JIM CHALMERS MP
SHADOW TREASURER
MEMBER FOR RANKIN
E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
TICKER NEWS
TUESDAY, 29 JUNE 2021
SUBJECTS: 2021 Intergenerational Report; Scott Morrison’s unwillingness to accept responsibility for vaccines and quarantines means more lockdowns for longer; Barnaby Joyce’s divisive comments about COVID-19.
ADRIAN FRANKLIN, HOST: Every five years in Australia the federal government releases the so-called Intergenerational Report. The Report is a look into the future predicting the impacts of population and policy over the next 40 years. Jim Chalmers is Australia's Shadow Treasurer and he joins us right now to give us his take. Welcome in to ticker news, how are you today?
JIM CHALMERS, SHADOW TREASURER: I'm great thanks Adrian, thanks for having me on.
FRANKLIN: Of course. So firstly, what are your key takeaways from the Report and does it live up to your expectations?
CHALMERS: Unfortunately, the Intergenerational Report paints a pretty bleak picture of the future of the economy in Australia. It says that the economy will be smaller than expected, growth will be slower than before, living standards will be stagnant. We've got at least 40 more years of debt and deficit.
What all that means, unfortunately, is this Government here in Australia has racked up generational debt without a generational dividend. The next 40 years are expected to be weaker in the economy than the last 40, which I don't think is good enough. This can't be the thanks that Australians get for the sacrifices they've made for each other throughout the pandemic.
FRANKLIN: Obviously, the pandemic, no one saw coming, very challenging to deal with, but do you think at the moment that they've overdone it in some ways and the debt and the position we're in has actually gone too far?
CHALMERS: I think the more important way to look at it is, what do we actually have to show for all of this debt? And also to understand that debt was actually multiplying even before COVID-19. One of the explanations that the Treasurer tries to give is he tries to pretend that all of these challenges laid bare by the Intergenerational Report are wholly and solely a function of the pandemic, when economists know that even before COVID-19 growth was weak, wages were stagnant, business investment was flatlining. We had a whole range of economic challenges, which meant that we were already falling short of the projections in the IGR before this one, before COVID-19 hit. We have to understand that.
Of course, in times like these, the Government needs to spend to support the economy, support workers and small businesses in particular. What really matters at the end of the day is whether or not this country has enough to show for it. Unfortunately, the Intergenerational Report pointed to those generations of debt without the generational dividend that we expect from such a big investment.
FRANKLIN: So what does the Government need to be doing to now pull Australia out of the pandemic, and hopefully into economic prosperity? What aren't they doing, what do they need to do?
CHALMERS: I think we need to look at it as two sets of issues. In the near term, obviously we need to turbocharge the vaccine rollout and build purpose-built quarantine facilities. The absence of urgency on both of those fronts from the Prime Minister means that we are far behind where we should be and that's why we've got these lockdowns. And we will have them for longer until this mess is sorted out.
That's the near term. In the longer term, clearly we can't just acknowledge or identify these problems in the economy and just throw in the towel as the Treasurer did yesterday, we need to actually do something about it. That means recognising we won't fix the Budget unless we fix the economy, we won't fix the economy unless we get productivity growing again.
We do that by having cleaner and cheaper energy, by teaching and training our people to keep up with technological change, by being better at turning our ideas into jobs, making sure that we do the right thing in the care economy, and the services economy, and other key parts of the economy as well. If we don't do that then we're really just resigning ourselves to the bleak future of the IGR paints.
FRANKLIN: Let's look at the vaccination rollout, which you touched on there. I mean, I don't think it's political to say it has failed up until this point. So why is it going so wrong do you think at the moment?
CHALMERS: I think any objective observer of quarantine and vaccines in particular, the absence of a public information campaign - or a meaningful one - the absence of Australia's ability to manufacture its own mRNA vaccines, I think any objective observer will see that as nothing short of a disaster so far and we need to see that fixed.
I think the problem here, and this is recognised I think increasingly, is the Prime Minister has spent too much time trying to avoid responsibility for these things rather than take responsibility. That's why we're so far behind. And the risk here is after everything that Australians have done for each other to limit the spread of the virus we risk squandering that by getting the vaccines, quarantine, and these other issues wrong.
If you compare where we're at in terms of vaccinations with the rest of the world we are a tiny fraction of what other countries have managed. That's not good enough. And that's why we are locked down once again.
FRANKLIN: So it's been announced that the AstraZeneca vaccine will now be available to under 40s, which is a major part of our audience here at ticker news, do you think people under this age will actually feel confident enough to get the job?
CHALMERS: I think the important part of that is consulting with GPs. If you're younger and you want to get the AstraZeneca vaccination then I think it's important that you seek advice on it, but we want to see more people vaccinated, definitely.
We want to make sure that we can get more jabs into people's arms because the absence of that has been so costly so far. That was one of the announcements that the Prime Minister made last night in his press conference in the evening. I think there were a whole range of matters raised by the PM in that press conference that Australians will be scratching their heads wondering why some of this hasn't happened already. Take another example, the aged care workforce, a lot of young people in that workforce as well. They were supposed to be vaccinated by Easter, we're almost in July, and something like one in six have been vaccinated.
So there's a whole range of issues raised by the Prime Minister last night which should have been happening already and aren't. We need him to take responsibility, rather than continue to shirk responsibility.
FRANKLIN: And just finally Barnaby Joyce was the news last week, selected as the country's next Deputy PM. How is the feeling, what's the response been like at Parliament House, a week on?
CHALMERS: Well, I think disbelief. And you look at some of the commentary that he engaged in over the weekend, where he said you could smell the burning flesh of Melburnians from regional Australia. And he's said regional people couldn't care less about what's happening in our cities when it comes to COVID-19.
I mean, this is what happens when you put the clowns in charge of the circus, you get more of this kind of divisive language.
Under normal circumstances the Prime Minister would be called on to intervene, to pull his deputy into line, but the sad truth is the Prime Minister is just as susceptible to this kind of divisive language. We need Australians to come together, not to be set against each other, as we deal with this virus and the challenges for the economy into the future. Unfortunately, whether it's the Prime Minister or his Deputy, they would rather divide people than bring them together. And that's unfortunately one of the key take outs of Barnaby Joyce's re-elevation to the Deputy Prime Ministership.
FRANKLIN: Interesting times indeed up there in Canberra. Shadow Treasurer, really appreciate your time today on ticker news, we'll speak to you again soon.
CHALMERS: Appreciate your time, thanks very much.
ENDS
