Labor Party believe in the same thing because they're the facts, for the same reason why your listeners who are listening to you this morning, many of them would have put solar panels on their roofs. They've done that, it might help the environment, but they've done that in the knowledge that once that initial payment is paid for, which might take a few years, from then on their power bills are cheaper.
FORDHAM: That's not the experience that people are getting these days, though. There are a lot of people have invested in the solar panels, we hear from them here PM, they say that they're not getting the kind of savings that they were promised.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, the fact is that the cheapest form of new energy is renewable. There's nothing to stop someone going out there and investing in a new coal-fired power plant. Nothing to stop that. Why hasn't it occurred throughout the entire nine years of the former government, when they went on about how this was going to occur? They indeed gave proponents in Collinsville in Queensland $4 million to do a feasibility study that we haven't even seen. Why didn't that occur during the last term? Because they couldn't get the investment because it doesn't stack up.
FORDHAM: Let me let me ask you about what's happening overseas. Because when you look at, say, Germany, they've spent almost a trillion dollars trying to switch away from fossil fuels. They're now dealing with some of the highest energy prices in Europe and having to switch back on coal. So isn't that a warning of what we've got coming here?
PRIME MINISTER: That's about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Ben, you know that, and Russia turning off some of the gas supply that was flowing through Western Europe. That's what's occurred there. Let's be very clear. That's a direct product of the Russian strategy.
FORDHAM: But we've got gas, we've got coal. So why have we demonised it to the point that there hasn't been that investment in those traditional forms of energy that we desperately need right now and the rest of the world can't get enough of?
PRIME MINISTER: Ben, you say it's been demonised. There has been nothing to stop that investment. The market has spoken.
FORDHAM: But isn’t it about the subsidies and the investments from government going into renewables and that's why the coal and gas industries haven't received the same support?
PRIME MINISTER: No it's not, Ben. No it's not. And I think that in your heart of hearts, you know it's not either.
FORDHAM: In my heart of hearts, I'm saying exactly what I what I believe and what I hear every day. We're constantly told that renewables are going to make energy cheaper for us. And a lot of these price hikes were happening before Ukraine.
PRIME MINISTER: Ben, there has been nothing to stop – under the former government or right now – nothing has stopped someone coming forward with a proponent for a new coal-fired power plant. Why hasn't it happened? Why hasn't it happened? Because the economics of it don't stack up. The former government spent years saying they were going to keep Liddell open and it was all empty rhetoric. And while that was occurring, we weren't getting the investment in the system that we needed to create new energy. During the life of the former government, four gigawatts of energy left the system and one gigawatt came in. Now, if that occurs at a time when the economy is growing, the population is growing, of course you have a shortfall in the market. It is a direct result of the failure of the former government, which is why the business community is saying this very, very clearly across the board, whether it's manufacturers in AIG, whether it's ACCI in terms of medium business or large business in the Business Council of Australia, or the National Farmers’ Federation, for that matter. They've all welcomed the new Government's policy on these issues, which is aimed at providing that investment certainty that's required.
FORDHAM: Let me move on to something that I know that you've got an update on and that is a conversation we've had on the program this week about an organisation called Fortem. They provide counselling and support to frontline emergency services workers, and they were going to have to cease operations in December because of a funding shortfall or some kind of budgetary error or issue. I understand you've got some news for us because their CEO, John Bale, has been telling us that unless the funding was guaranteed lives would be lost. You've got an update, I believe.
PRIME MINISTER: That's right Ben. I spoke to John Bale after he spoke on your program and he's good guy. He's concerned about the services that he provides being able to be continued. This was an issue whereby $10 million was promised by the former government but it was never delivered, it was never appropriated in the Budget and hence not a single dollar of that $10 million flowed. We had provided $2.5 million, a quarter of it, the $10 million was over two years. So we provided that funding up to December on the basis that he was told that it was going to happen and there was a media release issued in April, after the Budget, but it was never delivered. What the Government has done, I signed off last night the fulfilling of that promise by the former government, even though it wasn't delivered, to make sure that these services can continue to be provided for first responders, mental health services. There are other providers as well, we'll make sure that next time around there is a proper open tender process. But we want to make sure that the services can be delivered. Mr Bale was promised that this would occur by the former government. They didn't deliver it, but we're making sure that it is delivered. And we'll provide that $10 million upfront over a one-year period rather than two years so that we can then go to an open tender process which Fortem can participate in.
FORDHAM: Well, we appreciate that. Before I let you go, you're going to have to put a deadline on when you stop talking about the former government, I think. Because every time you say it, and I know that a lot of these things relate to the former government, but there seems to be a lot of feedback coming through from people saying, ‘When's he going to stop talking about the old government?’
PRIME MINISTER: Well Ben, as you know, something like energy, you can't build new energy infrastructure in a period of a couple of months.
FORDHAM: Can we set a deadline, though? Should we say December 31?
PRIME MINISTER: That's just the truth. What we have done very quickly is put in place our legislation, we did that within a month of parliamentary sittings. And we are a government that is getting on with our agenda.
FORDHAM: I understand, you should just have a yarn to a few people too if you could have.
PRIME MINISTER: Cheaper child care is coming on January 1, Ben.
FORDHAM: I know that, I know that you've got a curious mind. So I would suggest that you have a yarn to a few people with solar panels. I've just got this from a colleague: “I just got $1.85 off my power bill, thanks to my solar panels last month. We haven't had a lot of sunshine, of course, so that doesn't really help there”. I know I've got to go. And I know you've got to go as well. Good luck overseas, and we'll catch up when you're back.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much, Ben.