E&OE……………………….…………………………………………………………………

 

The Leader of the Opposition Tony Abbott joins us. Good morning Tony.

 

 

Good morning Grant and nice to be with you on this eve of Australia Day.

 

Yeah. I wonder if you’ll get an invite to go along to this – for this brainstorm meeting.

Well, I’ve certainly got some ideas. She can scrap the carbon tax, scrap the mining tax and not go ahead with the white elephant of the National Broadband Network and she can adopt the Coalition’s policies to stop the boats. Now, that’s not hard. I think these are good ideas and good answers that have been available for a long time. The problem is not lack of good ideas, the problem is a Prime Minister who is not prepared to implement them, but one thing I should say Grant, it’s good that she’s finally talking to her own backbenchers and not spending her whole time closeted in meetings with Bob Brown and with the independents.

 

That’s what I’ve been hearing from her own party. There’s a level of arrogance that they’re not used to from a leader and that’s something that they’ve got to address.

Well, the thing is that if a political party is functioning properly, every caucus meeting or every party room meeting is an opportunity for people to put forward ideas and that’s welcome by the leadership. Now, sometimes obviously there’ll be an argument - a disagreement, a discussion, but that’s not a bad thing. I think the problem at the moment in the Labor party is that anyone who says anything out of turn is immediately suspected of plotting Kevin Rudd’s comeback and that’s why I think there’s this kind of sterile sameness which is expected of Labor.

 

Just on that. Is a comeback to Kevin Rudd likely, because from what I understand, Kevin Rudd is not all that well liked in his own party, so they’re the people who have got to make that decision and I don’t think they’ll make the decision in the affirmative.

Well we’ll see. I think Kevin Rudd is desperately anxious to vindicate himself and I think the only way that he can vindicate himself and demonstrate that the current Prime Minister got it so wrong a year or so back is by his own comeback, but look that’s a matter for the Labor Party. In the end I think the Australian public are interested in good government. They’re not interested in this kind of navel gazing and squabbles over personalities. The trouble is they haven’t got good government at the moment. We are a great country with a lousy Government and every day that goes by, this Government just shows more of its failings.

 

To that end, is it the end of Julia Gillard? Is she hanging on by a political thread here?

Well someone said to me the other day that Andrew Wilkie has finally woken up to what the Australian public figured out a year ago that you just can’t trust the Prime Minister and I guess this is a problem for the caucus too, because whatever the Prime Minister says she might do arising from this closed door internal Labor Party summit, how can you believe her to actually do it, given the record she’s got so far?

 

Well, from what I understand, Andrew Wilkie in the first place didn’t quite believe her so he got the whole poker machine deal in writing. Now, if something is in writing, isn’t that a legal document and if he really wanted to pursue it, then there could be some legal ramification there?

Well that’s an interesting point Grant. I think it would be unusual to go to law to enforce a political agreement, but certainly if you look at the agreement between Julia Gillard and Andrew Wilkie, it was drawn up to look like a legal document. It was drawn up like the kind of affidavit that you get from solicitors. It wasn’t just an exchange of letters, it really did look like a legal document.

 

And it certainly wasn’t just a handshake, it was a legal document yeah.

Well, it was Andrew Wilkie’s attempt to get the most solemn possible commitment from this Prime Minister, because lets face it, in return, he was giving her the keys to the lodge, but she’s reneged and this is why I think the public are so convinced that you just can’t trust this Prime Minister, because it doesn’t matter how solemn the commitment, it doesn’t matter how weighty the pledge, it goes as soon as it’s not in the Prime Minister’s political interests to keep on with it.

 

There’s now three names hanging over her head. One is Peter Slipper, the other is Andrew Wilkie as we’ve just been talking about and also Craig Thomson. So, anything could happen. Are you able to talk to Andrew Wilkie and say, well let’s talk turkey and see if we can come to some arrangement ourselves?

Well, look I have a pretty good relationship with Andrew. I think he’s a decent human being. I think he’s a man of goodwill. There are lots of things I don’t agree with him about, but I think we can respect each other. He said that he won’t likely vote to bring down the Government, but obviously if there’s a case of serious maladministration or failure of integrity, that’s a different story. Let’s wait and see what happens here. Just on that subject Grant, you know, this investigation into Craig Thomson has now been going for three years…

 

See I don’t understand that and nor do most of the electorate. They’ll say if something like that happened in business in everyday business that would have been cleared up nearly overnight.

Well that’s what you’d think. I mean if most of us do the wrong thing, the prosecuting authorities don’t normally procrastinate for three years before they take action and if they did, we’d think it was a complete failure of justice.

 

Could there be a bit of interference from the highest office in the land? I’d hate to think that.

Well, we’d all hate to think that. We know that there was a phone call that was initiated by the Prime Minister’s office to the Industrial Registrar, now Fair Work Australia back in 2009 and look the Prime Minister has never satisfactorily explained this and you’ve got to wonder who’s leaning on whom in this kind of a situation. There’s some evidence that there’s been zero cooperation between Fair Work Australia and the NSW and Victorian police. Now, these are the criminal investigations that are also going on into Craig Thomson. Now, the fundamental point is, is the Prime Minister prepared to say that she has full confidence in the Fair Work Australia investigation. It’s now gone on for three long years, just as she says she continues to have full confidence in Craig Thomson and the problem for the public I guess is that any Government that relies on a tainted vote in the Parliament, Craig Thomson’s vote is a tainted Government.

 

Well, no doubt about. Well Australia Day tomorrow. What’s your plan? Knowing you, you’ll probably do a 2000km bike ride of some description.

Well, look that’s an interesting one. There’s a national event in Canberra that I’m going to. I’m hoping to do the Farm Cove swim – the Australia Day swim tomorrow morning. It’s only 2.2km Grant, there’s no 2000km…

 

That’s a walk in the park for you tomorrow.

Well it’ll actually be a splash around the park, because the beautiful botanical gardens are all around you there as you splash through the choppy waters of Farm Cove.

 

Yeah. Alright well good luck today and thanks for your time as always this morning. Thank you for that.

It’s a pleasure Grant.

 

Thank you. The Leader of the Opposition Tony Abbott.

 

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