MARK GIBSON, HOST: You never quite know who's going to phone into the breakfast show. Line two, the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese. Good morning.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning, Mark. 2008, it doesn't seem like that long ago.
GIBSON: It doesn't, does it? 16 years ago.
PRIME MINISTER: Yeah.
GIBSON: Prime Minister, you've called into the program. I think you wanted to comment, didn't you? What a week it's been with these terrible incidents. But Hannah Beazley, the State MP, an incident at her electorate office yesterday.
PRIME MINISTER: It’s been an awful week. Hannah, of course, is very well known to me through my friendship with Kim, her dad, of course, a great Australian and former Labor Leader and Governor. And Hannah has carried on that tradition in such a strong way. And the fact that you had this incident so soon after the tragedy that occurred with Helen Haines in Wangaratta on Monday is just heartbreaking. Helen, of course, remains in a very serious condition in The Alfred Hospital in Melbourne. I think all of our thoughts and prayers are with Helen at what is a very difficult time. Her husband Phil, gave an extraordinary statement last night at the hospital, joined with the Governor-General, Sam Mostyn, and I think the call that they made was incredibly powerful, for more civility in our public discourse and for us to remember that the principles of kindness and compassion are one of what makes us a strong democracy, where we can have debate and disagreement but do it in a way without descending into the sort of violence that we have seen in too many parts of the world. But it's certainly not who we are as Australians.
GIBSON: What's going on at the moment? You've stood in this studio with me and we've talked about this phrase, you know, the temperature and trying to keep the temperature down. We’ve all got a role to play in this, don't we? Media, politicians, every person on the street.
PRIME MINISTER: We all have a role to play and we all need to be conscious of it and try to do better. You know, we have had, I think, a range of changes in the way that society functions that are clearly having an impact. I was Deputy Prime Minister a long time ago now, 13 years ago, I was a senior Minister. I never had any security and didn't have the sort of concerns that are raised regularly now. And the fact that there has been such an increase in threats – I think people can say things online and in social media becomes normalised to, rather than say, I disagree with you, to have a much stronger and increasingly aggressive approach. And we need to, I think, be conscious of engaging in a constructive way. People have said to me earlier this week, how can we show our support for Helen? It's be more like Helen. She's someone who was respected because she was always respectful back. And I think it's important as well to recognise that even in these dark times, we've seen some of the best of the Australian characters, such as Ricky Jeffreys, the barber, a couple of doors down, who rushed into what was obviously a very risky situation, for his own safety, didn't think about that –
GIBSON: Yeah.
PRIME MINISTER: Just rushed in to help Helen, his friend and neighbour in terms of offices in that beautiful country town there of Wangaratta.
GIBSON: Prime Minister, I mean, it's all well and good and you're quite right to call out the heroism that happens in these events. It happened at Bondi. It happened with Helen Haines. But let's just wind it back a bit and talk about the fact that these events are happening, unfortunately. Are you prepared to tell us about some of the threats that you face as the Prime Minister of this country? I mean, I've just got to look at your social media pages and they are vile with the comments that are on there. I mean, it's, you know, it's a real issue, isn't it?
PRIME MINISTER: It is. I don't look at the comments for my own mental health. I just don't. I don't even have some of the platforms on my phone, so I can't see it if I wanted to. And there's been about 20 charges laid against people, some of very seriousness. But in order to get to the point where people are charged, by definition, there has to be evidence and that has occurred with me as Prime Minister. At any time, there's –
GIBSON: What, related to you? There's been about 20 people charged with threats related to you as Prime Minister?
PRIME MINISTER: Correct.
GIBSON: Wow.
PRIME MINISTER: Correct. And incidents as well, that, some of which I won't go into because they can, the advice is they can lead to copycat people. But we've had, it's public that there's been major security upgrades at The Lodge and at Kirribilli House. The number of people I have in my detail, that people can see when I come into your studio there, you know, I don't come in alone. There's, there's people with us and that unfortunately is necessary.
GIBSON: So, what does it mean more broadly now, do you think, for MPs across the spectrum? What does it mean for security around them and for their safety, do you think, moving forward?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we need to take the assessment seriously and we do that. There's been briefings yesterday of the different political parties and independents got briefings from the security agencies from ASIO, from the AFP, from the Department of Home Affairs. We need, though, to assert how important it is that Members of Parliament and Senators can go about their business, can go to festivals, can go to parks and have barbecues, can have street meetings. You know, I can't. During the last campaign, one of the things that I've always done in my electorate is to have, you know, barbecues and to have events, you know, ‘I'll be on the corner of the Livingstone Road and New Canterbury Road, Petersham, at this time, come and say g'day, put your views. I can't do that as a Prime Minister and I regret that because what we'd get is maybe twice as many people trying to create a scene as there would be people who genuinely want to put forward their views. My electorate office had to move –
GIBSON: Prime Minister, the news theme is going to fire off in 30 seconds. I just want you, well, thank you very much for phoning in and sharing this story this morning, but I, can you grab your politicians, doesn't matter what party they represent, can you grab them all together and tell them to tone down this language? You know, the language the other day, someone should be stoned in the square and all this. Tell them to calm it all down, will you?
PRIME MINISTER: Yeah, well, we do need to do that and all of us need to do better right across the spectrum.
GIBSON: Yep. Thank you very much for your time. Thanks for phoning it.