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March 28, 2025
JAMES GLENDAY: Let's go to the Shadow Minister for Home Affairs, James Paterson, who is joining us from Canberra. James, good morning. Sorry to keep you waiting.
JAMES PATERSON: Good morning. No problem at all.
GLENDAY: The Prime Minister is at Yarralumla, has this blown your leader's budget reply out the water just a bit?
PATERSON: Look, that's perhaps the petty Canberra game that the Prime Minister's been trying to play here today. But actually, I think the truth is, normally, Prime Ministers have the media to themselves on the day they announce an election, and instead, the Prime Minster has decided to share that media coverage this morning with Peter Dutton and his positive plan, particularly, to get more gas into the East Coast market with a domestic East Coast gas reservation scheme. Because on this Prime Minister watch, gas prices are up 34%. And what that means is households are struggling and forced to choose between feeding their families and heating their homes. We've got businesses that are closing, 29,000 on this Prime Minister's watch, in large part because of higher energy prices. And this is in a country where we have hundreds of years of supply of gas and we export gas all around the world, but there's a very serious risk that this winter that in states like my own in Victoria, there is a serious prospect of gas shortages. So we're going to take tough decisions in the national interest to address this and get more supply into the domestic market.
GLENDAY: You've pivoted nicely to my next question. This gas reservation policy seems pretty similar to what David Pocock and some progressive groups were pushing for earlier this week. You're a libertarian, you believe in free markets. Are you personally comfortable with the government intervening in a market in this way?
PATERSON: I'm entirely comfortable because I think there's a very important principle at stake here. Exporting gas around the world and earning income for our country is a great thing, but the principle is that Australian gas should be for Australians first. And it is insane that we have some of the highest gas prices in the world as a gas-producing and exporting nation. The market is not working as it should for a whole range of reasons, and Peter Dutton is unafraid to make tough decisions in the national interest. He will put our country first, even if the Prime Minister is not willing to do the same.
GLENDAY: Isn't this a policy effectively, though, to control prices and keep gas prices artificially down, taking the Australian gas out of an international energy market?
PATERSON: Well, it's policy to drive more gas into the Australian domestic gas market, and it is not only through an East Coast domestic gas reservation policy, but it is also about increasing the supply of gas. In this country, we take far too long to approve new gas projects. We don't do enough to explore for and take advantage of the gas resources we have. We struggle to move it around our country. And that's why we're going to streamline the approvals process for it. We're going to defund environmental activists who are on the taxpayer teat holding up these projects. We're going to invest in gas infrastructure to move the gas around the country, including with new pipelines and storage. And that is going to make sure that in the case of my home state of Victoria, we shouldn't need to be spending $800 million on an import terminal to bring gas from the international market back into Australia. I mean, that is just madness.
GLENDAY: Well let's see where we end up on this. I just want to take you to a slightly different issue. The Liberal Party markets itself as the party of lower taxes. It has done for decades and decades. Does it feel strange to be going to an election arguing for higher income taxes for the lowest pay bracket?
PATERSON: Well, actually, we're arguing for lower taxes. We're arguing for lower tax in a more targeted and effective way that's going to make a bigger difference to families who really need it, to Australians who are really struggling.
GLENDAY: Sorry to jump in, you're effectively saying that you're going to reverse the government's decision to lower the lowest income tax bracket.
PATERSON: And we're going to do that so that we can provide proper relief right away through reduced fuel excise. We're going to halve the rate of fuel excise from 1 July so that families who fill up a tank every week save $14. A two-car family that fills up every week is going to save $28. That's up to $1,500 a year that people are going to be better off under a Peter Dutton-led Coalition government, and we're going to do it through lower taxes. That is a tangible way of delivering relief. $0.70 a day in 15 months' time under the Prime Minister's plan is not going to deliver what people who are desperately struggling right now need.
GLENDAY: They're going to argue that it's long-term relief, et cetera, we're going to have that debate during the election campaign. Before I let you go, I just wanted to ask, Peter Dutton told me on Wednesday to listen closely to his budget reply to find out what his policy would be on migration numbers. I couldn't hear it. What's your target? Are you still hoping to reduce permanent net migration to 160,000 a year?
PATERSON: Peter announced in the budget reply last night that we'll reduce our permanent migration by 25%, starting with 140,000 permanent migrants in our first year and second year, rising to 150,000 in the third year and 160,000 in the fourth year. How we do that, we'll announce in the election campaign. But it will involve reducing international students because, on this government's watch, migration has blown out of control. More than a million people have come into our country over three years, and under their signature taxpayer-funded housing policies, not a single new home has been built. And that just doesn't add up.
GLENDAY: James Paterson, we do appreciate you stepping in at the last minute and having a chat with us this morning and enjoy the election campaign.
PATERSON: Thank you.
ENDS