THE HON TANYA PLIBERSEK MP
MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER

 

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
SUNRISE WITH NATALIE BARR
MONDAY, 8 APRIL 2024

 

SUBJECTS: OPERATION SOVERIGN BORDERS; SUPERMARKET CODE OF CONDUCT; YOUTH CRIME VIDEOS ON THE INTERNET.

 

NATALIE BARR: The Federal Government is under pressure to explain the latest lapse in border security after ten men from China illegally arrived by boat off a remote region in WA. All of them have since been caught and flown to Nauru’s detention centre for processing. But the Coalition is demanding answers from Labor in what was the third boat to arrive into this country in just six months. Let’s bring in Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek and Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce. Good morning to both of you.

 

TANYA PLIBERSEK, MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER:  Good morning.

 

BARR: Tanya, three boats since about November. Why do you think more are coming, and how concerned are you?

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, boats came under the previous government. The difference is we didn’t make a big deal of it and give the people smugglers the free advertising that they’re after. All of the settings on Operation Sovereign Borders are the same – if boats are intercepted they’re turned back. If people make it here they’re sent to Nauru. And we’ve increased the budget of Operation Sovereign Borders by about $470 million, about half a billion dollars.

 

So, of course we don’t like to see boats arrive, but these people have been dealt with immediately, and that sends a strong message to people smugglers who might be considering sending people on this terribly dangerous journey.

 

BARR: So, Tanya, if the budget has increased – which I know that the Opposition disputes – but if the budget has increased, why can’t they find the boats?

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: They’re in the budget papers.

 

BARR: Yeah.

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, it’s a big coastline, and they do intercept many, many boats. Many, many boats are turned around before they ever make it to Australia. We’ve got people offshore, Australian Federal Police working overseas to stop boats leaving in the first place. Over the years – Barnaby knows this – under his government some boats made it to Australia, many were turned back. And the work we do overseas to prevent people getting on a boat in the first place is a really important part of it as well.

 

But the commander of Operation Sovereign Borders has made it clear that nothing has changed, that the settings are as strong as they ever were and they’ve got extra budget now. So anybody who is considering getting on a boat should think twice. They’ll be picked up, turned around and sent back or sent to Nauru.

 

BARR: Yeah. Barnaby, Tanya’s right, isn’t she? Weren’t there two to three boats every year that the Coalition was in, but there was a policy of not speaking about it? Should we go back to that so it doesn’t give advertising to people who want to come here on boats?

 

BARNABY JOYCE: Well, look, the Labor Party can’t bring down the price of power but they can bring in illegal boats apparently. What you’ve seen here is they got rid of temporary protection visas – very important. Temporary protection visas went and that became the flag to people overseas that the capacity to stay in Australia is becoming more likely.

 

What we’ve also seen is a 14 per cent reduction in the surveillance capacity of our borders. What we’ve also – and we dispute this – we believe there’s a $600 million reduction over the forward estimates in the budget for – to keep our borders safe.

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: That’s just not right.

 

JOYCE: Now, what we – what is – it stands as fact. Just like power bills go up and you can see it in your envelope when you get the bill, boats are turning up, and apparently we can see them on television at night as these people arrive, and this is very, very bad.

 

BARR: Yeah, so that was my point, Barnaby.

 

JOYCE: People all around the world are really –

 

BARR: That’s was my point. We didn’t see them on television because under the Coalition government there was a plan where we didn’t report, the government didn’t report and there were two or three boats every year turning up. Should we go back to that? Because we’ve had international law experts yesterday, like Professor Mary Crock from the University of Sydney, say politicising the issue is dangerous because people smugglers will just put the word out and more will come. Should we go back to not saying anything?

 

JOYCE: Well, Nat, it’s really hard to stop it when –

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: That’s exactly what’s happening, Nat.

 

JOYCE: It’s really hard to stop it when they just walk into communities or walk into an Air Force base asking for directions to Sydney.

 

BARR: But politically.

 

JOYCE: It’s a little bit hard to stop that. It’s a little bit hard to stop that getting out to the public realm. And once it’s there of course you’ve got to commentate on it because that is your role. You can’t just try and say, “Oh, well, the Labor Party are botching this but we’re going to say nothing about it.” This is happening on their watch. It’s their problem and it’s out of control.

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: No, you’re making a political point of advertising it.

 

JOYCE: No, we’re not, Tanya. Tanya, you can’t make a political point when they actually turn up. That is a fact; not a political point.

 

BARR: Okay, let’s move on –

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, they turned up under you.

 

BARR: Let’s move on. The interim review of Australia’s Food and Grocery Code of Conduct will be released today. And it will recommend penalties such as harsh fines for supermarkets that breach rules of a proposed revamped and mandatory code. Tanya, this code is currently voluntary for supermarkets. Is the answer to lower prices hitting these corporations with massive penalties that could stretch into the billions?

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, that’s one of the solutions that’s proposed in this interim report – much larger fines, a mandatory code so that if companies are deliberately doing the wrong thing they are penalised appropriately for it. Our real interest here is making sure that people are paying less at the checkout. We want to make sure that the big supermarkets aren’t using their huge footprint, their huge networks to make it harder for customers to get a good deal at the checkout. So we’ve released this interim report. There’ll be a final report later in the year, and we are looking at all options to make sure that Australians get a good deal at the cash register.

 

BARR: Barnaby, I know this review rejects the Nationals’ call to force the big supermarkets to possibly break up and address these big market power issues. How will you respond to this?

 

JOYCE: Well, look, you can never underestimate big businesses’ capacity to talk to big unions and go via big Labor to make sure their big control over the marketplace doesn’t change. Now, obviously we’ll have a code. Let’s see where this ends up. But I tell you what they don’t want – they don’t want what they’ve got in every other developed nation like the United States of America and England and Canada, which is a divesture power, which is the sword of Damocles. You don’t go around breaking companies up every day [inaudible] and crooked, but what you do have the capacity to say to them in an overarching form is behave yourself because we have the power if it was required.

 

Now, they – the Business Council of Australia hate that idea. And like the Voice, which they cuddled up to the Labor Party next to the Voice and said, “Ra, ra, the Voice,” but they really don’t like the idea of losing their near monopoly status in the marketplace. And you do pay for it at the checkout. Make no mistake about it – the fruits of monopolies and duopolies comes out of our wallet when you go to buy groceries. And the Labor Party, they say they believe in the cost of living, but once it gets to their big mates, no, they don’t.

 

BARR: Right, okay. Let’s move to this next one. Finally, social media companies have been accused of fuelling youth crime in Australia by not removing violent videos of kids engaging in criminal activity for years after they were posted despite them breaching platform guidelines. These are these post and boast laws. Tanya, should we give eSafety more resources so they can actually look for this content? Because it’s staying up for years.

 

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Yeah, look, I’m really worried about the impact that the internet and the social media platforms are having on our kids, and it is important to give the eSafety Commissioner the tools that she needs to do her job properly. That’s why we have quadrupled her budget – it’s gone from about $10 million a year to about $40 million a year. And we’re also – we’ve brought forward the review of the laws that the previous government introduced in this area and we’re reviewing those laws at the moment to see if there are stronger powers that the eSafety Commissioner needs.

 

But it’s not just about the eSafety Commissioner. I mean, really, Meta, these large companies, need to do more to take down this material. When it’s depicting illegal stuff they could take it down. They don’t want to because it drives eyeballs on to their platform. The other thing they could do is change their algorithms to stop pushing this stuff in the way that they do, to make sure that they’re not rewarding the kids who are posting this sort of material by giving them clicks and likes and all the rest of it.

 

So, yes, we’re absolutely there to support the eSafety Commissioner, but how about the big companies that make billions of dollars out of their platforms actually take some responsibility for what they’re doing to our society as well?

 

BARR: Yeah, that’s a point, Barnaby, why are we spending taxpayers’ money trying to seek out this stuff when these big companies could be doing their bit? What do you think?

 

JOYCE: I’m about 70 to 80 per cent on side with Tanya on this one. These companies – multiple billion dollar companies, multiple billionaires saying, “Oh, we don’t know how to control this. Oh, it’s all too hard, we don’t know hard to do it,” with AI coming in, of course they know how to do it. They make a bucket load of money out of doing it. And I bet you if you put something up about Mark Zuckerberg, he’d come down – whoo – like that. But when it’s out there about, you know, other kids basically destroying their lives, “Oh, no, that’s a bit difficult.”

 

But what I would say as an addendum to that is we wouldn’t be seeing videos about the anarchy in Alice Springs if there wasn’t anarchy in Alice Springs. And what we’ve got to do and what the Prime Minister has to do is really focus on that section of Australia looking like the rest of Australia in law and order, like it would be in Mosman or Penrith or Tamworth or – I don’t know, Wagga, because there are sections of Australia people are – in some instances they have to see it to believe it and ask the question, is that Australia?

 

BARR: Same things that’s happening in Moree and several other communities around the country. They definitely need to address it.

 

JOYCE: Dead right.

 

BARR: But that is helping drive it, so at least address that. It’s really good that you are 70 to 80 per cent agreed on something. Thank you very much. We’ll see you next week.

 

JOYCE: I won’t make a habit of it.

 

MATT SHIRVINGTON: Nice to see Tanya and Barnaby on the same page. Fantastic. There you go.

 

END