E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
ABC NEWS
MONDAY, 3 MAY 2021
 
SUBJECTS: Australians in India; Morrison Government inaction on the NDIS; Minister Reynolds first official comments on NDIS; Morrison Government’s child care announcement.
 
PATRICIA KARVELAS, HOST: My next guest this afternoon is the Shadow Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and Government Services too, Bill Shorten. Welcome.
 
BILL SHORTEN, MEMBER FOR MARIBYRNONG: G'day. How are you, Patricia?
 
KARVELAS: I'm good. The Chief Medical Officer advised the Federal Government that Australia's ban on arrivals from India could result in people becoming stranded or dying in the worst case scenario. But equally, did also say that we needed to deal with this because of a potential third wave. The Federal Government immediately obviously took this action and says that it was transparent with the public. What do you think should happen now?
 
SHORTEN: Well, I think in all cases we should follow the medical advice and obviously by closing commercial flights between Australia and India, that's the right thing. But, Patricia, I just want to make clear for the record that I think that stranding our Aussies overseas, and I've said this before in other countries, but stranding Aussies in India with no means to bring them home, with no separate quarantine, which they could pay for. I think history is going to judge this period of government very poorly. I think it is cowardly.
 
KARVELAS: You think it's cowardly and – 
 
SHORTEN: Yeah. I do.
 
KARVELAS: Yeah, OK, so if you were in charge, I mean, you ran for Prime Minister. It didn't work out that way. But what would you do right now?
 
SHORTEN: Well, sixteen months ago, I'd have started building federal quarantine facilities outside the major cities. I mean, the Constitution gives quarantine power to the feds. I mean, this is not a new idea. Go back 100 years and down at Point Nepean, on the Mornington Peninsula there were quarantine facilities. Our founding drafters of the Constitution put quarantine in because coping with diseases from overseas was an issue. But I mean, the Government’s had sixteen months and all they ever do is blame the states. It's really weak.
 
KARVELAS: So, you say that it's weak. 
 
SHORTEN: Yeah, I do.
 
KARVELAS: The Government says, well, when it first started, they did the same with China. Is it the same?
 
SHORTEN: Well, what do you think?
 
KARVELAS: Well, I'm asking you.
 
SHORTEN: Well, okay, well, it's the fact - how many people have come to Australia from countries with COVID, United Kingdom and for quite a lot of the time, China. I've got no hassle with closing the borders. I support that, too. And in fact, I was saying they should do more action when Scott Morrison was still wanting to go and cheer his Sharkies on at the NRL. But the point about it is that Australians are stranded overseas, and I'm not here to judge the motives of why they're overseas. And of course, you can't just bring them back into the general community. But being an Australian citizen and in danger, don't we have an obligation? I mean, I remember a couple of decades ago when a yachtsman, his yacht overturned in the Southern Ocean, we sent a whole warship to get one guy, he wasn't even an Aussie. And so, now you've got Australians stranded. This Government puts everything in the too hard basket. It's just hopeless and weak. And I think that whilst at the moment Morrison's rhetoric may gain some favourability, in the test of time, I think this will not be viewed as Australia's finest moment.
 
KARVELAS: And what sort of impact is it having on the Indian Australian community?
 
SHORTEN: I think most of the Indian Australian community, certainly all the ones who've contacted me and I'll just speak for that, they get the closing of the borders. But I think they are shocked. I mean, I've got a dreadful, heartbreaking email from a person who's had to go over and see their father because they were dying. There were no restrictions saying you couldn't go. But they've got a family here who are doing it tough. Look, I know during COVID, a lot of us were separated from loved ones. But when you've got people in peril, just washing your hands of them like Pontius Pilate, I don't know. It doesn't feel right.
 
KARVELAS: Look, I asked Jane Hume about this in my interview with her. She said it was all based on the Biosecurity Act that Labor voted for too. 
 
SHORTEN: Sure. 
 
KARVELAS: OK, so Labor voted for a piece of legislation which allows for this to happen. It begs the question, should the legislation be changed?
 
SHORTEN: Well no, first of all - it may beg that question for you, but it doesn’t for me -  the legislation is there, but why has the Government chosen to put it up in lights now? This guy is like the David Copperfield of politics. You know, the old magician when he's pulling a trick in one spot, the magician’s magic is to get you to look somewhere else. I mean, the reality is we've got a really hopeless vaccine rollout in this country, missed all the deadlines. And what they want to do is start looking like they're tough on an issue, like, can we just talk straight? I get that we don't want to have people coming from COVID countries wandering around our cities. I really get that. I support that. I support the natural anxiety of Australians on that. But we have a bunch of Australian citizens and this Government just has put them in the too hard basket. And I think that's morally reprehensible.
 
KARVELAS: Let's move on to your portfolio. Services Australia says the department has made 724 million dollars’ worth of repayments under Robodebt obligations, which is around 96.4 per cent. Do you think that's laudable? Is that a good achievement?
 
SHORTEN: Do I think it's laudable they gave money back to people when they were never entitled to take it? No, I don't think they should have taken the money in the first place. They had no legal authority. I mean, you got to love this government and that Stuart Robert, who's, you know, he's now been promoted sideways. I mean, the fact of the matter is they’re returning money to people from whom they had no authority to take it in the first place. Do you think that's something they deserve praise for, or they should get the sack for?
 
KARVELAS: Linda Reynolds today question whether the NDIS is making people less functional over time. 
 
SHORTEN: Ugh. God.
 
KARVELAS: Well, obviously, you have a strong response to that. What do you what do you make of what she's said?
 
SHORTEN: The only thing which is harming the NDIS are the people running it. It's not the people on it. And the people running it is them. Like, what Minister Reynolds has done. And to be fair, she's still got her L plates on in the portfolio, so I've got to give a little bit of slack for that. Even though she's getting paid to run the show. The point about it is, she says they're making it less functional. What's her data? What's her evidence? And if it is the case that some of these packages are not sufficiently focused on people's participation, why is the Government cutting people's packages? I tell you what makes people less functional. It's like Liam Danher and his family up in Cairns, who had to fight for months and months and months to get a seizure mat. Liam was 23 years old, had epilepsy and autism. The three different experts said he needed a seizure mat, which meant that if he had a seizure in his sleep it could trigger an alarm and carers or family could come and rescue him. Do you know, the Government spent more money fighting his seizure mat, than it would have cost to pay for it. And the real tragedy of this horror story, Liam died of a seizure in his sleep without ever getting the mat. Now, if you want to talk about making it less functional, the people running the scheme are more interested in cutting the scheme than looking after the participants. And Minister Reynolds, I thought her presentation at Senate Estimates today was very poor form.
 
KARVELAS: What do you want to see in next week's budget when it comes to this area then? What should the Government be committing to?
 
SHORTEN: Just hands off the NDIS. Just, you know, if you want to make it more efficient, then stop some of the crooks and shysters who are fleecing participants accounts. If you want to make the Scheme more efficient, drop this mandatory, compulsory Independent Assessments, which is going to reinterview four hundred and thirty three thousand people with disabilities. And why are you asking them to prove their disability again? Like, that is horrific. That'll save 339 million dollars straight off the bat. Perhaps they should spend less money on lawyers, 17 dollars million last year fighting participants from getting things like seizure mats and instead speed up their decision making. I'd like them to see them lift the cap on permanent public servants in the NDIS instead of relying on labour hire - the labour hire people are lovely, but we need to have permanent Commonwealth officers who develop knowledge of the Scheme and of disability. So, there's some simple reforms.
 
KARVELAS: Just on another announcement that's come this weekend, and of course, the Government's preparing to deliver its federal budget next week. We're going to see these, you know, leaks or organised leaks in this case.
 
SHORTEN: Organised, very….
 
KARVELAS: Organised. They were all out.
 
SHORTEN: More leaks than the Titanic
 
KARVELAS: The government's childcare subsidy or announcement around childcare. Does it blunt your attack on the Government ahead of the next election, given Labor was putting so much focus on childcare and women's economic participation?
 
SHORTEN: No, it doesn't. But the very fact that you framed the question the way you have shows that you too have spotted what this is about. This is about the Government not wanting to be seen to be as hopeless on childcare. The reality is that Labor's scheme, which Amanda Rishworth, my Shadow Ministerial colleague has helped design, and some of it was drawn from what we took in 2019, is about providing a 90 per cent subsidy for many families. The Government's status quo is eighty five per cent. So, this is a cost of living measure, a hip pocket measure. But what the Government's done and it's again, it's like the old, you know, magician's trick. They want to look like they're doing something and rather not have you look at what Labor's really doing. I mean, if the Government was fair dinkum, they're the Government, they wouldn't be waiting till July 2022 to introduce new improvements. But secondly, and I think even more potently, which shows the superficial nature of this Government's commitment to early childhood education, is that their proposal will only benefit you if you have two children in childcare. So, you know, under this Government, you've got to have twins before you can get a benefit out of them. Labor's proposal goes to families who also have a single child in childcare. So no, as usual, the Government's doing too little, too late. It's about the politics. It's not about educating three and four year olds.
 
KARVELAS: When we talk about the time frame, and you're right about when the start will happen, it's next year it's not this year. I put that to the Minister. She said that it was based on advice from the department, that that's how long it took to implement.
 
SHORTEN: So, it's someone else's fault. I love this mob. You know, it's the fault of the people overseas. It's the fault of families for not having twins in childcare. It's the fault of the department. It's the fault of the participants in the NDIS. Just what is the point of the Morrison Government? They won the last election, as we both know. But really, what is their plan? They've had no plans except to cut and slash. They just want to be seen to do near enough is good enough. I mean, these guys are ramshackle, and we see this from childcare to NDIS to the fact that they are cowardly, abandoning thousands of people overseas.
 
KARVELAS: Bill Shorten, I'm out of time. Thanks so much for joining me. 
 
SHORTEN: Thank you. 
 
KARVELAS: That's the shadow minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and Government Services, Bill Shorten.