E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
RN DRIVE
THURSDAY, 4 APRIL 2019

SUBJECT/S: Budget Reply; apprentices; income tax; Medicare

PATRICIA KARVELAS: To shed a little light on what might be in this Budget in reply speech which is just in an hour and 20 minutes I think is Jim Chalmers. He's the Shadow Finance Minister. Jim Chalmers, welcome.

JIM CHALMERS, SHADOW MINISTER FOR FINANCE: Thanks very much, Patricia. 

KARVELAS: I've got your mic on now, you can say "thanks very much, Patricia".

CHALMERS: (Laughs) Thank you Patricia, now that I've got the mic on.

KARVELAS: Because I am operating the studio very badly, clearly. I shouldn't be asked to do that again.

CHALMERS: You're doing a better job than I would.

KARVELAS: Alright, now you are going to make a big announcement tonight, there's going to be several announcements, but tonight Labor will announce $1 billion in an investment to Australian TAFE and apprentices. What's in this plan?

CHALMERS: I won't be announcing all of Bill's policies tonight, but there will be a big push for training and apprenticeships in Bill's Budget Reply speech tonight. That's because we make a priority of training local people for local jobs. It won't be the only announcement in the Budget Reply speech, but it will be a very important component.

KARVELAS: Wasn't it announced last year?

CHALMERS: No, this will be a new announcement today. You'll have to wait and see. It's not long as you just said, an hour and 20 minutes or so. It is a new announcement making TAFE and training a priority of a Shorten Labor Government if it's elected next month, a very high priority, along with our other priorities for health, universities, schools and the like. 

KARVELAS: OK, so it says that this investment, and I'm looking at your press release to be really clear with our listeners, that the investment will provide 150,000 additional apprentice incentives in areas of skills shortages. How will that exactly work?

CHALMERS: Again, Bill will outline all of the details tonight. I don't want to get into too much of the detail, but clearly anybody who knows anything about our training system knows that TAFE has been hollowed out in recent years. We do need to make sure that we get more people, particularly young people but not only young people, trained up for the jobs of the future. We have made announcements in the past about TAFE and that's just because it's such a high priority for us. The other mob want to use taxpayer dollars to give big tax breaks to the wealthiest Australians. We'll make other choices. The choices that we make are to invest in TAFE, invest in hospitals and schools.

KARVELAS: Just one more question on the TAFE issue, and then we're gonna move on to some of the other themes, isn't this a state responsibility? Why would a federal Labor Government seek to spend money in an area that the State Government should be funding?

CHALMERS: TAFE and training is such an important area that there's a lot of Commonwealth dollars involved. The states run the TAFE systems, but they rely heavily on federal funding, and any observer of TAFE over the last few years would notice that they've been hollowed out. We think they're a key part of the education system. They've been run down for too long. Money's been pulled out of them by the federal Liberal Government and we want to turn that around.

KARVELAS: Healthcare is expected to feature heavily as well. We've already heard a range of announcements. What else can you tell me?

CHALMERS: Bill Shorten, as you know, is very passionate about making healthcare more accessible, more affordable, for more people. And that will be a key, if not the key, announcement that Bill will make tonight - an important investment in Medicare.

KARVELAS: Will he say that this election will be a referendum on Medicare?

CHALMERS: Well I'll leave the words to for Bill, I don't want to be the first...

KARVELAS: Is that the vibe?

CHALMERS: (Laughs) Well it will be an important issue at the election. 

KARVELAS: Because he also said it's going to be a referendum on wages. How many referendums are we about to have?

CHALMERS: Australians will make their choice based on a range of things - wages definitely. We've had stagnant wages. Definitely healthcare - we've had cuts to healthcare. Definitely schools and TAFEs and universities, and we're proposing to make important investments there. They will be important parts of the choice that people will make in May.

KARVELAS: The Coalition has announced about half-a-billion dollars for cancer treatment in Victoria. Will you match that or do you have different priorities?

CHALMERS: We'll announce our priorities tonight. Obviously, in the health system there's lots of ways that you can make key investments. And Bill will make it clear tonight what his priority is. We've spent much of the last six years defending Medicare, coming up with new ways to advance it so that people get the healthcare that they need and deserve, and all of your listeners can expect to hear much more about that tonight.

KARVELAS: I spoke to Arthur Sinodinis, who was of course former chief of staff to...

CHALMERS: It's good to see Arthur well again.

KARVELAS: It is actually, and to have him in the Parliament, he was former chief of staff to John Howard and of course former minister and he's been battling cancer, he's back in the Parliament. I asked him about the fact that you're going to clearly outspend the Government on health, and he said while it was important to neutralise health as an issue, which they tried to do in the Budget - they ended the Medicare GP freeze and the indexation for instance. That it's also about health reform, not just about putting money into health. We've heard this argument before from Liberals, but will we hear tonight about health reform or is it just about dollars, dollars, dollars? Is it just about an election, we want to win your votes, we're going to say we're going to spend big? Or will you prioritise reforming the health system as well?

CHALMERS: I respect Arthur, and so I say this will all due respect, but investing in health is not about neutralising something. It's not about a political strategy. It shouldn't be about what a Government says six weeks before an election when they've spent six years hollowing out healthcare. I think that's the wrong way to think about it. But your substantive question is a fair one, and I think what we're about in the health system is a combination of reform, but also it is starved for funds. And we have big challenges in the health system. I'm the Shadow Minister for Finance. My job is to make sure it all adds up, and governing is about choices and budgets are about choices. And part of that is making sure the health system has the resources it needs.

KARVELAS: So there will be - I don't know if this is going to be announced tonight - but in the campaign some detail on health reform, not just health dollars?

CHALMERS: There will be key changes to the health system tonight, not doubt during the campaign as well. We do understand that the health system is not perfect. One of the reasons it's not perfect, one of its imperfections, is it needs more resources, but there are other ways as well, and Catherine King has been working on that for some time. 

KARVELAS: You're also wanting to take the tax cut away from higher income earners. You've already announced that, you've made it clear that you don't want to flatten the tax system. You've been accused of class war, of wanting to attack higher income earners. What is your answer to that charge, that you're trying to pit Australians against each other.

CHALMERS: No, on the contrary. Our approach is exactly the opposite to that. I have heard that criticism made. It drives me nuts, because what we're trying to say is that if we want to grow sustainably as a country, we want to grow this economy, then we need to make sure that people on low and middle incomes get the reward for their effort, that they spend their money in the economy. We can start to turn around growth figures and consumption figures and wages figures, which have been floundering. That's the best way that we grow together as a country. The people who make that charge about class warfare are generally the people who want to take money out of hospitals and schools and give it to the highest income earners in this country. That's not the way to bring the country together, that's a recipe for division.

KARVELAS: Jim Chalmers, I'm in trouble because the house bells are ringing and you must go. Thank you so much for coming in.

CHALMERS: Thank you, Patricia.

ENDS