Well for the second time in three weeks, Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, has flown into Perth. And for the second time in three weeks, the PM is here in the breakfast studio at ABC Radio Perth. Good morning to you.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good to be here, Mark.
GIBSON: You’re racking up more of a world tour than Taylor Swift at the moment. You’ve just been in the US at the weekend. Quick stop in Canberra. Here you are in the West.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, it’s an important day for the West today. A milestone project as part of the $9.7 billion METRONET project. It’s going to transform the way that locals, but also visitors, get around Perth. And the removal of these level crossings today, a milestone, Victoria Park-Canning level crossing being removed, effectively, just means that people, whether they be on the trains or whether they be on the roads, by decongesting it, by de-linking it, what you do is you make it easier to get around this great city.
GIBSON: It’s only one step in the process, though, and there’s a lot still to come and a lot more pain for people who don’t have that Armidale train line open.
PRIME MINISTER: Yeah but it’s something, that is a fact, is that when you do major infrastructure, there is short-term disruption in order to get that long term gain. And with METRONET, it’s going to be such an extraordinary gain for the people along that rail line. It will mean quicker journeys on rail but also quicker journeys by road getting around. At the same time, there’s 4,300 jobs being created directly in construction. Importantly as well this is consistent with our Future Made in Australia agenda. This is Australian made steel that’s been fabricated right here in Perth.
GIBSON: Prime Minister, this time yesterday I was on air when the news came through about the ACCC’s federal court action against Coles and Woolworths for misleading shoppers about discounts. Now the allegations are jacking up prices, then reducing them slightly so that they could claim they were discounted. Now, if it’s true, and this is premeditated price gouging, it’s unconscionable conduct, isn’t it?
PRIME MINISTER: This is red hot for Woolworths. The allegations are about 266 products. For Coles, it’s 245 products. And the examples you would have seen out there for everyday products like Oreos and Weetbix is putting them up, then bringing them down by less than the amount in which they were put up, and putting tags on saying that their discounts and specials –
GIBSON: Shocking.
PRIME MINISTER: Is just an outrage. And Australians who go to the supermarkets have been concerned for some time. You would have heard, anecdotally, people telling stories about this. What we have here is the ACCC taking really strong action, and they made this announcement on the very same day that we released our exposure draft of the mandatory code of conduct, firstly, for supermarkets, and secondly, the legislation that we will amend the draft legislation out there to make sure that stronger action can be taken. People when they go to the supermarket, expect that when there’s a sales tag on it, that it actually is cheaper, not more expensive. That’s not too much to ask.
GIBSON: We’ve been too soft on them for too long, though, haven’t we? Things like voluntary codes of conduct, it’s time to get a bit tougher.
PRIME MINISTER: Well exactly. They’re having a lend here and the idea of a voluntary code of conduct that was in place from the former Government is just not good enough. That’s why we had Dr Craig Emerson do the inquiry. He made these recommendations to us and the exposure drafts that we released yesterday are a part of that. But as well, the ACCC, I’ve got to say, have really done their job here. They are taking this court action with specific evidence, with real world examples, in order to hold Woolworths and Coles to account.
GIBSON: Do they care, though? They get a bit of a slap on the wrist and a bit of a monetary penalty –
PRIME MINISTER: They’ll get a bit more than a slap on the wrist. There are significant fines can be put on both of these supermarket giants. And as well, I think the implications for their brand has been damaged by this because it confirms what many shoppers think and what they’ve been saying to me, which is why we have determined to take strong action. We can’t just sit back and say, ‘Oh, well, we’ll have this voluntary code’. I think Australians would be pretty shocked if you had a voluntary code for other things that really require proper action.
GIBSON: Is it time to break up this duopoly then?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, the problem with that analysis, which is the Greens Party position for a long time, and then bizarrely the pro-market coalition have decided to jump on board this populist position, is that who’s going to buy them? If you have a Coles supermarket in a particular area in Mandurah and it’s sold, then it’s going to be bought by Woolworths or by Aldi or someone else. So, that’s not really the solution. The solution is to get these supermarkets to do the right thing, to hold them accountable through laws that make them behave in an appropriate way that consumers expect. When shoppers go to the supermarket they expect to get goods at a fair price. I understand supermarkets have got to make a profit. They’ve got to make a profit so that they can employ people. But what they shouldn’t do is abuse that power.
GIBSON: Well, in case they hadn’t noticed, we’re in a cost of living crisis. I just want to know what else you can do? The Coalition is also calling for the excise on alcohol, which just keeps going up and up and up to be at least frozen –
PRIME MINISTER: Well they’re not, actually. What happened was the ³Ô¹ÏÍøÕ¾ Party leader had a thought bubble, put it in the paper, and yesterday the Liberal Shadow Treasurer and other Liberal Shadow Ministers, including the Finance Minister, dismissed the idea. So, it’s a bit like the thought bubbles that we’ve seen on nuclear power. Last time I was here, I was down in Collie, as you know, and yesterday Peter Dutton gave a speech on nuclear energy and why it was so important with not a single dollar attached, not a single costing, no detail.
GIBSON: What do you think, though? What can you do to reduce some of these taxes for Australian families?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, what we’ve done, the first thing that we’ve done, Mark, as you know, is from July 1, we’ve given every single one of your listeners a tax cut. More dollars in their pocket. So Australians are earning more and keeping more of what they earn. With wages rising and with taxes being cut, that’s the first thing that we did. And that, of course, was opposed vehemently by the Coalition. They said we should go to an election on it, but we made that tough decision, but it was the right decision to put more dollars into people’s pockets.
GIBSON: Got a couple more things I want to quickly get through with you. Interest rates – decision today from the Reserve Bank. The Federal Reserve, as you know, in the US, just cut rates by half a per cent. Is it time, where are we at with splitting up the Board into these two boards and one setting interest rates?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we’ve got legislation before the Senate, it passed the House of Representatives. It is the result of a hands-off inquiry that was held, an independent inquiry, saying this is the way to go. And it’s being held up by the Greens party and the Coalition once again, like holding up extra investment in housing. The Senate’s become a bit of a roadblock with what I call the No-alition of the Greens, the Liberals and the Nats all voting no. And it’s beyond my comprehension why they would. This is a sensible suggestion. Every economist in the land is saying this is a sensible suggestion and it will make the Reserve Bank more effective. The people who concentrate on interest rates shouldn’t be the same people who are managing the day to day activity, if you like, of the Reserve Bank institution. And that’s the idea of a separate board, one to run effectively the Reserve Bank, but the other one just concentrating on monetary policy and the setting of interest rates.
GIBSON: I’ll be watching the AFL grand final this weekend along with millions of Australians. I’ll also be bombarded by gambling ads during it. Can we just get on with banning them?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, certainly what we want to do is to reduce the impact and the harm that gambling advertising is causing, and we’re taking action to do that – we’ve done more in two years. Now whether the complete banning is of course, has been an option, whether that will solve the problem. The problem here, of course, is that sport gambling represents under five per cent of the problem gambling issue. Overwhelmingly it’s about poker machines. Then it’s followed by lotteries and lotto tickets and those issues as well. So, I know that as much as anything else, it can be annoying, the breaking up of ads, but we’re looking at a range of options.
GIBSON: It’s just not annoying the ad. It’s not just the ads that are annoying, it’s the harm it’s doing to people in society as well. And look, you’d be aware of the story around this morning about BetStop your self-exclusion scheme, your Government’s scheme. Big loopholes exposed there where this bloke from Sydney has lost nearly $70,000. I mean, he just had to go on and change his name and email address and bang.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, changing your name, just changing your name and just changing your email address –
GIBSON: Simple.
PRIME MINISTER: You say it like it’s simple.
GIBSON: Well, it is.
PRIME MINISTER: He’s changed, look, whenever there is a regulation people will try to get around it. But this person changed his name, changed all of his details, including his email address and other details as well to get around it. So, this has been identified. We’ll examine it. And of course, when someone tries to get around a regulation, what you do is you make sure you tighten it in a way in order to shut that down. And that certainly is what the authorities will do. But whenever you have some form of regulation, it is the case that people will try and get around it.
GIBSON: Same with social media for kids. Same with bans –
PRIME MINISTER: Of course. And people get around under 18s not being able to buy alcohol. But guess what, Mark, shock horror, last night somewhere in Perth, an under 18 year old got access to alcohol. Doesn’t mean that the ban’s the wrong thing. Doesn’t mean that you just throw it out. What it means is that humans do engage in this. We’ve said, for example, on the social media ban that, very upfront, what we’re trying to do here is to limit the harm, but people will try to get around it. We know that that’s the case. It doesn’t mean that sending that signal and getting the regulation as close to unbreakable as possible is the objective. But you know that these things do happen.
GIBSON: Prime Minister, thanks for coming in again. Good to see you.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks a lot, Mark.
