Interview with Monique Wright – Channel Seven, Sunrise
E&OE TRANSCRIPT
MONIQUE WRIGHT, HOST: The Prime Minister is gearing up for a face-to-face meeting with the Chinese President in Beijing this week. But there’s now going to be one massive elephant in the room, with the PM now under fresh pressure from the US to declare what Australia’s role would be in any potential conflict between China and the US over Taiwan. Now, despite pressure from the Pentagon, Anthony Albanese has so far avoided answering the question directly. For their take, let’s bring in Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth and Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce. Amanda, we’ll start with you. Is it in the public’s interest to know how we’d assist the US if a war occurs in Taiwan?
AMANDA RISHWORTH, MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE RELATIONS: Well, I think what's in Australia's interest and the public's interest is for us to have peace and security in our region. Of course, part of that is making sure Australia has the capability to respond in any unrest or conflict in our region, but importantly that we invest in our relationships in the region. When it comes to Taiwan, we support the status quo. That's very important. But I don't think it's in anyone's interest to deal with hypotheticals that haven't happened.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Okay, Barnaby, what about the coalition? Would the coalition go in and support the US in any conflict, potential conflict about Taiwan?
BARNABY JOYCE, NATIONALS MP: Well, when you support the status quo, as was just mentioned, you’d have to say how you'd back that up, how your actions would back that up, the support of the status quo. The status quo is no unilateral move by communist China to take over democratic Taiwan. And if you support the status quo and China does that, which they say they're going to do, what are we going to do? And if you say, well, we're going to do nothing, well, then the United States will say, well, I'm not really interested in your AUKUS agreement then. And if we don't have an AUKUS agreement, then one of the key planks - probably the most fundamental plank we have now of our defence arrangement knowing it goes vastly beyond submarines, falls over. And if we say we have the capabilities as we were just told by Amanda, in the last four years where they've been - you know, the term of government, they're in their fourth year, they haven't put any substantial new platform on. We keep on hearing this tripe about we're spending more money on defence, but that's inflation. You're spending more money on everything virtually in the budget because inflation's going up. So, yeah, we've got a real problem here. And if the United States deems that we're not sort of an earnest and fervent ally, then what have we. What. What exactly are we going to defend our nation with? We are way, way, way below what we need.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: So, Barnaby, should Anthony Albanese bring that up with President Xi this week?
BARNABY JOYCE: I'm absolutely certain that President Xi will bring it up with Anthony, and of course this is going to be a - you’re dealing with a totalitarian regime, a very efficient, a very astute but no doubt a totalitarian regime, and they will ask questions and they'll expect the answers. I don't know whether those briefings will ever become public, but America will also be very interested in what answers we gave.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Yes indeed. Washington watching incredibly closely. All right, moving on. Now, our Cancer Council is pushing for mandatory cancer warning labels to be added to alcohol in the same way that they are on cigarettes and vape packaging. Now, the UK is strongly considering this. Ireland has already locked it in. Now, Amanda, alcohol is a Group 1 carcinogen. So, that means it's in the same group as radiation, asbestos, and tobacco. Would our government consider warning labels on booze?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: Well, firstly, we have got our important alcohol guidelines which gives health professionals the guidance.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Yeah, sure, sorry to interrupt you there, but half of Australians are not aware that alcohol causes cancer.
AMANDA RISHWORTH: Well, what we will do when it comes to this issue is monitor what is happening in other countries. Of course, we’ve just recently put in 2023, made it mandatory to have the pregnancy warning labels on alcohol. That was a very important move. But more broadly we'll continue to heed the advice and have a look at what the - how effective it has been in other countries and continue to consider it.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: So, no, just a consideration.
AMANDA RISHWORTH: We will monitor the circumstance. We’ll monitor the situation.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Barnaby, what do you think, is that something the Coalition would back?
BARNABY JOYCE: Look, I'm probably with Amanda on this one. I don't know. Of course it's dangerous, too much alcohol - cigarettes are dangerous, alcohol is dangerous, a whole range of things in life are dangerous but you've got to also rely a little bit on people's common sense. If anybody thinks that having a diet of alcohol and cigarettes is anything but bad for you, well, you're a fool. But do we to put a warning label on everything in life that has the potential to hurt you? You’ve got to rely a little bit on common sense.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Yeah. It is interesting though, isn't it, that the Cancer Council is saying in their research that less than half of Australians are actually aware that alcohol is a carcinogen. All right, we have to move on now. Finally, Barnaby, you've announced an intention to introduce a private members bill when Parliament returns to repeal our net zero emissions target by 2050. You've called the target a lunatic crusade, slamming the policy because other nations aren't authentically participating in the fight to reduce emissions. I want to go to Amanda first on this. Look, there's no guarantee that Barnaby's private members bill will even be considered for debate here, but what are your thoughts, Amanda?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: Well, my thoughts are, what are your priorities? Our priority is our first piece of legislation, we will reduce people's HECS bills by 20 per cent. The coalition's first priority is to reignite the climate wars, stop action on climate change. And quite frankly, Sussan Ley has been trying to say her party's new, different, will heed the message from the election, but this shows same old, same old, the same old climate wars, same old climate denying, and that's their priority, not getting on and supporting people.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Barnaby, didn't the last election show that the electorate does care about climate change and wants to see action on it?
BARNABY JOYCE: We went to the electorate supporting net zero and we got walloped. So you can't say it helps you electorally. Let's just go through that. First of all, the majority of people on the globe and the majority of the economy of the globe are not participating in net zero. Therefore, whatever we do in Australia has no effect but to the economy of Australia. We have de-industrialised this nation. We're down to two oil refineries. We lost our plastic industry, our fertiliser industry, our heavy manufacturing glass industry. Tomago is now asking for billions of dollars in support. We are littering our landscape with wind towers and solar panels. We have one of the highest electricity prices in the globe, and unreliable. And this is somehow good for Australia when we've just been talking about how we defend our nation. It is lunacy. It is an economic lunacy. And the sooner we realise, like China has, India has, Indonesia has, the United States of America has, the opposition in England has, most of Southeast Asia, most of South America, most of Africa, that it's just a crazy scheme, then that is the chance we give ourselves of redeveloping the balance of this nation's economy so we can defend ourselves. So yes, it'll be interesting if Labor have such a strong view, will they allow this to be debated?
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Yep. Well, you certainly don't have an answer on that yet, do you?
BARNABY JOYCE: If you’re so certain of it Amanda, debate it.
AMANDA RISHWORTH: Well, we're getting on with the job of doing meaningful things for people's lives, like reducing their HECS debt by 20 per cent. Like having cost of living relief, like actually helping people. And of course, actually investing in renewable energy brings energy prices down.
BARNABY JOYCE: Why don’t you have the debate? This is a very important debate. You’re scared of the debate.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Okay gang. You both had your say and unfortunately, we're out of time.