MARK TAMHANE: Penny Wong good morning. Announcing the election yesterday the Prime Minister said again, "This is the most exciting time to be an Australian." I guess it is unless you dont like long election campaigns. Are you going to be excited for the next eight weeks?
SENATOR PENNY WONG, CAMPAIGN SPOKESPERSON: Good morning, good to be with you. Well, I dont think its the most exciting election, and if you are somebody who wants Medicare to be protected, or if you're somebody earning below $87,000, because you know you've been pinged by this Prime Minister. The reality is this is an election campaign which has a big contrast in it. A party that is about supporting Medicare, about investing in our schools and our universities, and then a party thats looking after vested interests and big business.
TAMHANE: You must be buoyed by todays opinion polls especially Newspoll. Labor can win this election.
WONG: look polls are going to come and go throughout this election, we start absolutely as the underdog. Mr Turnbull has a 20 seat head-start, that is a very big lead. Our job as the Opposition is to do what we're doing, which is to put forward policy alternatives and we've been doing that for the last two years. We haven't been a small target and we've been very clear where our priorities are: our priorities are not to give a tax cut to business, our priorities are to invest in schools, in education, in universities and in Medicare.
TAMHANE: You say your policies are out there and theres no doubt about that and theres no doubtalso that the Government has got an easy line to take against Labor in this campaign: you vote for Labor you'll get high taxes and more spending.
WONG: Well this is from the Government that has tripled the deficit in a couple of years. Taxes and spending are higher under them than they were under us or the long-term average. Certainly this is a Government whose rhetoric has never been matched by action. But look, the Australian economy is going through a big change, everyone in Australia knows that and the question now is: Which do you think is the better path? Do you think the best path is Malcolm Turnbulls tax cuts for high income earners, tax cuts for business or do you think that we should actually be investing in our schools, in our universities, in our people? That is the very clear difference between Labor and the Coalition.
TAMHANE: And do you think Australians are prepared to pay more for hospitals, health and education because under your plan, you know the higher income deficit levy stays, company tax is not cut, negative gearing tax concessions are less generous and you're saying you will fund Gonski in full.
WONG: Well, lets remember the people that got the biggest tax cut in the budget are those on high incomes.Do we think thats the right thing to do at this time? Do we think that its really the priority of the nation to put the budget into a more difficult position by cutting taxes for business? We dont think thats the way forward. We think you have to invest in people. We all know we're only going to be able to compete in the world ahead if our young people are the best and brightest and get the education they deserve.
TAMHANE: The ABC's Factcheck unit went through 78 promises that the Coalition took to the 2013 election and they found that 83 per cent of them had been delivered or are in progress. Now thats not a bad strike rate for an obstructionist Senate is it?
WONG: Well, quite a lot of the governments bill did pass the Senate, for all that they talk about the obstruction in the Senate. What we refused to pass were things that they didn't tell Australians before the election. They didnt say there would be cuts to health, they didnt say there'd be a GP tax, they didnt say there would be cuts to Medicare, they didnt say that they were going to have 100,000 dollar degrees. So we make no apology for standing for the last two and a half years against those cuts, which are, I think, not right for the future of the country, but also contrary to what Tony Abbott told people before the last election.
TAMHANE: What should we read into the fact, if anything, that both the Prime Minister and Bill Shorten have headed to Queensland as their first port of call in this election? Is that where you believe the election will be won or lost.
WONG: Well, the election is won or lost around the country and the election is won or lost on very different views, very different visions, for the future of the nation. But there is no doubt, Queensland is obviously a very important state for us, but there are seats across the country we will need to win if we aregoing to be in this. As I said Mr Turnbull starts with a 20 seat head-start. Thats a lot of ground to make up but we're very determined to take this fight up to the government and most importantly to fight for the policies that we believe are best for nation and we believe are the sorts of things Australians want us to prioritise.
TAMHANE: Penny Wong thanks for your time. No doubt we'll speak again during this long, long election campaign.
WONG: I'm sure we will. Thank you.
