1 October, 2012
With Kieran Gilbert and Nick Champion MP
1 October 2012
8:30am
E & OE
Subjects: Alan Jones, Queensland polls, car industry
KIERAN GILBERT:
I’ll go to you first Senator Fifield and we’ll start with the Alan Jones controversy. Laurie Oakes for one says that Tony Abbott needs to distance himself from Alan Jones after these comments. Do you think that’s a fair assessment?
MITCH FIFIELD:
Let’s be absolutely clear. The comments by Mr Jones were wrong and offensive and he has apologised for those as he should. Mr Abbott has made clear that he repudiates the comments of Mr Jones. But can I also say Kieran, what is also wrong and offensive are the attempts by Nicola Roxon, Bob Carr and Craig Emerson to seek to blame Tony Abbott for the comments of Mr Jones. Mr Jones is not Tony Abbott. Tony Abbott is not Mr Jones. Tony Abbott does not need to apologise for comments he himself did not make. I think it’s appalling, absolutely appalling the comments of Nicola Roxon this morning on the Today Show and also on Radio National where she sought to blame Tony Abbott. She, Bob Carr and Craig Emerson are seeking to gain political advantage from this awful situation. If they actually cared about a grieving daughter they would not be talking about this. We would all shut up and we would all move on.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Let’s look at, I want to put up on the screen for you Malcolm Turnbull’s tweet from yesterday, yesterday morning. Malcolm Turnbull tweeted ‘Alan Jones comments about the late John Gillard were cruel and offensive. He should apologise to the Prime Minister and her family’. Senator Fifield, that line from Malcolm Turnbull is a lot stronger than what we heard from Tony Abbott, who, let’s be open about it, is very close to Alan Jones and he said simply that the comments were out of line when others including Mr Turnbull described them as cruel and offensive. You’ve described them as offensive yourself this morning. Does he need to at least strengthen the criticism by simply saying you’re out of line, is that enough?
MITCH FIFIELD:
Tony Abbott has been crystal clear. The comments were out of line. They were wrong. He’s made that point. He said that Mr Jones should apologise. Mr Jones has apologised. What we’re seeing now is an attempt by the Australian Labor Party to seek to gain political advantage from an unfortunate circumstance. Can I say Kieran, I wish that when there was a party leader who actually themselves said something that was wrong and offensive, in the form of Mark Latham, who referred to a senior journalist as a skanky ho, I just wish that at that time Nicola Roxon had condemned him for what he said.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Let’s look at another comment from Nicola Roxon now. She was asked did the apology from Alan Jones go far enough.
NICOLA ROXON (file footage):
Look I don’t think it was. The apology unfortunately is for comments that are just one now in a long line of comments that have come from Mr Jones and any person who’s lost a parent knows that this is just not a topic to make some sort of joke about. It’s just lacking any common decency and unfortunately I think it’s an environment that has been set by a very strong campaign by the Liberal Party that often crosses the line and unfortunately we now see people repeatedly making inappropriate comments, then apologising, thinking it’s alright and then stumping up and making the comments again. It’s just really not good enough.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Let’s bring in to the discussion Nick Champion in Adelaide. Nick you’ve heard what Senator Fifield has to say about Nicola Roxon’s comments and others trying to make Tony Abbott accountable for comments that weren’t made by him. Why should he be?
NICK CHAMPION:
Well look leaders set the tone for their parties and more broadly for their constituency’s conduct. And when you look at it this was a Liberal Party event, it was set up by the Sydney University Liberals, it was there to raise money and it had a frontbencher, Sussan Ley was there and a number of Liberal Party MPs who were there. And so I think the Liberal Party does bear some responsibility for the tone of this event. And it wasn’t just the speech that was offensive, some of the auction items were offensive as well and I think just generally when you have the main speaker of the event saying that it was an undergraduate tone, I think political parties do have to take some responsibility for that. And I think the Liberal Party could begin its sort of path to redemption by donating the money that was raised at this event to a charity. I mean obviously it was there to raise money for their internal party mechanisms. I think that they should donate all the money that they raised at this event to some worthy charity.
KIERAN GILBERT:
But how much does someone need to be held accountable like you’re suggesting and others have said of Tony Abbott as the leader of the party for comments made by a broadcaster, who might be a friend of Tony Abbott’s, but how can you be held accountable for comments made by any friend or advocate or whatever else? Where is the line drawn?
NICK CHAMPION:
Well Kieran when you’re conducting official party events you do take some care with guest speakers and if they say remarks that are out of line with community sentiment then you’re political party becomes responsible for them. And that’s always been the case. It’s the case for the Labor Party and the Greens, for the Liberal Party and anybody else who sets up political functions in this country. And the Liberal Party want to believe that we should just let them off the hook for their conduct and for some time now there has been a vicious undercurrent in Australian conservatism where on one level they’re all very polite and nice and decent, and then on another level they’re very vicious, misogynistic and completely out of line with community sentiment. And I think it’s about time they cleaned up their affairs.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Nicola Roxon was asked this morning whether Alan Jones should be sacked. Let’s play you her response to that.
NICOLA ROXON (file footage):
I don’t think you can keep criticising women, keep making comments like this one that are just lacking in any decency. I think there’s a bigger question in some ways for the Liberal Party. It was a function of theirs, frontbenchers were at the function and they’ve not been seen or heard from. This is as if they are creating the environment that makes these sorts of comments okay and then running a million miles away from it and not taking the responsibility that they should.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Senator Fifield what do you say to that, because it was something done at a Liberal Party-sanctioned event and when it comes to the apology, we’ve seen similar comments made by this broadcaster before referring to sending the Prime Minister out to the ocean in a chaff bag and then apologising and then making another offensive comment. So does Mr Abbott, like as I said earlier Laurie Oakes suggested this morning, does he need to distance himself from the broadcaster?
MITCH FIFIELD:
Tony Abbott has distanced himself from the comments of Mr Jones. I think that’s all he needs to do. He has condemned the comments. He’s said that Mr Jones should apologise. And Mr Jones has apologised. I completely reject
KIERAN GILBERT:
But Senator Fifield I don’t think you can say he’s condemned the comments. He’s said they were out of line. Now out of line is different to condemning I would have thought.
MITCH FIFIELD:
It’s the same thing. And Kieran I completely reject the smear by Nicola Roxon and by Nick Champion that the Liberal Party somehow helped create an environment in which misogynistic comments are made. That the Liberal Party is to blame for what Mr Jones said. That is deeply offensive. All the Coalition has done and sought to do since we’ve been in opposition is to hold a bad government to account. Hold a bad government to account that lies to the Australian people. That says they won’t introduce a carbon tax and then does. Now no amount of seeking to smear conservative politics as somehow being misogynistic, when it’s not, is going to shield this government from accountability. We’re holding them to account because they are a bad government. And they need to stop these outrageous allegations and trying to smear every person who supports the Liberal Party as being somehow women haters. It’s garbage. It’s rubbish. And it’s got to stop.
KIERAN GILBERT:
I would say that you’ve condemned the comments and Malcolm Turnbull by saying they’re cruel and offensive, he’s condemned the comments. But saying something’s out of line, I know you’ve said that he’s condemning it but I think others would disagree with you on that. Does the Leader need to be a bit stronger in his repudiation of the statements made? If he does condemn them should he not make it clearer on that front?
MITCH FIFIELD:
He has been strong. He has been clear. I don’t know how this has become an issue about Tony Abbott. The only reason it’s become an issue about Tony Abbott is because we’ve had Labor frontbencher after Labor frontbencher salivating, falling over themselves to get out here, to take political advantage of something which is absolutely nothing to do with Mr Abbott.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Nick Champion, your response to that given that it does seem the government is drawing clear links to Tony Abbott with Nicola Roxon saying this morning he’s partly to blame for creating the environment. Now it was a Young Liberal event, Tony Abbott wasn’t there, his office and the federal party didn’t organise it.
NICK CHAMPION:
Well look nothing makes me sadder than the fact that we’re talking about these things on public television. I would have preferred that the Liberal Party didn’t hold these events and these remarks weren’t made. But when they’re made, you know Mitch just has to accept that you’re judged by the company you keep in politics and if you go to rallies.
MITCH FIFIELD:
Two words: Mark Latham. If you’re going down that track, Mark Latham. Where were you when he called that journo a skanky ho? Where were you? What did you say?
NICK CHAMPION:
Well, well I wasn’t even in parliament Mitch.
MITCH FIFIELD:
You were a member of the Labor Party. If we follow your rule, that’s fair.
NICK CHAMPION:
If I was there then I would have condemned it as being unreasonable. If I was there. But we’re talking about the here and now and what Nicola Roxon has said is that your political party is holding rallies with inappropriate signs, it’s holding events with inappropriate speeches and you’ve just got to clean up your own act and accept responsibility for it. Just accept responsibility for the conduct of your political party. And as I said before, you can begin by asking the Sydney Uni Libs to donate the money that they made at this fundraiser, deliberately trying to be controversial with deliberately controversial auction items and the like, they can donate that money to a worthy charity and that can be the beginning of your party taking responsibility for the matter.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Nick Champion, Senator Fifield makes a fair point though that if these comments have been made, they’re not the first misogynistic or offensive comments that you would find inappropriate. It’s not just the Liberal Party that has been responsible. There have been a number of cases in Labor’s history where similarly offensive comments have been made.
NICK CHAMPION:
Well if and when these comments get made, and I think there would be a remarkably few number of them, it depends on the political party’s response. And what you’ve got to do is disassociate yourselves clearly with the event and with the remarks. And we just don’t see that from the Liberal Party. What you see is this sort of defensive
MITCH FIFIELD:
We’ve done that Nick.
NICK CHAMPION:
This mock outrage from them where they try and turn the attack back. Well I just think it’s pathetic. Take responsibility for an event that your political party organised and benefited from and just send out a message to all your party branches and the like that this sort of conduct isn’t acceptable.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Senator Fifield just finally, we’ve got to go to a break, but your response.
MITCH FIFIELD:
The Liberal Party has condemned the comments by Mr Jones in stark contrast to the Labor Party’s reaction when Mark Latham referred to a female journalist as a skanky ho. Nicola Roxon at that time said nothing. Nick Champion was a party member and said nothing. Bob Carr at the time said nothing. Craig Emerson at the time said nothing. We’ve condemned the comments. Labor should do the same when their own people and their own leader make such comments. Our leader hasn’t said anything of the sort.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Let’s look at the Newspoll, I want to ask you about this Queensland-focussed Newspoll. It shows that Campbell Newman’s party, the LNP, are holding up, 60% on a two-party basis. It’s pretty much where it was at the election so suggestions that there have been an enormous voter backlash in Queensland seem to be premature.
NICK CHAMPION:
Well what I think there is in Queensland is enormous community concern about the approach of the state Liberal Government up there and what they’re doing is adopting the same austerity policies that have been adopted by American state governments and by European governments and the sort of job cuts and the resulting economic turmoil that results from them does affect growth in the longer term and it does affect the sort of economic prosperity of the community. So I wouldn’t be sort of hanging my hat on one poll if I was Mr Newman, I think there’s enormous community concern about the approach that they’re taking. It’s a very short term, very, very counterproductive approach that will affect growth in Queensland.
KIERAN GILBERT:
It won’t change the Labor Party’s approach, Senator Fifield, I wouldn’t have thought when it comes to warning about these cuts at the state level being the “warm up” act as they’ve described it for Tony Abbott. You would anticipate that to continue.
MITCH FIFIELD:
I would imagine so. The Labor Party never want to take responsibility for the mess that they leave state and federal governments in when they’re voted out of office. They create the mess and then they spend their time condemning the Liberal Party who take the difficult but necessary decisions to get finances back into order. I think Campbell Newman is making clear that he’s not governing with an eye to the polls. If he was then he wouldn’t be taking these difficult decisions. But people will ultimately reward a party leader who seeks to implement their commitments, which is exactly what Mr Newman is doing in stark contrast to Julia Gillard who lied her way through the last election and into office. Labor never take responsibility for the mess that they leave. We come in, clean up after them. And I think ultimately, the people pay on results.
KIERAN GILBERT:
This morning I want to wrap up our conversation with a story on the front page of the Financial Review quoting a couple of key Labor reformers during the Hawke era criticising the billion dollar handouts to the car industry and also the legal action to keep certain documents and details secret. Nick Champion, these two gentlemen that have been quoted are scathing of the handouts. To an industry that is big in your electorate what do you say? For example Nicholas Gruen, who was an adviser to John Button in the 1980s, he says ‘we should have more respect than to be offering money to a firm, i.e. Ford, that has shown itself it doesn’t particularly want to be here’.
NICK CHAMPION:
Well look you often get economists sort of pointing these things out. I don’t think they bear much responsibility for the reality of the global auto industry. And what you look at when you look at the global auto industry, if you go to Germany they give their car industry five-times as much as ours, if you go to America or Sweden they giver their auto industries eighteen-times as much as our auto industry. So we operate in the real world where unfortunately government give their car industries huge amount of money to compete both with those overseas subsidies and to compete with our high dollar. We need to support our car industry and that support is basically, you know, a small public investment in order to secure a large private investment. And the people who sort of make these comments in the Fin Review are talking to a very small constituency who basically don’t want a car industry in Australia and would happily wave it offshore. And I think we have to take that into account when we discuss their comments.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Let’s go to Senator Fifield finally with about a minute left, particularly in the context of those subsidies that are in place in many other motor-manufacturing nations.
MITCH FIFIELD:
We want a car industry. It should be supported. The Howard Government had a plan for the future which we continue to support but we don’t want to see waste. We don’t want to see “cash-for-clunkers” schemes. We don’t want to see the green cars scheme which was a massive waste of taxpayer money. The Productivity Commission should make sure that Australian taxpayers get bang for their bucks. And the Government should release the information that the Australian Financial Review is seeking. John Faulkner, as special minister of state, promised a new era of accountability that people would get and what they should get under FOI. I look forward to John Faulkner’s speech in the Senate condemning the Government for not releasing that information.
KIERAN GILBERT:
Senator Fifield, Nick Champion, we’re out of time. Good to see you.