Television Interview - Sky News Afternoon Agenda

TOM CONNELL, HOST: Welcome back. Let's thrash out the daily political issues - joining me now, Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister, Patrick Gorman and former Liberal MP, Jason Falinski, thanks both as ever for your time. Interesting to read this morning, I know you start with The Canberra Times, Patrick Gorman, as someone visits this great city a lot -

PATRICK GORMAN, ASSISTANT MINISTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER: Great to be here in Canberra.

CONNELL: There we go. We're getting a spiel already. And the urging from the union: 'don't cut public sector jobs.' Now, is this just going to be part of the general cost cutting from the government? You can't just carve out the public sector, because you know they're highly unionised, that they'll have to feel a bit of pain as well?

GORMAN: We will do what we've done in every budget, Tom, which is look at what we need to do to deliver the services Australians expect from the Commonwealth Government. Over the last few years, I would say this to your viewers and to the Community and Public Sector Union, we have made significant investments in the public service. Including bringing in a lot of those outsourced jobs that were on the shadow workforce, bringing them back in house, so they are good, secure jobs and to lift up the quality.

You have seen that in things like Veterans' Affairs, where we have reduced the wait times. You see it in faster delivery of pensions - it tends to be that we know when people are turning 65 years - 67 years old. So we do know that they are coming at us in those years as they get to pension age. So we have done a lot of that work. And then, we will always look to make sure that we can have our workforce targeted at government priorities.

CONNELL: All right, I'll take that as a 'maybe.' Jason, interested in your thoughts on what we're hearing from Jim Chalmers, that now actually is the time to be bold on reform, despite, you know, a lot of uncertainty around the world and including on spending cuts. I mean, it takes me to that sort of apocryphal claim that the word for 'crisis' in Chinese is, you know, 'opportunity' - is this the right approach? Be bold now?

JASON FALINSKI, FORMER LIBERAL MP FOR MACKELLAR: 'Crisa-tunity.' Well, he's got to start some time. He's done absolutely nothing in the last four years. And Tom, you know, living standards have dropped. We've been in a per capita GDP recession since this government basically got elected. Nine out of the eleven quarters that they've been in government, Australians have been going backwards. Eighty-two percent of all new jobs have been created in the public sector. I don't think Australians think that they're getting better service out of this government, or any government for that matter. They have wasted money, left, right and centre. They have reduced choice. They have massively made this country less prosperous than it was, and we're seeing the result of that over and over again. And look, we had the Productivity Roundtable I will give anyone who can name something substantive that came out of that that's been implemented, I don't know, a case of beer or something. It was all these things that this government has done is constant and consistent window dressing while the living standards of ordinary Australians goes backwards.

CONNELL: I made a, I thought, a pretty simple request from an unnamed government department. Fourteen days and counting, but I'm sure someone's on it. Patrick, do you want the 'case of beer challenge' there?

GORMAN: Jason knows that we have frozen the Building Code to make it easier for those who are building homes for Australians -

CONNELL: Well, there you go - we don't need your shopping list. Jason, is that a case of beer?

FALINSKI: That's not substantive -

CONNELL: Keeping building standards lower?

FALINSKI: So, so let me just get this straight: 'Chris Bowen created a massive problem over here, and we stopped it - oh, sorry, we didn't stop it. We paused it over there.' I mean, that's not substantive reform.

CONNELL: I'm going to be the judge, I'm saying that doesn't qualify. What's next, Patrick? 

GORMAN: We were always really clear that the work would go into the budget that's coming down in May.

CONNELL: That's coming. 

FALINSKI: No, no -

GORMAN: We were very clear about that - we were.

FALINSKI: This is unfair. 

GORMAN: Jason knows -

FALINSKI: This is unfair -

GORMAN: What is unfair is - 

FALINSKI: Patrick, he doesn't have an answer. It's not fair on Patrick, I'm sorry.

CONNELL: Oh, not fair on him?

FALINSKI: Yeah.

CONNELL: Okay, yeah, sorry.

GORMAN: I have got to say - we have all got a mate who makes a big bet, and then when they lose, never pays up. And for me, Jason's that mate.

CONNELL: I don't know. Well, we always need an adjudicator for something so subjective, so I'm gonna call that - let's wait till the budget.

FALINSKI: Do you know what, though? I am happy to share a beer with you two anytime you like. I don't need to lose a bet to do that.

CONNELL: All right, that might be a Friday afternoon panel job rather than a Monday. I think at the very least.

FALINSKI: I didn't say on air. 

CONNELL: Probably a good point. I'll move on.

FALINSKI: Patrick will call that not 'spending,' but an 'investment in our friendship.'

GORMAN: What Jason would like me to actually note is that if we actually went out to the pub, we would benefit from the government's freezing of the draught beer excise -

CONNELL AND FALINSKI: [Groans].

CONNELL: He'd be saying that, too, Jason, at the pub. The person pouring the beer would go, 'yeah, okay, mate, whatever - pay your $9.80.' So Patrick, interesting article on the NDIS spending. Social visits, so might be a trip to their haircut, or shops, whatever $12 billion is, apparently, what is paid for overall. Is this just a prime example of something that doesn't belong in the NDIS?

GORMAN: Tom, one of the reasons we created the NDIS is because we had too many people with a disability who were locked out of society, stuck at home too often. I do believe that we are a better society when people with disability can get out and about. I was at the soccer on the weekend in my electorate. I didn't doorknock on the way there, Jason, don't worry. So, I was at the soccer and I'm glad that people with a disability can also attend if they need a carer, they're not locked out of society.

CONNELL: The NDIS is basically a premium service, there's so many different charges for it, that if this type of thing goes through the NDIS - I'm not saying no one should ever have help in doing those sorts of things - but once this goes through the NDIS, it is more expensive, that's true isn't it?

GORMAN: We have done a lot of work, and you know this, and your viewers have seen Minister Butler and Minister McAllister out there talking about the work we have done to constrain the growth in the NDIS spend. When we came to government, it was rolling at about 22 per cent growth that was completely unsustainable. We have taken a lot of action to get a lot of the shonky providers out, to really crack down on things that should never have been in NDIS packages, and then get to a sustainable footing.

CONNELL: Okay, Jason, what have you made of this sort of spend? Because, you know, it's not just about existence. People deserve a life. But is this the sort of thing where the states have abandoned the field and this ends up in the NDIS?

FALINSKI: Well, this is mission creep in the NDIS, big time. This wasn't what the NDIS was designed to do. And look, you know, Bill Shorten, it got to the point where Bill Shorten had to step in because the NDIA was paying for sex workers, for people on the Scheme. So, you know, Bill Shorten has said that 10 per cent of spending inside NDIS is almost certainly fraud. That's probably an understatement.

There's a series that's been done by Drew Pavlou and Peter Zogoulas, my apologies, my apologies for any mispronunciation I've made there. Let's just point it out, like in Lakemba, there are 1300 providers for the NDIS scheme. So that's one provider for every 13 people in Lakemba. This scheme is clearly being rorted, because there has been massive mission creep. And the problem with that is, yes, it hurts taxpayers, yes, it's a massive misuse, fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayers money, but it also hurts the people, the genuine people in the scheme. Because there will come a time when we can't afford to do this anymore, and people who genuinely need help won't be able to get it, because we won't be able to afford it.

CONNELL: Funnily enough, the only thing I know you didn't pronounce was 'mispronunciation,' but - the irony of that.

FALINSKI: Damn!

CONNELL: But we will move on, Patrick, did you want to respond at all on the NDIS before we move on?

GORMAN: We have done a lot of work, as the Albanese Government, to clean up fraud in the NDIS. As Jason rightly pointed out, it was Bill Shorten who put this on the agenda. We saw things, when we came to government, that weren't right. You had invoices that weren't being checked. You had payments that were going out where we didn't have verification of the providers. We have put a lot more rigour into the system. That should give taxpayers a lot of assurance and also means we can meet that National Cabinet goal of bringing growth down to between five and six per cent over time. That is serious reform. It is not particularly exciting, but stamping out fraud isn't always exciting, but it is essential and necessary, and we have done that work.

CONNELL: Now, EV drivers love to look down on petrol drivers on, you know, the best of times, and now with the petrol price, that's on steroids, Chris Minns says, 'Come on, it's time for an EV tax because they don't pay for the use of roads.' Is that fair enough? 

FALINSKI: Oh for God's sake.

CONNELL: Patrick Gorman?

GORMAN: The big conversation about this happened at the at the 'carton of beer challenge' event that we were talking about earlier, which was the Economic Reform Roundtable. We will continue those conversations with states and territories, but I am always cautious about not trying to add too much more red tape and not trying to discourage people from purchasing an electric vehicle. We know they are a part of helping us meet our emissions targets, but we will keep those conversations going, because we also recognise that road users should contribute to making sure that we have roads we all use.

CONNELL: Not sure where that all ends up. I guess this might be another one for the budget. Jason, you had some strong words to say. I felt like I was being judged earlier, what have you got for me?

FALINSKI: Why is the answer from the Labor Party always more tax? I mean, you know, Allegra Spender comes out with a so-called 'reform paper' last week and points out that people making money from capital rather than labour pay less money. So her answer is, 'well, we better put up the tax on on capital.' Why is it that Chris Minns is always looking to tax people? Never, ever does the Labor Party or anyone on the Left actually think about doing a better job with the money they already have. It's - the absurdity of Chris Minns' response was just absurd.

CONNELL: But isn't it the case that if you are a petrol driver you are paying for the road, and then if you're an EV driver, you're not? Isn't there a fairness issue there, Jason?

FALINSKI: Absolutely, absolutely. Tom, so the answer to this unfairness is to bring down the tax on petroleum, not increase the tax on EVs.

CONNELL: And then raise no money for roads?

FALINSKI: Well, there's plenty of money still - are you kidding me? Do you know we are taking in more money than we've ever taken in before in tax revenue? Tom, you're trapped in the bubble down in Canberra, let me tell you, we are spending more money than we ever spent - 

CONNELL: Well we're not hitting the tax-GDP speed limit of 23.9 per cent from the Coalition.

FALINSKI:  - we are taxing people more than we ever have, we are reducing living standards, more than we ever had. There's massive fraud, waste and abuse, and the answer out of Canberra is always, 'hey, why don't we tax people more? Because we can't be bothered fixing the problems that we've created.'

CONNELL: You're not worried about maybe winning the Teal voters over driving EVs there, Jason?

FALINSKI: Well, sorry, I'm arguing for no new taxes on EVs, and you're arguing for taxes on EVs. What do you think is going to be more popular with the Teals?

CONNELL: No, that's what I mean. That was my point.

FALINSKI: Oh, that's your point. Okay, right. Okay, sorry for that. My point is that, why don't we actually work out ways to lower the tax burden on Australians who are currently paying more in tax than they've ever paid before?

CONNELL: Apologies to whomever is in Jason's afternoon meeting, I have fired him up too much, but we loved his passion on the programme, as we always do. Jason, Patrick, thank you. Talk next week.

GORMAN: Thanks Tom.
 

ENDS