E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
ABC NATIONAL WRAP
SUNDAY, 19 AUGUST 2018
 
SUBJECT/S: Turnbull Government energy crisis and division; Liberals’ big business tax handout; Parliament united against racism
 
PATRICIA KARVELAS: My first guest tonight is the Shadow Finance Minister. Jim Chalmers, welcome to National Wrap.
 
JIM CHALMERS, SHADOW MINISTER FOR FINANCE: Thanks very much, Patricia.
 
KARVELAS: Do you now have the same energy price policy as the Government?
 
CHALMERS: Who would know what the Government's energy policy is? It seems to change from day to day. We've got a Prime Minister in humiliating retreat and a Government which is beyond repair. You mentioned in your introduction that the Cabinet is dining together tonight. I don't think when Malcolm Turnbull invited his Cabinet colleagues around for dinner tonight that he'd realised that half of them want him on the menu. We've had an energy policy debacle in this country from the Government in the last week or so, and indeed before that. What we're trying to do in the Labor Party is be a constructive alternative. We've been the adults in the room all along. We've proposed more ambitious emissions reduction targets, we've had more to say today about pricing and implementing the recommendations of the ACCC. So we're doing our best to get a credible, responsible energy policy in this country while the Government tears itself apart.
 
KARVELAS: Just to be fair, and fact check what you just said, we have absolutely no evidence that half of his Cabinet wants to have the Prime Minister for dinner or however you phrased it, do we?
 
CHALMERS: (Laughs) There's a lot of internal dissent, Patricia. I was being flippant about it.
 
KARVELAS: You were, but none of the Cabinet have come out and said that they want the Prime Minister to resign.
 
CHALMERS: No, but a substantial amount of his colleagues do. I was being flippant, Patricia, about the dinner that they're having tonight in the Cabinet room. I hope, as Kristina Keneally said, that there are no sharp knives lying around. The Prime Minister's in serious trouble, and that's because he just keeps caving in time and time again on energy policy and across the board, and just trying to stay one camp fire ahead of the posse is no substitute for leadership on energy.
 
KARVELAS: Ok, but you've essentially responded to these same ACCC recommendations. You've essentially got the same policy, don't you?
 
CHALMERS: On that aspect, the Prime Minister said something very similar to us, something that Bill Shorten and Mark Butler had earlier announced, which was simply implementing the recommendations of the ACCC. But that's one subset of energy policy. When it comes to the National Energy Guarantee, we've said all along that we'd like more ambitious emissions reduction targets. We said that we wanted them to be done by regulation rather than legislation. We're pleased that the Prime Minister has caved in on that as well. But more broadly, I think in terms of the entire energy policy, who would know what the Government's energy policy will be by the end of the week, given it just last Wednesday night that we were given draft legislation on the National Energy Guarantee and it was gone by Saturday? Malcolm Turnbull has an energy policy that can't last from Wednesday to the weekend.
 
KARVELAS: This change the Government has flagged to the NEG addresses one of the major concerns of specifically the Victorian Government, that the target should be set and reviewed in regulation. It also means that an earlier and more frequent review may be possible. Does it mean that you're now prepared to fully support and get behind the National Energy Guarantee?
 
CHALMERS: We don't know what final form the National Energy Guarantee will take, Patricia. I guess that's the point I'm making. But Mark Butler and others have welcomed the fact that the emissions reduction target will now - it looks like - be set by regulation rather than legislation, and the states have been calling for that all along. So we've been constructive. Where the Government and Malcolm Turnbull in particular has come closer to our position we've welcomed it. But in terms of the final form of the National Energy Guarantee, who knows what will emerge from the Liberal and National party rooms on Tuesday. That remains to be seen.
 
KARVELAS: On corporate tax cuts, the Government looks set not to take it to the next election if it fails in the Senate. It'll be tested there, but it doesn't look like they have the numbers. Given your main line of attack politically is on the business tax cuts, where will that leave you?
 
CHALMERS: I don't think any deal in the Senate or anything Malcolm Turnbull says after it succeeds or fails in the Senate will be worth much. I think most Australians appreciate that Malcolm Turnbull will always bend over backwards for the top end of town. He will always look to give the biggest tax cuts to those who need them least. And I also think if he caves on company tax cuts, that will be the third humiliation in three weeks - the Longman by-election was the first; this debacle on energy policy is the second; I think if he abandons the one thing he actually believes in, which is company tax cuts for the big banks and foreign multinationals, I think that will be the end of him.
 
KARVELAS: Just on the Bob Katter party after that speech from Fraser Anning, do you see the Katter Party now as essentially the same as One Nation? Would you put them last in an election campaign?
 
CHALMERS: I don't determine the order of our preferences, but certainly I thought that the contribution by Fraser Anning was disgraceful, and I was really disappointed to see Bob Katter back it in. I think that's the ugly face, really, of the Katter Party, what we saw in the Senate last week and subsequently from Bob. We now have a number of ugly racist parties to contend with, but the final order of the ticket will be determined by party officials.
 
KARVELAS: Should unions ban all donations to the party now after that speech.
 
CHALMERS: I certainly wouldn't like to see our movement support a party which is prepared to put those kind of views about, but again, that's a matter for individual unions. I don't involve myself really in donation policy or anything like that. It's a matter for them. I've got enough on my plate in the Finance portfolio. But certainly I think a lot Labor people would have been terribly disappointed by what we heard out of the Senate and then out of Bob Katter last week.
 
KARVELAS: Just finally, on that unity and that display - we're going to have a discussion a little later about this on National Wrap by two people who were affected by racism - but where do you take it next? There was that display, some beautiful speeches, and some pretty strong speeches particularly from the two leaders. But what next?
 
CHALMERS: I think that's the right question, Patricia. We've got to make sure that we don't just have a unifying day in the Parliament and feel good about ourselves and listen to the fine words of the leaders, but I also think especially Ed Husic who gave one of the best speeches I've heard in that place. We need to make sure, and this was the point that Ed made, that that is the foundation for something real and meaningful and not just one day in the Parliament. That means being vigilant on cracking down on hate speech, it means making sure that we don't get carried away with some of the outrageous language we've heard about gang activity, particularly in Melbourne - all of these sorts of things. We need to make sure that was the beginning of something good and not just something that has a neat little bowtie on it on one day in one week in Parliament.
 
KARVELAS: Jim Chalmers, thank you so much for your time.
 
CHALMERS: Thank you, Patricia.
 
ENDS