2GB Ross Greenwood

SUBJECTS: Labor leadership; Education funding E&OE............................... Hon Christopher Pyne MP: Hello Ross. Ross Greenwood: Look here is the interesting thing right now, is you know it just seems as though the momentum has shifted. You can see it in the polls. You can see it in some of the coverage that Kevin Rudd is picking up. The question is now back on the Coalition as to whether it has not really adjusted its own strategy accordingly. Is it something we haven’t seen or is it something that the Coalition is waiting to see whether Kevin Rudd can effectively fizzle out. Pyne: Well Ross it was inevitable that there would be a honeymoon period if Kevin Rudd returned as Prime Minister and his strategy is to create as much distraction, froth and bubble, as possible from the main issues that people are concerned about which is cost of living, job security, border protection and economic management. Now he wants to distract everyone from those issues, they’re not going to be distracted from those. That means that the media is inevitably more interested in what Kevin Rudd has to say because they’ve got this shiny new toy. But as I said you can put a shiny new lid on a rubbish bin, it’s still the same ALP rubbish bin that it was before. At some point things will settle down and Kevin Rudd will be seen for what he is: the man who gave us 45,000 boat arrivals, he started the rot in terms of debt and deficit, who supported the Emissions Trading Scheme and then the carbon tax and then put up the carbon tax as part of his government and who has been one of the main reasons why there is anxiousness in the business community about confidence. One way you can deal with that is to call an election and get on with it. Greenwood: Just one thing about this also, and your other business of course is as the Opposition Education Spokesman, the one thing about this is it seems slowly slowly. They are making much of the fact that more states and territories are signing up to their education reforms which they now don’t call the Gonski reforms, they call it their own education reforms. Bill Shorten today says he has finalised a deal with independent schools to provide extra funding for that area. One billion dollars will flow to Australian independent schools over six years for those that sign up. Again in this regard, is this something that perhaps many parents listening to this who send their kids to independent schools are going to perhaps be attracted by that policy? Pyne: Bill Shorten has done no such thing and you have to be very careful about what Bill Shorten says and what he does. Because let’s not forget he said he was supporting Kevin Rudd and then he supported Julia Gillard three years ago, then he said he was supporting Julia Gillard and he supported Kevin Rudd two weeks ago, so Bill Shorten has no credibility when it comes to keeping his word. Can I say with respect to what happened today is that ISCA, the Independent Schools Council of Australia has no authority to sign any agreements with the Federal Government and in fact, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia independent schools have all come out since that Bill Shorten press release and pointed out they’d signed no such agreement with the Federal Government, that the Federal Government needs to treat with each independent school individually because there is no Independent system as such, it is entirely unlike the Catholic system. So since the government changed, one state has agreed to the Gonski reforms which is Tasmania, one state does not a spring make, or to use the old expression one swallow does not a spring make. They have not got a national agreement on the Gonski model, in fact they now have six different agreements. One for New South Wales, a sweetheart deal with South Australia which meant they got more money, sweetheart deal with the ACT they got more money, Tasmania got more money and was told they could split it however they wanted to, they now have negotiations with the Catholics, negotiations with the Independents, they are far from a national system. Greenwood: Just one final thing, going back to the current politicking that’s taking place, do you still believe or does your internal polling perhaps indicate to you that despite what you see in the newspapers, despite what you see in even some of these Newspolls that have been out this week that the vast majority of those people who were disaffected in the Gillard government are still waiting for the baseball bats to come out when the polling date is finally announced. Pyne: Well there are two things I would say about that Ross. Number one, what I’ve picked up in my electorate over the last two weeks is that people are relieved that Julia Gillard is not the Prime Minister anymore and they are hoping we still won’t lose the election but they know it is a different contest. Now if they don’t want us to lose the election it means they are not voting for the Labor Party. The other thing I would say is that Tony Abbott has already dispatched Kevin Rudd once. He did such a good job on Kevin Rudd and his failures that his own party got rid of Kevin Rudd and if Kevin Rudd is so confident that he is doing so well, why is he scared to name the election date? Why doesn’t he have the election in August when it’s due? The last election was August 2010, the next election is due in August 2013. Putting it after August, he is actually trying to gain extra hours of power and Kevin Rudd should stop running scared of Tony Abbott and get on with the election. Greenwood: Christopher Pyne the Shadow Education Minister, the Manager of Opposition Business in the House of Representatives. Always good to have a chat. ENDS