LEON BYNER, HOST: Let's welcome the bloke who's the boss of Australia, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. Prime Minister, thank you for coming on and welcome.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning, Leon. Good to be with you.
BYNER: Now, has the Government received any assurances from Optus that it will pay for new passports for customers affected by the cyber breach?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we've written to Optus making clear the Government's view, which is that taxpayers shouldn't pick up the bill here. That's what the Coalition called for, and I found that rather extraordinary. That here we have a clear failure to ensure that people's personal details were kept secure, and the taxpayers shouldn't pay for this. So, our view is very clear, and we'll continue to pursue that view. We await Optus to respond to our very clear, written request to them.
BYNER: Another part of this question is that the telco has admitted that thousands of Medicare numbers have been breached. So, what happens in those sorts of circumstances, do we really need to, there'd be a lot of people affected, getting a new Medicare card?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, that is being dealt with as well. People, of course, just like other details, driver's licences, and other details that appear to have been gotten by ill means here. It is possible for people to get those replacement Medicare numbers and cards. It shouldn't have an enormous impact, but it's of concern that this has occurred. It's a wake-up call to corporate Australia. I spoke to the Head of the Australian Signals Directorate on Friday night about the breach. I spoke to the Optus CEO on Saturday about it personally. And it's very clear that this shouldn't have occurred. But the Government is working around the clock with Optus to make sure that people's details are protected and to make sure that any impact of this is minimised.
BYNER: Yes, because I suspect this sort of saga suggests that we need to have a serious rethink of our privacy laws. And one reason this mess has occurred is because telcos are required by law to keep people's details for many years. So, do you think it's upping the fines, the answer, or is it something else?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, it's a range of measures. Upping the fines is certainly one area where there needs to be a penalty for a failure of this magnitude, and it's simply not in place at the moment, so that's one measure. But also, we need to look at the privacy laws and we've said certainly that we will do that. We're working with the banks at the moment and working with Optus to make sure that the impact of this is minimised.
BYNER: Are you somewhat confident, Prime Minister, that Telstra and Vodafone have got their systems up to scratch and some of the smaller companies?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I certainly hope that that's the case. I mean, it is a huge wake up call. I met with the Australian Stock Exchange last year, we had a breakfast. And they were saying that their biggest focus at that time was on cyber-attacks. We know that ransom attacks occur, have occurred across a range of businesses. There's a cyber-attack in Australia of some form once every eight minutes. Just think about that. Once every eight minutes. Now those cyber-attacks can be from state actors from other countries basically, or they could be from criminal based organisations that seek to essentially disrupt the company's activities and then ask for a fee, in order to either return the information or to unplug what they have stopped occurring. So, we know that this is a major, major issue. And I personally visited the Australian Signals Directorate as the Prime Minister to sit down and to talk with the security experts. We know this is a major issue, and it's going to be more important in the future, not less, as more and more of our activity is digitised.
BYNER: Yes. I want to make this point too, because as far as many are aware, the telcos lobbied the previous Government not to include them as part of new critical infrastructure laws. In fact, it's claimed that Optus led the lobbying back in 2020, arguing that further regulations on the sector would be too onerous and expensive. So, where do you stand on that now?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, the former Government dropped the ball on so many things, and this is just one of them. And that's why then after this occurred, I found it inexplicable that they should put out a release saying 'Labor must fix the passport cost issue for customers', what that means of course is taxpayers doing it. Companies need to be held to account here. And that's something that my Government is determined to do.
BYNER: The Budget bottom line has improved over the last Financial Year, we've shaved another $50 billion from the deficit, you obviously welcome this, right?
PRIME MINISTER: Of course, we do, but we need to get real as well. From some of the rhetoric of the former Government this week, I found it astonishing. Yesterday, they were talking about how well the Budget position was. Well, the truth is we have record deficits and those deficits are there far into the future. There are massive demands on Government expenditure in the National Disability Insurance Scheme, in our defence and security expenditure that we are going to need to make into the future. We have an ageing population, we can't continue to have an aged care system that isn't properly funded, with an aged care workforce that aren't properly paid. So, these are things that are major challenges. But we have, from the former Government, we've inherited a trillion dollars of debt. And whilst the commodity price increases, in part due, of course, to the war in Ukraine. Now what we've had as a result of that, is massive increases in the cost of fuel and energy. That is something that is feeding into inflation, putting pressure on households. But it is also at the same time, it is improving the Budget bottom line, because of the increased commodity prices for iron ore and coal.
BYNER: I was going to ask you about that, because in the end, there is solid demand for our coal, iron ore and gas, we're damn lucky that that's the case, aren't we?
PRIME MINISTER: Absolutely, and we've continued to benefit from our resources. What we need to do though, is to ensure that we take advantage of that in a serious way. Continue to export sure, but where possible value add, we need to make more things here. If we just export our resources, wait for someone else to value add and create jobs, and then import it back at higher value, then that's not the way forward for Australia. I want a Future Made in Australia. I want the resources that are in increased demand, including copper and lithium and nickel, to produce batteries and produce other things here in Australia, creating high-value jobs here in Australia.
BYNER: Now, the Opposition have had a bit of a go at you, saying that you're talking down the economy, and they're saying this is a bid to soften the public to raise extra taxes and more spending, and maybe a rate hike. What do you say to that?
PRIME MINISTER: Look, the Opposition left a trillion dollars of debt. They said that they would produce a budget in their first year back in 2013, and that there'd be surpluses every year then on, and they never did. They never did. And what they have left is the highest deficit, the second-highest deficit, the third-highest deficit, just massive debt. And at the same time, of course, we have real pressure on inflation, and that has led to, of course, interest rate increases that are putting pressure on household budgets. The former Government had no economic plan going forward for Australia. We do. My Government does, to take pressure off households through cheaper child care, cheaper medicines, that legislation passed the House of Representatives this week, by embracing the cheapest form of new energy, which is renewables, and making sure that that can drive cheaper energy, not just for households, but for manufacturers as well.
BYNER: We were told as consumers, Prime Minister, you'd be aware of this, that fuel prices will immediately jump by 20 cents a litre when the fuel excise ends, but data suggests that drivers have already been slugged with a hike. Do you think we're being ripped off?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, that's why we're getting the ACCC to really monitor all of the costs of fuel, to make sure that there isn't a ripping off of consumers. And we've really ramped that up. And I'd say to any operators out there who are thinking of taking a windfall game, that the ACCC will clamp down on you.
BYNER: Now, there's a Federal Anti-Corruption Commission that's now been introduced into the Parliament. This was an election promise. Do you think the legislation will pass this year?
PRIME MINISTER: I'm certainly hopeful that it will. We don't control of course the Senate. But it will certainly pass the House of Representatives this year, and the Senate should pass it. This is good legislation. This is a fulfilling of a clear commitment. We will have a strong, independent, National Anti-Corruption Commission that will help to restore faith in our political system and ensure that corruption is not allowed and that it's held to account. It will be a very strong body.
BYNER: The independents however though, they are saying quite loudly, that what has been put forward by the Government, is too many hearings behind closed doors, and they should be only in exceptional circumstances, should they not be public? Would there be not more transparency if we had that?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, there will be transparency, and it will be up to the National Anti-Corruption Commission as to whether hearings are held in private or publicly. And that is best practice. There are private hearings across all of the state bodies, including the one I'm familiar with in New South Wales, but in South Australia as well I know that that is the case. And you know, what we need to make sure is that there is a public interest test and that the NACC is able to undertake its work in order to weed out corruption. What we don't want is for people to be, because they appear before a National Anti-Corruption Commission, for there to be a smear out there when they're actually assisting the National Anti-Corruption Commission in any of their hearings. But it will be a decision for them, just as it will be a decision for the National Anti-Corruption Commission on who they investigate, what they investigate, based upon serious or systemic corruption, and it won't be controlled by the Government. Surely, that is a sensible thing. It's not surprising, of course, that people in Parliament sometimes look for some product differentiation. I would have been surprised if everyone said the legislation is perfect, and it just got waved through. We'll have hearings, if there are sensible suggestions put forward, then we of course are open to that, just as we did when we dealt with the climate change legislation. But I'm very confident that we've got the model right. We did a lot of work on this. And we're already, by the way, a fair way ahead of the former government, who did get elected in 2019 on a promise of having an Anti-Corruption Commission, and they didn't even move the legislation in the Parliament.
BYNER: Now, I understand that you're meeting with a group that's working on the Indigenous Voice Referendum. What's up for discussion?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we're talking about the processes and the campaign, what the structures of course might be like, for the Voice to Parliament. But we're very focused on the very clear principle here, Leon, which is just two things. One is, should we recognise in our nation's birth certificate, the fact that Australians have been here for 65,000 years. We share this continent with the oldest continuous culture on Earth, that should be recognised in our Constitution. That's the first principle. The second is, should we ask First Nations People, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People, for their opinion on issues that directly affect them. So on housing, health, education, all those issues that are practical, where there's a huge gap, in life expectancy, in educational outcomes, in health outcomes, between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, and that's all the Voice is. It's not a third chamber of Parliament. It's not a body that has the power to override Parliament at all. It's simply good manners. Just as if I was proposing something that would impact your life, or your neighbour's life, you ask them for their view. And that to me is what the Voice to Parliament is about. We will have a referendum in Australia in a year's time, or 18 months' time, sometime over that Financial Year period, I should imagine, of 2023-2024. And one of the things we'll be talking about today is with bringing together Indigenous leaders, so we can consult them about what their views are. So, people like Noel Pearson, Marcia Langton, Ken Wyatt, the former Indigenous Minister in the Morrison Government is one of the people participating in this group. It will be a moment of great national pride and national unity if we get this done.
BYNER: Prime Minister, I understand that one of your colleagues, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus, has flagged changes to data retention laws, so that companies are made to dispose of data when they no longer have a purpose for it, for example, when a customer leaves a provider like Optus. Is that an active discussion right now?
PRIME MINISTER: It is. And it seems to me that that's a pretty common sense proposal.
BYNER: So, you reckon it'll get up, it should, shouldn't it?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, it just is common sense to me. And one of the things that we're looking at is a range of reforms. My Government is determined to make a difference to people's lives each and every day. The former Government just ran out of steam some years ago. So, we've got a lot of catching up to do and this is one of the areas.
BYNER: Prime Minister, thanks for coming on today and making yourself available to South Australia. And we'll definitely keep in touch.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much, Leon.