SAMANTHA MAIDEN: The New Zealand Labor opposition is the government and thats a little bit awkward for the Foreign Minister Julie Bishop. Joining me now live to discuss this is Penny Wong. Good morning.
SENATOR PENNY WONG, LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION IN THE SENATE: Good morning, good to be with you Sam.
MAIDEN: What has been your observation of the Foreign Minister Julie Bishops response to this? She seems to be doubling down and the Prime Minister says no apology required?
WONG: I think I said at the time, Sam - I might even have come on your show I certainly said at the time the Foreign Minister made the comments that she would find it hard to trust a Government if the Government of New Zealand changed, when she called into question whether she could work with a Labour Government in New Zealand, I said at the time it was most unwise.
We know the context, the context was she and the Prime Minister Mr Turnbull at the time desperately trying to distract attention from the fact that Mr Joyce might have been a New Zealand citizen. And all that argy-bargy, thats politics, but we dont put our diplomatic relations into that domestic political fight and it was mist unwise of the Foreign Minister to do so.
And I am actually very surprised that she is taking the approach that she has taken since the Government was elected, not only doubling down, but even lashing out at people who are pointing out the obvious, which is that the Foreign Minister of Australia should be playing domestic politics with foreign affairs and more importantly shouldnt be suggesting that, as the Foreign Minister of the country, she would find it hard to work with a Labour Government in New Zealand. Well she has got a Labour Government in New Zealand and she is going to have to set about repairing the relationship.
MAIDEN: Do you think the relationship has been damaged in anyway by the Foreign Minister Julie Bishops conduct?
WONG: I think we have such a longstanding, such a deep relationship, theyre part of the family arent they? So, I think it is a very robust relationship and I dont know the Prime Minister-elect personally, Jacinda Ardern, but she seems very gracious in her response, very mature in her response at the time to Ms Bishops intemperate remarks, and I suspect she will be a very decent person to deal with.
But, really, when you have made a mistake it is much better to acknowledge you have made a mistake and deal with it rather than lashing out at people as the Foreign Minister seems to have done since Mr Peters made his announcement.
MAIDEN: The tables have turned obviously now with their victory, but you did acknowledge at the time that you thought your staffer did the wrong thing in trying to contact the New Zealand Government in relation to this matter?
WONG: I dealt with all of that at the time, Sam, but I also made the point that when people talked about conspiracy, the real conspiracy would have been if people had sought to cover up the fact of the possible dual citizenship of the Deputy Prime Minister of Australia. We know it was important for that issue to be resolved because hes currently before the High Court and were awaiting that decision.
But thats been dealt with and we know domestic politics is always a bit of argy-bargy. I thought what was unwise at the time, and I said so, was the Foreign Minister coming out, and, for domestic political reasons, suggesting that she would find it difficult to work with a Labor Government in New Zealand. Well as I said shes got one now and instead of continuing to lash out at people she should set about repairing the relationship and moving on from this.
MAIDEN: Its an interesting result though in New Zealand isnt it? Because New Zealand Labour got fewer votes than their opponents and they are forming Government now with Winston Peters. Youve experienced forming Government with a coalition of others, do you have any advice for her in terms of how to manage that and manage the combination of managing it with Winston Peters and others?
WONG: I reckon Id leave domestic New Zealand politics to them dont you think Sam? I would make this point though, they have a very different electoral system to Australia and the, I think its called MMP system that they have, which is a proportional representation system really by dint of the nature of the electoral system is going to lead to many more governments in coalition; Governments formed by agreements with other parties as you often see in many European democracies. So its not an unusual state of affairs and youve seen quite a lot of Governments of that ilk on both sides of politics of the sort of centre-right and centre-left of politics in New Zealand since the system was introduced.
MAIDEN: The Labor Party got a lot of heat though in Australia in terms of the agreement and governing with the Greens. If you were going to form Government after the next election, if you needed to form a coalition, would you take the view going forward that you shouldnt actually formalise it? Would you still have to have a confidence and supply agreement? What Im asking you is, would you change the way you did it if you needed to form Government after the next election with the support of the independents or the Greens?
WONG: Well thats an interesting set of propositions Sam. What Im working towards, what everybody in the Labor Party is working towards, is a majority Labor Government, thats what we want. We want to form strong and stable Government for Australia that deals with so many of the issues that this Government appears to have been unable to deal with. Whether its energy and climate, whether its jobs and the economy these are some of the issues that where we think were offering a much better alternative, and our objective is a majority Labor Government.
MAIDEN: Okay, I just want to ask you a couple of other questions in relation to foreign affairs today very sad news from Kenya with confirmation that an Australian teacher, Gabrielle Maina, has been shot in whats believed to be a botched robbery. Obviously DFAT officials will be working with her family, but obviously its a very disturbing incident; an Australian who was over there working to try and help the community who appears to have been murdered just walking down the street.
WONG: And can I express my personal sympathy to her family and friends and those of the Labor Party. I dont have much additional information to what youve just outlined Sam. I havent been briefed as yet in relation to this. Im sure that our foreign affairs consular officials will do, as they always do, an excellent job in engaging with members of the family but its obviously a very distressing event.
MAIDEN: The other front page news today is this letter that North Korea has sent that is being purported according to the Foreign Minister Julie Bishop to suggest the sanctions are working. I have to say, are we really supposed to take this story seriously? I assume that it is some sort of welcome distraction from the New Zealand issue but are we really supposed to believe that the sanctions are working because North Korea writes a letter with a bit of signature emotional language, or fiery language, that the sanctions are working if theyre continuing to test missiles.
WONG: You judge people by their actions generally much more than their words in life. And certainly when it comes to the sorts of behaviour that we see from North Korea where, youre right, the rhetoric has always been pretty ratcheted up. But what is more important and more concerning for all of us not just Australia but the whole international community is the continued trajectory of testing and that theyre seeking to develop a much a great nuclear capability. They are the greatest risk to peace and stability in our region.
We have consistently provided bipartisan support for the Governments position that we should have a strong unified position across the international community, a focus on sanctions and economic and political pressure, and we agree that those are important. I thought it was interesting that the Foreign Minister chose to make the letter public, Im sure she has her reasons for doing so and Im sure she has her reasons for seeking to read into the letter the view that youve outlined that sanctions are working. I dont know the extent to which thats accurate or not, but what I would say is this we need to continue the sanctions, we need to ensure that we maximise the economic and political pressure on North Korea and it is critical that the whole international community, including China which has a particular relationship with North Korea, continue to exert that pressure. And we all have an interest in resolving this diplomatically.
MAIDEN: But you must have a view on what this letter means. Is there anything to suggest that this letter means anything other than the Turnbull Government needs a distraction to the New Zealand election result?
WONG: I might leave that to journalists and commentators like you. At face value weve got a letter, the Foreign Minister has made some comments about what she thinks the letter means, and Im saying whatever we say the letter means, she can disclose herself why she thinks it was appropriate to make the letter public. Im making a more principled point which is we do need to continue the sanctions, and on that we agree with the government and we agree with the majority of the international community, which is working together as we should to put maximum pressure on North Korea.
MAIDEN: And just finally before you go in your old portfolio of Climate Change, a lot of conservatives are saying that they think theres a de facto emissions trading scheme or a de facto cap-and-trade scheme in terms of what has been announced this week. Is there, yes or no?
WONG: Certainly from what you can see they talk about a secondary exchange in some of the documents and some of the discussion about it, well I dont know whats being exchanged. But I think this really goes to the point, this is a whole of economy reform because it does affect the whole of the economy when you have changes into your energy and electricity systems and what weve got is very little information from the government about whats included.
What we do know, and this is a problem, is that it appears to king hit the renewable energy sector and all the jobs that rely on it. We know thats a problem and we know that the so-called price guarantee has sort of morphed over the days of the siting week from being a guarantee to an assessment to a maybe or best estimate. And it looks like about 50 cents a week in three years time. So a lot that Malcolm Turnbull said early in the week doesnt appear to be the case later in the week.
MAIDEN: Okay Penny Wong, thank you very much for your time today in Adelaide, we appreciate it.
WONG: Great to be with you Sam