December 5, 2024
PETER STEFANOVIC: Back home now and the Reserve Bank is under increasing pressure to bring forward rate cuts after yesterday's GDP figures show the biggest hit to our living standards on record. Joining us live now is the shadow Home Affairs Minister, James Paterson. James, good morning to you. The Treasurer says, well, it's up to the private sector to get us out of this mess. The private sector says, well, you're the one that's hampering us. Hello, IR. What's your view on the state of play?
JAMES PATERSON: Well, there's no question Pete that it's pretty cute for the Treasurer after two years of smashing the private sector with higher taxes, with more government spending, with more red tape, with more regulation, whether its industrial relations or the environment or anything else, to all of a sudden turn around realising the damage he has done, and the Albanese government has done to our economy and says could the private sector please come and help bail him out? Well, I don't have any confidence that businesses will have confidence to invest if this government remains in Canberra, if they're re-elected at this election and God forbid, if they re-elected in minority with the Greens and the Teals. That will send a very strong signal to investors that Australia is not a good place to do business and I think they will take their business elsewhere.
STEFANOVIC: James, The government has changed its language recently, you would have noted this. Rather than life will be better under Albanese during the election. It's now well, things would be worse under Peter Dutton. What are your thoughts on that pivot of semantics?
PATERSON: Well, Anthony Albanese has nothing to offer the Australian people except three more years like the last three of economic pain and stress. And so he's pivoting to personal attacks on Peter Dutton. And I think it's very telling when a government seeking a second term has nothing of their own to offer, that they instead just engage in negativity and personal smears against Peter Dutton. The truth is that most Australians cannot afford another three years like the last three. They can't afford the weak and incompetent leadership that we've seen from the Prime Minister and his cabinet, and they know that if he's re-elected that things won't get better. They know that interest rates are coming down elsewhere in the world. They've come down in the United States. They've come down in New Zealand. They've come down in Canada. They have come down in the United Kingdom. But they haven't come down in Australia because government spending is out of control and the national accounts are further evidence that the reckless spending we've had from Jim Chalmers in Canberra is making life harder for Australians.
STEFANOVIC: Well they say that the spending is what's saving us from going into recession.
PATERSON: Well, what's saving us really from going into recession is the record high levels of immigration that this government has presided over, about a million people in their first two years in office. But unfortunately, that's having really perverse effects for other Australians in terms of higher rental prices, higher house prices, increasing the cost of living and of course increasing pressure on infrastructure and services, because this is a government that thinks it's okay to bring in a million people but only build a couple of hundred thousand homes. And it is no wonder that we're seeing the real financial stress that Australians are under as a result.
STEFANOVIC: Elsewhere this morning, James, at least 70 pro-Palestinian activists gathered outside Sydney's Great Synagogue yesterday calling for sanctions against Israel. This while members of the Jewish community were locked inside. What are your thoughts on that?
PATERSON: Pete, it is astonishing to me that there's any Australian who thinks it's appropriate to protest outside a synagogue, much less so that they would do so in a way that requires the people inside to go into lockdown out of fear for their safety. But actually, this is the second time that pro-Palestinians have chosen to protest outside a synagogue in just the last few weeks and the third time since the 7th of October that we've had protests outside a synagogue. One incident in Melbourne last year required police to evacuate a synagogue during Shabbat service during Friday night prayers. That's a disgrace. It should not happen in our country. But it is no surprise when you have a weak Prime Minister like Anthony Albanese who has adopted a position of moral equivalence when it comes to these issues. Who can't condemn anti-Semitism unequivocally. Who can't call out this behaviour. And when the police are failing to enforce the law for the criminal acts that we've seen in our country.
STEFANOVIC: Just another note on that subject. There's this other story that emerged yesterday about Australia's top diplomat in Israel being summoned for a dressing down by Israel's Foreign Minister about a decision to deny entry to a prominent former Justice Minister in Israel. So she was stopped from coming here. How are our foreign relations going?
PATERSON: Bilateral relations between Australia and Israel are at their lowest ebb in decades. The Albanese government has trashed this very important bilateral relationship. Israel is an incredibly important security and intelligence partner. There are terrorist attacks in our country that have been thwarted by Israeli intelligence. And yet the Albanese government, in the pursuit of their political and domestic agenda, is happy to trash this important international relationship. I'm not surprised that the Israeli government is disappointed with the Albanese government after their treatment of Ayelet Shaked, who was blocked from this country. But also after the reckless motions at the United Nations just the other night where Australia not only abandoned Israel, but we walked away from our closest and most important ally, the United States. And the Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, has trashed decades of bipartisanship when it comes to these issues. We always would have voted against these one-sided motions in the past. But in an attempt to appease inner city voters and others in our country, this government is trashing our foreign policy record.
STEFANOVIC: Ok, James Paterson from Tasmania this morning, appreciate your time.
ENDS
