THE HON TANYA PLIBERSEK MP
MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER
E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
SUNRISE WITH NATALIE BARR
MONDAY 16 SEPTEMBER 2024
SUBJECTS: MISINFORMATION ON SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS.
NATALIE BARR: Federal politics now and Anthony Albanese has responded to Elon Musk labelling him a fascist over the government's plan to fine social media platforms up to five per cent of their revenue for failing to prevent the spread of misinformation. The Prime Minister said Musk and those alike think they are above any accountability and respond with abuse and invective when called out. The PM also said he would not give in to bullies as he moves to introduce world leading social media age limit laws.
For their take let's bring in Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek and Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce. Good morning to both of you. Tanya, when it comes to social media policies, how sure are you that companies will agree to our laws if the people that run them are calling us fascists?
TANYA PLIBERSEK, MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER: Well, I think it says a lot about Elon Musk. He is absolutely not interested in the harm that he is allowing his social media platforms to do to our young people and in many ways to our democracy and our society. He's a greedy billionaire who wants even more money flowing into his pockets, and he doesn't care how that happens and he doesn't care about the harm that he's doing. We're making some very reasonable proposals to protect our kids. You know, we've got rules about all sorts of things, car seats, pool fences, button batteries to try and keep our kids safe. We know that early exposure to social media is harming them. Since 2010, we've seen a doubling of the rate of young people going to hospital for mental health concerns. And we know social media is harming our kids. We need to get a handle on it. And Elon Musk should get out of the way. Or even better still, take some responsibility.
BARR: Yeah, but you've hit the nail on the head haven't you? Didn't we fine him last year? Or fine X for not answering questions on how they were tackling child sex abuse material? And has he paid it yet? So, it sounds good, and most people agree with what you're saying, but how are you going to actually put it in place?
MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Yeah, it's hard because these big tech companies think they're above the law. You see the way they minimise paying tax by moving their profits around the world. This is just one more example of how they think they're above the law. We know that it's the right thing to do to protect our kids. We're going to do it. We're going to legislate as a government to do it. And we're very hopeful that the Coalition will support us.
BARR: And, well, first of all, Barnaby, are you going to support it? And second of all, can we just be hopeful? Can we do anything against these guys?
BARNABY JOYCE: Look, vastly, the majority of what Tanya said, I agree with. People who create mechanisms which bring on such things as anorexia, especially for young girls, body image, these caustic, horrible, filthy sort of cesspits which people such as Mark Zuckerberg and others their platforms make money out of. Nobody wants that. We absolutely must do what we can to do that. And to go out there and say that a certain race should be wiped off the face of the earth, of course, that should not be allowed. But we've got to make - it is an absolutely imperative for both myself and Tanya and the Labor Party and the Coalition that this does not morph into the censorship of the political debate. That if someone says, well, for instance, I'll say something, I've got - I don't think that Swindle factories and climate policy is going to make a degree of difference to the climate. That's my right. Now, Tanya will disagree with it and that's her right, but we're allowed to have that debate. You can't just say, well, I'm going to wipe that debate off the social media because I think it doesn't agree with me. That's going to be the - that's going to be the tricky part of how we manage this. But I hope we can land it because there is so much good that needs to be done from this. And more to the point, I think you guys are dancing around it at Seven and Nine and ABC. We need a vibrant fourth estate and these billionaires are just ripping all your advertising revenue off and we won't have a fourth estate. We won't have advertising on your show, so we won't have your show. You will not have a job Nat, you will not have a job Shirvo, because your program - your company will be, as far as its media side, will be out of business, it'll be a charity. And we've got to make sure we do something about that as well.
BARR: Yeah, exactly, that they pay for news. It's getting ridiculous on all fronts. Where's the line on censorship, Tanya?
MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Oh, I think it's very clear that you have to have a very high bar. I'm all for free speech. I agree with Barnaby that it's right, that he and I have the right to disagree. He should be able to put his point of view, I should be able to put my point of view. That's healthy debate. There's nothing wrong with that. What we have said is that if there is deliberate misinformation and disinformation that is verifiably false and doing harm, that the Australian Communications and Media Authority should be able to have a look at that. Now it has to be a very high bar. It has to be doing harm to our society.
BARR: What, like they're killing the dogs, or they're killing the cats. Would that be deliberate misinformation?
MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, I mean, it seems as though it was deliberate misinformation. I'm not sure it would meet the very high bar that we're talking about for the sort of harms that we're trying to avoid here. But that's not a matter for me to decide. This is legislation that's currently before the Parliament. We'd love to engage with the Coalition on this if they have sensible changes that they want to make. Michelle Rowland, the Communications Minister, has said that her door's open. We need to have this conversation, though, because we know that a lot of this misinformation and disinformation is deliberately generated by trolls overseas to cause social discord and to harm and undermine our democracy. Like this isn't accidental stuff. It's not some kid in his mum's basement. It is in many cases very deliberate, calculated stuff. But it has to meet a high bar. We're not talking about shutting down, even the most vociferous disagreement is fine.
BARR: Yeah, and it's generated by bots often to swing elections, isn't it? Okay, thank you both. We'll have to leave it there. We'll see you next week.
END
