TRANSCRIPT: TV INTERVIEW - SYDNEY - THURSDAY, 25 JUNE 2020

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS WITH KIERAN GILBERT
THURSDAY, 25 JUNE 2020

SUBJECTS: Qantas; arts support package; Guy Sebastian; Eden-Monaro by-election; Ruby Princess.

TONY BURKE: Well I put it in the reverse I've gotta say Kieran. It's not a case of what Qantas should have done, it's a case of what the government should have done. Qantas is not the only business that makes decisions based on a financial year. The financial year date that every business is focused on is the 30th of June. Scott Morrison is focused on the by-election date, and business would be given certainty if the government was willing to release the report that they have in their hands now. And businesses are being forced to make decisions for the next financial year without having information available to them that Scott Morrison has available to him. So this is really a case where you need to put the national interest ahead of political games. Scott Morrison has the report of the review into JobKeeper. He should release it. He shouldn't be playing a game of delaying it until after the by-election. It will save jobs if businesses have certainty, but the one rule we know for business is the worst situation for businesses if they have to make decisions and they just don't know. I'd be surprised if these are the only lay-offs that we see in the coming days. But if we want business to be able to act with a bit of confidence, the government simply has to release a report and make clear what's happening to JobKeeper. Because it is hard to believe that they’re simply going to allow JobKeeper to fall off a cliff at the end of September. If that is what they're planning to do then they should be upfront about it.
 
KIERAN GILBERT, HOST: It certainly doesn't look like that's the case. From what the prime minister was saying earlier today that industries like this will be supported, he seemed to suggest that that was the message to Alan Joyce too last night. I guess isn't it the sad reality that because our international borders are shut for the foreseeable future, so much of the Qantas fleet grounded, that some job losses were inevitable. Isn't that just the sad reality of the situation?
 
BURKE: I think you have to look at this crisis different Kieran to other crises, in that normally the businesses that take a hit during an international or domestic downturn are the businesses that were either too highly leveraged or in trouble in some way already. What happens during this crisis is the businesses that take the biggest hit are the businesses that have been actively shut down because of the decision of government. Now that causes you to handle things a bit differently, because what you're wanting to make sure of is that on the other side when restrictions are lifted again, that you've got the capacity for those businesses, with aviation I guess, literally to take off again. Now if you leave business without certainty, and you leave them having to make these sorts of decisions while the government's keeping documents secret, you only jeopardise the capacity for them to be able to get the workforce that they need when restrictions are eventually lifted. There is a real economic consequence to the game that the government's playing.
 
GILBERT: Do you believe that the 6000 jobs cut announced today by Alan Joyce would have been saved if the government had moved more quickly to provide clarity on JobKeeper?
 
BURKE: Oh that's unknowable. But what I do know is that any business that’s deciding, do they keep people on or do they let them go, they're more likely to let people go if there's uncertainty. Every extra layer of uncertainty puts people's jobs at risk. And there is one level of certainty that is 100 per cent in the hands of Scott Morrison, and that's whether or not he releases a report on the future of JobKeeper. There are some businesses, and I've heard the prime minister say this, there are some businesses that are only being kept afloat because of JobKeeper but there are other businesses that will be completely viable once restrictions are lifted. And JobKeeper determines whether or not those businesses will be part of the Australian economy, and whether or not their skilled workforce will be available to them.
 
GILBERT: And would you hope that the state leaders do start to ease the interstate borders now, the restrictions like WA, Tasmania, Queensland, because of this imperative to get into industries like aviation back up and going despite what we've seen of this hiccup in Melbourne recently.
 
BURKE: I don't want there to be not just interstate restrictions, I don't want any of the restrictions to be there one day longer than is required for health reasons, not one day longer than is required for health reasons. The Victorian circumstance shows us how quickly this virus can not just creep back up but storm back, as we've seen in Victoria. So we have an economic crisis because we have a health crisis. So you can’t in the name of the economy makes the health crisis worse. But certainly I don't want the restrictions to be in place one day longer than is required to keep people safe and healthy.

GILBERT: One of the industries, you're the Shadow Arts Minister, former arts minister yourself, and obviously one which is heavily reliant on tourism, international and interstate as well. Today the Government's announced its support package. It seems like it's been widely well received by the industry hasn't it?
 
BURKE: I'm really pleased the Government has acknowledged that there was a need for an arts and entertainment sector package. For more than 100 days now I've been arguing for one. And up until today the government's been arguing that Labor was wrong. So I'm glad that they've made that acknowledgement, and there are some businesses that will be helped significantly from what's been announced today. There are some areas where it will clearly fall short. There's a problem for venues and certainly the industry, if we start to lose venues then the industry looks very different on the other side of this. And there's also, it's pretty hard for anyone in the visual arts sector to access this particular package. But the big gap that we're continuing to advocate for, is what happens to the workforce? So the moment the government designed JobKeeper – and this was another one that we've been arguing for a wage subsidy and the government had been ridiculing us, saying no you don't need to do anything like that, we were pleased when they got there. But the way they designed it, they effectively drew a fence around people in the arts and entertainment sector. So if you think about it, you know if you're a road crew for gigs, unloading the trucks and setting up stage, you work gig to gig, event to event, festival to festival, you've got a different employer each time. And so these individuals get employed either as short-term casuals or as freelancers or short-term contracts. So once the rule was set in place to be eligible for JobKeeper you had to be with the same employer for more than 12 months as a casual they all got knocked out. Today's announcement, they're still knocked out. Today's announcement, it's not until social distancing restrictions get lifted and the major events start to happen before those individuals get work again. So while I'm pleased for a large number of businesses that they've made the steps they've made today – I'm not sure how the loans part of it will work because a lot of these companies can't afford to carry extra debt – but I'm pleased with the acknowledgment, I'm pleased what's been put in place for the businesses. But the workforce – every worker who's been left behind for the last hundred days, they're still left behind today.

GILBERT: And is it fair to say for large parts of the industry that this is going to need to be a semi-permanent support package, because until there's a vaccine how does this industry get up and going again, particularly live performances?

BURKE: It depends on the nature of performance. So smaller venues it's obviously easier. Even during this time I've managed to get myself to one gig at a local place where they had separate tables, social distancing. For theatre where it's fixed seating that becomes a little bit easier. The large-scale festivals where you just move stage to stage, they're really hard. So one of the things I've been asking for, and the prime minister made some noises today that he may go down this path, which if he does it's good – I've been arguing when they came up with the three stages for the rest of the economy, they effectively need to give those a parallel set of stages for what the different stages of relaxation of social distancing will be like for live performance. And that will really help industry to plan. So whether masks have to be involved, what has to happen, whether we just keep a record of where everybody was sitting so that it's easier, whether we change what happens in foyers in intervals. There's different things that can be worked through but if that information is worked through with industry then they can plan and certainly some parts of it we'll be able to get back on their feet sooner than others.

GILBERT: Guy Sebastian, the popular singer, has copped a bit of flak it seems on social media for standing alongside the Prime Minister, that seems a bit unfair.

BURKE: Yeah look I'm a bit forgiving of this one. I know some of the some people on social media have piled on a bit – but I can understand how desperate this industry has become. For 100 days the industry was just shouting and screaming for help, and being not only ignored by the Prime Minister, being ignored by their own minister. The Minister for the Arts Paul Fletcher was writing articles basically saying you don't realise how good you've got it, here’s all the support we're allegedly providing for you. To artists, performers, road crew, who weren't receiving a dollar. So I can understand after neglect for that long artists feeling desperate enough that someone like Guy Sebastian says, look if it helps get the prime minister over the line I’ll turn up to the media conference. And I wish it hadn't come to that, but if that's what artists have to do to get the prime minister over the line then let's hope the next announcement he makes doesn't just extend itself to the businesses, it extends itself to the workforce as well.

GILBERT: A couple of quick ones before you go. Eden-Monaro, Saturday week. Anthony Albanese's first electoral test as leader. Are you optimistic of holding onto the seat. you think you will?

BURKE: Yeah I think the way Andrew Clennell called it just before I came on was spot on. This is hard. It's a hard by-election. It's difficult for people to get their normal gauge of what's happening because of the way we've got social distancing at the moment. Certainly, we couldn't have a better candidate than Kristy McBain. And Anthony Albanese has been out there campaigning, and making clear day after day that this is a chance to send a message to the government that the response during the bushfires wasn't good enough. That the people who've been left behind on JobKeeper, that shouldn't have happened. Even when they make an announcement like today we can go straight away to hang on they're still leaving other people behind and we want to get through this crisis as a together Australian community. That's the whole objective. So there's a message that certainly people in the community want to send. It's an opportunity for them to send that message loudly and clearly I hope they do.

GILBERT: And finally, given the spike in cases in Victoria that we touched on earlier, can you see why there's there is renewed scrutiny on the handling of this crisis by the Andrews Government and suggestions that it's fallen short?
 
BURKE: I think when ever you get any uptick in the numbers then then there's scrutiny and that's reasonable that there'd be scrutiny. We've never had any uptick anywhere in the country that was like what happened when the Ruby Princess was unloaded, and I'm still astonished that Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton seem to think that they did nothing wrong.

GILBERT: Tony Burke we're out of time, we’ll talk to you soon.

BURKE: Great to talk to you Kieran.
 
ENDS