E&OE

 

JAMES GLENDAY: Now, the Shadow Treasurer, Angus Taylor, joins us from Adelaide to talk about week two on the Federal Election Campaign. Angus, good morning. 

ANGUS TAYLOR: Good morning, James. Good to be with you.

JAMES GLENDAY: Why have you backflipped on your work from home policy? 

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, we made a mistake. It's always a tough balance to get right between accountability and efficiency of any workforce, and at the same time making sure we've got flexibility. Flexibility really matters in a modern workforce. We want the public service to be the best it can possibly be. We want to make sure it's a public service that isn't bigger than it needs to be, where our great public servants are empowered to do their very best work, and getting the balance right between accountability for every dollar of taxpayer’s money is incredibly important. Their flexibility matters too in a modern workforce, and so we've adjusted this. There was a very dishonest scare campaign running from Labor, of course, that this was across the whole of the private sector workforce, which it clearly isn't what we're talking about. We're talking here about the public service.

JAMES GLENDAY: You were. Clearly though, this was coming up as a problem in your internal polling. Who in your party was telling you that this was a good idea in the first place? 
 
ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, what's a good idea is to make sure that every dollar of taxpayer’s money is being spent well, James. I think all Australians, all Australian taxpayers deserve that and want to see that. They all know in their own workplaces, this is an ongoing issue, getting this balance right between efficiency and accountability and flexibility. And it's never an easy issue. But at the end of the day, we want to see, as I say, a really great public service. I've learned over the years, you don't need to have a bigger team to have a better team, but you do need to empower people to get on and do great work. That’s what we want to see.

JAMES GLENDAY: How long is it going to take to reduce the public service by 41,000 people via natural attrition, if you're not going to actually make cuts?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, hiring freezes and natural attrition are the focus. And I've said this last week at the Press Club that that would be our focus, absolutely, and it's not frontline services, and it's Canberra-based public servants as the focus. And we've been clear about that. We've said that it will be five years. Look, it's a big public service now. It's got a lot bigger under Labor, so the natural attrition is significant numbers and that's why, over a five year period, we believe we can bring the public service down by 41,000. The important point here, James, is you don't need a bigger team to have a better team. I learnt this in the private sector. Unlike so many on the Labor side, I have deep experience in business in the private sector, and I know what it means to have a great team where great people are doing great work and are enjoying their work at the same time.

JAMES GLENDAY: This is a pretty big backdown regardless though. Are there any other policies you might jettison? Anything else you've been listening to concerns about? I mean, you've been very quiet about nuclear power lately.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well no, we're absolutely not backing down on that, I can assure you, James. We're not backing down on making sure that we drive down the price of electricity after the complete and abject failures of a government that promised a $275 reduction. And we're not backing down on our strong economic management at a time where there's so much uncertainty around the world today. We're likely to see a big reduction, over $100 billion wiped off our share market. Self-funded retirees and young Australians saving up for a deposit for a home are all going to pay the price for this, a deeply uncertain world. We need strong economic management and that will continue to be our focus.

JAMES GLENDAY: I'm just going to jump in then. So if nuclear power is a policy that you're going to keep, you're not backing down on your other things, how are you going to pay for it? Because cutting public servants has been your response, Jane Hume's response, other frontbenchers’ response to questions about how you're going to pay for your actual policies.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Yeah, but nuclear power is through to 2050 and it's substantially lower than the cost of Labor's policies.

JAMES GLENDAY: It’s hundreds of billions of dollars, no matter which way you twist it though right?
 
ANGUS TAYLOR: But that’s the energy system. The energy system, much of which is paid for by a combination of the private sector and state governments. The piece we will finance, of course, is the nuclear generators which will deliver a return. And that's how we've modeled it, James. Unlike the sorts of things Labor does, where it just throws money at things constantly, they will deliver a return. So this is good, responsible economic management, and that's what we need in a deeply uncertain world. I think we really are facing a world now where the global trade system is under serious threat. Share markets, of course, have been in free fall. There are predictions from JP Morgan and others that we're facing a US recession. Of course that is contagious and so we need a strong hand, a stable hand when it comes to economic management.

JAMES GLENDAY: Responsible economic management involves generally putting out fully costed policies. When will we see the Coalition's policy costings? It's less than two weeks, the two weeks and one day, until voters actually begin early voting.

ANGUS TAYLOR: We will put them out on the same timeline as past oppositions, including Labor. It will be before the election, I’m not going to give you the date now, James. But you'll get to see them in the detail that is customary and that will follow the normal practices. And the important point here is you will see, sneak preview, that our budget position is stronger than Labor's. You will see that strong economic management is central to everything we're doing. You'll see that, in particular, that a position where there's red ink as far as the eye can see from Labor, is not a sustainable position for a Liberal party that has always believed in strong economic management as the pathway to aspiration, prosperity, housing, small businesses, all the things that we back.

JAMES GLENDAY: I just want to take you back to this, just the work from home policy. You said you got it wrong. Are you apologizing effectively to voters?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Oh yeah, we are saying this was wrong. We've recalibrated and we will make sure that we have a public service that is effective, that is efficient, where people can be their very best. Where people can migrate from the public sector to the private sector and back over time as well. I think this is incredibly important. We want our public service to be its very best. 

JAMES GLENDAY: Alright. Just finally, Newspoll suggests you might have lost a little bit of ground. It's school holidays, or nearly school holidays in a lot of the country, and then it's Easter and it's Anzac Day. Do you have enough time to get your message through, and are the voters that you still need to win over going to be paying attention?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, I'll never obsess about the polls, James. I think what Australians are paying attention to right now is the collapse in their living standards. That's unprecedented, that's unrivaled, worse than any other developed country in the world with no pathway back to prosperity. No pathway back to the standard of living Australians had when we were last in power, until the end of the decade and beyond. And I think Australians know that they need a better way. There is a better way, beating inflation, boosting growth with investment and backing small business, fixing housing and energy. These are the policies we know alongside immediate tax relief at the bowser. These are the policies we know are essential to get this country back on track, and I firmly believe they're the right policies for Australians.

JAMES GLENDAY: Alright, we had Labor frontbencher Murray Watt rebutting a lot of those things you said earlier in the program, so I'm not going to go back through it all but Angus Taylor, we do appreciate you joining us today. 

ANGUS TAYLOR: Great to be with you, James.

ENDS