TANYA PLIBERSEK MP 
SHADOW MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING 
MEMBER FOR SYDNEY

 
 
E&OE TRANSCRIPT 
TELEVISION INTERVIEW 
ABC INSIDERS WITH DAVID SPEERS

SUNDAY, 18 OCTOBER 2020
 

SUBJECTS: NSW ICAC revelations; Federal integrity commission; COVID-19; Universities; Jobs ; ACT and New Zealand elections.
 
 

DAVID SPEERS, PRESENTER: Tanya Plibersek, welcome to the program. 
 
TANYA PLIBERSEK, SHADOW MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING: Good morning. 
 
SPEERS: So do you agree with what Kristina Keneally's arguing there, that in the Gladys Berejiklian case, she’s suggesting women are so weak of mind and heart that a romantic entanglement impaired her from exercising scrutiny?
 
PLIBERSEK: Look, I think there's a very simple proposition at the heart of this. Someone's personal life is a hundred per cent their personal life - unless it impinges on their work and the New South Wales ICAC is looking at the moment at this very serious set of allegations that Daryl Maguire has inappropriately used his office to enrich himself and it's quite properly looking at all of his associates. It is quite properly looking at whether the Premier turned a blind eye to this behaviour. I'm not going to pre-empt or comment in detail about what ICAC is looking at because I'm a Federal MP. My concern is why don't we have a national integrity commission, a similar anti-corruption body at a Federal level that you've just been discussing with your guests and-
 
SPEERS: We'll come to that. I'm keen to get your thoughts on that. But I just want to.. just clear this up. You are one of Australia's most prominent female politicians. Do you share the view of your colleague that there's this suggestion here that being romantically engaged with someone, entangled with someone, has impaired her ability to exercise scrutiny?
 
PLIBERSEK: I feel actually, as a human being, very personally sorry for the Premier. It is hard to form and maintain relationships in our line of work. But there is never any excuse for corrupt behaviour or turning a blind eye to corrupt behaviour. Any sort of impropriety should be properly investigated by ICAC and if it's referred to the police by the police or the courts.It doesn't matter who the person is. It doesn't matter their gender. It doesn't matter if we like the person or feel sorry for them.
 
SPEERS: And do you, just to be clear on this, do you think Gladys Berejiklian should resign?
 
PLIBERSEK: I'm actually not going to comment on that. Jodi McKay is doing a great job at holding the New South Wales government to account. She's a person of unimpeachable integrity. I'm going to leave that fight for Jodi McKay. 
 
SPEERS: All right. Then on the idea of a national integrity commission or anti-corruption body, Labor is saying that what the government's put forward is too weak. Do you think such a body should be able to investigate politicians, hold public hearings, that sort of thing?
 
PLIBERSEK: Absolutely I do. I think it's extraordinary that two years ago the government said it had begun work on a national integrity commission almost a year before that. So there's a three year delay now, according to the Morrison government's own timetable on a Federal equivalent and I can't believe - even the discussion of what they're proposing now is - it's the integrity commission you have if you don't want to have an integrity commission. It can't look at behaviour that's happened in the past. It can only happen- it can only look at behaviour that's happened after the laws have passed and the body is set up. It can't look at things off its own bat. It can't accept referrals from whistleblowers. So basically the government says 'Oh do we feel Investigating ourselves over this allegation? Hmmm.’ And then if the government wants to investigate itself, it can refer itself to its own integrity commission. I mean, what a joke. We would not have seen investigation of the land deal around the airport. We would not have seen investigation around the dodgy water deals we’ve seen. We wouldn't have seen investigation of allegations of forged documents or branch stacking using taxpayer funds. All of these things ought to be properly investigated by a Federal integrity commission and the model that the government's proposing wouldn't touch those sorts of issues. It shows how weak the model is.
 
SPEERS: Let me turn to Victoria, one new case yesterday, two today. We're looking at a pretty equivalent situation to New South Wales. Do you think Victoria should be open to the same extent that you are there in New South Wales?
 
PLIBERSEK: Well, I think the first thing to say is Victorians ought to congratulate themselves. It has been such a tough time and they've done so well as the numbers in the last few days show. I think it's been an extraordinarily difficult time for Victorians. I would be going stir crazy if I was under the same lockdown as they've done. So I think they ought to congratulate themselves and I think it's actually really gross that Federal Liberal MPs are trying to use this as an attack on Daniel Andrews. What he has done is - he hasn't done it for popularity - he's done it because he's considered it the right thing to do. The Federal government ought to be looking at its own role in Victoria's difficulties including aged care, which is completely a Federal government responsibility, where some of the largest failures are. And have a look at the contact tracing app. I mean Greg Hunt, he's a Victorian, the contact tracing app at last count had found 14 people. That adds up to about $5 million per person that the app has found. Imagine how much sooner Victoria could have opened up if the contact tracing app that the Federal government is completely responsible for had worked as it was intended to work, as it was promised to work.
 
SPEERS: What about an area that is a shared responsibility to a degree and that's education. There are still students in Victoria, Years 8 to 10, that are still learning from home, months down the track. Would you like to see them able to return to the classroom?
 
PLIBERSEK: I want to see all kids in the classroom as quickly as possible because remote learning takes a toll, and it takes a toll most particularly on the most disadvantaged students and we've seen that. We've seen teachers just doing an extraordinary job in getting work into kids' lounge rooms. It's been harder for kids who don't have an internet connection, don't have a device at home, teachers have been driving loaner computers around and dropping off dongles and packets of papers that kids can do their work on. It's been really tough and hardest, as I said, on the most disadvantaged students, so of course, I want to see them back in the classroom and the Federal government could help here by providing resources for catch up, for tutoring, for helping kids in the classroom that have fallen behind. And sadly the most recent Federal budget had none of that extra assistance which could go into classrooms to help those kids who've fallen behind. Kids have fallen behind, but we can help them catch up if we put the effort and the resources into doing so.
 
SPEERS: On higher education, the government's funding reforms have now gone through the Senate, tomorrow in the House, they'll be rubber stamped there. These are changes that might make some degrees cheaper - maths and science and so on - but others, like the arts and law, far more expensive. Will Labor reverse these changes if you win the next election?
 
PLIBERSEK: We'll announce our education, higher education policies well before the next election, but you can judge us on our record. We almost doubled higher education funding when we were last in government and opened up universities to an additional 200,000 students. But on this legislation David, we are heading down an American path of university debts that are crippling for life. Your degree would have cost about $40,000. My degree, I did a four year degree would have cost closer to $50,000. And my daughter, who started university this year, if she started next year instead - she's doing Arts/Social Work - she would graduate with a debt of around $55,000. She wants to be a child protection worker, so she'd be entering a labour market with high unemployment where, at the moment, one in three young people are looking for a job or more hours of work, entering a labour market with high unemployment with a debt of close to $55,000, $58,000 of debt, these young people, at the same time as they don't know if they’ll have a job, they want to save for a house. It's so tough on these kids, so tough and so unfair.
 
SPEERS: Yeah. For some it will be cheaper under this new approach for the courses I mentioned. Can you just clear up for us, if Labor does come to power and they're entering their second or third year of that degree, it won't suddenly become more expensive for them? You're not going to jack up the fees for those who are getting a cheaper deal now?
 
PLIBERSEK: I'll tell you David, we are not in the business of putting up university fees. We want every young person to choose the degree that suits them best, that will help them get a great job, and have a great life. That applies to university, that applies to TAFE. We made university much more accessible-
 
SPEERS: Right. So if you choose, if you choose one of these cheaper courses now, if you choose one of these cheaper courses now for next year, don't worry Labor is not going to change the rules in year 2 or 3?
 
PLIBERSEK: We are never in the business of making it harder to go to uni. We're always in the business of making it easier and you know what? With one in three young people looking for a job or more hours of work, I want to make sure that any young person who's not earning can be learning - at TAFE, at university, in an excellent, properly funded school system. Because it's good for those individuals, it gives them the skills and the education they need to get a job in the future. But it's also good for our nation. We know that investing in education is one of the best ways of increasing productivity and by the way, for every extra dollar we spend in education - put it this way - every million dollars we spend in education, we create about 15 jobs, almost 15 jobs. For every million dollars we spend in construction we create 1.2 jobs. So the investment in education isn't just good for the individuals. It's not just good for our national productivity. It also has a massive employment multiplier.
 
SPEERS: All right. Couple of other quick ones. You've got a book coming out in a couple of weeks.
 
PLIBERSEK: I do.
 
SPEERS: It's a collection of essays called 'Upturn: A better normal after COVID-19'. In your introduction, you write about the need for more well-trained workers in the caring sector - aged care, childcare, disability care - and you say all that's missing is the government commitment to training the workforce and paying a share of wages. So do you think the government should directly be subsidising the wages of these care workers?
 
PLIBERSEK: We effectively do that. There's massive investment in childcare and we just announced another $6.2 billion in Anthony's Budget reply speech that we would like to see go into childcare. That means more women can go to work.
 
SPEERS: That's indirect support. I appreciate that. I'm just saying that's indirect support to the families. Should the workers have their wages subsidised?
 
PLIBERSEK: Well no, that money goes into the system and that money then pays workers wages and it happens like that in childcare. It happens like that in aged care as well. We've got more than a 100,000 people waiting on the Home Care waiting list who have been assessed as eligible for Home Care. All we need is a government that's prepared to pay for those packages and those packages pay the wages -
 
SPEERS: I appreciate that point, but there's been a shift in Labor's approach here. You took to the election last year a plan to directly subsidise child care workers' wages. Anthony Albanese's package announced last week that you're referring to didn't have that. It's, it is extending the family- the payment for families up to quite high incomes of half a million dollars a year. So do you think you should still be trying to subsidise the wages of the workers? 
 
PLIBERSEK: No, we should be putting the money into these sectors - aged care, disability, childcare, education, healthcare - because they are massive employers, including massive employers of women. The separate issue of unequal wages and underpayment in the caring professions has to be dealt with through an industrial relations framework that properly pays caring professions. We know that there's a gender pay gap. We need to address that gender pay gap but what I'm talking about in the book is expanding aged care, expanding childcare, expanding health and education, which are all big employers of women, where you get really strong additional job numbers for every million dollars that you invest in those sectors.
 
SPEERS: OK. Final one. A good night for Labor in both the ACT and New Zealand last night. In fact, a big win, a landslide win for Jacinda Ardern across the ditch. What are the lessons for Labor in Australia from these results?
 
PLIBERSEK: I think Jacinda Ardern did a great job, Andrew Barr did a great job as well in the ACT and the lessons are clear. Govern well. Give people a vision for the future. Make sure that you're investing in the services that make life better. Make sure that you've got focus all the time on jobs, on full employment and that positive vision for the future includes building things, making things, caring for people, good jobs with decent pay and conditions, investment in renewables to power our future, to bring down the cost of energy in our grid for our households and our businesses. I think there's a lot in common between the ACT and New Zealand and congratulations to two great teams and two great leaders.
 
SPEERS: In the case of Jacinda Ardern, does having a progressive female leader help?
 
PLIBERSEK: Oh, well, she's just an inspiring person, an inspiring leader and I think the whole world has been looking at Jacinda Ardern and saying "I wish we had a bit more of that".
 
SPEERS: Tanya Plibersek, thank you. 
 
PLIBERSEK: Thank you.
 
 
ENDS