TRANSCRIPT: TV INTERVIEW - SKY NEWS - FRIDAY, 17 SEPTEMBER 2021

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS WITH LAURA JAYES
FRIDAY, 17 SEPTEMBER 2021

SUBJECTS: Vaccination rollout; drive-through vaccination hub at Belmore Oval; submarines; nuclear power.

LAURA JAYES, HOST: Tony Burke, thanks so much for your time. We're really starting to get those vaccination rates up in New South Wales, about 50 per cent double dose. This will help with any hesitancy won’t it?

TONY BURKE, SHADOW MINISTER FOR INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS: There's a real sense of hope coming out of today, Laura. There's a buzz that you can feel here in Belmore. And you know, before the gates opened today you already had a line of cars already. And the thing that's interesting about a lot of the vehicles, some are people driving themselves but you've got others where there's families there and other family members have all come in together to get vaccinated. Some people have been hesitant. Some people have been concerned about waiting rooms, and some people just haven't got around to it. Making sure that it's as convenient as this at a place that’s as familiar as the Canterbury Bulldogs just makes it that much easier for people. We're really hopeful about the impact this will have.

JAYES: Yeah, indeed. So could we even reach that 70 per cent double dose target earlier than first thought?

BURKE: At the moment Canterbury Bankstown is a bit behind. So we're desperate here. We didn't do that well on the football table this year. But we're desperate to get to the top of the table in terms of people getting vaccinated. And, there's nothing that beats hesitancy like knowing people who've been vaccinated. And that's why having it here, it's so visible, people are talking about it. And the more publicity it gets, the more conversations that happen, the more people will take out that extra layer of protection, because we want to get back to work. We want to live in a suburb where we don't have helicopters flying overhead at night, even with the curfew lifted. The helicopters are still there for some reason, waking people up at night. I don't know why. And there's been a real sense of resentment locally. And this is the community just getting together and saying, Okay, let's try to fix this ourselves.

JAYES: The curfew has been lifted, we can see the light at the end of that long tunnel. Some businesses will get back to some kind of business, looks like in mid-October. But when that happens, you know you've spoken about this community divide, the divide in a couple of months seems to be between the vaccinated and unvaccinated, which frontline businesses such as hospitality is going to have to police. What is the solution there in your view?

BURKE: I would I would like to see a situation where government provided leadership on this. Be it the prime minister or be it Paul Fletcher as arts minister. It makes it much easier for businesses, if there's some guidance given about these the sorts of rules that would be appropriate, rather than just saying our it's all up to them. Arts and entertainment, hospitality: first to be hit, there'll be the last to come out in many ways. But vaccination will give them a give them a faster path through with this. And a bit of leadership would make the world of difference and stop every individual venue from thinking they have to fight for themselves.

JAYES: Without it, you know, you're not constrained by showing leadership either. We could be in an election in, you know, six months’ time, this is still going to be an issue after the election. So what would Labor do?

BURKE: Well I think I've just made pretty clear, I don't think it's helpful at the moment to have an alternative set of rules out there that people think, oh that’s Labor’s set of rules versus the government’s set of rules. I really don't think that helps. At the moment the sense of division and confusion about rules here is like you would not believe. The number of people who are still saying they don't know when they're allowed to leave the local government area and when they're not. What's happened in the last 24 hours I cannot begin to say, the combination of confusion and frustration, where people saw two sets of people in breach of health orders. One lot at the beach where nothing was done to them. And the other lot at Rookwood cemetery, grieving for a relative, where they were arrested. And people are saying, well if both were in breach how come the people grieving at a cemetery are the ones who are in trouble?

JAYES: But the public health order is clear isn’t it? I mean, there are number limits on a funeral. We don't like them. But are you saying the confusion is because they're both outdoors?

BURKE: On the weekend you still had to wear a mask outdoors unless you were exercising. People sunbaking at the beach, not wearing masks - I don't think they were exercising. I'm yet to hear that sunbaking is a form of vigorous exercise. And you can imagine how that was already received here in the area in my part of Sydney. Add to that the fury that occurred when people started to see well, if you're breaching the health orders and breathing at the local cemetery, they're the ones that get arrested. I have no problem with the police enforcing health orders. And we want to build trust and confidence in the rules. I’m for all of that. That's exactly why I'm not offering you alternative rules Laura. But it doesn't take much to get the frustration when people see this concept that the people who are at the beach were breaking the rules and nothing happened to them. The people grieving for a relative were breaking the rules and they're the ones who got arrested.

JAYES: Alright, let me ask you about AUKUS. It is awkwardly named. But you know, we throw around the word historic a lot. This is definitely one of those times though. Does Labor offer full bipartisanship on what was announced?

BURKE: Oh, we've supported the announcement. We've been a supporter of the alliance right back to when it was first being formed with John Curtin. So the relationship with the alliance is something that Labor has its fingerprints all over the whole way through. And that initial direct engagement with the United States is something that's a really proud part of Labor history. So yes, in terms of the announcement itself. Anthony Albanese has put forward three conditions which are important, none of which breach what's been announced but which are important in terms of making sure that you don't have nuclear weapons, in making sure you're not breaching the non-proliferation treaty, and making sure that it's not being done through a domestic civil nuclear capacity. Now, all those parameters are within what's been announced. There will be other questions that will be asked, quite rightly, about how much money might have been wasted over the last eight years. There were already questions about the government's handling of the submarine project and the submarine contracts before this announcement happened. Now, it's only right and proper that we follow that through. We know that this government is not good at managing money. And we know there have been really serious examples of waste. It's right and proper that we’ll pursue that. That’s separate though to the alliance and the announcement that’s been made.

JAYES: The Greens have warned of “floating Chernobyls” out of this deal. I spoke to Simon Birmingham a short time ago and he said that essentially if we wanted to go down any kind of path of nuclear power in this country it would need to be bipartisan. Do you offer any hope on that front?

BURKE: Well, I think in terms of if you're talking about nuclear power in Australia the key problem here is the dollars don't add up. If you did it, you would be increasing people's electricity prices. And if the government wants to go down an argument where they want to increase people's power prices, then we'll have that debate with them. But people want their power prices lower. And that's why you need a combination of renewables with battery firming and community batteries. You need to make sure that you improve the transmission system, all issues that we’ve committed to, all issues which would drive down power prices.

JAYES: Okay, let's talk climate change another time. Tony Burke, thanks so much.

ENDS