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Morning, Prime Minister.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning, Craig. Good to be with you.

REUCASSEL: So when were you told about this Dural discovery?

PRIME MINISTER: Look, the facts have been put out there now. I receive regular briefings from our national security agencies and from the Australian Federal Police. I certainly discussed the issue with the Premier of New South Wales, Chris Minns. NSW Police have people in custody. And they continue with other agencies including those involved in Special Operation Avalite, which is the Australian Federal Police and our intelligence agencies to conduct their investigation.

REUCASSEL: So, was it a few days after 19th? You know, you haven’t given us a date. But was –

PRIME MINISTER: I don’t go into operational –

REUCASSEL: Understood.

PRIME MINISTER: I don’t go into operational details. The important thing here are two things. One, is that the priority must be keeping Australians safe. And in this case this incident has been discovered, people have been held to account, but there are ongoing investigations. And that’s, the second thing that needs to happen is that the job of politicians is to support our security agencies, anti-terrorism organisations, that do such an extraordinary job in investigating but also importantly stopping threats to our safety and allow them to have operational control over investigations. And it’s important that politicians don’t try to score points in order to, if it, undermines those very investigations. And this is ongoing.

REUCASSEL: This an ongoing investigation. As I said, it has been kept quiet. Your –

PRIME MINISTER: There’s more than 100 police involved in this, as well as obviously the Joint Counter Terrorism Team.

REUCASSEL: And it has been moved to the Joint Counter Terrorism Team. This was Premier Minns speaking yesterday about this finding.

CHRIS MINNS, PREMIER OF NEW SOUTH WALES: This is the discovery of a potential mass casualty event. There’s only one way of calling it out and that is terrorism.

REUCASSEL: Terrorism. Do you classify this as terrorism as well, Prime Minister?

PRIME MINISTER: I certainly do. I agree with Chris Minns. It’s clearly designed to harm people, but it’s also designed to create fear in the community. And that is the very definition. As it comes in, it hasn’t been designated yet by the NSW Police, but certainly is being investigated, including by the Joint Counter Terrorism Team.

REUCASSEL: So these explosives were discovered on January 19th. You held a meeting of ³Ô¹ÏÍøÕ¾ Cabinet on the 21st. Did you discuss this then, given it was a potential terrorist act in Australia? Did you discuss this with ³Ô¹ÏÍøÕ¾ Cabinet?

PRIME MINISTER: We discuss a range of issues with ³Ô¹ÏÍøÕ¾ Cabinet, but by definition we don’t talk about what is before ³Ô¹ÏÍøÕ¾ Cabinet. We receive security briefings through our ³Ô¹ÏÍøÕ¾ Security Committee, is the primary body in which we received those confidential briefings.

REUCASSEL: Now, in terms of the people behind this, it does seem like, well we’re not sure if it’s alike or otherwise. But the people, the person that owns the caravan was already in custody. It seems like they’ve been arrested over a separate incident. Does this back up, last time we spoke to you, the Federal Police Commissioner Kershaw had talked about the way this is happening. Here’s what he said.

REECE KERSHAW, COMMISSIONER OF THE AUSTRALIAN FEDERAL POLICE: We believe criminals for hire may be behind some incidents.

REUCASSEL: The Daily Telegraph’s reporting that some of the people at the periphery of this include Tammie Farrugia, who was last week charged over the antisemitic attack at Woollahra in December. Is this further proof that this is what is happening? That it’s somebody just hiring lower base criminals to do these acts?

PRIME MINISTER: Well, I’ll leave the comments on operations to the police. I think that it’s really important here, Craig, that politicians are responsible here in the way that we convey information. But clearly the police –

REUCASSEL: Okay well, let’s leave, we’ll leave that because we’re speaking to the Deputy Commissioner later –

PRIME MINISTER: The police have indicated very clearly that there is evidence that across a range of these incidents that there are criminal elements involved. That is that people are being paid to commit what are crimes.

REUCASSEL: So it’s not an act of passion or politics, it’s an act of people being paid for it. We’ll speak to the Deputy Commissioner about that later. Let’s move then to the politics. Let’s leave beside the police issue of this. The Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs has just tweeted, saying the epidemic of antisemitism is spreading in Australia almost unchecked. We expect the Australian government to do more to stop this disease. Are you not doing enough?

PRIME MINISTER: People are in the clink, Craig. People are being arrested, investigations are taking place. The police and authorities are doing their job. We remain concerned about this escalation. We’re doing everything that we can. And the fact that people are being detained, arrested, charged, kept in the clink without bail, indicates that that’s the case.

REUCASSEL: We are speaking later to the Jewish Board of Deputies. Are there other things being requested by the Jewish community that the Government is not doing? You say you’re doing everything we can.

PRIME MINISTER: Everything that has been requested by the Jewish Board of Deputies, who I’ve met with regularly, has been delivered, some of it in record time. For example, the last request for increased funding for security around synagogues, around schools and Jewish institutions, was requested on a Saturday evening and was announced on the Sunday morning.

REUCASSEL: We’ll move on from that topic, although no doubt we will be coming back to it Prime Minister. There’s also news today that Australian, Oscar Jenkins, is alive, months after being captured by Russian forces. This has been conveyed to us by the Russian Ambassador. Do we have any video or evidence or proof that he’s alive? What kind of verification do we have at this point?

PRIME MINISTER: Well, we have received confirmation from Russia that Oscar Jenkins is alive and in custody. But we still have serious concerns for Mr. Jenkins. We have called upon Russia to release Mr. Jenkins and to provide the protections that he’s entitled to under international humanitarian law. We’re working with Ukraine as well and the International Committee of the Red Cross to push for access to Mr. Jenkins so that we can independently verify what his circumstances are.

REUCASSEL: Yeah, it must be a rough ride for the family there. And just finally, given the latest inflation figures, do you think it would be irresponsible of the RBA if they didn’t drop interest rates at their mid-February meeting?

PRIME MINISTER: Well, the RBA are independent, of course. But the RBA –

REUCASSEL: I know, but what are your thoughts that?

PRIME MINISTER: The RBA’s band is between 2 and 3 per cent. The figures yesterday were welcome news that the Government’s strategy that we have put in place – to lower inflation, whilst we are increasing wages and keeping unemployment low – indications are that that is proving to be successful. And an inflation rate of 2.4 per cent is clearly within that band.

REUCASSEL: I’ll take that as political speak for, yeah, you should drop the rates, but we know you want that anyway, Prime Minister. Thank you for speaking to us this morning. We do appreciate it.

PRIME MINISTER: Thanks Craig.