7 September 2013

TRANSCRIPT OF THE HON. TONY ABBOTT MHR INTERVIEW WITH ANDREW OKEEFE AND MONIQUE WRIGHT, WEEKEND SUNRISE, SEVEN NETWORK
Subjects: Election Day 2013; the Coalitions commitment to repeal the carbon tax; the Coalitions Real Solutions. E&OE. ANDREW OKEEFE: Opposition leader Tony Abbott joins us from Freshwater Surf Life Saving Club in Sydney. Good morning Mr Abbott and thank you so much for making this time this morning. TONY ABBOTT: Andrew, thanks for coming down to Freshwater, and thanks for enjoying this beautiful electorate. ANDREW OKEEFE: If only we were there in person. Mr Abbott you've said that today's election is a referendum on the carbon tax. Really, though, there have been a number of issues in this election - the paid parental leave scheme, the national broadband network, asylum seeker policy, education reforms - these have been big issues for the electorate. Will you really force another election if you can't win the repeal of the carbon tax in the Senate? TONY ABBOTT: Andrew, it is a referendum on the carbon tax, it is a referendum on governments that don't tell the truth, and the point I make to the Australian people even now as polling booths are about to open is that, if you elect the Coalition, we will scrap the carbon tax, we will end the waste, we will stop the boats, we will build the roads of the 21st century, but we can only do that, as you suggest, if people vote for the Liberal National candidate in the House and also in the Senate because we need a strong and stable majority government in both Houses of Parliament if our country is to go forward as effectively as we should in the next three years. MONIQUE WRIGHT: We have an Australian electorate that seems largely disillusioned with politics in general. What is your plan if you are to become prime minister tonight to inspire the electorate? TONY ABBOTT: Monique, I'm not taking it for granted because this election could still go either way. There are a lot of people who are toying with the idea of voting for independents and minor parties. My strong request to them is don't because we need a strong and stable government. Should the Coalition win the election, I think the most inspiring thing I could do for people is

actually keep our commitments. I think people are pleased and satisfied with governments which are competent and straightforward with them. I think they get very unhappy and disappointed, understandably, when governments are incompetent and break their word. ANDREW OKEEFE: To be straight with the electorate, I think, and many people feel given the response in our soapbox, that neither Party has been entirely straight with the Australian people about our economic situation both Parties are hammering the fact that everyone is doing so tough while the economists are telling us we have in fact never been more prosperous. We've never had it better. Will you try and change the conversation about entitlement and prosperity in Australia if you become prime minister? TONY ABBOTT: Andrew, there is no doubt that, as a people and as individuals, we should be more inclined to count our blessings, but it's also true that we should try to be the best we possibly can be, and I think there's a feeling that our country hasn't been all it could or should have been over the last few years, and at least a part of that is that we've had a government that you just can't trust. That's why I think it's so important to put a stable, adult, grown-up government in place that says what it means and does what it says. MONIQUE WRIGHT: This week you announced that you cut foreign aid by $4.5 billion over the forward estimates. If we can't afford to help other countries that need it, who can? TONY ABBOTT: Monique, we are not cutting foreign aid. Foreign aid will go up every year under the Coalition if we win. We are just reducing the rate of growth. You see, you've got to be a stronger country before you can be an even more generous country. We've always been generous, we will continue to be generous, we won't just be as extravagantly generous with borrowed money as the current government was proposing to be. ANDREW OKEEFE: Mr Abbott, Waleed Aly wrote a very interesting article in the paper yesterday in which he said that huge arguments or debates over the last three years have essentially been resolved. Both Parties now agree the NBN is not a white elephant, it's just how much we want to spend. Both Parties now agree that the Gonski reforms are not a conski that they need to be put in place. Both Parties now essentially agree that asylum seekers wont be processed here, that they will become some other country's problem. What is the real difference now between the Labor and the Coalition positions on the biggest issues? TONY ABBOTT: There are lots of very big differences, Andrew. The Government believes in a carbon tax. We don't and we will scrap it. The Government believes in a mining tax. We dont and well scrap it. The Government believes in big government, more regulation. We don't and we want government to be effective, sure, but not gigantic, and we will cut red tape. We want to build

the roads of the future and the Government is far from convinced that that is the way to go. So, it is a very clear choice, the clearest choice in a generation, and that's why I think it is very important that people vote for a strong and stable majority government, and that means voting for the Coalition in the House and in the Senate. ANDREW OKEEFE: Back to that question of moral leadership. If the economists are telling us that in fact we are one of the strongest economies in the world, and we as a people are the most prosperous people in the world, will you put an end to this constant hankering about how tough we have got it? If all the climate scientists are telling us we are headed for an ecological disaster, will you reignite the debate about what we can actually do to save this planet? TONY ABBOTT: Obviously we do need to take strong and effective action against climate change, but it's got to be smart action, not dumb action, and that's why the Coalition will provide sensible incentives. We wont clobber the economy with a great big tax that doesnt actually reduce emissions. ANDREW OKEEFE: It's been proven that during the course of that tax, emissions have been reduced and the overall cost to the Australian household has been totally offset by other measures. So, this is precisely the kind of thing that I am asking, are we going to address what the experts actually tell us this, so Australians know the full picture? TONY ABBOTT: Well, obviously it's important to reduce emissions. Our policy will reduce emissions. If you look at the modelling of the Government, the documents that were released in July of 2011, in 2020, our emissions will actually be higher than now despite a carbon tax which, under Mr Rudd should he be re-elected, will go up to $38 a tonne. If you want to reduce emissions, you've got to vote for the Coalition, not for Mr Rudd. MONIQUE WRIGHT: We are out of time. Any chance that you are going to go in for a dip this morning? TONY ABBOTT: I'd love to be going in for a swim, the waves look inviting, but I've sworn off budgie smugglers for the duration of this campaign, and again, make your vote count, Australia vote for the Coalition and the House and in the Senate, and don't risk another unstable Labor/Green government. ANDREW OKEEFE: I don't know if you saw this morning but Will Ferrell has commented on your budgie smugglers Mr Abbott, although he has got another term for them. I'll leave it to you to Google that one, but you've become an international hit. Thank you so much for joining us,

best of luck with your campaigning today, and we look forward to talking to you tomorrow or next week. TONY ABBOTT: Thanks Andrew, thanks Monique. [ends]

7 September 2013

TRANSCRIPT OF THE HON. TONY ABBOTT MHR INTERVIEW WITH CAMERON WILLIAMS TODAY, NINE NETWORK
Subjects: Election Day 2013; the Coalitions Real Solutions Plan. EO&E........................................................................................................................................... CAMERON WILLIAMS: Mr Abbott joins us now from the Freshwater Surf Lifesaving Club on Sydney's Northern Beaches. Tony, I was not going to ask, but Ron Burgundy has put it on the world agenda, so how is it hanging? TONY ABBOTT: Well, look, I'm down here at Freshy's Surf Club, and you'll be pleased to see Cam that I'm in a suit not the budgie smugglers. I sort of wish I was out there on the waves, it's a nice wave for an elderly long boarder this morning. Australia has a democratic duty to do today - it's a great thing that our country is voting. It's great that we do have a choice, and my strong hope is that Australians will choose a stable majority government in the House and in the Senate that will scrap the carbon tax, end the waste, stop the boats and build the roads that we need for the 21st century. CAMERON WILLIAMS: You avoided references to the banana hammock. Thank you very much for that Mr Abbott. It would seem ironic that the possibility exists that there'll be a landslide victory for the Coalition, but you could still get hung up in the Senate, which is the difficult position that Australia has been in for some time now. What do you say about that? TONY ABBOTT: Youre dead right, Cam. There is a real possibility - not just of a Green dominated Senate, but of an unstable Labor/Green government, and that's why it's very important that people vote for a strong and stable majority government that can get things done, that can be an adult grown up government, and the only way to do that is to vote for the Coalition, for the Liberal or for the National Party candidate in the House and in the Senate. Because the sad thing is

that independents and minor parties mucked up the last parliament. It would be a tragedy if they mucked up the next one as well. CAMERON WILLIAMS: Is it just some sort of vague pre-election threat that you would go to a double dissolution in that situation. Would you be intent on carrying that through? TONY ABBOTT: I'm determined to scrap the carbon tax. That's what I'll do. I will do whatever is necessary to scrap the carbon tax and to keep the other commitments that my team and I have made because that is what people are so upset about. They are upset about governments which are a) incompetent, and b) untrustworthy. Governments and Prime Ministers who say one thing before an election and do the opposite afterwards. We are sick of it. The only way to properly protest against incompetent and untrustworthy government is to vote for the Liberal Party or the National Party, a strong Coalition candidate, because we are the only ones that can give the country a strong and stable majority government. CAMERON WILLIAMS: What was your first thought when you heard Mr Rudd had been brought back into the fold to contest the election? TONY ABBOTT: I thought "here we go again." The second change of Prime Minister in just a little over three years - not by the people, but by the faceless men. Again, we have to get right away from that. That is why - I'm calling on the Australian people today to join us, join me and to choose a strong and stable majority government which respects the will of the people, where the Australian people and not the faceless men are determine who the Prime Minister is. CAMERON WILLIAMS: Once that decision has been made, won't you just become like all the other elected governments, and we'll start to hear "there's budget surprises, we didn't account for that. We'll have to renege on that promise," there's an element of we've heard it all before, no matter what happens. TONY ABBOTT: I want to make a clean break from that, Cam. You're right. People are sick to death of it. I want to be a no surprises, no excuses prime minister. I want us to be a government which says what it means, and does what it says. I know we haven't had that for the last six years. That's why I think Australians are yearning for change. The only way you can get real change is to vote for a Liberal or a National Coalition candidate in the house and in the Senate otherwise we could just be saddled with another weak unstable Labor/Green minority government. CAMERON WILLIAMS:

It seems inevitable that you are about to be elected as Australia's Prime Minister. What's the single biggest issue in your mind? What do you want to achieve in the next three years? TONY ABBOTT: Cameron, above all else I want to keep our commitments - they are to scrap the carbon tax, to end the waste, to stop the boats, to build the roads of the 21st century. We haven't had a government which has delivered on its commitments over the last six years. We have had a Prime Minister who was all talk and very little action. When he did act he hurt people's job security. I want to put all that behind us so that very quickly the last six years seems like a bit of a bad dream, and we can get on with having a strong and stable adult grown up government which does its job, doesn't boast, doesn't skite, gets on and does its job in a competent and trustworthy way. CAMERON WILLIAMS: Tony, who is.. You have got some support gathered around today. Who will be your chief protagonist... TONY ABBOTT: It's the Freshy surf club, a good place to be Cam. CAMERON WILLIAMS: One of the original surf clubs. It's a beauty. Who do think will be your Opposition Leader when you do take parliament? TONY ABBOTT: Well, again Cameron, I'm not getting ahead of myself. I think that we have still got 10 hours to go until the booths close. A lot can happen in 10 hours. There's been a massive last-minute blitz of phone calls and letterboxing and dirty tricks from all sorts of people, but certainly the Labor Party and the unions have been very active. I'm just focused on doing everything I can. My team is focused on doing everything they can, and we can to give Australia the better government that it needs. CAMERON WILLIAMS: I knew you would say that Tony. I think the fear that some Australians have is that you as Opposition Leader have always said that a strong government needs a strong opposition. Are we going to be in a position where we'll have a weak opposition? If the polls are right, the Labor Party is going to get wiped out. TONY ABBOTT: I don't believe the polls. Kevin Rudd doesn't believe the polls. I don't believe these polls I think it's still very close. Basically we are in the last minute of the Grand Final. One try could swing it. The game is see-sawing backwards and forwards, up and down the field. I don't think anyone should think that this is over. You can't risk voting for a Labor candidate or for an independent and minor party candidate thinking that the Libs are going to get in anyway.

There's no certainty in that. The only way to be sure that we have a strong and stable government is to vote for the Coalition in both the House and the Senate. CAMERON WILLIAMS: Thank you very much Mr Abbott. A long day ahead. We certainly wait to see what Australia decides. Thank you for your time this morning. TONY ABBOTT: Thank you so much, Cam. Nice to be with you. [ends]