Senator Dean Smith – Shadow Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury – Transcript – Interview with Gary Adshead, ABC Drive
SENATOR DEAN SMITH SHADOW ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR COMPETITION, CHARITIES AND TREASURY LIBERAL SENATOR FOR WESTERN AUSTRALIA TRANSCRIPT – INTERVIEW WITH GARY ADSHEAD TOPICS: Greens salmon stunt, Federal Budget, Budget in Reply, North West Shelf approval delay. E&OE GARY ADSHEAD: It’s a perfect way to bring in my next guests, who are of course Madeleine King, the Federal Resources Minister, and WA Liberal Senator Dean Smith. And no doubt he, probably, hopefully he got to see this with his own eyes. [RECORDING] SENATE PRESIDENT Senator Hanson-Young, second supplementary. [RECORDING] SARAH HANSON-YOUNG Thank you. The Australian Conservation Foundation, the Australian Marine Conservation Society, WWF, the Australia Institute. They’ve all condemned these laws. That’s right. On the eve of the election, you have sold out your environment credentials for a rotten stinking extinction salmon. [RECORDING] SENATE PRESIDENT Senator Hanson-Young, remove the prop from the chamber. Senator Hanson-Young, you’re not in a debate with me, it’s a prop. It’s a prop. Remove it from the chamber. GARY ADSHEAD: It was actually a dead fish. And Madeleine King, the Federal Minister for Resources, and WA Liberal Senator Dean Smith join me now. How are you both? MADELEINE KING: Well, I’m very distant from any salmon, I’d have to say Gary. I was not there. I’ve seen the footage. The magic of the Senate. DEAN SMITH: I’m very well as well this afternoon Gary, great to be on the show. I was in the Senate Chamber. I did see the salmon. It was wrapped in plastic, so we couldn’t smell it, but we could definitely see it. I think it sort of exposed the fact that the Australian Greens aren’t very good at debating the issues, that they have to bring props into the Senate. GARY ADSHEAD: Well I did ask the Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Miles, whether he’d ever seen a fish in Parliament, of any houses, and he categorically said no. Is that the first time you’ve ever seen a fish in the, in the Senate, Dean Smith? DEAN SMITH: Actually it’s interesting you say that Gary, because before I came to the Senate there was some…this may not be the first fish incident. Let me go away and do some Senatorial homework for you. You know that I’m a bit of a Senate nerd. Let’s just see whether this was the first fish incident or whether there have been others. GARY ADSHEAD: Okay, well I look forward to that update. Of course, we do know about some coal being taken into Parliament down in the lower house at one point. So that’s well and truly documented. Okay, on with it then. We, we did just have a Federal Budget of course, last night. So Dean Smith, I’ll start with you on this. Clearly Angus Taylor and Peter Dutton have described the tax cut that’s been offered by the Albanese Government as a hoax, a cruel hoax. So if that’s a cruel hoax, what tax cuts are you going to give? DEAN SMITH: We’re voting on the tax cut bill tonight in the Senate. That’s the plan and we’ll be opposing it. I think the Coalition in the Senate might try to rename the tax cut bill to the 70 cents a day paid sometime next year bill, because it is a cruel hoax. Because the Budget in its entirety is really an election Budget. There’s no doubt about that. Jim Chalmers and Anthony Albanese have taken a decision to try and bribe Australian voters with just 70 cents a day, paid sometime next year. I spoke in the Senate this afternoon, Gary, when you read more deeply into the Budget papers, it’s quite revealing because while it might be a Budget for the election, it’s certainly not a Budget for the future of this country. Those Budget papers that were released last night by Jim Chalmers show that the gross debt for this country will tip over $1 trillion for the very first time. It shows also that the plan to put the Budget in balance, which was to happen over the next decade, is now into the never never. Alarmingly it shows an 8.7% increase in government expenditure to $731 billion. And for the first time in 40 years, the first time in 40 years, government spending is going to tip over the 27% of GDP mark. So yes, it’s a Budget for the 5th, for the 3rd of May, the 10th of May, the 17th of May. Madeleine might be able to enlighten us on that during the show. But it’s certainly not a Budget for the future. And if Australians are voting for the future, then they can’t vote Labor, they have to put Labor last. GARY ADSHEAD: So yeah, well if it is small fry, then it’s not much of a bribe according to what you just said then, Dean Smith. But Madeleine King, if it’s so small fry, was it worth the $17 billion extra going into the deficit? MADELEINE KING: Well, Gary, I’ll just start by saying it’s, it’s interesting to see the, the Coalition now following the lead of the Greens in undertaking a stunt this time just maybe not a fish, but it will go down like a, like a maybe a dead cat DEAN SMITH: That was a rhetorical flourish. There is no Coalition plan to rename the legislation. Just to get ahead of this before we get back into the Senate. MADELEINE KING: But anyway, that’s what happens in the Coalition and of course they’ve voted against a series of tax cuts because they don’t want to deliver any tax relief for Australians. And you know, the, the Coalition has scoffed at these latest tax cuts, but what I know when talking to people in my community in Rockingham and Kwinana is every little bit helps. So this tax cut announced last night, on top of the tax cuts of the previous Budgets, are about for every Western Australian, on average,…