LAURIE OAKES:Ms Gillard, welcome to the program.
JULIA GILLARD: Thank you, Laurie.
LAURIE OAKES: You've seen Ross Coulthard's story on the TWU. As Workplace Relations Minister, what's your reaction to it?
JULIA GILLARD: My reaction, Laurie, is anybody who has an allegation about these matters that they want investigated should report it. It seemed to me from the story that there are two types of allegations. One is about personal intimidation. Those matters, of course, should be reported to the police. Another is about breach of electoral disclosure laws. That matter should be reported to the Australian Electoral Commission for investigation. And I note, Laurie, that from your earlier investigation into this matter, the story that aired last September, there is an ongoing Australian Electoral Commission investigation, as I'm advised.
LAURIE OAKES: OK. But the story ended with a call for a full investigation. Will you order one?
JULIA GILLARD: Well, they're the appropriate entities to investigate, Laurie. If there are breaches of electoral laws, then the proper body to do that - indeed, I would say the only body that can do that - is the independent Australian Electoral Commission. Matters that need to go to the police, obviously can't be investigated by anybody else other than the police.
LAURIE OAKES: Well, they can be, of course. You can set up an inquiry and this morning Liberal frontbencher Joe Hockey says there should be a full independent inquiry, preferably by a judicial officer. Now, you have inquiries into other things, you're having one into the Haneef affair, why can't you have an inquiry into this?
JULIA GILLARD: Well, I think the appropriate course here, Laurie is to allow the agencies that specialise in these types of investigations to do their work. I note when Mr Hockey was the Minister before the last election and your first story aired, that he asked for a range of inquiries to be done by the entities that normally do them; that is the Australian Electoral Commission and the like. So there is merit in having the specialist entities do these inquiries.
LAURIE OAKES: Well, let me ask you this: Would it be legitimate for money to be extracted from companies by a union and funnelled into a slush fund to help the Labor Party?
JULIA GILLARD: It's certainly inappropriate for money to be taken from companies through any use of industrial pressure. Obviously that's wrong and if there's an allegation of that, and people want it investigated, and clearly they do - they've appeared on your show - then the matter should be reported for investigation.
LAURIE OAKES: Well, wouldn't the Labor Party want it investigated? I mean, if you're the recipients of the money from this slush fund, I mean you're in it up to your necks, aren't you?
JULIA GILLARD: Well, as I understand what's been put in this story, Laurie, money was disclosed by Labor MPs in New South Wales; that is the Labor MPs have acquitted their obligations under the electoral laws. Now, what remains, of course, is the assertion and, of course, these things are assertions at this stage - that a proper declaration wasn't made by the fund. Now, that is an allegation that should be investigated by the Australian Electoral Commission.
LAURIE OAKES: The most crucial allegation seems to be that union officials were ordered to perform time-consuming company inspections, even when there was no evidence of any breach of workplace or safety laws, and they did that as a means of encouraging, if I can use the term, companies to put up the cash for this fund. Would that be legal?
JULIA GILLARD: There are right of entry rules under industrial law and we've said we will keep the same right of entry rules. They enable a union to investigate a suspected breach of an award or an agreement. That has to be done for a proper purpose, and if an employer believes it's being done improperly, then they can complain to the Australian Industrial Relations Commission about that and have it investigated.
LAURIE OAKES: The man at the centre of these allegations, the head of the union, is Tony Sheldon, why is the Government considering his appointment to the National Transport Commission?
JULIA GILLARD: This matter is yet to be considered by the Government, Laurie, and matters relating to appointments to the Transport Commission will be considered in due course, but the Federal Government is yet to deal with that issue.
LAURIE OAKES: But he has been recommended by Transport Minister Anthony Albanese, hasn't he?
JULIA GILLARD: As I understand it, there has been a recommendation of people who could serve on that body from the joint Commonwealth-State meeting of Transport Ministers, but the Federal Government has not, as yet, considered any of those recommendations. Can I say here, Laurie, this is a body that deals with, amongst other things, safety on our roads, safety for truck drivers, safety for other road users, so it's not inappropriate to think that someone with a representative role in relation to truck drivers could bring some information and expertise to bear. But in terms of the identities of who is to be appointed to any of those positions, that matter has not yet been considered by the Federal Government.
LAURIE OAKES: Well, given these allegations, is Mr Sheldon's appointment appropriate, would it be appropriate?
JULIA GILLARD: Well, that needs to be considered by the Government when the matter comes before it, Laurie. I'm not going to engage in a one-off decision here on television. Obviously these things need to be considered in the proper way by a government.
LAURIE OAKES: But with this smell around Mr Sheldon's union, I mean, surely you can say that until this is cleared up, you won't appoint him?
JULIA GILLARD: What I can say, Laurie, is in making appointments to this Commission, which plays an important role in relation to issues like safety, the Federal Government will be looking for expertise and ability to do the job. Obviously, we will want to be appointing people who are fit and proper for that task, and the Government will make a decision about each of these Commission appointments at the appropriate time.
LAURIE OAKES: OK. While we're on the subject of the Government's relationship with the union movement, the Fair Pay Commission minimum wage case has been in the news. Don't the unions have a right to expect that the party they formed when it's in government would back their claims for a decent rise for minimum paid workers?
JULIA GILLARD: What everybody should expect from the Rudd Labor Government is that we will act in the national interest. And when it comes to our industrial relations system, we've clearly defined what we believe is in the national interest. And that's having a fair, balanced and flexible system, one with a safety net that can never be stripped way from working Australians. One of the great vices of Work Choices is that it allowed that safety net to be stripped away. We're in the Parliament guaranteeing that safety net with our Transition Bill which we hope will be finalised in the coming week.
On minimum wages, we've asked the Fair Pay Commission to consider a measured increase. We want it to weigh up, of course, all of the economic factors, because we understand and I believe working families understand, that there's different issues that they need to think about here. Certainly, people like to see more money in their pay packet, but they also like to see a low inflation environment and they don't want to see upwards pressure on interest rates. So the Government has canvassed each of these issues with the Fair Pay Commission.
LAURIE OAKES: But why won't you nominate a figure? Why won't you say, "low-paid workers deserve this amount"?
JULIA GILLARD: Well we've said low-paid workers deserve a measured increase; we've provided the Fair Pay Commission...
LAURIE OAKES: But that could mean anything?
JULIA GILLARD: We've provided the Fair Pay Commission with the sort of economic information we believe it needs to set about its task. We've certainly said to the Fair Pay Commission that this is a fast-moving economic environment. Clearly there are matters happening internationally that have the ability to affect the Australian economy. We're dealing with a high-inflation environment, we are fighting that inflation, and we will take the opportunity after the May Budget to update the Fair Pay Commission on economic settings, if that seems necessary.
LAURIE OAKES: Will you nominate a figure then?
JULIA GILLARD: We've said in this submission that there should be a measured increase. I note, Laurie, that the former government did not nominate figures to the Fair Pay Commission when it went about its task. We've taken the approach that we want the Fair Pay Commission to understand the depth of the Government's concern about the cost of living pressures on working families, and we also want the Fair Pay Commission to understand the steps that the Government is taking to fight inflation and to make sure that those working families, and particularly those low-paid workers, aren't confronted with ever-escalating prices every time they go to the shops and increased housing costs, whether that's increased mortgage repayments or increased rents.
LAURIE OAKES: This is a return of me-too. John Howard did it, so you'll do it?
JULIA GILLARD: I'm making the point here, Laurie that there's a balance. Our submission clearly outlines the factors that need to be considered by the Fair Pay Commission. The Fair Pay Commission is independent. We support, of course, minimum wages being set independently. We've said in the full operation of our fair and balanced industrial relations system that would be done by our new industrial umpire, Fair Work Australia, but we believe that should...
LAURIE OAKES: But in the meantime, ...
JULIA GILLARD: …be an independent function and the Government…
LAURIE OAKES: In the meantime though...
JULIA GILLARD: …should act as an advisor in that process.
LAURIE OAKES: In the meantime, you've got the Fair Pay Commission, Labor in Opposition didn't trust the Fair Pay Commission, bagged it up hill and down dale, and yet now you're prepared to trust it with this crucial decision affecting the lowest paid workers in the country without any guidance. How do you explain that?
JULIA GILLARD: We made it clear before the election, Laurie, that we would have a two-year transition period to our new industrial relations system. In the course of that two-year transition period, the Fair Pay Commission would continue to deal with the minimum wage setting function. We decided to do that because we've asked the Australian Industrial Relations Commission to take on a huge and important task, and that's about modernising our award safety net. And so we thought that in that transition period, when the Commission was fully deployed, modernising awards, that it made sense to keep the Fair Pay Commission setting minimum wages. The Government has provided detailed guidance about its views in its submission, canvassing all of the factors that need to be taken into account in setting minimum wages, including, of course our very deep concern about cost-of-living pressures on minimum-wage families.
LAURIE OAKES: Well, put your Education Minister's hat on now. Why do you want to extend the model of funding private schools on a socio-economic basis to public schools?
JULIA GILLARD: I think all Australians are concerned that every kid should get the best possible start in life, and we can look across this country now and we know that there are pockets of this country that, despite more than a decade and a half of economic growth, are still disadvantaged. And we know schools in those communities can do it tough, and that's true of the public schools, it can be true of the private schools as well. We want to address disadvantage wherever it is, to make sure every Australian child gets a first-class education. And for those children who come from homes where they may not have been assisted to learn to read or count or recognise colours or hold a crayon or any of those things before they come to school, we want to make sure that those children get the benefits of universal pre-school and then a great school. And that's why we want to be able to identify disadvantage. A socio-economic index is one way of doing that. Another way of doing it is a special index we've funded, developed by Fiona Stanley and her colleagues, an Australian of the Year. It's the Australian Early Development Index. It's a population measure which will enable us to identify those schools that have numbers of children that are at risk of education or developmental delay. So it is a very powerful tool to work out where we need to intervene to make sure that those children end up with a great education.
LAURIE OAKES: OK. Well, when you've identified the schools that serve socio-economically disadvantaged households, how do you intervene? I mean, how does that affect school funding?
JULIA GILLARD: Well, it's obviously got implications for resources, and that's the conversation we're having with our State and Territory colleagues. And Laurie can I say this: State and Territory Ministers around the country are committed to making sure that every child gets a great education. They're committed to combating disadvantage. So we're all working off the same page here, which I think is terrific, and heralds an ability for us to make a difference for those children and for their life chances because we know from all of the statistics and all of the research, that if you miss out at school, if you don't come out of school able to read and write and do all of those things that we ask people to do in a modern country, then you are set up for a life of disadvantage.
LAURIE OAKES: Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson says he is concerned that money will be taken from public schools in higher-income suburbs and diverted to the ones you identify as needy. Will that happen?
JULIA GILLARD: Of course not, and our setting here is to make a difference for every Australian child, and I would have thought that that ought to be at least a bipartisan sentiment, that we want to do the right thing by all Australian kids. What we're obviously talking about here is improving the circumstances of schools that are doing it toughest, and as Kevin Rudd, the Prime Minister, frequently said in the run-up to the election, we're not about taking resources away from schools, we're about increasing resources in schools, and increasing the prospects of children getting a great education. And one of the things...
LAURIE OAKES:
If you're talking about increasing funding to education, which must be what you're saying, how do you do that when the razor gang is axing everything, trying to save money in this Budget?
JULIA GILLARD: Well, this Budget will be one of promise delivery and our promises include huge new investments in education. $1 billion for computers in schools, $2.5 billion for trades training centres in schools, universal preschool for all 4-year-olds, 450,000 places in vocational education and training and, Laurie, the list goes on and on. So people will see new resources for education in this Budget. At the same time, we are in intensive discussions with our State and Territory colleagues, a process kicked off by the Prime Minister before Christmas through the Council of Australian Governments, and one of the aims of that process is to be improving our education system. And we, of course, too, talk regularly with Independent schools and with Catholic schools, and many of them serve communities where people are doing it tough.
LAURIE OAKES: The Government got into terrible trouble over the carers' allowance and the seniors' allowance. Can you guarantee that in this Budget, the cutting will affect the better-off people, not the most vulnerable people in the community?
JULIA GILLARD: What I can guarantee first and foremost is we will deliver our promises. This is a government that believes in keeping its word which is a stark contrast to the former government that introduced the concept of non-core promise into the Australian political lexicon. That is the promise you make at election time and discard the day after. We won't be doing that. Then in terms of this budget, we will always be mindful of the needs of the people who require government assistance the most - the aged, the sick, people who do it tough who need government assistance. And when you look at our policies from the last election, so many of them were about assisting those sorts of Australians, people who are doing it tough. Jenny Macklin has just introduced a new utilities bonus to help people pay their basic bills. Nicola Roxon is in the process of improving the health system because these are the Australians who most rely on our public health system, need access to doctors and access to hospitals, and so it goes on. Tanya Plibersek focused on making sure there’s affordable housing.
LAURIE OAKES: Well, we can't list them all.
JULIA GILLARD: And, Laurie, I accept you can't listen to them all, but there is a huge suite of promises there to help those Australians who are doing is the toughest.
LAURIE OAKES: We thank you very much. We're out of time. Back to you Ellen.
JULIA GILLARD: Thanks Laurie.
ENDS