Transcript – 4BC Brisbane Radio – 5 January 2012

Brisbane 4BC Radio

with John Scott

5 January 2012

3:10pm

E & OE

JOHN SCOTT:

I don’t quite have my head around the social inclusion portfolio, so I thought we’d try to throw some more light on it for you. Mitch Fifield is the Shadow Minister for Disabilities, Carers and the Voluntary Sector and also the Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate. He is a Liberal Senator from Victoria, and he joins us. Welcome to the program.

MITCH FIFIELD:

Thanks very much John.

SCOTT:

Thanks for taking time out of what I would guess would be a pretty busy schedule. Tell me about this social inclusion portfolio. I understand Gary Johns in The Australian has been quite critical.

FIFIELD:

That’s right, and I also have an opinion piece today in The Oz. It’s quite a peculiar portfolio. Most people are unaware that there is a Minister for Social Inclusion. But the really worrying thing is that the Minister, Mark Butler, himself doesn’t know what the portfolio is. Shortly after he was appointed, late last year, the press gallery asked him at a press conference, what is social inclusion and what is your portfolio? And his rather unenlightening response was that social inclusion means different things to different people. He then tried to explain in an opinion piece in The Australian last week that it’s a relatively new concept and people would be unfamiliar with the term. The funny thing is, this Government has had that portfolio for four years, and the first social inclusion minister was Julia Gillard. So she obviously didn’t do a great job at defining the portfolio.?

SCOTT:

I believe the British Government disbanded theirs – it was an initiative of Tony Blair, but they got rid of it. And I think the South Australian State Government have also closed down their unit, haven’t they?

FIFIELD:

That’s right, in fact the British Government disbanded their social inclusion unit before the current federal Labor Government implemented theirs. And the South Australian Government as well have diminished theirs somewhat.

SCOTT:

You’d be aware that Ms Roxon, the Acting Social Inclusion Minister has come out and indicated that you represent the big end of town and have little interest in helping these groups out of the cycle of poverty and disadvantage. Which is not quite true, because you say in your article, that social inclusion really is part of every minister’s portfolio?

FIFIELD:

That’s right. We have ministers for health, housing, indigenous affairs and disabilities. Each of those ministers is in effect a social inclusion minister. And I would argue that the ultimate social inclusion minister is in fact the federal treasurer – if they’re doing a good job. Because if you’ve got a federal treasurer who’s ensuring a strong and growing economy, that means jobs, and the single greatest contribution you can make to anyone’s social inclusion is a job. The other contribution that a treasurer makes to social inclusion is that, if you’re a good one, you make sure that you live within your means and you run budget surpluses, so that you have the capacity to address systemic disadvantage. 

It was also reported in The Australian that the department spent about $60,000 on airfares and about $13,000 on accommodation, meals and catering. And really, what have we seen for that?

FIFIELD:

Nothing, and in fact the Minister can’t tell us what that money was spent on. The other thing that the $3.3 million a year that goes towards the Social Inclusion Unit has provided is eight research reports. And I’ll just give you a few examples from one of them, where $110,000 was spent to find out that Australians are satisfied with their lives, that 96% of people have contact with family and friends in a typical week, that 16% of people find difficulty having a say in the family home sometimes, and that 7% of people are scared after dark. So what that money found is that people are pretty happy, they enjoy their family and friends, their families sometimes give them the irrits, and that people are sometimes afraid of the dark.

SCOTT:

Why would they do this? Is it an election ploy?

FIFIELD:

It’s just Labor. They’re far more into being seen to be doing something, rather than actually doing something. So the whole social inclusion portfolio is really a cover for a lot of inactivity. What I would prefer to see is that you have ministers in individual portfolios – like my own portfolio of disabilities – actually making a difference. There is massive unmet need for people with disabilities in Australia. There are waiting lists for supported accommodation, for aids and equipment and for respite. I’d much rather see money directed to those sorts of things rather than this social inclusion portfolio.

You say that if you win government, you’d put the savings of disbanding this portfolio into a national disability insurance scheme. How do you see that working?

FIFIELD:

Well that’s just one thing that the savings from this portfolio could be directed to. My real point is that there is massive unmet need in a number of portfolios where you can make a real difference to people’s ‘social inclusion’, if I can use the phrase once. And that’s a far better use of taxpayers’ money than the social inclusion portfolio, which employs 19 people, produces eight lovely reports, but how has it improved the quality life of a single Australian?

SCOTT:

And nothing really seems to happen as a result. As you’ve indicated in the article, it’s almost a revolving door as far as ministers in that particular portfolio.

That’s right, but it seems to be a pretty good one. Julia Gillard had the gig – she was promoted to Prime Minister. Tanya Plibersek had the gig – was promoted to Health Minister. And Mark Butler has now found himself in Cabinet with this particular portfolio.

And this is just one area where there is massive waste.

A huge amount of waste. The thing that concerns me is that when you spend a dollar – when you waste a dollar – that means that’s a dollar that can’t be spent somewhere else doing good. Just take the current Government’s annual debt interest bill. It’s $6.5 billion per year. Now that $6.5 billion per year which could have, for instance, gone to provide a national disability insurance scheme. Instead, $6.5 billion is being spent not on a road, not on a school, not for supported accommodation, but just on servicing interest. And add to that the money that seems to be wasted in the social inclusion portfolio, and you’ve just got more waste.

Have you, or are you going to raise this in the Senate?

I will when we’re back. We’ll have the opportunity of Senate Estimates hearings in February, and I will be certainly be raising questions about the social inclusion portfolio and where the money has gone at those hearings.

We’ll be interested to see the answers that you receive.

I’ll make sure you’ll hear what they are, John.

Mitch, all the best for the new year. 

Thanks indeed, you too.

ENDS