Transcript - Sky News Newsday with Ash Gillon - Thursday, 1 April 2021

PATRICK GORMAN MP 
SHADOW ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR WESTERN AUSTRALIA 
MEMBER FOR PERTH
 
 

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS NEWSDAY WITH ASH GILLON
THURSDAY, 1 APRIL 2021 

SUBJECTS: WA election result; State borders; vaccine roll-out. 

GILLON, HOST: For more on all things West Australian, joining me live in the studio is Labor MP Patrick Gorman. Good to see you.

PATRICK GORMAN MP, SHADOW ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR WA: Good to be here.

GILLON: I think it is worth just taking a look back at the wash-up from the WA election. As we know, it was an astounding victory by the WA Premier, Mark McGowan. But now a couple of weeks on, we're seeing all the results really in their finality. And it was an extraordinary result. When you look at that two party preferred basis, you wouldn't have ever seen anything like it.

GORMAN: I don't think I'll ever … I've never seen anything like that in my lifetime, and I don't think I'll ever see a result like that again. The size of the swings, where in some seats you saw twenty five per cent swings to first term MPs. You had Mark McGowan, who has a two party preferred vote somewhere in the mid 80s. It is spectacular. And there's obviously a lot of lessons that knowing that that won't be replicated again, that you can learn from obviously clear messaging, making sure that you have actually been a good government. I mean, that is ultimately the big lesson of this campaign was that Mark and his team led a good government and the people of Western Australia recognised that. On the other side, I just I don't think you're going to see an opposition ever concede an election like that ever again, because that was a huge strategic mistake.

GILLON: Well, the former prime minister, Tony Abbott, was in Perth last night and the local paper here, The West Australian, led with a big splash, today - Abbott spread his advice to his local team in the Liberal Party. He also did have a warning for Mark McGowan, though he warned of the temptation to become arrogant. He pointed out that Mark McGowan has said he'll also be the treasurer, as if being the premier isn't enough. We're going to return to this conversation about moment and hold tight. I'm just being told that Gladys Berejiklian is holding a media conference …

***

GILLON: A huge relief for residents in that state, the Labor MP Patrick Gorman is still with me. Patrick, thanks for sticking around through that. We heard that Gladys Berejiklian was sounding pretty relaxed about the situation in New South Wales. Queensland is looking good. Really good news out of there today. But the question is being asked, was it overkill to go into lockdown in the first place?

GORMAN: Well, of course, Queensland made this decision based on health advice. And if they hadn't done that, we would have people saying, well, are they ignoring health advice? So it's a very difficult situation for governments. The important thing is that looks like that lockdown has worked. I mean, that's great news for Queenslanders. Great news for my parents-in-law who live in Brisbane City. And great news for some sort of four million people in Queensland. It is. It's good. And they can enjoy Easter. That's encouraging to hear that. Obviously, church services can go ahead for Easter. Obviously very important for many people. And for New South Wales, it's great to seeing that we're not saying large community spread across northern New South Wales.

GILLON: The New South Wales Premier at that news conference clearly didn't want to get back into this stoush that we've seen erupt between New South Wales and Queensland governments and the Commonwealth over the vaccine rollout. The government federally keeps telling us, well, of course, they were going to be hiccups as soon as Europe stopped some of these vaccines coming into Australia, that was always going to affect the pace of the rollout here. Do you have sympathy for that position?

GORMAN: Well, it does seem like the Federal Government is backtracking on what they had previously promised the Australian people. So I don't have much sympathy in that sense because no one forced,

GILLON: The point is that it's out of their control.

GORMAN: No one forced them to make a promise of four million vaccines by March. That was something that they did as a media stunt and a photo opportunity. So the fact that they went and did that, that was entirely Scott Morrison's marketing department that pushed him in that direction. And now to sort of reverse the spin. I don't have much sympathy. And I think Australians that I'm speaking to are frustrated, saying, well, what is the actual hold up? Because what we're saying now is it's not it doesn't appear to be a problem of vaccine supply, it now appears to be a problem of vaccine delivery and logistics. And that's something that's entirely the Federal Government's responsibility. They've signed contracts with a range of consulting firms, logistics firms. They've put lots of money out the door to get this done. And if it's not working. Scott Morrison's actually got to take some responsibility. And I think if he did that, then maybe people would be more sympathetic. But until he can show some contrition and say, yes, I know I overpromised, I know I underdelivered, and actually say here is what the timetable now looks like. People are going to feel like they just kind of being run around in circles.

GILLON: Are you hoping that other state premiers, like the WA Premier, for example, Mark McGowan, lifting those borders now that Queensland's out of lockdown?

GORMAN: Well, again, just like Queensland has, Western Australia makes those decisions based on health advice. I hope that we do get to a point where we're not looking at those long locked borders. Obviously, it is a measure that's necessary at certain times. I think everyone has come to accept that. You don't have to like borders to accept that they are necessary health response. I definitely fall into that category every time they shut. I hate it, but I also accept that it's the right thing to protect the health of people. As for when they start to ease again, I hope that we start to get confidence that it is under control in Queensland. But also I think we've got acknowledge that these things go hand in hand with the vaccine rollout. Until that vaccine rollout is happening in a sense where people that, you know, in everyday life have actually got the vaccine. I've met one person in Western Australia who has had the vaccine. It is not happening at a very fast pace. Until that happens, I think we are going to see relying on these other more what would be proven measures to prevent transmission. But the vaccines are the path out of all of this.

GILLON: Yeah, we all hope that it speeds up pretty quickly. Patrick Gorman, appreciate you coming in. Thank you for your time.

ENDS