Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister
GREG JENNETT, HOST: Why don’t we introduce now our political panel, and we’re delighted to say we have two West Australian guests today, Labor Frontbencher and Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister, Patrick Gorman is here. Welcome back, Patrick. And Liberal Senator Linda Reynolds joins us here in the studio. Welcome to you too, Linda. The legacy question; Patrick Gorman to you. First of all – what is it? Is it the pandemic which was obviously reflected on by the Prime Minister and most other commentators in what are we saying the last hour or so?
PATRICK GORMAN, ASSISTANT MINISTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER: Look, Greg, if I can be honest with you and your viewers first, I am still in shock. Mark has been such a phenomenal leader of our state. He was a friend of mine before he was Premier, he’ll be a friend of mine for many years to come. But this is a big day for Western Australia and if I think about what that legacy is, I think about where he’s taking our state from and to. When he came to office, we had one of the highest rates of unemployment, we had growing debt and we had an infrastructure programme that had really kind of run out of steam. And so he’s transformed the state with Metronet. He’s set us as West Australia on the path to a renewable energy future, in terms of the big plans they put out there. He did have an incredible role of leadership during COVID where he stood up for what was right and he stood up for what he believed in. I think your viewers will remember him standing up from time to time against Clive Palmer and many others and he just showed others how to do the job of being a great Premier, standing up for your state. I’ve enjoyed campaigning alongside him for many years and I’m sure every now and then he’ll still maybe come out and hand out how to votes for me.
JENNETT: Well, I’m sure he’ll appreciate those remarks. I might get some further thoughts from you on what might actually lie ahead for Mark McGowan in the future. But he did all of that, didn’t he – Linda, would you acknowledge – to devastating effect politically? I don’t know whether you want to start on where the Liberal Party is at. I was hoping to get there in a few moments, but maybe the same question, an open one about legacy. What do you acknowledge?
LINDA REYNOLDS, SENATOR FOR WESTERN AUSTRALIA: Well, first of all, I wish him well as a Cabinet Minister with key responsibilities for COVID. I noticed how tough that period was for all politicians, federal and state, so I do wish him well. It is a bit of a surprise, but I think what today will mark is a fundamental transformation in the politics in Western Australia. Because we will go from the politics of the single person, the cult of the personality, which has really sucked the oxygen out of the political debate in Western Australia, because it has been all about one man.
JENNETT: That’s quite the compliment to Mark McGowan.
REYNOLDS: Well, it might be a compliment to him being a great politician, but it’s come at the great detriment to the State of Western Australia. So, you asked me about the WA Liberals. The party has been slowly rebuilding. We’ve got under the great leadership of our new president, Caroline di Russo, with Libby Mettam, who is absolutely doing a magnificent job of focussing on the issues that matter. And there is not a single social indicator of which the State Government is responsible for, whether it’s public housing, health, education, policing, juvenile justice, roads. There is not a single indicator that he has left things better in six years than he inherited it. So, Patrick was certainly gilding the lily, because Metronet has not delivered a single train yet. The only one that has is the one that we started. So, it’s over time, over budget and now will be an opportunity for both parties to really focus on the issues that matter in Western Australia.
JENNETT: Let’s not slug it out over each and every debating point around the legacy. But if I can zero in, Patrick, on the pandemic as an Eastern State person at the time, it seemed hardline and resolute, but he absolutely tapped into the mentality of West Australians at that time. That’s never to be repeated, though, by his successor, whoever that might be, is it? Because those circumstances were so unique at the last election?
GORMAN: Well, those circumstances during the COVID Pandemic were unique. We backed in Prime Minister Morrison when he chose to close the international border. I mean, people had to make very difficult decisions and some of them were not popular at the time and some of them have had some foreseeable and some unforeseeable consequences for the long run. But I think the people of Western Australia backed what Mark McGowan chose to do. The decisions him and his Cabinet made. I do think one of the legacies he leaves, amongst many others, is a very solid Cabinet, some really talented Ministers and the biggest ever backbench that’s ever been seen by a political party in Western Australia. So, there’s a lot of talent there and that gives me great optimism for the state’s future, that actually there’s a good, diverse team who can handle whatever the next challenge is. Because, you know, in politics that there’s always another challenge coming at you and so often it’s about how you respond rather than how you necessarily anticipate. And COVID is a good example.
JENNETT: And, Linda, you’ve already sketched out what you think the road back might look like for West Australian Liberals. But just on that pandemic question, the numbers speak for themselves, don’t they? The numbers in the Parliament, the numbers that voters flocked to Labor with at the last election. There were some fundamentally rum calls made by the Libs there – gifted government to him.
REYNOLDS: Look, there is no question that the combination of having a single, emperor-type, other people have described him as a leader, but also with us not having our act together. We were far too focussed on ourselves and we didn’t provide the viable alternative that we should have. But as I’ve said, we’ve learned from that. We’ve had reviews, we’ve made constitutional change and we are fundamentally reforming our party so that we can support Libby Mettam and really hold this terrible government to account because there is not a single social factor and metric that this McGowan Government has delivered, not one.
JENNETT: All right, those numbers, the metrics that I’m referring to, by the way, for those who don’t follow WA State politics, 53 Labor MPs in the lower house in Western Australia, four Nats and two Libs. So, that is one metric of his success. Heir apparent and replacement process, how does that work, Patrick Gorman?
GORMAN: Well, I’ll be respectful of my State Parliamentary Labor colleagues and is a decision for them in terms of who should choose to nominate. We’re really proud here in terms of the processes that we have in the Federal Caucus, which were initiated more than a decade ago when Anthony Albanese was Deputy Prime Minister, which is to make sure that it’s both the caucus and the members who have a say. And that was adopted under Mark McGowan’s leadership for the West Australian branch as well. So, it’s a decision of both. If there’s a choice between some of those very talented Ministers, depending on who puts their hand up, and that’s a matter I’ll leave to them. But if there’s a choice, it’s a choice of both the caucus members of the state party and the party members.
JENNETT: In equal weighting? How does that work?
GORMAN: Fifty-fifty. And that’s what people expect today. It’s to give a good, strong mandate to whoever should take on that role and to make sure that there’s a diversity of voices in terms of who should choose that leader. But again, we’re getting probably a little bit ahead of ourselves. We’ll see who puts their hand up. I think anyone who does; one of the first things I’ll say is acknowledge the huge shoes there are to fill. But again, I’m confident that it’s a great team. I’ve worked with so many of them closely over the years. I’m the former State Secretary of the WA Labor Party. I know them well. It’s a great team and I think Mark has left the talents in the WA Labor Party in such a good position for what is an inevitable leadership transition. These things happen at some point.
JENNETT: They do. And you wonder what sort of planning went on behind the scenes because it was so shocking to so many. Linda, final process, you’d have to imagine, based on what Pat’s just outlined there, that there’d be Labor people working towards a smooth, uncontested transition, wouldn’t you?
REYNOLDS: Well, I’d imagine so, and I hope so for Western Australia that’s the case. But I’d just like to pick up Pat’s point that they’re a nice team. Well, they might be a nice team and a large team, as you pointed out. But after six years, they’ve left the state socially in a complete mess. So, the problem of having the politics of a single leader means that he’s left a void because there is not a single obvious successor and there is not a single member of the frontbench who hasn’t made their portfolio worse in terms of housing. Housing outcomes, policing have gone backwards, ramping. So, every single social metric and I noticed Pat wasn’t able to identify a single metric. They’ve got a large surplus, but what have they done with it?
JENNETT: All right, well, the members will make a decision on that before too long, I imagine. Why don’t we move on to the Voice? And Patrick Gorman, the Race Discrimination Commissioner, Chin Tan, has made a public appeal to keep race out of the unfolding debate on the Indigenous Voice to Parliament. To whom do you think he was speaking, while not naming any individual?
GORMAN: Well, I think we can all take a little bit of guidance from those remarks, which is that this is about recognition of the First Peoples of this country. It is about the unique relationship that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have with this land we now call Australia. And it’s about constitutional recognition and it’s about giving those people a Voice to Parliament, recognising that unique circumstance of 65,000 years of continuous culture. Now, I do think, though, that if I imagine what was in the back of the minds of the delegates to the Uluru Dialogue, they probably knew that doing constitutional recognition would not be an easy path, but it was the path we had to take.
JENNETT: Yeah. And do you think, Linda, that might have been an embedded reference there from Chin Tan to Peter Dutton, having made that speech in the Parliament last week about re-racialising the country?
REYNOLDS: Well, I certainly hope not, because it is so important that we keep this debate civil. And ultimately this is not just about constitutional recognition. And I think Patrick has highlighted that the Government are conflating constitutional recognition. And if they were really serious about constitutional recognition, like in 1967, you can have two questions, although in ’67 they were different issues, but still, do you agree with constitutional recognition in Section 51, yes or no? I think that would get through in a canter, bit like the 90% in 1967.
JENNETT: But that’s not the question.
REYNOLDS: No. And that is how the Government is ultimately, I think, letting Australians down, because if they asked about constitutional recognition, it would have strong support. But by saying it has to be through this particular constitutional recognition of a Voice –
GORMAN: – can I just? I have to correct Linda here.
REYNOLDS: No. Constitutional recognition through this particular type of Voice, I think, is wrong because people should have the choice on both questions because there are more than one model to have a Voice.
JENNETT: On tone, and I will give Pat a right of reply in a moment, but are you worried personally about the tone? Where it begins at, let alone where it ends by October or November?
REYNOLDS: Well, ultimately, I respect the Racial Discrimination Commissioner and he’s got a right, obviously, to talk about this issue, but ultimately, we are talking about a race-based provision in our Constitution. My personal preference would be to get rid of any reference to race in our Constitution while having a constitutional recognition of our First People, but not having specific race-based rights. And Australia is not a racist country. Of course, we have a small pocket of racists, but you can see through the debates in the Senate pretty much every day between our Indigenous Senators that there is division, there is great division in the Indigenous community in this country, which is causing dissent. It is. And it’s a shame because it’s a lack of leadership by the Prime Minister that he’s forced this debate on our nation instead of having a constitutional convention.
JENNETT: All right, Patrick Gorman, I know you want to pick up on a couple of those points.
GORMAN: Let’s just stay fact-based. Facts are that survey after survey shows that majority of Indigenous Australians support constitutional recognition through a Voice. The fact is that our Constitution already has provisions in it that relate to race in sections 25 and 51. The fact is that this is not about race in recognition, it is about recognising the unique position of the First Nations of this country we now call Australia. And the fact is that this is not, as Linda has just tried to suggest, a Government proposal. We have simply picked up the proposal from the Uluru Statement from the Heart, which was not delivered to Prime Minister Albanese and his Government. It was delivered to Prime Minister Turnbull. And that request that was given to Prime Minister Turnbull was for a constitutionally-enshrined Voice to Parliament. There was five years that that statement sat on the desk of former Liberal Prime Ministers who did nothing about it. We are simply responding to that request. And that request was to give the Australian people a chance to have a say, and I’m going to do that.
REYNOLDS: Have you been to the Kimberley recently and talked to Indigenous communities? I have, just over a week ago. And only one person in a week, I was up there with Jacqui Lambie and some other Senators. And the entrenched disadvantage is palpable. And the clear message from everybody is nobody is listening to us. We know what we need from the state Government, we know how to get in the Fitzroy Valley what we need.
JENNETT: And none said the national Voice would be the answer?
REYNOLDS: No. Only one elder raised it with us and said, ‘I support it because Pat Dodson told me it was important, because people are saying they’re not listening to us now.’ NIAA this week in Estimates were saying, ‘oh, yes, we’ve done this fantastic job in the Kimberley from Canberra, from Perth and from Broome,’ and they couldn’t even tell us how much money is being spent in Indigenous communities for disaster relief. So, the Voice, rebadging the NIAA into a Voice is not going to make any difference to the lives of Aboriginals in Western Australia and particularly in disadvantaged communities. And they know it.
JENNETT: Well, this is a fact-based debate that I suppose we’ll try and conduct and conduct civilly as we can on this programme. And no doubt we’ll be returning to questions of tone and divisiveness as the months unfold, but we’re going to wrap it up there. Patrick Gorman and Linda Reynolds, thanks for your extensive thoughts on a momentous day, really, for your home state of Western Australia with Mark McGowan’s departure.
