Tuesday, 12 August

EO&E

PETER STEFANOVIC All right, let's get more reaction from the Opposition now joining us is Shadow IR Minister Tim Wilson. So how are you feeling about it all this morning Tim?

TIM WILSON Well, I think it's incredibly depressing. We've got a government that is naive and is engaging in revisionism in terms of the issues. They're now saying that we should be going along with this because it's a bipartisan position. The Labor government has shattered the bipartisan position that was shared by the Liberal Party and the Labor Party, which is, of course, sympathetic to a two-state solution but with massive conditions, including starting with support for security of Israel and, of course, at least the return of hostages, but instead we now have almost a near-unconditional acceptance of a Palestinian state without any acceptance of the  or expectation of the security of Israel.

PETER STEFANOVIC Did Israel have this coming though, the restriction of aid, the closure of crossings in March which led to mass starvation. Folks looked on in horror, so is the Prime Minister just doing what the people want?

TIM WILSON Well, what we're seeing now is a very aggressive Hamas propaganda outfit being put forward. And unfortunately, the more Hamas uses civilians as props in their propaganda and we fall for it, the more they will continue to do it. I mean, on the 7th of October 2023, this is exactly the objective that Hamas sought to achieve. Senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad said recently, the initiative by several countries to recognise a Palestinian state is one of the fruits of October 7. We proved the victory over Israel is not impossible and now the Albanese government has gone along with it. I need to be clear about this, Peter. This is not being done in my name. The clear question for, I think, for a lot of Labor MPs, like Josh Burns and Mark Dreyfus, is, is this being done in their name? They're saying nothing on social media. They're not fronting up to the media. I think it's their responsibility to turn up and say this is being done in their name or it is not being done in their name because the decision this government is making is completely inconsistent with everything they've said in the past.

PETER STEFANOVIC All right, yeah, we did put call outs to those names and we got crickets in terms of a reply. I mean, do you agree with our guests this morning who have said, I mean essentially all these decisions are a lot of theater, because it's not going to change a single thing on the ground. So is it worth basically blowing up our relationship with Israel? And note that the Prime Minister actually accused Netanyahu this morning of being in denial.

TIM WILSON Well, I think there's only one person in denial, and it's our Prime Minister. Firstly, we should be standing by our allies. You know, we don't agree with every decision that's made by our Allies all of the time. We don't agree with every decision that's made by the United States. We don't agree with every decision that's made by Israel either. But we should working with them and standing by them as much as we can. But we're now faced with a situation where we're in open conflict, with their national interests and their security. And I think it's enormously problematic because the message we've actually sent to the international community is not about Israel or Palestine. It's actually about our Government being weak and prepared to bow to pressure off the back of the propaganda outfit of a terrorist organisation. And there will be massive flow-on consequences when our government stands up to the global community and says, yes, we are weak.

PETER STEFANOVIC Okay, just let's get to another couple of quick matters away from that this morning. Tim, do you think the pitchforks are going to be out for the RBA today if it doesn't cut rates?

TIM WILSON Certainly, there's a lot of financial stress out there in the community. There are a lot people who have slowly eaten away in their savings and people are now feeling real financial stress. There's data out there highlighting that upward pressure on grocery prices, electricity prices, and, of course... what people are paying on their mortgages is huge, and people are always looking for relief. But let's not forget why there is still significant inflation pressure and interest rate pressure in the Australian economy compared to the rest of the OECD, and it's because of State and Federal Government expenditure. Until you address that, you will continue to have higher interest rates than the rest the developed world.

PETER STEFANOVIC And just a final note, inquiry into penalty rates, that's up tomorrow have you got an expectation ahead of that.

TIM WILSON Well, we simply want the Government to answer basic questions. How many small businesses are going to be affected? Is it going to have an impact on the number of jobs and, in particular, number of rostered people being employed? Because this whole palaver started because the retail industry wanted to increase the wages of retail workers as a baseline of 35%. So the Labor government's been arguing against a 35% increase in the base rate of pay for retail workers so that they can empower unions against workers. And we want to know what the case of that is and whether unions agree with it.

PETER STEFANOVIC Tim Wilson, thanks for your time.

ENDS