TANYA PLIBERSEK MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR EDUCATION
SHADOW MINISTER FOR WOMEN
MEMBER FOR SYDNEY
E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
4BC DRIVE WITH SCOTT EMERSON
WEDNESDAY, 28 JULY 2021
SUBJECTS: Sydney lockdown; JobKeeper; Vaccinations for MPs; Tokyo Olympics.
SCOTT EMERSON, HOST: And we’re always joined at this time of the week by the Shadow Minister for Education, and Shadow Minister for Women, Tanya Plibersek. Tanya, unfortunate news today, sad news. I feel for you down south of the Tweed there. Another four weeks in lockdown.
TANYA PLIBERSEK, SHADOW MINISTER FOR EDUCATION, SHADOW MINISTER FOR WOMEN: Yeah, it doesn't feel great. Over the past few weeks of lockdown, I've been ringing a lot of businesses that have contacted me, a lot of my constituents, and they are really doing it tough. I've had businesses who just scraped through the lockdown last time around, they don't know whether they'll manage this time. And one of the confusing things to people is that there's plenty of people who actually got JobKeeper last time, who aren't eligible for assistance this time under the way that it's working. So if you get even two bucks of Austudy or something, but you've lost your job in retail or lost a job in hospitality, you're not eligible for help this time. And so there are a lot of people who are confused and doing it really hard. So not a great time to be a Sydneysider, sadly.
EMERSON: Those numbers today, 177, the numbers went up from yesterday again. From being on the ground there, is there a feeling that it is going to be brought under control eventually? Because you would have thought after five weeks, the numbers haven't got to those levels we saw in Melbourne at the height of their wave, but they keep creeping up and up and up.
PLIBERSEK: Yeah, the problem is that number of people who are in the community when they're infectious and they don't know they're infectious, and that's the number we're looking at really closely every day. And it's been in the 40s the last few days, that's a real concern because we know that this is a very infectious strain of the virus. So if someone doesn't know they're infectious and they go home to their family, or they're going to work and contacting their colleagues, that's a real problem. So we really, I mean, most people have been so fantastic. They've been disciplined, they've been really good about protecting their families, their work colleagues and others, but we need to have more testing, more vaccinations, people need to follow the rules, and basically they need to behave as though every time they walk out of the house as though they're infectious and everybody they come into contact with is infectious. But people have to be super careful at the moment.
EMERSON: Now Queensland's Chief Health Officer, Jeanette Young, has said she wants all the state parliamentarians vaccinated. Now we do have some very young parliamentarians, MPs. One of the ministers, in fact, is only 28, another member is 29. Should pollies be jumping the queue and getting vaccinated if they're young? Or should it just be going along with everyone else for their age group?
PLIBERSEK: Look, I think there's two ways of looking at this. I don't think they should be jumping the queue to get a vaccine that they're not eligible for. But if what they're doing is saying, okay I'm going to take, say, AstraZeneca to show that I've got faith that this is safe for most people and that it's important to get vaccinated, then they may well reassure other people in the community that it's worth doing, that it's important to be vaccinated. I've had my first dose of AstraZeneca, I'll get my second dose in a couple weeks’ time and I'm really looking forward to being fully vaccinated because if you look at the people who are in hospital here in New South Wales, the people who've got seriously sick have been those who haven't been vaccinated. And I think it's important to keep telling the story that vaccination protects us.
EMERSON: No, I'm on the same page as you there, Tanya Plibersek. I'm 16 days away from getting my second AZ jab. I cannot wait to get it and I just urge everyone out there to just get a jab if they can, no matter what it is, just get vaccinated. That's what we do need to happen. Now, let's talk about the Olympics - a bit of a ray of light, shining golden moment here in Australia with a lot of people obviously still suffering from lockdowns and the impacts of COVID. Today Ariarne Titmus, we're claiming her as a Queenslander, she lives up here now, but also our rowers - men's and women's - a great day in Tokyo.
PLIBERSEK: Yeah it's fantastic, and it is uplifting to see these great athletes. And I’ve got to say I'm so proud of the Australians. I'm so proud of the women in the pool, Ariarne has done really well but she's not the only one. I'm watching Matildas soccer players with a great deal of interest and so hoping that they're going to do well. There’s a lot of great stories coming out of this. And it was beautiful to see Naomi Osaka lighting The Cauldron the other day. What a fantastic athlete. What a fantastic symbol internationally. And a special shout-out to, I think it's a Norwegian women's handball team isn't it, that are jn trouble for not wearing briefs enough uniforms? Oh my goodness.
EMERSON: These are the ones that wore the shorts rather than -
PLIBERSEK: Bikinis. Yes bike shorts instead of bikinis and got fined for it. I'm on their side, they should be able to play in whatever suits them.
EMERSON: Well, don't forget, this is Tokyo. I know this would be the IOC officials, but the Tokyo officials - I think the ex-Prime Minister there, some of the things he was saying about women, at one point ‘invite them to meetings, just make sure they don't say too much’. So sometimes you think, you wonder what century we are living in, indeed. All right, Tanya Plibersek, great to talk to you. Keep your chin up, as best you can down in Sydney, we’ll catch you again next week.
PLIBERSEK: Thank you. Look forward to it, talk again soon.
ENDS
