Morning Doors, Parliament House

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
Doorstop – Morning Doors, Parliament House
24 March 2014

SUBJECTS: Senate by-election; South Australian State Election; Paul Howes; Speaker Bishop.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Bill Shorten was in Perth on the weekend announcing the Western Australian election campaign for the Senate and again he failed to outline to the voters of Western Australia that he in fact is voting to keep the mining tax when he is in Canberra, by claiming to be against it while he is in Perth.  He voted last week to keep the carbon tax but he wants people in Perth to believe that he is in favour of a lower standard of living or a lower cost of living for West Australian residents.

So Bill Shorten wants to have it both ways, he also wants to go to Western Australia and criticise the Liberal Party about so called education cuts when we are putting $1.2 billion more into education than Bill Shorten would have if he had been re-elected because when he was the Minister for Education he cut education spending by $1.2 billion. So on the carbon tax, Bill Shorten voted to keep it last week, if he wants Western Australian voters to believe he wants a lower cost of living, the two are not mutually capable of being delivered. He will this week continue to support the mining tax but he wants Western Australians to believe he is against the mining tax and if he had been re-elected, education would have been $1.2 billion the poorer because of a lack of support from Bill Shorten when he was the Minister for Education.

So Bill Shorten can’t have it both ways, he can’t claim to be one thing in Perth and another thing in Canberra.  We used to say he was the faceless man, he is now the many faces man, he is the two faced man, one face in Perth, one face in Canberra and I think the Australian voter particularly the Western Australian voter is awake to Bill Shorten and his inadequacies.

QUESTION:

Are you concerned about voter fatigue? Certainly Bill Shorten seemed to be concerned about that yesterday, how do you think that will affect the Liberal vote?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well I don’t know how that will affect the Liberal vote. I think that Western Australians have been to the polls quite often in the last year or so.  They had a Western Australian state election, a federal election and now a Senate by-election.  It is unprecedented, certainly not the doing of the Federal Liberal Government though.  It is the result of the Australian Electoral Commissioner losing 1300 ballots and the Electoral Commissioner has fallen on his sword so to speak because of that.  But I do hope that Western Australian voters will recognise that if they do want lower cost of living they will need to vote for a Liberal Senate candidate in order to get rid of the carbon tax, if they want to get rid of the mining tax they need to vote Liberal and if they want to have stable Government that is focussed on getting on with the job rather than the chaos that is Labor they will vote for the Liberal Party Senate candidates.

QUESTION:

Do you still have confidence in the State Director in South Australia?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well I have confidence in all of the officers of the Liberal Party, they all work extremely hard, they put many times their families on hold in order to…

QUESTION:

… the loseable election in South Australia?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well let’s not have any of this cant and hypocrisy from Labor about this South Australian state election.  The Liberals achieved 53 per cent of the two party preferred vote.  They won 51 and a half per cent of the two party preferred vote in 2010.  In the last six elections in South Australia, Labor has won the two party preferred vote only once.  Jay Weatherill’s Government is an illegitimate Government.  He presides over a Parliament where he holds on with the support of a conservative seat independent in Frome which is a seat that has always been traditionally held by the Liberal Party and Bob Such of course is in Fisher which is traditionally also a Liberal voting seat.  In both of those seats, the Liberal Party came second after the two independents and in polls published since the state election those people in those electorates have indicated they wanted a Liberal Government.  So Geoff Brock is supporting a Labor Government.  He therefore has become a Labor member.  Jay Weatherill leads an illegitimate Government.  His is a tired, third rate Government driving South Australia backwards.  And I think at the next state election in South Australia, whenever that is held, the public will cast a very serious judgement on a failed third-rate Government driving us backward. Sorry Laura?

QUESTION:

The party knew the rules.  You couldn’t even win a seat with a margin of 0.6%.  Who’s to blame? 

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

We won 53 per cent of the two party preferred vote.

QUESTION:

But not where it mattered, Mr Pyne.  Is that a problem?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

The Liberal Party won the popular vote and Jay Weatherill presides over an illegitimate Government which has never worried the Labor Party before and won’t worry them this time.

QUESTION:

But Mr Pyne, we don’t have that system.  We have a system where you have got to win the number of seats, not the amount of popular vote.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well then perhaps the Electoral Commissioner in South Australia should look at the way they are drafting the boundaries.

QUESTION:

But what Laura is saying is that you knew the rules going into the elections so what happened where you failed to win where it mattered?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

We won 53 per cent of the two party preferred vote and the Electoral Commission draws the boundaries and they drew the boundaries in a way that appears to have favoured the Labor Party.

QUESTION:

So doesn’t it show that Labor is better at negotiating with independents?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

What is shows is that the Electoral Commission in South Australia has drafted the boundaries in such a way where Labor can get 47 per cent of the vote and win the election.  That needs to be closely looked at.  And Jay Weatherill is a third-rate Government driving South Australia backwards.  It is very sad for my state and he leads an illegitimate government and he will be treated that way.

QUESTION:

Are you suggesting the Electoral Commission, there is some sort of conspiracy here to favour Labor?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Look the Electoral Commission has an Act of Parliament that requires that if 50 per cent plus one of the vote goes to one party they should win 50 per cent plus one of the seats. Now in the last six elections, Labor has won two party preferred majority once and yet been governing since 2002.  Now either the Electoral Commission have had a whoops moment on several occasions or they don’t know how to draw electoral boundaries in order to fulfil the requirements of the Act.

QUESTION:

Mr Pyne, you are blaming the umpire.  You knew the system.  You failed to win.  Aren’t you sounding like a sore loser?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

We won 53 per cent of the vote, Latika. 

QUESTION:

But you needed to win seats, not votes.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

And Labor has taken Government with support of an independent who represents a conservative seat.  He’ll have to wear that in his electorate over the coming four years.  And I would hope that the electors of Frome would cast a very serious judgement over a person who represents a conservative seat who has put Labor back into power with 47 per cent of the two party preferred vote.

QUESTION:

[inaudible]

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

I assume Paul Howes is making a play for Federal Parliament and he certainly has a lot more ideas about the future of Australia and what needs to be done about policy that the current crop of people who represent the Labor Party in Canberra. So he would be very welcome here but that is a matter for the Labor Party.  At least he recognises that you can’t simply hold on to policies that have failed in the past and ignore the election result as Bill Shorten and his team do.  They are continuing to support the carbon tax, support the mining tax, to continue to support big spending, big taxing Labor Governments and I think Paul Howes has a lot smarter ideas about the future of the Labor movement.

QUESTION:

Do you think he’s a threat to Bill Shorten?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well I think the biggest threat to Bill Shorten is Bill shorten himself but I don’t think, Paul Howes will probably get in the queue, I am sure.  But Bill Shorten’s problem is that he doesn’t understand what he stands for.  He is all tactics, and no strategy and as a consequence the public is seeing that Bill Shorten is careering one day’s stories to the next rather than putting a narrative for the Labor Party for the future and showing that the has new ideas.  He should read Graham Richadson’s column from a couple of Fridays ago which said there is no point of hanging on to failed policies that have been rejected by the Australian people.  But of course Bill Shorten is a creature of the union movement, he is a union leader supporting union leaders. He is running a protection racket for a protection racket and while he does that he won’t be able to make those decisions himself to bring the Labor Party into the modern era.

QUESTION:

Actually that’s not true.  He’s been making some very controversial statements lately and…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

You’ve had a lot of questions, Latika.

QUESTION:

And he has actually been ostracised from the Labor movement for his more controversial and what some people would say middle of the ground thoughts and policies and views…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well he should use this opportunity to fly free from the union movement and cast out in different directions.  Last question.

QUESTION:

Do you think the growing concern about Bronwyn Bishop’s conduct in Question Time is justified?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

No I don’t think it is justified at all.  In fact I don’t have any growing concern about Bronwyn Bishop as the Speaker.  I think she’s doing a terrific job, a very good job.  Unfortunately Tony Burke and Mark Dreyfus in particular are very rude to Bronwyn Bishop as Speaker.  They don’t show the respect that a Speaker deserves.  I certainly showed a great deal more respect to Anna Burke and Harry Jenkins and Peter Slipper than they show to Bronwyn Bishop.  They are trying to cause a fight with the Speaker because they want a distraction.  But Bronwyn Bishop is much smarter than the Labor movement and she won’t buy into that.  She is doing a very good job and I hope she’s there for a very long time.

QUESTION:

[inaudible]

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

I think she is doing a very good job.  If the Labor Party members weren’t quite so rude, and abrasive and deliberately trying to provoke a fight, I think that they will find they will get along much better with the Speaker.

QUESTION:

There are calls to upgrade the Navy Patrol boats early that has been run down trying to intercept asylum seekers.  Will there be money in the next few couple years for that?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

Well that should be a question you should put to David Johnston, the Minister for Defence.

QUESTION:

Just finally, do you think the Government should be doing more publicly to help Peter Breste?  His trial resumes in Egypt today.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE:

I think that’s a good question for the Foreign Minister but I am not going to stand on her ground in the same way I am not going to answer questions on behalf of David Johnston.

[ends]