HOST: The election campaign is obviously a marathon eight weeks and it means its a marathon rather than a sprint. And one of those taking part in the marathon is South Australias own Labor Senator Penny Wong, who is in the studio now. Penny Wong, good morning and thank you for your time.
SENATOR PENNY WONG, LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION IN THE SENATE: Good to be with you.
HOST: Now, look we were talking to Phil before about the latest Newspoll and the fact that there has been a pretty dramatic decline in support for both the major parties here in South Australia. We have now got 40 per cent of people saying that theyre not going to vote Labor and theyre not going to vote Liberal. What do you put that down to?
WONG: Well, I think in South Australia what youve seen, because you dont have a very high Greens vote, youve actually seen a lot of people thinking about voting for Nick Xenophon, which I understand. Hes a very effective politician, hes the best stunts man around. He gets a lot of attention.
I suppose on that front what Id say is a couple of things. The first, is that many of his candidates are not going to be like Nick and we know that because of what we saw in State Parliament. So when youre voting for Nick youre actually probably voting for a range of other people many of whom you dont know.
The second, I mean Nick is in an experiment, isnt he? He is wanting to go national. His brand has been a very effective advocate for South Australia. I think going national is going to change what sort of approach he takes.
HOST: Youre someone, Penny, who went into politics because youve long held passionate views and you want to, based on your own beliefs and your own convictions, you want to make changes. You want to change society for, in your view, the good. Havent you felt in the last five years, be it from Rudd to Gillard, back to Rudd again, then Abbott gets in and says the adults are in charge and then a couple of years later he gets knocked off. Have you felt that the politics has actually gotten in the way of achieving things? Are we seeing a public disenfranchisement with the system?
WONG: Sure, I think youve seen a lot of aggression in Federal politics. Certainly the Abbott period, was dominated by a very aggressive period and youve described a period in government where Labor didnt do as well as it should have, not in terms of policy, I think we were effective in terms of policy, but we didnt do as well in terms of our internals. And thats a lesson we needed to learn and we have learnt.
So I can understand people being turned off some politics. I guess what Id say is that ultimately you can make a decision not to be interested in politics, a lot of people do, but you cant actually make a decision not to be affected by it. So, if youre going to be affected I reckon take enough of an interest, at least around elections, to work out what is the choice. The choice is between two parties that have very different views about Australia. Our priority is Medicare, jobs, education; their priority is a tax cut for big business.
The second thing Id say on someone like the Xenophon team, who knows what their vision of Australia is - who knows? I know that Nick does most of the public commentary. We dont know what all of his candidates think, but before people are voting they should perhaps consider what are they voting for because they are often not going to be -
HOST: Constitutionally he has to do all the public commentary.
WONG: Thats right, he has gagged his people. Thats right.
HOST: Well, we sort of do know what some of them think.
WONG: I think youd be a bit grumpy if we did that, if we gagged all our candidates. Sorry Will.
HOST: As long as Bill Shorten is happy to come on as often as you do, Penny, then it would be tremendous.
WONG: Ill put in a quiet word, all right? Ill put in a quiet word.
HOST: We could work with that. We do know what some of the Nick Xenophon candidates stand for now though. There has been some background due diligence done now on things they have said in the past. I mean its incredibly broad to say that Nick Xenophons history has been picking people in State Parliament like Anne Bressington, who has views that are not mainstream. Is there anything specific that you have heard from his candidates that are standing in this election in the Nick Xenophon team that you find concerning?
WONG: Well, I obviously dont agree with his number two candidate Stirling Griffs position on penalty rates. He has spent a lot of his adult life in his work environment and he has said publically he doesnt support penalty rates. Now, hes entitled to that view, but thats not my view. I think if people are going to vote for Nick they should be really clear that Nick will get elected and their votes may well go to Stirling and others who have put very clearly they dont support penalty rates.
HOST: Can I ask you about this corporate tax argument, you mentioned it a moment ago as well. In fact, without being too cab fixated this half hour, I was in a cab on Friday -
WONG: Cabs are useful. I catch cabs a bit around town.
HOST: Theyre a very useful way of getting a barometer of -
WONG: You get a lot of intel, dont you?
HOST: You do, you do. Well, the intel I got on Friday was out of everything that had come out of the election campaign this far, I had a cabby saying how stupid do people in Federal politics - and he was being nonspecific - think we are?
WONG: All of us.
HOST: Thats right, he didnt seem to care, he said generally. To be peddling a line that corporate tax cuts, company tax cuts, dont ultimately benefit people more than just the big end of town, or that very simplistic characterisation. His concern was that this was a dumbing down of a debate that was more important than that. It deserved better. He thought he deserved better.
WONG: Sure.
HOST: Do you think it is dumbing down to suggest that this Coalition policy to cut tax over the next ten years is pandering to the big end of town?
WONG: No, I think Id argue on equity and on economic benefits. The biggest hit on the budget that has been announced this election campaign has been the company tax cut. So its about $50 billion out over the ten years. Thats the single biggest hit, much bigger than our investment in education.
So I guess the first question is, do we really think at a time when the budget is under pressure and the economy needs government to engage and to manage it. Do we really think the best thing government can do, the highest priority, is to cut company tax? Bearing in mind that we already have, because of what we call dividend imputation here in Australia, a lot of the tax benefit will actually go to foreign shareholders. So that is the first point.
The second point is an economic argument, which is the Governments own modelling shows that the outcome in terms of jobs so they talk about their plan for Jobs and Growth the outcome in terms of jobs is about 0.1 per cent, about one tenth of one per cent, more jobs over the long term. Now that is a very small return on a very big investment by taxpayers. That is what a company tax cut is; it is your taxes essentially enabling a company tax cut, instead of being put to other use. So I think there is a very clear difference of views here. We say protect Medicare, invest in jobs, invest in education and they say company tax cut. Im happy to argue the merits of that.
HOST: Yeah, Im interested in that, because you read something like KPMGs submissions to the Henry Tax Review and they say if youre going to cut any tax and you want to minimise the disruption to the economy, you want to have flow on effects, excess burdens and all this kind of stuff, reducing those, youre talking payroll tax and then company tax. So if tax cuts are going to be a component of stimulating the economy, youre not really looking at anything other than company at the moment?
WONG: I guess its a question of priorities. Youre right, in a perfect world, if the budget was strong and we didnt have the deficit triple over the period since Joe Hockey was Treasurer, if we didnt have $100 billion more in debt, if we didnt have under investment in Australias schools, you might make a different set of decisions, but theyre not the cards in front of us. The cards in front of us are weve got a rising debt, weve got higher deficits, we have demonstrably a lot of kids in Australia who are not getting the resources they need, not getting the teaching they need at schools. And that is not just a fairness argument, which is important - I actually think in a country like ours a fair go should mean that every kid gets good education wherever they are. There is an economic argument, because were not getting the benefit of them being the best t hey can be. As a nation, we are not getting that benefit.
HOST: Isnt the criticism of Labors position in terms of the $37 billion that youre spending on education, Penny, the same criticism you just made of the Liberals? I mean if the Liberals are talking about you give company tax this kind of relief over ten years hopefully it will all sort of trickle down? There hasnt actually been any specific modelling around what the benefit of the education outlay would be either. Youre both kind of running on the vibe in a way arent you?
WONG: I just think if you look at international evidence, you look at what the OECD has said, you look at what the Reserve Bank, I think the Deputy Governor, has said. I dont think there is anybody who would suggest its not good for the economy to invest in your people.
And leave aside modelling, you get that. I mean, Im sure, your kids - those that you have and those that you might have - youre going to want them to get the best education they can. Thats not because you dont think its a good thing, you dont think its important. You know its important. You know what it will mean for their lives. We have got to think about that across the whole community.
HOST: Just finally Penny, what is it week four, week four of eight?
WONG: Yeah, now were into a proper election campaign now. This would be like the first week.
HOST: So start your engines.
WONG: So start your engines, gentlemen and ladies.
HOST: Youre right, weve got to start paying attention now. Do you think that because its been so long there is going to be this cluster of activity in the final fortnight? Like guys still havent got your health policy, for example. That hasnt been released. So there is still a bit to come.
WONG: Yeah, there is still a bit to come. We have made a very big announcement on Medicare. So this is saying that we would return to indexation on the Medicare rebates. So this is to stop the GP Tax by stealth, thats a very big investment in Medicare. Weve got more to say. I reckon most people havent really been engaged, which is fair enough.
HOST: Well, the fact that Family feud won the ratings the other night probably suggests that.
WONG: I think over the next few weeks people always start to decide as they get to the business end of an election campaign.
HOST: Penny Wong, thanks very much for coming in.
ENDS