PAUL TURTON, HOST: The catastrophic flooding across New South Wales, of course, that has impacted on so many communities, including here in the Hunter, will of course require a substantial response from all levels of government. The Prime Minister has already taken steps to address the crisis and joins me now. Prime Minister Albanese, thanks for coming on today. Good morning.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning, Paul. Good to be with you. But sorry about the circumstances which are quite horrific for such a vast part of New South Wales. Now we tragically now have a fourth person confirmed that he has lost his life driving through flood waters near Coffs Harbour and near Nana Glen, just about 30ks north of Coffs. He was found overnight. Again - a reminder that if it's flooded, forget it and for people to not take risks during what is a very dangerous period.
TURTON: PM, I just got a text message as you were speaking, sending a big thank you to the Good Samaritan in a black ute who stopped and warned drivers from entering flood water on Industrial Drive last night at about 7:30. You are a hero, says our text, our opening text of today. Plenty of families are counting the cost and, of course, as you've just indicated there, some have paid the ultimate price. We seem to be getting plenty of practice at disaster response. Are we getting any better at it?
PRIME MINISTER: We sure are. Well, tragically I think that the response is getting more and more efficient and I wish that wasn't the case, frankly. But we are dealing with the circumstances more and more regularly and they're more intense. Just a couple of months ago, of course, we were dealing with a tropical cyclone in a non tropical area of Northern New South Wales and Southeast Queensland and now we're dealing with a flood area and impacts from Grafton up in the North Coast right down to the Central Coast and there are more than 40 emergency warnings have been issued. There's been an extraordinary number of incidents dealt with by the SES, well over a thousand, over 400 flood rescues. We've had the Australian Defence Force chopper rescuing more than a dozen people over the last 48 hours as well. And we've got around about 50,000 people are isolated at the moment. I'm on my way now, I'm in the Hunter now on my way to Cessnock and we'll be going with the Premier to Taree a bit later this morning to survey what has occurred. But people do need to make sure that they don't take risks. People can log on to hazardwatch.gov.au or they can download the Hazards Near Me app in order to get the latest information as well.
TURTON: PM, we're here to serve our audience, of course. Do you mind if I fire a couple of questions that have come in? Knowing that you'd be on our program today, our listeners have fired in some questions. The first one is on insurance. It's increased a massive amount, as you would well know. The question is, what is the Government doing to protect properties and lives from flooding and fire, particularly with an emphasis on insurance?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, insurance, of course, is a major issue and the costs of it are rising because the amount of damage being done by extreme weather events is increasing. So, we're continuing to deal with the peak organisation, the Insurance Council. We're continuing to make sure that we do what we can to make sure that insurance claims are dealt with in an expeditious way. That's very important. But, you know, this is an ongoing issue that we're very conscious of. It's not easy to just solve all of the issues of rising insurance costs because the costs relate, of course, to the number of claims that are made. But we continue to work through those issues with the relevant companies and with the peak organisation.
TURTON: PM, one of our texters is a little familiar here. I hope you don't mind. Hi, Paul, can you please ask Albo if he can commit to federal funding for a regional road repair fund for the Hunter and Mid North Coast areas affected by flooding and the bad weather. Thanks, says Brendan at Adamstown Heights. PS, on ya Albo.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we have, there are 16 local government areas have triggered disaster assistance. Part of that will be the Commonwealth and the State combining to fix infrastructure that kicks in at a time like this. In addition to that, there are four local government areas have triggered the Disaster Recovery Allowance. That'll be available from Monday. What that does is provide for 13 weeks of pay for employees, for sole traders, people who are self employed and can't therefore undertake their work. And that applies for Kempsey, Port Macquarie, Mid Coast and Dungog at this stage. That will be available from 2pm on Monday. It's likely that the number of local government areas that are eligible for that assistance will be expanded, of course, as the disaster area has continued to increase. We need to be conscious of the fact that even when we hope the rain eases tomorrow, floodwaters continue to rise at this point on the Mid North Coast. So, it's something we need to be very conscious of and remain vigilant over.
TURTON: Prime Minister, quite a few questions as you would imagine, and you've intimated that climate is obviously playing a role in your mind anyway. But there are a couple of questions around climate change. Could you please ask the Prime Minister to what the Government is planning to do within this term on climate change? When will they release the 2035 emissions reductions target? Is the first part of that question. And I'll just add in an extra from another contributor who says, the current chaos of extreme weather is only going to increase with climate change. What will it take for the Government to stop approving coal and gas projects like the Woodside North West Shelf gas project? That's from Graeme at Lambton and Ian from The Hill. Those two questions.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, climate change is real and my Government certainly acknowledges that. And that's why we're committed to net zero by 2050 while we're committed to a 43 per cent reduction by 2030 under the legislation that was carried. For our 2035 target, we're awaiting the advice from the Climate Change Authority that is based upon the science and based upon the economics of what is possible as well. So, we await that advice and when we receive that advice it will be released and we'll establish our 2035 target this year going forward. But at this point our concentration is on that 2030 target and getting our emissions down as part of our contribution to the global effort that's required. We have approved enough renewable energy projects to power some 10 million homes around Australia. And after a decade of denial and delay, you can't just do that overnight. With regard to gas projects, one of the things that is required for major users of energy like Tomago there in the Hunter is to move to renewables, which they are doing, but with some firming capacity as well. And gas has a role to play in that. That's the truth of the matter. And so you have to have real solutions. My Government's determined to do that and we're rolling it out. Now, every weather event can't be traced down specifically to climate change because there's always been extreme weather events in Australia. But what you can say is that the science told us they'd be more frequent and more intense and that's precisely what is happening, which is why my Government are taking it so seriously. We have introduced as well in our first term, the first ever fuel standards, something that the Coalition said that they'd get rid of if they were elected on May the 3rd. So, we're making decisions across not just energy, but transport and other areas as well, energy efficiency, agricultural changes as well, to make sure that we get those emissions down. But importantly as well, we're engaging with the world. And just last week I was in Indonesia meeting with President Prabowo as well as having a meeting with Prime Minister Lawrence Wong of Singapore about how we get down emissions in the region as well and getting that cooperation going forward. There's actually a prospect of Australia exporting renewable energy to help power Singapore and Indonesia through the Sun Cable project, which will be, if it can go ahead, the largest solar project any in the world in the Northern Territory and helping to power not just our country, but helping to power importantly Singapore and Indonesia as well.
TURTON: Yes, PM, you're optimistic enough to think that we will see the sun again. That's reassuring. Just one other question in regard to this discussion. Plenty of contributions from our listeners fall outside the scope of what we're talking about today and I thank them for those questions, but we won't slot them in. One that is relevant and was raised by a couple of people was in regard to our black spots, telephone black spots. As we know, in emergencies we really get found out when we can't get communications, important emergency communications through to those at risk. The question is, good morning, can you ask the Prime Minister if he can encourage our leading phone carrier, Telstra, to improve coverage to black spot areas, especially after this current flooding episode?
PRIME MINISTER: Yes, well, we certainly are doing that and through the NBN as well. We're making sure under the last term of office we had a whole program aimed at dealing with this black spot issue and making sure that telecommunications services weren't cut off. That was one of the experiences that occurred in 2019-20 with the bushfires that devastated Australia, the east coast, during that period. So, there has been a lot of investment. We recognise that there is more to do and we're working with the carriers as well as with, of course, the government-owned NBN as well, has an important role to play.
TURTON: I Prime Minister, just in closing, a lot of what you've discussed with us this morning will be welcomed by those who will be recipients of it. Many though will say that it won't arrive quickly enough. The discussion on climate change, for example, the availability of emergency resources to assist those in trouble, they'll complain about red tape and all the rest of it. Is the Government, or our various governments, including the Federal Government, going hard enough at delivering these essential services?
PRIME MINISTER: If you look at the experience that we have firsthand with Southeast Queensland and Northern New South Wales, the payments were made incredibly quickly and efficiently. Services Australia unfortunately do have so much experience in making sure it's done in an efficient way. So, for example, the Disaster Recovery Allowance will be available from 2 o'clock on Monday through Services Australia. And so tragically, because of the experience, I think there's been a great deal of efficiency in making sure that things are delivered quickly and we've made those decisions very quickly as well for this week. And so, we've established the National Emergency Management Agency, have activated a crisis coordination team and they're working with Services Australia and the various agencies to make sure the payments are made efficiently as well as working across the three levels of government.
TURTON: Prime Minister, it was good to have you on our show today. I appreciate you being available. Thank you.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much. Well look, just a shout out to the volunteers who are doing such extraordinary work. At the worst of times we do see the best of the Australian character. This week is Volunteers Week and Wednesday was a special day, we acknowledge that these people are heroes, people who are helping their fellow citizens, their local community, but also those people who've travelled to the region to provide help as well. They deserve all of our thanks and all of our praise.
TURTON: Prime Minister, thank you.