Transcript - Sky News with Tom Connell - Thursday, 6 May 2021

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS NEWSDAY WITH TOM CONNELL
THURSDAY, 6 MAY 2021 

SUBJECTS: Lockdown, JobMaker, Indian travel ban

TOM CONNELL, HOST: From the Labor party, Patrick Gorman. Do you see this as an overreaction Jason?

JASON FALINSKI, LIBERAL MP: No, Tom. I think you need to have a precautionary principle here, this seems reasonable and sensible precautions to take, and hopefully by 5 pm Monday we'll be back to normal again.

CONNELL: Patrick, the premier said WA would have locked down by now, is that true?

PATRICK GORMAN, SHADOW ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR WESTERN AUSTRALIA: Well, I think that was probably a bit unnecessary. Obviously here in Western Australia we did go to lockdown recently and we've had since then some further cases, which didn't result in a lockdown. So you have to look at individual outbreaks based on the health advice you receive about the particular circumstances. That's what New South Wales has done, and I have to say, to everyone in New South Wales, I hope it is a quick period of restrictions, and I hope that are that the news is good over the next few days.

CONNELL: Was that a change of heart from Mark McGowan though, you mentioned that sort of second time and he didn't, does he realise you can't just keep locking down at one or two cases for months? That people will get sick of it?

GORMAN: I don't know what went through the Premier's head, but what I do know is that each time you have a different case you have to respond to it differently, of course in the period in which the second round of West Australian cases were found we had been on a range of restrictions, including extensive mask wearing, and that does appear to have prevented any further outbreak, even though they are people in that second round of infections were working as Uber food delivery drivers. So I think we're really fortunate in that regard and I think anything that, as I've said on this program before no one likes these restrictions. We just accept them to be necessary, and when they're not necessary, we shouldn't do them. So I think that's a good thing.

CONNELL: Guess the necessary judgement is the key one. What about what Gladys Berejiklian  had to say, Jason? Do you agree with her, would WA and Queensland have locked down in this circumstance, the missing link in particular?

FALINSKI:  It's just a fact, they would have Tom, and they have in the past and they'll do it in the future. And the disappointing thing about this is that in New South Wales, we don't have to lockdown because the government in this state made the necessary investment that allow us to continue our lives, because they have the track and tracing capability, and governments in other states decided not to make those investments and Victoria the death toll was over 800 people because of it, you know that's just a historical fact.

CONNELL: I want to ask about JobMaker, Jason. I'm interested in what the talking points are, I'm sure you'll reveal them. This was a centrepiece of the budget that's just been quietly dropped. Apparently it's just a complete flop.

FALINSKI:  Ah, well Tom, it's one of those programs that you, well firstly can I say, I don't know what's going to happen in the budget. Second thing that I would say is that's one of those programs that you want to flop and because it's a program that basically says, you know, use this program if you can't get people back into work. Now, what all the statistics are showing, what we know from both private and public sector economists, is the job market is roaring back to life, that Australia has succeeded, as I said last week, where other countries haven't even begun to fail. We have a particular moment in Australia, at this present moment, we can set ourselves up for the future, where we can make sure that we have a growing economy, a sustainable economy that will be able to support the essential services that people need to get on with their lives.

CONNELL: There you go Patrick, a good flop. What do you think?

GORMAN: I'd agree that this government is a good flop. 2019 was the 'back in black' budget, they scrapped it. 2020 was the JobMaker budget, they've scrapped it. Whatever we see from Josh Frydenberg and Scott Morrison next Tuesday night, it's going to stick around for about 3 months before they do another backflip.

CONNELL: Alright, that's pithy, I'm just going to pay that and move on, because Jason you got a good whack at WA so you can call that one all. I want to ask finally though about the prime minister, what he had to say this morning, Jason what happened?

FALINSKI: Are we happy with Tom keeping score?

CONNELL: I'm writing it down.

CONNELL: We'll see.

FALINSKI: The west never wins under Tom. 

CONNELL: I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean. The prime minister though, blaming the media for talking about the prison penalty for Australians trying to get back from India, Jason Falinski, it was in the health minister's press release, it was dropped in multiple newspapers for the Saturday edition, and it's the medias fault, is it?

GORMAN: Only if the west wins.

FALINSKI: Well, it almost inevitably always is, Tom, but fortunately you're round to set the record straight. Look, I think the point that the prime minister's trying to make here is that these penalties have been on the books for a very long time, it wasn't something that was introduced simply for the ban, the temporary pause, on people getting repatriated from India, and it all got conflated and there's been a lot of misinformation out of there. It is good that-

CONNELL: Wait, conflated?

FALINSKI: Yes.

CONNELL: The health minister chose to put it in release, it was actually, if you look at the release and go back, it's listed before the date of the flight bans and how long it's going to last for. This wasn't an accidental slip-in, the government is refusing to own it though, and blaming the media.

FALINSKI: No, we're not refusing to own it, this has been a penalty that has been in existence from the beginning of this pandemic, there's nothing new about that. But the way that it's been reported, the way it's been reported by some sections of the media, that somehow we introduced it specifically for repatriti- people who are trying to get around the Indian ban, the ban on the people from India trying  to return to Australia, that just simply wasn't true. This penalty has existed for anyone trying to get around our border control measures, to stop the spread of this virus, I mean the first responsibility of any safety.

CONNELL: You can put a hundred things in a press release, you choose what you put in it.

FALINSKI: We can go back to talking about a press release, if you'd like?

CONNELL: Well, this is why the media talks about it. I'll send you a copy.

FALINSKI: Please do, I'd appreciate it. Thank you Tom, I really appreciate it.

CONNELL:  Patrick, do you disagree with anything the government has done here, on India?

GORMAN:  Look, I disagree with the choices they've made. They had a choice to either find ways to get Australians home, and they've failed on that month after month. Or, they could choose to put out a media release saying that they'd send Australians to jail. They chose the media release to send Australians to jail rather than doing the detail policy work make sure that we get those Australians home. We always knew they were going to be second and third waves across the country. It's not, across the world I should say. It's not a surprise there have been outbreaks in countries like India, this would have been on the health advice and advice for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade for months.

FALINSKI: Well, okay, if it's no surprise-

GORMAN: And the only plan they had was a media release to send people to jail!

FALINSKI: I just love the Labor party, public policy comes down to media release, we saw how that worked under Christina Keneally. But if you knew, hang on, if you knew there was going to be a third wave, Patrick, can you tell me where the next one is going to happen?

GORMAN: Jason, I don't know where the next outbreak is going to come from.

CONNELL: Jason doesn't ask the questions. Tell you what, we'll all be in the studio next week, we're right out of time, Gladys has cost us, we'll all be in the studio next week-

GORMAN: I need a whiteboard to be able to decode all the things Jason says.

CONNELL:  For the record, Jason you're one, Patrick, you're one, I'll give myself one as well.

FALINSKI: Well I’d give you two, Tom. I’d give you two.

GORMAN:  Everyone wins on Sky News!

ENDS