Television interview - ABC 7:30

LAURA TINGLE, HOST: Prime Minister, thanks for talking to 7:30.
 
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good to be with you, Laura.
 
TINGLE: Your Treasurer said today that budgets are an opportunity not just to reflect on what's in the Budget papers themselves, but also on what's happening all around them. When we look at this Budget, what should it tell Australians broadly about where the Government is taking the country?
 
PRIME MINISTER: It should tell people that we're laying the strong foundations for a better future. That we're a Government that takes the commitments that we took to the 2022 election seriously, that we're about implementing them. And we're a Government with a sense of purpose. We want to change the country for the better. And the foundations that we laid to deal with the immediate challenges of cost of living pressures that people are feeling, we wanted to alleviate those pressures without putting pressure on inflation, but also always having an eye on the medium and longer term. Hence, the real transition to Australia becoming a renewable energy superpower at a number of facets within there.
 
TINGLE: Well, a huge turnaround in the Budget, apart from anything else, gets the economic management monkey off your political back. And also, you've dealt with defence and national security. These were always Coalition strengths and seen as Labor weaknesses. What does it mean that you seem to be clear of those now?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, it's important that we do deal with national security, we live in uncertain times. And my Government's been very focused on not just investing in our defence capability, but also investing in our relationships in the region, in the Pacific, with ASEAN, with our European friends, as well as our traditional partners like the United States and the United Kingdom. So we've been very focused on that. But we've also been focused on a strong economy. I understand, and my Government understands, that you need that strong economic foundation if you are going to be able to do the social policy reforms, and if you're going to be able to do the environmental reforms that we want to do.
 
TINGLE: But you have moved into traditional Coalition country, if you like, in the political sense. And it really means that Labor has moved into the centre while the Liberals are a bit lost. We've got a big change in our political stage going on at the moment, haven't we?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I think the Liberals and Nationals were in government for almost a decade, and they lost their way. They produced a Budget in 2014 that reflected their ideological viewpoint, a Budget full of privatisation and cuts and harsh measures. That didn't go down well. So for the rest of the term, they did very little. They were defined by what they were against. We want to be defined by what we're for. We are for a strong economy that creates opportunity. I said during the election campaign, I wanted to make sure that no one was left behind. Traditionally, Labor has been the Party for the disadvantaged, and last night's Budget reflects that. But also, no one held back. We're the Party of aspiration. We're the Party that understand that people want a better future for their children. And that means creating more opportunity, dealing with new industries being created because of a clean energy future, making sure that we don't just continue to export our resources, but we value add wherever possible. We make more things here, and we train Australians for those jobs. That's why, in addition to the moves we had in last October's Budget that began with 180,000, fee-free TAFE places, last night's Budget gives 300,000 more to provide that opportunity. Our child care policy is also very much front and centre. But we've added to it, so that we unashamedly want to put women at the centre of economic reform, providing that opportunity so that the whole of the population is able to contribute. That's how you boost capacity. That's the low-hanging fruit, as Danielle Wood said, when she opened our Jobs and Skills Summit. So the measures that we put in place, the aged care wage increase, $11.3 billion we found for that, the other measures designed to support women, are very much a focal point of last night's Budget and of my Government.
 
TINGLE: The big challenges ahead in terms of Budget spending are defence and the NDIS. The cost of politically neutralising defence, if you like, is that you're at the financial mercy of a defence establishment which has an appalling record of profligacy. Despite the Defence Strategic Review, you've given it carte blanche to spend hundreds of billions of dollars, how are you possibly going to keep track of what they're doing?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we certainly haven't done that, Laura. And the National Security Committee is meeting regularly, making sure that we put in place in last night's Budget, $19 billion of additional expenditure. But that was within the existing Budget. So we made, as well, as a result of the Defence Strategic Review, we made difficult decisions, so that we focus on every dollar going into defence.
 
TINGLE: But they've got hundreds of billions of dollars of contingency reserve, which shows how rubbery the numbers are, doesn't it?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we want to make sure that every dollar goes towards an outcome. The problem with the former Government was that they had multiple programs, running billions of dollars over budget, and running late. What we've done is identified by having the Defence Strategic Review, having a real focus, having the National Security Committee meet a number of times in partnership with the Expenditure Review Committee, so that we get that proper spending and that proper scrutiny over defence spending, because we want to make sure that it makes a difference. Hence identifying what Australia needs and then providing the funding to achieve it.
 
TINGLE: Paul Keating called the AUKUS deal the worst deal in history, and he's got a point, doesn't he, that we are the only AUKUS partner spending any money?
 
PRIME MINISTER: That's not right at all. The truth is that the United States and the United Kingdom are, of course, also spending, investing in order to secure their national security interests. I was in Barrow just last week, looking at the submarine manufacturing facility that's there. That's the centre of that town. And it's a great example of how investment in defence can have an impact, not just on national security, but on industry policy as well. And I see our defence expenditure being, for this generation, what the car industry was in the post-War period. That it will have a spin-off with high-value manufacturing, that will add to employment, add to the economy, whilst we're also investing in our national security.
 
TINGLE: To quote Jim Chalmers again, he said today, he thinks there's a generosity inherent in the Australian character that says - if you're doing it the toughest, you need the most help. And he decried what he called the downward envy of Angus Taylor complaining the Budget helped those on low incomes, but not middle Australia. We haven't seen much of that generosity on display in recent years. Are you changing the politics, or is the community changing?
 
PRIME MINISTER: I think it's both. You need leadership, and you need a government that doesn't deride people who are not well-off. Billy Bragg sang, 'Just because you're better than me, doesn't mean I'm lazy'. And he was right. The truth is that we don't have equal opportunity. And the job of government, the job of the state, is to intervene in ways that facilitate people to be able to rise up, to be able to make the most and to aspire to a better life for themselves. Not just a better life economically, but also in the way that they live their lives. Hence, our investment in arts and culture as well, we regard as about that quality of life. And that is what we want to do. Now, I think that is in accord with Australian values. I believe that Labor should be the natural party of government. That our values that we have are more in accord with the majority of Australians' values, than the Coalition, who rely upon, traditionally, rely upon fear campaigns and misinformation. And we're seeing that at the moment. We're seeing that in the response to this Budget, relying upon a catastrophising of everything that is put forward, after 10 years of neglect and not having a forward agenda. They simply are defined now by what they're against.
 
TINGLE: I have to ask you about the Voice. Is it a problem for advocates of the Voice that they can't argue it's really powerful and transformational, but they also can't say that it isn't?
 
PRIME MINISTER: I believe that the Voice is a generous and gracious offer from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who gathered at Uluru, with the First Nations Constitutional Convention, and decided on a way forward. What the Voice will do is to provide an opportunity for Indigenous people to speak, to have that voice, but also for government to listen. And we know that you get better outcomes when you listen, when governments do things with Indigenous people rather than for them, because you need that sense of ownership. So if you look at the programs that have been most successful, community health programs, Indigenous rangers programs, justice reinvestment, they have that in common. So the Voice is about just two things. It's about recognition. And it's about listening. It isn't about a third chamber. It isn't about a right of veto over what government does. But it will give Indigenous Australians a voice. And I believe that the government will have the opportunity to get better outcomes and close the gap. We've done it the other way for a long time. This is an opportunity to change Australia, and I believe it is a significant change, and it's one for the better.
 
TINGLE: Last week in the UK, you expressed frustration over Julian Assange's incarceration, saying the case needs to be brought to a conclusion. What would that look like? Would that be that the extradition request was dropped? All charges were dropped? Do you want Julian Assange back in Australia? And this is something that you will press home when President Biden's here for the Quad meetings?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I, of course, don't discuss the private discussions that I have with leaders of other countries. But my public comments are the same as my private ones here. And we have made our views very clear to the US administration. We'll continue to do so. And a solution needs to be found that brings this matter to a conclusion. And Mr Assange needs to be a part of that, of course, and so I'm hopeful that that will occur. It has been too long. And in my view, as I've said before, I see nothing is served from the further incarceration of Mr Assange.
 
TINGLE: Prime Minister, thanks for your time on a busy day.
 
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much, Laura.