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April 2, 2025
Transcript – 2GB Mornings
02 April 2025
E&OE
MARK LEVY:
Senator Paterson, good morning to you.
JAMES PATERSON:
Great to be with you.
MARK LEVY:
Well, mate, this is ridiculous. Clearly, the curfew isn't working. This man should have been behind bars long before he got to 26 breaches.
JAMES PATERSON:
Well, that's exactly right, Mark. And the government had two opportunities to do better here. Firstly, they could have legislated proper mandatory minimum sentences, which actually applied for one year. But Home Affairs officials admitted to me in Senate estimates last week they stuffed up the drafting and left judges with discretion to allow them to impose shorter sentences than the mandatory minimum one year. But secondly, they could have actually used the preventative detention powers that the parliament passed 16 months ago to lock some of these people up. But instead they've spent 22 million dollars on lawyers fees instead of putting these people behind bars.
MARK LEVY:
Unbelievable. Unbelievable, Senator, and this grub has a 13-page criminal history and a history of violence.
JAMES PATERSON:
If ever there was a case of someone who posed a risk to the community, who was appropriate for a preventative detention order application to the courts, this alleged offender is it. It never should have got to the situation where he has apparently pursued police with an implement and caused them to discharge their firearms because they feared for their safety. But on Anthony Albanese's watch, that's exactly what's happening.
MARK LEVY:
I'm sitting here shaking my head, I really am, and then we've got another case, another drug trafficker and a man who exposed himself to a ten-year-old boy have had their deportations halted after the Administrative Review Tribunal ruled they should be allowed to stay in Australia despite their criminal histories. What the hell is going on here, Senator Paterson?
JAMES PATERSON:
In some cases, these cases are even worse because this is entirely self-inflicted. The government can't blame the High Court here for this one. It's their own Ministerial Direction. The previous government, when Peter Dutton was Minister for Home Affairs and Immigration, cancelled 6,000 visas of a whole range of offenders and deported them offshore. But this government, in their wisdom, decided to soften that tough approach and make it harder to deport these people. Now, it wasn't because of a High Court ruling. It was because of a decision by the Prime Minister and a direction he made to his former Immigration Minister, Andrew Giles, and as a result, some pretty reprehensible characters are getting to stay in our country.
MARK LEVY:
And a lot of people, Senator, are pointing the finger at Mr Giles, but we've got to remember Tony Burke is now in charge of this, and it hasn't improved one bit.
JAMES PATERSON:
Exactly right. We've got new cases happening every day on Tony Burke's watch as Minister for Home Affairs. He hasn't lifted a finger to change these policies to protect our country. And I assume that's because the Prime Minister doesn't want him to, for whatever reason. And ultimately, Anthony Albanese is responsible for this.
MARK LEVY:
Isn't it funny too Senator, I'm just thinking out loud here, this is the same Tony Burke who was travelling the country holding the industrial scale sized citizenship ceremonies shaking hands with New Australia and saying welcome to the best country in the world, all the while under his watch we're allowing more and more of these criminals into our community.
JAMES PATERSON:
I think we are the best country in the world, but we certainly don't have the best government in the world. And the decisions that they're making have made Australians' lives harder. They've made the cost of living worse and they've made us less safe and Australians are becoming victims every day of new crimes committed by people who never should have been in our country and should have been removed from our country or at least taken off the streets to protect Australians and when the government can't meet its most basic and fundamental duty of keeping Australians safe, how can you trust them to get anything else right as well?
MARK LEVY:
Yep, exactly. I'll come to China in just a second, but you mentioned the High Court. There's another challenge today, and a decision to be handed down, one that could see even more criminals released. Can you explain that one to us, Senator Paterson?
JAMES PATERSON:
Well, I've got grave fears about this High Court case, given this government's track record with previous High Court cases. They have made concessions of fact that they didn't need to, like they did in the NZYQ case, which led the court to make the decision they did. And they failed to prepare to act when those High Court decisions have come down. They've been panicked and rushed, and that's meant they've made major drafting errors that have exposed Australians to risk. So I fear this could go the same way, but we'll be watching very closely to see what the High Court decides today.
MARK LEVY:
Well, while I've got you, Senator, I'd love to ask you about this Chinese research vessel or the spy ship that's off the south coast of Australia. I note the former Prime Minister Tony Abbott is accusing the Albanese government of allowing Australia to be bullied and pushed around by China. Are you concerned by the appearance of yet another Chinese vessel off our coast?
JAMES PATERSON:
I am concerned about it, and I'm concerned even more about the Prime Minister's response to it. His first instinct on these questions seems always to downplay the seriousness of them, just like he did with the live firing exercise that the Chinese Navy conducted just off our shore in the Tasman Sea. He said that was no big deal, and we did the same - frankly, a slur on the men and women of the ADF. And we had to rely on a Virgin Australia pilot to let us know about that activity. This latest research vessel is very curious indeed. They are not taking the most direct route back to their home port in China. For some reason, they've decided to go past southern Australia, including between Tasmania and Victoria, across the coast of South Australia, and now heading into WA. And on that transit, they have entered into our territorial waters, not just our exclusive economic zone. And the Prime Minister wasn't even able to understand who was monitoring them. He told the country that it was the ADF, as in our defence force, and it turns out it was the ABF, in other words, our border force.
MARK LEVY:
Incredible. It's interesting you talk about that too, Senator. I played a piece of audio a short time ago of the Prime Minister being asked about a story that we broke on this program last week. It features on the front page of the Daily Telegraph today about a Sydney primary school that has written to parents allowing students to opt out of an ANZAC service, and the Prime Minister was asked about it this morning, knew nothing about it. I would have thought, Senator, and you can shed some light on this for me, given you're an educated bloke and you are well-versed in a whole range of issues. Given it's spoken about on a sizeable radio network like 2GB, given it features on the front page of the Daily Telegraph, shouldn't the Prime Minister be across these things on the election campaign trial?
JAMES PATERSON:
I choose my words carefully here, but there's no doubt in my mind that the Prime Minister lied today when he answered that question, because the basic due diligence that happens to a Prime Minister every day, let alone in an election campaign, is his media team briefs him on issues that are in the media. So even if he personally hasn't been tuning in to 2GB this morning, although he should, and even if you personally didn't read the Daily Telegraph, I guarantee you his media advisors briefed him on this. And instead of being honest about that and just answering the question directly, he sidestepped it and pretended he didn't know, and he's done this multiple times before. In fact, once he said that he didn't know about something because he was in the car, as if he didn't have a phone, so that his media advisors and staff couldn't call him and brief him on it.
MARK LEVY:
Unbelievable. Out of interest, what should the Prime Minister have done in relation to this research vessel, the Chinese spy ship that we're talking about, what should he be doing with it?
JAMES PATERSON:
I think the first and most important thing was for him to get his facts right. The second most important thing was not to baselessly compare it to what our men and women in the ADF do. Because they don't operate like this, and he made that false moral equivalence. And the third thing is to stand up for Australia. I mean he's made much of the fact that he has a relationship with the Chinese government, how about he actually uses it in the national interest, raising issues of concern, he stands up for our country? We know when there were serious safety incidents involving Australian Navy divers in the region from the Chinese Navy, he failed to raise it when he had the opportunity to do so in person with Xi Jinping and that is an abrogation of his responsibility as Prime Minister. He owes it to our men and women in uniform to stand up for them, and he failed to do so.
MARK LEVY:
And one last one, Senator. You're the spokesperson for the Coalition's campaign headquarters. Obviously, you're looking at numbers, you're speaking to a lot of people on the ground in the various electorates. How are things looking for your side of things at the moment?
JAMES PATERSON:
Well it's going to be a very close election, it could come down to a handful of seats and the Prime Minister is already having to contemplate a possible minority government with the Greens and the Teals, which I think would be a disaster for our country. But we're confident the more the Australians hear our message, the more open they are to voting for Peter Dutton and the Coalition, in particular when they hear that we'll cut the fuel tax in half and they'll save $14 every time they fill up their tank, people are very open to voting for us and getting that cost of living relief immediately that they need.
MARK LEVY:
All right, Senator, lovely to catch up as always, and we'll wait and see what happens with this High Court challenge today in Canberra. Appreciate your time as always.
JAMES PATERSON:
Thanks, Mark.
ENDS